Discussion

'StravaLeaks': France's aircraft carrier located in real time by Le Monde through fitness app

teroshan: https://archive.is/jDMmD

paxys: Is an aircraft carrier's location supposed to be secret? Pretty hard to hide from a satellite I'd imagine.

ImPostingOnHN: Many countries do not have ready access to satellite imagery, much less realtime satellite imagery. Iran, for example.

mmooss: > Pretty hard to hide from a satellite I'd imagine.At one time I guessed that too, but I've heard navy people explain that it's actually pretty effective. Imagine saying 'pretty hard to hide in North America from a satellite' - it's actually not hard because the area is so large; there aren't live images of the entire area and someone needs to examine them. Oceans are an order of magnitude larger.A significant element of security for naval ships is hiding in the ocean. US aircraft carrier planes have a ~500 mi effective radius without refueling; even if you see a plane, all you know is that the ship might be in a ~3,142 square mile area. And remember that to target them, you need a precise target and the ships tend to be moving.With ML image recognition at least some of that security is lost. Also, the Mediterranean is smaller than the oceans, but the precision issue applies. And we might guess that countries keep critical areas under constant surveillance - e.g., I doubt anything sails near the Taiwan Strait without many countries having a live picture.

orian: Maybe it was just an old stupid treason? Someone against the war and… hard to believe there are no rules about location.

FridayoLeary: Unrelated but the UK has 2 aircraft carriers (but not enough planes, but that's for a different time). Why aren't they being deployed? this war is literally the reason why they were built. It's not a declaration of war to project your military power to a region you have an interest in. But of course our navy is a laughingstock, taking a full week to deploy a solitary destroyer while our bases are under attack. (and the US basically broadcast their intentions months in advance). Meanwhile the straight of Hormuz needs defending and that is also something that's very much in the UKs interest as its continued closure is costing our economy. I'm confused what the logic is.

rcxdude: I think the international community is demonstrating to the US that they can't drop their military support for their allies and also expect that they still help to clean up their messes.

hollerith: >Is an aircraft carrier's location supposed to be secret?Yes.

detaro: deploy and do what exactly? Get involved and potentially sacrifice a few UK soldiers to stroke Trumps ego? Sit around and look pretty? Having a carrier there doesn't magically make problems go away.

georgefrowny: As the UK chief of defense staff commented drily: "we have an aircraft carrier, it's called Cyprus".

FridayoLeary: I kind of understand that, although of course i completely disagree with their line of thinking. Iran is everyones problem and open conflict like this would have been hard to avoid down the road. Point is they had months to anticipate this latest conflict, why did they do absolutely nothing to mitigate this? Why was the UK apparently completely unprepared? Europe's economy is suffering, more then America. Why do we even bother with a Navy if we don't wan't to use it?Also what military support did they drop exactly? Ukraine isn't part of NATO, and the US has been carrying 90% of NATO since forever. I will point out that it was the US, through a combination of bombing and diplomacy that got rid of the Houthi threat to shipping. Nobody else succeeded.

Totoradio: True, but think about the reverse: being able to flag a strava user as being part of the french navy can be valuable too

paxys: Iran is being fed intelligence by Russia, so they definitely have that info.

giarc: I don't know about Strava, but my Apple Watch will detect when I'm going on a walk or a bike ride and ask if I want to track it. I just instinctively say yes. Strava might do the same and so it could just be habit for the sailor and a dumb mistake.

blitzar: > this warThere is no war; there is a speical military operation, an excursion or a preemptive retaliatory defensive strike.

Theodores: Maybe it was fake. Someone with a water-borne drone and Starlink could spoof it, in order to throw those pesky Iranians off the scent. Unless you were on the aircraft carrier, had satellite imagery or could physically see it, it would be hard to prove that it was a fake. Any attempt at debunking would meet fierce resistance from Strava bros.

Maken: How is Iran anyone but Israel and USA's problem?

4fterd4rk: Many of the threats to a carrier aren’t nation states with a constellation of satellites.

snowwrestler: You can buy satellite imaging.Operationally, navies with carriers assume that opponents know where they are.

ImPostingOnHN: Generally, the one who causes the problem should fix it. Especially when the problem they caused is hurting their friends.It takes a really good friend to not only accept and forgive the hurt caused, but to help fix the problem, too. Usually an apology from the problem-causer must come first.I think what we're seeing is that the USA has un-good-friended so many countries that it has no good friends left with the military capabilities to help. It has allies maybe, but nobody who would do such a favor after being victimized by the asker and the problems they caused, without even so much as an apology.It certainly doesn't help that the USA is asking for help, but probably wants to boss around anybody who volunteers, and it is doing none of the work itself. Sounds like a toxic team.

Jensson: They fund terrorism in the countries around them, all the neighboring countries there hates Iran. That is why they aren't really angry that USA is bombing Iran.

marcosdumay: NATO countries need to keep their military close to the Noth Atlantic to protect Greenland from recent unexpected threats.

lm28469: > It's not a declaration of war to project your military power to a region you have an interest in.There was no declaration of war by anyone so far, and I doubt Iran would wait for an official letter telling them they're allowed to sink a US allied carrier, especially now that they killed the leader's wife, son, dad, and a bunch of relatives (plus the only dude who the US could reasonably negotiate with)

Theodores: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declaration_of_warNobody declares war these days. It is always going to be some type of 'special military operation' at best.Declaring war implies sticking to the rules. Decapitation strikes on the leadership with side portions of schools getting bombed would be considered illegal if war had been formally declared. Equally, having cluster munitions rain down from the sky over populated cities is also not exactly morally correct.Rules makes war a sport of sorts, it might as well be boxing where you are not supposed to bite ears or punch below the belt. Yet, if you came under assault and needed to defend yourself, then a bite to the ear or a kick in the balls might make sense at the time.

astrobe_: It's pretty hard to hide it from anything. Its surface is ~17000 m² (a tennis court is ~260 m²), and is 75 m high (~ 25 floors building - probably half of it under water, but still). And that's a mid-sized carrier according to Wikipedia.It's not built for hiding at all, that's what submarines are for (and that's where our nukes are).

lm28469: > Iran is everyones problemIt was at best a regional problem until the US and israel decided to fuck things up and make it a global problem, they didn't have nukes, they were not building nukes, even if they had nukes they would not have used them for anything other than extinction level threats, so just like israel, everyone is OK with them having nukes despite being the same type of religious nutjob thecracy, strange. Iranians are very rational when it comes to escalation, more so than israel.> Ukraine isn't part of NATO, and the US has been carrying 90% of NATO since foreverYeah idk, maybe don't put cia bases there then? And maybe don't antagonize russia for decades and act surprised when they act like enemies.You won't catch me defending Russia or Iran but get the fuck out of here with the "the US are the good guys and we're doing god's work by wiping out evil regimes" rhetoric lmao> Nobody else succeeded.Yes because that's the only thing they know and understand, bombs, if the problem cannot be solved with bombs they're useless

Jensson: > even if they had nukes they would not have used them for anything other than extinction level threatsI'd agree for just about any other country, but Iran have a terrorist regime that is funding terrorists everywhere. They are not like Pakistan or North Korea etc, Iran is crazy and doesn't follow normal international norms.Even Russia and Ukraine doesn't bomb third party countries in war just for supporting the other side, that is a crazy stupid thing to do and any country behaving like that should never ever have nukes.

BigTTYGothGF: The US has been funding terrorists for longer than the current state of Iran (or even its predecessor) has been around: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27état#Uni... and we still haven't nuked anybody in anger since 1945.

lm28469: > deploy and do what exactly?To get sunk by a $20k drone, the most likely outcome at that point

Jensson: How would a drone sink a carrier? If Iran could do that they would already have sunk the American carriers.The risk at the straights aren't drones but torpedoes and mines and attack boats.

lm28469: > How would a drone sink a carrier?Ask Ukraine, they've been sinking russian warships left and right, even in their own ports

lm28469: > Even Russia and Ukraine doesn't bomb third party countriesThird party to who? they all host US bases lmao, a country which just attacked them without declaring war, pearl harbor style, without congress approval, against all kind of international laws, because israel was going in anyways (according to Rubio) for their holy warStop drinking the kool aid and plug in your brain, it's way more nuanced than you're lead to believe. No one is "crazy", they all have very rational reasons for what they're doing, the fact that you don't even try to understand them doesn't mean they don't exist.