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“Yeah, she’s got a little age on her, but we have to keep using her until they can debug the software on the new-generation tanks.” (Photo by Andy/Flickr
You know those movies in which the villain at some point shouts, “I’m going to rule the world?” He never adds, even under his breath, “if I can get this damn tank started,” or “providing this fershlugginer gun will shoot for a change.” But for anyone setting out to take over the real world today, such qualifications — and many many more — are embarrassingly necessary.
The relentless enrichment of the “defense” industries at the expense of everybody else continues apace in all those countries run by people who want to take over the world — on other words, countries that are run by the defense industries. Expense is no object, it seems, when you’re after the biggest bomb, fastest fighter, or most menacing ship. The results are increasingly hilarious:
- We learned just last month that when the most expensive warship ever built, the $18-billion aircraft carrier Gerald R. Ford, was delivered last year, the 11 elevators that lift bombs to the deck for loading on warplanes did not work. This, of course, makes combat operations impossible. We had previously learned that two other systems on the carrier — the one that launches the planes and the one that snags them when they land — are not working right either.
- A major component of the weaponry aboard the Navy’s brand new Zumwalt-class destroyers was supposed to be a pair of 155mm Advanced Gun Systems capable of devastating a land target up to 80 miles away. When building the first vessel in the class cost seven times the budget, plans to build 32 of them were scrapped because we can only afford three. That made manufacture of the rounds for the gun systems, at an estimated $800,000 each, too costly even for the defense department. So the Zumwalt destroyers have guns, but no ammunition for them. On the other hand, they look really cool. (The first ship in the class, by the way, broke down in the Panama Canal on its maiden voyage and had to be towed.)
- Then there is the legendary F-35 fighter plane, which is legendary for missing every deadline, exceeding every budget, and falling short in just about every capability in the 17-year program. [See details in “DEE-FENCE, DEE-FENCE, DEE-FENCE,” The Daily Impact March 23, 2017] In September, the first one crashed in South Carolina. Despite hundreds of admitted deficiencies, the aircraft is being flown by the Navy, Air Force, Marines and 11 other countries. But not in combat. It’s not yet capable of combat.
This high-priced crapification of high tech war machines is not confined to the United States:
- China had been scheduled to unveil its new home-grown engine for its new-generation stealth fighter, the J-29, ay the Zhuhai Air Show this week. But the engine failed its reliability tests, and China, which some believe wants to rule the world, will have to continue to depend on Russia, which has shown signs of wanting to rule the world, to build the engines for the J-20.
- Russia, which under Vladimir Putin acts as if it were still the Soviet Union and a global superpower, has been trying to replace Soviet-era ships, tanks and aircraft with new generation stuff but has not had the money to keep up. Russia actually has an economy the size of Italy’s — it is dwarfed by those of California and Texas (not combined, individually).
As a result of all this crapification, these are lean times for all the World War Three fans, who are chafing at having to make do with sputtering riots in Afghanistan and the like instead of the carpet bombing and tank battles they crave. But when it comes to ruling the world, it’s turning out that no one can afford it and no one can start the engines.
Wow, when someone said the “cost of war is too high” they did not realize the full potential on that thought.
He who assists a ruler with the Way does not force the world with arms.
Doing so often results in getting it all bounced back at you.
Wherever armies pass, thorns and brambles grow wild.
Whenever wars are fought, lean wars soon follow.
No, one should only aim at carrying out relief, and not venture to force one’s power upon others.
When relief is achieved, one should not be assuming;
Should not be proud;
Should not be boastful;
Should see it only as something being done because there’s no other choice;
And should not force things further.
When things come to the summit of their vigor, they begin to grow old.
This is contrary to the Way.
And whatever goes contrary to the Way hastens to its demise.
(Laozi, Daodejing, Chap 30)
What I was going to say….
Being a man of service in the combat arms, martial pride is most important. in the years after the fall of western civilization… hard mined men will be our most valuable technology
The real purpose of so-called “cutting-edge” weapon systems such as the Ford-class Carrier, the Zumwalt-class Destroyer, and the F-35 is not to produce viable and effective weapons for national defense; rather, it is to serve the political and economic interests of the varios “actors” involved. Viewed from this perspective, such systems are working just fine.
Of course, we all know that means for the people whole very lives might one day depend on some expensive POS that was accepted for service after failing all its tests.
I read both of the articles you tagged in your entry about Russia, and would make two counterpoints:
First, it’s not the size of Russia’s economy that matters so much as its nature. With plenty of oil, natural gas, minerals, land and timber, as well as an educated, homogenous population that fully supports its leadership, it would seem that Russia is actually in a fairly strong position economically. I would add that Russia stands to benefit from global warming – at least agriculturally.
Second: As far as its military is concerned, no nation has done well by underestimating Russia’s war making capabilities…Just ask Charles XII of Sweden, Napoleon or Hitler.
I don’t doubt Russia’s war making capabilities, which it has demonstrated in Ukraine and in Syria. (You didn’t mention nuclear weapons, which make them even more formidable.) But imperialism leading to world domination is a whole other kettle of fish, and when your equipment is creaky (or, as in our case, brand new but non-functional) and your (Russian) army is made up of mostly one-year draftees, it’s impossible. As we have demonstrated in Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan. (Oh, wait, we did kick Panama’s ass…..)
True, America and Russia are similar in certain respects – imperialism being the most obvious. But it seems that the U.S. is in decline, while Russian is ascending…at least for the short-term. That’s the impression I get.
“…these are lean times for all the World War Three fans”
Au contraire, Tom Lewis, these are the best times for My People ever!
I don’t need the stinking deck guns on my destroyers to be operating at full efficiency! In fact, I don’t need them to operate at all, come the big one.
What I need most is to get my anti-ballistic missiles within range of my enemy’s ICBMs (get ’em tight!), so that I can intercept any first strike survivors while they are still in boost phase.
I need Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia; I need Slovenia, Slovakia, and Romania. I need the Ukraine (oh yes I do!), and possibly Georgia too. I need proximity!
Outside of my hunter-killers eliminating all enemy boomers in the initial 2 minutes, every other conventional weapon’s system will be irrelevant, including my big, beautiful obsolete carriers.
WW III is about missiles – nuclear tipped strike and kinetic interceptors, their capabilities, and above all, their location at the onset of hostilities.*
*A thing that will not be proceeded by an announcement, btw. My People are all about the sneak attack. WW III must be fought and won in Phase One. If the war extends beyond Phase One – 12 minutes, tops, excluding mop up – it will result in a tie, and ties are unacceptable to us …and to planet Earth, I suppose, should we remember Her at all during the Fog of War.
If you told the Pentagon brass in 1988 that they will soon be given permission to place anti-ballistic missiles – with the spelled-out capabilities of the SM III Block IIA interceptor – inside the borders of the Soviet Union, they would have all dropped dead, on the spot, from heart attacks.
But animated back to life by good old American will and determination, and the need to get the job done, now that the job can actually, get done, they would have inquired, and how much will it cost us to gain this war-winning geographic edge?
Are we talking 10 trillion? 50 trillion? 1000 trillion … f*ck it! True full-spectrum dominance has no price, give us the figure and we will pay!
Then when you told them; generals, relax, it won’t cost you a dime, the Soviets are going to roll back and allow you to occupy the entire battle-space from the Baltic to the Black Sea, for nothing; our top brass would all drop dead again from heart attacks.
Why should the elite use war(conventional or otherwise) when they can accomplish population reduction goals by simply crashing our economies? It appears they are well on their way to triggering just such an event. All of the recent actions of the Federal Reserve in conjunction with otherwise mysterious Trumpian chess moves(tariffs, etc) are just what is needed to topple our globally dependent and very fragile economic systems.
The use of nuclear weaponry would be unnecessarily messy, and inefficient compared to economic warfare. The people running the global population reduction program are not so much evil, as pragmatic, and in a twisted sort of way, merciful. Radioactive poisoning would cause much more suffering than simple starvation, or cholera. In addition, economic warfare on this scale requires minimal deployment of ground troops. One year after the collapse, ninety percent of the population will have starved or killed each other over the remaining food supplies. The mop up operation will be distasteful, but minimally problematic.
What almost no one wants to admit is the necessity of such a reduction in our numbers. The cold hard fact is there are no practical alternatives, given the psychological makeup of Homo sapiens. And in addition, if we don’t go voluntarily, the planet will turn inside out to rid itself of the pestilence.
Perhaps we should consider acceptance, and go quietly.
” Radioactive poisoning would cause much more suffering than simple starvation…”
This may be true, but suffering is irrelevant to My People. The only consideration is the perfection of the math. Our mainframes have been working on the formula for more than 50 years, and Our new Speed-o-Lite Supercomputer IIs are spitting-out printouts that indicate: all parameters of the formula have gone green. Repeat: all parameters are now green!
My People call our formula; Precision Culling, as precisely 4.666 billion humans will be eliminated, a majority of which My People have labeled, the Other People.
Unless, of course, My People have missed or overlooked a relatively minor hiccup in an infinitely vast data steam. If that is the case, all formulas will turn red. Repeat: red! Should conditions go red during the operational phase, or slightly before, all 7.53 billion humans will be eliminated, including every member of My People.
We call the call the minor hiccup formula; Precision Over/Culling.
I see. Mad Max would suit you better.
Feel free to elaborate (be careful though, the madness you think you see in me might be but a reflection).
Or don’t. I have been studying global thermonuclear war for more than 50 years. I had my 10,000 hours in 30 years ago. I know the subject cold.
I know why people react to the prospects of nuclear war the way they do, and why almost every citizen in this country makes a very conscious decision to know absolutely nothing about it.
Simply put, they are intellectual cowards, and when added up, it is this cowardice that I consider nothing less than a form of collective insanity, because the less American citizens know about nuclear war, the more likely it is that their country will participate in one.
And there will only be one.
Note: Mad Max? I’ve gotten that so often over the years that I no longer take pleasure in the irony.
A tour de force vid about the “fershlugginer gun.” Just kidding. Besides, who would bring a gun to a nuke fight?
A compact, tour de force vid about Russian and US conventional missile systems and fighter aircraft, numbers, capabilities, deployment, and doctrine; from the artiste, Covert Cabal.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sLv0_GzTJUg&index=2&list=PLEWwNHI8ASQGfdWbg8MAIJ1uV0nEZpFmp
All this work and effort and money put into weapon’s systems that will play no part in WW III, except again, in a mop up role: US nuclear-tipped fighters WILL be penetrating enemy airspace sometime after judgement day has begun, searching for survivors.
Note: The artiste, Covert Cabal, also goes by name Invicta, and Invicta is in the argument for, the greatest Roman historian of them all. I sh*t you not.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpGMSzgd8eg&list=PLkOo_Hy3liEJYEQ23l6bDrFrQYdkoZ3BC&index=5
That was embarrassing. Tour de force my ass. Wrong link. Who cares about anti-ship missiles or ships in general?
I think this is one.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=thZWvlVPaA8&list=PLEWwNHI8ASQGfdWbg8MAIJ1uV0nEZpFmp