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Mr. Luddite

On 4/15/2017 1:53 PM, Keyser Soze wrote:
On 4/15/17 1:45 PM, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 4/15/2017 12:30 PM, Keyser Soze wrote:
On 4/15/17 11:27 AM, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 4/15/2017 10:36 AM, wrote:
On Sat, 15 Apr 2017 07:40:14 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

On 4/15/2017 1:20 AM, wrote:
The Snooze Press (Ft Myers paper) had an interesting article about
this bomb. It was developed at Eglin AFB in the pan handle and they
were talking to a guy there.
It turns out this is the most expensive barrel bomb I have ever
heard
of. These are 16 million a pop. I am not quite sure why you need
precision guidance on a bomb with a 1 mile blast radius but it has
it.
I am still not sure why it is so expensive but it is a DoD project.
The guy was saying he really expected these things to be "demilled"
(scrapped) probably because they were approaching their expiration
date. I suppose it was "use it or lose it" for the air force.
I am still not sure how effective it actually was but since it is
really a "shock and awe" weapon, I suppose we shocked someone using
it.
In typical fashion, the russians just packed a bigger tank with
explosive and have a bigger one but I am not sure if it is guided
and
I know it was a lot cheaper.

If you believe the Pentagon, it was the perfect weapon for the
intended
purpose. Apparently several attempts by Afghan forces (with American
special force advisers) had been made with boots on the ground to
clear
the caves and tunnels of ISIS without success. They just ran through
the tunnels into Pakistan. The MOAB took care of that problem.

I don't believe the pentagon on much, particularly on untested
weapons. When I see things like this I am reminded of the navy/marines
in the Pacific in WWII. They would lob thousands of 16" shells onto
islands to kill the nips in the caves, then go ashore and find out,
they might be shaken up but they were still alive and shooting.
Our ability to root people out of tunnels and caves has always been
spotty and we always seem to come up with a new idea that doesn't
really work as well as we hoped.
I still think we used that one because it was coming up on it's
expiration date and they knew Trump liked the idea of "biggest"
anything.
I am still waiting for a real BDA

You, nor I, have any idea of what the "expiration date" is on those
bombs, so that's a pretty silly conclusion.

It's not "untested". It was designed and tested for a specific
purpose.
Until now, there wasn't an appropriate target for it.

You and Harry are the most cynical people I know when it comes to
things like this ... or anything new. I have far more
faith in what experts in the defense department think we need as
options. Maybe it's because I worked with them often over the years.
They are not all job protecting, resource spending bureaucrats that
some
people automatically assume they are. In fact, they were more
interested in reducing costs, reducing unnecessary complexity and
making
program objectives more efficient. Even the "mil-spec" requirements
for
most of the electronics were dropped in favor of qualified, commercial
grade components.

Perhaps I get my cynicism about the military from Dwight D. Eisenhower:

"Every gun that is fired, every warship launched, every rocket fired,
signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not
fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. The world in arms is not
spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the
genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children."

The only way to make your dreams come true is to forever ban conflicts
and wars and expect everyone on the planet to honor it. How realistic
is that? I think Eisenhower had that in mind when he generated your
quote. It sure would be nice ... but....

Despite the trillions we have spent and the thousands of American
soldier lives we have sacrificed, we seem incapable of winning
"unconventional" wars against determined ideological enemies. We have to
find other, better ways of dealing with extremists. I don't think we
expend enough effort in that direction. Yet another aircraft carrier or
another supersonic fighter jet isn't going to make a difference.

You won't like this, but I believe it. We haven't fought a "war" since
WWII that politics didn't over-ride military objectives.