Ukrainian troops are using Latvian-built electric scooters to move quickly, quietly, and off-road:
The Mosphera military e-scooters used by Ukrainian operators are made by Latvian firm Global Wolf Motors, are about twice the size of a regular scooter, and have motorcycle tires, Klavs Asmanis, the founder and CEO, told Business Insider.
These nimble, off-road e-scooters can hit 62 mph, cover up to 186 miles on a single battery charge, and weigh just 163 pounds, making them easier to handle than heavier bikes.
Asmanis said they can make deliveries to the front lines, do reconnaissance in Russia-held territory, and quickly evacuate lightly wounded troops, among other missions, and Ukraine is putting them to work.
[…]
Asmanis said the scooters offer advantages over other vehicles being used in this war. For instance, they are smaller and lighter than traditional vehicles, they don’t drown out the buzzing sound of drones, they’re easier to quickly bail out of in an emergency, and the scooters don’t require risking a car, truck, or other vehicle that could be packed with gear for other missions on quick, daring dashes.
He said they excel in forested areas. “Its e-scooter-style wheelbase makes it easy to weave between trees” and trails, while its 163-pound weight “means that if it does get stuck, it’s far easier to pull out compared to a motorcycle.”
They’re also far easier to hide when not in use, in bushes or under branches.
[…]
Asmanis said his vehicles are better suited to conflict than typical e-scooters, describing them as “in the middle between scooter and motorcycle” because it has much larger wheels, like motorcycles do, than regular scooters.
This is your blog and content is your exclusive preserve, but the prolonging of the conflict costs thousands of Ukrainian civilian and conscript lives. Every exciting new killing technology deployed by Ukraine only ends up being copied by Russia a couple of weeks later, and the killing continues.
So it’s more or less a quiet and light motorcycle. And now mounted infantry is used by both sides. Did anyone predict this?
Michael van der Riet:
It is proper for Americans to applaud the success of an ally.
The world would be a better place if the Ukraine conflict was over. As Salvador Madariaga wrote:
‘What is a conflict? It is a problem that has become poisonous. What is a problem? It is a question that has become neglected. What is a question? It is an everyday matter that needs our attention. If therefore we want to avoid wars, it is very little use waiting to avoid our ordinary, humdrum matters until, unattended, neglected, poisoned, they become conflicts.’
To seriously end this war, the conflict needs to be dialed down step by step, to a problem, a question, an everyday matter that needs our attention. Won’t be easy,
Motorcycles were predicted.
Bruce: “The world would be a better place if the Ukraine conflict was over.”
For whom? The United State is very pleased to expend the Ukrainians down to the very last man, woman, and child, and the Ukrainian state’s balls are so thoroughly in the United State’s purse that that is just what will happen.
That scooter looks extremely fucking cool. I want one.
Quality of life would significantly improve for everyone if electric scooters like this were the only permissible ordinary short-range mode of travel.
As a consequence the civilian electrical grid is a more valid war target. You win some, you lose some.
Bruce, it is a fiction that the war is between Ukraine and Russia. The war is between the US and Russia. The Ukrainians are just the extras, or the chorus line if you like, there to provide the blood and suffering. “The success of an ally.” Hah.
Freddo: “As a consequence the civilian electrical grid is a more valid war target. You win some, you lose some.”
Solar panels more or less completely remove the need for an “electrical grid”, let alone a “civilian electrical grid”.
Someone tell Zelensky he should ask for solar panels rather than Tomahawk missiles.
Freddo: “Someone tell Zelensky he should ask for solar panels rather than Tomahawk missiles.”
Who?