"Russia Resurgent?" Topic

Well, with this latest admission, seems like Russia has more than enough resources to fund an updated army, navy, and air force:

link

A gazillion carats of diamonds is probably more than enough to help significantly with that, assuming the price doesn't fall to $10 USD a carat, or less.

Apparently, they're also two times as hard as normal diamonds, which might make those others sell seem a bit like quartz.

Interestingly, the De Beers diamond cartel is strangely quiet on the subject.

Why does this seem like the theme of a new Bond movie?

Diamonds haven't been rare or special since they opened the mining fields in Africa, it's just a massive marketing trick pulled by De Beers.

The high quality stones for jewellery generate some cash, but industrial diamonds are relatively cheap. Still the Russian supply is probably going to kill the synthetic diamond industry if they can mine it cheaply enough.

Industrial diamonds are different then what idiots buy for jewelry. Plus we are talking about an impact crater 62 miles across. Sure you will get a higher concentrtion per ton, but that is a lot of earth to move still. The Russians have known about this find for long time and havent figured out a way to get them out of the ground yet.

There has got to be a SciFi movie based on this.

Vince

I see a satellite, with diamonds on its wings…and a "laser".

What Doug and Patrick said.

Rarity is 1 carat plus finished diamonds of flawless or near flawless quality. Everything else is DeBeers shill and pulling the wool over the eyes of the public.

As an aside, there are some extremely high quality man made diamonds out there. diamondnexuslabs.com is one company I have kept my eyes on. There are others too. Wish I had known about them prior to purchasing my wife's engagement ring ;-)

However, the Russian army, navy, and air force have fallen so far behind it will take decades to get back up to speed. Their pilots barely fly, most ships can't even make it out of port, the army has mothballed most of their armor, training has slipped to an all time low, and they have had very few large scale operational exercises.

Good points Aegis, not to mention they make large use of contracted soldiers (ie. Mercs) of dubious quality.

Well, we did go over the 120 hours/year levels (I believe the minimum level nessesary to keep pilot skills is 80 hours), we do have actual field exercises and we are getting new equipment.
Sure we cannot be compared to the (good old) soviet times, but it is much better than 90s (or present day Ukraine he he), so it is improving.

However, the Russian army, navy, and air force have fallen so far behind it will take decades to get back up to speed. Their pilots barely fly, most ships can't even make it out of port, the army has mothballed most of their armor, training has slipped to an all time low, and they have had very few large scale operational exercises.

That is not entirely true anymore. The Russians have been able to profit greatly on the run up in oil prices, and they finally got their act together as far as selling it to the rest of the world for cash. High oil prices are part of the reason that Putin has been particularly frisky and taking jabs at the West.

Tosh! They're Russians: they park their tanks in forests without guards, their ships are rotting in port, and they are still killing their recruits with neglect.

Resurgent? Not yet.

Good call Killer Woobie!!

Kerplokistan….

Russian arms sales are facing competition from the Chinese who have decided to mimic 'Western' sales techniques. It's not perfect, but makes them seem much friendlier and professional than the Russian approach.

They've been telling me that Russia is modernising since Peter the Great – I'll believe it when they get there.