Russia is seizing hundreds of commercial jets owned by US and European leasing companies, a further sign of the challenges the country's airline industry faces due to sanctions following its invasion of Ukraine.
  • pingveno@lemmy.ml
    95·
    3 years ago

    I hope this doesn’t lead to poorly maintained planes falling out of the sky on a regular basis. We have already seen what an embargo can do to the vehicle situation in Cuba, where most cars are decades old. While a jet can last, it needs those parts. It would be horrible for a jet full of people to suffer for the ambitions of their leaders.

    • ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆@lemmy.mlOP
      138·
      3 years ago

      I’m sure a nuclear superpower that’s one of the few countries that can launch stuff into space can figure out how to keep planes running. People in the west seem to have a profound misunderstanding of the technological capabilities in Russia.

      Meanwhile, the last time planes full of people were falling out of the sky was when Boeing rolled out their new planes.

      • DPUGT2@lemmy.ml
        82·
        3 years ago

        Russia’s problem has never been “figuring out how”. It is a nation full of world-class scientists and geniuses.

        Russia’s problem (and the USSR before it) has always been to manufacture goods in the quantity and quality needed for mass produced consumer goods and a robust economy. They’ve never seemed to be able to do that.

        The good news is that one problem solves the other. Who will be able to afford to fly on jets they can’t maintain when their economy finishes imploding?

        • ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆@lemmy.mlOP
          95·
          3 years ago

          It’s important to keep in mind that USSR never had a chance to develop peacefully. It got invaded in 1918, then it was plunged into WW2 a couple of decades later, and after that the Cold War. USSR was completely devastated during the war, while US emerged unscathed with a huge booming economy. The combined west had much greater resources, and this allowed the west to drag USSR into an arms race that was a huge drain on its resources.

          If USSR could’ve devoted all the effort that was put into keeping up with the west militarily into domestic development, amazing things could’ve been achieved.

          • DPUGT2@lemmy.ml
            32·
            3 years ago

            It’s important to keep in mind that USSR never had a chance to develop peacefully.

            This isn’t about assigning blame, not for me. Yes, they did get a shit deal. Hobbled at first by the sort of royalty/nobility like out of some fucked up fairy tale right until and even into the 20th century, then almost nonstop warfare. For all the lack of fighting, even the cold war was nearly as bad.

            Though I am not generally sympathetic to communism, I wince to think what might have happen if they had no developed nuclear weapons. But that cost dearly.

            They had a shit hand.

            If USSR could’ve devoted all the effort that was put into keeping up with the west militarily into domestic development, amazing things could’ve been achieved.

            Possibly. Or they could have squandered it. Even if a person accepts that communism and marxism is a legitimate political ideology and in the right circumstances can flourish, it can also fail… and fail without any deliberate sabotage or harsh misfortune.

            The funny thought is that, had they succeeded peacefully, that might have been most threatening of all.

            • ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆@lemmy.mlOP
              52·
              3 years ago

              Thing is that even with all the external pressures, USSR managed to provide a good standard of living for the the people. Personally, I remember my time growing up in USSR very fondly and I think I had a far better childhood than most kids growing up today. Everybody had housing, food, healthcare and education. Everyone had a job guarantee without any grind and with over 20 days vacation. Nobody worried about losing their job and ending or on the street or not being able to retire in dignity. Life wasn’t opulent, but it wasn’t bad either, and after 30 years of capitalism it got significantly worse for the vast majority of the population in former USSR republics.

              I think that the threat of a good example is precisely why capitalist nations are so hostile to any socialist experiments. Not a single socialist country has ever been allowed to develop free from threat of invasion, coups, or economic warfare.

          • Julianus@lemmy.ml
            413·
            3 years ago

            If they hadn’t been saddled with a monster like Stalin. Also, if they’d followed their own path. Rather than trying to force a moon landing, when they lacked the computers to coordinate many small rockets, as SpaceX can do today. Or dropping all their plans to copy the Space Shuttle with Buran, which they didn’t even use anyway. The USSR was always too occupied with image over substance and you can see a direct line of that in Putin today.

              • Julianus@lemmy.ml
                37·
                3 years ago

                From Wikipedea: “Buran completed one uncrewed spaceflight in 1988, and was destroyed in the 2002 collapse of its storage hangar.”

                Reminds me of the fate of the Admiral Kuznetsov. A pattern of neglect.

                • ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆@lemmy.mlOP
                  108·
                  3 years ago

                  The program was abandoned because Russia went through hell in the 90s that was engineered by the west. Hateful westerners like you are precisely what gave rise to Putin. Now you get to reap what you sowed. Enjoy.

      • mekhos@lemmy.ml
        6·
        3 years ago

        Russia has some amazing technical capabilities and brilliant engineers, the question is not going to be how to do it - the question is going to be how to afford to do it.

      • Julianus@lemmy.ml
        69·
        3 years ago

        They aren’t a superpower. This would imply the ability to project power across the planet. And right now, Russia is struggling at the ends of it’s own rail lines. And how many aircraft carriers do they have? Zero.

        They are nuclear armed, but I doubt if they can maintain 1% of their arsenal given the corruption and neglect evident in the rest of their military. They do love blowing money researching old-fashioned “super weapons,” ala Hilter’s last days. But they can’t afford more than the demo model. Or the clean up when they splash isotopes all over their own lands when one blows up in testing. Meanwhile, America, the real superpower, is on to 21st century tech.