I think the West could give the kind of Stinger, shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles we gave to the freedom fighter mujahedin in Afghanistan to the moderate rebels in Syria — with minimal provocation to the “other super power”, with the two foreign bases (the other Cam Rahn Bay) but with the ability to fry the entire world in half an hour.
Putin would be in an even weaker moral position worldwide (and even perhaps among his own people) because of the link to the shameful history of Russia invading and subduing a small nearby country.
Not an exact moral/political match — but a moral equivalent.
I understand the fear of ISIS types getting their hands on these weapons and shooting down airliners but we armed many mujahedin who later turned against us with these weapons in Afghanistan — so far so good.
When we give the Syrian fighters TOW anti-tank missiles we insist on the empties before we give them replacements. That seems to work pretty well against proliferation.
Unless I’m mistaken, the record of shoulder fired missiles actually bringing down airliners they have actually been fired at is pretty poor — could be wrong. I would presume that is because of the inadequacy of the thrust of a human shoulder fired weapon to penetrate the massivie double thrust of a modern turbofan engine. Five sixths of the air flows around a the engine in a turbo fan (twice that in a 787) — and most of the thrust come from the bypassed air.
“Navy pilot Alan Shepard became the first American to reach space on May 5, 1961 — 55 years ago this week. His capsule sat atop the Mercury-Redstone 3 rocket, propelled by a single engine that produced 78,000 pounds of thrust.
“Although space flight still remains the domain of astronauts and a few fit millionaires who can pay their way to orbit, most of us can experience multiples of the power Shepard was riding every day. New Lufthansa Boeing 747-8 aircraft, for example, which shuttle daily between major global destinations, come endowed with four GEnx-2B engines that generate a combined 266,000 pounds.” http://www.gereports.com/the-worlds-largest-jet-engine-is-already-more-powerful-than-americas-first-manned-space-rocket/
Usually, from the accounts I’ve seen there is damage to the wing — which indicates deflected aside to me.
I would try to get the Russian people at home to realize that a lot of Putin’s “foreign policy” is to deflect an attempt to deflect their attention from the kleptocracy at home. Demonstrations were beginning against such when Putin decided he needed to invade the Ukraine.
i suspect Russian policy is dictated by the game of empire. which hasn’t changed in the last three thousand years or so.
Russia feels mortally threatened by American policy in Ukraine and probably in Syria, just as we would feel threatened if Texas seceded and then joined a military alliance with Russia, or it, say, the Russians established a missile base in Cuba.
of course war is always useful to deflect attention from kleptocracy at home, not that you’d ever see that here.
I think the West could give the kind of Stinger, shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles we gave to the freedom fighter mujahedin in Afghanistan to the moderate rebels in Syria — with minimal provocation to the “other super power”, with the two foreign bases (the other Cam Rahn Bay) but with the ability to fry the entire world in half an hour.
Putin would be in an even weaker moral position worldwide (and even perhaps among his own people) because of the link to the shameful history of Russia invading and subduing a small nearby country.
Not an exact moral/political match — but a moral equivalent.
I understand the fear of ISIS types getting their hands on these weapons and shooting down airliners but we armed many mujahedin who later turned against us with these weapons in Afghanistan — so far so good.
When we give the Syrian fighters TOW anti-tank missiles we insist on the empties before we give them replacements. That seems to work pretty well against proliferation.
Unless I’m mistaken, the record of shoulder fired missiles actually bringing down airliners they have actually been fired at is pretty poor — could be wrong. I would presume that is because of the inadequacy of the thrust of a human shoulder fired weapon to penetrate the massivie double thrust of a modern turbofan engine. Five sixths of the air flows around a the engine in a turbo fan (twice that in a 787) — and most of the thrust come from the bypassed air.
“Navy pilot Alan Shepard became the first American to reach space on May 5, 1961 — 55 years ago this week. His capsule sat atop the Mercury-Redstone 3 rocket, propelled by a single engine that produced 78,000 pounds of thrust.
“Although space flight still remains the domain of astronauts and a few fit millionaires who can pay their way to orbit, most of us can experience multiples of the power Shepard was riding every day. New Lufthansa Boeing 747-8 aircraft, for example, which shuttle daily between major global destinations, come endowed with four GEnx-2B engines that generate a combined 266,000 pounds.”
http://www.gereports.com/the-worlds-largest-jet-engine-is-already-more-powerful-than-americas-first-manned-space-rocket/
Usually, from the accounts I’ve seen there is damage to the wing — which indicates deflected aside to me.
I would try to get the Russian people at home to realize that a lot of Putin’s “foreign policy” is to deflect an attempt to deflect their attention from the kleptocracy at home. Demonstrations were beginning against such when Putin decided he needed to invade the Ukraine.
Denis
i suspect Russian policy is dictated by the game of empire. which hasn’t changed in the last three thousand years or so.
Russia feels mortally threatened by American policy in Ukraine and probably in Syria, just as we would feel threatened if Texas seceded and then joined a military alliance with Russia, or it, say, the Russians established a missile base in Cuba.
of course war is always useful to deflect attention from kleptocracy at home, not that you’d ever see that here.