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Europe under extreme duress

ea6bflyr

Working Class Bum
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
Mix between the Buk missile system (SA-11 Gadfly in NATO designation) from the 1980s:
1668835845362.jpeg

and the Vietnam era S-125 Neva (SA-3 Goa):
1668835953874.jpeg
 

Griz882

Frightening children with the Griz-O-Copter!
pilot
Contributor
S-125 (NATO SA-3 Goa)?

They look like SA-3s (or SA-26s). Change my mind.

It’s Iran, I’d vote for Sayyad-2.

Mix between the Buk missile system (SA-11 Gadfly in NATO designation) from the 1980s:
View attachment 36763

and the Vietnam era S-125 Neva (SA-3 Goa):
View attachment 36764

I was going to say SA-6 or 11, based on the launcher.
Should “We the People” be concerned about the state of Naval Aviation intelligence?

DFE5F790-8B70-4127-A54E-C543F9D74AC5.jpeg
 

Random8145

Registered User
Contributor
It's doubtful the west is trying to help Ukraine survive but not win decisively. It's a minor miracle Russia didn't win decisively, and I think if we could help Ukraine end this tomorrow without triggering a nuclear response then we would.
Just curious, but why do you say it is a "minor miracle" that Russia didn't win decisively? They seemed to blow the whole thing from the very start.
 

Random8145

Registered User
Contributor
THE CHINESE find it pretty instructive that we are significantly attritting a near peer adversary's ground force using mostly Cold War surplus stock plus a few fancy newer toys (Javelin, NASAMS, GMLRS). Lucky for them, these observations come just in time for them to tweak their Taiwan OPLANs.
Is/was Russia ever really a "near-peer" adversary though? "Near-peer" means they should be able to give NATO a run for its money. Now it seems clear that it was all just an image. If Putin had somehow been able to try attacking NATO, given all the massive preparation NATO has been engaged in since 2014 precisely for such a scenario, I think his forces would have been (conventionally) annihilated. NATO forces are probably the best prepared they've been in over a decade to fight off a Russian attack, maybe even longer.

Another thing people are forgetting is the massive role that Elon Musk's Starlink satellite system has been playing in allowing the Ukrainian forces to communicate and operate drones to help their artillery target Russian tanks and so forth. No one foresaw this and without it, the Ukrainians would be a lot more hampered in their communications. The combination of the satellite terminals being very lightweight, portable, and easy-to-use with the sheer number of satellites (thus making it impossible to shoot down) and SpaceX's thus far being able to fend off the constant Russian attempts at hacking the system, have made it a very important asset to Ukraine's military.
 
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Random8145

Registered User
Contributor
Sigh . . . one of the most mildly infuriating things about the end of the Cold War is people insisting we have to use Russia’s awkward-ass and confusing weapons nomenclature.

It’s an SA-10. Or maybe an SA-12. Or maybe an SA-20. I literally have no idea when people use this stupid “S-300” crap.

And that’s before having to keep it straight in my head that a Kub is a freaking SA-6 and a Buk is its more modern successors. But hey, that could still be an SA-11 or an SA-17, because ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.
For some fun historical trivia, this is how the convention of naming American battle tanks after generals got started. Basically when WWII started, the Brits noticed that the American naming convention for our tanks and weapons systems was a bit confusing. For example, there was the M1 light tank, the M2 light tank, the M3 light tank, the M3 medium tank, the M4 medium tank, the M1 Carbine Rifle, the M1 Garand Rifle, the M1 105 mm howitzer, the M1 150 mm howitzer, etc...so the Brits just look at this and are like, "Yeah this is way too confusing, so we will just start naming the American tanks after American Civil War generals." So the M4 became the Sherman, and the British variant I think the Lee.

After that the convention stuck, so the U.S. then produced the M26 Pershing, the M60 Patton (with the M60 machine gun :) ), the M14 rifle, the M16 rifle, the M1 Abrams, etc...the Army loves that "M" designation for everything.
 
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Griz882

Frightening children with the Griz-O-Copter!
pilot
Contributor
For some fun historical trivia, this is how the convention of naming American battle tanks after generals got started. Basically when WWII started, the Brits noticed that the American naming convention for our tanks and weapons systems was a bit confusing. For example, there was the M1 light tank, the M2 light tank, the M3 light tank, the M3 medium tank, the M4 medium tank, the M1 Carbine Rifle, the M1 Garand Rifle, the M1 105 mm howitzer, the M1 150 mm howitzer, etc...so the Brits just look at this and are like, "Yeah this is way too confusing, so we will just start naming the American tanks after American Civil War generals." So the M4 became the Sherman, and the British variant I think the Lee.

After that the convention stuck, so the U.S. then produced the M26 Pershing, the M60 Patton (with the M60 machine gun :) ), the M14 rifle, the M16 rifle, the M1 Abrams, etc...the Army loves that "M" designation for everything.
Well…not really. The “M” simply means “model” and when attached to a type or system is obvious (M1 rifle vs M1 tank) The British are no different using the term “Mark” or Mk for their systems. Thus we have the Mk AND number thereby giving us the No. 4 Mk. 1 rifle or Lee-Enfield (WWII pattern). The same was done for tanks giving us all manner of Mks to sort out. Still, both are better than the cumbersome German system such as "PzKpfw VI Ausf. E" to describe a tank.

The nicknames were simply to inspire the troops and give civilians something easy to latch onto when reading about the forces.
 

Mirage

Well-Known Member
pilot
Just curious, but why do you say it is a "minor miracle" that Russia didn't win decisively? They seemed to blow the whole thing from the very start.
You are only asking why it's a minor miracle because you have hindsight.

The Russian military was orders of magnitude larger and more capable than the Ukrainian military at the outset of the invasion, plus Russia had time to prepare it's forces. It's a minor miracle that Ukrainian forces stood their ground and chose to fight, let alone them being able to so successfully. Most forces would have thrown down their arms and ran (Iraq in first Gulf War for example)
 
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