The objective laws of military physics postulate that...

[luvdovz.livejournal.com]

...In the conditions of a military conflict, the US aircraft (planes, helicopters, invisible flying saucers, etc) are completely and totally invincible. A scientifically and politically proven fact! They just can't be brought down. Not by enemy missiles, RPGs or anything like that anyway. The only way to bring down a US aircraft is either through a malfunction (which never happens), or through incredibly severe weather conditions (happens sometimes), or ultimately, human mistake (now that's another story).

Here's the latest piece of evidence of this scientific axiom:

Missile hits top US general’s plane in Afghanistan

That's the chief guy in charge of the military HQ there, one of the topmost of the top guys in the US military. Who the Taliban, in their silly attempt to win a PR victory, failed to kill because he wasn't there. A small but significant victory for the good guys!

OK, there's this tiny detail that the plane was on the ground. But don't let some pesky facts get in the way of my hyperbolic narrative! Besides, even though the Taliban had priorly managed to knock down a helicopter over those mountains, of course the key word in this piece of information is that it all happened INCIDENTALLY. It was just an extremely unlikely occurrence, with a statistical probability bordering on the Planck scale. It couldn't be otherwise, of course! :P

OK, ridiculous strawmen aside, it's another question what sort of animal this "Taliban missile" is, considering that in principle the Taliban have been arming themselves with US-made missiles ever since the Bushonian era. On the other hand, there's of course the consolation that the reason that the plane was hit at all, is that the missile was US-made. If it were a Russian made missile, the Taliban would've stood no chance! AW HELL YEAH!

Never mind that incident with the F117A stealth fighter that was knocked off flight over Serbia during the post-Kosovo-war bombings. The Serbs had allegedly used a new Russian system to "see" through the mist of stealthiness (a disguise system that the Chinese have apparently ganked these days as well - they'll never learn), then displayed a sign, saying "SORRY! We didn't know it was invisible!" Parts of that plane still remain in a Serbian museum of fail to this very day.

Comments

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

Forget the Taliban knocking down planes, I'm still wondering how the Iranians managed to do it. We've been at war with the Taliban that they've probably gotten enough of our weapons and adapted to our MO that that kind of thing, while still stupid, is at least somewhat passable. The Iranians, OTOH.........

[abomvubuso.livejournal.com]

"The Wildlings have become much like us, so in order to beat them, we have to become like them - live their way, move their way, fight their way".
Qhorin Halfhand (http://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/Qhorin_Halfhand)

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

Which would mean that the USA is the Wildlings here. ;P

[luvdovz.livejournal.com]

Well maybe the Iranians are not as stupid as the cartoonish 300 movie would have us believe.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

300 was really an accidental pro-Taliban propaganda movie as it was. ;P It's not a matter of stupidity, it's more of a matter of how they developed the technology to bring down stealth aircraft when they're pretty much choked off from foreign weapons supplies. This would indicate that technologically speaking modern military technology is much easier to counter than propaganda allows for it to be. Even when sanctions are cutting off the easiest methods for them to get counters.

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Nor covered with face piercings.

[sophia-sadek.livejournal.com]

The Persian nobles tended to be somewhat inbred. Marriage to a close relative was considered to be a blessed condition.

And the Spartans were significantly different from what the movie portrays.

[meus-ovatio.livejournal.com]

The "official" estimates are that with new "5th-gen" aircraft, the US expects somewhere in the 200:1 ratio of shootdowns versus losses.

[meus-ovatio.livejournal.com]

This is somewhat of legacy of NATO and Cold War strategies, which required certain trade-offs in numbers versus capability when dealing with Soviet and/or Chinese contingencies. While everyone always reaches near-parity eventually, they tend to do it 10 years behind us. So sure, Iran or Russia or China are just now developing viable anti-ship hypersonic missiles which pose a greater threat to surface fleets. But we already had that a long time ago.

So sometimes conservatives get all white-knuckled and panikcy about it, but really it isn't too much of a big deal.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

And which was all useless in any event as such a war goes nuclear in at most a week and then everybody loses. Which is why it was never fought. Admittedly if the USA was expecting the Soviets to emulate the Chinese on the Chosin Reservoir, we probably would have been unpleasantly surprised to be fighting somewhere on the Rhine when Soviet Operational methodology actually proved to rely on firepower and maneuver. Of course then we would have been losing, so we throw out the nukes, they counter, and 8 million years later, sapient chimpanzees repeat the process and destroy themselves with another round of nuclear war. 65 million years later, sapient beetles again destroy themselves with nuclear war and Earth's biosphere dies a merciful death.

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I remember hearing that statistic sometime ago. There were some US planes shot down during Gulf War 1.

[meus-ovatio.livejournal.com]

Yeah they get into all kinds of stats. Sorties/loss. Flight hours/loss. Combat time/loss. They've got like a zillion ways to measure things.

[luvdovz.livejournal.com]

That's too much! Anything but zero is too much! Have you heard anyone dying while playing a videogame? We should make it that efficient!

[mahnmut.livejournal.com]

The guy who was playing this videogame (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xH9xSHcFreY) sure didn't die. Except of uncontrolled wargasm, perhaps.

[meus-ovatio.livejournal.com]

In Korea it was something like 3:1. Vietnam was 17:1 or thereabouts. What this reflects is not any inherent technological superiority or capacity, but a rather more flexible military bureaucracy that democracies enjoy versus despotic militaries -who can't change or adapt without someone, somewhere losing their head, career or their family be putting into a work camp.

Russia knew what was wrong in Afghanistan. Russia knew how to do "better" in Afghanistan, but Russia couldn't change because Comrade Ivan was in charge and Comrade Ivan said this is the Holy Military Doctrine Against Which No One May Differ.

[sophia-sadek.livejournal.com]

Your statement on the "chief guy in charge of the military HQ there" seems a bit off the mark. The chairman of the JCS is at the top of the military bureaucracy, but the office is considered somewhat marginal because it is not in the chain of combat command. It is more like the chief logistics officer. He was also visiting the country. He is not stationed at the Afghan HQ.

BTW, rumors of American military invincibility are greatly exaggerated.

[luvdovz.livejournal.com]

Dayum. They even failed at picking up the right target! Buncha losers.

rumors of American military invincibility are greatly exaggerated.

You don't say?

[rimpala.livejournal.com]

This oddly reminds me of that time in the war in Kosovo when someone managed to down one of our stealth fighters.

One of the Serb protesters held up a sign saying "Sorry! We didn't know it was supposed to be invisible!"

[luvdovz.livejournal.com]

There's text under the cut too, you know. :P

[rimpala.livejournal.com]

Oh... hello text!

[sandwichwarrior.livejournal.com]

The only way to bring down a US aircraft is either through a malfunction (which never happens)...

*giggle snerk*

[luvdovz.livejournal.com]

Scientifically proven fact!

[caerbannogbunny.livejournal.com]

First, it's a rocket attack. Now, given that it's a civilian reporter and the distinction is probably beyond many reporters realm of either caring or understanding, it could actually be a missile, but I would expect an anti-tank guided missile might actually do more damage (i.e. destruction) than a simple rocket attack because those things tend to have a larger, more precisely detonated warhead with more penetration power than your typical RPG or MRL type rocket.

This story: http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Latest-News-Wires/2012/0821/US-Joint-Chiefs-of-Staff-s-plane-damaged-in-Afghanistan actually says mortar or missile and causing shrapnel damage.

This story: http://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/Afghanistan/US-military-chief-s-plane-damaged-in-Afghan-attack/Article1-917348.aspx Says shrapnel from the attack hit.

So, whatever the weapons, they weren't able to specifically target specific aircraft, only where the aircraft should be. More likely, it's simply a harassment attack meant to just rile the Americans, maybe cost some time and money, and--if they get really, really, really lucky--hurt an American or even kill one.

So, targeted attack, no, lucky strike, yes.

And as far as an F-117A goes, have you ever looked at one? I mean, they essentially depended on the bad guys using Soviet era radars and their primary use was simply blowing up said radars for the most part so other planes could come in en masse. The fact it interfered with cell signals at low level probably wasn't seen as too much of an issue for the targets (and times) it was intended to fight. The fact Clinton kept using them after their "best before" date, sort of guaranteed something would happen.

As for what kind...

We're probably looking at the kind on this page: http://www.acus.org/natosource/nato-forces-seize-rockets-iran-afghanistan

Large diameter, unguided rockets intended to be fired via a multiple launch rocket launcher en masse. When used in massed batteries of MRL's, you can cover an area with them and do a lot of damage to lightly armored and unarmored targets, you can also use them one-or-two at a time from improvised launchers or from single rails--depending on the design--to provide long-range harassment fire on an area target. (Like an airfield).

For helicopters that must drop low to the ground to load/unload/land, often RPG's are used because they are simple, lack guidance systems that may be distracted by defensive countermeasures for missile guidance systems mounted on most helicopters, and are often easy for even a caveman to operate.

(Cue GEICO cave man.)

[luvdovz.livejournal.com]

So, targeted attack, no, lucky strike, yes.

Like I said, if anything happens, it's just by incident! Otherwise they can't hit anything American even if they tried!

And as far as an F-117A goes, have you ever looked at one?

They look like UFOs, what of it.