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Mike1158
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How about a diesel hybrid drivetrain? Do away with the gearbox for a start.
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On second thoughts, far too sensible. Perhaps remove a fuel pump from a Saturn 5 and use that instead. It is bound to get more support in the Senate armed forces how much can we afford for tea and cakes committee.
Kat Tsun
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F-14D said:
It's not a prototype in any real sense of the word: It's a Strf 90/CV90 hull with a fancy body kit and a fake turret.
The thing is just a trade show centerpiece since Anders blew up.
Mike1158 said:
You'd have to catch the US Army sleeping to put a diesel in the M1, because if it's awake there's gonna be a fight.
The last two times someone offered the US Army a diesel (AIPS/Block III and FCS) it chose the turbine (LV100-5 and LV50-2) every time. There's no reason they'd pick a diesel now, especially considering how cheap oil has been.
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Fuel prices cannot be guaranteed over the long term and I am sure they could use the saved weight by ditching the gearbox for a start, factor in the increased operational range and they would be daft NOT to stick a diesel engine in the back. However, immense rank does not make intelligence a 100% factor.
Looking at the military management of these projects, a certain lack of inteligence is about all that can be guaranteed.
Looking at the military management of these projects, a certain lack of inteligence is about all that can be guaranteed.
Kat Tsun
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Foo Fighter said:
Fuel prices haven't been as cheap as they are now since the 1980s glut. History over the long term shows that all oil increases are followed by massive dips. Moreover, turbines and diesels are not as substantial a difference as you think. AGT-1500 is only two generations behind the latest Euro Powerpacks. LV100-5 was almost as efficient as a diesel, plus the advantage of less moving parts and easier maintenance. The tradeoffs of the increased fuel price can be met by having more tanks operational for the same amount of work hours.
Fuel economy is mostly a European thing since they're not guaranteed to survive the next round of budget cuts, much less be able to fuel their armour. The US Army, OTOH, has a global empire to police so its partially immunized.
Hardly the US Army's fault that its very useful laboratories, like Watertown, were consolidated into a smaller and far less capable "Army Research Laboratories" in the 1990s. If you want to see where the "military management" aspect comes in, you need look no further than Reagan, Bush, and the advocates privatization and efficiency that indirectly created the conditions for FCS.
The private contractors' management and marketers who promise the moon and have zero scruples about lying about their inability to produce equipment (A-12 is a good example: the engineers were told to wheel out the massive composite wing spars and remove the "defective" stickers by management, to show Cheney the great progress they were making in Avenger II's manufacture) to meet military standards or timetables are more to blame. The post-Cold War inability of the US military adequately acquire new systems partially lies with the Shinseki clique and partially with the contractors involved, but I'm more inclined to place blame on the contractors; the Army had just had all its labs shut down by BRAC, which sorta neuters how it could translate the wishes of the generals to operational realities.
Believe it or not, Army Materials Laboratory and ERADCOM and all the other major labs did things just as important as making systems and theorizing. They were the bridge who could make sure the theorycrafters of the Army could meet the salespeople of the MIC armed with the information to see through bullshit and know what they actually want. You consolidate that and shut down the bulk of it, you've reduced its ability to bridge the public and privately owned halves of defense acquisition, and the private portion begins to take advantage of the public portion.
Further, there's nothing "unintelligent" about a turbine engine. It has distinct advantages over a diesel. The cold start capability, reliability, ease of maintenance, and tactical acceleration tend to be a few of them. The US Army wouldn't go for a diesel because it requires more hours to work on and has more moving parts. This is why AIPS picked the turbine.
Ignoring the advantages of a turbine over a diesel is disingenuous and blaming it on perceived stupidity is outright ignorant.
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Actually you are missing the hybrid aspect of my suggestion, not a vanilla diesel engine which would also require a massive transmission/gearbox. A diesel generator for a hybrid power UNIT.
By the way, the ignorance of the military planners is about the whole system where very highly place military and ex military take kick backs by industry for favour rather than the military being plain stupid. I think you missed MY points by a country mile but that happens in debate wherever you are and whatever topic is current.
A smaller generator engine for use when the main engine is idle/offline would also be useful to maintain power for electrical systems.
By the way, the ignorance of the military planners is about the whole system where very highly place military and ex military take kick backs by industry for favour rather than the military being plain stupid. I think you missed MY points by a country mile but that happens in debate wherever you are and whatever topic is current.
A smaller generator engine for use when the main engine is idle/offline would also be useful to maintain power for electrical systems.
Kat Tsun
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The "ignorance" of military planners is mostly because they're military generals. Defense procurement doesn't happen in a vacuum, and generals are not engineers. They would be pretty piss poor generals if they were, anyway. Before the 1990s, the US Army had a massive number of arsenals and laboratories that allowed generals to consult expert engineers who didn't have a conflict of interest in providing honest information to them. It let them skirt around the bullshit of marketers and brought their ideas back to reality. Since 1992, with the consolidation and closure of most of the arsenals and their labs, that doesn't exist anymore.
There isn't any kind of conspiratorial cabal between megacorp CEOs and the top brass that seeks the destruction of the US Army or whatever. It's far more banal and less dramatic. Companies want to make money by securing contracts, and contracts tend to award money incentives that create a perverse incentive (more specifically it's a "moral hazard" in economics) that means companies get paid the longer the contract is drawn out. The US Army is exceptional in this regard because its version of the story resulted in utter failure. Other cost-plus programs like Virginia, CVN-21/Gerald Ford, F-22, and F-35 are or were progressing far better on that front, mostly because the in-house development and research units of the Navy and Air Force were kept more or less intact, and the development of a warship or a fighter plane is far less ambitious than remaking a land force.
There is a dearth of understanding of engineering and science in the US military and DoD since the gutting of the arsenals in the 90s. It was first apparent in the development of Longbow and later LHX, then culminated in FCS.
So you have project managers who take the execuspeak at face value and military generals who think their ideas are workable because some engineers presented a nice Powerpoint presentation, without anyone around to tell them the truth of the matter. Normally this would be fixed by the generals consulting with in-house, Army owned and operated engineers who have as much (or more) experience as the private sector guys. Now they have private sector guys to tell them what the other private sector guys are saying, so it's not isolated anymore. Everyone has a conflict of interest in screwing the military over for delivery of contracts.
How to fix it? Go back to the arsenal system. Break up ARL into the independent laboratories again and give them their own spaces to work. Watertown, Detroit Arsenal, and the other closed down research and development bases should be re-nationalized. Expand the R&D of the DoD's in-house engineers instead of outsourcing it to private contractors. Give the military the ability to consult experts on the matter who know what they're doing and know the fields they're expected to manage. Instead of sending Colonel J. Smith whose Master's thesis was on French literature in the 17th and 18th centuries, as PM Team Devers ammunition development or whatever, you send Colonel J. Smythe, whose Master's thesis was on aerodynamic flow effects at hypervelocity and how it relates to optimum fin design of subcaliber armour-piercing ammunition, and spent the last ten years working in a managerial research capacity at Ballistics Research Laboratory to head up that.
Probably not that dramatic, but having some form of being able to consult experts whose first priority isn't to make sure they're turning a profit, where by helping you wrap up the cost-plus contract in a timely manner they are reducing the potential profit (especially in the modern age of smaller and skimpier budgets and orders, extended contracts can mean life or death for contractors and their subcontractors) and thus have a vested interest to mislead you by promising outlandish claims based on optimistic scenarios, you have people you can turn to who can tell you like it is and don't have this conflict of interest.
It sounds simple enough, but in practice it would be political suicide in the neo-liberal engine of modern America, and probably take years or decades to show results.
That's enough of that, though.
A CODAG wouldn't offer much, except for eating fuel when you need the booster from the turbine. The Swedes never considered it for Strv 2000/Strv Ny, and its a bad halfway house between a turbine and a diesel. You might as well go full turbine or full diesel instead of trying to have both. Unless you mean something like hyperbar, which in that case you're already eating as much fuel as the turbine, and if you have the room for something as big as LV100-5 or AGT-1500, there's literally no reason to go for hyperbar.
Both of these would still have the reliability/maintenance overhead that a turbine reduces by being simpler.
FCS promised to be even simpler than Abrams' powerpack, since it would do away with the mechanical transmission and replace it with an electrical drive powered by a turbine. Unfortunately, FCS lacked sufficient digital ju-jitsu to get through the practical problems of bandwidth and radio-electronic combat.
Anyway, Abrams tanks already have gasoline APUs. As of SEP, the APU is now internal (replaces the left rear fuel tank), so replacing the powerpack with a diesel and the APU with a turbine isn't really necessary. That already exists and you can generate electrical power with the external APU (eAPU) on -A2s or the internal one on the -A2 SEPvX.
The only tanks that don't have the generators are the M1A1 and -A1HAs/SAs, and the only people using those (practically speaking) are the USMC. The Guard also has them, but when was the last time a Guard armoured unit fought their TO&E mission? The Regular Army rolls with -A2s and SEPs.
There isn't any kind of conspiratorial cabal between megacorp CEOs and the top brass that seeks the destruction of the US Army or whatever. It's far more banal and less dramatic. Companies want to make money by securing contracts, and contracts tend to award money incentives that create a perverse incentive (more specifically it's a "moral hazard" in economics) that means companies get paid the longer the contract is drawn out. The US Army is exceptional in this regard because its version of the story resulted in utter failure. Other cost-plus programs like Virginia, CVN-21/Gerald Ford, F-22, and F-35 are or were progressing far better on that front, mostly because the in-house development and research units of the Navy and Air Force were kept more or less intact, and the development of a warship or a fighter plane is far less ambitious than remaking a land force.
There is a dearth of understanding of engineering and science in the US military and DoD since the gutting of the arsenals in the 90s. It was first apparent in the development of Longbow and later LHX, then culminated in FCS.
So you have project managers who take the execuspeak at face value and military generals who think their ideas are workable because some engineers presented a nice Powerpoint presentation, without anyone around to tell them the truth of the matter. Normally this would be fixed by the generals consulting with in-house, Army owned and operated engineers who have as much (or more) experience as the private sector guys. Now they have private sector guys to tell them what the other private sector guys are saying, so it's not isolated anymore. Everyone has a conflict of interest in screwing the military over for delivery of contracts.
How to fix it? Go back to the arsenal system. Break up ARL into the independent laboratories again and give them their own spaces to work. Watertown, Detroit Arsenal, and the other closed down research and development bases should be re-nationalized. Expand the R&D of the DoD's in-house engineers instead of outsourcing it to private contractors. Give the military the ability to consult experts on the matter who know what they're doing and know the fields they're expected to manage. Instead of sending Colonel J. Smith whose Master's thesis was on French literature in the 17th and 18th centuries, as PM Team Devers ammunition development or whatever, you send Colonel J. Smythe, whose Master's thesis was on aerodynamic flow effects at hypervelocity and how it relates to optimum fin design of subcaliber armour-piercing ammunition, and spent the last ten years working in a managerial research capacity at Ballistics Research Laboratory to head up that.
Probably not that dramatic, but having some form of being able to consult experts whose first priority isn't to make sure they're turning a profit, where by helping you wrap up the cost-plus contract in a timely manner they are reducing the potential profit (especially in the modern age of smaller and skimpier budgets and orders, extended contracts can mean life or death for contractors and their subcontractors) and thus have a vested interest to mislead you by promising outlandish claims based on optimistic scenarios, you have people you can turn to who can tell you like it is and don't have this conflict of interest.
It sounds simple enough, but in practice it would be political suicide in the neo-liberal engine of modern America, and probably take years or decades to show results.
That's enough of that, though.
A CODAG wouldn't offer much, except for eating fuel when you need the booster from the turbine. The Swedes never considered it for Strv 2000/Strv Ny, and its a bad halfway house between a turbine and a diesel. You might as well go full turbine or full diesel instead of trying to have both. Unless you mean something like hyperbar, which in that case you're already eating as much fuel as the turbine, and if you have the room for something as big as LV100-5 or AGT-1500, there's literally no reason to go for hyperbar.
Both of these would still have the reliability/maintenance overhead that a turbine reduces by being simpler.
FCS promised to be even simpler than Abrams' powerpack, since it would do away with the mechanical transmission and replace it with an electrical drive powered by a turbine. Unfortunately, FCS lacked sufficient digital ju-jitsu to get through the practical problems of bandwidth and radio-electronic combat.
Anyway, Abrams tanks already have gasoline APUs. As of SEP, the APU is now internal (replaces the left rear fuel tank), so replacing the powerpack with a diesel and the APU with a turbine isn't really necessary. That already exists and you can generate electrical power with the external APU (eAPU) on -A2s or the internal one on the -A2 SEPvX.
The only tanks that don't have the generators are the M1A1 and -A1HAs/SAs, and the only people using those (practically speaking) are the USMC. The Guard also has them, but when was the last time a Guard armoured unit fought their TO&E mission? The Regular Army rolls with -A2s and SEPs.
Kat Tsun
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You don't really need hindsight to know that there wasn't any precedent or need for a medium armor, air-mechanized force before Shinseki. It received enough criticism as is, notably from Antulio Echevarria, on epistemological and practical grounds, rather shortly after Shinseki made his big speech in 1999.
Desert Storm never really proved anything regarding the supposed vulnerability of Light troops to Heavy. Saying it did is an extremely tendentious reading, and probably the most important thing that FCS got wrong.
The 9th Motorized Division experiments showed that a medium motorized/armoured unit's ability to fight Heavy forces was sharply reduced compared to more traditional heavy armour, with mutual destruction being the best possible result, or total destruction [of the motorized troops] in close combat. FCS never answered the latter question except that "UAs won't engage in close combat", and intended the need for/lack of heavy units to be solved by multinational allies, like Germany and the Arabs, instead of the US Army. It also never properly addressed the distributed air defense and MANPADS problem, and sort of just assumed the US Army would get "there" before that became an issue, because it could just move faster, or something.
A lot of the stuff piled up in 2003, with the Iraqis practicing deliberate and proactive deception operations to reduce the effectiveness of American deep raids, the very sort of tactic that Desert Storm allegedly vindicated, and the basis of the air-mechanized raids of the Transformation-era Unit of Action, but it was visible as far back as 1999 when TF Hawk found gathering the necessary intelligence for adequate SEAD against a distributed and low profile air defense was extremely difficult, to say the least. It was enough that people began to seriously question the deep raid/interdiction, but apparently not enough that people questioned the Objective Force's basis for existence.
Further, none of the supposed need for a medium force to bolster the Light force was found. Light troops equipped with Javelins, and (sometimes, but not always) backed by helicopter gunships, repelled armoured troops without casualties. I guess by that point it was probably too late to just kill FCS, though, since the Army decided to go all in back in 99-00, and that was like a year after.
Modernizing the Light force with systems like LOSAT or EFOGM, Javelin, and AGS would have been sufficient to deter the nightmare Desert Storm II, while the Heavy force could just take M993s to replace M113s and M2001s to replace M109 and FAASVs, to give armored units a unified tempo. Unfortunately, for some reason "staid" is synonymous with "bad".
Simpkin was correct in his statement that peacetime Western armies have a "unrivaled and largely deserved reputation for blinkered thinking", which in this case means pretending that history started in 1991. Lack of intelligence isn't correct, since it's obvious enough to anyone who gives it more than a minute's thought that generals are substantially more intelligent than average, but you can say FCS was the result of a lack of realistic expectations, or presence of unrealistic expectations, or assumption of unrealistic scenarios, or based on a tendentious view of history. Those are all correct, but the last one is the most correct.
Desert Storm never really proved anything regarding the supposed vulnerability of Light troops to Heavy. Saying it did is an extremely tendentious reading, and probably the most important thing that FCS got wrong.
The 9th Motorized Division experiments showed that a medium motorized/armoured unit's ability to fight Heavy forces was sharply reduced compared to more traditional heavy armour, with mutual destruction being the best possible result, or total destruction [of the motorized troops] in close combat. FCS never answered the latter question except that "UAs won't engage in close combat", and intended the need for/lack of heavy units to be solved by multinational allies, like Germany and the Arabs, instead of the US Army. It also never properly addressed the distributed air defense and MANPADS problem, and sort of just assumed the US Army would get "there" before that became an issue, because it could just move faster, or something.
A lot of the stuff piled up in 2003, with the Iraqis practicing deliberate and proactive deception operations to reduce the effectiveness of American deep raids, the very sort of tactic that Desert Storm allegedly vindicated, and the basis of the air-mechanized raids of the Transformation-era Unit of Action, but it was visible as far back as 1999 when TF Hawk found gathering the necessary intelligence for adequate SEAD against a distributed and low profile air defense was extremely difficult, to say the least. It was enough that people began to seriously question the deep raid/interdiction, but apparently not enough that people questioned the Objective Force's basis for existence.
Further, none of the supposed need for a medium force to bolster the Light force was found. Light troops equipped with Javelins, and (sometimes, but not always) backed by helicopter gunships, repelled armoured troops without casualties. I guess by that point it was probably too late to just kill FCS, though, since the Army decided to go all in back in 99-00, and that was like a year after.
Modernizing the Light force with systems like LOSAT or EFOGM, Javelin, and AGS would have been sufficient to deter the nightmare Desert Storm II, while the Heavy force could just take M993s to replace M113s and M2001s to replace M109 and FAASVs, to give armored units a unified tempo. Unfortunately, for some reason "staid" is synonymous with "bad".
Simpkin was correct in his statement that peacetime Western armies have a "unrivaled and largely deserved reputation for blinkered thinking", which in this case means pretending that history started in 1991. Lack of intelligence isn't correct, since it's obvious enough to anyone who gives it more than a minute's thought that generals are substantially more intelligent than average, but you can say FCS was the result of a lack of realistic expectations, or presence of unrealistic expectations, or assumption of unrealistic scenarios, or based on a tendentious view of history. Those are all correct, but the last one is the most correct.
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Not sure what is intended by the comment about a keyboard warrior but I got my information and experience from 10 years in a tank regiment from driver to vehicle commander. I have seen the results of senior staff messing with requirements until nothing but spending money is the result. Do not forget that these senior staff are those who say what the Army will need to fulfill role for the next ten years, and then change those requirements. As a non Army project, consider the epic fail of the Nimrod AEW & Constrol aircraft and the scrapping of ALL our support Harriers and the new Nimrod ELINT aircraft rather than stockpiling them somewhere until funds could be released. The higher up the food chain the more responsibility must be borne when the needs of the task are second handed to the government. People have died due to failings of those senior OFFICERS.
Imagine having a heavy tank without the ammunition to be deployed. Really efficient management is it NOT?
Imagine having a heavy tank without the ammunition to be deployed. Really efficient management is it NOT?
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Foo Fighter said:
Not defending every stupid decision out there (*cough* cancelling Zumwalts) but all you're saying is you have a really good view of your postage stamp-sized piece of the big picture. Your situation is hardly unique. Everybody on the planet thinks "the suits" are inept. More often than not though it's because, in their little bubbles, those doing the criticizing don't have all the facts. Do people make mistakes? Obviously. Do politics get in the way of making good decisions at times? Sure. Are the people at the top complete retards? For the most part they're quite the opposite. That's WHY they're at the top.
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We all go by our own experience and that is the way of the world and it does not make me an idiot, speaking plainly here, what military experience do the two of you (Kai Tsun & sferrin) have?
Senior officers are supposed to ensure their troops do not get put into situations where the equipment they have is deficient or running out of ammunition BEFORE they get to the point of pulling triggers for real. During the run up for GW1 or Op Granby to us Brits and the more prosaic Desert shield/storm by US it was found that the military high ups had removed certain inoculation media from stocks. When it was decided that the TA would have to be deployed (National Guard in the US) they realised that they had failed to alter certain deployment conditions. It was required that ANY deployment of the TA HAD to be part of a NATO deployment or they could not force TA members to travel with their unit. This led to a huge shortage of trained personnel. When many like me volunteered outside our reserve period they then got to the next problem. Not enough basic inoculation doses. The suppliers the high ups in the MOD (who just happened to be senior military figures) selected were apparently on price and post Op Granby, these inoculation doses were found to be sub par and in several case NOT FIT FOR HUMAN USE. Figures high up in the military have the positions for a reason, sometimes they get caught out by their decisions and while their is no absolute PROOF that there were kickbacks, many suppliers were more expensive than alternate suppliers.
As for IQ deciding how smart people are, not necessarily so. These people have made a career out of telling government suits what they want to hear rather than the truth and btw, my IQ is 199.
Another FACT, the MOD decided to allow the production of Heavy armour AND the associated main gun ammunition to cease in the UK, now we have to hope we can continue to source this from other nations. What sort of senior officer allows this to even get discussed?
Senior officers are supposed to ensure their troops do not get put into situations where the equipment they have is deficient or running out of ammunition BEFORE they get to the point of pulling triggers for real. During the run up for GW1 or Op Granby to us Brits and the more prosaic Desert shield/storm by US it was found that the military high ups had removed certain inoculation media from stocks. When it was decided that the TA would have to be deployed (National Guard in the US) they realised that they had failed to alter certain deployment conditions. It was required that ANY deployment of the TA HAD to be part of a NATO deployment or they could not force TA members to travel with their unit. This led to a huge shortage of trained personnel. When many like me volunteered outside our reserve period they then got to the next problem. Not enough basic inoculation doses. The suppliers the high ups in the MOD (who just happened to be senior military figures) selected were apparently on price and post Op Granby, these inoculation doses were found to be sub par and in several case NOT FIT FOR HUMAN USE. Figures high up in the military have the positions for a reason, sometimes they get caught out by their decisions and while their is no absolute PROOF that there were kickbacks, many suppliers were more expensive than alternate suppliers.
As for IQ deciding how smart people are, not necessarily so. These people have made a career out of telling government suits what they want to hear rather than the truth and btw, my IQ is 199.
Another FACT, the MOD decided to allow the production of Heavy armour AND the associated main gun ammunition to cease in the UK, now we have to hope we can continue to source this from other nations. What sort of senior officer allows this to even get discussed?
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Foo Fighter said:
Explain the relevance. I had an F-16 crew chief once tell me the U-2 could go Mach 3. Does the fact that he was a crew chief mean he was correct? Your retreat to, "what is your military experience" is like a sign saying, "I don't have a case, I just don't know it, and now I'm going to throw out red herrings in an attempt to divert." Just stop already.
Kat Tsun
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dan_inbox said:
The Congressman one is from a study published in Intelligence by J. Wai in 2013. I forgot where the US Army article was, but the officer schools generally prefer to accept candidates who are one standard deviation above the mean I think, but it was basically the same thing as the Congress one. No one was pulling ASVAB scores or anything for 10,000 officers. Just like J. Wai wasn't pulling SAT/ACT, LSAT, and GMAT scores for Congressmen.
However, it's far more in depth than the military thing because that just goes off of a single standardized test while Congressmen are judged by income as well as against multiple test averages, and the route to Congressional office is generally more stringent than passing board exams anyway. TBH, I don't see any difference between a random US Army general and Congressman in required social aptitude, except that the Congressman is more transparent and visible while the general can hide away from the cameras and make all sorts of gaffes. This might actually raise the bar higher for the politician, who must be both intelligent enough to understand their policy advisors and a sufficiently competent actor to perform in front of camera. The Congressman is also probably more likely to have studied a useful trade like law, as opposed to something totally useless like French literature in the 17th century, but I digress.
It's assuming, based on their socio-economic status and prior professions, the averages of standardized tests, and admission scores of pupils at elite US post-secondary institutions, that the Congressmen are above average intelligence because to be accepted to those schools, to have these professions, their current or previous SES, etc. inherently requires higher intelligence than the mean. It's more comprehensive than the US Army thing because the US military IQ rating just goes off the results of a single test. This uses SAT/ACT, GMAT, and LSAT averages, plus attendance at elite schools, and breaks down the billionaires by economic sector in which they made their wealth. There's a few other metrics used I think.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/finding-the-next-einstein/201311/who-s-smarter-republicans-and-democrats-in-congress
https://www.psychologytoday.com/files/attachments/56143/wai-americas-elite-2013.pdf
The tl;dr is that "The Congressmen are dumb" is a piece of folk psychology/sociology that doesn't stand up. It's the civilian equivalent of the "the generals are dumb" that goes around in military society. Congressmen are well and definitely smarter than the average American, and some are probably genius IQ.
Foo Fighter said:
A high intelligence doesn't inoculate someone from being wrong, and especially when determination of "wrong" is made based on subjective moral judgment rather than anything objective, as is common in politics and philosophical fields (like macroeconomics or military science) and opposed to something more basic like chemistry or physics, or applied science trades like engineering and medicine. If anything, it's likely to make them more wrong, because they'll be able to rationalize their positions and entrench themselves in being wrong, and defend themselves very articulately and lucidly.
A high intelligence also makes it easier for someone to understand complex problems (higher g), to weigh the advantages and disadvantages of potential solutions offered by advisors, and make decisions based on the knowledge offered by other people. Further, education in logic and rhetoric as a lawyer is far more applicable to the job than education in a specific knowledge domain like high energy physics or neuroeconomics.
Foo Fighter said:
One who is pining for a fleet of General Dynamics heavies in the form of Scout-SV and "M1A2UK". They've already started using alliterative names. Ajax, Ares, Atlas, Apollo, Athena, Argus, Agamemnom? Achilles?
Even if they don't pine for the M1, it's a good move for Britain to not develop tanks in the future from the standpoint of continued economic growth. Britain's post-industrial service economy produces more money and income for the population compared to an older industrial economy, and directly benefits like 90% of the population with increased wages. It's a trend that can be seen throughout history in most societies that base their economies on consumer demand (as opposed to something like state demand), which is most/all developed economies, and some developing ones.
Developing tanks would require rebuilding an industry that no longer really exists. Between the privatizations of neo-liberalism and the defense consolidation of industries, a lot of institutional knowledge that once existed has been lost. While it could be re-created, it would require re-learning things about tanks that is no longer understood collectively, and probably take a lot of years and millions or billions of pounds of investment.
It would just be cheaper, faster, and just as good to buy surplus American M1A1s with modern ammunition (M829A3 or -A4 would be a good replacement for L27 anyway) when Challenger 2 runs out. The money not expended on rebuilding British tank industry could be used to acquire additional American-made arms, like F-35 (which is like 30% British) and P-8 Poseidon to fill the VLO and MPA gaps. In the future, something like C8 or C7 for when L85 gets too long in the tooth, etc.
Sure, you get less things than you would if you were industrially self-reliant, but self-reliance requires maintenance and orders made regularly, even in excess of requirement. Further, you can buy things off market and be almost assured of receiving a useful quantity of product, because the products are already developed and exist. A new UK tank would require the growing pains of development, assuming it even made it to production and didn't turn into the land equivalent of MRA.4 or Future Combat Systems.
The UK isn't politically willing to sacrifice its pensions or NHS budget in favour of tank factories, or gun factories in general. Why should it when the United States can spend all that money for it and it can reap the profit of American investment? The Americans aren't going to stop selling guns to Britain because they want to give the contractors money or something anyway.
Anyway, BAE can restart L27 production if it needs to. The machinery allegedly still exists, probably covered in plastic and grease in a locked and guarded warehouse. CHARM 3 is really old, though, and M829A4 exists, so why would bother? Unless Russia decides to import nothing but the finest T-72s from the Third World, instead of buying/making T-90s or T-14s, L27 isn't going to be hugely useful against the latest ultra-modern tanks.
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Thanks for those references. They go quite a way towards contradicting the "out of someone's *ss" suspicion.
Still. These articles have two interesting points:
- they judge admission into a top school as "proof of intelligence", with no mention whatsoever of the wealth of the parents of that student.
In the US system? Hrmm.
- they consider journalists as part of top intelligent people.
On my side, no need for further comment.
Now in my book there is one simple denial of any supposed intellectual superiority of congresspeople: just see how many of them are corrupt, how many get caught, and how stoopid was their scheme. 'nuf said.
Not even mentioning the egotistical and counter-public-interest side of the legislations they enact. 'nother whole can of worms, which really reflect on the whole lot of them.
Psy-PHD writing articles can make interesting smoke and mirrors, but the proof is very much in the pudding itself: how they behave, what they produce.
Yuck, unfortunately.
Still. These articles have two interesting points:
- they judge admission into a top school as "proof of intelligence", with no mention whatsoever of the wealth of the parents of that student.
In the US system? Hrmm.
- they consider journalists as part of top intelligent people.
On my side, no need for further comment.
Now in my book there is one simple denial of any supposed intellectual superiority of congresspeople: just see how many of them are corrupt, how many get caught, and how stoopid was their scheme. 'nuf said.
Not even mentioning the egotistical and counter-public-interest side of the legislations they enact. 'nother whole can of worms, which really reflect on the whole lot of them.
Psy-PHD writing articles can make interesting smoke and mirrors, but the proof is very much in the pudding itself: how they behave, what they produce.
Yuck, unfortunately.
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And the history of "The Smartest People in the Room" being part of or latching onto the most ridiculous and destruction political ideologies can fill a library. No high IQ in and of itself does not impress me. Don't sociopaths and psychopaths generally have high IQ's? Look at the political dysfunction around the world these are the smartest people? The problem is the 'smart' people tend to want to rule the rest of us and think they know better than we do to run our own lives.dan_inbox said:
moonbeamsts
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I thought this part of the forum was M-1 tank replacement,not congress/ generals IQ or best education!
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