So it turns out that having the most *expensive* military tech in the world may not be the best strategy, huh?
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@artemis Iran is not ill-equipped to fight a war. it is very good at restraint. the reason there are no USA boots on the ground is because the commanders are chickenshit assholes who know they'll get torn to peices the moment they do that. Iranians are armed. Iran has a professional military. and like Hezbollah, they will sacrifice cheap hardware for as long as they can before they get into heavier weaponry and sacrificing soldiers' lives.
@burnitdown
I just added a clarification in case it was unclear in my post: I don't believe their military capabilities are insignificant, but I know that a lot of people DO (or did) believe that. -
@twobiscuits
Well, yeah. But these people don't have memories that go back that far, so Ukraine is the "ok, how did you not realize this?" example. -
@artemis Asymmetric warfare is a real thing.
Just one example.
The British RAF celebrates taking down two drones (I'll take those to be Shahed-136 drones, unit cost about $35.000) with two ASRAAM (Unit cost >£200,000) by scrambling a F35 (probably the F-35B Lightning II, unit cost $109 million to $135 million+) and two Typhoons (unit cost about $200 million to $300 million).
So that's roughly (not calculating fuel, deployment, training, personnel, etc. and taking the cheapest known costs)
$264.857 + $264.857 + $109.000.000 + $200.000.000 + $200.000.000 =
$509.529.714 versus $70.000.
LMAO.
Okay, okay, one more example, just for fun.
The sober comment of a NATO commander afterwards: “We’re fucked.”
Exercise: Ukrainian drone pilots wipe out NATO battalions
During the "Hedgehog 2025" exercise in Estonia, NATO troops were clearly shown their limits in a duel with Ukrainian drone teams.
Militär Aktuell – Militär News & Analysen zu internationalen Krisen, Streitkräften & der Defence-Industrie (militaeraktuell.at)
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@artemis yikes. If Wikipedia is right. The last four were moved *from* Bahrain in January. Madness.
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Iran appears to be using shortwave radio to send cyphered messages. It's an old school Soviet method of communication. And guess what? It works. None of it goes through a computer, so there is nothing to hack. It's inexpensive & easy to do, & you can just keep changing frequencies when your opponents start interfering with the one you're using.
All the fancy spy equipment the US has? Not meant to deal with that simple, low-tech tactic.
@artemis Pentagon Persian Gulf war games were notorious....cuz they were unwinnable
And then they created false circumstances, basically cheating for the usa
And STILL the games are unwinnable.
This was with strategists
And people who think beyond the end case scenarios (death camps and final solutions) as a feature and not a horror
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As we have ALREADY seen in Ukraine, military "superpowers" have a real problem facing off against forces defending their homeland using cheap & quick-to-manufacture arms & equipment.
@artemis where have I heard these lessons before? Afghanistan, Afghanistan (Soviet), Vietnam, Korea, WWII Eastern European front, Afghanistan (British), the US fucking Revolution?
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I also think they didn't comprehend that Iran has prepared for this. I don't mean bracing up due to recent threats. I mean, the US has been threatening their very existence for such a very long time.
They are prepared, they have strategies, they don't use expensive tech where something else will do, & they have made themselves intimately familiar with their enemies' capabilities. What else would anyone expect them to do?
They knew we intended to come for them eventually.
Delusional racism...
These motherfuckers think they are the Master Race so they can't actually comprehend that brown people could beat them. They think they win by default.
Their brains are so cooked. They did not fucking believe this could possibly be difficult.
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Delusional racism...
These motherfuckers think they are the Master Race so they can't actually comprehend that brown people could beat them. They think they win by default.
Their brains are so cooked. They did not fucking believe this could possibly be difficult.
The Trump administration is possibly the most hopped-up on their own propaganda administration the US has ever seen. These people are drunk on it.
They think they have a literally invincible army, & they believe that it is impossible for white people to lose to brown folks (among many, many other false beliefs that are going to kick them in the ass).
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The Trump administration is possibly the most hopped-up on their own propaganda administration the US has ever seen. These people are drunk on it.
They think they have a literally invincible army, & they believe that it is impossible for white people to lose to brown folks (among many, many other false beliefs that are going to kick them in the ass).
Also, I suspect the US is going to turn out to not be as well-armed or prepared as they think because in Trump's kleptocracy, you gotta think some wild corruption is going to come to light & some armaments that are supposed to be there aren't & some equipment that is supposed to work doesn't.
Theft. Fraud. Graft. Cutting corners. It's a mess for sure.
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The Trump administration is possibly the most hopped-up on their own propaganda administration the US has ever seen. These people are drunk on it.
They think they have a literally invincible army, & they believe that it is impossible for white people to lose to brown folks (among many, many other false beliefs that are going to kick them in the ass).
...that are going to kick all of us in the ass.
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Also, I suspect the US is going to turn out to not be as well-armed or prepared as they think because in Trump's kleptocracy, you gotta think some wild corruption is going to come to light & some armaments that are supposed to be there aren't & some equipment that is supposed to work doesn't.
Theft. Fraud. Graft. Cutting corners. It's a mess for sure.
@artemis Even if the US military is as heavily armed as it's meant to be - they were for korea, vietnam, iraq, iraq again, afghanistan, etc. too.
The US can be heavily armed and still get it's ass kicked. -
Also, I suspect the US is going to turn out to not be as well-armed or prepared as they think because in Trump's kleptocracy, you gotta think some wild corruption is going to come to light & some armaments that are supposed to be there aren't & some equipment that is supposed to work doesn't.
Theft. Fraud. Graft. Cutting corners. It's a mess for sure.
Would you honestly believe that there is a single part of the federal government that is not currently being stripped for parts & sold off? Is there a single part that isn't filthy with fraud & bribes & payouts?
They have been destroying the ground beneath their (and our) feet for a while.
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So it turns out that having the most *expensive* military tech in the world may not be the best strategy, huh?
Who could have known that having very expensive equipment & arms/ammunition that take a long time to make might not be an advantage?
@artemis see also Millennium Challenge 2002.
US forces get roasted in a wargame by an opposing force using unconventional tactics, pentagon brass declared unconventional tactics against the rules and declares that they won anyway.
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@artemis Even if the US military is as heavily armed as it's meant to be - they were for korea, vietnam, iraq, iraq again, afghanistan, etc. too.
The US can be heavily armed and still get it's ass kicked.@miss_rodent
Hundred percent. But I am pretty sure the whole federal government is hollow now, so this is going to go even worse. -
The Trump administration is possibly the most hopped-up on their own propaganda administration the US has ever seen. These people are drunk on it.
They think they have a literally invincible army, & they believe that it is impossible for white people to lose to brown folks (among many, many other false beliefs that are going to kick them in the ass).
@artemis Yeah, but I'm still waiting for them to get to the “find out" part.
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So it turns out that having the most *expensive* military tech in the world may not be the best strategy, huh?
Who could have known that having very expensive equipment & arms/ammunition that take a long time to make might not be an advantage?
@artemis I believe Arthur C. Clarke wrote a short story about this back in the 50s -- "Supremacy" or something like that. (I looked it up recently, can find it again if you're curious.)
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Would you honestly believe that there is a single part of the federal government that is not currently being stripped for parts & sold off? Is there a single part that isn't filthy with fraud & bribes & payouts?
They have been destroying the ground beneath their (and our) feet for a while.
Frankly, the entire military-industrial complex IS a con. That huge military budget sure has gone to a lot of boondoggles & overpriced crap, huh?
This has been true for a while, but just like everything else right now, we are reaching the point where the bottom is going to fall out because everything has been so eroded over time.
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@miss_rodent
Hundred percent. But I am pretty sure the whole federal government is hollow now, so this is going to go even worse.@artemis Fair. There's been issues with contractors and suppliers taking advantage of US military contracts for decades, which I imagine has only gotten worse.
Like, an ex of mine use to talk about how they weren't allowed to maintain a lot of their own equipment when she was stationed in the middle east for the forever wars - they had to get an approved maintainer through the contracted company to do repairs and shit (at high cost, often slow).
Which seems... absurd to me. -
Since he keeps up on all this stuff & has knowledge of naval operations, spouse has a pretty good idea of what the Navy is capable of, & he thinks the US is pretty much fucked when it comes to the Straits of Hormuz.
They didn't even THINK about this once before doing it.
@artemis The people doing the thinking want to weaken democracy worldwide, which means weaking nominally democratic governments worldwide -- which means weakening the US military, which is still not directly under the control of POTUS nor even the Wall Street oligarchy, is consistent with their goals.
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Frankly, the entire military-industrial complex IS a con. That huge military budget sure has gone to a lot of boondoggles & overpriced crap, huh?
This has been true for a while, but just like everything else right now, we are reaching the point where the bottom is going to fall out because everything has been so eroded over time.
The US is a hollow nation. Hollowed out over decades. In the coming years, everyone is about to find out that there is not much left.
We haven't quite reached the point where they try to strip the last of the drapes & furniture out of the White House to sell, but it feels like we're close, doesn't it? They are stealing & grifting absolutely anything & everything that they can.
