Political Discussion Thread (READ FIRST POST)

[ijuin 572]

Just the speed alone means that jet fighter pilots have only half as much time to react as WWII fighter pilots.

[mlooney 3,417]

8 minutes ago, ijuin said:

Just the speed alone means that jet fighter pilots have only half as much time to react as WWII fighter pilots.

Yeah, but in reality modern fighter pilots don't dog fight all that much.  While dog fighting skill are sill some what important, almost all air to air kills after Viet Nam were done by missiles.

[Darth Fluffy 302]

8 minutes ago, ijuin said:

Just the speed alone means that jet fighter pilots have only half as much time to react as WWII fighter pilots.

Far more smarter threats, too. WW II pilots had opposing fighters shooting, and anti aircraft guns aimed by people. Modern fighters have opposing fighters, airborne missles, SAMs, and radar guided anti-aircraft guns.

[mlooney 3,417]

AA guns went out of fashion a while back, but are returning with some force as anti-drone systems.  While stopping a munition carrying  drone is a good idea, it's a bit hard to justify using a $X missile against a drone that cost $X/10.

[Darth Fluffy 302]

2 hours ago, mlooney said:

AA guns went out of fashion a while back, but are returning with some force as anti-drone systems.  While stopping a munition carrying  drone is a good idea, it's a bit hard to justify using a $X missile against a drone that cost $X/10.

I recall the 'Gun Dish' system was particularly accurate. Mid to late 80s, I think.

Patriots against SCUDS have the same drawback, you can go broke shooting these down, but consider the cost of the damage they do if they hit. THat's the real gain.

[mlooney 3,417]

Quote

After 4 hours of negotiations between the political groups of the EP, the agreement on the text was achieved. The main line is: “European Parliament /…/ ⁃recognises Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism and as a state which uses means of terrorism”.

https://twitter.com/KubiliusA/status/1593309275971002368?t=QRErAzNeEWCYnVCeaxZnkA&s=19

[mlooney 3,417]

2 hours ago, Darth Fluffy said:

I recall the 'Gun Dish' system was particularly accurate. Mid to late 80s, I think.

That's the radar for a ZSU-23-4, a 1960's era system. Not all that accurate and easily jammed.  It was fairly effective in the '73 war where Israeli aircraft flew low to avoid SAMs but didn't have jammer vs it.  Every war it was used in after that it was fairly ineffective.   Was used in Afghanistan by the soviets in a ground support role, where it's high rate of fire made it a good choice. 

[Darth Fluffy 302]

1 hour ago, mlooney said:

That's the radar for a ZSU-23-4, a 1960's era system. Not all that accurate and easily jammed.  It was fairly effective in the '73 war where Israeli aircraft flew low to avoid SAMs but didn't have jammer vs it.  Every war it was used in after that it was fairly ineffective.   Was used in Afghanistan by the soviets in a ground support role, where it's high rate of fire made it a good choice. 

So, a quick Google search says you are right about the platform and age; The gun was upgraded in '73, seems to be the variant of interest (M1); Gun Dish seems to refer specifically to the fire control radar, which may have been an upgrade, ah, "radar upgraded in 1970 (V1). I recall hearing that jamming from the opposing aircraft improved its accuracy, courtesy of home on jam. It seemed to be more of an object of concern than the SAMs. Maybe because bullets are not dissuaded by flares. (Missiles are much like cats and red dots in that regard.)

[mlooney 3,417]

2 hours ago, Darth Fluffy said:

So, a quick Google search says you are right about the platform and age; The gun was upgraded in '73, seems to be the variant of interest (M1); Gun Dish seems to refer specifically to the fire control radar, which may have been an upgrade, ah, "radar upgraded in 1970 (V1). I recall hearing that jamming from the opposing aircraft improved its accuracy, courtesy of home on jam. It seemed to be more of an object of concern than the SAMs. Maybe because bullets are not dissuaded by flares. (Missiles are much like cats and red dots in that regard.)

The "Gun Dish" radar had issue with "track breaker" types of jamming as well as chaff.  Don't get me wrong, for its day and age it was a dangerous system and the pilots need to keep their wits about them when dealing with it, but it score in 73 was due mainly to Israeli pilots not having the right kinds of jamming pods and no chaff at all, plus not really respecting the threat.  They had a bad case of "victory disease" based on how well the IAF did in the six day war.  They were not expecting the Arab forces to have an integrated air defense network and payed the price.  You will note that Israeli air craft losses have drop to almost nil despite going up against modern Russian air defense system in Syria and Lebanon.

[Darth Fluffy 302]

3 hours ago, mlooney said:

You will note that Israeli air craft losses have drop to almost nil despite going up against modern Russian air defense system in Syria and Lebanon.

That is a good point.

[mlooney 3,417]

Of course post 73 Israel has had the most attention paid to "Suppression of Enemy Air Defense"  (SEAD) or "Destruction of Enemy Air Defense"  (DEAD) of any air force in the world.  Not even the US spends as much time on it as Israel.

[mlooney 3,417]

 

[The Old Hack 2,448]

On 11/17/2022 at 6:27 PM, mlooney said:

AA guns went out of fashion a while back, but are returning with some force as anti-drone systems.  While stopping a munition carrying  drone is a good idea, it's a bit hard to justify using a $X missile against a drone that cost $X/10.

Unfortunately sometimes you have no choice if the drone's target is valued at $X*100.

As to that counteroffensive, it reminds me a little of Hitler's plans for invading Germany in "The Producers."

[mlooney 3,417]

2 hours ago, The Old Hack said:

Unfortunately sometimes you have no choice if the drone's target is valued at $X*100.

Oh, yeah, you need to stop armed drones before they can drop their payload, not every thing (or for that matter any thing,really) in combat has a dollar price attached to it.  My point was, all things being equal,  the side making some thing that cost $x/10 is going to make more of them than the side making $x things, so the defender is going to be overwhelmed by the number of attacking things.  "Swarming the enemy" is a real thing.

[ijuin 572]

And this explains how the US military justifies needing a budget seven times larger than any other military in the world.

[Darth Fluffy 302]

1 hour ago, ijuin said:

And this explains how the US military justifies needing a budget seven times larger than any other military in the world.

Loss of life is less acceptable in US culture than many, so yeah, we are more likely than many to spend on Patriot missiles to shoot down SCUDs, to cite an infamous example. 

[Don Edwards 548]

A SCUD that misses the intended point of impact by a little bit, often still does the job.

An anti-missile missile, nope, it has to be more accurate - or be rather plural.

Both the accuracy and the plurality increase the cost.

[Darth Fluffy 302]

1 hour ago, Don Edwards said:

A SCUD that misses the intended point of impact by a little bit, often still does the job.

... and even when it misses, it still has value as a terror weapon for the unintended damage it does. Look at Russia's bullshit shooting at Ukrainian cities.

Their looting projects an image world-wide as pathetic losers. You can't make your own damn appliances, you have to steal them from 'your land'? This is like bullshit the Nazis pulled. I really felt for the poor Russian bastards that were sent into this travesty, but this kind of stuff says, "OK, no, you earned the beating you're gonna get."

[Darth Fluffy 302]

I think the New York Post's reaction to Donald Trump's presidential run announcement deserves to be made into a new slang verb, 'Page 26ed'.

Quote

Yahoo News: “Florida man makes announcement,” ran a headline on the bottom of the front page, referring to the former president and Celebrity Apprentice star. The story was buried on page 26. (There was a notice on the front page to look there.)

“With just 720 days to go before the next election, a Florida retiree made the surprise announcement that he was running for president,” the column began. “In a move no political pundit saw coming, avid golfer Donald J. Trump kicked things off at Mar-a-Lago, his resort and classified-documents library.

“Trump, famous for gold-plated lobbies and for firing people on reality television, will be 78 in 2024,” it continued. “His cholesterol levels are unknown, but his favorite food is charred steak with ketchup.”

The list of non-attendees was impressive, and included members of his own family.

[ProfessorTomoe 1,308]

2 hours ago, Don Edwards said:

An anti-missile missile, nope, it has to be more accurate - or be rather plural.

But what are the specs for an anti-anti-missile missile missile? </Bullwinkle mode off>

[mlooney 3,417]

11 hours ago, ProfessorTomoe said:

But what are the specs for an anti-anti-missile missile missile? </Bullwinkle mode off>

You joke but there exists something called "penetration aids".

[Darth Fluffy 302]

55 minutes ago, mlooney said:

You joke but there exists something called "penetration aids".

Are you suggesting that congress should use lube?

[mlooney 3,417]

1 hour ago, Darth Fluffy said:

Are you suggesting that congress should use lube?

I'm not sure, but I suspect that LUBE is an acronym  for something in the US military

[Darth Fluffy 302]

2 hours ago, mlooney said:

I'm not sure, but I suspect that LUBE is an acronym  for something in the US military

I'm sure we can come up with one.

Le'see, ... L ... Light, ... U ... Underground, ... B ... Ballistic, ... E ... Effector - It is a launch tube that you can bury, like a mine, that launches a mortar round for a burst several feet in the air.

 

[mlooney 3,417]

17 minutes ago, Darth Fluffy said:

I'm sure we can come up with one.

Le'see, ... L ... Light, ... U ... Underground, ... B ... Ballistic, ... E ... Effector - It is a launch tube that you can bury, like a mine, that launches a mortar round for a burst several feet in the air.

 

Well http://acronymsandslang.com/LUBE-meaning.html has this entry "Leather Uniform Bear Encounter", which I sorta want to know the context for.