While we’re waiting...

I met Bruce at a hotel downroute during his Astreus years - I think it was somewhere in the Canaries but it was a long time and a crate full of alcohol ago so I wouldn’t bet my life on it - and he’s awesome.

Picture time...

I know how to solve the issue of Russians flying into Turkish airspace:

SO. MUCH. VIGNETTING.

It was never part of Russia, it’s historically German/Prussian. What about Vyborg or the Kuriles? Poland also used to be more to the east.

That Kaliningrad is still occupied by Russians is a disgrace much like Vyborg is.

Oh, really, the unborn children committed those massacres?

The argument that the nuclear bombs were dropped on Japan in order to avoid further deaths is largely a myth. Immediately after the war, the argument was that “we did it to save 250,000 American lives”. Decades later, the argument became 500,000 lives, then 750,000 lives, and so on. Getting bigger and bigger number in…

This sounds horrible but Japan had it coming when they refused to surrender and those bombs saved innumerable Japanese and American lives

Bullshit bullshit bullshit. Japan surrendered because of the threat of invasion by the Soviet Union. Current research has shown that H and N did not change the mind of the Japanese leadership, and furthermore we had already burned out the entirety of Tokyo before we dropped nukes.

Because as it stands, they are the only country in history that has fired nukes (plural) during a time of war. So we know they’re capible of pulling the trigger even more so than with ISIS or North Korea.

Gorbachev, His arms open. Reagan and Gorbachev at Tanagra.

Shaka, when the Berlin Wall fell.

That was 25 years ago, before Russia was militarily intervening in the affairs of its neighbors. If a country wishes to join NATO, that’s between them and the alliance. Russia gets no say.

With a picture of the world’s greatest pizda.

Challenger happened because an o-ring in one of the solid rocket boosters froze in the abnormally cold January air, allowing extremely hot gases to blow a hole in the external tank, igniting the hydrogen. The Energia booster doesn’t have solid rocket boosters. In their place are liquid fueled boosters which can be…

That was the theory, but I think in practice the expense of overhauling them every time negated most of the cost advantage. Probably would have been cheaper to just through them away everytime, and probably an engine designed for single use would be cheaper in the first place. If nothing else, the economies of scale…

It should be noted that the Bulgarian MiG-21s have pretty ancient avionics that do them no favours when going up against more modern fighters. They don’t have the avionics suites that Indian or Romanian MiG-21s have, which do give them quite a bite.

I really hope it doesn’t come to that, but the sentiment is appreciated. Didn’t know we didn’t give you any votes, then again I haven’t followed the Eurovision contest in recent years.