panzersaurkrautwerfer

CPT Panzersaurkrautwerfer is serving on the Brigade Staff in a National Guard Brigade Combat team. He also served as Company Commander for a forward stationed tank Company, X Company 2-9 IN 1 ABCT 2 ID, Battalion Plans Officer 2-9 IN 1 ABCT 2 ID, Squadron Assistant Operations officer 5-4 Cavalry 2 ABCT 1 ID, Troop Executive Officer X Troop 5-4 Cavalry 2 ABCT 1 ID, Platoon Leader X Troop 5-4 Cavalry 2 ABCT 1 ID, Staff Officer 5-4 Cavalry 2 HBCT 1 ID, Liaison Officer to Joint Operations Center with Iraqi Security Forces, and Platoon Leader X Troop 5-4 Cavalry 2 HBCT 1 ID. He served on two separate deployments to Iraq in support of both Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation New Dawn, in addition to two years spent forward stationed at Camp Casey Korea. His military education includes the Maneuver Captain's Career Course, Cavalry Leader's Course, Armor Officer's Basic Leader's Course, Basic Officer Leader's Course Phase II, the Commander's and First Sergeant's Course and he never mentions being Combatives Level One certified because only tools count that as a legitimate school. If we're counting stupid schools he's also the owner of a USFK driver's license, and has the expired certification to run ranges from small arms to Bradley main gun systems on Fort Riley KS. He has two Bachelors of Arts in Political Science with an emphasis on international relations, and one in history and has no idea why West Point counts International Relations as a Bachelors of Science. He also has a dim view on just how much national level policy 1LT Elmonairy might have at his lofty peach as a First Lieutenant (although his heart is in the right place, as the ACR was something we need to bring back), or how much practical tactical understanding an Army lawyer might have. He also thinks Sgt Joch would do really well to listen and accept input rather than digging himself a deeper hole. The US interest in region is keeping ISIS contained, which is sort of working (it hasn't been able to make significant advances) and keep a lid on the Syrian civil war (this failed, but I would argue because we did not follow up with even fairly modest measures back during the whole "line in the sand" fracas). The current strategy still reflects this. While I disagree with the rose tinted assessments our government issues, this is something where going boots on the ground will not lead to a better resolution. It's like a runaway machine gun. The best tactic isn't to try to stop the bullets, or open the cover and deal with the rounds cooking off, you try to stop the ammo being fed (by breaking the belt), and keep the whole mess pointed in a safe direction and wait for it to stop being dangerous. The US interest in a peaceful Syria just frankly is not worth the sort of efforts it would take in terms of troops on the ground. And the US, and most of its citizens do not recognize the sort of ownership of Syria you are ascribing to it (if anything Syria is "owned" by Russia and Iran, and has been for some years). This is sort of true. However the actual input has varied, and looking at the balance of fighting in the last major NATO mission with ground troops, the bulk of the fighting, dying, and expenses fell on the American forces, and looking at our NATO allies, it's not a bill I feel (and apparently the American government at large feel) inclined to pay.

Also think in terms of how the systems work anyway. Most NVGs are simply aplifying a different flavor of light waves. If it's something that reflects light effectively, it'll mess with NODs pretty badly. Heat still transmits fairly effectively through mist and fog (especially when dealing with active heat sources like a human body). This is one of the reasons why US infantry is being outfitted with the combo thermal/passive IR type devices, and why weapons mounted thermal optics are employed.

First, in order to keep this post up to the standards of being trolling, you're all total nazis of whatever sexual orientation you find most offensive, and should bow down and give physical pleasure to my wookie. Now that's out of the way, I will endeavor to remain somewhat civil. Now why did that happen? Do you think it might have less to do with France and more to do with Mali's position within Russian and Chinese interests? Do you think reasonably given the divisive nature of Syria that you will get Russia and Iran (both totally behind the Shia minority), Turkey, virtually every Sunni Arab state (totally opposed to Shia rule) and the West (totally opposed to both the Assad Regime, and a Sunni theocracy) that a similar vote is possible? I would contend it is not. Mali was unanimous because the Russian-Chinese interests in the region are not in conflict with French intentions rather than some majestic ninja French skills. This does not at all carry over to Syria because there's massively conflicting interests that are frankly mutually exclusive. The French tried very hard to present a unified anti-Assad front after the chemical strikes, and they failed mightily. Again is this because France is amazing, or because the French-Mali relationship is something that is a direct result of French neo-colonialism? I will contend with no small amount of justification that the sort of soft power the French have with the military junta is directly because of the degree Mali depends on the French for support in all things. The US has no such soft power with any of the parties in the Syrian conflict (not at all with the Assad family, none with ISIS, and the FSA training thing shows a very limited amount of actual control over those guys) and it would be foolish to extend that model outside of its French-Mali context. With complete support of the Mali government, with significant US logistical support, against an enemy many times weaker than parts of the FSA, let alone ISIS and the Syrian government. They're not at all alike, there'd certainly be a minor conventional force on force fight against the Syrian loyalists, there'd be a fairly massive COIN type fight against the FSA, and ISIS would be a whole bag of suck in its own right. Mali was a much simpler fight, against a much less capable enemy. This is true to an extent, however the US goal isn't to totally defeat ISIS by itself, inherit another long lasting nation building conflict at the cost of trillions of dollars and thousands of lives. It's to make ISIS less effective and allow it to be destroyed eventually by regional forces because it just is not worth the bones of one Minnesota Grenadier to paraphrase a dead German. US air power has allowed the Kurds to keep in the fight, turn back ISIS in places, and has allowed what little success the Iraqis to have against ISIS to occur. It's a low-risk, low-reward strategy. However that's what the American government, and American people will support. Here's why I have some concern about your understanding of warfare. Population density is what matters in terms of maintaining control over a population. In a wider more open country it is easier to contain population centers. Mali is easier to either protect loyal populations, or contain spots of resistance. It's why in the larger sense the problems in Iraqi weren't in the hinterlands, they were in the cities, because in built up demographically diverse areas, denying the enemy "key terrain" is much more difficult. You need a lot more forces because you'll have to go full Baghdad and T-Wall up major population centers. COIN is very expensive in terms of manpower, and what the French did is not the same. The question isn't needing 30 times as many people to achieve the same, distinctly because it is not the same conflict or terrain. That is fine. However simply reinstating the Assad regime is not practical for a variety of tactical, strategic, or geopolitical reasons. Simply handing power back to Assad will not answer the mail in terms of stopping ISIS, nor will the various players in Syria that are anti-Assad stop trying to off him simply because we've now put ourselves in the line of fire. The solution needs to be something inclusive of all parties. We're not there yet because Assad still thinks he'll one day return as king of all Syrians. FSA still believes it's going to do like five different things depending on the various groups you talk to. ISIS will never be ready to talk. There needs to be an outcome, but it won't be an outcome delivered at an outside power's bayonets. There's a saying I'm fond of along the lines of "never petting a burning dog." The US policy is largely based around avoiding commitment beyond what we're comfortable with, and with knocking ISIS around. ISIS is our primary focus. We largely sat out most of the Syrian conflict because it really is Someone Else's Problem, beyond again, low-risk low-reward attempts to shape the outcome in our favor, why should we commit to more? What possible reason beyond "owning" the middle east (which many, myself included would contend is not at all the case, or a desirable outcome) should the US commit to years more of war? I will not deny you can sling insults, but I would be very interested to see you sling something relevant or well reasoned for a change.

Raven is pretty much commercial parts at a 100% price mark up. It's really good for letting you know something is on an objective, but it's a small remote controlled plane sized platform. The optics and platform performance suffer accordingly (on the other hand, it's the sort of thing that gives virtually every company in the Army it's own personal UAV).

It's really a silly term in most cases anyway. The terrorist's key distinction is that he isn't blowing up the target because that target is valuable, he's blowing it up to inspire terror/force whoever is opposing them to come to terms by manipulating that terror. In that regard all of the various players in Syria are at least a little bit terroristic (although the Syria Army would best be described as using "terror tactics" simply because it's a nation-state vs the usual Terrorist non-state actor status, although given that it's hard to qualify the chemical weapons and indiscriminate bombing as anything but simply terrorism*). It's just not a useful label though. Especially not in Syria.

Unlike freedom, which costs around 1.05. As far as being on topic, I'd like to see some more run down in the supported unit-rotary wing relationship, and the air-ground coordination piece. As far as off topic though: Sgt Joch: I couldn't have written a less informed, less intelligent post if I was being paid to. While you are certainly entitled to your opinion, I am equally entitled to state just how silly I find it to be. As to your first point, that's all well and good (and disputable), however could you show me how the Syrian government forces have behaved better than those two groups? As to the second one....oh good god I don't even know where to start. Syria is top to bottom someone else's problem and largely on the periphery of US interest outside of ISIS and whatever commitment we have to human rights. And frankly neither of those are even close to being sufficient to spin up the 150,000+ soldiers required for such a mission (number is based on the ground forces present in Iraq, which was still not really enough...and still a much easier problemset than Syria is). Expecting the US to ride in, sacrifice a few thousand more US servicepeople, and trillions of dollars to fight a multi-polar counter-insurgency conflict, and likely a short high intensity conflict simply because we are America and this is now somehow our problem is frankly moronic, and I will not stoop low enough to leave any semblance of doubt that it might be anything but quite possibly one of the dumbest ideas for resolving the Syrian crisis that I have heard. As to your third point, French neo-colonialism is not a good model for long lasting internal security and strength. The US has little interest, or desire to become the defacto military and security force for the middle east (and I imagine the Arab world is rather disinterested in that arrangement too), and frankly French operations in Mali are a terrible analogy for anything except for French operations in Mali. The degrees of complexity in Iraq, and Afghanistan, let alone Syria dwarf the fighting in Mali to the degree is is simply not even a reasonable comparison and only someone lacking a passing understanding of all four conflicts would deem fit to make it. All and all I do now have to wonder about the state of the Canadian education system however.

I would add-on to this that it is not only not the uber-tank, but that it is also not as certain as many of those supporters seem to believe. An all Armata force, or a partial fielding in the near future both remain pretty distant milestones by most estimates.

1. All things in armor design are compromises. There's a finite price or impact on other systems for each thingy you strap to a tank though. Given the practicality of mounting a jammer that is strictly directional, placing it on the part of the tank most likely to be facing the enemy is the best engineering solution. The various bolt-on EO jammers the US uses for instance, are much the same in that they're usually forward facing and mounted to the roof of the turret. 2. As adk pointed out, the EO jammer is only moderately effective. It doesn't affect certain kinds of guidance, and a lot of the SACLOS missiles no longer are as affected by it. 3. In regards to using LRFs to play "spin the turret." I could only really see it working with an IFV type unit, like you're using one IFV to cause the turret to slew away from another IFV that's putting a missile into the air. In terms of tanks, the amount of time from lase to sabot in the air is pretty short, so you're better off just plugging whatever you just lased (or in event of target obscuration putting the round on point of aim*) *If the tank is stationary, that means under all that smoke is still the same thing the gun was pointed at. If the tank is moving slowly, more or less same deal. If it's moving quickly, then give it a minute at it might be clearing the smoke, and he has to clear the smoke too to get a shot on you.

1. It's worth noting that the Taliban as an organization did not exist during the Soviet-Afghan War. It was a movement borne of the chaos after the conflict. This is especially worthy of discussion simply because it shows the simplicity and ultimately failure to comprehend the relation between different parties in the region. There was a wider umbrella of anti-Soviet resistance. We supported some of those with weapons and training, either directly and indirectly. So if you're going to lump blame for supporting the Taliban, and then declaring them terrorists, it's equally valid to laud us for preparing the Northern Alliance to resist the Talbian. 2. In regards to the various Sunni extremists, it's a two fold matter of discussion: a. It is all Assad's fault. By design he ruled over a state that suppressed and eliminated any sort of resistance through coercive measures. Whatever middle ground there was, or elements that might have been interested in talking it out were thrown into jail/gassed/gunned down in the streets years ago. Ultimately this lead to a polarized system in which broadly you either have "I am an Alawite stooge" or "I support hanging all the Alawites from lamp poles by their intestines." The various Sunni extremist groups best answer the call for the dead Alawite society. b. Here's effectively our choices should we choose to be involved in Syria at all: i. Alawites: Effectively a hereditary dictatorship that has employed chemical weapons against civilians, and supports a return to a minority lead state where any resistance to the state was met by disappearing into a dark hole in the ground. ii. ISIS: A Islamist group with global domination type goals. Thinks slavery is a moral imperative. Pretty rapey. iii. FSA: A collection of dudes, some pretty terrible, others merely unpleasant, with some being actually kind of okay. Sometimes effective, sometimes not, sometimes corrupt, sometimes not. It's fiction to believe that again, we can simply pick something (except to stay out and accept the outcome, whatever it may be) that avoids the risk of Libya part 2, pretty much worst time ever for the middle east, or supporting a state that believes chemical weapons are an acceptable response to social disorder. I believe the Assad regime is done, it's just a question of if they leave when things finally break down for exile in Russia, or it ends with a shouts of allah akbar. It has lost the effective control of much of Syria and has little remaining legitimacy. ISIS is strictly speaking, totally unacceptable. The FSA, and Syria as Libya pt 2 to me is more acceptable than Assad funtimes or ISIS control. Which is to say I desire a better outcome, but part of owning your position is understanding the likely outcome, and frankly a broken chaotic Syria with short of total warfare is superior to the status quo or the kingdom of ISIS. 3. We may have to accept "lawful evil" sometimes. We really don't have the ability to force a choice politically short of the Russian style "prop up Assad until infinity." We eventually have to accept some manner of popular choice on the ground. And if that popular choice is a somewhat Islamic society, well damnit booze taps are off for now. Anyway. Own who you're supporting. At least somewhat. This whole sitting on the fence and wailing thing is sort of tiresome.

Lawl. If you set up any more strawmen, you ought to be able to corner the scarecrow market by Q4 2016. Of course then you say: Which is pretty much what I've been saying. As the case is the Russian plan is fairly clearly Assad forever which is not all parties, or a workable plan. Which makes bombing the FSA a silly act especially in light of the danger presented elsewhere. The FSA nor Assad offer a reasonable choice in terms of going forward. However the FSA is likely the only not-ISIS group for the Sunnis of Syria to fall under, so perhaps it's best if we foster "less crazy" instead of killing it and dumping the survivors into "crazy and now really embittered" camps. As the case is, the WTF Turkey stuff as gotten more than some airwaves, and it's rather led to more than a little ill will on the part of Turkey's NATO allies. And their constant refrains of trying to tie the actually totally ISIS operations inside their countries to some sort of bizzaro Kurdish-ISIS tagteam has worn very thin.

I hope for a meaningful, lasting peace. My personal belief is this is impossible with Assad remaining in charge based on prior bad acts, and his existing policies. The legitimacy of his government is pretty much shot regionally, and internationally he's got Iran and Russia and that's about it. The real trick of course would be keeping things from Libyaing into the ground. In a lot of ways it's Not Our Problem. Historically imposing external controls on establishing a government have been just as ineffective as simply letting anarchy and chaos sink in. Some sort of cease fire and power sharing agreement between the FSA and existing government would likely be best for all Syrians. We're only really in this mess because Assad's responses to when this was simply protests was gunning folks down in the street.

Part of the problem I would argue is that it's a weapons system without a niche. We've already found "American" answers to the problems the RPG-7 solves. Which is not to say it is a bad weapon, or that the American solutions are better...but I think you'd have to be looking at scrapping the AT-4, M25, and SMAW-D all at the same time before you'd have the kind of capabilities gap to make a yankilized RPG-7 viable.

This is not what I am saying. In the short term ISIS is the biggest problem and it demands our attentions. In the longer term the conditions Assad established were what allowed groups like ISIS to flourish, and unless those problems are resolved, the Syrian civil war is going to become a cyclical event. I'd argue the FSA and Assad both are bad enough actors in the long term that a meaningful solution needs to instead be some sort of synthesis, an inclusive Alawite-Sunni government but that's something the Syrians need to work out themselves. Last part first, yeah ground intervention outside of asset protection seems unlikely. In the wider sense though military intervention would start small and grow. Looking at past interventions it's almost a cyclical trap. Initial military commitments are somewhat successful and a solution appears at hand....but man we could really use another Battalion. Okay we've got this part of the country locked down, we're going to need two Brigades. All the cities are ours, but we just can't seem to keep the roads open, with merely another Division we can keep the countryside. But that's really the deceptive part. It's not defeating the enemy in the wider sense. Destroying training camps and ammo depots helps, but those can be replaced. So long as the enemy has a permissive population to operate in whatever containment achieved by military force will last only as long as the force is applied. Which, again is the deceptive part. It'll look like you're doing a lot, but in reality you're just slowing and stopping the enemy, but not defeating him. And until you defeat the enemy, you will not have that lasting victory.

Best case: You get Fallujah. Won with US blood with Iraqis in tow, then lost again because the underlying problems are not resolved/Arabs at war. Worst case: It isn't like Russian troops have had issues with insurgents before. This isn't a problem resolved by military might. Miltiary might is useful for managing the crisis (or keeping it from getting worse) but all Russia will do by propping up Assad is set the stage for the next Sunni revolt. Unless there's some sort of reconciliation between the Shia ruling elite and Sunni majority it's just going to be a question of when we see ISIS and the FSA again. Is there a Russian translation of "Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife" by John Nagl, or perhaps "A Savage War of Peace: Algeria 1952-1962" by Alistair Horn? I haven't read anything really good on the Iraq war simply because I sat through it so haven't felt so inclined to seek a good case study. However sheer military might in this case is ethereal. ISIS is an open conflict because the Assad regieme is so weak. You bring down the hammer, retake Syria a city at a time in great cost in blood and treasure (using Russian divisions with the requisite platoon of Syrians to keep it tied in with the host-nation), all you're doing is pushing ISIS back into the shadows that it dwells in quite ably. And then you've got Russians coming home in boxes because the Syrians are quite content to hide behind someone else and let them catch bullets for a change. There must be some manner of reconciliation to regain some sort of cohesive Sunni-Shia-other ethnic grouping. You can't kill your way out of this sort of conflict. Riddle me this. How much better is the war against ISIS in Iraq going with very capable western aviation? I contend the overall effort would be just as effective with IL-2s or A-1 Skyraiders in place of what's whipping around right now. In regards to flying too low to be shot down, no such thing. As to ISIS vs FSA More complicated than that even. Broadly the FSA is a collection of various groups fighting for everything from a Islamic government to a secular democracy...but yes generally one that is contained handily within Syria. In effect the FSA is collection of Syrian Sunni nationalists groups. ISIS is a transnational movement with the intent of something between a pan-Arab Caliphate, to something resembling global domination depending on the delusions of the person speaking on their behalf. Not understanding this difference though is pretty doom and gloom. You can't win against ISIS in Syria without addressing ISIS in Iraq. Worse, he folks who support the FSA strongly reject the Assad regime. If you destroy the FSA militarily, the alternative isn't reconciliation and returning to normality, it's supporting the much worse and scarier ISIS folks who are still killing the hell out of Alawites. As I keep saying until you give a reason for the Sunnis to support the government, they're going to join whoever opposes the Alawites.

I don't think his point was that it was jamming, it was that the regiment would have a significant emissions signature, and given what we know about NATO electronics intercept capabilities, I think his point was you'd know about where the Armatas were at a given time. As far as jamming, dedicated EW assets tend to have the ability to cover several frequencies at once. Jamming a Regiment's worth of APS however is likely not as effective as taking their FM coms, sat communications and GLONASS offline (or rather, filling those spectrum with garbage transmissions, bad data, and the like). It is however worth noting that given some of the Electronic Emissions Collection assets though that the spectrum used by the APS might be discovered, and loaded into some manner of reactive jammer. Which interestingly enough might be the great undoing of APS, simply that at the same time a round is fired, some sort of reactive jammer kicks in on the launcher side and degrades the APS sensor systems. I imagine you'd even get away with some sort of directional antenna thingy because you're not looking to jam a platoon's worth of APS, you're looking to get the one tank you just shot at. Dunno. Likely a reason someone hasn't done that yet anyway I don't know of.

I think EW formations is the wrong way to do it simply because it's something that's hard to quantify. An EA-18G or whatever supporting a CMBS sized battlefield is a bit crazy, as the amount of EW screwery most EW type systems are capable of in a small localized area is pretty nuts. More realistically you're benefiting from a Division-Corps level asset giving wide spectrum EW support for a good portion of the Ukraine. Rather than EW formations, perhaps have it detract some points from the QB pool based on EW disparity. One force with extensive EW fighting one without any EW support will have a good deal less points than its opponent, while two forces each with EW kicked up to 11 will have about equal points. Basically keeps one side from effectively having more "bang" for the same buck. In regards to in service, there's already a wide range of vehicle mounted EW jammers, it's just a question of what they can do without significant modification. What I know that's solid totally failed my "is this readily available on the internet test?" but needless to say stuff like DUKE and WARLOCK were demonstratively effective against the wide spectrum of communications systems and given what they could do to AFN when a convoy went by, I got the impression the range had more to do with "need" than "technological limits."

Re: TOW Please look up the list of TOW operators globally. You'll note Turkey, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Lebanon, Kuwait, Jordan, Egypt, and Luxembourg are all TOW operators. Seeing a TOW in Syria is about as indicative of US arms shipments as spotting an AK-47 for sale in the US indicates Russian sleeper cells. Who's labeling them? Very likely the same folks who do not consider the FSA or ISIS to be separate entities. From third party observers the majority of Russian strikes are hitting in the FSA/not ISIS areas. Considering the degree to which Syria is observed, and the fact we watched the Russian planes try to sneak in likely indicates a level of understanding of where Russian munitions are striking beyond slapping a label on a video on youtube. Regardless, still curious to hear why Russian strikes will do what other strikes have not. Do you have a chemical weapon that turns Sunnis into Shia? I imagine that might help. I have to wonder what sort of target discrimination/designation they're using. Low and fast isn't the optimal for target acquisition, it usually works best with clearly marked targets. If they're feeding off of Syrian targetry, I imagine that's going to be interesting results.

The portable coms jammer thing already exists. While they're all branded as counter-IED devices, there's a family of small electronic warfare doohickies that'll make a wide spectrum of frequencies no longer viable. In regards to giving Marines lasers, god have mercy on us all.

Which is what the not-Russian airstrikes have also done. Riddle me this: What makes the Russian strikes more effective? Putin is practically begging the US for shared targeting, it certainly can't be a better list of things to hit. Which weirdly enough is why the US shot itself in the foot to a large degree. We tried to support anti-ISIS only rebels, which largely do not exist mind, because supporting people who sometimes fight ISIS but also have a huge hardon for killing Assad does not serve the longer objective of degrading ISIS (or a FSA winning at the expense of Assad's forces just means a weaker anti-ISIS front). It's bombing the Soviet Union for invading Poland when your objective is to get rid of Hitler. Not terribly helpful at all. Individuals yeah. Some did. But the place catching the Russian bombs by and large are the folks who remained loyal to the FSA. If anything Russia is making joining ISIS a safer proposition than remaining in the FSA. Which is why if the FSA is defeated ISIS will then get to saw off Assad's head on youtube. The only real reason we've got some sort of static front is ISIS is fighting both Assad's forces and the FSA. Remove one, ISIS is stronger for it. Please do go on. I'm genuinely curious to see what sort of magic powers Russian warheads have in regards to resolving the situation on the ground. I mean it isn't like anyone has been dropping bombs on ISIS or the FSA for an extended time already.

The areas in which the overwhelming majority of Russian strikes have fallen lack meaningful ISIS presence. They're majority controlled by FSA forces, which while you classify them as terrorists, they are not aligned with ISIS and are actually in open combat with them. The strikes are conducted strictly in support of Assad-regime objectives, which do so at the expense of weakening resistance to ISIS elsewhere (as again, FSA and ISIS are both against Assad, BUT are also violently opposed to each other) which has allowed ISIS to gain ground. Some Russian strikes have hit ISIS controlled areas, but they are fairly small compared to efforts expended against the FSA. This is problematic in the larger scheme of things in combating ISIS, simply because the sorts of targets Russia has hit in ISIS areas do fairly little to impact the strength of ISIS strategically. What we need is an effective on-ground resistance to ISIS, which the Syrian Regieme alone is not (as ISIS's progress, and the floundering nature of the Syrian Army's offensive against the FSA even with Russian support illustrate). Frankly the best way out of this is some sort of FSA-Syrian military alliance, or at least detente until ISIS is degraded enough to be dealt with. Russian attacks however, as I've just pointed out are doing very little to destroy ISIS, while doing a fair bit to degrade what has been at least a moderately effective ISIS resister....while proving inadequate to achieve Assad Regime aspirations. They're not helpful, they're at best cynical, or at worst terribly misguided.

Not delving too far into politics, however: 1. Russia has shown a distinct lack of desire for full-on Ukrainian invasion. It is however an expensive endeavor at a time in which the Russian economy is not doing as well. Making an equally expensive operation elsewhere would be strategically viable in terms of if not reducing Russian focus on the Ukraine, at the least making maintaining the same level of support more painful. 2. In regards to arming terrorists, Russia is pretty unambigously putting the majority of its attentions on groups that are not ISIS. While they're hitting some of the other radical non-ISIS aligned Sunni groups, the majority of the Russian bombing in the realm of 85% of all strikes are falling on targets that could not even be remotely described as ISIS based. Some Ukrainian weapons, of which there's already a large number in the hands of third party actors worldwide thanks to Ukrainian surplus arms sales, also would not stand out especially much. If anything they could just shrug and claim they divested those missiles to <insert historical buyer of Ukrainian cast off weapons here> and have not seen them since the late 90's or somesuch. Additionally by some estimates Russia is actually inadvertently helping ISIS by damaging other groups in Syria that traditionally have resisted ISIS on the ground. If this is either cynical policy (eliminate all not-Assad resistance to ISIS in Syria, force west to support Assad) or meatheaded foreign policy, I cannot say. The relative lack of success of Syrian ground forces while supported by Russian aviation seems to indicate some level of overestimation of Russian airpower or the capabilities of the Assad Regime to bring decisive conclusions. Most of the world views Russian airstrikes as having little to do with reducing the terrorist threat, and a lot to do with keeping Assad in power. This is in line with current Russian objectives in the region. If I was a country that felt Russia had invaded and armed terrorists in my eastern portion, I would perhaps feel that arming the FSA, which is largely not regarded as terrorists by the international community, to resist Assad and his Russian backers would be a good chance to draw some blood at little risk or expense.

It simply is not a planned upgrade. The 25 MM for the M25, and the Bushmaster have zero commonality. The next generation US autocannons are likely to be 30 MM. The Bradley at the time is not slated to receive the sort of datalink you need to program AB weapons.

I don't think their main threat is air based at the moment. Also it's sort of like a minefield in that you wouldn't have to send a lot, you'd just need to send enough to make Putin go through the funtimes of explaining why they're short a few helicopters and there's another generation of unpleasant youtube videos. Which then might lead to a Russian escalation, which then draws more Russian resources from the Ukraine and further isolates Russia on the international stage. Dunno. Just spitballing.

Already did, or someone did at least. Just not many. Makes you wonder if some of Ukraine's MANPADS stock might just fall off a truck somewhere out of spite rather than any long term goals.

I think history is not going to be so kind to the Stryker. The weight is also a serious issue. Even without the ERA it was already having major issues with crossing any terrain that was not a functional roadbed. And it's already blowing suspensions. I'm not trying to be Mike Sparks but once you cross a certain point in terms of weight, wheels stop being quite so practical. I think the more reasonable plan was not every vehicle with a 30 MM, but instead working out some manner of fire support Stryker to fill the role the MGS did not quite live up to. Then there's also rumblings about attaching some manner of bolt-on ATGM to the not-cannon armed vehicles.