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Another area we disagree. The longer we wait, the weaker we will be for the actual fight. As our weak governance racks up increasingly absurd debt, the pressure to divert military spending to welfare programs will only grow. The longer we wait, the fewer war fighting experts we will have coupled with less and less modern military equipment to fight with. I still think we win based on geography and natural resources, but it'll cost more lives and treasure to wait. Whether or not there is a nuclear exchange, which is not nearly as certain as you propose, does not change the calculus. Will be we better capable of fighting Russia today, or after another 10-20 years of peaceful decline? I'll be honest. I don't care about you. Or me. I want what is best for my kids. I am not interested in adding WWIII to the list of hardships we are pushing off to the future. Appeasement does not work. History is clear on this point, and that's exactly what you are proposing.

I think you may be correct here, eventually. But starting the war that will result in a nuclear exchange just to get it over with is dumb. Next after Ukraine is Moldova, also a non NATO country. Which means the rest of us have two countries to figure out what is actually required. Which means we have a chance to avoid a nuclear war. All of this is how the cold war was fought. The various proxy wars, two segregated economic spheres, etc. The cold war won't look the same the second time around (Putin also learned from glasnost and perestroika) but first step is understanding what is actually happening. Most American pundits are still stuck in main character syndrome, they only disagree on whether it's a hero or anti-hero story. I don't disagree with your primary thought, just the best way to fight this.

I’ll answer: We let it fall. We have no treaty obligations, and although I’m opposed to Russian aggression I do not believe WW3 is the best option for our interests. If they start some shit with a NATO ally then fights on.

So, I'm glad you are at least honest about this. Thank you. The reason I am against allowing Ukraine to be taken, under your logic, is because I believe that *if* they truly want to take Ukraine, they will not stop at non-NATO countries. Wouldn't make much sense strategically. We're better off just starting the damn war now if that's the case. Unless of course the plan is to let them weaken their military by taking Ukraine and Moldova, at which point we immediately go in an crush them. But I'm positive that's not the plan. And to be clear, my primary reason for supporting Ukraine hasn't changed. Sovereignty matters, and a stable world order is not possible if it is not enforced. And here we are. I agree, the right answer is money and equipment, which we are somehow screwing up. And if we are willing to fund the perpetual Ukrainian insurgency, maybe it stays that way after Kiev falls. But it seems like Republicans have forgotten why the world needs police, and why it's better to be the ones in charge.

Really thin on specifics, but seems to be vaguely in line with the 353 drama https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2024/04/highly-toxic-lethal-command-culture-kadena-air-base/ Sent from my SM-G781U1 using Tapatalk

Was discussing this topic with a coworker; flabbergasted that Biden is still a viable contender for reelection following this once in a century type of failure/embarrassment. He keenly pointed out that most Americans do not give a shit about what happened in Afghanistan one way or another; much like they couldn’t care less about what happens in Ukraine. We obviously care about it on this board but we are not a representation of the general populace. The election will come down to the economy, border, and social issues.

Fixed it for you my man!

True. The Navy/Marine peeps on Airwarriors are so much happier for whatever reason.

At the end of the day, yes. They aren't NATO. This was always about making Russia bleed to take Ukraine, and destroy as much of their shit as possible in the process. This is the spark that will re-arm Europe, and the wall will go back up. This war will be fought economically. Hopefully. I really really hope. Because all the politicians are in fact stupid children. EDIT: Just to clarify, I'm saying sending western troops to fight for Ukraine is dumb. Sending more money/equipment is par for the course. Also Moldovia is fucked too.

The current "AI" iterations are not AGI, however they are closer to functioning like a human brain than we have ever gotten before. The irony here is that we didn't accomplish this by figuring out how the brain works, quite the opposite, we created an array of associations that is as mysterious to us as the individual neural pathways of a human brain is. We know that the brain has a combination of biologically-arranged pathways (e.g. for walking, breathing, visual identification of faces, eye position, etc.) and experience-formed pathways (math, music, flying a plane). Right now the AI models crunch tons of mostly-unfiltered data into a model that we do not have the ability to directly adjust because of the sheer volume of parameters, then an overlay is used to do things like prevent swearing, giving directions for bomb making, etc. But this is in it's infancy. Once you can pre-program certain behaviors into the actual model, then leave the rest of the model to continuously adapt the weights based on new data, we will take another big step to AGI. But since we have precisely 0% knowledge on what is or what causes consciousness, it is entirely possible that we reach a point where AGI is achieved simply by running the models with enough horsepower that we stumble into the solution. That is, incidentally, remarkably similar to how evolution works. Are humans the only animals that are conscious? What about dolphins, octopi, crows, or chimps? If not, does that mean there is no intelligence other than human intelligence? That seems like an arbitrary definition. Where is the line, and how smart does a computer need to be before it is considered intelligent? Smarter than all humans, or just smarter than any human? Do people born with Down Syndrome have consciousness? What if an AI surpasses the intellectual ability of someone with DS? Calling even the current models an "abacus" is like calling the human brain a glutamate sensor. Sure, it's kind of true, but it's the scale of the apparatus that makes it interesting.

What? There are ten parked on our ramp right now. ESSS has been around since the 80s and was a pretty standard phenomenon. You didn’t see it in COIN Iraq/Stan because of either the weight penalty, the lack of requirement due to availability of FARPs, or some combination there of. In the 90s it was pretty much normal, same as Apaches flying with a single tank inboard. Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

You want at least 2 drives for redundancy. Tons of 2-bay options. No need for separate systems. Backup and storage are mostly-idle processes, so adding security recording won't tax the system. If you start running multiple services that simultaneously access the hard drives, that's where you start getting into more advanced requirements.

I will start by saying that I hate that news outlets are using the term "Russian friendly Republicans." I do not believe the Republicans against this funding are necessarily Russian friendly. I do however believe they are idiots. Not a single one of them seems willing to answer a simple question. What do we do if Russia marches on Kiev? The argument before was that Russia was just taking historically Russian territory in East Ukraine with a majority Russian population. But now that Russia is advancing, and making some moves towards Kiev, he's the new position that Russia should be allowed to annex the entire country? We have a group of phenomenally stupid legislators on both sides, and it now appears increasingly likely that we are in fact going to go to war. Would have been cheaper to just send them the money.

Neither. Intelligence requires consciousness. It's nonsensical to call an abacus conscious.

Any FedEX guys know when the iPad (10) lanyards are getting ordered? I’d like one.

If you think Tommy Tuberville will make that decision, we really are fucked. And hearing a high ranking GO actually be honest about costs, troop numbers, etc is a nice departure from the Afghanistan hearings.

He's saying his data is from young Army troops who were probably snorting it. Done many a charlie round up to FOB/COPs picking up joes who overdosed on a myriad of everyday supplements.

Army straight pays their folks for them. This is dumb.

Awards/medals are embarrassing compared to the days of old. Even bronze stars and to some extent, DFCs, are handed out for simple baseline-doing-your-job. Everyone gets a trophy for just breathing and doing average shit. Ridiculous.

I just learned today that our President's uncle was a pilot. And he was eaten by cannibals. Yuck! And it reminds him of Trump. Double Yuck! https://x.com/Breaking911/status/1780666424513470596

Indeed. In their defense, I've seen hundreds if not thousands of Blackhawks flying around stateside/OCONUS/deployed and I don't think I've ever seen one with tanks. Obviously a gaping hole in the pre-deployment study plan, but without intel or someone telling them they have that capability, I don't think a fighter pilot would just guess that a Blackhawk has that ability.

It's been decided. Ukraine is failing. We're going to war. General Christopher G. Cavoli is the CC of the European Command and the NATO Supreme Allied Commander. Here are some of his remarks at the Senate Armed Services Committee Hearing. Tuberbille: "It's obvious to me just being in all these meetings uh and hearings not just you of other people we're getting ready to go to war with Russia uh have we got a game plan for that for how many people we're going to need on the ground young men and women from uh United States when this war starts?" Cavoli: "Sir, we have standing operational plans um around the globe for a variety of problems." Tuberbille: "How many do you think it's going to take for us to beat Russia? Because Ukraine can't beat Russia." Cavoli: "Sir, can I take that in close session please, sir?" Tuberville: "Okay, uh what about the budget? 60 billion is going to be a drop in the bucket to the American taxpayer we're 35 trillion in debt what is this going to cost us I know y'all surely put the numbers to that uh of of our conflict versus uh Russia when this all starts have we done that?" Cavoli: "Sir, um the number I would have to talk in close session about also um but I agree if we were to go to war with Russia in uh um it would the the money we're spending in Ukraine would be a drop in the bucket." Tuberville: "Yeah, where where are we going to get our energy from uh when this starts because they don't have any in Europe uh uh the Saudis I don't know where they're going to help us out uh we're going to have to buy it from Ukraine I guess I mean Iran CU we're not pumping the oil and gas that we need where we going to get our fuel for a war like this." Cavoli: "Sir, that that's outside of my area of expertise but I'm sure I can get you the answer." Tuberville: "Do we have enough right now uh you know to get a war started uh on the ground there for our troops?" ... Cavoli "I would agree with that for instance the US Army is now 450,000 when I joined it it was 785,000. Tuberville: "With Ukraine um fighting right now as they are uh do we have any count of numbers of how many soldiers that they have actually fighting uh that they have in their military against Russia?" Cavoli: "It's between 900,000 and a million right now" Tuberville: "How about Russia? How many they have uh deployed uh within Ukraine not not on the borders but how many do they have deployed in Ukraine?" Cavoli: "Inside the country 470,000 outside the country more and then they have the rest of their military" Tuberville: "Yeah my understanding is after the uh Massacre they have been growing at 40,000 uh soldiers a month that are volunteering for the military.is is that pretty good Intel or not?" Cavoli: "I'm tracking 30,000 but yes, the size of the Russian military is bigger today than it was when the war started and it's bigger today than when the massacre started."

Thanks for the responses guys. For context, my friend has a few more years left until retirement and isn’t worried about hiding anything anymore and more concerned about the long term effects of it if left untreated. If any.

@ClearedHot What did you end up going with? My requirements are pretty minimal.. was thinking of just going with their cheapest single bay and a reasonable hard drive. Mostly just want to backup family photos and videos, organize and manage them, view/distribute as necessary. I would have said I am technically inclined.. but those penguins have long ago jumped off the iceberg. Synology definitely looks user friendly. Being able to expand and store home security footage in the future would be nice too. But maybe that needs to be a whole separate system?