There aren’t really good alternatives to the rare earth metals in terms of what they are used for, but there can be in terms of supply of them. Despite their name they are not actually that rare, just not very easy to extract economically. In terms of the percentage of Earth’s crust made up of them, most rare earths are pretty similar to such widely-used stuff as copper and tin. The problem is that they don’t usually gather up into high concentrations that are easy to mine, they’re all dispersed

China has a combination of really good reserves of them, a lot of industrial investment into the process of producing them, and a conscious strategy to be involved in other places with good reserves by doing the refining of their ores. There’s plenty of rare earth deposits elsewhere, but China has done it cheaper than everyone else for a while now. Brazil, India, Australia, and Russia have the next-biggest reserves, and I can’t help but note that China has made efforts to align with three of those four

Both

The companies are being investigated on suspicion of disseminating violent, pornographic or degrading messages accessible to minors, which can lead to up to three years in prison and a fine of 75,000 euros ($87,465) for individuals involved, the office said. Shein and AliExpress are also being investigated over the alleged dissemination of images or representations of minors of a pornographic nature, which can lead to five years in prison and a fine of 75,000 euros, the prosecutor’s office said.

Anyway, have we tried selling them Opium again?

The UK is one of the world’s leading producers of morphine and codeine, so kinda yes actually

60 years is a hell of a run of Hamlet

Canada has a pretty big and well-established aerospace manufacturing industry already, though, unlike Portugal

Hopefully, but that’s not likely to be (directly) handled by finance regulations

Australia is a regular participant, the Caucasian countries are also regular entrants and may or may not be in Europe depending on where you draw the border, Morocco is a previous entrant, all of North Africa is eligible to enter but chooses not to, and Lebanon and Jordan have invites too. We should kick Israel out for the real reason of its actions in Gaza and the rest of Palestine, not over silly attempts at technicalities

Two people’s hands. The hand holding the pellets and the hand with the red nail varnish belong to one person (who is to the right of frame), but a second person’s hand with no nail varnish is reaching in from the left

Pretty sure you’re thinking of Marjorie Taylor Greene there, a completely unrelated person

It’s also significantly heavier with the same thrust and less wing area, and its payload is limited unless it uses external hardpoints that worsen its stealthiness.

I have read reporting on F-35s getting a 15-1 kill ratio at Red Flag 17, but it’s worth noting that the aggressor aircraft at that one were F-16s. That’s a capable plane in its own right of course, but it’s twice as old as the Typhoon and hasn’t had all of the same modernisation

Oddly enough there’s actually an interview with two pilots of the relevant aircraft who duelled during an exercise last year in which they (very briefly) discuss some of the advantages https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upqVaKWQ_EU

To be fair, whether or not the F-35 is the right choice here, the Eurofighter and the F-35 are for different jobs. The Eurofighter is first and foremost for fighting other aircraft, while the F-35 sacrifices some capability in that regard to be better at blowing up stuff on the ground. That’s why the Americans have both the F-22 and the F-35. The Eurofighter is our F-22, not our F-35

I don’t doubt that the F-35 could take on most other aircraft very effectively, but a big country like Germany is spending enough and flying enough to warrant specialisation

Your whole premise was “how can we justify taking in male refugees?” If there’s a million-plus strong category of men who aren’t being drafted the why the hell shouldn’t we take them in as refugees if they need it?

The Ukrainian MoD refusing to recognise a right of conscientious objection does not mean Germany has to do the same

You could probably tell that Ukrainian soldier that you’re going to support him regardless of whether his wealthy countrymen flee or not. If you don’t want to return those that fled, what good does it do to the soldier for you to pick this fight? You’re not arguing to give him another soldier at his side.

Not every man is able to fight, Ukraine is not drafting every available man (the minimum draft age is currently 25), and conscientious objection is a right even in well-justified wars

It’s the same general principle here, yeah. Domestic law enforcement is the police’s job, the military can’t just start shooting at whatever it likes without asking

Yes (or at least I don’t personally know of anywhere that it isn’t the case), this is just a German newspaper reporting on a German professor’s work

Oh, I was thinking of it as keeping the cucumber clean

Surely if you’re going to eat it, it kinda defeats the point of having a coating in the first place? But if it stays solid I imagine it can be thrown into compost

I believe this is almost exclusively a Telegraph thing, and even then mostly in headlines. From their style guide:

“Percentages: per cent does not take a full point. Use pc only in headlines and % only in tables. In City page copy pc is acceptable.”

The same section of the style guide chooses to use hundredweights as an example unit of weight, so I definitely think there’s a significant degree to which they’ve just always done it and do not want to change it

Frankly I would be happy to take centre right over some of the people pushing the anti-migration stuff here

Don’t be ridiculous, it makes them expats