Splinty

Hamas, Hezbollah, and indirectly Iran will never allow that to happen. There are FAR too many fanatics in all those groups leadership, and their ranks to ever let any good solution happen. Until Hamas and Hezbollah are weakened to almost complete ineffectiveness and Iran contained, Gaza will be mired in poverty and terrorism.

Where can I get these excellent Soviet vehicle mods. Love the numbers!

The only units that currently wear berets are the same ones that had them all along. Special Forces, Rangers, and Airborne. Shinseki's failed experiment with Black berets for all troops is done.

I totally agree. If we keep to this planet only we will die off.

As a former infantryman, Military Policeman, Signal Soldier, and Air Defender in the US Army, I always preferred Soldier. Warrior, and Warfighter never sat well with me.

All I can say is that in over 20 years being a member of this forum, I've never hit the Ignore button. Until today.

I personally think it's mostly a combination of diplomatic and bureaucratic inertia. Never underestimate the delaying power of "getting all the Is dotted and all the Ts crossed".

Let's not forget the stories of how Russian soldiers coming home from Ukraine are treated. From what I've read it's worse than how US vets were treated during the Viet Nam era. On the other hand US vets returning home from Iraq and Afghanistan were judging from my own experience, were treated very well, regardless of people's opinions on the wars themselves.

I was in the Infantry. I just assumed that everybody still got bayonet training. So much for assumptions, lol.

The US Army and Marines still do bayonet training in basic and boot camp. But as was mentioned previously it's more about aggression and motivation than actually training to use them in combat. In any case a big knife always comes in handy.

They couldn't get Prig to stand near a window. So they put him on a plane.

Or the Lieutenant was in the tank he shot at. Nothing like a good fragging.

Looks pretty good. A US unit would move out and space themselves the same way. Does anyone know if Ukrainian Units with NATO gear are organized in platoons of 3 vehicles (Soviet style) or 4 (NATO standard))?

Absolutely. Spot on.

One doesn't have to really aim to hit a group of relatively low flying and slow moving targets. All that is needed to degrade these types of attacks is to use lots of automatic fire in the general area of a group of these things. They would have to be pretty big to carry a fully loaded infantryman and his weapons systems. Yes, paratroop drops are extremely messy, but even airborne troopers weren't flying horizontally. And let's not forget the mass casualty events EVERY single airborne assault was. Even the successful ones like Normandy. Or to go from another direction, the helicopter borne air assaults of the Vietnam war.

This retired infantryman says, not only no, but HELL no. Why? You ask. Darn near every soldier on the ground has an automatic weapon. If a group of those "grunt copters" flies over or attempts to land near an enemy position, they will be massacred before they hit the ground.

Name me a war where that doesn't happen. A large number of super rich families got their money from World War 2. Sorry Steve. I won't derail the thread again

I didn't fight for the abstract concept of nationhood. But I DID choose to join the military (US Army) as a career. Because I love my friends and family, and being a soldier was my best way to serve THEM. When it actually came to war, I fought for the folks on my left and right. Nationhood sounds good as a thing to fight for, but there are very few people who actually do that.

I didn't do 2 tours in Iraq to make somebody rich. I went to fight terrorists. You will find the vast majority of my felllow military members went for the same reason.

Keep in mind the US elections are over a year away,and any policies that would harm Ukraine would take another 3 months or so to have any serious effects on their conduct of the war. Having said that I believe Trump getting back in office is a dangerous thing, but Ukraine still has a decent amount of time before any significant change in US policy can do damage.

Maybe in Eastern Ukraine, but don't forget that the western part of the country has sustained a lot of damage as well. A frozen conflict (which I don't think will happen) won't have much effect on rebuilding the west of the country. In any case, even if we end up in a Korea type situation. Ukraine will become like South Korea,with a thriving Western style economy.

Whatever happens, Ukraine will not be a ruined state. There are hundreds of Western contractors waiting for this war to end so they can help rebuild the country.

Now compare crew losses from Soviet/Russian armor to NATO/Western armor.