Originally Posted by ORAC
Except they’re not, are they?
I think the point was that they
would be, if striking the Assad regime. Which is a fair one.
Originally Posted by A Van
All those Tornados would be downed above the sea if they shoot at the Russian forces in Syria.
If the Tornados were launching cruise missiles I should imagine it would be from beneath the radar horizon of land-based SAM, which would mean fighters needing to be sent after them if Putin’s threat was to be fulfilled. Even if it was assumed that western escort fighters were kept away by the SAM, the Russian fighters would still have to run the gauntlet of naval SAM (and perhaps F22!?) while chasing the Tornados, at the same time as the air defence network would presumably be dealing with dozens of incoming missiles. It’s nowhere near as cut-and-dried as you make out...
...but what a mess!