[HN Gopher] Soviet Union sold titanium to US believing they need...
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Soviet Union sold titanium to US believing they needed it for pizza
ovens
Author : jerryjerryjerry
Score : 45 points
Date : 2023-06-18 21:13 UTC (1 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (theaviationgeekclub.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (theaviationgeekclub.com)
| RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote:
| This is due a miscommunication. The SR-71 was originally
| developed for rapid pizza delivery(this was when companies took
| their pledge, "It's hot or it's free" seriously). It could
| deliver hot pizza to any point in the continental US rapidly
| allowing there to be full coverage with only a few actual pizza
| baking locations. Unfortunately, the Air Force saw the potential
| military implications and repurposed it.
| Hikikomori wrote:
| The Deliverator's car has enough potential energy packed into
| its batteries to fire a pound of bacon into the Asteroid Belt.
| Unlike a bimbo box or a Burb beater, the Deliverator's car
| unloads that power through gaping, gleaming, polished
| sphincters. When the Deliverator puts the hammer down, shit
| happens.
|
| You want to talk contact patches? Your car's tires have tiny
| contact patches, talk to the asphalt in four places the size of
| your tongue. The Deliverator's car has big sticky tires with
| contact patches the size of a fat lady's thighs. The
| Deliverator is in touch with the road, starts like a bad day,
| stops on a peseta.
|
| Why is the Deliverator so equipped? Because people rely on him.
| He is a role model. This is America. People do whatever the
| fuck they feel like doing, you got a problem with that? Because
| they have a right to. And because they have guns and no one can
| fucking stop them. As a result, this country has one of the
| worst economies in the world. When it gets down to it --
| talking trade balances here -- once we've brain-drained all our
| technology into other countries, once things have evened out,
| they're making cars in Bolivia and microwave ovens in
| Tadzhikistan and selling them here -- once our edge in natural
| resources has been made irrelevant by giant Hong Kong ships and
| dirigibles that can ship North Dakota all the way to New
| Zealand for a nickel -- once the Invisible Hand has taken all
| those historical inequities and smeared them out into a broad
| global layer of what a Pakistani brickmaker would consider to
| be prosperity -- y'know what? There's only four things we do
| better than anyone else: * music * movies * microcode
| (software) * high-speed pizza delivery
|
| The Deliverator used to make software. Still does, sometimes.
| But if life were a mellow elementary school run by well-meaning
| education Ph.D.s, the Deliverator's report card would say:
| "Hiro is so bright and creative but needs to work harder on his
| cooperation skills."
|
| So now he has this other job. No brightness or creativity
| involved -- but no cooperation either. Just a single principle:
| The Deliverator stands tall, your pie in thirty minutes or you
| can have it free, shoot the driver, take his car, file a class-
| action suit. The Deliverator has been working this job for six
| months, a rich and lengthy tenure by his standards, and has
| never delivered a pizza in more than twenty-one minutes.
| thrill wrote:
| If a fella wasn't careful, such a vehicle might crash ...
| into snow.
| duxup wrote:
| Considering a pizza oven doesn't require titanium... that's a
| strange cover story.
| blihp wrote:
| They didn't know that at the time. Not an outrageous story as
| hotter is generally better for pizza ovens.
| varjag wrote:
| You don't quite need 1500C or so Ti alloys can tolerate to
| bake a pizza.
| duxup wrote:
| > They didn't know that at the time.
|
| Hard to imagine they even tried to find out as the lie would
| quickly become obvious with just a little effort.
| epmos wrote:
| Rutile is used in refractory bricks and the import was of
| the ore mineral. So not completely unbelievable.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rutile#Application
| kevin_thibedeau wrote:
| There was no shortage of TiO2 in the US. It's used
| everywhere. They were specifically importing the refined
| metal because the soviets had the only viable production
| capacity.
| satiric wrote:
| Forget wood fired pizza, titanium fired pizza has a way better
| flavor.
|
| I wonder if they really used the pizza alibi for all the
| titanium or if they diversified. Did they really put all their
| eggs in one basket?
| taf2 wrote:
| Can't wait for the YouTube video about this - should be a
| good DIY series
| atomicnumber3 wrote:
| The capitalists are decadent bourgeois pigs, who could fathom
| the whims of their lifestyles?
|
| (this is a joke)
| klyrs wrote:
| I swear to you, there is an untapped market for titanium
| pizza ovens. Maybe for camping gear. Maybe for stationary
| ovens. But fire + titanium + father's day? It practically
| sells itself. Titanium pizza peels are already on the market.
| Who needs this shit?
| msla wrote:
| So you're saying those uranium-powered baby monitors probably
| aren't on the up-and-up?
| ezzaf wrote:
| Perhaps a more accurate headline would have been this buried
| deeper in the article
|
| "The US worked through Third World countries and fake companies
| and finally was able to ship the ore to the US to build the
| SR-71."
|
| And to complete the loop, Russia is now importing sanctioned
| American microchips for its missiles via third parties. I wonder
| if the order form states they will be used in smart pizzas ovens.
| 8note wrote:
| > After all, they fraudulently possibly told their comrades that
| the United States was a lazy country that probably couldn't even
| cook for itself. They need it to go out to buy pizza...
|
| This is a weird dig at the soviets, who were probs just happy to
| to find some customers to justify having already dug up all the
| ore. The fraudster seem to be the Americans in this case?
| varjag wrote:
| Fun fact, pizza was virtually unknown in USSR throughout its
| existence.
| cpursley wrote:
| What you could get was Georgian-style khachapuri which is an
| amazing cheesy butter bread thing.
|
| Now there's a Dodo pizza in every city and pizza-sushi-etc
| places kn every corner.
| YLYvYkHeB2NRNT wrote:
| when is OK to trust a liar?
| tedunangst wrote:
| But why would a pilot be privy to the materials sourcing
| operations?
| dharmab wrote:
| This information has been declassified for decades.
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(page generated 2023-06-18 23:00 UTC)