Xlucine

Pakistan found a sub:
https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=2950969591583426
 
Looks like a snorkelling SSK (note the splashing behind the masts), which isn't the hardest thing to find. They're trying to imply it's a scorpene, but the reference images provided don't look like a great match (the masts appear to be more side-by-side on the scorpene, whereas the sub detected looks to have them in a line). I'd guess it's a kilo, so only an 80's vintage 877 design but still capable of launching cruise missiles

Finally, the Mark V is finished, photographed, and on my shelf. Overall, I'm pretty satisfied with this project.










Rest of photos
 

I'm calling this more Carcinisation
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carcinisation

Horseshoe Crabs are now nested within Arachnida and therefore there must have been either A) multiple terrestrial invasions by stem arachnids or B) horseshoe crabs went back into the ocean. 
 

Maple-syrup flavoured T26 is confirmed, after the legal challenge fell through:
https://www.janes.com/article/86254/canada-confirms-type-26-frigate-selection
 
I figure this makes it the largest single class of modern warships outside the US and chinese navies

Brits make fun of us while they can't even keep their motorists safe from Octopi:
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-devon-47144891

Mostly a political choice.
Buying an American plane when you are trying to build a self reliant European defence industry send the wrong message, and currently the F-35 is the symbol of the American clutch on European defence.
Also Germany being part of the SCAF program, should the program stay on track the F-35 would have a service life of around 10-15 years before starting  to be replaced in the German army.
 
On the other hand Germany still want to keep it's B61 (which is also purely symbolic given that those weapons are mostly outdated, and under a double key system), and since it would take between 7 and 10 years to green-light the the eurofighter to carry it, at this point the Super Hornet is almost guaranteed to win (yes it's also an American plane, but not as high profile as the F-35).
Add on top of that the argument used to reject the F-35 was that you could "replace" stealth by escorting your bomber with a decent EW plane (whether or not this is a valid argument) and you have another point for the F/A-18
 
http://www.opex360.com/2019/02/02/lallemagne-ecarte-le-f-35a-et-le-f-15-pour-remplacer-ses-chasseurs-bombardiers-tornado/

Iranian Military Exhibition thx @PDF (https://defence.pk/pdf/threads/eghtedar-40-defense-exhibition.599895/)


 

Copying my response to this same question on the dicksword:

 
 

This is not an assumption by me, but mentioned in the patent by KMW. Each individual armor element has an opening (covered by a plug) on the top, which is used to fill them with Schüttgut (via gravity). This plug is visible on the Wisent 2 aswell. Aside of that, the shape of the armor element is optimized for being filled with Schüttgut rather than NERA; if it would be NERA, why not reuse the same falt-sided NERA modules as fitted to the Leopard 2A4M CAN?
 

Hole and plug for filling the armor boxes, labeled with the number 8.1 in the patent.
 
Light-weight NERA by itself provides poor protection against KE projectiles such as AP(DSFS) munitions and EFPs. That's why modern vehicles usually use a combination of light-weight NERA and passive armor (ceramics, spaced steel plates, etc.). Diehl designed a type of anti-EFP armor consisting of hollow steel bars meant to shatter the brittle EFPs. For additional protection against EFPs, NERA sandwich plates (labeled 11 in the patent drawings) could be added inbetween the hollow spaces:

https://www.monch.com/mpg/news/land/4868-nexter-trials-leclerc.html
 
Apart from the confirmation that the 140mm trials where to asses the capability to integrate a 140mm in a 50t tank, it was announced that at IDEX 2019, they'll present a Leclerc with a drone attached which main purpose would be reconnaissance and target designation.
 
Qualification of a new programmable HE round called M3M (Impact, delay, airburst) will begin shortly.
Nexter is also working on yet another APFSDS called SHARD (probable that it will never see service like it's predecessors) and apparently the Polynege guided ammunition is still on the table (which would work well with the new reconnaissance UAV)

Mentioned something in the discord about having work up in a local gallery, here is some of it (first six photos) plus some other things:
 

 

 
More

Leclerc has been used as a platform to test a 140mm gun:
 
https://www.janes.com/article/85934/iav-2019-nexter-tests-140-mm-gun-on-leclerc-mbt

Clearer images:



"New Turret" refers to the turret citadel, with re-used equipment mounted on it.

Some information on BMP-3 with Epokha from GurKhan.
    Epokha unmanned turret is planned to be installed on modernized BMP-3s, it is armed with low-energy 57 autocannon similar to LShO-57 (which is basically an oversized AGL) and 2 new ATGMs. When people heard name of new ATGM (Bulat) and looked at model of Epokha turret everybody thought that Bulat ATGMs were new small caliber missiles as big launchers on sides of unmanned turret were exactly same as Kornet launchers on Berezhok and other turrets for IFVs.

 
   But looks like we were wrong:
   Bulat is Kornet-sized ATGM with new guidance system (possibly 3rd gen F&F, i hope). It is possible to use Kornets in those launcher, so Bulats are not going to be exclusive type of ATGMs that Epokha can use. I suspect that during initial presentation those things will be armed with Kornets instead of new Bulats.
 

   Bulat ATGM 3D model shown during presentetion of Boomerang-BM unmanned turret, sometime before 2015 IIRC.
 
   So what are those smaller caliber missile launcher on Epokha turret roof?
   Picture from patent:

 
   Those things are our good old friend "guided bullet" concept, which was sort of known for years.
Docs that were posted on otvaga:
http://www.fips.ru/cdfi/fips.dll/ru?ty=29&docid=2496087
http://www.fips.ru/cdfi/fips.dll/ru?ty=29&docid=2512047
http://www.fips.ru/cdfi/fips.dll/ru?ty=29&docid=2496089
http://www.fips.ru/cdfi/fips.dll/ru?ty=29&docid=2538881
http://www.fips.ru/cdfi/fips.dll/ru?ty=29&docid=2527366
http://www.fips.ru/cdfi/fips.dll/ru?ty=29&docid=2569229
 
In container/launcher:
http://www.fips.ru/cdfi/fips.dll/ru?ty=29&docid=2568823
http://www.fips.ru/cdfi/fips.dll/ru?ty=29&docid=2529256
http://www.fips.ru/cdfi/fips.dll/ru?ty=29&docid=2535119

 
LShO-57/AGS-57:
 

I was this close to posting this in the ATGM thread

Just got through Guderian: Panzer Pioneer or Myth Maker? by Russell A. Hart. I was looking forward to reading it; the introduction says the book "seeks the real Heinz Guderian, not the man of legend." I was expecting a short but interesting insight into how Guderian inflated his accomplishments, much like Bond and Mearsheimer had done with Liddell Hart (and which Gat later attempted to redress). No less than Richard DiNardo proffered a decently glowing review of the book that concluded with, "This monograph is certainly not the definitive biography of Guderian, and I do not think the author had that goal in mind. As a corrective to one of the more mendacious memoirs of the Second World War, Hart's work clearly hits the mark." Looking good!
 
As it turns out, the book is a hot mess. It consists of surprisingly repetitious (and it's only 118pp), scantily-researched, poorly-evidenced, and thesaurus-driven prose that does little to convince the reader of the author's arguments unless the reader is fine with simply taking his word on things. (Of course, with the way things go on social media, this may not be an issue...). The third sentence in the introduction is, "Unfortunately, too many of Guderian's biographers have accepted Guderian's view of his accomplishments without sufficient critical scrutiny." In the endnote for this sentence Hart mentions seven such hagiographies, including two editions of Macksey's book on Guderian, Panzer General and Creator of the Blitzkreig. From this strong start, I thought with glee, clearly Hart will offer some hard-hitting, original research using novel sources!
 
Oh. Hart's main sources are the biographies he accused of insufficient critical scrutiny in the third sentence of his book.

 
Hart consistently makes assertions and accusations with no supporting examples, and often with even no citation. Some of this stuff I even believed going in, but if I had disagreed I would not be convinced by Hart simply saying so. E.g., people now realize Lutz had a large hand in forming the German armored forces. Hart agrees, stating. "It was Lutz more than Guderian who transformed the Mobile Troops Command into a strong, coherent branch in the late 1930s. Quietly, with much less fuss and rancor than Guderian was raising, Lutz negotiated, cajoled, listened, and compromised to push forward his command more effectively than Guderian ever could have done." What negotiations and compromises actually occurred are, like many things in the book, left to the reader's imagination.
 
Hart later says that "Guderian despised the Catholic, Slavic Poles who now [in 1939] occupied parts of his native, beloved Prussia." This is not provided with any citation or evidence. It's not that I wouldn't believe such a statement, but I would expect some evidence to accompany its presentation. Hart later says that during the French invasion, "In his private correspondence, Guderian expressed compassion for the plight of the French populace. This demonstrated that he held the 'civilized' French in much higher regard than he did the Slavic Poles." So I guess that's the evidence? Again, not that I wouldn't believe it, but that connection seems a bit of a stretch.
 
Likewise, Hart says that during the Polish invasion Guderian "earned the enmity of many a senior officer whose command prerogatives Guderian carelessly and thoughtlessly trampled over. For example, Guderian soon found himself at odds with the 3d Panzer Division commander--Freiherr Geyr von Schweppenburg--another future rising star of the armored force." What prerogatives were trampled, what odds occurred, and how those odds were resolved are not mentioned.
 
A fourth example: "Largely as a result of Guderian's insistence, these [Hummel and Wespe] were produced only in limited numbers, sufficient at best to equip a single battalion in each panzer artillery regiment during 1943-5. The lack of self-propelled guns reflected Guderian's opposition to diverting resources and production capacity to artillery weapons and his firm prewar belief that only tanks could fight other tanks effectively." This cites pp.216-22 in Panzer Leader. Unfortunately, my edition is apparently paginated differently, because there is nothing in those pages in my copy that talks about Guderian's opposition to SP arty. I did find where Guderian laid out the notes he took to his 9 March 1943 conference with Hitler et al after becoming Inspector-General of Armored Troops, which included "9.The artillery of the panzer and motorized divisions will from now on be receiving the adequate number of self-propelled gun-carriages which has been requested for the past 10 years...Tanks of latest design must be supplied for artillery observers."
 
A final example of evidenceless assertions for this post, but by no means final in the book: "[Guderian's] response to that trend [of the SS and Nazi party gaining influence and threatening taking over the army in 1944] was to more strongly identify himself and the armored troops with the national socialist worldview and agenda." No citation, no elaboration on how Guderian identified the armored troops with the Nazi worldview and agend, or even what that means, really.
 
Hart can't seem to decide how well Guderian performs as far as politics and influencing others. He variously describes him as having "political naiveté" (p.90), being "a consummate political operator" (p.92) who "continuously politicked" (p.93) those in Hitler's sphere, who executed a "calculated political neutrality" (p.102) after the assassination attempt on Hitler, yet who was again "a political neophyte" (p.115) who was "politically naive" (p.117). This list starts at p.90 only because that's when I bothered to start keeping track. It exists throughout the book.
 
I generally like historical scholarship and biographies to take a decently even-handed approach, but Hart makes no attempt to hide his bias with word choice, time and again throwing out strings of adjectives full of negative connotation: "More than anything else, it was his repeated, insolent defiance of higher authority, his insatiable and threatening demands for more of everything, his inability to understand the needs of other commands or act as a team player, combined with his inability to finesse his superiors, that cost Guderian his appointment." Jeez, say how you really feel.
 
So, in sum, I was disappointed. I went into this book believing that Guderian made more of himself than he should have re: the formation of German armored forces, but Hart did little to convince me had I not already thought so. The book is not all bad (I hadn't heard of the bribes Hitler gave to senior officers, but this research is not original to Hart, who cites others' work), but it's shallow and I feel it's not very good scholarship, especially from a history professor and PhD-holder who specializes "in the history of the Second World War in the European Theater." At least it was only like $12.
 

A VERY comprehensive survey by the Dept of Justice which includes 287,400 prisoners who used a firearm in a crime and how they obtained it. Includes graphs and other info
 
https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/suficspi16.pdf
 
Highlights
 
An estimated 287,400 prisoners had possessed a firearm during their offense. Among these, more than half (56%) had either stolen it (6%), found it at the scene of the crime (7%), or obtained it off the street or from the underground market (43%). Most of the remainder (25%) had obtained it from a family member or friend, or as a gift. Seven percent had purchased it under their own name from a licensed firearm dealer.
 
...
 
Among prisoners who possessed a firearm during their offense, 0.8% obtained it at a gun show.
 
State prisoners with no military service were more likely to possess a gun during their offense (21%) than prisoners who had served in the military (16%).
 
Almost 3 in 10 (29%) black prisoners serving a sentence in state prison in 2016 possessed a firearm during their crime. White (12%) and Hispanic (21%) state prisoners were less likely to have possessed a firearm during their crime. Similarly, white (17%) and Hispanic (13%) federal prisoners serving a sentence in 2016 were less likely to have possessed a firearm during the crime than black (29%) federal prisoners.

Depends on what you consider live ammo.
For law enforcement anything below the second line of this table is considered as it:
 

It ranges from tear gas launched from a grenade launcher to 7,62mm so it's quite a wide definition.
 
If we are only talking about bullets then definitively no. The only case when the law enforcement can use them (in the context of a protest) is when they are directly shot at with firearms, which is basically never.
 
Otherwise they have access to a wide range of "stun" grenades which work either with sound, light, both, shock-waves and rubber projectiles.
Those are supposed to be used when the crowd get too close allowing the law enforcement to retreat and reorganize.
They are first to be rolled on the floor and if things get really out of hand launched from a hand held grenade launcher.
 
Now some of those grenades contain a little amount of explosive, and regularly cause injury (launched to close, launched in a high arc against the procedure, idiot trying to pick up the nade blowing up his hand, etc).
Needless to say they regularly pop up in the public debate because of the serious injury they can cause.
 
One particular type of grenade was for example banned, after causing a death in 2014, the officer launched it in a high arc against procedure and it got stuck between the backpack and the back of a man, the blast killed him.
We are one of the few country (if not the last one) in Europe which still use such a large panel of potentially dangerous grenades.
 
Funny enough the use of the taser was banned for law enforcement as it was seen as dangerous for vulnerable peoples (elderly, pregnant women) but mainly that it was degrading and against human dignity.
 
This article sums up what the law enforcement can and cannot do during a protest:
 
https://translate.google.fr/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.lemonde.fr%2Fles-decodeurs%2Farticle%2F2016%2F05%2F03%2Fce-que-la-police-peut-et-ne-peut-pas-faire-pendant-une-manifestation_4913025_4355770.html

Looks back at the XM60... 

Molnibalage make several really good booklets about the air defence systems, here I try to cover them all:

S-25
S-75 family
S-200 family
S-300 family
IADS / GCI systems of the Cold War
Nike family and BOMARC
HAWK
Patriot
Air defense at the XXI. century
S-125 vs. F-117
2K11 Krug
2K12 Kub
9K33 Osa
9K331 Tor
9K37M1 Buk
9K81 / 9K81M aka S-300V / VM
9K35 Strela-10
2K22M Tunguska
ZU-23-4 Shilka

Download directory:

Download Directory @ Mediafire

This is the translation of the long Hungarian book what Molnibalage made in cooperation with other guys for ex. with Hpaps, he is well known for the SamSim.
This is the whole, in Hungarian: click here

Because these chapters (booklets) just a part of a big book are some parts in the document which refer to content of the book in other chapters. Slowly the whole book will be translated, but it could take years to finish it.

Have a good reading! 

This would make a fun design-a-tank competition.

Another lithium SSK joins the east-asian arms race:
https://www.janes.com/article/85421/south-korea-completes-preliminary-design-for-second-batch-of-kss-iii-submarines
 
With the japanese launching one this year, I'm sure it won't be long before china gets one in the water (wouldn't be surprised if lithium batteries were fitted to that weird sub with a tiny sail that showed up recently). The battery chemistry would suggest an order of magnitude increase in submerged range is possible, and given that batteries can be refilled underway I expect to see lithium based subs (SSL's?) replace AIP systems quickly. Not having to store strong oxidisers on board the submarine is another plus, those things have a long history of being lethal to the wrong side.

Removing Animea; Iwo Jima edition. 

 
Bonus: Allen M. Sumner class at Iwo Jima. 
 

So i visited a museum today and look mock up of what i found...

"Ice-resistant self-propelled platform North Pole"   
 
   lol, i just posted about that thing.