B-2 question

"Pooh Bear" wrote
I confess to being kinda amazed that the threat of use of certain weapons
in
essence caused the CCCP to dismantle itself.

It almost beggars belief that someone was smart enough to think it through
in
advance - but was that the case ?

Was it simply pure luck ?


Graham



There was a book written around 1960 by a Harvard Uni Professor (I forget
the name of the book or author sorry) that predicted that Communism couldn't
work. He also said that because of increasing defense costs and because the
USSR spent huge portions of their available budget on the military, not to
mention the Soviets mentality that the best way to overthrow them was to
build up your military and wait. I dont know if Reagan or his team ever
heard of this book but the idea had been around for years. The cost of
Technology and not being burdened by Vietnam meant that the time had finally
come in the '80s

I'm really ****ed off with myself that I cant remember the books title

Rob

rob wrote:

"Pooh Bear" wrote

I confess to being kinda amazed that the threat
of use of certain weapons in essence caused the CCCP
to dismantle itself.

It almost beggars belief that someone was smart enough
to think it through in advance....

There was a book written around 1960 by a Harvard...Professor...
that predicted that Communism couldn't work. He also said that
because of increasing defense costs and because the
USSR spent huge portions of their available budget on the military, not to
mention the Soviets mentality that the best way to overthrow them was to
build up your military and wait.

More remarkable is that it took a Harvard professor until "around 1960"
to figure out that Communism couldn't work. Many people understood
earlier that the USSR would eventually fall, as long as we stood fast
and met it on all fronts, including in places like Viet Nam (as badly
botched as that particular effort was tactically).

Islamist terrorism will also be snuffed out eventually, albeit with a
different set of tools.

The Chinese are a bigger problem over the long run.


Jack

In article ,
BUFDRVR wrote:
Urban Fredriksson wrote:

They saw and intercepted him

I'm not sure this is a documented fact.

Maybe not.

I've seen interviews where it was
claimed Rust's landing in Red Square was not a surprise, but I've read other
publications claiming that he was tracked, at best, intermittently across
Eastern Europe, Ukraine and finally Russia.

Ukraine isn't on the way to Moscow from Helsinki. The
official Soviet line is he was first intercepted at the
north coast of Estonia. Could be face saving, but I've no
doubts they had full radar coverage along the coast even
if they lost him later. I don't buy the story that the
Border Guard Day had anything to do with him slipping
past.
--
Urban Fredriksson http://www.canit.se/%7Egriffon/
There is always a yet unknown alternative.

Urban Fredriksson wrote:

Ukraine isn't on the way to Moscow from Helsinki.

Well, I'll admit to ignorance on this one. I had thought (prior to reading your
post) he had flown direct from Hamburg to Moscow, after some initial reasearch,
I stand corrected. Thanks.


BUFDRVR

"Stay on the bomb run boys, I'm gonna get those bomb doors open if it harelips
everyone on Bear Creek"

robert arndt wrote:

Pooh Bear wrote in message ...
hobo wrote:

The only reason any B-2s were built at all is because the way the
contracts were structured it would have cost just as much to build 21 as
to build zero.

Defence contractors need an assurance that they'll get loadsa money for
their efforts.

For the government, they need to see some hardware in return.


Graham

Ought to be interesting to see if any of the projected "B-3" concepts
actually get built:

http://www.globalsecurity.org/milita...personic-2.jpg

As far as black projects go I've heard that each TR-3B ASTRA costs 3
billion!! So, the thought of building yet another manned bomber that
doesn't leave the atmosphere would seem ridiculous and obsolete.
Aerospace defense platforms are the future, leave the atmosphere to
the UCAVs...

The concept of building another super hi-tech bomber in the absence of a credible threat that couldn't be
defeated by existing hardware is insane.

Graham

Jack wrote:

rob wrote:

"Pooh Bear" wrote

I confess to being kinda amazed that the threat
of use of certain weapons in essence caused the CCCP
to dismantle itself.

It almost beggars belief that someone was smart enough
to think it through in advance....

There was a book written around 1960 by a Harvard...Professor...
that predicted that Communism couldn't work. He also said that
because of increasing defense costs and because the
USSR spent huge portions of their available budget on the military, not to
mention the Soviets mentality that the best way to overthrow them was to
build up your military and wait.

More remarkable is that it took a Harvard professor until "around 1960"
to figure out that Communism couldn't work.

But in WW2 it was Communism and the mass manufacturing under state control it
constructed that enabled the Russians to ultimately defeat the Germans.
Tankograd for example.


Many people understood
earlier that the USSR would eventually fall, as long as we stood fast
and met it on all fronts, including in places like Viet Nam (as badly
botched as that particular effort was tactically).

Viet Nam was a classic case of poking your nose in where it wasn't either wanted
or appropriate. Shoring up a corrupt regime was plain stupid.

I doubt it had any effect other than negative.


Islamist terrorism will also be snuffed out eventually, albeit with a
different set of tools.

You gonna convert them to Christianity ? I assume that by 'eventually' you mean
maybe 100-1000 yrs ? You won't 'defeat' Islamic 'terrorism' until you get to
understand Islam and how the Arab mind thinks. At which point you'll realise the
errors of your ways to date.

Don't forget - one man's 'terrorist' is another's 'freedom fighter' ! In WW2 the
French resistance were heroic from the standpoint of the Allies but terrorists
to the Germans. It's merely a point of view. The victor's opinion pervails.


The Chinese are a bigger problem over the long run.

The Chinese are now capitalists.

The only problem that China presents is that they may be better capitalists than
you are ! Are you sure your job is secure ?


Graham

Pooh Bear wrote:

The concept of building another super hi-tech bomber in the absence
of a credible threat that couldn't be
defeated by existing hardware is insane.


It's called technological progress and it's not insane. If you have a
credible threat but don't have a new weapon in development - that's insane.

--
Regards,

Venik

Visit my site: http://www.aeronautics.ru
If you need to e-mail me, please use the following subject line:
?Subject=Newsgr0ups_resp0 nse

"rob" wrote in message
...

"Pooh Bear" wrote
I confess to being kinda amazed that the threat of use of certain
weapons
in
essence caused the CCCP to dismantle itself.

It almost beggars belief that someone was smart enough to think it
through
in
advance - but was that the case ?

Was it simply pure luck ?


Graham



There was a book written around 1960 by a Harvard Uni Professor (I forget
the name of the book or author sorry) that predicted that Communism
couldn't
work. He also said that because of increasing defense costs and because
the
USSR spent huge portions of their available budget on the military, not to
mention the Soviets mentality that the best way to overthrow them was to
build up your military and wait. I dont know if Reagan or his team ever
heard of this book but the idea had been around for years. The cost of
Technology and not being burdened by Vietnam meant that the time had
finally
come in the '80s


The idea hadn't "been around for years". Some people (mostly on the right)
had said that the "inherent contradictions" of the Soviet system would lead
to it's collapse but 1. no "reputable" policy maker during the '60s, '70s or
early '80s advocated policy based on the impending collapse of the Sovs and
2. no intel shop anywhere in the US _predicted_ worsening Soviet economic
conditions. To the contrary, the foreign policy "establishment" both
Democratic and Republican assumed that the Sovs would be a permanent
fixture. That was the origins of Kissengerian "Detente" and Carterian
lectures about "inordinate fears" of Communism. Reagan had faith in the
"inherent contradictions" and several private citizens (including fairly
famously, Robert Heinlein) looked at the Sovs and saw through the Evil
Empire's New Clothes but the policy establishment did not. The decline and
collapse of the Soviet Union was the biggest intelligence failure in the
last fifty years and the soft landing that resulted from that collapse, the
largest miracle.