A minority government of Red-Green-Red (SPD, Grüne, Linke) would force the conservatives to either work productively with the other democratic parties or side with the fascists of the AFD. It would basically boil down to whether or not Merz will do again what he promised he wouldn’t do (working with the AFD). Should he do that, I very much expect the CDU to “decapitate” itself by splitting from left to right: The MAGA people around Merz, Linnemann, Spahn and Dobrindt get ousted by the traditional conservatives.

Most likely outcome? Probably. Most favourably, though? Probably not.

“Capable” in this context doesn’t just refer to training alone.

As laid out in the video, Russian recruits are getting older and older (as in: have sometimes even fought in Soviet era conflicts) and recruitment standards are dropped more and more (apparently having Schizophrenia is OK for a Russian soldier) to keep a steady influx of warm bodies. Next, Russian recruits appear to be broadly separated into two groups: The meat shields who are rushed to the front with minimal training to plug the biggest holes in the units (stark examples include only multiple days between reported recruitment and death). The second group is going through a more traditional training regiment but also shortened. This shortening also applies to officer candidates.

In short: Recruits are getting less physically capable due to the average age increasing drastically over time, and militarily less capable due to shortened or basically nonexistent training.

As for the Ukrainians: I expect the video with analysis on their casualties and recruitment to drop this week.

Russia won’t run out of troops, but they will run out of capable troops: Russian Casualties & Force Generation - Losses, Recruitment & Sustaining the war in Ukraine

Apparently I misinterpreted this statement by Scholz. I initially thought when I heard about it, he was speaking on behalf of the whole SPD and not just himself.

He is not leading anything at the moment. His party won the most votes, but is far from having 50% + 1 seat. Merz depends on forming a coalition, and he basically alienated everyone.

Yeah, I won’t put my money on it either. However, I can see various NGOs initiating reports to federal prosecutors in the aftermath, followed by calls to lift immunity. Of course, his coalition wouldn’t allow that to happen, but doing so would cost them a huge chunk of credibility.

The thing is:

As per law, the federal police is required to enforce the warrant and Merz can do shit about it unless he successfully overturns the law. If the officers did not arrest him, they would even be liable to prosecution for obstruction of justice (Sadly, no English version of the German law article). In fact, even Merz himself could be charged himself should he try to order them to stand down, which AFAIK he doesn’t have the authority to do anyway.

0 F is defined as the lowest temperature a guy was able to reach with some random mixture which is arbitrary.

But 0 C is commonly defined as the point at which water turns from solid to liquid and the other way round. Scientifically it’s ever so slightly off but still it’s defined via Kelvin.

Obligatory link to IPoAC

* insert “Corporate needs you to tell them the difference between USS Arleigh Burke and JS Kaga Meme” here *

The WW2 jokes about Japan having an aircraft carrier Kaga (again) write themselves, though.

Though the countries listed are not part of NATO and are weak.

Perfect to get the collective confidence back on its feed after getting a literal bloody nose in Ukraine.

for Armenia they have to go through Georgia first

Two for the price of one. That’s a bargain!

German federal intelligence agency:

“First Time?”

Edit: Sorry, forgot to mention: There appears to be no English translation for the second link. :(

I do not have an English translation but in this interview a lieutenant general of the German Bundeswehr says that they are observing that not all new supplies are being pushed to the Ukrainian front lines and instead new stockpiles are being created.

My personal expectation is that Putin will attempt one more push in Ukraine once mud season is over, take what he can get and then agree to another peace deal (Minsk 3 anyone?). He will then take some time to restructure and reinforce the military before again “coming to the aid of suppressed Russian minorities”, this time in places like Georgia, Moldova or Armenia. Ukraine is off the table because they will use the time to reinforce as well.

Issue #1113 by any chance? :D

Not necessarily a phishing mail. I got tagged in an issue that some idiot created and codeberg dutifully sent me a mail notification.

Doesn’t have to be Gitmo. I recommend reading Little Brother and according to one hacker, so does the NSA.

Not that I am arguing for simply rolling over but:

Come screw with my first constitutional rite, and my iron clad citizenship.

When push comes to shove, they won’t give a flying fuck about a piece of paper that says they can’t do that. Just ask anyone who’s been to Gitmo on either side of the bars.

On second thought… yeah.

We happily take the blame for WW2, but WW1 is on Austria!