IMHO, every rail road bridge within 200-300 km of the Ukraine border on the Russian side should be taken down. Target the repair crews too. Without rail, the Russians would only be able to deliver, out-of-fuel, equipment to the Ukrainians. Bob Wilson
The Ukies are trying.... There are not yet enough F16s in country to make that happen and the skies over those bridges are at least highly contested. The Viper is a decent air-to-mud truck and you will have a hard time picking out a more dangerous plane at knife fighting range.....BUT.....Russia has about the best SAM systems in the neighborhood. Just ask the Malaysians. I think we ought to give them every single Penguin we own (F35s) and start back-filling those here with F15x and F/A-18s until we can field an emergency G6 replacement on a no-bid contract from Boeing. They need the work, and the only things that seem to be falling off of their military aircraft are bombs and missiles...... Farm out some of the subassembly work to Lockheed.
...for ONE launcher running a radar, and you'd probably have to use more than one missile. You can, and the US has used Vipers for Weasel ops (SEAD) but those HARMS are kinda spendy - up to 3/4 of a mil per shot. Either way you would never get close enough to the Rooskie SAM batteries with a '16 hauling an ARM. The S300/400 system has at least 5x the range and so you'd have to expend the aircraft and the pilot on a one-way, and this isn't counting all of the MANPADs that would be used to counter that type of attack. We'd have a hard time going it with MOST of our Penguins and F15Es (if you could find enough mission capable F35s to conduct a strike!) ...and THEN you'd still have to take out the bridges while dealing with the 2nd and 3rd tier SAMs. The Ukies need to follow the NVA/Afghan model and keep bleeding their invaders white. That's one of the all too friggin many things Biden makes stupid comments about. One of his more misinformed quips about gun control is that 'you need an F15' to fight the government. Nope. They didn't have frontal aviation and tanks in Viet Nam (unless they stole them from US!) Last time I checked the NVA (officially, the Vietnam People's Army) is still 2-0.
I wonder what it will take for Putin to use his nukes. And wasn't he supposed to be on his death bed? Seems like he's still on his regular bed.
We need to actually mind our own and stop coddling little Mr. Padington Bear already. This is already WW3 by proxy. Thank biden for high gas prices to pay for a war that we have no business being in. Then there is Isreal that we are helping. We need to stop funding them too. Guess we will understand next year when we are targeted if biden is still in control. Trump is not great but at least he will protect us from Russia.
They CANNOT under ANY CIRCUMSTANCES 'order the release of nuclear weapons.' without that order being validated - optimally by the SECDEF (which is sorta why you never want one of those going radio silent following a surgery when they're getting a Brazilian Butt lift) In the US, NO ONE PERSON has release authority. The idea of a Biden or a Trump with their paws on 'the nucular button' is a fallacy. OK... There ARE (probably) parts buried deeeep in SIOP that would give one watch officer sole release authority but this would (probably) only be a programmed and limited retaliatory action. The Rooskies have always practiced MUCH MUCH tighter control over their strategic forces that we do. Putty might be able to do a onsey-twosie - but I think even that might be a biiiiiiiiig stretch.
The Ukrainians out numbered 38 m to 144 m Russians, roughly 5-to-1, have been very clever. Give them the weapons and no doubt we'll have lessons learned. BTW, the Marines were experimenting with drones in 1970. Bob Wilson
Marines are good like that. They're usually out on the sharp end, and it's better to expend a drone to see what's around the next corner or over the next ridge than it is to send a 19-year-old kid. You don't have to go and get the drone and send it back home in a box if somebody shoots it. If nothing else, it saves wear and tear on helos.
President Biden was talking about domestic terrorists using guns to fight their enemy, the USA and it’s military, which have F16’s and more. Like, the domestic terrorists are not that bright. Jan 6 was the same. What were they even thinking they can do, the domestic terrorists, including the one watching it on tv in the WH? President Biden said exactly what many rational are thinking. Nothing complicated about it.
Few say so.... I'm not going to waste the ones and zeroes trying to teach primary school level Revolutionary war history in this setting - or the last two conflicts that the US was forced to leave as a result of non-domestic terrorists. We have the political sub-forum for that and it includes a cartoon page and a political memes page - for those who want to read about the President "saying exactly what many rational are thinking...." (and what many rational people are thinking about what the President is saying.) See you there.
It is not political. I understand what President Biden said because I said the same thing to myself before he said it. What are they thinking going up against the US military. They must be bright enough to realize it doesn’t end with overwhelming local police.
