Where has it all gone wrong?
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Imagine for a moment that a trustworthy & honest PM had decided not to get involved with both Afghanistan and Iraq 2 as they're both a waste of life, money and time.
What would force levels be like now, how much would have spent on doing not much??
Hoorah for BS wars, hoorah.
What would force levels be like now, how much would have spent on doing not much??
Hoorah for BS wars, hoorah.
I remember seeing the movie "final countdown" about a 1970s carrier intervening at Pearl Harbor.
For that I have been intrigued by the thought of what one Tornado with LGB's (and a tanker) would have done to Hitler's Germany.
Flying a mission a night I think they would have changed the course of the war and been pretty safe - it would have taken a lucky shot against them.
But how much damage could they have done?
As well as leadership targets and specialist factories I imagine that the German Navy's surface ships would have been pretty easy to target.
What would you have targeted? What effect do you think one aircraft would have done?
For that I have been intrigued by the thought of what one Tornado with LGB's (and a tanker) would have done to Hitler's Germany.
Flying a mission a night I think they would have changed the course of the war and been pretty safe - it would have taken a lucky shot against them.
But how much damage could they have done?
As well as leadership targets and specialist factories I imagine that the German Navy's surface ships would have been pretty easy to target.
What would you have targeted? What effect do you think one aircraft would have done?
I don't own this space under my name. I should have leased it while I still could
TR, the Third Reich military machine was designed to resist hits by 1,000lb bombs. Think battleships, submarine pens, coastal fortifications, C2 bunkers etc.
For an effective campaign by GR4s target sets would have to consist of soft targets such as bridges, factories, rail ways etc. While one GR 4 has the potential to replace many Lancaster s the multiplicity of targets would require mass as well as accuracy.
We saw this as true in shock and awe. Quality to be sure but quantity too.
For an effective campaign by GR4s target sets would have to consist of soft targets such as bridges, factories, rail ways etc. While one GR 4 has the potential to replace many Lancaster s the multiplicity of targets would require mass as well as accuracy.
We saw this as true in shock and awe. Quality to be sure but quantity too.
The obvious targets for a single Tornado in WW2 would be key personnel. With good intelligence it would have been possible to remove Hitler and his closest circle one by one, after which saner views in the military might well have prevailed.
Moving on to the present, there must be many in power here and among our allies who have fantasised about the removal of Assad from the equation, as his presence is at the root of the current mess in Syria. Unlike the WW2 scenario, that would obviously be politically unacceptable, paricularly now the Russians, who are a strong supporter of the Assad regime, are in the game.
Moving on to the present, there must be many in power here and among our allies who have fantasised about the removal of Assad from the equation, as his presence is at the root of the current mess in Syria. Unlike the WW2 scenario, that would obviously be politically unacceptable, paricularly now the Russians, who are a strong supporter of the Assad regime, are in the game.
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It may be little consolation, but EVERYBODY is in the same boat. The French Air Force has only about 220 combat aircraft, which again is rather less than they brought to the party in Suez, while the RCAF has only about 75 CF-18s. And that is just two examples. Look at the rest of NATO.
And on the subject of putting modern aircraft into historic situations, it would have been interesting to have seen the effect half a dozen A-10s would have had in supporting the landings on Omaha...
And on the subject of putting modern aircraft into historic situations, it would have been interesting to have seen the effect half a dozen A-10s would have had in supporting the landings on Omaha...
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Ah, the good old days when:
Hilaire Belloc - Wikiquote
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Hilaire_Belloc
D.
Whatever happens, we have got. The Maxim gun, and they have not
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Hilaire_Belloc
D.
Ah yes....Fantasy thinking going on.
Good thing the Armies of WWI did not have modern day Gatling guns instead of Maxim/ Browning Machine Guns.
Good thing the Armies of WWI did not have modern day Gatling guns instead of Maxim/ Browning Machine Guns.
This going back, what if, works the other way as well. It has been said that Wellington would have had Waterloo wrapped up in a couple of hours had he had a few thousand long-bowmen available.
I don't own this space under my name. I should have leased it while I still could
Oberon, indeed, the difference between skilled and unskilled. How would WW 1 have gone with skilled riflemen using cover from fire rather than as Churchill accounted, the number of rifles with many dying without ever firing a shot.
Kitbag et al
Posts like yours come up on a regular basis. I'm afraid they betray how out of touch you have become.
It has already been pointed out to you (and gets highlighted with monotonous regularity but is conveniently ignored) that we no longer need those numbers of aircraft to achieve the desired effect. We all know that quantity has a quality of its own but you need to accept that numbers nowadays are not everything.
Secondly, look at your list. 18 (at a rough count) squadrons of FJ type aircraft plus a number of heavier bombers. This was just in that theatre. So we can expect a significantly higher number throughout the entire RAF. Despite the fact we no longer need that number of aircraft do you think the public would stand for us having dozens of Sqns sat around doing nothing?
I'm afraid you need to move with the times and accept that the modern RAF is nothing like it was in the fifties. On some levels that is an undoubted shame. On others it is a very good thing.
BV
It has already been pointed out to you (and gets highlighted with monotonous regularity but is conveniently ignored) that we no longer need those numbers of aircraft to achieve the desired effect. We all know that quantity has a quality of its own but you need to accept that numbers nowadays are not everything.
Secondly, look at your list. 18 (at a rough count) squadrons of FJ type aircraft plus a number of heavier bombers. This was just in that theatre. So we can expect a significantly higher number throughout the entire RAF. Despite the fact we no longer need that number of aircraft do you think the public would stand for us having dozens of Sqns sat around doing nothing?
I'm afraid you need to move with the times and accept that the modern RAF is nothing like it was in the fifties. On some levels that is an undoubted shame. On others it is a very good thing.
BV
I don't own this space under my name. I should have leased it while I still could
BV, KB has a point, and so do you. Joe Public tolerated about 20 V-Bomber Sqns doing nothing but sitting around deterring. And you point about quantity having a quality all of its own sort of accepts numbers.
Yes, in today's austere times we are making do with less. In a benign environment four aircraft can operate with impunity and little risk of collision. As soon as 'we few, we happy few' come up against '10,000' then apart from multiple engagements on each intruder and the possibility of one or two not being targeted you would be looking at 50-75% attrition.
As you will know, Bomber Command loss rates and numbers declined as raid numbers increased.
Only if we avoid even GW2 levels of intervention will our few have any capability. Against a high threat environment the whole dynamic shifts and quality will get swamped by quantity.
Yes, in today's austere times we are making do with less. In a benign environment four aircraft can operate with impunity and little risk of collision. As soon as 'we few, we happy few' come up against '10,000' then apart from multiple engagements on each intruder and the possibility of one or two not being targeted you would be looking at 50-75% attrition.
As you will know, Bomber Command loss rates and numbers declined as raid numbers increased.
Only if we avoid even GW2 levels of intervention will our few have any capability. Against a high threat environment the whole dynamic shifts and quality will get swamped by quantity.
What it looks like from out here is that the current military represents exceptionally poor value for money, whatever arguments exist about level of capability required.
The inability of the government (and possibly the highest levels of military seniority) to plan more than a couple of years ahead, write a reasonable contract, or stick to design decisions appears to have wasted absolutely catastrophic amounts of money just on equipment acquisition alone.
But as I say, that's just what it looks like from out here.
P
The inability of the government (and possibly the highest levels of military seniority) to plan more than a couple of years ahead, write a reasonable contract, or stick to design decisions appears to have wasted absolutely catastrophic amounts of money just on equipment acquisition alone.
But as I say, that's just what it looks like from out here.
P
we no longer need those numbers of aircraft to achieve the desired effect.
What is the desired effect?
If the Russians decided to get really Bolshie....so you have enough to go up against them and win?
Yes, we have NATO but can we actually depend upon the other Partners to live up to the Contract?
Is any recent history of NATO sufficient to convince you the Alliance is really what it advertises itself to be?
I don't own this space under my name. I should have leased it while I still could
Phil, I was at a meeting 27 years ago to determine the mapping presentation on the EFA display. The colour display would be limited to 16 colours. If the map was presented track-up would it be necessary or possible to display names and so on track up or remain north up as on a paper map?
Now we accept a multi-colour, 3D, track up display as quite normal and that on your cheap TomTom.
Technological progress is so rapid that even 12 months ahead is Crystal ball stuff.
Now we accept a multi-colour, 3D, track up display as quite normal and that on your cheap TomTom.
Technological progress is so rapid that even 12 months ahead is Crystal ball stuff.
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The point neglected here is the fewer the numbers, the more the numbers matter.
Falklands: Only two carriers available but sufficient for the job(?).
Just one lucky hit, one carrier down, campaign over.
It needed three. With only two it all hinged on luck. We were lucky.
Feeling lucky again?
Falklands: Only two carriers available but sufficient for the job(?).
Just one lucky hit, one carrier down, campaign over.
It needed three. With only two it all hinged on luck. We were lucky.
Feeling lucky again?
This may be horribly obvious, but I'd love to hear the reasons we can't:
- Adopt a rapid-prototyping approach. Avoid embarking on these multi-decade development projects in order to fight the last war. This is vastly easier now than it has been in decades past, but it's always been possible.
- Stop worrying about it. As I understand it, at least one ground-attack aircraft, until recently, required the weapons systems officer to stick a map in a slot and line it up with the radar image using an optical combiner. It would have seemed archaic in the late 80s, but it reportedly worked OK until, what, the mid-2000s?
- Make strategic decisions on a similar timescale to the development process. Don't, for instance, spend titanic quantities of cash fitting out your aircraft to do something, then scrap them at more or less the same time you complete the job.
Sorry if this is a maternal egg-sucking lesson, but this is more or less the thoughts that go through most people's minds when the latest news story of catastrophic billion-pound waste in the MoD.
P
- Adopt a rapid-prototyping approach. Avoid embarking on these multi-decade development projects in order to fight the last war. This is vastly easier now than it has been in decades past, but it's always been possible.
- Stop worrying about it. As I understand it, at least one ground-attack aircraft, until recently, required the weapons systems officer to stick a map in a slot and line it up with the radar image using an optical combiner. It would have seemed archaic in the late 80s, but it reportedly worked OK until, what, the mid-2000s?
- Make strategic decisions on a similar timescale to the development process. Don't, for instance, spend titanic quantities of cash fitting out your aircraft to do something, then scrap them at more or less the same time you complete the job.
Sorry if this is a maternal egg-sucking lesson, but this is more or less the thoughts that go through most people's minds when the latest news story of catastrophic billion-pound waste in the MoD.
P
I don't own this space under my name. I should have leased it while I still could
Phil, the modern aircraft, in simple terms is a fusion of an aerodynamic body, an electronics package and power plants. Probably the least contentious is the power plant.
The most contentious is probably the electronics package.
Perhaps a simple solution is a barebones aircraft into which you bolt, not integrate, a weapons system but if it was that easy we would be using Windows 3.1.
A Canberra bomb truck with a new weapons system could do the job but it would only be viable in a limited set of circumstances.
The most contentious is probably the electronics package.
Perhaps a simple solution is a barebones aircraft into which you bolt, not integrate, a weapons system but if it was that easy we would be using Windows 3.1.
A Canberra bomb truck with a new weapons system could do the job but it would only be viable in a limited set of circumstances.