The excerpt adarza commented likely explains it somewhat. Ships made shorter by cutting a section of the middle out & rejoining the ends. They probably both had the same modification around the same time, so reached a point of similar wear and (literal) tear at the same time. I’ll bet they forgot about their history and neglected to perform the more thorough integrity checks they required because of it.
To be fair, they’re not the only ones… *cough*Boeing*cough*
They don’t hand out guns like candy in the UK, unlike the US.
I would imagine they’re going to pursue similar deals with the other island nations in the area, then possibly start building military ties & bases.
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War is another major economy driver, so no - it would not “crush” their economy. If you think in the current Internet age the Chinese government can be organized against so easily that it’ll be overthrown by their own people, then you know so little about China that further discussion on this topic with you is a complete waste of time.
China’s MO is to antagonize. They keep pushing knowing that sooner or later some individual they’re antagonizing is going to fuck up and cross the line, and they’ll be able to go all in on a “response” while blaming the other side for starting it.
China’s government likes to play both sides against the middle. With a population the size of theirs, I wouldn’t be the least surprised if they were perfectly fine throwing a few people under the bus on this.
Yet, they can’t win an election. SMDH.
I wish I could only selectively see the seemingly fewer and fewer good things in life, but I’ve lived long enough to see how far downhill we’ve gone over the past handful of decades. It’s made even more depressing by the fact of having seen the root cause (mostly aggressive manipulation by the right wing eaten up by selfish masses) of what was an upward trajectory turned to shit needlessly in order to serve as a scoreboard to a pissing match for the ultra-domineering control freaks.
Even if climate change doesn’t make human life completely unbearable for humans on what’s left of the planet, it’s going to take too long to rebalance our living circumstances to see much hope for a good future for the masses. Especially as those at the top work so vociferously against the common interest.
Same playbook as Republicans: every accusation is a confession.
Agreed, but he disappeared well before the election.
I bet there’s still some FORTRAN in use at NASA/JPL.
Alternatively, I’m pretty sure key parts of Excel were written in x86 assembly. Dunno if that’s still true.