In message , bulba
writes
On Sun, 8 Aug 2004 14:25:30 +0100, "Paul J. Adam"
wrote:
If it's a silly analogy, why did you suggest it? And why are you now
complaining?

No, I mean that there are no such silly people to believe that
F-22 is absolutely perfect fighter airplane, because you obviously
can envision something even better and more expensive.

Sorry, no - there is nothing better than the F-22. Been shouted
repeatedly in rec.aviation.military.

And
obviously there are no such silly people - except this marketroid
who has written somewhere that this airplane would be able
to single-handedly shoot down one thousand MiG-21s.

No, that was the study of the F-15 versus the MiG-21 done by Lt.Col
Larry Welch (USAF) over thirty years ago: the peak exchange rate was 955
MiG-21s downed per Eagle lost, according to the models of the day. (the
Eagle was equipped with the notional AIM-82 dogfight missile in that
case, but AIM-9X is considerably more capable)

Isn't the F-22 meant to be better than the aircraft it's replacing?

technology is not per se the reason to drop this weapon
altogether, like existence of flares is not the reason
thought by anyone by the heavily stoned to stop using
the IR guided AA missile at all.

What countermeasures do you put on your fast jets to protect them
against the LePage Glue Gun? It's a potential threat: you can't *prove*
than an enemy isn't busy developing it as we speak. Yet the aircraft of
the United States would be *helpless* against this weapon!

On the other hand, there are a *lot* of IR-guided weapons out there, and
a great many of them remain vulnerable to flares and disco lights even
before you get into more interesting countermeasures. There's a credible
SA-7 threat because the weapons exist, have proliferated, and are being
fired at us.


So, given a choice between defending against the improvements in
IR-guided weapons, or developing countermeasures against the fiendish
LePage Glue Gun, which has the higher priority? The real-world threat,
or the notional future problem?

Same with NMD - just because technology isn't perfect doesn't
mean it's unnecessary or useless.

Neither is it necessary or effective. The argument is riddled with
contradictions, as you yourself are demonstrating.

Meanwhile, the US has confidence in the security of its borders, because
illegal immigrants can't enter, ships have their cargoes properly
inspected before entering port, aircraft are screened before being
allowed to overfly the US, and no merchant ship can get into SS-N-2
range of the US coast without having been carefully checked out first.

1. You won't have 10 or 20 nuclear explosions airbursted by
merchant ship or aircraft overflying in disguise.

Firstly, says who? Al-Qaeda have demonstrated the ability to stage four
near-simultaneous hijacks, why is it beyond their wit to position a
dozen rustbucket merchantmen?

Secondly, NMD won't stop 10 or 20 launches, remember?

2. Even if point 1 were necessary, that still leaves space
undefended - what's the point of arming the facade of
the house with all kinds of alarm systems and locks if
the doors in the back of the house don't even have locks?

If access to the back is "cross the deep ravine, swim the raging river,
and climb the Cliffs of Despair" while access to the front is "walk in
off the street", then perhaps the priority for security is the front.

I'll address the issue of cruise missiles, but regarding
"sneaky attack" this is only the way to run the terrorist
act. Nt that _warfare_: there is no formulation of demands,
no conditions made openly, no mutually assured destruction,
no indefinite time of waiting on the weapon and it still
having _threat potential_.

And nuclear blackmail with a handful of ICBMs from narrow threat arcs
(all that NMD can cope with) is more effective how, precisely?

This is not the way _foreign policy_ can be implemented.
"Sneak attack" is only the way for a terrorist act, which
however terrible in cost of lives, isn't large scale warfare
or viable tool of blackmail and forcing the country into
some policy or away from it.

And, again, threatening nuclear blackmail with a small number of
untested weapons is more effective how?

Note that the old Styx is a simple cruise missile, widely proliferated
and copied, readily available, and with the payload to carry half a ton
of nastiness into a city centre. Airbursting it would be trivial,
granted the ability to build or adapt a nuclear weapon. It's cheap,
available, deniable... and completely immune to NMD.

SS-N-2: range: 80 km. Subsonic.

And readily adapted to launch from the ubiquitous shipping container.
How thoroughly is a typical Panamanian-registered freighter inspected
while fifty kilometres off the US coast and - apparently - bound for
Buenos Aires?

1. Regarding "immunity to NMD": do you expect river gunship to be
useful on the desert?

No, just as I don't expect NMD to be effective against single ICBM
launches in narrow threat arcs.

Pretty trivial to circumvent: either don't use an ICBM, or launch from
outside coverage (and let's not get into penetration aids, themselves
hardly new technology)

What's the point of trying to apply weapon
where it doesn't apply?

Indeed. If a hostile nation has a nuclear weapon, NMD doesn't stop them
delivering it. If a terrorist group acquires a nuclear weapon, NMD
*certainly* does nothing to stop them delivering it.

So what was the point again?

2. Cruise missiles CAN be stopped where US has defensive
capability: on the sea, in the vicinity of coasts of US.

How many SAM batteries do you have assigned to the task? It's been quite
a while since the Nike days.

Even
if the current radar network is not up to task, it's not
impossible and not even very difficult for US to do so in
principle.

But you're not doing it and have no plans to do it. Something to do with
shortage of funds, because NMD is expensive... whoops.

3. Cruise missiles have short range and relatively long
time to target - anyway a lot longer than ballistic missile
for a mile of range. Any significant attack on US would require
either submarine closing to the US shores very closely or
launching the missiles from the longer range. In both cases
the attack is stoppable and very risky for the attacker.

Or, again, launch from cargo ships. Mix that in with aircraft-carried
weapons and ship-carried weapons as suicides, maybe truck bombs coming
in from Mexico, and you've got a delightful cocktail of confusion, and
(other than the nuclear weapons themselves) all within al-Qaeda's
demonstrated capabilities.

Now, remind me how NMD helps with any of this other than siphoning off
funding.

Then it's bloody useless, isn't it?

Of course not.

Compare the number of vehicle-borne IEDs sent against US targets, to the
numbers of ICBMs launched at US targets.

Where's the actual, real-world threat that is killing your people today?

It's designed to meet a threat that doesn't exist yet, and does nothing
against the much more effective, credible and likely forms of attack.

Hm. I used to think those missiles NK has launched and that have
flown well past Japan are real.

Any of them demonstrated the range to reach the US?

Or those medium-range missiles
India has developed - are they real or just figment of my
imagination?

Ditto. (And then there's accuracy at that range, to say nothing of
reliability)

Don't forget Japan, either.

Those other "more effective, credible and likely" forms of attack
are not at all more effective, credible and likely.

Cheaper, more proven, more reliable in terms of keeping the package
working, much harder for the US to detect and trace to originator.

They're a lot
less effective (range, speed, having the weapon available
available all the time on your own territory you control), credible
(making 10 synchronized and successful nuclear explosions from
sneaky attacks from ships and smuggled bombs is precisely
what I would call incredible and very difficult and very unlikely
to succeed, therefore incredible)

Why? Al-Qaeda have demonstrated just this sort of capability already.

and unlikely (what's the point
of engaging in crazy schemes that can be used only once
if you can rely on proven and more reliable technology).

You mean, technology that doesn't exist and hasn't been tested? (NK or
Indian ICBMs able to reliably hit the US)

Systems like NMD and the experience and the technology
are not built in six months. That requires decades of
experience. It is statistically very probable the threat that
NMD is designed to address will appear. It is not the
question of "if" but "when".

Meanwhile, the dastardly enemy will not use improvised attacks, because
they're less effective than ICBMs. Al-Qaeda will reject idiot schemes
like "hijack some airliners and fly them into buildings" because it's
impossible to co-ordinate and execute such attacks. No illegal cargoes
are smuggled into the US, and your borders - air, land and sea - are
airtight.

They're not?

But at least, if anyone gets a deathwish and decides to heave an ICBM at
you, there's a chance to stop it. Assuming everything works.

And they've tested how many weapons?

And Pakistan and India tested how many weapons?

Your government doesn't seem too worried: Pakistan's a trusted ally,
remember?

(North Korea may well be playing nuclear games, but building NMD is
about the least effective defence against any NK warheads you could
manage)

Why should NMD be ineffective against missiles from NK?

Where are they being fired from? (Hint - remember that shipload of
tactical ballistic missiles being shipped to Yemen? The North Koreans
will sell for hard cash)

No. A North Korean nuclear warhead would be a threat.

So they're close to it - Israelis probably did not test their
warheads,

Well, actually...

The problem comes from assuming that the only way Kim Jong-Il would use
it would be to developing a workable intercontinental missile, mate his
scarce (and unproven) nuclear warhead to it, and fire it in the general
direction of the US hoping to hit something important. On top of that,
you have also to assume that NMD is the only possible counter to the
weapon.

You don't build NMD to counter just NK,

Limited arcs, remember?

just like you don't build
seven aircraft carriers for single purpose of holding Germany
in check for the next 3.5 years and after that all the hell may
break loose.

Aircraft carriers are extremely powerful and flexible tools.

NMD is a one-trick pony.

Any system that requires the likely enemy to be stupid, is not well
planned.

By this token it is stupid on the part of enemies to equip their
airplanes with flares, because two-color IR seekers in more
advanced AA missiles can distinguish between a flare and a
real target.

Why? Are you assuming that you'll only be fired on by "more advanced"
missiles? There are a *lot* of old IR threat weapons out there still
using mechanically-scanned lead-sulphide seekers, and many of them will
still work when fired.

Besides, it's worth remembering that the AIM-9M required some hasty
adjustments to its CCM logic after Desert Storm: turned out that its
flare-rejection logic worked well against Western countermeasures, but
rather less well against those used by Iraq. (Five misses of eleven
fired)

How many weapons have they fired at anyone? And what's their expected
reliability rate?

Worse and worse - it's so bad in Russia that it is becoming a real
threat. I don't have the data, but it's been so bad there that
this journalist who was trying to write on the issue was killed
by a bomb. He was supposed to meet with this retired RVSN
colonel who's making public fuss about state of RVSN in Russia.

The bomb was supposed to kill them both, but the colonel
got late a few minutes and the reporter has opened that
briefcase that was lying there by himself, so only he died.
The missiles, despite official explanations, neither in US nor
in Russia have not had their targets deprogrammed - missiles
are just switched into another mode, but if something goes
wrong or the command in Russia doesn't switch the missiles
into another mode in emergency situation, the missiles will
recall their usual targets in America.

Besides, NMD's not aimed at Russia, remember? Do keep up.

Do keep up in checking reality: Russian missiles are in fact
still aimed towards America and the possibility of erratic,
unauthorized launch is increasing every day.

And NMD is still not positioned to defend against a Russian threat,
therefore the Russian threat is irrelevant to the current NMD
deployment.

Besides you do not know if the NMD will not be necessary
in future to guard US against Russia, because politics
will change again.

Obviously, whoever's planning the system either expects Alaska to be
mobile or doesn't anticipate a threat from Russia.

Not so much in ICBMs these days.

NOT YET. And because it doesn't need to.

And penetration-aid technologies have been around for, what, thirty
years?

Still, I've heard Russians make a whole new world
of difference in their work on Topol missiles.

Have they stopped blowing up in flight yet?

So, NMD is actually meant to be able to stop a rogue Russian strike?

I think this is one of the quiet goals of the system, yes.

Then it's really, really badly designed for the job.

Not very likely - they could easily overwhelm it even if NMD worked
perfectly. So, not much use, is it?

Overwhelmed by a single launch?

I thought your criterion was "10 or 20 nuclear explosions". That's maybe
three Russian ICBMs, but then aren't you saying their technology is
racing ahead? NMD's in the wrong place, too vulnerable to
countermeasures and too easily saturated, to protect against that
threat.

--
He thinks too much: such men are dangerous.
Julius Caesar I:2

Paul J. Adam MainBoxatjrwlynch[dot]demon{dot}co(.)uk