Most usefull russian toys list

[MikoyanPT]

Concerning that report on Sirya buying 8 MIG-31, wich i consider kind of useless, if they can´t back it up whith a modern radar and early warning sistem covering the entire airspace (you can´t hit what you can´t see).

I was thinking wich russian toys would be most usefull and desirable for today´s wanabee dictator´s seeking their share of world domination.

My choices would be:

For everiday use

AT-14 Kornet

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4fSOEul7rA

More of the same and better if you are too lazy to walk

AT-15 Khryzantema

Look great on parades

Tungusca M1 Air Defense

Because it is cool

TOR M1 Air Defense

Its kind of obvious i think anti tank and anti air defense are important to would be dictators survival until old age.

Any more sugestions and opinions ?

[Karelian]

A few ROP-A "Shmels" would always be nice.

http://www.janes.com/defence/land_forces/news/jidr/jidr010104_3_n.shtml

[MikoyanPT]

Originally posted by Karelian:

A few ROP-A "Shmels" would always be nice.

http://www.janes.com/defence/land_forces/news/jidr/jidr010104_3_n.shtml

Excellent, very useful in field trips to scare of the bears.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TgRJRpGJfbg

[Sergei]

ICBM with a nuclear warhead.

[Sergei]

Btw. Karelian, did you too serve in Kontioranta? I was there in I/1999 in the Anti-tank platoon.

[Karelian]

Sergei, I live next to the place in the same municipality, but back in the day in II/03 I volunteered to the FRDF in Pori Brigade, Säkylä.

Gonabiitsi kun nyt on mitä on, niin hyvässä kuin pahassakin.

[kipanderson]

MikoyanPT,

Agree very much with your list.

They are the sort of systems that would greatly increase the cost of entry for a wealthy, NATO style invader.

It is often forgotten just how fragile an asset air-power is in that it takes so long to replace losses. Just a 1%- 2% loss rate pre-mission would be unacceptable/sustainable for any NATO country. Some in the military press believe the latest Russian system could achieve that.

All the best,

Kip.

[Peter Cairns]

I'd go for a scud with a cluster warhead.

Even with a poor CEP it could still close an airfield, and force the aggressor to launch operations from far further out.

Cruising at 400knots an F-16 could from 200 miles, go to target and loitr for two hoursif need be. Extend that to 400miles and the loiter drops to thirty minutes, so you need four times as many planes to achieve the same coverage.

Peter.

[YankeeDog]

How do you actually expect to get a SCUD close to a US Airbase? They're all protected by 3rd Gen. Patriot batteries now. The 1st Gen. Patriots did pretty well against SCUDs in GWI; the 3rd-gen systems they have now are MUCH better. Kill % against a dumb medium-range missile like a SCUD is somewhere over 90%.

If you had a more sophisticated delivery vehicle, like a fast cruise missile, it might work. But launching SCUDs against well-protected targets like airfields is probably a waste of time.

Softer targets, like civilian centers, is a different matter. Even the US can't afford to put anti-missile batteries everywhere.

[Capt. Toleran]

Mikoyan, excellent post, I actually bookmarked it.

[MikoyanPT]

Capt Toleran

Peter and Yankeedog,

That looks like Iran choice, investing madly on missile sistems of every kinds and shapes.

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=d00_1182288466

But what i consider more interesting is their interest on anti-ship missiles

SSN-4 anti ship missiles launch doctrine

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=c3f_1182203610

Or this spooky concept of commandos at sea doing piracy and sabotage acts mostly with mines (russian as usual) and demo charges

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=df9_1182151740

[ July 01, 2007, 01:42 PM: Message edited by: MikoyanPT ]

[Axel]

Do I love the BMP2

[MikoyanPT]

Originally posted by Axel:

Do I love the BMP2

Yes, russian vehicles are sexy.

But add a few buckets of dollars and you get the shinning BMP 3 with sport leather interiors and a nice box to carry your fishing poles in fishing trips (you will never need a boat with one of these)

[MikoyanPT]

Making duck hunting rifles since...

IZMASH small arms (makers of Kalashnikov rifles, what they are making today)

[Peter Cairns]

The US only has about a dozen Patriot battallions so even if it dispersed them amd took them from around the world it would be struggling to cover ever airfield.

Secondly even witha arnge of 70 miles, a cluster warhead could still be detonate high or via a proximity or RWR detonator before the patriot impacted.

The third possibbbility id for the first Scud in the salvo to carry a FAEwarhead which detonates in the stratospehere to create an ionised zone that the Patriots ground radarcan't see through, effectively greatly limiting the reaction time againstthe rest of the salvo.

All that aside, you can't operate AWACs JSTARS, Tankers otr transports within scud range because if even one gets through the wing area on large aircraft is so big that a single clusterhit would almost certainly result in a lot of damage.

You can't risk large operations within range so you have to pull back. For CM:SF to work the USwill need a lot of friendly air bases and allies willing to take hits. Without that no matter how bad things got in Syrian the US just wouldn't go in.

An interesting scenario would be a loss of allies, (say Turkey pulling out, or the Saudi's) part way through so that as scenarios progressed quite suddenly US airpower became much more sporadic and less responsive.

Peter.

[YankeeDog]

I'm still very skeptical that you could get a SCUD close enough that the bomblets land anywhere near a major US airfield, even with a moment-before-impact detonation system. Only 30% of Iraqi SCUDs launched at an area under protection of a Patriot Battery GWI managed to get close enough for their warheads to even land in a populated area. Given the fact that the newer Patriots are vastly improved from their GWI predecessors, I really don't think you have much of a shot of getting one close enough to a US airfield to land any bomblets on the field. After all, Airfields are pretty big, but Tel Aviv is bigger.

As far as only 12 batteries, the US only needs to cover the airfields in SCUD range; 12 batteries should be enough to give the US more than enough land-strip facilities.

I also think it's naive to suppose that a nation like Syria would be able to do some kind of saturation attack, launching SCUDs in salvos. The first thing the US goes after is C&C facilities, making coodinating such an attack difficult. And then you have JSTARS tracking the movement of anything metal on the ground. Isolated SCUD launchers pulling out from well-hidden positions might stand a shot of getting off a missile or two. But a coordinated strike of multiple SCUDs launched more or less simultanously, no way. The Iraqis only managed 39 missiles in 19 salvos over the course of an entitre month GWI. I think that would be harder to do even that now.

Finally, even if by some miracle the Syrians do by some miracle manage to limit the use of proximal land airbases, either by direct attack or by somehow getting Turkey and/or Syria to refuse the bases to the US, you still have 3+ Carrier Air Groups to deal with, as well as air assets that fly in from much further away -- the B-2s and B-52s are going to be flying in from the CONUS, and places like Diego Garcia, regardless.

Any way you look at it, I think the chances of degrading US air support to available to ground forces enough to make any real difference are slim to nil. Better off spending your money elsewhere.

This doesn't necessarily mean I think cluster bomb warheaded SCUDS would be a bad idea; I'd just target them somewhere else. Being able to throw a few hundred bomblets along a US path of advance and/or supply would be very handy. Slow the US spearheads down. Force them to spread out and check every click of the advance for Mines, IEDs, cluster bomblets, and ambushes. Time is your friend on the defense.

Nor do I think attacking forward US airfields is necessarily a bad idea. Probably not an option for Syria, but as the Iranians I'd try to get my hands on a few diesel-electric subs and target the Carriers. Diesel-electrics are actually quiter than nuke subs, and littoral waters give all sorts of evasion and hiding opportunites to a good sub skipper. The US has been operating its flattops remarkably close to shore in the Med and the Persian Gulf lately.

An Argentinian diesel-electric actually managed to slip through the escort screen, and take out a US carrier in a wargame off Hawaii a few years back. So it's possible. . . probably a suicide mission, but I don't think the Iranians have a problem with that. That's a Hail Mary worth shooting for.

[Sergei]

YankeeDog, the premise of this thread isn't US vs. Syria, or is it? I thought it was only a generic MDS case (Mad Dictator Syndrome).

But I think you're right, SCUD as such is so yesterday's technology, I wouldn't buy it except for showing off in parades.

[YankeeDog]

Hmmm... not sure.

Well, if my generic MDS case happens to be Iran, with a decent amount of coastline, and the enclosed waters of the Persian Gulf, I'm going for the DE Subs.

[Vanir Ausf B]

Forget the Scuds. PAC-3 eats Scuds for lunch. I'll take the Iskander. Terminal phase manoeuvring for da win.

Oh, and to defend against the retaliation, S-400 Triumf

[Bigduke6]

First the hard part, you create an infantry force willing to fight and die, and make the training national so you can call up plenty of reserves. So you are conscripting.

Your elites are not silly useless commandoes, but sapper formations good at emplacing explosives and mines, especially against armor.

The you equip you infantry with:

- Mortar-delivered nerve gas.

- 7.62mm assault rifle and make AP ammo standard

- Sa-14 issued down to infantry platoon.

- .50 MG issued down to infantry company.

- .50 single-shot snipe rifle issued down to platoon.

- RPG-14 issued down to infantry squad.

- AT-14 issued down to infantry company

Copious amounts of low-metal shoebox mines.

If you have extra cash left over then you plunk out for guided missles.

If you have a coast then it's small boats + Exocet or the Russian analogue.

Infrastructure things that will help:

- Communications using wire, motorcycle runners, semaphore, or some other way of talking without transmitting.

- Populace is armed ahead of time

- Populace is educated to high school standard.

- Polulace moves around the same way as your infantry, be it vehicles, camels, foot, whatever. Because the sattelites can't tell the difference.

Do all that, and it would not be fun at all for a NATO-type force to invade you. But as noted, the starting point is a national army capable of rapid expansion of resonably capable infantry formations in case of an invasion.

[FAI]

Originally posted by Bigduke6:

First the hard part, you create an infantry force willing to fight and die, and make the training national so you can call up plenty of reserves. So you are conscripting.

Your elites are not silly useless commandoes, but sapper formations good at emplacing explosives and mines, especially against armor.

The you equip you infantry with:

- Mortar-delivered nerve gas.

- 7.62mm assault rifle and make AP ammo standard

- Sa-14 issued down to infantry platoon.

- .50 MG issued down to infantry company.

- .50 single-shot snipe rifle issued down to platoon.

- RPG-14 issued down to infantry squad.

- AT-14 issued down to infantry company

Copious amounts of low-metal shoebox mines.

If you have extra cash left over then you plunk out for guided missles.

If you have a coast then it's small boats + Exocet or the Russian analogue.

Infrastructure things that will help:

- Communications using wire, motorcycle runners, semaphore, or some other way of talking without transmitting.

- Populace is armed ahead of time

- Populace is educated to high school standard.

- Polulace moves around the same way as your infantry, be it vehicles, camels, foot, whatever. Because the sattelites can't tell the difference.

Do all that, and it would not be fun at all for a NATO-type force to invade you. But as noted, the starting point is a national army capable of rapid expansion of resonably capable infantry formations in case of an invasion.

Good points, but an armed and trained population is the nightmare of every dictator. A democratic third world country might pull it off, though.

[Londoner]

Originally posted by YankeeDog:

Only 30% of Iraqi SCUDs launched at an area under protection of a Patriot Battery GWI managed to get close enough for their warheads to even land in a populated area.

Weren't those figures rubbished??

[Bigduke6]

Well, you can get around the armed population point by a combination of conscription, reserves, and national identity (with or without propaganda). Or you can go the Afghan route, every Pathan is a warrior, it's possible to beat up on superpowers with raw material like that too.

I'd say democracy really doesn't enter into it. For instance, both Sudan and North Korea would be huge problems for the US to invade, both are dictarorships, but the first is awash with weapons and the second is locked down tighter than an anti-NRA meeting in the Vatican. The key thing is having lots of young men willing to fight, and able to handle effective infantry weapons the US can't really detect until they shoot.

The problem is, of course, a force like that can't really invade neighbors, and so the tin-pot dictators love their fighter jets and tanks.

[Soddball]

Originally posted by Londoner:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by YankeeDog:

Only 30% of Iraqi SCUDs launched at an area under protection of a Patriot Battery GWI managed to get close enough for their warheads to even land in a populated area.

Weren't those figures rubbished?? </font>

[YankeeDog]

Originally posted by Soddball:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Londoner:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by YankeeDog:

Only 30% of Iraqi SCUDs launched at an area under protection of a Patriot Battery GWI managed to get close enough for their warheads to even land in a populated area.

Weren't those figures rubbished?? </font>