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Saint Celestine posted:A little known one is the British counter-insurgency campaign waged in Malaya after World war 2. The British basically had every possible thing in their favor, though...easily isolated geographical area, a populace that was largely supportive of the government from the beginning, a government that was capable/competent/effective from the beginning (which meant that they only had to make minor concessions to placate the majority of the rest of the population that didn't support them from the beginning), a colonial government that was very supportive of transitioning to self-rule, and an insurgency that was almost completely based in an ethnic minority (and as such was much easier to isolate from the population). Also it didn't hurt that the MCP/MNLA were one of the most incompetent insurgencies in the history of insurgency. That isn't to say that the Commonwealth forces didn't do a lot of things right, because they did, but basically the Emergency was like playing COIN with every cheat code activated.
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Apr 17, 2013 03:57
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Godholio posted:That reminds me of the picture at the beginning of every security/survival/intel slideshow for SOUTHCOM: Behold, the FARC Chick! brb defecting to the Colombian jungle
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Apr 18, 2013 04:30
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRU3I_o1vLc
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Apr 19, 2013 01:11
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EVA BRAUN BLOWJOBS posted:For some reason I was reminded of this classic today. Required viewing before every time the JASDF came to town. Booblord Zagats posted:
IIRC the dude chillin' with the beard and shades was a Navy UDT/EOD/speshul forces type who had to set up some poo poo (dummy explosives or something) prior to the Marines landing for their exercise, he decided to hang out and catch some rays.
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Apr 22, 2013 23:06
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Bob A Feet posted:All environmental controls except the blower are in the front seat, where the student usually sits. For an english speaking student, no problem. The fact that the Japanese student is not respond on ICS is probably freaking the instructor out a ton. TURN--THE HEAT--OFF ....on?
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Apr 23, 2013 23:26
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Godholio posted:That's certainly possible. Vietnam-era AIM-7 Sparrows were dropped before ignition (and often didn't light at all, but modern missiles are a bit more reliable). The F-22 (and I assume F-35) actually kick the AIM-120 out of the internal bays. FWIW all stores that don't fire directly off the rail (which is pretty much everything other than Sidewinders, Mavericks, and Hellfires) are forcibly kicked off the pylon, either using cartridge actuated devices (basically a gigantic plunger thing that is powered by a couple of shotgun shell-esque things that smacks into the store and forces it out into the slipstream) or the newer design, which is pneumatic actuated pylons (same concept, just with using pressurized air instead of cartridges.) It wouldn't add that much weight...but if you wanted to put missiles on an Osprey you would probably just utilize a Harvest Hawk-esque system, which leads me to... ArchangeI posted:Isn't there some sort of guided missile that can be fired from the open cargo ramp of a C-130? Would seem an easy conversion (and therefore unlikely to be adopted) Yup (click for big on the second one):   Ten Griffins out the back and 4 Hellfires on the wing. Also that Minuteman video owns but I can't believe anyone thought that was a good idea...there is literally nothing about that idea that makes any sense, either from a tactical employment standpoint or a strategic deterrence posture perspective. Booblord Zagats posted:Gun pods didn't really do anything but make pilots feel a little bolder about engaging. F-4s with gun pods only had 3 confirmed and 3 likely kills. Top gun and adapting tactics from the finger four to the loose-deuce is what really made the kill ratios go back up USAF aircraft had a few more kills with 20mm than that (15ish out of 100+ kills, that's counting both gun pods and the integral M61 on the -E) but yeah, improving tactics was primarily responsible for the turnaround. That's also why Navy fighters in general and F-4s in particular had better performance earlier in the war; the AF was behind the power curve there.
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Apr 28, 2013 02:29
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DoktorLoken posted:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSFjhWw4DNo&feature=youtube_gdata The best part of Credible Sport is that technically it would've worked (albeit with some insanely small safety margins); the failure during the test was due to the flight engineer (insert joke about FEs here) getting confused and firing the lower set of braking motors early because he thought they were on the runway (those were only supposed to be ignited on the ground). When he did so it dropped the airspeed effectively to zero, so since they were 10 feet in the air the aircraft basically dropped straight down onto the runway, breaking the wing spar and starting a fire. They were firing it manually during the test because they needed to get more data to further calibrate the computer. If it had gotten through the testing when it was flown operationally all the rocket motor firing timing would've been computer controlled...and I really can't think of a bigger "gently caress you" to Iran than if they had pulled that off: "Oh, Desert One? That was just practice. We just raided your capital, rescued our hostages, and then bundled them into a C-130 which we landed and took off from a soccer stadium. Wanna gently caress with us some more?" Also the plan called for the Herks to be flown directly to a carrier for the treatment of what was expected to be pretty heavy casualties, so after taking off from a soccer stadium they would've landed on an aircraft carrier...in the same sortie. The mighty Herk:  Dead Reckoning posted:Booblord's link pretty much covers it. Some Air America contractors in a helo chased down and splashed two NVA troop transports sent to assault Lima Site 85. The next attempt was more succesful Not really picture related, but holy poo poo if you haven't read One Day Too Long, you need to. What happened to those guys at LS 85 is infuriating (more specifically, the timeline and justification for leaving them on the mountain way past when they should've been pulled off), and the way their families were treated after the fact is loving shameful. Here's a painting of the kill in question, for those of you who didn't click on Booblord's link: 
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Apr 28, 2013 06:21
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holocaust bloopers posted:Insert story of when my hilarious mistake almost led to the crash of an AWACS. The failure to reset rudder trim on the three engine touch and go or something else? I was trying to find a funny AWACS picture but I don't think I can do any better than this.
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Apr 28, 2013 07:11
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Godholio posted:There were no serious injuries despite crew leadership directing people to egress through the fire (WTF!). Hahahahahaha...I had never heard that part of the story before. Oh, AWACS. Here's a picture of the jet still on the runway, minus the nose gear and with some pretty sweet scorch marks: 
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Apr 28, 2013 19:13
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Godholio posted:Actually, I don't know. He's most likely a captain by now, since it's unlikely this incident made its way onto his OPR because of the way they're written. I know it probably wouldn't impact his OPR/promotion poo poo, but he would've at least had something put in his FEF, right?
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Apr 28, 2013 20:01
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Stultus Maximus posted:Not gonna happen. The USMC PR machine is the fineset in the world. Every Marine a PAO. quote:The Marine Corps is the Navy's police force and as long as I am President that is what it will remain. They have a propaganda machine that is almost equal to Stalin's. Just one of many things that Harry Truman was right about. Baloogan posted:Do our enemies know and fear the USMC? More importantly, do West Virginians revere them? Pic thread, another thing Truman was right about : 
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Apr 30, 2013 04:26
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WP CURES PALESTINE posted:Dear Aviation wings of other branches, the USMC are still flying this:  Not even going to respond to this post. Okay, one response: I want to see a USMC MAGTF organic air wing go up, all on their own, against someone with a decent air force, just once, if only to shut them the hell up. Also yeah, it's a LITENING pod as others have pointed out, the bomb is a GBU-12 500 lbs Paveway II LGB. The Hornet has a GBU-32 1000 lbs JDAM and a GBU-16 1000 lbs Paveway II LGB. And honestly if you have a load shift in flight you're pretty much hosed regardless, unless it's a really small/light load, you have plenty of altitude/airspeed to recover in, and a very competent/skilled crew. Unfortunately most load shifts become apparent very shortly after taking flight, which means the vast majority of them occur on or immediately after takeoff, when you have neither altitude nor airspeed for recovery. Godholio posted:PDS=Passive Detection System, which includes the "cheek" antennae, and a small antenna under the nose and tail...all missing because this is an old as gently caress photo, like 90% of the AWACS pictures out there. I.e. the person who shams even by NATO standards. Godholio posted:The Marines, apparently. Something something Henderson Field something something abandoned by the Navy something something STOVL something something Chesty. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bjoMQRUWEe8 JDAMs are loving awesome.
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May 1, 2013 03:04
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holocaust bloopers posted:Holy poo poo wtf Air Force. Rumor I've heard is that they had 3-4 patch designs prior to that one that got shot down as "too offensive/inappropriate/whatever" so they submitted that one as a "gently caress it, I don't care anymore" protest patch, and it got approved, which honestly probably says more about the leadership than it does the students. Still a dumb patch.
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May 2, 2013 02:37
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McSpatula posted:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FSjr24zl85o Forget Bagram Batman, now there's the J-bad Joker. I loving love the Duffelblog Also Bagram Batman gave an interview. And has a facebook page. Any idea how the Tacomas performed compared to a Hilux?
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May 2, 2013 03:27
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Bones also have ejection seats. So every strategic bomber in the US inventory has ejection seats, it's just the mobility heavies and then AWACS/JSTARS that don't.GAS CURES KIKES posted:gently caress me that cartoon kills me everytime That was a real bad 6 months. Sitka 43 happened in the summer and then Haney went down in November. Sitka 43's crash site was pretty loving awful. One of my guys at the time stepped out for a smoke and had the C-17 fly right over him when it was already well into the mishap sequence...he was probably the better part of a mile from the crash site, with a pretty significant amount of trees in between him and it, and he still felt the heat from the fireball. But from what I understand it still wasn't as bad as Yukla 27. It is really, really eerie how close the two crash sites are together...standing on the railroad embankment you face toward Sitka's site and you only have to rotate maybe 30 degrees to face Yukla's. They're only a couple hundred feet apart.
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May 3, 2013 06:22
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HATE CURES TRANNYS posted:That ejection capsule from that movie where Harrison Ford is the president an Air Force One crashes. Don't forget William H Macy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yehCJ076_zI
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May 3, 2013 23:50
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Godholio posted:You know somebody told him to do it. Wasn't the pilot, guarantee that was the CDDAR guys. Also guarantee that it's in the Crash/Recovery TO, the designation of which escapes me at the moment. A-10 Crash Recovery (click for huge): 
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May 4, 2013 04:40
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Godholio posted:Are you sure that's a recover and not installation on a stick or something? The engine is removed. Seems like something that would normally wait until they got it out of the way.  It's an exercise/training event. You can't do training lifts with an operational aircraft (for obvious reasons) so they either use ground trainers (which could quite possibly have engines removed), or utilize opportunities like putting aircraft on sticks. Pretty sure that's a GITA though.
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May 4, 2013 04:56
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Admiral Bosch posted:When I saw the video it was some variety of Asian narrating, not sure if it was JDF or South Korean. Looks like JSDF uniforms to me. Bob A Feet posted:Like, how did this happen? Whenever I've done a grenade on a range its been mad safe. Not to nerd out but no PPE, sandbag berm. Did the grenade just drop over her shoulder when she went to throw it? And why the gently caress does the PSO behind her glance up over the berm as it goes off? My head would be buried in the loving ground. Asia. Like if you've ever worked with the ROK military or JSDF it should make perfect sense to you how this could happen. Cerekk posted:Misread, watched for Mark 48 vs attack helo, was disappointed. I did the same thing. I was hoping at least for a sub shooting a missile at a helo or something.
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May 10, 2013 01:59
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Christoff posted:But I mean what were they thinking the first time? That they'd win? Like Limp Wristed Limey pointed out, it was a lot closer run thing than people think. If they had a) effectively reinforced their forces on the islands during the initial stages of the assault (before the British submarine threat cut off the islands from the mainland), b) conducted effective joint ops (seriously, the Argentinian military was basically fighting three separate wars), c) gotten luckier with the Exocets, d) had better fuzes for their bombs, and/or e) targeted the British supply/landing vessels in San Carlos Water instead of warships, they quite possibly could've sent the British forces home with their tail between their legs. Vasudus posted:Here's a super super simple explanation of communism courtesy of Animal Farm: Some people are more equal than others. Orwell got it right. Also gently caress Duranty. e: Since this is the photo thread, the Atlantic did one of their photo features last year on the 30th anniversary of the war:      One more: 
iyaayas01 fucked around with this message at 04:22 on May 14, 2013 |
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May 14, 2013 04:13
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Vincent Van Goatse posted:I will never stop thinking how funny it is that there was a minor scandal in Britain over the sinking of the Belgrano. I mean, seriously some housewife berated Thatcher a couple years later when she appeared on some call-in news interview show because Say what you will about The Sun, but their initial headline about the Belgrano sinking was loving hilarious. Also I'm reminded of the people who got pissed at Sharkey Ward for shooting down that Argentinian C-130 near the end of the war. Oh yeah, and I almost forgot...add "if their Navy had been halfway competent and not a bunch of pussies and had still deployed their carrier to engage the British fleet instead of forcing their entire naval aviation arm to attack from the limits of their range with very limited intel" to the list of things that might have tipped the balance in their favor.
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May 14, 2013 05:20
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if a warship is sailing away from the Falklands it can't possibly be dangerous therefore TORY WAR CRIME BLARGH
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Limp Wristed Limey posted:There was talk of US carriers helping if things got out of hand but again it was just talk and rumours. I would love to find out what the US would have done if the UK had been defeated. The Reagan administration was not happy with the conflict at all. They did provide a new version of the sidewinder though and they did provide satellite intelligence. I think people overestimate the amount of overt support the US would've been willing to provide had things gone terrible. Yes, we gave you guys the Lima and a shitload of satellite pictures, but I have my doubts that the whole "give you a carrier if the Hermes and/or Invincible got sunk" thing would've really gone down, because if you listen to Lehman talk about it, him and Weinberger were just going to casually give a loving US Navy aircraft carrier to a foreign government to use in a war based on the verbal authorization of the President and somehow were going to keep this a secret from literally everyone else in the Cabinet (most notably Al Haig), because Lehman and Weinberger were the only two who thought arming a foreign government with a US warship was a good idea. Also the French, in hilariously typical French fashion, also had a team on the ground in Argentina that was providing technical assistance with maintaining and prepping the few Exocets that the Argentinians had.
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May 14, 2013 07:41
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Counterpoint: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5eBT6OSr1TI But seriously, that's basically John Lehman saying what I said before, that him and Caspar Weinberger had it all figured out how they were going to deploy an entire US carrier (okay, amphibious assault vessel) under the command of a foreign government fighting in a foreign war, and do so without Al Haig, the rest of the Cabinet, and Congress finding out. Right. Sending small groups of "contractors" to Laos to wage a secret war is one thing, but thinking they could pull that off without anyone finding out is loving ludicrous.
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May 15, 2013 03:14
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It doesn't beat chess or the lava monster, but I thought this one was kind of cool: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UwY67LYzH7Q Completely unrelated, it's time to repost the Hawg Wild van: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hANySXFKqVg CHAFF!!!!!!
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May 16, 2013 05:07
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front wing flexing posted:That sub is single handed one our most valuable strategic assets and has been worth every penny. Seriously. I know literally nothing about any of that poo poo and I still feel confident in saying that her and the Parche could've been the only US nuke fast attacks to every do anything and they still probably would've justified the cost of the entire fleet. On the subject of RN ship names, they have a boomer named Vengeance.  While we're on the subject of British ballistic subs, I love the fact that their entire nuclear war continuity plan is PM-->Dude the PM designates-->sub CO's open sealed handwritten letters of last resort and carry out whatever orders the PM stated in the letter. Who needs continuity of government, line of succession, or airborne command posts? I guess it makes sense (at least in the Cold War) given the small size and relative proximity of Britain to the Soviets made any government surviving a full blown attack unlikely, but it still amuses me.
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May 17, 2013 02:17
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Godholio posted:Maybe he meant no raping with hands in pockets. This is the AF, we do raping right.
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May 19, 2013 02:00
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 ATTENTION https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4pqW0Mtc9c THERE IS A DOG IN THE NEW CALL OF DUTY GAME   
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May 22, 2013 07:02
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The Stygian posted:I want one of those Boston Robotics BigDog robots as a game companion. And then have to do covert missions with it trailing along behind. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VXJZVZFRFJc
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May 22, 2013 16:26
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11b1p posted:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0XbEr9jAFgM Recruitment video truth. This some bullshit The thumbs up around the 1:00 mark was loving great too. AF version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3m4mnIFWi9o (Need to watch this one to fully appreciate it). The dude sweeping the flightline and the urinalysis always get me. Since they were in the related video section, have some freestyle fridays: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vz7FI_S0_NE I lose it at the MJ bit every time, although the Scissor Sisters bit is pretty loving funny too. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBiwdB8txHI Reflective belts, steel toes, ear-pro, and line badge...I see nothing wrong with this, come at me QA. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSisymcSCV4 Pooh Bear gets jacked up at Kef.
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May 25, 2013 06:11
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DrCuntmuffins posted:fuckin maintainers hahahahahaha It was the same brit guy for all of them. These dudes have some moves: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n9eat5pwfqM Ignore the dumb soundtrack in this one, it's really only worth watching for the first one, featuring a bullfighting Spaniard: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-oHUSyZUkQ I love that the Hornet pilot starts trying to run him down. I guess they took Tiger Meet a bit literally. Bad day at Bragg: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b4L50eMI8gY The way those wings flex when the aircraft hits... 
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May 25, 2013 07:49
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This is still my favorite gimmick account.
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Jun 8, 2013 18:13
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Can-O-Raid posted:Love how Vietnam gets shoved in under the right armpit, and Afghanistan is half cut off. No Just Cause. Truly the forgotten war.
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Jun 14, 2013 18:01
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Godholio posted:I'm not sure if you're using that word correctly. Usually it's obvious one way or the other. Haha, I had the same thought.
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Jun 22, 2013 16:59
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Dg3Us9ld2g
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Jun 26, 2013 19:16
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If you don't think the BATTLEBOX is awesome you're a goddamned communist. e: Handsome Ralph posted:Imagine if that were real, how disappointed you would be to see a 747 towing an A-10 with a glider (that has fuel pods for some reason That is the best part of the whole thing.
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Jul 2, 2013 18:57
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) attached just to give you an M113.
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Veins McGee posted:
Asian American Female Employment Service.
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Jul 3, 2013 17:58
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white privilege posted:loving goddammit the US military needs to stop thinking tactically and start thinking strategically. This will occur right around the same time we have a strategy driven budget process (and develop capabilities/weapons systems based on a coherent grand strategy), as opposed to the standard 31%/27%/22%/rest for the Pentagon breakdown. Karzai is no dummy, he knows he's got about 2 months after we completely pull the plug (Najibullah lasted three). There has never been a coherent desired end state because everyone knows (but no one is willing to openly state) that our options are either politically tenable but realistically not achievable (a viable competent Afghan state) or realistically achievable but politically not tenable (leaving the country to the Taliban). But instead of recognizing that we have bounced from objective to objective, focused on whatever the operational/tactical flavor of the week is (counter-terrorism, COIN, FID) while continuing to fight a war without any loving idea what in the gently caress we want our end state to be. Oh, and we're doing this in a backwards illiterate impoverished landlocked country in Central Asia with a GDP south of Haiti's. Because I know what's what I think of when I think of "regions of the world that are of true strategic interest, worthy of the world's greatest superpower and most powerful military alliance spending over a decade fighting in, at the cost of thousands of lives and billions of dollars." This entire war is the biggest loving joke. e: Sorry, thought this was the current events thread not the picthread, that was a downer of a post. Here's a picture of an aircraft that the Afghan Air Force can't fly effectively and that they won't be able to maintain once we pull out: 
iyaayas01 fucked around with this message at 18:01 on Jul 8, 2013 |
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Jul 8, 2013 17:49
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holocaust bloopers posted:I see that and think of how awful it must've been for all of those maintainers and aircrew guys. Congratulations, Dyess leadership. You single-handedly ruined the day for hundreds of people. My favorite story is when a C-5 base tried this and singlehandedly wrecked every last one of their maintenance metrics for the next month. Also when AMC tried a week long "surge" involving mostly C-5s and actually moved less cargo during the "surge" than they would've if they had just kept flying normal ops. Because FRED breaks, it's what FRED does. movax posted:I gather it's a fuckload of work / organization to get 20 planes to sortie simultaneously? I figured C-130s would at least be near the bottom of the hours of maintenance per flight hour scale. Dyess's PAA/PAI is around 30...I guarantee you that in order to make that photo happen there were dudes working 12s to get a couple of hard broke jets greened up in order to make the photo time, and given that it was a photo op I guarantee that their leadership directed that every aircraft that wasn't a flyer was on the schedule as a spare, meaning that the mx crews got to prep the rest of those aircraft just like they were flyers. Not as bad when a fighter unit wants to do poo poo like that though, they have to prep for weeks in advance in order to green up the cann bird(s) as well as whatever other hard broke jets they have. And the end result is always a great picture, which unfortunately I cannot find...basically it's this picture (click for huge):  Except every aircraft has a bubble above it with the maintenance discrepancy that it was probably coming back with..."Code 3, ECM Fail," "Air Abort, Oil Pressure Warning Light," "IFE, Engine Fire," "Ground Abort, Hydro Leak," "Code 2, HUD," "Code 3, Radar," etc. e: Forgot the one that will of course happen, "Code 3, Over-G." iyaayas01 fucked around with this message at 17:53 on Jul 10, 2013 |
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Jul 10, 2013 17:45
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white privilege posted:i pretty much want the entire middle east to burn. full on sunni-shia death war all over the region. qtiyd Also all ethnic groups in Afghanistan kill each other.
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Jul 13, 2013 17:48
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white privilege posted:the motive is largely irrelevant when the results are the same. murder is murder, you treat it from a law enforcement standpoint, not a military or quasi-military one. you have poo poo like the colorado theater, that school in CT, shitloads of people died, way more than in boston. yet people who advocated for extreme responses to that were (rightfully) marginalized. the responses to terrorist attacks should be exactly the same. just another crime, we have shitloads of them in this country. It's almost like the people who carry out these crimes are doing it to try and send a message outside of killing a bunch of people and by treating it like any other crime we deprive them of that effect. Nah why would we want to do that, time for the breathless 24/7 news coverage and old white guys up on capitol hill wisely intoning about how we must remain vigilant against the islamic terror threat and by the way please give me ten gajillion dollars for a completely worthless federal anti-terrorism something or other in my district. At least this time the assholes were incompetent enough that we didn't feel the need to start a completely pointless 12 years long and counting war in a worthless country in response to the attack. edit - Good point, here's a picture of the last time the navy thought building a bunch of really fast small unarmored ships was a good idea (click for huge):  iyaayas01 fucked around with this message at 18:03 on Jul 19, 2013 |
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Jul 19, 2013 17:59
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