You can bet that we'll lose in Iraq too.

You can deny it all you want, but everyone knows that we'll pull out before the entire thing is over.

That is one thing I would doubt this time big time. The US has a different attitude than in Vietnam. There are still the war protesters, but no real massive anti war rallys. Iraq also has a end game plan that includes its own people - unlike Vietnam. It is a very different war and one that will ultimately be won. The question is, when can the Iraqies actually support themselves solely? Most operations now don't even involve US or British troops, so they are getting close, but when is the answer?

Anyway, the US Troops on the ground think the media are complete idiots and they see a much different picture than what the US media reports. I can post some letters from US troops incase anyone is interested, but it is interesting to see it from the eyes on the ground vs what sells a story.

-S

Yes there is hiding. The place is called plain sight. Can that room penetrating radar detect the difference between civilians or enemy insurgents? No. Kinda reminds me of a mission in ‘Tie Fighter’ when scanning the cargo of a shuttle the player detects “Rebels� and I just scratched my head and asked “Does this scanner determine a persons political affiliation?� Use non-combatants as cover and enemy troops as a source of supplies (Uniforms):

“The skillful soldier does not raise a second levy, neither are his supply-wagons loaded more than twice.
Bring war material with you from home, but forage on the enemy. Thus the army will have food enough for its needs.� -Sun Tzu

Tie Fighters have far more advanced scanners, but in its roots it's like Friend or Foe, if it doesn't have an Imperial Union Card, it's Rebel. :arrgh!:

Getting back on track. As aircrew we get shown various videos, pictures, of threatening weapons (The Tor-M1 video we got shown wasn't pleasant). One of the videos which was a recognised threat was the use of lasers to dazzle pilots and rearcrew. One of the only countries to not take part in the agreement (its name escapes me) was the US. They now have rifles with a laser mounted on top used purely to dazzle people (Aircrew, ground troops whatever). We also were shown a dialog of a scientist working on laser technology. A series of events happened whilst he was conducting experiments and ended up having his eye popped by the laser and melt down his face. Which made us all realise how dangerous lasers can be.

There are many threats in the enviroment us fly boys go in, including large flying telegraph poles from the ground, but this one scares me the most. Not only does it cause temporary blindness and things in the short term that could cause the aircraft to ditch but its the long term effects, of which most escape me now but the ones that hit home were eventual permanent blindness and flashbacks.

I don't fancy hanging out the side of a helicopter trying to manouver it into a tight location only to have some farmer from somethinkistan using a laser purchased from America blinding me and causing the helo to crash.

Keep up the good work though :roll:

Or, in the case of the American Revolution, until you can persuade your enemy's enemy to win the battles for you.

Fair fight...? Just listen to that phrase itself.

Is asymmatrical warfare - unfair? It is beyond such categories. Guerillas fight the way they do, to counter for example technological superiority of their enemy. Fairness is not at question here, has nothing to do with it at all. Or honour, btw. Fight the way that you win or be amongst those that are left - that is what war is about.

Fairness... Well, thinking in such terms with regard to warm, that is really queer.

BTW, I can fight off and defeat an opponent who has a knife, or even a pistol, if he is not too far away and acts stupid. Fair fight. F-5 Tigers in an excersice back in the late 80s, I think, defeated an equal force of F-15s, both teams were American pilots. Fair fight. Over at SB they just reported how a good team of Leo-1-tankers defeated an attacking force of Abrams by clever tactics. Fair fight. - Not always does "in a fair fight" the better technolgoy guarantee the winning of a fight. Partisan and guerilla tactics is about how to counter an attack by forcing the enemy into a kind of battle were his superior charcateristics are minimzed or neutralised. That'S what it all is about, denying him his strength, and exploiting and maximizing his weakness, without giving him a target yourself. Is that "unfair"? :-?

Or does "fair fight" mean that the enemy should behave according to the other side's textbook and shall cooperate with his opponent's intention to wipe him off the table?

BTW, my impresison of the VC and the Iraqi insurgents is that they are very successful in what they wree doing. Vietnam war was lost for the US, and one cannot say that the US has Iraq under control. Quite the opposite.

Fair fight... :dead: That is only valid for toy-armies made of tin soldiers

"Battle" singluar verb. Don't give the French too much credit... :D

But they did defeat Kapitian’s Invincible Royal Navy and for that they forever have my thanks :-j

I think you're oversimplifying the effects of the French entry into the war. With the defeat at Yorktown, it became clear that retaining the American colonies would require an expensive war of attrition. Having just spent an enormous amount of money in conflicts around the world as a result of the French and Indian War, Great Britian saw that bankruptcy was a distinct possibility. Thus, the result of the American Revolution was a strategic, not tactical, victory as a result of French intervention. The British has little to fear from Washington's tactical ability and the colonists' skill as combatants.

However, this has little to do with either lasers or tanks, as so, I apologize for sidtracking this discussion.

What? You mean the Americans didn't use laser tanks?!

However did we lose? :cry: ;)

Well, the only problem I can see with laser weapons would be any kind of fog, rain, etc. That would drastically cut the range of the weapons down to near nothing. Of course it depends on the type of laser too. They are probably using something more advanced then a focus laser. Heh. Chemical laser I would suspect. Still, I don't see a way around the problem with it being refracted by atmospheric distortions. :hmm:

Anyway, aside from the rather nasty blindess effects of laser, it would be virtually useless as a fatal kind of weapon. The heat of it would just cauterize any wounds. You'd have to hit them somewhere in the brain. Maybe the heart, not sure if that would be fatal though. I suppose if you used a big enough one, you could either vaporize them or light them on fire, like the old ant and the magnifying glass. That would be interesting. :dead:

Not really. Blindness should be enough to eliminate enemies, killing is not needed, just make them unable to fight.

Cauterizing wounds? Depends on the laser. Strong continuous-wave IR lasers like CO2 lasers would do that, but fast pulsed lasers, especially UV excimer lasers can behave differently. Such lasers can deliver energy very quickly, vaporizing a surface layer without giving much time for surrounding material to heat up (which is why they are used for cutting heat-sensitive materials).

Wouldn't an affective form of defence be the same tiles they use on the shuttles for re-entry. Ok, it wouldn't last forever but it'd give you enough time to return fire and/or move position.

Or have everyone run around with giant mirrors :P

Mmm. Fun.

High power military lasers are real.


ABL Testing Boosts Confidence in Ability to Shoot Down Ballistic Missiles
6 December 2005
Air Force Lt. Gen. Henry “Trey� Obering III, director of the Missile Defense Agency (MDA), said today that the Airborne Laser’s (ABL) megawatt-class chemical laser had successfully completed its 2005 “Knowledge Point� of firing long enough with sufficient power to prove it is technically capable of destroying boost-phase ballistic missiles.
Since the series of tests began on Nov. 10, 2004, the Chemical Oxygen Iodine Laser (COIL) has been fired more than 70 times, beginning with a burst of a fraction of a second and increasing until a firing on Dec. 6 exceeded the full duration goal at a level that is believed to be capable of destroying a ballistic missile during its boost phase, or within the first few minutes after it is launched.
Although the precise duration was not announced for security reasons, the firing time surpassed goal ABL engineers wanted to reach to achieve the second MDA Knowledge Point for the year.
On Aug. 1, MDA announced the successful completion of the first Knowledge Point – the conclusion of an eight-month long series of flight tests of the ABL aircraft, YAL-1A, which demonstrated the performance of the ABL’s sophisticated battle management and beam control/fire control systems.
The ABL COIL is composed of six interconnected modules, each as large as a sport utility vehicle turned on end. Each module weighs about 6,500 pounds and has 3,600 separate parts. When fired through a window in the aircraft’s nose turret, it produces enough energy in a five-second burst to power a typical household for more than one hour.
Currently, the aircraft is undergoing modifications to its aft section at the Boeing facility in Wichita, Kan., readying it for installation of the COIL beginning in 2006. Following a lengthy series of ground and air tests of all its complicated systems, ABL will begin additional testing that will include the planned intercept of a ballistic missile target before the end of the decade.

More news articles below:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6473144/

More info here:

http://www.upi.com/SecurityTerrorism...7-042543-8671r

http://www.gizmag.com/go/2809/

http://www.boeing.com/defense-space/...l/mission.html

http://www.missilethreat.com/systems/abl_usa.html

http://www.aero-news.net/index.cfm?C...7-dbe6b82cff6e

http://www.photonics.com/spectra/app...psAirborne.gif

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/media...0/14714975.jpg

http://www.globalsecurity.org/space/...-0000p-009.jpg

http://www.boeing.com/special/abl/pi...dres/abl30.jpg

http://www.airbornelaser.com/pics-cl...ar3_shryne.jpg

More pics here:

http://www.boeing.com/companyoffices...ips/index.html