The Military Thread

So, Lockheed can bleed the Pentagon dry and laugh all the way to the bank, but a few idiots overpay enlistment bonuses during a time there was a need for manpower in a war we never should've been in, and the soldiers themselves are punished for it?

Sounds about right

The MSG in charge of enlistments got sentenced for fraud, Nasty Girls come under Title 10 when active and are under state control when acting as Nation guard. The problem was both shitty Regular Army accounting and shady State level management.

Funny tho: a CA guardsman sued, and with his paperwork the CA guard and the fed forgave his debts. Strange how gov'ment accounting works.

I got dinged for something similar a long while back. I was positively furious.

Super late but...

Cute, but even in its gutted form the British military isn't the sort of thing you dismiss too lightly - at a minimum they've got a pretty good expeditionary capability (if one far more lightweight than I feel entirely comfortable with).

I would say that claiming Brexit will have a significant impact on our defence is overstating the case, to say the least, considering how trifling the EU's military contributions tend to be - NATO has always been the far more important alliance in military terms, and to imply otherwise strikes me as being not entirely correct.

Well it's sending the economy into the shitter. And whenever that happens the fleet gets the axe. I mean the Torry's delayed a frigate build in Scotland, pushing the SNP towards another referendum. That's how committed they are to not spending any money on the Royal Navy.

Maybe the Brits can cut a deal for the US to loan some ships to the RN, do some joint taskings with personnel rotating between the ships of the two countries (allows more folks in the RN to get experience doing stuff on a wider variety of ships without needing as many ships), and in return, you give us all access to the BBC and a 99 year lease for Prince Edward Island.

A profile of Trump's favorite General

General Flynn is an absolute disgrace to the uniform, as anyone other service member who would vote for that piece of shit.

You say that like Britain is going to have money for that. The mass exodus of investment banks and such has already begun and the economy is going to crash so hard it is not even funny.

I was just poking fun at the fact that some people in the UK still think it's the 1940's and the Empire is alive and well :P

Think Defense is closing.

Oy vey.

EDIT: A retired JSDF soldier committed suicide by blowing himself up. His house also burned down around the same time. Three other people were injured.

edited 23rd Oct '16 4:37:39 AM by Krieger22

@Math:

That isn't really something I've been seeing over here, at least in my experience (perhaps it's the places you've visited?). If you don't mind a potential descent into hyperbole, the prevailing mood is one of defeatism and declinism that can sometimes verge on the shirt rippingly over-dramatic, complete with howls of despair.

@Think Defence closing:

A shame; admittedly I haven't followed him as closely since he revamped the site and the content slipped away from the sort of thing I was interesting. However, he was still extraordinarily well informed, and I think the matter of British defence is a criminally underserviced one in the blogosphere - off the top of my head the only ones I can recall are Defence with a C (updates infrequently), Kings of War (disappeared), Fall When Hit (see Defence with a C), Defence in Depth (ditto)... and that's about it. I think it's important that the public - even if only a small proportion - are properly educated on defence issues.

Cross-posting from Sky-High in Yack Fest, mostly for FF Shinra's benefit. Remember when we were discussing about what kind of financial nightmare India/Japan defense deals would look like?

Now we know.

For those keeping track at home, that is a little more than an F-35, per aircraft. For this thing.◊

I'm beginning to think my worst-case scenarios about Indian procurement policies crossbreeding with Japanese military-industrial protectionism were all too apt...

Yikes, there's a good chance the F-35 will be cheaper than that once it reaches full production. Could New Delhi not find another platform? Or another source?

And the JMSDF have only recieved 4 so far. One reason why the US-2 is so expensive.

Unlikely. The only other sources for seaplanes of that size are the Russians or the Chinese.

edited 24th Oct '16 2:18:01 PM by Greenmantle

Oh, the US-2 is a niche craft/at low rate initial production? That explains a lot of things.

Thanks for that. Looks quite steep.

However, shouldn't we be comparing the price to the Poseidon P-8I?

Not really. It's a cargo/SAR plane. The MTOW is half of a C-130J. I mean, blown flaps means it's got great short-takeoff characteristics, and of course it can float, but still, eesh.

The question, is there a comparably capable craft with larger production runs that can meet the same requirements?

I don't recall flying boat type planes being all that common these days in terms of large production runs.

edited 24th Oct '16 4:19:22 PM by TuefelHundenIV

Bombardier Canada has a multipurpose variant of the CL-415 water bomber, but it's a lot smaller. The other offerings are Chinese or Russian.

I suppose that's the price of going for a really niche capability.

USAF brought down a small drone in Iraq with electronic warfare. No indication what system did it; in theory it could've been anything from a handheld Drone Defender to some larger truck-mounted EW system (those have been popular as counter-IED jammers).

Sabre: It certainly seems that way. Though I wonder if it is so pricey why they didn't design and build their own. I am guessing questions about confidence and capability in doing it right are at the top of the list for reasons why.

I am wondering what else the US has in it's hip pocket for drone interception. There is at least one commercially made drone interception system that has a few interesting options as a launcher that has aim correction capability and can even launch jammers.

edited 24th Oct '16 8:43:18 PM by TuefelHundenIV

Two west point students made a "gun" (a jammer built around an Ar-15 lower) that could down some off the shelf drones. I presume that someone at DARPA built something bigger and/or better.

When it comes to Indian manufacturing of military goods, they are confident to building completely from scratch (as opposed to licensed manufacture) in only two sectors: missiles and boats (apart from certain classes they haven't had to build before now, like carriers and helicopter platforms, and that only requires a bit of assistance, not total dependence). They've had issues with land vehicles (Arjun) and aircraft (Tejas), so they're stuck paying premiums for niche aircraft until their local players get enough know-how.

Thankfully, I doubt India will ever need to buy more of them. By the time they are up for replacement, India will probably be able to build their own.

Taira: We already know about that one and it is mentioned in the article as one of the options. The US could have other tools we don't know about yet.