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StandardVC10 posted:Russian film prop? Yeah, reportedly it's from some 80's Soviet action flick.
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# ? Oct 13, 2014 07:06 |
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# ? May 23, 2024 15:37 |
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Igor Strelkov posted:It's huge and awesome, unfortunately it's also a huge and sort of slow target. That they're actually using them in something of a gunship role shows how hard up they are. Iraqi officers are also promising encircled troops air support and supply drops that never show up and never existed. It's not good. I was under the impression that while the Hind was designed around that transport "flying BMP" capability, they realized pretty fast in Afghanistan how terrible an idea that was and just used the space to carry more rockets for field reloadings and/or an extra technician/door gunner. So using it in a attack/gunship role is pretty much the norm. And it's really not terrible at the gunship role, especially not when you put it in time frame. It was loving the mujahideen up pretty well until we started giving them MANPADs. It's not like a fleet of early 70s AH-1 would've fared any better really. Mazz fucked around with this message at 07:45 on Oct 13, 2014 |
# ? Oct 13, 2014 07:40 |
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Saw this and thought of the thread: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/special/2014/newsspec_9035/index.html
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# ? Oct 13, 2014 10:34 |
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Mazz posted:I was under the impression that while the Hind was designed around that transport "flying BMP" capability, they realized pretty fast in Afghanistan how terrible an idea that was and just used the space to carry more rockets for field reloadings and/or an extra technician/door gunner. So using it in a attack/gunship role is pretty much the norm. I was talking about today, in Iraq, against an enemy with poo poo loads of manpads. They've been using it as a gunship out of pure necessity, and getting shot down a lot as a result.
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# ? Oct 13, 2014 10:45 |
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Igor Strelkov posted:I was talking about today, in Iraq, against an enemy with poo poo loads of manpads. They've been using it as a gunship out of pure necessity, and getting shot down a lot as a result. Ah yeah okay, when I initially read it and the other response post I thought you guys were emphasizing it was still primarily a transport.
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# ? Oct 13, 2014 14:03 |
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Cyrano4747 posted:
I did way back in college. It quotes the U.S. Declaration of Independence quite freely doesn't it?
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# ? Oct 13, 2014 14:15 |
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And the French one.
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# ? Oct 13, 2014 14:45 |
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simplefish posted:Saw this and thought of the thread: sorry to side track but holy poo poo BBC what is with that layout? Some web designer got a little too clever-by-half.
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# ? Oct 13, 2014 15:31 |
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Hubis posted:sorry to side track but holy poo poo BBC what is with that layout? Some web designer got a little too clever-by-half. I actually really liked it. True, it's treading that boundary between neat presentation and getting a little too clever for its own good, but I think it keeps inside that line. As far as pairing images with the text in an interesting fashion I thought it was pretty well executed. Also a kick rear end article in general.
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# ? Oct 13, 2014 16:05 |
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It's just the BBC catching up with the times. Google, etc have started to use that format. My one objection is the way images will just pop up suddenly on the right. Here's another loving amazing article done in the same format, following a robin-hood esque robber in Greece. Who escaped from prison in a helicopter. Twice. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/special/2014/newsspec_8700/index.html
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# ? Oct 13, 2014 17:29 |
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I mainly lurk this thread but after a conversation with a buddy of mine, I'm re-reading Ed Zuckerman's The Day After World War III. It came out in 1984 and is based on government plans for after a nuclear war. What's really fascinating is how blase and chill about everything it is. It's very readable and obviously well-researched, but it's also written in that nonchalant Cold War tone where you just talked about everything like it was no big deal. Like "Yeah, we figure all the refugees will want to register at their local post office to have their mail forwarded. Of course, we'll also want to make sure the dead people are on file, so if you try to mail them, you'll get the letter back as Undeliverable: Deceased." Likewise, it's kind of nice, but also kind of hilarious, that someone thought about where to house all the refugees, but also came up with a federal form that you could fill out in triplicate to get a cash grant to improve your hovel. It's also darkly hilarious one of the measures for economic regrowth was per-capita GDP, but the author makes the point that with a massive die-off as you'd expect in a nuclear war, that's not necessarily as great as it sounds. What good is a 1970s-era per-capita GDP if there are only 10 people left? Definitely worthwhile reading so far, has anyone else here read it?
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# ? Oct 13, 2014 17:46 |
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Dr. Kyle Farnsworth posted:Definitely worthwhile reading so far, has anyone else here read it? Im definitely going to now. Nuclear War is the trainwreck to end all trainwrecks and therefore the most fascinating thing on the planet.
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# ? Oct 13, 2014 18:06 |
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StandardVC10 posted:Whoa, they actually built one of those? Thought it was just a paper project. They only finished one, it made its first flight a few days after the B-52. It had a lot of handling problems and the AF wasn't really all that interested since the B-52 was ok (albeit with a far lower payload).
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# ? Oct 13, 2014 18:24 |
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Cyrano4747 posted:I actually really liked it. True, it's treading that boundary between neat presentation and getting a little too clever for its own good, but I think it keeps inside that line. As far as pairing images with the text in an interesting fashion I thought it was pretty well executed. It's perfect on a tablet/mobile phone but I don't really care for it on PC. But yeah, the article was great. Youtube recommended this video of the Avro Vulcan to me and while the title is probably wrong it does sound great and that take off https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WL46N60ZWI
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# ? Oct 13, 2014 19:31 |
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I ran across this footage, timestamped below, of what appears to be two guys doing a HALO out of the damned bomb bay of an IL-28 . Anyone have more details? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mlxzT5GdUrw&t=214s
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# ? Oct 13, 2014 19:37 |
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simplefish posted:What I love is that the endgame of WWII turned into "The enemy of my enemy is... well gently caress it, still my enemy." "The enemy of my enemy is my enemy's enemy, no more, no less."
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# ? Oct 13, 2014 20:43 |
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Dr. Kyle Farnsworth posted:What's really fascinating is how blase and chill about everything it is. It's very readable and obviously well-researched, but it's also written in that nonchalant Cold War tone where you just talked about everything like it was no big deal. Transcripts of Congressional hearings from that era are wonderful caricatures of themselves. In one I flipped through, the CEO of Boeing went before the Senate and explained that really, we could probably emerge with 5, 10 million dead, industry intact ready to roll out the next generation of Boeing (TM) bombers. (He didn't go as far as to say "depending on the breaks"). The Senate ate it right up.
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# ? Oct 13, 2014 23:12 |
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StandardVC10 posted:Does anyone have a TLDR on why nothing involving the C-27J and the United States makes any goddamn sense? It's worth noting that these weren't C-27Js as originally reported, they were some old as balls C-27As/G.222s that we bought for the Afghans for some reason several years ago, spent money to refurbish with new avionics, armor, and some other stuff, and subsequently had issues getting spare parts for, which is why they were running an MC rate in the single digits and why in one month they flew less than 5% of the time they were supposed to. The whole thing is still stupid as poo poo but it's not like we were taking new off the production line tails and scrapping them. Of course, I've heard a (pretty credible) rumor that when they were scrapped we didn't take any of the upgraded poo poo out of them, so assuming that's the case it wasn't like we were strictly scrapping really old planes either. The whole thing is because of the HULK SMASH mentality the entire DoD is taking to the poo poo like this is just the tip of the iceberg. As for the JCA/C-27J, here's a post I made a couple months back in the AI thread: iyaayas01 posted:DoD as a whole bears a lot of the responsibility for that debacle...the whole reason JCA got started in the first place is because in the middle of the last decade everything in DoD had to be relevant to fighting a couple pointless low-intensity wars in a couple of shithole third-world countries, everything else was a non-priority for reasons...which meant the Army got to call a lot of shots they otherwise wouldn't have normally gotten to call. The USAF had just gotten done getting hammered by everyone for not doing enough to support said pointless low-intensity war, so we were more than happy to do whatever OSD said, and then as icing on the cake throw in the fact that Congress saw the JCA as an attractive option to use as replacement aircraft/mission in ANG units that were losing their Herks due to BRAC. For all those reasons, JCA happens as opposed to being aborted like it honestly should have been. So basically the tl;dr is DoD buys a plane without fully thinking through the process because WAR, turns out that said plane isn't really too useful when WAR ends, budget pressure and politics result in program self-destructing in hilarious fashion. Also throw in something about the USAF loving over the Army about fixed wing aviation (yet again).
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# ? Oct 13, 2014 23:20 |
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Red Crown posted:Transcripts of Congressional hearings from that era are wonderful caricatures of themselves. In one I flipped through, the CEO of Boeing went before the Senate and explained that really, we could probably emerge with 5, 10 million dead, industry intact ready to roll out the next generation of Boeing (TM) bombers. (He didn't go as far as to say "depending on the breaks"). “If we have to start over again with another Adam and Eve, then I want them to be Americans and not Russians, and I want them on this continent and not in Europe.” - Senator Richard B. Russell, 1968. Welp poo poo, killed most of humanity. At least those godless commies are dead, better start fuckin'!
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# ? Oct 13, 2014 23:50 |
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Please tell me they're really calling it a "retrograde" now.
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 00:06 |
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Godholio posted:Please tell me they're really calling it a "retrograde" now. Yup, at least that's what they were calling it last year when I was out there.
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 00:23 |
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Dude, retrograde is not the preferred nomenclature. Realignment or pivot, please.
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 01:08 |
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I'm pretty sure after three pivots it's officially a pirouette Article from 1959 about the S1W reactor prototype: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1959/01/admiral-rickovers-gamble/308436/?single_page=true quote:On June 25, 1953, full design power was reached. Not one part of the plant indicated failure to meet the rigid specifications. In less than a month after power generation by the world’s first nuclear power plant, Mark I was running smoothly at its maximum rating. The one remaining question was whether the machinery could withstand long high-power running.
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 01:15 |
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Snowdens Secret posted:I'm pretty sure after three pivots it's officially a pirouette Admiral Hyman G. "gently caress You, I'm the One In Charge" Rickover
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 01:25 |
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This never gets old https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJ7niLYSVFo
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 02:11 |
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Ogrel72 posted:This never gets old Is the next in line already rolling before the one ahead is off the ground? And something else that just popped in my head, wasn't the B-52 supposed to be getting 4 RB-211s to replace those 8 old and smokey P&Ws? An RB-211 powered B-52 would be awesome beyond words, and sound like sex (or a lot like a 747).
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 02:37 |
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Doctor Grape Ape posted:And something else that just popped in my head, wasn't the B-52 supposed to be getting 4 RB-211s to replace those 8 old and smokey P&Ws? An RB-211 powered B-52 would be awesome beyond words, and sound like sex (or a lot like a 747). Besides a certain upfront cost the military doesn't have nearly the backlog of RB211 parts as it does JT3D parts. I suppose they could start buying up old RR-powered 757-200s and 747-400s, but I don't know what the budgetary requirement for that would be (they did something similar for the KC-135E program.) Don't consider that an authoritative answer though, I'm just a hobbyist.
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 02:45 |
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Doctor Grape Ape posted:And something else that just popped in my head, wasn't the B-52 supposed to be getting 4 RB-211s to replace those 8 old and smokey P&Ws? An RB-211 powered B-52 would be awesome beyond words, and sound like sex (or a lot like a 747). There's a world of difference between "this could be a good thing to do" and "we're going to do this."
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 02:54 |
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Godholio posted:There's a world of difference between "this could be a good thing to do" and "we're going to do this." Oh I know, I just remember reading some little tidbit about it in an RB211 love thread on airlines.net sometime ago and that video jogged my memory.
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 03:00 |
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holocaust bloopers posted:Today I learned that the US Army operated a Hind that we took in the Gulf War. It's now (or was) used for OPFOR training. Huh. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0aScbm3RDpw I used to watch that show all the time back in the 90s. If you get a chance, watch that one and there is another show about the SU-25, although half of the time they talk about the Russian war in Afghanistan.
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 03:31 |
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Doctor Grape Ape posted:Is the next in line already rolling before the one ahead is off the ground? Comedy option would be 2x GE90s... if the loving 11-foot fan could fit under the wing, that is.
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 04:43 |
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Doctor Grape Ape posted:Is the next in line already rolling before the one ahead is off the ground? With respect to the BUFF getting re-engined, even if you put aside the ground clearance issues caused by the drooping wings and low landing gear, money isn't getting shaken loose for that unless the TF33s start slipping off the wings at night to attack children.
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 05:13 |
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Dead Reckoning posted:...money isn't getting shaken loose for that unless the TF33s start slipping off the wings at night to attack children. Not even then, because that would be mission overlap with the Predator drones.
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 05:27 |
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Xerxes17 posted:Not even then, because that would be mission overlap with the Predator drones. No, that'd be grounds for urgent replacement because we can't have the bomber people muscling in on that sweet budgetary pie.
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 05:29 |
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Telven posted:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0aScbm3RDpw Wings and Beyond 2000 were my weekday go-to homework/model car building white noise. Beyond 2000 is hilarious to rewatch now. e- Beyond 2000 and a Vector, if this was any more 90's it would be shouting "WOOP WOOP WOOP" while pumping its fist
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 05:32 |
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The coasties colors remind me of I would love to see the army get the A-10's when they are retired, but some need to go to the coasties.
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 14:48 |
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B4Ctom1 posted:The coasties colors remind me of Would they remove the Gau-8? That would be depressing.
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 15:11 |
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B4Ctom1 posted:The coasties colors remind me of Hah, station a squadron of A-10s in florida for drug interdiction. Think: http://youtu.be/Km7_cNajNKc?t=2m26s but with more GAU
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 15:13 |
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Dark Helmut posted:Would they remove the Gau-8? That would be depressing. Refit it to fire pepper bullets, and give them to local police to use for riot control -- seems to be what we do with the rest of our surplus military equipment.
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 15:29 |
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# ? May 23, 2024 15:37 |
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Hubis posted:Refit it to fire pepper bullets, and give them to local police to use for riot control -- seems to be what we do with the rest of our surplus military equipment. Hawg one-one cleared warm.
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# ? Oct 14, 2014 16:04 |