Russia’s Self Delusion
<p>Survivorship bias is a commonly known term that is a type of selection bias in statistical and scientific research. It comes from a story in World War II about engineers who were wondering which parts of the airplanes needed more armor on them. They looked at all the damage that the bombers had on them and summarized it with the graphic below or some 1940s equivalent.</p>
<p>Then someone pointed out that they had only studied the bombers that returned from their missions — the ones that were shot down over Germany had not survived, and thus, the red dots don’t show which areas need more armor, but which areas don’t need armor at all. Planes damaged in those areas can still fly back to base. The parts that needed reinforcement are the engines, the tail section, and the cockpit because if the bomber gets hit in those areas, it doesn’t make it home.</p>
<p><a href="https://medium.com/@dylan_combellick/russias-self-delusion-ea3ac7bcd907"><strong>Read More</strong></a></p>