Thursday, January 12, 2017

Vanessa Beeley — Israel Violates Syrian Airspace, Bombs Ammunition Depot in Mazzeh, Damascus


The objective was clearly not just to destroy some ammunition. This is a provocation aimed at provoking someone, likely Iran.

Interestingly, the aircraft is reported as a newly received US F-35, which is supposedly state of the art stealthy. Did it sneak through Russian air defenses, or were they not deployed in this area?

2 comments:

Matt Franko said...

they are pulling out Tom:

https://www.rt.com/news/372804-syria-military-russia-kuznetsov/


Their northern pipelines must be getting near completion and some long term contracts being signed for the supply...

So maybe Israel taking advantage of some of the fog of war remaining to blow up some stuff destined for hezbollah...

F-35 is stealth... this is coming up with the Trump thing trying to get Boeing's F/A-18 involved in the F-35 discussions ... F/A-18 not stealth so apples to oranges... doesnt look like Boeing is interested they seem to be putting more $$$ into stealth drones rather than manned:

http://www.popsci.com/you-cant-replace-f35-with-f18-donald-trump-tweet

Not enough sales volume to get 2 firms interested... so looks like Lockheed-Martin is taking the manned stealth business and Boeing is going to take the unmanned stealth business...

so Trump has a dilemma here as he always wants multiple bidders... unless he increases the volume he won't get it... I dont think he understands the defense business fully... its not like building construction where there are many firms who can do the work...

Matt Franko said...

Here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Strike_Fighter_program

"Merrill McPeak, former Chief of Staff of the United States Air Force, has complained that Les Aspin's decision to force all three services to use a single airframe greatly increased the costs and difficulty of the project."


Aspin eliminated competition when he mandated a tri-service platform.... competition is what Trump knows is needed to get prices down... you have to get several quotes and have firm/fixed guaranteed quantities to get the best prices...

Now they only can deal with Lockheed-Martin ... bend over....