Russia is signaling it could take out the West's internet and GPS. There's no good backup plan.
Russia is signaling it could take out the West's internet and GPS. There's no good backup plan.
The electronic communications and navigation systems the West depends on are vulnerable to Russian attack.
The EU could also supply Ukraine with weapons, which could destroy Russias entire electricity grid, oil refining capacity, gas network and key pieces of its transport infrastructure. However there is no need to be loud about it, since everybody knows that is true.
42Russian warfare is 90% cyber these days. They troll, hack, spy and attempt to influence elections using the internet. Are they really going to cut off their ability to engage in those activities? It's like saying they will blow up their own weapons factories if people don't start catching their bullets.
38They did waste vast amounts of own men and material when deciding to enter Ukraine to take a quick "short stroll" that somehow now already takes over 900 days. Wouldn't be the first time they shoot themselves in the foot proper.
14The foot keeps getting in the way.
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36They can knock out huge sections. Most of the Middle East was taken offline some years ago with only one cable cut. The old redundant Internet of the Cold War is long gone even within the US. Most of the rest of the world never had redundancy to begin with.
5they’re quite capable of taking out the satellite portion….
see also: Starfish Prime… weird how you just replied to the title of the article without reading it..
then we have no constraints - even moral - left to prevent us from destroying the ocean floor cable communications of our enemies,
they’re talking about cutting ocean floor cables…
and
In recent months, Russia has been accused of interfering with GPS navigation systems, causing havoc on commercial airline routes. As a result, flights from Helsinki to Tartu, Estonia, ground to a halt for a month in April.
nothing about nukes.
2
If they take out the internet, they lose their biggest manipulation tool. As if that'd ever happen...
33Oh no... I can't do my job without Internet... please don't do this... /s
27Ah jeez that'd be terrible. I'd probably have to stay home because nothing in society would be working. Then to pass the time I'd have to do things like reading the books I've been dying for time to read or finally getting to my collection of handheld consoles and emulators.
Might even have to have a glass of wine to calm my nerves from the stress.
5
What degree of aggression against the EU would spur the EU into action?
Russia already can't take over Ukraine. It would not be able to fight on more fronts, and certainly not against a strong EU with many more resources to spare.
Cyberwarfare and individual assassinations, sabotage, and disinformation campaigns were not enough yet. The EU is patient, because there's nothing to win. But the invasion of Ukraine showed that the EU can suddenly and significantly oppose Russia when certain lines are crossed.
Surely, it's in the interest of Russia both as preparation, but in large part to try to unsettle the EU, mainly its citizens. Much like it tried with Nuke warnings. GPS disruptions across borders. Gas and oil cutoffs. Blocking Ukraine food exports. Etc etc.
18I really wonder about this too. If Russia destroys those undersea cables, would that get a direct response? I would like to think so, because that's a planet-scale disruption (I think?), but it really depends on the people in charge of the countries involved and their stomach for violence and escalation.
I'm passionate about minimizing war and I seriously hope we never fire nukes at each other again. But a country willing to inflict global damage as a kind of tantrum over their failures in a conflict they single-handedly started...I mean, we can't tolerate that as a species. There's gotta be a line somewhere.
12I don't think an attack on undersea cables would spur aggressive/invasive action. I would expect more direct, obvious, and public military presence, observation, and possibly isolation of Russia on it's borders though.
Human, especially civilian lives are probably a line. Sabotage that would be inconvenience rather than disabling and cause direct suffering - I don't think it'd spur direct military action. Political - sure. The EU is already driving a hard sanctioning course, and would likely increase such political responses.
There are alternative internet routes, and we're not that dependent on them - in a fundamental, life or death or direct human suffering kind of way.
5Realistically the writing is on the wall here. Either Russia comes to its senses, or it will be dealt with eventually. Yes that will be painful, but it will be less painful than letting a nuclear terrorist dictate global norms.
The reality is that if Russia was willing to walk down the latter path, they would have probably done it already.
3
Do they wish all their cities were glassed? Because that's how you achieve that.
15I mean, my local server is the backup plan.
I can game for days without food or water and only need to emerge to forage like once a week.
Perhaps even visit the local market for fresh memes, but thats it.
14I have like 800gb of memes I've saved like currency over the years.
6Please give me a torrent so I can download culture too. 👌
2And the vast majority only those games only take up a fraction of that total spaces.
But yes, this is how digital shit survives the ages.
1
Well, let them try. It's unlikely to result in anything more than a temporary disruption and as a result a lot of current shitty practises would need to be improved so I see that as a net positive.
12I got a report that this article is paywalled but am not seeing a paywall here. Is anyone having issues?
8I can't read the article, first paragraph gives a subscription scroll over popup.
10Apparently, my adblocker fixes that. Alternatively, use https://archive.ph/VpBsk
3
Russia is full of shit
7The moment every hoarder with a home PLEX-server and an overflowing NAS has been waiting for.
6Hell yeah come watch if you bring food.
2I need a new goal since I reached my last one of "more hours of content than the duration of The American Civil War".
1
Like we couldn’t wreak havoc on them tenfold. Anyone want to bet on the blyats instead of the West?
5Good fucking bye.
4That would mean world war 3 for sure.
4if by world war you mean "every other country shares a look and then stomps russia into annihilation instantly" then sure
0I don't think this true. Russia can certainly be beat but unlike most of their potential adversaries, their arms industry is already producing at high levels and they have a large drafting effort going on.
0
I wish a motherfucker would try
4the backup plan is destroy russia and build new GPS from its broken parts
3