Bulletins and News Discussion from March 31st to April 6th, 2025 - Magnitude 7.7 Earthquake Hits Mandalay

Image of destruction in Mandalay, Myanmar, from Al Jazeera.

As if the ongoing civil war wasn't enough, Myanmar has now been struck by a very powerful earthquake, resulting in 2000 deaths and thousands more injured as of the time of writing. Estimates are that the death toll could reach 10,000. Infrastructure like roads and bridges are damaged, and the hospitals are overwhelmed. The earthquake struck during Eid prayers, resulting in even higher casualties as several mosques collapsed. 20 million people already required humanitarian assistance in Myanmar, and now the situation there will be even worse. International rescue teams have rushed into the country, and aid is being raised, though with USAID experiencing the... changes that it is, the United States will be of even more limited help than usual. So far, China has sent $14 million, while USAID has supplied $2 million. In Thailand, the death toll seems considerably lower, though there has still been significant damage; a skyscraper under construction collapsed in Bangkok.

Myanmar is located very close to the boundary between the Eurasian and Indian tectonic plates. In particular, the country is divided in two by the north-south oriented Sagaing fault. This fault is typically strike-slip; that is, each side of the fault moves horizontally past each other. The earthquake's depth was 10 kilometers, which is pretty shallow, and its proximity to the surface amplified the felt force of the earthquake. Additionally, the soft soil in this region tends to further amplify seismic waves through a process called liquefaction. Combine all this with the lackluster building codes due to many years of impoverishment and civil wars, and this explains why the death toll, and the expense to the country in general to repair damage, will probably be extremely high.

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Between this and stuff @MarmiteLover123@hexbear.net has been posting, the US is striking Iran like very soon, right?
- I would have guessed tomorrow, but it looks like they're not done moving equipment
- That first picture is what I posted about here the large military movement to Bahrain. It went under the radar, but NBC News confirmed my suspicions that at least part of this deployment is to move two Patriot batteries and a THAAD battery to the region.
  The Pentagon has moved an additional aircraft carrier and its attendant ships into the region, joining the USS Harry Truman carrier strike group already there. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has authorized at least two Patriot missile defense batteries from Asia to be moved to the Middle East, two U.S. officials and one defense official told NBC News.
  And in a move that suggests thoughts of a sustained campaign in the Middle East, NBC News has also learned from one U.S. official and another person familiar with the matter that defense officials have approved the relocation of a large missile system known as a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, or THAAD, a more complex effort.
  The other part of this airlift, I suspect, is to support the A-10 deployment from the National Guard to the region. I expand on my theory about the A-10s new role against fastboats and drones here, and commented on the new US warplans about new nuclear weapons for the extremely unlikely event of a nuclear strike here. I tracked Chief Kurilla's plane landing in Israel this morning, but didn't post about it. F-35As were already deployed over a week ago to the region, posted about that here.
  Will the USA strike Iran? It gets more likely with every deployment, but it could just be part of the "maximum pressure" strategy to try force Iran to the negotiating table. I still don't think the USA will strike Iran at this time, but the assets needed to strike Iran are being moved to the region to do so if the USA deems it necessary. Key deployments to watch out for are the F-16CJs from the 480th Fighter Squadron and other squadrons, this is the US Air Force's "wild weasel" aircraft for SEAD/DEAD operations. F-22 deployments to the ME region would also be very significant.
  
  US taking assets from Cringe Korea gives Comrade Kim the opportunity to do something extremely funny.
  
  Patriot batteries and a THAAD battery
  aren't these hypersonic bait?
  
  As for targeting the air defence systems themselves, it absolutely can be done in theory. Iran has anti radiation ballistic missiles in the Hormuz 1 and 2 for this. The question is if this capability will be used in practice if war breaks out.
  Iran don't have "hypersonic weapons" (in a missile that spends the majority of it's flight time in the atmosphere at hypersonic speeds while capable of maneuvering), Iran has ballistic missiles with Maneuverable Re-entry Vehicles (MaRVs) capable of glide phases and "pull up/down" maneuvers. Then there is Fattah-1, which has a thrust vectoring sustainer rocket motor on the MaRV itself to enable changes in trajectory in the midcourse, and allows for more energy to perform maneuvers in the terminal phase. Fattah-2 is Iran's rumoured hypersonic weapon, but there are no signs of it being operational.
  It's still very difficult to defend against MaRV capable missiles if/when they evade midcourse interception by systems like Arrow-3 and SM-3. THAAD does plug the hole in the air defence of MaRVs gliding above the engagement ceiling of systems like Patriot and Arrow-2, but then magazine size (the amount of interceptors in a THAAD battery) becomes a big issue. More explanation on that here and here. There is a cool video of Iranian MaRVs in action during Operation True Promise II somewhere in those threads, if you want to see what glide phases and pull up/down maneuvers look like in practice.
  The main problem with Iranian missiles is that their longer range missiles don't have great accuracy, but Bahrain is well within the range of Iran's shorter range ballistic missiles, which have demonstrated high accuracy before. So I don't think that the USA will park their aircraft within range of the shorter range missiles. The A-10s are rumoured to be stationed in Jordan, and the F-35As are in Saudi Arabia. B-2s are well out of Iran's MaRV capable missile range in Diego Garcia. Bahrain is a good location to put air defence systems in place to defend against potential attacks on Qatar and Riyadh in Saudi Arabia, where the US has large air bases. Even if Qatari air bases are not used in the attack, they could still be targeted.
- cool zone rapidly approaching

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