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Voluntary Involuntary Disarmament
For those (like me) who have concerns about what American interest is served by our financial and military material support for Ukraine, there is a theory that the American arms establishment is pushing the conflict and looking to goose their bottom lines by selling the US government arms to replace those sent to Ukraine. But what if that isn’t so?
There is a Powerline post out today that raises questions about the ability of arms providers to rearm America. Quoting from the Wall Street Journal:
[T]he largest ground war in Europe since World War II isn’t translating into boom times for U.S. defense contractors. Hobbled by supply chain disruptions, a tight labor market and a Pentagon procurement process that can take years, arms makers have been struggling to respond to the soaring demand. . .
When the Pentagon ordered new Stinger antiaircraft missiles—widely used in Ukraine—in August, it was the first U.S. order from Raytheon for the weapons in 18 years. By December, Ukraine had burned through 13 years of production, said Greg Hayes, chief executive of Raytheon. Five years worth of Javelin missiles had also been used in the conflict.
Raytheon was still making some Stingers for an overseas customer before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but found some suppliers had gone out of business and had to redesign parts to boost production.
Couple that with the chart from Center for Strategic & International Studies and you begin to wonder whether arms merchants really are behind Biden’s actions or whether they are untethered from reality:
When they say “follow the money,” whose money should you be following? If the cupboard is bare and it will be a while before you can fill it up again, how are the arms merchants profiting in the near term from sales that can’t be completed for months/years? If America is to avoid a nuclear exchange with Russia, the theory is it is because the Russians know that we could defeat them even with just conventional weaponry. But what if the Ukrainians have already thrown our conventional arms at the Russians? What is the deterrent then?
I once had a boss that said, “Don’t let your mouth promise something my *ss can’t deliver.” If arms producers are pushing this conflict, has the sales department been talking to manufacturing? Russians have spreadsheets, too. They can calculate the tipping point where either we, or the Ukrainians, don’t have enough armaments to finish the job.
And don’t take your eyes off the CCP.
Published in General
Honest question: What is the shelf life of the consumables (i.e. missiles and ammunition) sent to Ukraine? How far were they from their “best before date” anyways?
What do we conclude when Democrats refuse to fill the strategic petroleum reserve when oil is $25/bbl and later insist on selling what is left to China. What is the Dems “strategy”?
Right now, it feels like our government is disarming us and hobbling us. This is not good, this is why I didn’t want to be involved with Ukraine. Ukraine needed to make choices without assuming America could back them up, because we are not in the position to be that kind of an ally.
Our leadership right now is not good for this. This right here is proof of that.
And I blame every single person who thought the Democrats were the “adults” in the room. They are not fit to vote, not fit to lead.
One might note that Stinger missiles have never actually been used by US forces in sizable quantities. They’ve really only ever really been used by foreign forces, whether they be governments that bought them or “freedom fighters” that received them from the US government.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FIM-92_Stinger#Service
Where’s Boss Mongo when you really need an accurate assessment? Miss that man.
It is my casual and absolutely inexperienced observation that the type of war and munitions being waged and consumed in the proxy war with Russia, are not the same as those if the US actually waged war.
The Russians primary process is to use land based bombardments, followed by grunts to pound Ukraine into submission, and occupy territory. This involves lots of tanks, howitzers and ground based missile systems. NATO and the US are responding in kind with tanks, missiles and howitzers.
The US strategy would be to rely on an initial campaign of air superiority, with naval support, which (I think) use unique munitions not listed in the table above. The US strategy would rarely look like the Russian ground war of grinding attrition. (thank goodness!)
Therefore, the dwindling down of those munitions listed in the table seem less critical to US capabilities and readiness for potential future conflicts.
Another observation of this war, is the amazing tactical transformation in the use of the personal drone, and unmanned drones in locating and destroying traditional combat units. This war is teaching the world that a small unit with a $2,000 drone can readily destroy the $20MM tank. These drones combined with satellite imagery provide real time pinpoint data on locations and strength of units. The drones then have the lethal capability to deliver simple or complex attack systems. (ie gravity dropped or guided). It is different and evolving daily.
That would require US personnel, which means a hot war between the USA and Russia. You can’t just hand warships and air superiority fighters to Ukraine.
I have read that missiles are kept in sealed containers, warehoused in environmentally controlled facilities, to control humidity, temperature, etc. (Early experience taught that failure to do so resulted in rapid degradation of electronics.)
For now. It won’t take long for arms industry engineers to develop countermeasures. The game is as old as war itself.
To the best that it’s possible, sure. Still, volatiles don’t store well — the bigger the unit bang the shorter the shelf life, as a rule.
Several things can be true at once and I think many of them are when it comes to Ukraine. I don’t think our support for Ukraine is primarily because it is sound US policy to get involved in Ukraine. I think primarily we are in Ukraine because the Russian collusion narrative created Putin as a boogey man for the Left in the US. A secondary reason we are in Ukraine is because it has apparently been a “piggy bank”/ playground for western elites for a while. This makes Ukraine a virtue signaling opportunity for the international and America Left.
This doesn’t mean that I don’t think there are legitimate US interests in stopping Russian aggression and in preventing Putin from gobbling up Ukraine, or at least making sure it is a bone that sticks in his/ Russia’s throat. It does mean that we aren’t operating from a well thought out foreign policy objective and with a sound strategic plan and goal for Ukraine. I think we, like so many other issues, are acting on an emotional position.
Finally the left doesn’t do second order thinking well. It is totally conceivable to me that they don’t understand that all of this equipment needs to be replenished, and how long that will take. A word of caution though I think the estimates of how long it will take may be a little inaccurate. I suspect if we had a competent administration and a sober plan we could probably get that estimate down.
I think Nohaaj’s point is that we aren’t giving the Ukrainians the same things we would be using to actually defend the US or our NATO allies if the Russians attacked Us/ NATO. I think that is true on some level, but not completely, in that there is overlap. Ukraine has become a de facto proxy war with Russia. Whether it was wise or not we have to hope that the war degrades Russia long enough for us to rearm before we have to face them again.
It’s amazing how many “good ideas” turn out to be, well, not so good.
See also all the Democrat-run cities with crumbling infrastructure.
Well, obviously. The whole point of the exercise is to prevent a hot war between the US/NATO!
I doubt we’ll go to war against NATO. But maybe we should. It would definitely be interesting.
Apparently I didn’t make my point very well, but I can’t read where I suggested a war between the US and NATO.
(I think Misty just wrote poorly.)
No doubt Claire predicted one if we elected Trump.
I wish our German friends had listened to Trump. It is sad how many people were broken by Trump derangement syndrome.
Dingbat alert .
Could it be that the drones are making tanks obsolete as aircraft made battleships obsolete in WWII?
Would be an interesting thought experiment. Basing would be a concern. I suppose rolling north first and taking out the closest member would be a wise option. Eliminate the close threat. Then, where to establish a beachhead in Europe?
I’m not so sure that Obama and Biden were interested in maintaining, much less strengthening the US military at any time. Much less now when the largest land war in Europe since WWII is nearing the one-year mark.
The biggest strategic blunder was crippling US, and to a certain extent the Canadian fossil fuel industry. M1 Abrams, small, armored vehicles, supply trucks, combat aircraft, and naval vessels do not run on solar panels. Not to mention the ships, and trains necessary to provide logistical support to ports, and on the seas.
If Putin is delusional enough to think Russia would survive a nuclear war, then he’s insane. He can’t even use nukes against Ukraine because the wind patterns in Europe would move radioactive fallout across Russia. Perhaps Putin is delusional, and he can find a bunker deep enough, and large enough to house him with the entire Russian women’s gymnastic team.
This is why I am against us being there.
Yes they are and they are periodically inspected. And a certain random number are expended to verify condition.
Republicans led the charge to reduce military spending after Desert Storm. Both parties are guilty of short term thinking.
The Germans cut military spending to pay for unification. Then decided Poland makes a nice buffer and Russia is an opportunity, not a threat.
No. Airplanes didn’t make battleships obsolete. Airplanes made battleships expensive gun platforms requiring lots of maintenance, sailors and protection.
There are oodles of videos that would seem to indicate exactly that point.
They did but they didn’t do while ramping up our commitments and encouraging instability. I personally thought it was short sighted at the time; however, this was when Russia and China were looking decidedly less belligerent than they are now and in fact when we still had great hopes of bringing them into the international order peacefully.