Archive for the ‘Russia’ Category
Posted on July 20, 2010 - by Venik
The Water Boys
The best way to keep a secret is not to concede its existence. Indeed, it would be difficult for your neighbor to poison your dog, if he doesn’t know you have one. Should, nevertheless, the facts escape, your next best defense is wordiness. You shall contribute to the spectacle at every opportunity in the hope [...]
Posted on May 29, 2010 - by Venik
Yak-130 Crashes in Russia
A Yak-130 advanced trainer jet crashed earlier today at the Lipetsk combat flight training center of the Russian AF. Both pilots ejected and were treated for minor injuries. There was no damage on the ground. The aircraft went out of control on takeoff during a routine training mission. This is first crash of an in-service [...]
Posted on April 20, 2010 - by Venik
Why Russia and Poland Will Never be Friends
You probably heard the story by now: a plane full of Polish russophobes flew into a tree in Russia. Too bad Dante is dead: a lot of good material for a Commedia sequel. There is a veritable flurry of news reports and editorials predicting an epic thaw in relations between Russia and Poland. A brief [...]
Posted on February 18, 2010 - by Venik
Mistral for Russia
France’s decision to sell four Mistral-class helicopter carriers to Russia was met with heavy criticism in the US, Georgia and the Baltic States. Interestingly enough, Russia’s decision to buy the four vessels for more than $2 billion was met with a lot of criticism within Russia as well. This is really the first time in [...]
Posted on February 9, 2010 - by Venik
Sukhoi T-50 Production and Procurement Details
The PAKFA (Russian abbreviation for the Prospective Frontal Aviation Complex) fighter project is currently scheduled to enter production at the end of 2014. The single-seat model is expected to enter service with the Russian AF in 2015. The dual-seat model for the Indian AF is expected to enter service two years after that. The two-seater [...]
Posted on February 6, 2010 - by Venik
Sukhoi Stealth Fighter’s First Flight
As many of you already know, last week the Sukhoi T-50 stealth fighter prototype – Russia’s long-awaited answer to Lockheed-Martin’s F-22 – completed it’s maiden 47-minute flight from the manufacturer’s test airfield in the Russian Far East. The single-seat aircraft features low-observable geometry, two widely-separated engines with 3-D thrust-vectoring nozzles, internal weapons bays, all-movable angled [...]
Posted on February 2, 2010 - by Venik
Novaya Gazeta and DDOS Attack
The Register, among others, reports that the Web site of one of Russia’s leading independent newspapers – the Novaya Gazeta – came under a distributed denial-of-service (DDOS) attack. Currently the newspaper’s site is unstable. The reason I even noticed this news item is not because I am a big fan of Novaya Gazeta. It is [...]
Posted on October 1, 2009 - by Venik
War in Georgia: Reviewing EU Findings
As some of you may have heard, the international fact-finding mission (IIFFMCG) organized by the EU to investigate the 2008 war between Georgia and Russia has finally released its final report. As was expected, most of the blame for starting the war went to Georgia. Russia’s “fault”, according to the investigators, for the most part [...]
Posted on August 10, 2009 - by Venik
Delusions in Tbilisi
Recently Russian online news service Lenta.ru published a Q&A session with a well-known Georgian political and military analyst Mamuka Areshidze, who is known for his anti-Kremlin attitudes but is also somehow not a particularly big supporter of Georgian El Duce. In other words, Areshidze is supposedly a moderate, a centrist and so his take on [...]
Posted on August 9, 2009 - by Venik
Russians in Afghanistan
AP’s recent “Safety of Russian planes in Afghanistan questioned” by Catrina Stewart is exactly why female journalists should stick to writing about Gucci purses, chihuahuas, and SUVs. After some, no doubt, extensive research on the subject of military transport aviation, this broad came to the conclusion that the reason NATO keeps hiring Russian cargo aircraft [...]
Posted on August 7, 2009 - by Venik
Happy Anniversary, Misha
Tweeter celebrated the one-year anniversary of the Georgian-Russian war by setting it’s Web servers on fire. (For those of you with long-term memory problem, here is a brief recap of the events.) The Unix gurus at Tweeter’s datacenter blamed the downtime on unspecified hackers unleashing a DDoS attack. According to some networking experts interviewed by [...]
Posted on August 3, 2009 - by Venik
Finland Pushes Putin’s Buttons
As any family feud, this story has many ins and outs. Paavo Salonen from Finland married Rimma from Russia, they had a son – Anton – and they got divorced. Rimma’s older son from first marriage Nikita, who is now 19, lived with his stepfather Paavo in Finland. Rimma was living with her younger son [...]
Posted on July 28, 2009 - by Venik
Loose Lips…
Newspapers in America and Russia are busy busting Joe Biden’s chops for taking lead from Sarah Palin and going Maverick on relations with the Kremlin. It is not that Biden said something that the Russians didn’t already know: Russia’s economy and population are both in decline and long-term prospects are not exactly rosy. Depending on [...]
Posted on July 15, 2009 - by Venik
Talking to Taliban
Coalition losses in Afghanistan continue mounting. Most casualties are sustained when troops are at their bases or on routine patrol missions. Recent reports suggest that the coalition is short on operational helicopters. Available fleets of attack helicopters and ground attack planes are stretched thin providing cover to supply convoys and ground patrols. The overall situation [...]