Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => The O' Club => Topic started by: Boroda on October 03, 2007, 08:38:15 PM
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Beep-beep.
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Sputnik (http://history.nasa.gov/sputnik/) stunned the world
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:rolleyes:
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I hear it made quite an impression back in the day......Hey, inside every russian is a american just begging to escape :aok
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Happy Birthday Boroda!
What????
:confused:
Mac
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(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/be/Sputnik_asm.jpg/732px-Sputnik_asm.jpg)
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The United States sees your Sputnik and raise you:
(http://www.kidport.com/RefLib/Science/MoonLanding/Images/MoonLanding.jpg)
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Beep-beep? I thought this was a Roadrunner thread. :D
Oh, that's right, you soon put Wily Coyote in orbit.
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Originally posted by Masherbrum
The United States sees your Sputnik and raise you:
(http://www.kidport.com/RefLib/Science/MoonLanding/Images/MoonLanding.jpg)
Hollywood Studios?
j/k
:p
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Originally posted by Masherbrum
The United States sees your Sputnik and raise you:
(http://www.kidport.com/RefLib/Science/MoonLanding/Images/MoonLanding.jpg)
Better get a band-aid on that hurt national pride of yours.
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Originally posted by Boroda
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/be/Sputnik_asm.jpg/732px-Sputnik_asm.jpg)
Filmed in Stalinwood studios. :p
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Sputnik was actually the idea of one man and one man alone. He only recently received praise for it. The russians were stunned at the reaction of the world.
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Originally posted by Viking
Better get a band-aid on that hurt national pride of yours.
Yup, seeing the flag of Norway being planted on the moon first hurt really bad.
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http://www.ksl.com/?nid=169&sid=1893019
According to one of the scientists on the project, Sputnik 1 came about not because of any Soviet desire to beat the US into space, but because they were looking to test out a rocket designed to deliver a military payload.
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Originally posted by MiloMorai
http://www.ksl.com/?nid=169&sid=1893019
According to one of the scientists on the project, Sputnik 1 came about not because of any Soviet desire to beat the US into space, but because they were looking to test out a rocket designed to deliver a military payload.
No. R-7 was already tested as a nuke delivery system that time. And Sputnik was a test of R-7 possibilities as a particular orbit injector and sure, a test of radio-transmitting ability.
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Originally posted by Estel
No. R-7 was already tested as a nuke delivery system that time. And Sputnik was a test of R-7 possibilities as a particular orbit injector and sure, a test of radio-transmitting ability.
I don't know the exact engine name of the R-7 rocket but I think R-7's engines are still used on Soyuz flights.
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Originally posted by MiloMorai
http://www.ksl.com/?nid=169&sid=1893019
According to one of the scientists on the project, Sputnik 1 came about not because of any Soviet desire to beat the US into space, but because they were looking to test out a rocket designed to deliver a military payload.
Ya think?
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Originally posted by Boroda
Beep-beep.
And of course it was built with Technology and Plans stolen from the USA
:rofl :rofl :rofl :rofl :rofl
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Originally posted by 1K3
I don't know the exact engine name of the R-7 rocket but I think R-7's engines are still used on Soyuz flights.
Soyuz is an R-7 fitted with a third stage. BTW, US still uses Atlas launchers, same first generation liquid-fueled ICBM.
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Originally posted by Boroda
Beep-beep.
And here for sale are 400,000$ (old price 15,000$) 'sputnik' salad bowls.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/03/science/03collector.html?pagewanted=1&_r=3
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Originally posted by Boroda
Soyuz is an R-7 fitted with a third stage. BTW, US still uses Atlas launchers, same first generation liquid-fueled ICBM.
The present Atlas is third or fourth generation.
Atlas V uses (how's this for irony?) a Russian-designed RD-180 main engine and Aerojet-made solid boosters.
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Originally posted by Viking
Better get a band-aid on that hurt national pride of yours.
How's that Gsholz? Have another drink.
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The Soviet accomplishments with Sputnik and Gagarin shouldn't be downplayed. Set the national pride aside for a thread.
Great accomplishment.
Charon
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interesting to wonder how much the russians and the US could have accomplished and sooner if they had worked together instead f fighting the cold war
But If it hadnt have been for the cold war neither side would have probably accomplished anything at all
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Originally posted by Charon
The Soviet accomplishments with Sputnik and Gagarin shouldn't be downplayed. Set the national pride aside for a thread.
Great accomplishment.
Charon
I'm sure Boroda has finally "changed" and................Yeah right.
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I'm sure Boroda has finally "changed" and................Yeah right.
So what? The Soviets orbited a satellite when ours were cooking off on the launch pad like roman candles. Was kind of a pisser at the time, bordering on national hysteria.
In fact, the moon landings were a direct response to that hysteria. A GREAT catchup to be sure, but reactive none the less.
Charon
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<
Explorer I's small package of instruments produced the first major discovery of the Space Age—The Van Allen radiation belts surrounding the Earth. Explorer I burned up in the atmosphere on March 30, 1970.>>
wile the russians were trying to put onto orbit a small basket ball sized satellite that could only go beep beep beep the US was building a bigger satellite that would actually do something.
so the russians were first with the least by four months.
:lol
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sputnik 2 (http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/tmp/1957-002A.html)
1st living being into space
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Originally posted by john9001
<
Explorer I's small package of instruments produced the first major discovery of the Space Age—The Van Allen radiation belts surrounding the Earth. Explorer I burned up in the atmosphere on March 30, 1970.>>
wile the russians were trying to put onto orbit a small basket ball sized satellite that could only go beep beep beep the US was building a bigger satellite that would actually do something.
so the russians were first with the least by four months.
:lol
Let me quote this so you will not edit retarded remarks. (See Raider14's link)
Anyhow, I'll drink tonight to this event.
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wile the russians were trying to put onto orbit a small basket ball sized satellite that could only go beep beep beep the US was building a bigger satellite that would actually do something.
so the russians were first with the least by four months.
Sputnik was a far heavier satellite. Explorer was the smallest thing that could be called a satellite that could still make orbit. Soviet rockets were far ahead in throw weight as well as reliability at the time. Explorer weighed 18 pounds. Sputnik 186 pounds and two years later the same R-7 launch vehicle with some minor improvements was deployed carrying a 2.4 Mt warhead that could hit all of Europe and parts of the US. The reason for the hysteria.
Charon
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I would wish the Soviet Union a well deserved "Happy Birthday!!" on this the anniversary of a truly momentous occasion in human history...but, you know...
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Sputnik was there first. The first mammal was launched by the USSR as well. Then the first astronaut. Okay.
But the lead of the USSR was maybe better shown with the incredible Luna missions, - the back side of the moon, the first moon material retrival etc.
Sure the USA caught up and took the lead, but Sputnik was still a big step.
So happy anneversary Sputnik!
BTW, the Japanese have just launched a sattelite into moon orbit.
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Originally posted by DREDIOCK
interesting to wonder how much the russians and the US could have accomplished and sooner if they had worked together instead f fighting the cold war
But If it hadnt have been for the cold war neither side would have probably accomplished anything at all
Hmmm. Interesting question. If to imagine, that we worked together..... I don't think, that Sputnik would be launched sooner. It's because of the concurence. That time, when USA got Verner fon Braun, USSR was forced to use Korolev's methods. And Sputnik was fully his idea. Like R-7. And if both sides would be based on fon Braun's technology, this could make the whole work if not fully fatal, but very slow. For now, we know that some of fon Braun's technologies, inherited from V-1 and V-2 projects were wrong. But that time, nobody knows about it. So Korolev was free of that errors and possibility of clean and succesful launch was raised in times.
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The greatest lead in space technology the Russians made was that of robotic spacecraft. While NASA was striving to surpass the embarrassing lead the Russians had in manned space fight the Russians had correctly predicted the the future of space exploration will be dominated by robotic space craft. Thus the Russians were the first to land on the Moon and retrieve lunar materials ... not with manned space craft, but with robotic space craft.
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Congrats Russia, that must have been very exciting times.
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no doubt... their nazis were better than our nazis for quite a while. They treated their worse tho.
lazs
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Originally posted by lazs2
no doubt... their nazis were better than our nazis for quite a while. They treated their worse tho.
You are a master of generalization. If American engineers failed and had to turn to military criminals as chief designers - it doesn't mean that other nations did so.
R-7 was indeed a successor of German missiles, but it took Korolyov's genius to combine German rocket engine technology of the 40s, American "stressed shell" technology of the 30s and railway automation from the 20s. R-7 variants are still the cheapest and most reliable mass-produced launch vehicles.
Korolyov indeed persuaded the military to use R-7 as a satellite launcher, and he developed a super-heavy ICBM having space flight in mind. He really made a useless ICBM (launch preparation - 24 hours, launched from a table, only like half-dozen launch positions built in Baikonur, Kap. Yar and then Plesetsk), but a great launch vehicle. Compare it to American Redstone missiles used before Atlas became operational, they look like pencils :)
What amazes me is that he had enough imagination to even think of artificial satellite as of a possible and necessary thing. And could persuade the military to spend precious missiles for "useless toys". Khruschev said that we make missiles on conveyor "like sausages", but it was just a giant bluff.
IMHO if a first satellite was launched by the US - it could never draw so much attention and maybe just became another useless toy made for the International Geophysical Year. Suddenly Evil Russians made something so technologically advanced that couldn't be beaten by the so-called "free world". Without Cold War the Space Race was impossible. A pure example of how propaganda drives real politics and engineering, and it was good! ;)
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Originally posted by Viking
The greatest lead in space technology the Russians made was that of robotic spacecraft. While NASA was striving to surpass the embarrassing lead the Russians had in manned space fight the Russians had correctly predicted the the future of space exploration will be dominated by robotic space craft. Thus the Russians were the first to land on the Moon and retrieve lunar materials ... not with manned space craft, but with robotic space craft.
lol, they forgot to plant a flag there...
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Originally posted by Boroda
Suddenly Evil Russians made something so technologically advanced that couldn't be beaten by the so-called "free world".
beep beep beep. :lol
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Originally posted by 1K3
lol, they forgot to plant a flag there...
Soviet flag was on the Moon 10 years before "the Eagle has landed".
With all possible respect to Apollo crews, the whole effort and ingenuity of American engineers - you have to admit that it was a giant adventure, and it's pure luck that it killed only three astronauts. Apollo crews were the real heroes.
There was an opportunity to reach the Moon using Proton launcher, but it wasn't reliable enough for manned flight by Soviet standards. Cosmonauts including Leonov and Gagarin wrote a petition to Politburo saying they want to try even if there's only a 1/10th chance of survival, but "Evil Soviet Regime" (tm) refused.
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boroda, how many Cosmonauts died in your space program, can you tell us or is it still a state secret?
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Originally posted by Boroda
Soviet flag was on the Moon 10 years before "the Eagle has landed".
The first soft landing on the Moon was Jan. 31, 1966 Luna-9.
July 20, 1969 - Jan 31 1966 < 10 years... more like 3
Of course Luna-2 impacted the moon on Sept. 12, 1959 but can you really say an impact at 2670 m/s is planting a flag, since they were metal pennants, not flags, and I doubt they are in pristine condition once the dust settled some 145 km distant.
(http://content.answers.com/main/content/wp/en/8/8c/Luna_2_Pennants.jpg)
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http://www.streamphoto.ru/users/Sputnik50/222295
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The Soviet program suffered various incidents and set-backs.
The Soviet space program was tied to the central planning of the USSR's five year plans. This made it difficult for the Chief Designers to respond in 1961 to the US launching a crash program for a manned lunar landing as the next five year plan would not start until 1964. Centralised planning and the concentration on production targets also made it difficult for middle management and engineers to highlight defects in equipment leading to poor quality control.
The Soviet space program produced the first cosmonaut fatality on March 23, 1961 when Valentin Bondarenko died in a fire within a low pressure, high oxygen atmosphere.
The Voskhod program was cancelled after two manned flights due to the change of Soviet leadership and the near fatality of the second mission. Had the planned further flights gone ahead they could have given the Soviet space program further 'firsts' including a long duration flight of 20 days, a spacewalk by a woman and an untethered spacewalk.
The deaths of Korolyov, Komarov (in the Soyuz 1 crash) and Gagarin (on routine fighter jet mission) within two years of each other understandably made some negative impact on the Soviet program.
The Soviets continued striving for the first lunar mission with the huge N-1 rocket which exploded on each of four unmanned tests. The Americans won the race to land on the moon with Apollo 11 in July, 1969.
On April 5, 1975, the second stage of a Soyuz rocket carrying 2 cosmonauts to the Salyut 4 space station malfunctioned, resulting in the first manned launch abort. The cosmonauts were carried several thousand miles downrange and became worried that they would land in China, which the Soviet Union was then having difficult relations with. The capsule hit a mountain, sliding down a slope and almost slid off a cliff; fortunately the parachute lines snagged on trees and kept this from happening. As it was, the two suffered severe injuries and the commander, Lazerev, never flew again.
On March 18, 1980 a Vostok rocket exploded on its launch pad during a fueling operation killing 48 people.
In the summer of 1981 Kosmos-434, which had been launched in 1971, was about to re-enter. To allay fears that the spacecraft carried nuclear materials, a spokesperson from the USSR Ministry of Foreign Affairs assured the Australian government on August 26, 1981 that the satellite was "an experimental lunar cabin". This was one of the first admissions by the Soviet Union that it had ever engaged in a manned lunar spaceflight program.[1]
In September 1983, a Soyuz rocket being launched to carry cosmonauts to the Salyut 7 space station exploded on the pad, causing the Soyuz capsule's abort system to engage, saving the two cosmonauts on board.
The Soviet space program produced the Space Shuttle Buran based on the Energia launcher. Energia would be used as the base for a manned Mars mission. Buran was intended to operate in support of large space based military platforms as a response first to the US Space Shuttle and then the Strategic Defense Initiative. By the time the system was operational, in 1988, strategic arms reduction treaties and the end of the Cold War made Buran redundant. Several vehicles were built, but only one flew an unmanned test flight; it was found too expensive to operate as a civilian launcher.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_space_program
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Since they got that far while being hampered by their system, - it only emphasizes the brilliancy of their achivements IMHO.
And the Luna projects, being able to retrive moon material to the earth in the 60's through RC/robotics is just stunning.
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probes and satelites are fine but for sheer brillance and of course the fantastic entertainment value nothing nothing tops the apollo programme. glad i was around during that period to witness it.
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Aye that is true. The whole world was holding it's breath so to speak.
I will never forget the excitement around the first moon landing.
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Why did the Soviet Union lose the Moon Race? - www.astronautix.com (http://www.astronautix.com/articles/whynrace.htm)
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Originally posted by Viking
Better get a band-aid on that hurt national pride of yours.
Better than living in Norway and have nothing to be proud of.
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Originally posted by Dago
Better than living in Norway and have nothing to be proud of.
If a place where you live is the only thing to be proud of - then I pity you.
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Originally posted by Sombra
Why did the Soviet Union lose the Moon Race? - www.astronautix.com (http://www.astronautix.com/articles/whynrace.htm)
It's all much simplier. We didn't have unlimited resources like "blue" side.
One of the reasons of the USSR's collapse was inability to spend vital resources on propaganda purposes. And leadership didn't understand that one rouble spent on propaganda payed 10 times.
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Originally posted by Boroda
It's all much simplier. We didn't have unlimited resources like "blue" side.
One of the reasons of the USSR's collapse was inability to spend vital resources on propaganda purposes. And leadership didn't understand that one rouble spent on propaganda payed 10 times.
:rofl :rofl :rofl
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Originally posted by Boroda
It's all much simplier. We didn't have unlimited resources like "blue" side.
One of the reasons of the USSR's collapse was the overspending of vital resources on propaganda purposes. And leadership didn't understand that government is the overhead of a market driven economy and it should be as small as possible.
There... better... and something for the USA to consider as well.
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"beep beep"
pah!
inside every rocket & satelitte is a small (c) by von Braun :D
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inside every rocket & satellite is a small (c) by von Braun
I think thats right underneath the Goddard (TM) :)
Where satellites are concerned big props to my man, Arthur C. Clarke!
Charon
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hell boroda.. you built walls around your country to keep people in.
Did you really think that was gonna work?
lazs
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Originally posted by lazs2
hell boroda.. you built walls around your country to keep people in.
Did you really think that was gonna work?
lazs
Why lazs, haven't you heard, people are flooding Russian embassies worldwide begging for visas to live in the great Russian workers paradise? :rofl
:rofl
:rofl
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Originally posted by Dago
Why lazs, haven't you heard, people are flooding Russian embassies worldwide begging for visas to live in the great Russian workers paradise? :rofl
As I said - Soviet propaganda sucked.
I am sure that 95% of people on this board will prefer Soviet society to anything else.
In the 5% left I see people like Lazs. In total population count I think 99% is a better estimation.
Holden, "market driven economy" is a myth for people who can't read. Now our government is 5 times bigger then it was in Soviet times, if you include Party officials in Soviet government. It's called "capitalism".
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Originally posted by Boroda
Holden, "market driven economy" is a myth for people who can't read. Now our government is 5 times bigger then it was in Soviet times, if you include Party officials in Soviet government. It's called "capitalism".
Don't mistake government bloat for an economic system.
Governments are able to bloat under captialism by stealing from those who actually produce something.
If you rely on the government to actually do the producing, you get very little actually produced.
This is because goverments by their very nature are extremely inefficient due to inadequate to non-existent oversight and accountability. Therefore, they bloat under captialist systems and create unnecessary scarcity of resources under socialist systems.
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Originally posted by E25280
Don't mistake government bloat for an economic system.
Governments are able to bloat under captialism by stealing from those who actually produce something.
If you rely on the government to actually do the producing, you get very little actually produced.
This is because goverments by their very nature are extremely inefficient due to inadequate to non-existent oversight and accountability. Therefore, they bloat under captialist systems and create unnecessary scarcity of resources under socialist systems.
I have to say that I am one of the few who actually lived and worked under both systems. And I do have some background. Just enjoying reading books, you know.
History teaches us that no one learns from it. In 1916 Russian Military Department considered placing weapon orders in privately-owned companies. Test task was producing a gun-sight for 1891 three-line rifle (known in the West as Mosin-Nagant). Out of three companies two failed completely to produce anything, the third managed to present a gun-sight in iron, but it was so bad that it was absolutely useless.
At the same time Imperial government had a contract with American weapon factories for a million (!!!) rifles. They failed. I mean - not only failed to make a decent rifle designed in Russia (meaning it can be made in any bed-factory). They also got pre-payed and failed to produce it in ordered quantities. More to say: they got almost ruined, and were seriously thinking of selling themselves to Russian Military Ministry for debts.
Just imagine it: they got an order for a MILLION rifles, pre-payed, price was bigger then what Military Ministry spent on same rifles made in Sestroretsk or Tula, and, being a contemporary world's hi-tech smithery - they failed completely.
So it goes.
Capitalism works only when you got unnecessary resources. And even then it usually fails.
I wonder how much Redstones or Atlases were overpriced. Capitalism. (it's just a lame attempt to turn back to the original topic ;))
Who could even think of launching an obviously useless beeping ball under capitalism? A waste of money without any profit.
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Watching a 1972 movie called "Taming Fire". About Korolyov. http://imdb.com/title/tt0069434/
Kurchatov speaks. "Science have turned into an instrument of blackmailing. Look how far they have got. Do you still think they will mind moral?"...
If only I had Russian subtitles for this film - I'd spend some time translating it to English. You guys probably don't understand what huge layer of human culture you miss.
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"I am sure that 95% of people on this board will prefer Soviet society to anything else.
In the 5% left I see people like Lazs. In total population count I think 99% is a better estimation.
"
Huh?
So that's just going to leave Lazs and me :D No, just a minute. WHO ON THIS BOARD WOULD PREFER SOVIET SOCIETY TO ANYTHING ELSE???
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Originally posted by Boroda
At the same time Imperial government had a contract with American weapon factories for a million (!!!) rifles. They failed. I mean - not only failed to make a decent rifle designed in Russia (meaning it can be made in any bed-factory). They also got pre-payed and failed to produce it in ordered quantities. More to say: they got almost ruined, and were seriously thinking of selling themselves to Russian Military Ministry for debts.
The Russian Contract
Remington and Westinghouse Mosin Nagants were originally part of a contract with Imperial Russia for up to 1,500,000 rifles from Remington and 1,800,000 rifles from New England Westinghouse. The contract with Remington was dated November 3, 1916. Remington received a down payment of $7,500,000 from Russia with manufacture of rifles starting shortly after. In total there were only 769,520 New England Westinghouse rifles built and 750,000 Remington rifles built. Of the 750,000 Mosin-Nagant rifles manufactured by Remington, only 469,951 had been delivered to Russia by February 1917. In March of 1917, Nicholas II was forced to abdicate and the Provisional Kerensky Government took power. Remington and Westinghouse continued to build rifles during this time. Remington alone produced as many as 4000 rifles per day during November of 1917. The Kerensky government continued to accept deliveries from Remington and Westinghouse.
U.S. Army Training and National Guard Rifles
When Bolsheviks took power the U.S. contracts were cancelled. Remington and New England Westinghouse faced a terrible economic loss from both Russia defaulting on the balance of the weapons and because of the United States canceling the contracts due to not wanting to deliver weapons to the Bolsheviks. To save Rem-UMC and New England Westinghouse from bankruptcy the U.S. government purchase the most of the remaining, completed rifles at approximately $32 each. The majority of rifles purchased by the US were New England Westinghouse rifles. Most were used for military training purposes was given a temporary U.S. designation The U.S. Magazine Rifle calibre 7.62mm Model of 1916. The US made use of the American made M91s to train new Army recruits. US surcharged rifles were kept in the United States for SATC and other troop training; both the Colorado and the Alaska National Guard, to name a few, had to turn in their US rifles and were instead issued Mosins. Rifles were proofed and surcharged at a couple of US arsenals, many of them at Benicia Arsenal. Although most Mosin Nagant rifles that remained in the country were not surcharged but were given to the NRA after the war ended. Most were brand new when sold off by the NRA at $3.90 + $1.58 postage. The NRA was sold out of U.S. Mosins by 1929.
http://www.texastradingpost.com/militaria/usmosin.html
Nice twist to the truth Boroda.:D
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angus.. boroda is delusional about 95% wanting to live under soviet rule.. it is the bitterness and vodka talking... he is able to ignore in his mind the fact that they had to build walls to keep people in... he is stuck on the old commie line that "communism can work.. it just hasn't been done right yet"
It can't be done right. The whole idea goes against human nature (well... not against womans nature).
He does have a point tho.. you and I are very different.. you want a nanny... you also don't want quite as much as boroda thinks you want but... you, and maybe 95% of the people (he is correct I think on the numbers) do want a lot more socialism than really free people should.
You are more willing to trade security for freedom than the individualists here but not quite so far gone yet as boroda believes..
And why not? he has never felt real freedom. he has nothing to judge.. he sees his blizzards through the bottoms of vodka bottles.. all is grime and missery around him... He thinks that because all drive has been beaten out of the people around him that... it is a natural state.
lazs
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Well, while I am not as right winged as you are Lazs, I am far away from Boroda.
The commie regime was IMHO too much against human nature, - you needed a "new" human for it to work.
As for the "nanny" part, you'd be surprized to see how little freedom you need to sacrifice for a lot of security. And security in big steps is a kind of freedom.....
The commies had one thing good though. (apart from some interesting hardware etc). And that was crime control. The USSR of post-Stalin was not a totally bad place in many cases..........
(Now you're going to call me Boroda :D)
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Remington and Westinghouse Mosin Nagants
Those are fine rifles that are much sought after by collectors. No better or worse than the Izhevsk 91/30 I have in the safe today. As pointed out, the only failure was that of payment and it dammed near bankrupted the US companies.
As an aside, a number of surplus Westinghouse and Remington 91/30 were bought by Bannerman (a famous military surplus dealer of the time) and converted to 30.06. These are potentially dangerous, but only because of the conversion process. The .06 cartridge is much longer, and in reaming out the chamber it is likely that thinner parts of the barrel are now supporting the cartridge.
One of the commercial sales was to Bannerman’s, the great New York City military surplus house, which had the guns converted to fire the common .30-06 round; the rifles have the new caliber stamped on their actions. These guns can still be found but should NOT be fired: the conversions were not done to modern safety standards and these rifles are considered dangerous to shoot. Though interesting as collector’s items, they should be deactivated by removing the firing pin, or clipping the end off the firing pin, or by any other means to ensure that they cannot be fired by accident or design.
http://www.mosinnagant.net/USSR/US-Mosin-Nagants.asp
Charon
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Originally posted by Angus
The commies had one thing good though. (apart from some interesting hardware etc). And that was crime control. The USSR of post-Stalin was not a totally bad place in many cases..........
The last prisoners the Gulag system sentenced according the political paragraphs of the criminal code were quietly released in 1989.
1989 - 1952 = 37 years post Stalin
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Ah, forgot those "islands" However, life for a devoted commie wouldn't have to be that bad, while the life for a suspected commie in the USA in the times of McCarthy would not be too good. No Gulag though.
BTW, recently "visited" the former STASI hq in Dresden.
It was a house belonging to the great-granparents of my wife. A house in a nice neighbourhood, sited in the slopes above the Elbe, facing the core of Dresden.
Anyway, a whole row of houses (5 or so) belonged to the Stasi, with the USSR service (Putin they said) on the other side of the street.
The houses had been connected with a network of tunnels, so that basically Stasi personnel never walked the streets much on errands.
They were well fenced off with double fences and dogs between them. The barbed wire tilted INWARDS though!
There were movement sensors and floodlights, and the slope down to the Elbe (It's some piece of land) is covered with thorned scrub, - You will do some shredding if you try crossing there.
After the wall fell, and Stasi went under, the house has been abandoned. However, the awe was such that it was untouched for some 10 years. It now belongs to the former owners.
Imagine, all that Stasi stuff just in that city. Incredible!
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Originally posted by Angus
Ah, forgot those "islands" However, life for a devoted commie wouldn't have to be that bad, while the life for a suspected commie in the USA in the times of McCarthy would not be too good. No Gulag though.
"As long as you agree with me, you won't die in prison" balanced against "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it. "
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Well, the spirit of the McCatrthy's days were a tad more rough than that. "Suspected commie" position could give you a load of trouble. But not a slavecamp ticket ;)