Wars and Politics of Ice and Fire

I don't think the two are mutually exclusive. It was an absolutely stunning reversal of ill fortune in the Byzantine Empire that fell to shit because after the death of Manuel there were constant revolts that sapped the Empire of its economic and military strength and allowed the Turks to recover and regain the economic heartlands of Anatolia.

Thanks for the question, Claudius.

I think there's a lot of unknowns to base a solid inference on. The relationship between the Vale and the North are friendly at the time of Domeric's fostering, Robert's Rebellion was recently concluded and so strengthening relations would just be normal politics. We don't see any scheming against the Arryns and Redforts were loyal from the outset. I think the cigar is just a cigar in this case, without more information.

Thanks for the question, Anon.

Mid-level can mean a lot of things depending on how high up the hierarchy you have. A military special task force under USSOCOM is about the size of a battalion which is typically commanded by an O-6. Given operational secrecy and the need for flexibility in special forces compared to conventional commands, these sizes have more wiggle room. Your "mid-level manager" could be a senior NCO within a unit, the commander of the special mission unit (like Deltas or DEVGRU), could be someone in the staff at Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), or could be a staff officer at USSOCOM.

The top brass are the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the combined heads of the component Armed Services, who serve under the Secretary of Defense and the President, who as the civilian commander-in-chief is the absolute top position of the chain of command, with the only higher authority being the US Constitution. But you also have the unified combatant commands which are broken up either by geographic region (INDOPACCOM is the Indo-Pacific, for example, while EUCOM is Europe) or by specialized function (USCYBERCOM is for cyberspace). These are four-star generals in charge of a vast area of responsibility, whose orders and overall strategy are implemented at each rung lower on the chain.

Thanks for the question, Anon.

Certainly.

If Kamala had won the election, I imagine she would continue Biden's policy - intelligence sharing would continue, weapons would continue at their same slow pace. In that sense, I don't predict a substantial change in terms of Ukraine seizing large swaths of occupied territory back from the Russians. Aid packages continue unabated, unless MAGA Republicans have enough control in Congress to try and stall aid packages or check Presidential Drawdown Authority legislatively. That isn't likely, however.

What I think would stay the same is Ukraine's pivot to mid-range and long-range strikes. This strategy has been quite successful at blunting Russian progress and causing significant problems to their economy. So I think you would still see hits to the Crimean land bridge on logistics vehicles and strikes on Russian oil infrastructure. I also think that Musk blocks Starlink in Russia regardless of who is President.

The biggest difference is that Kamala Harris is highly unlikely to have gone into Iran, meaning that oil prices would still have remained where they were before the Straits of Hormuz were closed. That in turn would mean that the oil Russia could have sold would not have reached such a windfall, which would increase pressure. Harris is also unlikely to have offered any form of sanctions relief, meaning that the Russian economy would be even more rickety than it is right now.

Overall, I'd say it would have put Ukraine on a better footing, especially as 2026 rolled around.

Thanks for the question, Anon.

Carlin remains a king.

Tywin's strategy is to eliminate Robb Stark at once, believing him to be a green boy in the field that could easily be bottled up after one defeat. Robb has no reputation yet, but Tywin (and Jaime) critically underestimated the Northern-Riverlands Alliance's capability to do them harm which is a big strategic mistake. Once he had successfully (in his mind) pacified the North, Jaime (or Andros Brax if Jaime lacks the attention span) would settle Riverrun's surrender while the rest of the Lannister force wheels around to defend King's Landing. Certainly risky, but if you are faced with wars against multiple opponents, acting early to eliminate and secure one of your flanks is not incompetent.

While Tywin does let his emotional smallness lead him to strategic disaster, this blunder was more on Jaime. Tywin's big reckless move was his monumentally reckless idea of having Gregor Cleganr act as a deniable bandit in the hopes of an endless series of maybes to trade Eddard for Tyrion.

Now Tyrion is correct when he sits amazed at the Baratheon brothers' feud preventing them from uniting and crushing King's Landing while he is away. Renly's vanity essentially prevented the anti-Lannister forces from coalescing into a single coherent whole. Had Renly not declared, the Northmen-Riverlander forces would have not needed to declare between two kings and could have kept their war aims on avenging Eddard, rescuing his daughters (they don't know Arya is out and about yet), and paying back the Lannisters for burning the Riverlands. Stannis could have confirmed Joffrey's illegitimacy which neatly sidesteps the idea of the Iron Throne attacking the Riverlands as a royal action, and indemnities could have been settled through seizure of Lannister assets.

But Renly had to be king, so we're left with Tywin skating out of his mistakes, until his serial abuse of Tyrion catches up to him in a painfully karmic fashion.

Thanks for the question, Anon

Mel Brooks is probably my favorite comedian when it comes to making film. Kind of a boring pick given how legendary he is, but he's legendary for a reason. The world will be poorer when we lose him.

It was probably the result of jamming that sent the drone of course, much the same thing that happened with the Ukrainian drones up in the Baltics.

While I'm all for the Article 5 meme button, the scale of the action to me suggests that what NATO should do is two-fold. One, they should increase their investment into a European c-UAV network with more fighter patrols and jammers (coordinating with Ukraine to ensure they're only jamming unfriendlies) and demand an indemnity and public apology for the people wounded. When Russia predictably refuses, levy firmer sanctions.

Thanks for the question, Cle.

Didn't watch it. I honestly didn't find Colbert all that funny in that sort of schtick, though he was a laugh riot as Phil Ken Sebbin. John Oliver was far funnier on Community than he was as a host of Last Week Tonight.

More the latter. He's putting more pressure on Cuba by drying up its fuel lifeline, but Cuba has been in a state of slow collapse since the fall of the Soviet Union and COVID basically lobbed a bomb onto the island. Since the Revolution, the Cuban economy always depended on cheap oil and grain imports from the Soviet Union and exporting overpriced sugar to the Eastern Bloc. Without them, Cuba was always going to be short on food, clean water, and energy, and as such, a country on life support. Venezuela could keep it afloat with oil, but it was also collapsing due to its own self-inflicted economic ruin.

Thanks for the question, Cle.

Given Trump's approval rating and his push to monopolize candidates in the GOP, no, I think the Dems are still going to take the House.

The Senate is much harder, and the Dems nominating Platner is certainly not going to win over independents in Maine - and while Tallarico has better odds against serial embezzeler and overall piece of shit Ken Paxton over John Cornyn, he's almost certainly not going to win unless a lot of Republican voters simply stay home on election day.

Thanks for the question, Anon.

I give it worse-than-even odds. Between extreme economic dysfunction and constantly hemorrhaging their best and brightest to migration for economic opportunity, and the tepid support of Russia and China, two of the world's most unreliable senior partners, I think Cuba is likely to crack.

Not that I'm going to mourn them. Cuba's economic dysfunction is their fault.

Thanks for the question, Cle.

Not yet.

Perhaps the most brazen act of corruption in a Presidency full to bursting with them.

Thanks for the question, Anon.

That sounds really interesting. Do you have a link to it?

I never finished it. I had worked on it off-and-on, but I always ended up working on other projects. Once Professor Attewell passed on, I guess it just felt...too late I guess.

The basic premise was that this was a cousin of the ruling Queen Arryn, a talented knight and general who had the fortune of fighting for or against most of the petty kings of Westeros at one point or another. Half Arryn, half Durrendon, he was "the picture of knightly courtesy, yet always under him raged the storm, eager to get out." The Worthless War featured prominently, with his legendary rivalry against Prince Joros Stark. He also dealt with a peasant rebellion in the Dornish Marches, fought as a mercenary under Lady Lanna Lannister against the Greyirons, and founded House Arryn of Gulltown.

It was a lot of fun to sketch out, especially the parts where almost all of his victories were undercut out from under him. Victory without satisfaction.

Thanks for the question, Anon.

The right to crenellate would cover significant expansions, especially if they were fortified. You might be able to sell minor expansions as part of normal repairs and renovations due to weak soil or weather susceptibility. As always with feudalism, the political is personal. You may be able to sell the need to build a wall higher because the walls were built 200 years ago and trebuchets are better since then - but if you're good with the king, you could probably just receive a license to crenellate instead and not worry about the cut-and-thrust.

Thanks for the question, Anon.