I Know What You're Thinking And You're WRONG
Once again, NO I am not using the DARPA Telepathy Helmet that I long-term-borrowed and returned a couple of years ago, it's because I am insightful and clever, not to mention it's my blog and I make the rules. Art!
Once again the blog goes on at length by showing what we're not talking about today, which is the way we (rock and) roll, which is a splendid mental exercise you should all appreciate.
So, no heavy metal bands. Nor are we talking about that famous quote from 'Cool Hand Luke': "What we've got here is failure to communicate", which, if Art will do the honours again -
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| Luke has a nice relaxing lie down |
No, you see, I came across a loooong Tweet by 'Chris0_Wiki' on That Platform, detailing the inner workings of the Ruffian military as it tried to create modern telecommunication systems for it's orcs. Chris himself took the article from a milblogger in Ruffia, one 'Oleg Tsarev', who posted it on Telegram as of 6th February, pre-throttling. In case you were wondering, Tsarev, the utter rapscallion, is a Ukrainian who fled to Ruffia and whom is now an ultra-nationalist pro-Ruffian, who nevertheless hates hates hates the Ruffian Ministry Of Defence, as he, along with ultra-nationals, considers it to be far too namby-pamby and also riddled with corruption. Art!
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| Red bull gives you wings |
He's not wrong about that second part. He also cautions that the cases that follow are only the ones released to the public, and that there will be military cases nobody will know of for decades.
ANYWAY he points out that, at the start of the Special Idiotic Operation, the orcs were buying up Motorola hand-held radios because they had nothing else suitable or issued. Now, four years later, the 1,000 illegal Starlink terminals are gone with almost nothing to replace them despite tens of trillions of rubles being poured into the sector since 2011. This is the date when the ten-year GPV-2020 plan came into execution, intending to update and modernise the Ruffian armed forces. Art!
Of the overall total, ₽18 billion (or $233 million in proper money) was allocated for digital telecommunications and tactical radios research and development, which sounds like an awful lot, and which various Ruffians in high places licked their lips at. Why so? Because these people have been carrying out fraud, embezzlement, extortion, bribery and passing port to starboard since they were at the lowest level of the totem pole. Art!
To port is the 'R-168 Akveduk' tactical radio, and to starboard is the 'R-187P1 Azart' radio. The Akveduk has not been produced in large numbers as, developed between 2013 and 2017, it's full of South Canadian microchips from Texas Instruments and AMD. The Azart, supposedly '6th generation', is full of Chinese components, has a short battery life, low range and is vulnerable to electronic warfare. Why are these comms systems so underwhelming despite all that funding? O I thought you'd never ask! Let's have a portrait. Art!
This is Colonel General Khalil Arslanov, who was Deputy Chief of the Main Communications Directorate of the MoD, very much past tense. During his time in office, he stole ₽2.2 billion ($28.5 million) from that previously mentioned ₽18 billion budget assigned to Voentelecom, between 2013 and 2017, and ₽6.7 billion ($87 million) from the Azart budget. He got sentenced to 17 years in prison, the heaviest sentence ever for anyone in a corruption trial. His co-defendants - he liked to spread blame and money around - Colonel Kutakhov got 7 years, and Igor Yakovlev got 6 years. All three conspired to supply the orcs with cheap, insecure Chinese Baofeng radios that were re-branded with prices jacked up sky-high. Arslanov is not due for release until July 2042.
Bear in mind that Ukraine could easily intercept, eavesdrop and pinpoint any orc using either the Motorola or Baofeng radios, and often did. Art!
This is the 'Andromeda-D' automated airborne command and control comms system, intended for use by the orc's VDV paratrooper units. It cannot interface with older comms equipment, is woefully insecure (the poor thing!) and is very complicated and unintuitive. Once again, this sub-par performance is because of graft and corruption. The enterprise responsible for creating this module was the <deep breath> Central Research Institute of Electrical Engineering and Control Systems, whose executives stole ₽500 million ($64 million) from the budget funds.
We haven't finished yet. Art!
The 46th Central Research Institute, which was tasked with developing digital telecom systems, and whose General Director, Alexander Molodchenko, and his mates Ivan Maltsev and Olga Pavlova, conspired to steal ₽460 million ($6 million) by inflating prices. Art!
Then we have the 31st State Design Institute, which defrauded ₽188 million ($2.4 million) from a contract issued by the MoD for fibre-optic communications.
You may be seeing a pattern here.
Or, take the Director of Slavgorod Radio Equipment Plant, who stole a relatively modest ₽18 million ($233,000) but who still got 4 years in prison.
Definitely a pattern.
These investigations and prosecutions, with a few swingeing sentences, are the result of Putinpot replacing the incredibly corrupt Shoigu with Belousov as Defence Minister back in 2024. Ol' Belly is an economist, not a military man, so his corruption might be less extreme than a soldier. Art!
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| Weaned on a lemon |
He has an uphill struggle; I recall Chuck Pfarrer stating that it would take 20 years to stamp out corruption in the orc army.
We'll see!
Wowsers, wall-to-wall text, we need pictures, nurse, and stat!
Brace For Impact
In mind of the above, here's one from my news feed. Art!
Andromeda again. This time it's the galaxy not a dodgy telecom system.
As for the panic-baiting headline, file under IGNORE. The Andromeda galaxy is our nearest galactic neighbour, but that's 'near' in astronomical terms. It stands (or sits) two million light years away, so you have time to make your last will and testament and observe the rise and fall of Hom. Sap. along the way.
You What?
In Conrad's experience, a 'cupola' is a small raised viewing dome atop a tank turret that allows the commander to have a 360⁰ view through vision blocks, without having to stick his vulnerable head out of the turret. Art!
In Mind Of The Above
Talking of communications or lack of them, here's another bizarre entry on my news feed, which is doing the heavy lifting today for picture content. Art!
My O my. I was aware that one irked Telegram user scornfully referred to using pigeons instead to communicate, but Dog Buns! the Ruffians do miss their Starlink so.
Destroying It From The Inside
Hereafter DIFTI. We've mentioned a few cases of this errant behaviour in employees or ex-employees, where they act out of spite or pettiness and harm their employer, which is one reason people with IT access are usually shooed off the premises the instant they become redundant. Just in case. Art!
Say hello to Andrew Skelton, data protection specialist at Morrisons, the UK supermarket chain. Denied a promotion, he deliberately leaked sensitive staff information - including bank details - of 100,000 employees and was arrested, tried and sentenced to 8 years in 2014 - so he's due out this year!
What happened next was a 6-year struggle by Morrisons to avoid tens of millions in fines for a Data Protection Breach, which went all the way to the Supreme Court. Finally, in 2020, they were held not vicariously liable, resulting in a big Phew! from the shareholders.
We'll be coming back to this theme, I find it verrrrry interesting!
Finally -
It's an anniversary today, isn't it? though for what escapes me at present.
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