# Has the American Military actually dropped in Quality?



## Haim Arlosoroff (Nov 4, 2021)

Hello Kiwifam,





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I, like most of you, have seen the Chadiban retake Afghanistan, the Chinese Navy begin to flex against the US Navy off their own coastline, and high-ranking openly-transgender official-admiral Levine of the United States Public Health Service.  I wonder if a rot, after decades of war has set in and the once great Permanent Standing Army — whose large, permanent, professional military establishments because of their awesome dual temptations for domestic oppression and international adventurism by those in power, their drain on public resources, and, not least, their not-infrequent aberrant behavior of those in uniform are so necessary of a modern republic — jewel of the Founding Fathers, has begun to fall apart?


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Take, as an example, the Low Ready position which is a carry position allowing superior readiness for forward targets while still practicing safety.  It is opposed by the High Ready Position which drops the butt of the rifle into the armpit space and pulls the rifle end up and less forward so that it does not catch on anything if you have to turn-around to engage an enemy.  Sound simple?  Watch this:





How many times did they point their rifles at each other?​
Training has certainly fallen, and in the need to improve personnel numbers there have been compromises made.
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Now admittedly, the Royal Marines are an 8000 amphibious light infantry force designed to rapidly deploy in amphibious warfare, arctic warfare, mountain warfare, and expeditionary warfare.  While the US Marines, since WWII, has been made into an infantry, armor, artillery, and aerial combined arms force some 200000 strong.  The Flattop USS Bonhomme Richard wasn't a real carrier, lost to a single sailor starting a fire, so it isn't a sign that blue-on-blue loses will start to occur the moment the stresses of war set in.  The US Sub which hit rock bottom isn't the navy hitting rock bottom but the result of America projecting its power too far without proper support which is fine.  Traps aren't gay even though they are hyper-sexual men trying to be the center of other men's sexual attention, and the pride flag is the flag Americans should die hoisting up.  Not the Stars-and-bars or whatever this was:

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That would be suicide, as opposed to Transgender Soldiers which are only a strength.

But tactics/operations/strategy, like in Iraq and Afghanistan, are fine.  Its not that technological changes can render existing tactics obsolete, and sociological changes can shift the goals and methods of warfare, requiring new tactics.




A blurring of the lines between war and politics, combatants and civilians may have occurred since Vietnam (or during Vietnam because of Operation Phoenix).  Arthur Shawcross, who killed 11 sex workers in New York state on his return from Vietnam, has claimed in taped interviews to have worked in Operation Phoenix. It’s also widely thought that Richard Ramirez's cousin Mike (who effectively 'mentored' Richard in killing) was also involved. Further concrete details are sketchy, as is the case with most good CIA operations.  The list of US soldiers to return from Vietnam only to go on to become serial killers in their homeland is not a short one.  However maybe it is a recent change in the air.  Maybe it was the Internet, maybe it was the goals of America to freedom-monger in hostile countries, or maybe it is just hostile powers using propaganda?  What can be said though, is that warfare has returned to a decentralized form where one of the major participants is not a state but rather a violent non-state actor.  The fourth generation of warfare signifies the nation states' loss of their near-monopoly on combat forces, returning to modes of conflict common in pre-modern times.  Classical examples, such as the slave uprising under Spartacus or the mercenary uprising that occurred in Carthage after the first Punic War, predate the modern concept of warfare and are examples of this type of conflict.  Barbarism, and its adherents, are returning to humanity because there is something in American geopolitics which seems to justify it to populations both foreign and domestic.

The military has actually acknowledged this, however they've decided the answer is just to push through it.  If you're taking fist-after-fist to the head then you should learn to headbutt fists better and better.  Which is my reading of Fifth-generation warfare and USCYBERCOM, other than that it seems to just want to generate Civil Wars and 'Vietnam' hostile powers more often than America is forced into long-term conflict.  Although maybe 5th-generational warfare was whatever the Fat Leonard scandal and its Thai SEAL Team were about?  Hard to say, the media never covered that story for reasons of being ethically compromised and morally subverted.  Maybe that is what 5th Generational Warfare is?

Lastly however there is technology.

Where once First Lieutenants like Benjamin S. Kelsey and Gordon P. Saville could write a set of aircraft performance goals like Circular Proposal X-608 for a twin-engined, high-altitude "interceptor" having "the tactical mission of interception and attack of hostile aircraft at high altitude" in order to bypass the inflexible Army Air Corps requirement for pursuit aircraft to carry no more than 500 lb (230 kg) of armament including ammunition, and to bypass the USAAC restriction of single-seat aircraft to one engine resulting in the Lockheed P-38 Lightning.  Total development time taking from February 1937 until July 1941 or four years to complete from the initial idea, to the design, the XP-38 and YP-38 prototypes and their Mach tuck problems which were solved by wind tunnel testing and dive flaps.

Then in April 1965, Harold Brown, at that time director of the Department of Defense Research and Engineering, stated the favored position was to consider the F-5 and begin studies of an "F-X". These early studies envisioned a production run of 800 to 1,000 aircraft and stressed maneuverability over speed; it also stated that the aircraft would not be considered without some level of ground-attack capability. On 1 August, Gabriel Disosway took command of Tactical Air Command and reiterated calls for the F-X, but lowered the required performance from Mach 3.0 to 2.5 to lower costs.  When the proposals were studied in July 1966, the aircraft were roughly the size and weight of the F-111, and like that aircraft, were designs that could not be considered an air-superiority fighter. Through this period, studies of combat over Vietnam were producing worrying results. Theory had stressed long-range combat using missiles and optimized aircraft for this role. The result was highly loaded aircraft with large radar and excellent speed, but limited maneuverability and often lacking a gun.  In practice, due to policy and practical reasons, aircraft were closing to visual range and maneuvering, placing the larger US aircraft at a disadvantage to the much less expensive day fighters such as the MiG-21. Missiles proved to be much less reliable than predicted, especially at close range. Although improved training and the introduction of the M61 Vulcan cannon on the F-4 did much to address the disparity, these early outcomes led to considerable re-evaluation of the 1963 Project Forecast doctrine. Through tireless championing of the concepts and good timing with the "failure" of the initial F-X project, the "fighter mafia" pressed for a lightweight day fighter that could be built and operated in large numbers to ensure air superiority. In early 1967, they proposed that the ideal design had a thrust-to-weight ratio near 1:1, a maximum speed further reduced to Mach 2.3, a weight of 40,000 pounds (18,000 kg), and a wing loading of 80 pounds per square foot (390 kg/m2).  Four companies submitted proposals, with the Air Force eliminating General Dynamics and awarding contracts to Fairchild Republic, North American Rockwell, and McDonnell Douglas for the definition phase in December 1968. The companies submitted technical proposals by June 1969. The Air Force announced the selection of McDonnell Douglas in December 1969.  The first F-15A flight was made in July 1972, with the first flight of the two-seat F-15B following in July 1973.  Total development time taking from April 1965 or early 1967 until July 1972 or five-seven years to complete.

Now the F-35 was the product of the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program, which was the merger of various combat aircraft programs from the 1980s and 1990s.  Paul Bevilaqua was working for Lockheed Skunk Works in 1986, when DARPA and the similar British agency launched a program called ASTOVL and issued a 9-month contract to develop concepts for a stealthy supersonic STOVL plane, in accordance with USMC wishes, but without the usual strict technical requirements. Bevilaqua is not a propulsion engineer, and got help from various Lockheed experts in propulsion, materials and other specialised fields to verify the theories of using extra engine power to turn a lift fan, which was then patented in 1990-1993.  Both DARPA and the Marine Corps liked the concept, and from there it developed through various defense programs such as CALF and JAST into the Joint Strike Fighter Program and through to the X-35B and F-35B. Bevilaqua was a key figure in persuading the Air Force in 1992 that the concept aircraft could be useful as a conventional aircraft without the LiftFan. When the US Navy also came on board, the road was paved for the JSF concept of similar aircraft with different applications, in accordance with JAST Concept Exploration findings.  The actual JSF development contract was signed in November 1996. The JSF program was created to replace various aircraft while keeping development, production, and operating costs down. This was pursued by building three variants of one aircraft, with the initial goal of the variants sharing over 70% of their parts.  The F-35's mission systems are among the most complex aspects of the aircraft. The avionics and sensor fusion are designed to enhance the pilot's situational awareness and command and control capabilities and facilitate network-centric warfare.  The first F-35A, AA-1, conducted its engine run in September 2006 and first flew on 15 December 2006.  The first F-35B, BF-1, flew on 11 June 2008, while the first weight-optimized F-35A and F-35C, AF-1 and CF-1, flew on 14 November 2009 and 6 June 2010 respectively.  The F-35B's first hover was on 17 March 2010, followed by its first vertical landing the next day.  For testing avionics and mission systems, a Boeing 737-300 was modified to duplicate the cockpit, the Lockheed Martin CATBird. This was how field testing of the F-35's sensors were conducted during Exercise Northern Edge 2009 and 2011, serving as significant risk-reduction steps.  Flight tests revealed several serious deficiencies that required costly redesigns, caused delays, and resulted in several fleet-wide groundings. In 2011, the F-35C failed to catch the arresting wire in all eight landing tests; a redesigned tail hook was delivered two years later.  Software and mission systems were among the biggest sources of delays for the program, with sensor fusion proving especially challenging.  Multifunction Advanced Data Link (MADL) is a key capability provided by Northrop Grumman's F-35 integrated communications, navigation and identification (CNI) avionics as a fast switching narrow directional communications data link between stealth aircraft.  It replaces the older Link16 which allowed a missile from one plane to be handed over to another plane after firing.  MADL is expected to provide needed throughput, latency, frequency-hopping and anti-jamming capability with phased Array Antenna Assemblies (AAAs) that send and receive tightly directed radio signals using the Ku band.  However since the F-35’s Multifunction Advanced Data Link (MADL) and the F-22’s Intra-Flight Data Link are incompatible, so the two aircraft types cannot transmit data to each other. In December 2020, the USAF demonstrated an F-35A and F-22 exchanging data for the first time using a ground-based gatewayONE system, which is designed to translate between their two different communications systems. Also, as part of that demonstration, a gatewayONE aboard a Kratos XQ-58A Valkyrie unmanned air vehicle was supposed to facilitate the airborne of exchange of data, but failed due to technical issues.  In fatigue testing, the F-35B suffered several premature cracks, requiring a redesign of the structure.  The F-35B and C also had problems with the horizontal tails suffering heat damage from prolonged afterburner use.  The F-35's reliability and availability have fallen short of requirements, especially in the early years of testing. The ALIS maintenance and logistics system was plagued by excessive connectivity requirements and faulty diagnoses. In late 2017, the GAO reported the time needed to repair an F-35 part averaged 172 days, which was "twice the program's objective," and that shortage of spare parts was degrading readiness.  Gun accuracy of the F-35A remains unacceptable. As of 2020, the number of the program's most serious issues have been decreased by half.  In August 2021, the F-35C embarked on its maiden deployment on board the USS Carl Vinson with another aircraft making its debut deployment being the CMV-22 Osprey variant.  Total development time taking from 1986's ASTOVL proposal or November 1996's JSF development contract until August 2021 or Twenty-Five to Thirty-Five years to complete.

It still had some minor problems​There seems to be a slowing of procurement in the Pentagon.  While the Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicle is the famous example, lampooned in the movie Pentagon Wars, it is systemic and unable to be fixed from within.  Technology from the 1980s is first seeing the field decades into the 21st century.  Failures of Airframes are excused by 'breakthroughs' in electronic coordination between branches of the military which will only add bureaucracy in a pilot's ears until the President is talking to each and every pilot before they can launch against an adversary.  Stealth and MADL aren't making pilots more lethal but incentivizing hesitancy. Once those internal shaking & baking bays are opened then the enemy can see you after all.  Remember too that the F-117 was shot down.  Wartime has a way of accelerating development and I wonder if 2021 America is better or worse than 'Painfully White' America at doing that.  Then the battle of the 1980s technology might close together faster than you think.  Their F-15 and f-16s would be newer too, its not like we made better ones in the last two decades.


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## Red Hood (Nov 4, 2021)

It needs to be a man's military again. The kind of thing total pussies would move to Canada to dodge a draft from.


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## Haim Arlosoroff (Nov 4, 2021)

The Shadow said:


> It needs to be a man's military again. The kind of thing total pussies would move to Canada to dodge a draft from.






Afghanistan had moments of that, when you got to the edge of things.





Thing is, girls can't go a week without showers stuck in with the boys.  So the Army/Marines shy away from quiet duties on the front with a minimum of supplies and comfort, and so the frontier is always right up to the central bases and they just get shelled and rocketed.Damn stupid way to fight a war, at least counter battery and have a scouting post outside the base sight the shelling in order to counter battery.  Instead they just take it, its a bizarre way to fight.  Neither you nor the enemies are in any hurry to kill each other so the war goes on and on.

Germans said that about the Americans too, where the Germans would shell and then attack the Americans would just shell and shell without advancing.  At least the American men of WWII would shell the enemy back though, at least they dug in foxholes and kept the enemy front away from their HQ.


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## Lorne Armstrong (Nov 4, 2021)

Haim Arlosoroff said:


> Afghanistan had moments of that, when you got to the edge of things.
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> 
> 
> ...


Anyone who’s ever served in the US Military, if they’re being honest, can tell you that there’s been a decline.


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## Solid Snek (Nov 4, 2021)

Lorne Armstrong said:


> Anyone who’s ever served in the US Military, if they’re being honest, can tell you that there’s been a decline.


To be fair, that's just anecdotal evidence, especially if you're no longer in service. Everyone always thinks that shit's getting huggier since their day -

(there's a great clip from King of the Hill, where Cotton and his WW2 buddies rag on a pack of Vietnam vets for being pussies; I can't find it online, so pretend it's posted here)

And it's possible this is true! But, it might just be personal biases. People tend to look back on the past with nostalgia, romanticizing their own experiences, and misjudging how much better things were back when _they_ were young and tough. Furthermore, the military is one of the world's largest corporations; even high ranking officers only ever directly experience a tiny fraction of what it encapsulates. Even if a veteran were to have perfectly accurate judgement in regards to, say, the combat readiness of the unit he served in, his experience would not necessarily be enough to draw conclusions about the state of the military as a whole. So, US military personnel are not necessarily the most reliable source for information!

That said,* yes,* based on nothing more than my own anecdotal observations, the military has absolutely dropped in quality. That video of the 10th Mountain guys is pretty funny (horrifying?). It's sad to think that they can get away with flagging their battle buddies like that, but they crack one joke about trannies, and they're liable to get court martialed for an EO violation.


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## attractive_pneumonia (Nov 4, 2021)

I would probably state that the military has become addicted to high performance things because it is so averse to casualties. Whether it be high performance planes, tanks, vehicles or units of troops. Your bog standard GI has been de-emphasized in favor of special forces and overwatch in the form of drones, and some form of CAS, whether that be Spectre Gunships, A-10s or Fighters flown in from carriers or local airforce bases. I would say with full conviction that the USA of WW2 would defeat the modern US army in a land war, the current US army is small, averse to losses, uses weapons that take a long time to produce and contain complicated components unsuited for long duration in the field without servicing. On the other hand all of the stuff used in WW2 could go weeks or months in the field, the units in the field just accepted a high level of attrition, their equipment was cheap and mass produced, and in high quantity. The modern US army would follow the same path it did in Iraq or Afghanistan, an amazing early performance and quickly fall into crisis as everything around its bases turn hostile until it loses any measure of a coherent campaign. *The Modern US army cannot garrison a country to retain control of it.* The WW2 army had huge amounts of manpower and would expend it as needed. Also the WW2 military did not need to operate from highly centralized bases, you can service P-51 and other planes in any field, they can take off from a gravel road even if it wasn't level and dummy rockets blow shit up just as well as a JDAM. Nonstop air attacks from prop planes in high numbers can easily work over a modern airbase, a P-51 strafing with 8 50cal machine guns will swiss cheese almost anything, there was a reason the P-51 remained in service into the 1980s as a military plane in South America. https://youtu.be/SAPqr3YCNmA is a good example of what kind of shit the WW2 era got up to, they were far more capable at widespread destruction of industry than the modern military.

One thing the American people have lost is their ability to narrow in on "good enough." Sure you may need the F-22 to secure air supremacy in modern warfare but at what point does "good enough" come in for Fighter-Bombers or Close Air Support? Is the F-4 Phantom incapable of flying to a place and hurling bombs onto it?


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## wtfNeedSignUp (Nov 4, 2021)

Almost certainly yes. There's the reliance of overly specialized tech that is almost certainely going to break when it's critical (nevermind the fact it requires materials from enemy countries). The absolute lack of capable and responsible leadership, as shown in the Afganishtan fiasco. But I think the biggest question is moral, like why exactly would a USA soldier fight in a conflict that has actual stakes? Maybe if they can be fooled into thinking it would protect their family and neighbours, but beyond that there's nothing. The American dream became how many niggers your tax dollars can feed, and any legacy would be paved over with a statue of some wife beater who got the boot of the law stepped on him.


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## Haim Arlosoroff (Nov 4, 2021)

attractive_pneumonia said:


> One thing the American people have lost is their ability to narrow in on "good enough." Sure you may need the F-22 to secure air supremacy in modern warfare but at what point does "good enough" come in for Fighter-Bombers or Close Air Support? Is the F-4 Phantom incapable of flying to a place and hurling bombs onto it?


Complete change in topic, but have you ever played Wargame: Red Dragon?  Its pretty much exactly like you describe, tech from the 60s-70s used against 1990s level of tech and its pretty interchangable.  A M48A5K can hit just as well as an M1A1 Abrams but it completely lacks a stabilizer so it has to come to a complete stop to do it.  Obviously the armor is very poor by comparison but its balanced in-game by cost and so the numbers you can field.  It gives you a fairly good intuition of the limits of ground based AA, overwhelming naval CIWS vs using better missiles, and the difference between America's stabilized MBT guns vs Russia's 9M119M Refleks (which was much better than America's XM1111 Mid-Range Munition).  Its an RTS, but it seems to be getting a solid following.


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## El Gato Grande (Nov 4, 2021)

In terms of technology, the U.S military is still doing very well, however there has been a decline in personnel and leadership quality.

Increased procurement times for modern equipment makes perfect sense because the more technologically advanced something is the more engineering, logistics, complexity, expertise and therefore complexity and troubleshooting will be required. While the F35 suffered from corruption and engineering mistakes the high ambitions behind its design (doing anything and everything most modern combat aircraft can be asked to do) made it the over-engineered nightmare it was/is. You can see this isn’t an issue native to America when you look at other militaries around the world having similar procurement times for top-of-the-line equipment.

Overcomplexity is an obvious weakness, but as conventional war becomes more and more reliant on technology it will simply become more decisive over time. It’s logical to buy 10 F35s to fight a peer opponent instead of 200 MiG 21s, because  with MiGs you’ll run out of planes and expensive to train, human pilots before the F35s run out of missiles. In certain situations quantity can beat quality, but modern military strategy revolves around exploiting technological supremacy as much as possible for maximum efficiency.

I don’t know much of anything about U.S military recruiting, but they’ve been facing a recruitment shortage in recent years, likely due to how much of the population is ineligible for service due to obesity and muh mental health. This is also a possible liability in war—we will be able to blast anything to bits, but unable to field enough infantry to occupy it. However the U.S of A is a big place, and if they wanted to they could still draft hundreds of thousands of young men into service. If you’re not a fatass or an autist you’ll be sent to fight Chinese alongside Indians in the Himalayas while all the losers watch from the comfort of home.

Leadership is degrading due to peacetime complacency at best and politicalization at worse. Afghanistan is a prime example of the leadership/intelligence failing to see reality. However this issue can be realistically fixed, as in the event of a real conflict the incompetents will likely be quickly replaced once people’s lives are on the line.


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## ShortBusDriver (Nov 4, 2021)

> Overcomplexity is an obvious weakness, but as conventional war becomes more and more reliant on technology it will simply become more decisive over time. It’s logical to buy 10 F35s to fight a peer opponent instead of 200 MiG 21s, because with MiGs you’ll run out of planes and expensive to train, human pilots before the F35s run out of missiles. In certain situations quantity can beat quality, but modern military strategy revolves around exploiting technological supremacy as much as possible for maximum efficiency.


A couple of things, the US's premier fighter is the F22 Raptor, not the F35.

The F22 came about as the Russians already had comparable or better aircraft and the Chinese are working on their own.

The F35 exists because the F22 costs $100 million dollars per unit far too expensive to buy a fleet of.

Firing missiles and the idea of technological supremacy turned out to be an absolute folly for the US during Vietnam when military brass thought air combat was going to be done with missiles and didn't think the F4 Phantom needed a gun. 

Instead F4 Phantom pilots found air combat still took place at close range and the Migs they were fighting against had guns. This sent the US into a scramble to try and retrofit a gun pod to the weapons rack of the F4 Phantom.


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## Suburban Bastard (Nov 4, 2021)

wtfNeedSignUp said:


> Almost certainly yes. There's the reliance of overly specialized tech that is almost certainely going to break when it's critical (nevermind the fact it requires materials from enemy countries). The absolute lack of capable and responsible leadership, as shown in the Afganishtan fiasco. But I think the biggest question is moral, like why exactly would a USA soldier fight in a conflict that has actual stakes? Maybe if they can be fooled into thinking it would protect their family and neighbours, but beyond that there's nothing. The American dream became how many niggers your tax dollars can feed, and any legacy would be paved over with a statue of some wife beater who got the boot of the law stepped on him.


lol you're just pissed they're preventing you from going full 14/88 shooting spree


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## Haim Arlosoroff (Nov 5, 2021)

El Gato Grande said:


> In terms of technology, the U.S military is still doing very well, however there has been a decline in personal and leadership quality.


The generals are more interested in staffing their ranks than in the quality of their fighting forces.  Maybe they're right and the situation is that dire, but its been eyeopening to be sure.  They've always been a Power Point and numbers game group at the Pentagon, but they're missing the smaller details in their larger assumptions of the world.  Its going to bite them in the ass one day.




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El Gato Grande said:


> You can see this isn’t an issue native to America when you look at other militaries around the world having similar procurement times for top-of-the-line equipment.


The Su-57 was thought up in 1979, and Sukhoi started its program in 1983, the Soviet Union collapsed just before 1992, and in 1999, the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation initiated the PAK FA or I-21 program, with the competition announced in April 2001.  On 25 May 2018, the ministry disclosed that during the February 2018 deployment to Syria, a Su-57 fired a cruise missile in combat, likely a Kh-59MK2.  On 27 September 2019, the ministry released a video showcasing the first flight of the Okhotnik UCAV alongside Su-57. Reportedly the UAV operated autonomously and flew for more than 30 minutes interacting with the Su-57 to test extending the fighter's radar and target designation range for use of long-range air-launched weapons from the outside of enemy air defenses.  Total procurement time was 19 to 39 years during which the Soviet Union collapsed.  Admittedly the Okhotnik UCAV bears some visual resemblance to a RQ-170. It is speculated that the Russian engineers could have had access to the one that was captured by Iranians as well as the Taliban captured USAF E-11A, serial 11-9358, which crashed in Afghanistan at about 1:00 PM (LT); 8:30 AM (UTC).  These would have greatly accelerated the Russian development of their Battlefield Airborne Communications Nodes, UAVs, and strong insight into the MADL of the F-35.  Ironically strengthening the F-22 since it is as incompatible with MADL as it is with supplying Oxygen to its pilots.

So if America fell it might have delayed the procurement of the F-35 in whatever new government arose by 4-6 years?  The F-35 narrowly beat the Su-57 and the Soviet Union collapsed midway through its procurement.  I wonder what a uniquely bad procurement time for top-of-the-line equipment would look like?

Would it start out as the Truck and become a CAESAR self-propelled howitzer, upgrade to a SpGH DANA only to end up as a 8x8 Mobile Gun System?​


El Gato Grande said:


> It’s logical to buy 10 F35s to fight a peer opponent instead of 200 MiG 21s, because with MiGs you’ll run out of planes and expensive to train, human pilots before the F35s run out of missiles.


The problem is that at 50,000 ft the AN/APG-81 would in Europe be looking up around 82,000 ft at a Zaslon-A "look-down/shoot down" on a Mig-31 which has been upgraded to attack low-flying cruise missiles.  If it can see the F-35, then the weapons platform from the mid-70s/early-80s has a chance to kill it.  If.  But yes, the Mig-21 is only for 3rd world dictators who want a loud engine during a military parade for a fly-by.
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 An Su-7 might fly a ground attack mission by surprising an enemy, no doubt the North Koreans would try it.  It might even work against the South Koreans once.  However even their F-5Es will shoot them down, never mind the F-16Cs they have.


El Gato Grande said:


> However the U.S of A is a big place, and if they wanted to they could still draft hundreds of thousands of young men into service. If you’re not a fatass or an autist you’ll be sent to fight Chinese alongside Indians in the Himalayas while all the losers watch from the comfort of home.


​
That would be the last war America ever fought, I think a draft would lead to fragging right away once the Rainbow Flag rather than squad tactics or competent leadership reared its ugly head.  After Germany invaded the Soviet Union during Operation Barbarossa, recruits from France, Spain, Belgium (including Walloons), the territory of occupied Czechoslovakia, Hungary and the Balkans were signed on to the Waffen-SS. By February 1942, Waffen-SS recruitment in south-east Europe turned into compulsory conscription for all German minorities of military age. From 1942 onwards, further units of non-Germanic recruits were formed. Legions were formed of men from Estonia, Latvia as well as men from Bosnia, Herzegovina, Croatia, Georgia, Ukraine, Russia and Cossacks. However, by 1943 the Waffen-SS could not longer claim overall to be an "elite" fighting force. Recruitment and conscription based on "numerical over qualitative expansion" took place, with many of the "foreign" units being good for only rear-guard duty.

Ironically Straight White Christians would right away be reduced to rear-guard duty as they wouldn't fit in.  Scarcities of physical fitness and ample opiates have taken their toll on the still third-of-America which is the White Male, being told they'll either get a heroes death fighting with Troons for Israel or get sent to rear-guard duty because they're racist will provoke the largest shift in American politics not seen since the end of slavery.  They've seen what America cheers for, who cares if the LGBT watching on their TV boo you as you're sent to Jail when you would not serve?



El Gato Grande said:


> The U.S armed forces have a lot of problems, but they are still the best military in the world.


I'll give you best armed forces on the offense, I don't know if you've seen Russian Tank numbers or China's small naval numbers but I wouldn't want to start a war of aggression with them.  They can't project power at all, but if America is blamed in Europe/Middle=East for the war and they continue trade with Russia or China its going to be a longer war until it goes nuclear.  At some point in the next twenty years, someone is going to dare America to fire on them first and then just ignore America warships or fighters when they won't fire first.

America will not accept casualties, the morale is too low and the cause too immoral.  Empire, even for gas prices, is not supported.  Huge gas prices are coming anyway, so why bother bullying the world if not for the Petrol-Dollar inflation protection?


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## El Gato Grande (Nov 5, 2021)

ShortBusDriver said:


> The F22 came about as the Russians already had comparable or better aircraft and the Chinese are working on their own.


What is your rationale for the Su-27 and it’s variants being “better or comparable” to the F-22? (I assume you are referring to Su-27). Also the US is drawing up plans for 6th gen fighters.


ShortBusDriver said:


> The F35 exists because the F22 costs $100 million dollars per unit far too expensive to buy a fleet of.


Cost reduction was a big motivation/goal, but the F35 has a far more expanded role than the F-22 does.


ShortBusDriver said:


> Firing missiles and the idea of technological supremacy turned out to be an absolute folly for the US during Vietnam when military brass thought air combat was going to be done with missiles and didn't think the F4 Phantom needed a gun.
> 
> Instead F4 Phantom pilots found air combat still took place at close range and the Migs they were fighting against had guns. This sent the US into a scramble to try and retrofit a gun pod to the weapons rack of the F4 Phantom.


Vietnam happened when missile technology was still very new and far less developed than it is today, and I do think/agree with you that the same may apply to stealth/new tech in the modern age. However continuing to use missiles vs guns as an example it’s clear that pursuing technological supremacy is the way to go, as while the cannon issue was a suprise in Vietnam it was able to be mitigated while missiles kept getting better and better. In the 80s and 90s air combat became extremely one sided depending on who had better missile/radar technology (mole cricket 19, gulf war). In general it’s easier to modify a high tech platform than it is to bring a lower tech platform up to the capability of a higher tech one.


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## Haim Arlosoroff (Nov 5, 2021)

El Gato Grande said:


> Vietnam happened when missile technology was still very new and far less developed than it is today, and I do think/agree with you that the same may apply to stealth/new tech in the modern age. However continuing to use missiles vs guns as an example it’s clear that pursuing technological supremacy is the way to go, as while the cannon issue was a suprise in Vietnam it was able to be mitigated while missiles kept getting better and better. In the 80s and 90s air combat became extremely one sided depending on who had better missile/radar technology (mole cricket 19, gulf war). In general it’s easier to modify a high tech platform than it is to bring a lower tech platform up to the capability of a higher tech one.


What do you think about the Project 23900 amphibious assault ship?  After the French refused to deliver two Mistral-class amphibious assault ships due to Russia's military intervention in Ukraine in September 2014, Russia decided to build the _Ivan Rogov_ and _Mitrofan Moskalenko _which will be able to carry up to four Sukhoi S-70 Okhotnik-B drones, to both perform strike missions and to perform target designation for the hypersonic Zircon missiles launched from other ships.  The Russian Defense Ministry announced the successful test of a missile launched from a nuclear submarine for the first time from a surfaced position. The ministry, which tested firing the missile from a warship in July, said that the nuclear submarine _Severodvinsk_ fired the missile while deployed in the Barents Sea and had hit its chosen target.

They really seem to like a Radar visible drone relaying information to a hidden missile launcher.  I think America is going to spend a long time striking down every drone we see because of the Iranian incident.  Normalizing shooting down each other's drones seems easier than allowing Russia to fire from under cover.  Personally I think this stealth thing is over-rated.  We're going to be using Electro-optical targeting systems once the software catches up to the existing hardware found on everyday Graphics Cards.  Once a computer can keep track of the 3d space around it and render objects moving separately from the background it won't matter if its stealthy.  Russian Tanks use Line-Of-Sight Beam Riding (LOSBR) or beam guided anti-tank missiles currently, it cannot be that hard to paint a target similarly with a laser or even simulate doing so within the rendered battle-space within the targeting computer tracking the two planes and the missile flying between them and relaying guidance to the missile as the pilot maneuvers.  Once Electro-optics surpass IRST because a single Jet can composite its surroundings together from a few camera located around the fighter, Stealth will be over.


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## Lorne Armstrong (Nov 5, 2021)

El Gato Grande said:


> However the U.S of A is a big place, and if they wanted to they could still draft hundreds of thousands of young men into service. If you’re not a fatass or an autist you’ll be sent to fight Chinese alongside Indians in the Himalayas while all the losers watch from the comfort of home.



There is no way that forced conscription into the US Military is ever coming back.  The current Admin can’t even get 30% of the population to take their government sanctioned shots under threat of loss of livelihood.  There’s NO WAY that half the people drafted wouldn’t just refuse and what can the Feds do?  Can’t arrest them all.

What you’d see them do if they have to is what they had to do back in the mid-to-late 2Ks during “The Surge”. Call up the Guard and Reserves, extend deployments for everyone, lower recruiting standards to allow dropouts, fatbodies, and criminals in, while at the same time offering large cash bonuses to anyone willing to join or reenlist.


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## murdered meat bag (Nov 5, 2021)

standards for sof units have been reduced to allow women into the program. that is a real thing.



Lorne Armstrong said:


> There is no way that forced conscription into the US Military is ever coming back.  The current Admin can’t even get 30% of the population to take their government sanctioned shots under threat of loss of livelihood.  There’s NO WAY that half the people drafted wouldn’t just refuse and what can the Feds do?  Can’t arrest them all.
> 
> What you’d see them do if they have to is what they had to do back in the mid-to-late 2Ks during “The Surge”. Call up the Guard and Reserves, extend deployments for everyone, lower recruiting standards to allow dropouts, fatbodies, and criminals in, while at the same time offering large cash bonuses to anyone willing to join or reenlist.



you arrest 100 and make their convictions and punishments public. America's problem with the draft is that 1/3-3/8th of military aged males are too fat to be drafted.


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## Seventh Star (Nov 5, 2021)

Haim Arlosoroff said:


> Once Electro-optics surpass IRST because a single Jet can composite its surroundings together from a few camera located around the fighter, Stealth will be over.


Oh not this shit again. It's like ATGM's, APFSDS, 88mm cannons, and HEAT. Everything is "the end of tank armor", until higher output engines, composite armor, ERA, pike noses/slopes, and passive/active protection systems pop up, shut them down, and the debate starts all over again a few years later. It's just not that easy.


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## LeChampion1992 (Nov 5, 2021)

Lorne Armstrong said:


> Anyone who’s ever served in the US Military, if they’re being honest, can tell you that there’s been a decline.


Yeah it began in earnist around the later years of the 2000s. It was trying to turn the recruitment into more of a police academy to prepare the masses for more police actions. But between 2011-2021 the US military really began to degrade and the Dems are mainly the reason for it.
The political class wanted to turn the US military from a military force which ruthlessly enforces it's geopolitical interests into some glorified jobs program got the green new deal. If you talk to any vet they will tell you it's the military command that is utterly incompetent and it's mainly because their all wokeists.


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## Haim Arlosoroff (Nov 5, 2021)

Seventh Star said:


> Oh not this shit again. It's like ATGM's, APFSDS, 88mm cannons, and HEAT. Everything is "the end of tank armor", until higher output engines, composite armor, ERA, pike noses/slopes, and passive/active protection systems pop up, shut them down, and the debate starts all over again a few years later. It's just not that easy.


The concept of armoring Tanks is hardly the Stealth Mafia in the Air Force, everything has to be stealth when wing-mounts and external fuel (or flying fuel trucks) are hardly low-radar.  The F-35's bays shake and/or bake any missile hidden by them.  Its a fad, fighters dogfight, missiles work 2/3rds of the time, troops want loud noises that scare the enemy over smart bombs that kill the enemy, and the next-gen bomber can only get through last-gen's air superiority safely.

Tell the Anti-ATGM rhetoric to the Russian who made it work better than we did (in an American-Russian war I would hope our attack helicopters would be killing their tanks more than the abrams' do), and as for the APFSDS it just isn't long enough until you have to muzzle-load an artillery piece because it sticks out the enemy-side then and and only then it has been perfected.  The American MBT, the Abrams, has much better gun stabilizers, engine output, and ceramic armor which suits the shoot-and-scoot mindset which NATO quietly follows when it isn't doing the *TEMPO TEMPO TEMPO* mindset.  The Abrams can shoot better moving than the Chinese can shoot static.


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## Seventh Star (Nov 5, 2021)

Haim Arlosoroff said:


> Tell the Anti-ATGM rhetoric to the Russian who made it work better than we did (in an American-Russian war I would hope our attack helicopters would be killing their tanks more than the abrams' do), and the APFSDS just isn't long enough when you have to muzzle-load an artillery piece because it sticks out the enemy-side then it has been perfected.


I don't know if it's too late and my brain is fucky or something, but this reads just like a schizopost. I have no clue what you're trying to say.


Haim Arlosoroff said:


> America has much better stabilizers, engine output, and ceramic armor which suits the shoot-and-scoot mindset which NATO quietly follows when it isn't doing the *TEMPO TEMPO TEMPO* mindset.  The Abrams can shoot better moving than the Chinese can shoot static.


The Abrams also weights more than a WWII heavy tank. The Chinese and Russians can easily put out lighter and more tanks. We have little knowledge of protection on these vehicles, but the Abrams has less hp/ton than say, a Type 99 or T-90. It's extremely fattened up by the various upgrades it's gotten over the years, while the other two are under 60 tonnes at the very least. Their MBT's are easier to deploy and get the job done pretty much just as well. The Abrams will grow even heavier with SEPv4.

Also the Abrams uses a mixture of ceramic/DU armor in a not very efficient arrangement. Sloped armor doesn't matter as much when it comes to APFSDS, but it technically does allow other MBTs, in particular the Type 99, to squeeze some more use out of their armor, APFSDS shatters at extreme angles.

What matters is that no concept dies off that easily.


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## WutangLee (Nov 6, 2021)

my two cents having finished my service is leadership is under a giant delusion that they're just tapping into reserve of intelligent people (lol, cause in delusion land,  "smart" people don't look down on service members) that is meant to compensate for your cookie cutter meathead. However there will be long lasting consequences if it goes off the rails. This isn't like when they desegregated races where the country unlocked a large pool of poor but tough until then ostracized minority enlistees that could be easily shaped and molded into your military because you gave them a sandwich and taught them how to tie their shoes. The Troon and LGBT crew are stubborn, hard to work with, and expect you change for them.  Also, the sandwich and shoe tying isn't gonna fly, there is an ulterior motive almost all the time. I hate saying it, but poor kids are who they should be going after, because they drink the koolaid; you do you civic duty, and there is opportunity at the end of the tunnel. the LGBT TROON crowd utterly despises service members, and you will never change that. Just google what happened to the ARMY esports team, the mentally ill pronoun crowd ran and would bombard communist memes.




Seventh Star said:


> I don't know if it's too late and my brain is fucky or something, but this reads just like a schizopost. I have no clue what you're trying to say.
> 
> The Abrams also weights more than a WWII heavy tank. The Chinese and Russians can easily put out lighter and more tanks. We have little knowledge of protection on these vehicles, but the Abrams has less hp/ton than say, a Type 99 or T-90. It's extremely fattened up by the various upgrades it's gotten over the years, while the other two are under 60 tonnes at the very least. Their MBT's are easier to deploy and get the job done pretty much just as well. The Abrams will grow even heavier with SEPv4.


the TYPE 99 can't shoot for shit, and it might just be the crews that are poor, but the Chinese probably won't give out anything reliable on what the faults are.  When it comes to the Chinese you have to look at what they will and will not export, and also the performance of their exports.


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## Haim Arlosoroff (Nov 6, 2021)

Seventh Star said:


> I don't know if it's too late and my brain is fucky or something, but this reads just like a schizopost. I have no clue what you're trying to say.


It was too late for me, I was making a joke about the APFSDS just being an over-sized Roman pilum for all its metallurgy.  Sorry, I type in schizo when I'm both tired and distracted by conversation while I'm also typing.



Seventh Star said:


> The Abrams also weights more than a WWII heavy tank. The Chinese and Russians can easily put out lighter and more tanks. We have little knowledge of protection on these vehicles, but the Abrams has less hp/ton than say, a Type 99 or T-90. It's extremely fattened up by the various upgrades it's gotten over the years, while the other two are under 60 tonnes at the very least. Their MBT's are easier to deploy and get the job done pretty much just as well. The Abrams will grow even heavier with SEPv4.


You're absolutely right about the mass creep, it started at about 55 tons and now hits mid-70s.  I thought it had a much better powertrain, but 1,500 horsepower seems to be the universal output today.  Only the Challenger 2 is worse at 16.0 hp/t.

Chinese tanks are apparently rather good, but once they break you pretty much have to get a new one. In 2015, China participated with the Type 96A in a Russian-hosted tank biathlon where it competed against the Russian T-72B3 which it lost to.

The Chinese are very Polish in their tanks, they're trying to have a force with both NATO and Russian characteristics.  The ZTZ-99 has a 2A46 tank gun with a T-72 carousel-style autoloader which China licenced 9M119 missiles from Russia in order to build for, but also claims a dual-axis stabilized main gun, stabilized gunner thermal sight, an advanced ballistic computer and a laser range finder like a NATO tank.  Its very ambitious, considering the previous ZTZ88 was a T-62 with a NATO 105mm rifled gun.  The ZTZ96 seems to just be a Type 85-III with the additional spaced armor on the turret front and with less of the Type 85-III maintenance issues.

Their ZTQ-15 seems to just be a ZTZ88 design with a better engine for the Tibetan heights and better armor, but it also uses NATO 105mm rounds.



WutangLee said:


> the TYPE 99 can't shoot for shit, and it might just be the crews that are poor, but the Chinese probably won't give out anything reliable on what the faults are. When it comes to the Chinese you have to look at what they will and will not export, and also the performance of their exports.


Apparently Pakistan has the latest export, the MBT-2000 which is the Type 85 fitted with Chinese 125 mm gun and autoloader, Western fire-control system, Ukrainian KMDB 6TD-2 1200 hp diesel engine and French SESM ESM500 automatic transmission.  If only we hadn't crashed a helicopter playing canoe-or-capture, we might have had sane relations with them.  Although I don't think the ZTZ-99 has an ZTZ-99-II for export yet.


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## Lemmingwise (Nov 6, 2021)

Obviously the military grew in strength. It's like wondering if a year 1000 knight army could defeat a year 0 roman army. Yes, they can. With the rapid development of tech, that's about how dramatic a tech advantage is between 20 years difference.

But the real question isn't whether the US army declined or improved, but whether they improved enough to remain as dominant as they were. They haven't.

When supranational elites were wondering how they could control the world better, they figured that the land of the free (and armed) was never going to be too easy to control. But if they moved all production to another country that has a government with no problems repressing its people relentlessly, then they knew it is only a matter of time before they can leverage this into strategically and step by step controlling the world.

Stealing and backdoor buying all the tech they need, they can produce such an incredible amount of missiles it makes your head spin and your carriers say "yikes". The fact that there is even a lack of political will to let china stop raping the US in trade deals makes pretty clear how this is going to end.


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## NynchLiggers (Nov 6, 2021)

I'm very far from a expert in military themes, but the high command is either in denial or actively seeks to deliberately reduce the quality of the Armed Forces. Troons in the military are the exact same as troons in any other field: narccisistic, delusional, etc.


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## Poppavalyim Andropoff (Nov 6, 2021)

depends how many traitor troons are enlisted at the momment ..


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## Haim Arlosoroff (Nov 6, 2021)

Lemmingwise said:


> Obviously the military grew in strength. It's like wondering if a year 1000 knight army could defeat a year 0 roman army. Yes, they can. With the rapid development of tech, that's about how dramatic a tech advantage is between 20 years difference.


Which has the better Bradley Fighting Vehicles, M1 Abrams, Strykers, LAV-25s, LVTP-7s, Humvees, M109 howitzers, UH-60 Black Hawks, AH-64 Apaches, AH-1G Cobras, Nimitz class Carriers, Los Angeles class Subs, Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, A-10 Thunderbolts, F/A-18 Hornets, B-2 Spirits, F-14 Tomcats, F-15E Strike Eagles, F-16 Vipers, F-117 Nighthawks, or F-111G Aardvarks?  Why?  I don't really have good answers as a lot of these vehicles decayed in the following decades, we've stopped building them so we've kept using the older and older frames.

It would be like if the 1000AD Knights were equipped with (there was no year 0) 44BC Roman equipment refurbished but essentially the same equipment.  Which, by the by, Caesar had about fifty thousand fighting men with 2-3 times that in camp doing logistics because Romans were really good at organization.  At the Siege of Jerusalem in 1099AD there were about 1,200-1,300 knights, 11,000-12,000 infantry, and about twice that is camp hands.  The year 1000AD army fighting a year 1AD army probably would certainly lose.  Romans never had a million men under arms in the entirety of their empire, but they got close!  Spain managed only 300,000 at the height of their world-spanning empire.  The American War of Independence had only about forty thousand men total including the camp hands on each of the sides in 1776.  The American military's armies surpassed Caesar only in 1861.

This has been dictated through history by logistical constraints, mainly the supply of food. Before the mid-17th century, armies basically lived off the land. They didn't have supply lines; they moved to the supply, and many times their movements were dictated by supply considerations. While some regions with good communications could supply large armies for longer periods, still they had to disperse when they moved from these well supplied areas. The maximum size of field armies remained under 50,000 for most of this period, and strength reports over this figure are always from unreliable narrative sources and must be regarded with scepticism. In the second half of the 17th things changed greatly. Armies began to be supplied through a net of depots linked by supply lines, that greatly increased the size of Field Armies. In the 18th century and early 19th century, before the advent of the railway, the size of Field Armies reached figures over 100,000.

Getting back to the actual topic though, I just don't believe America has the fighting spirit today that it had even in 1990.  Vietnam burned the WWII fighting spirit out of America, and the Oil Wars to keep the energy sector using American Dollars I think destroyed the vast remains of a fighting spirit.  Kids just don't want to jump out of planes for Israel, led by a Troon who is going to lead them across miles of dirt without showering, eating well, or the Troon's medical cocktail to keep it from killing itself.  The dream is over, the reality is starkly difference then the last generation which played with G.I. Joe figures.  Troons who played Battlefield and jumped out of Jets to RPG an enemy fighter do not want to go through boot camp to become a hero.  They want to hate America and snark.  'militainment' as a concept has failed to produce good recruiting, Iraq and Afghanistan became too real for the propaganda to filter out.


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## Cat Menagerie (Nov 6, 2021)

I live beneath a common AF flight path near a huge ass AF base, so I hope it's not that bad where it matters. They fly pretty low overhead at times. I don't want them crashing one of their AWAC (or AEW&C or however it's spelled)  glowplanes into my neighborhood, but if they do, I guess I'll upload the video here.


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## Seventh Star (Nov 6, 2021)

WutangLee said:


> the TYPE 99 can't shoot for shit, and it might just be the crews that are poor, but the Chinese probably won't give out anything reliable on what the faults are.  When it comes to the Chinese you have to look at what they will and will not export, and also the performance of their exports.


Look at the tank biathlon and judge for yourself.


Haim Arlosoroff said:


> It was too late for me, I was making a joke about the APFSDS just being an over-sized Roman pilum for all its metallurgy.  Sorry, I type in schizo when I'm both tired and distracted by conversation while I'm also typing.
> 
> You're absolutely right about the mass creep, it started at about 55 tons and now hits mid-70s.  I thought it had a much better powertrain, but 1,500 horsepower seems to be the universal output today.  Only the Challenger 2 is worse at 16.0 hp/t.
> 
> ...


It's not that ambitious. The Chinese are pretty smart and have been doing technologically advanced tanks for a long while. The 111 was a heavy tank project in the 60s that would have incorporated a 130mm gun, a stabilizer, and a carousel-style autoloader. Apparently they stalled out at a 122mm, manual loading prototype. They've had a lot of experimentation with stabilizers, ATGM's, and composite armor. The problem is that the industry wasn't strong enough to produce any of these in mass.

The Russians themselves are no slouches either, the T-90 has some impressive systems like the Shtora and obviously possess dual-axis stabilized guns. Dual axis stabilization is a basic requirement, and the next frontier is three axis stabilizers, already tested in the 80s with a Leopard testbed.

The Abrams is a very competent design for it's era, but by now everyone is making a new generation of tanks with more potent guns and more retarded amounts of armor. Sure, they won't completely replace the old Leopard 2s, T-90s and whatnot, but its going to get left behind soon, and the Army is just thinking about building a M1A3.


Lemmingwise said:


> Obviously the military grew in strength. It's like wondering if a year 1000 knight army could defeat a year 0 roman army. Yes, they can. With the rapid development of tech, that's about how dramatic a tech advantage is between 20 years difference.


That's not that easy. The Romans were better prepared, usually had professional, large armies, and better commanders.


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## SSj_Ness (Nov 7, 2021)

Naturally the military is weaker, society as a whole has been sabotaged by the left.


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## woodfromwell (Nov 7, 2021)

an ever-growing percentage of the American military is made up of individuals seeking a fast-track citizenship. joining the military in the current year is not unlike taking a job at Walmart.


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## Burned CDs (Nov 11, 2021)

I remember in 2007 the army wouldn't accept me for a weed possession charge. I spoke four languages and could fix anything mechanical and computer related.


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## Lemmingwise (Nov 11, 2021)

Burned CDs said:


> I remember in 2007 the army wouldn't accept me for a weed possession charge. I spoke four languages and could fix anything mechanical and computer related.


But did you grow up with two mothers and are you nonbinary?


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## El Gato Grande (Nov 13, 2021)

Haim Arlosoroff said:


> What do you think about the Project 23900 amphibious assault ship?  After the French refused to deliver two Mistral-class amphibious assault ships due to Russia's military intervention in Ukraine in September 2014, Russia decided to build the _Ivan Rogov_ and _Mitrofan Moskalenko _which will be able to carry up to four Sukhoi S-70 Okhotnik-B drones, to both perform strike missions and to perform target designation for the hypersonic Zircon missiles launched from other ships.  The Russian Defense Ministry announced the successful test of a missile launched from a nuclear submarine for the first time from a surfaced position. The ministry, which tested firing the missile from a warship in July, said that the nuclear submarine _Severodvinsk_ fired the missile while deployed in the Barents Sea and had hit its chosen target.
> 
> They really seem to like a Radar visible drone relaying information to a hidden missile launcher.  I think America is going to spend a long time striking down every drone we see because of the Iranian incident.  Normalizing shooting down each other's drones seems easier than allowing Russia to fire from under cover.  Personally I think this stealth thing is over-rated.  We're going to be using Electro-optical targeting systems once the software catches up to the existing hardware found on everyday Graphics Cards.  Once a computer can keep track of the 3d space around it and render objects moving separately from the background it won't matter if its stealthy.  Russian Tanks use Line-Of-Sight Beam Riding (LOSBR) or beam guided anti-tank missiles currently, it cannot be that hard to paint a target similarly with a laser or even simulate doing so within the rendered battle-space within the targeting computer tracking the two planes and the missile flying between them and relaying guidance to the missile as the pilot maneuvers.  Once Electro-optics surpass IRST because a single Jet can composite its surroundings together from a few camera located around the fighter, Stealth will be over.


I think amphibious assault ships will be useful for Russia for operations in the black and Baltic seas. Their investment in hard-to-counter weapons like hypersonics also makes sense as they are trying to stave off an opponent with far more resources (combined NATO).

Drones are where air combat is going. Drones will probably be grouped into disposable types which are optimized to be as cheap and swarm-based as possible, and more expensive types equipped with the same suite of equipment manned aircraft are. Disposable types will be used suicidally in situations where each drone is a simple sensor/missile platform worth less than the fancy SAM the enemy will be using to shoot them down, whereas fancier drones like the S-70 will be used in situations where maximum performance (best range, EW capability, etc) of the drone is desired. It will shift modern combat even further into the realm of technology as whoever has the best manufacturing capability and aerospace+software R&D wins, putting more importance on money and engineering supremacy and less on pilot training.

There’s a good chance that stealth technology isn’t as invulnerable as the U.S tells people it is, and there’s uncertainty involved as no major wars have happened involving it, but I think it’s very capable technology based on how militaries around the world are acting. In the 50 years it’s been around stealth has only grown more commonly used by the USAF, to the point where stealth planes are standard issue (F-35) instead of specialist, and other air forces with far lower budgets are trying to transition to stealth as well (SU-57, J-20, H-20, buying F-35). Saddam’s army was a mess, but the fact that F-117s were able to cruise over Baghdad (the most heavily defended city in the world at the time) without being detected indicates that stealth is effective to at least a moderate degree. Everyone points to the F-117 shoot down in Yugoslavia as being an example of the vulnerability of stealth technology, but that situation required extreme incompetence on the part of the US (open bay doors, failure to change flight course from previous missions allowing Serbs to simply use max concentration of radar), and the F-117’s stealth was already considered outdated at the time.

I’m skeptical of electro-optical detection and laser guided weapons defeating stealth (though they may prove effective against it in niche situations) Lasers and optical systems have a smaller effective range than equivalent radar systems, which most stealth technology revolves around countering. Electric optical and laser guided missiles are a capable technology at close range (hence their use in ATGMs, MANPADS and short range AA with a range of under 10 miles), but aren’t realistic for use at longer ranges. I do agree that electro optical has potential to compete with infared (but has its own share of unique problems) but a F-35/J-20 with longer range radar-guided weapons is just going to take shots at you with AIM-120s and PL-15s while staying out of your range, necessitating your use of radar and therefore justifying its stealth.


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## El Gato Grande (Nov 13, 2021)

Haim Arlosoroff said:


> Getting back to the actual topic though, I just don't believe America has the fighting spirit today that it had even in 1990.  Vietnam burned the WWII fighting spirit out of America, and the Oil Wars to keep the energy sector using American Dollars I think destroyed the vast remains of a fighting spirit.  Kids just don't want to jump out of planes for Israel, led by a Troon who is going to lead them across miles of dirt without showering, eating well, or the Troon's medical cocktail to keep it from killing itself.  The dream is over, the reality is starkly difference then the last generation which played with G.I. Joe figures.  Troons who played Battlefield and jumped out of Jets to RPG an enemy fighter do not want to go through boot camp to become a hero.  They want to hate America and snark.  'militainment' as a concept has failed to produce good recruiting, Iraq and Afghanistan became too real for the propaganda to filter out.


Couldn’t agree more. Modern American culture is based around hedonism and holds social justice as being the greatest goal to aspire for, while any sort of harm or suffering must be avoided. This is the worst culture you can have for military recruitment besides an anarchist shithole where people retch at the very idea of government.

 IMO this has already been happening throughout the latter 20th century. WW1, WW2 and Korea, which were both nasty conventional wars on the other side of the world (besides Pearl Harbor), but were seen as acceptable, even heroic, and Americans both in foxholes and at home gave their best effort without a second thought. Vietnam however was met with widespread discontent and defiance. Part of it was TV and overconfidence by the media turning into disappointment after the Tet offensive (which was a major tactical victory for the U.S/south Vietnam which permanently crippled the Viet Cong anti-Americans idolize today), but I think a lot of it came down to how privileged the baby boomer generation was growing up in the economic boom in the 1950s compared to their earlier counterparts who had to brave the depression and pre-1940s farm life. Not saying boomers can’t be tough, but the far easier lives the majority of them had combined with a liberal culture lead more of them to become “softer”.


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## Urbanmech (Nov 13, 2021)

@Haim Arlosoroff Did you even try and vet your B-52 info or just believe everything thats on the internet?  The "B-52H" shot down in Afghanistan was during take off. The problem is B-52's have NEVER set wheels down in Afghanistan, it was most likely one of the larger drones they shot down.  The Guam crash in 2016 was due to a flock of birds getting sucked into a few of the engines and prevented the B-52H from achieving necessary thrust for take off, it just ran off the runway and never took off as you can see in that top left doompost pic. One of the other two articles is about a 'Cargo Plane" crash in 2015 has absolutely nothing to do with B-52's. And with the last article do you really need to go all the way back to 1984 where a B-52 crashed in southern Utah for some relevance?  The picture you posted is shit when it comes to the info.

On another note Aircraft 61-0007 "Ghost Rider" and 60-0034 "Wise Guy" were taken out of the Boneyard after a decade to get back to 76 B-52s. Probably to replace both the ones that crashed at Guam but we get to see how that will work out in the years to come.


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## Haim Arlosoroff (Nov 14, 2021)

Urbanmech said:


> Did you even try and vet your B-52 info or just believe everything thats on the internet?


I formally sent a FOIA request for any classified flight missions involving a B-52 which were then lost, I'll let you know when they grant me the clearance to even research the information.  On a more serious note thank you for your info, but to be blunt just as in WWII the Japanese public and much of the military command structure were kept in the dark about the extent of the Midway defeat.  Just as Japanese news announced a great victory instead. Just as only Emperor Hirohito and the highest Navy command personnel were accurately informed of the carrier and pilot losses. Just as even the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) continued to believe, for at least a short time, that the fleet was in good condition.  I personally believe America would lie to its citizens about combat losses.  I no longer believe America is better than that, it would lie about the AA capacity of the Taliban and did as the Afghan papers revealed.  So maybe I am actually wrong, but maybe Afghanistan was a boondoggle for 11 rather than 10 reasons?  We would need a lot of the classified info, to prove no flights resulted in losses.

I'll take the L on the B-52 Image.  But I'm keeping the USS Bonhomme Richard, which burned for four days, that shit was funny.


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## Urbanmech (Nov 14, 2021)

Haim Arlosoroff said:


> I formally sent a FOIA request for any classified flight missions involving a B-52 which were then lost, I'll let you know when they grant me the clearance to even research the information.  On a more serious note thank you for your info, but to be blunt just as in WWII the Japanese public and much of the military command structure were kept in the dark about the extent of the Midway defeat.  Just as Japanese news announced a great victory instead. Just as only Emperor Hirohito and the highest Navy command personnel were accurately informed of the carrier and pilot losses. Just as even the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) continued to believe, for at least a short time, that the fleet was in good condition.  I personally believe America would lie to its citizens about combat losses.  I no longer believe America is better than that, it would lie about the AA capacity of the Taliban and did as the Afghan papers revealed.  So maybe I am actually wrong, but maybe Afghanistan was a boondoggle for 11 rather than 10 reasons?  We would need a lot of the classified info, to prove no flights resulted in losses.
> 
> I'll take the L on the B-52 Image.  But I'm keeping the USS Bonhomme Richard, which burned for four days, that shit was funny.


Well like I said the Taliban claimed to have shot down the B-52 during take off and I know for a fact that closest a B-52 has gotten to having wheels down in Afghanistan is Guam and the Chagos Archipelago aka Diego Garcia. Another thing to consider is they shot down a B-52 and took no pictures of the crash? I think the last several months has shown the Taliban know full well how to document their victories/trophies and the lack of media evidence makes it very apparent they probably shot a drone down on take off. Telling ya it didn't happen even if the government tried to cover it up the Taliban would have posted the evidence. The last 3 B-52 crashes have been either accidents like the 2016 and 2008 Guam Crashes and the 1994 Dumbass Cowboy Pilot Fairchild Crash. During the Gulf War some of the B-52's were hit with missiles and such but the military didn't count the one crash as combat related, but keep in mind that was still when the B-52's were still using dumb bombs for runs.


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## Gender: Xenomorph (Nov 14, 2021)

I mean, US is bad and all, but the state of China is worse. Sure they might look civilized and competent, but they're really not. Their infrastructure is falling apart and half of mainland China is under water.

If Social Justice plagues US' military, then China is plagued by incompetent command, blame throwing, half assed projects done in a rush, and leadership who wants to make a quick buck and cash out instead of delivering a product, and many, many more!


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