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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: tejek who wrote (604654)	3/22/2011 1:42:44 PM
From: longnshort	Respond to of 1575191

OBAMA OBAMA OBAMA

To: tejek who wrote (604654)	3/22/2011 2:08:30 PM
From: Bill	1 Recommendation Respond to of 1575191

Who sent those planes up?

To: tejek who wrote (604654)	3/22/2011 3:30:37 PM
From: bentway	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1575191

That F-15e might have been 30 years old!

To: tejek who wrote (604654)	3/22/2011 6:03:08 PM
From: TimF	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1575191

Complex systems fail. Fighter jets are put under a lot more stress (even in non-combat flying) than airliners. Even flying straight, level, and slow, they would be less reliable since there are tradeoffs in design and the fighters tilt more to performance and less to safety and reliability (which is not to say that the later are ignored, they get a lot of attention but you can't avoid tradeoffs even when your spending as much as a modern fighter costs). Also a lot of American fighters are old. Not as old as B-52s or many of our tanker planes, but fighters are stressed more than the larger planes. With proper maintenance they should still work, but older planes are still more likely to crash than new planes (except maybe brand new planes, and esp. brand new designs). We could try to make sure that none of our fighter planes are over 20 years old, but that would be expensive, we simply are not going to spend that much more on fighter acquisition. Also this is one crash. Its hardly surprising. We had mechanical failures leading to crashes in every war since aircraft where introduced to the military in WWI. This (depending on how you define the term) might not be called a war, or at least is a very small one at this point, but many small applications of force also had cases of mechanical failure leading to aircraft crashes. Its normal. It would not surprise me if it happens to another US or allied aircraft or more than one, before this is over, unless its somehow wrapped up very soon. Its sort of a "dog bites man" story. Which is not to say that there is definitely no story here, I don't know the details of this particular case. Its possible there was some cutting corners that went beyond the norm, or something else that could be an issue. Without a lot more information I just can't know for sure. Similarly when a dog bites someone, it might be part of some larger story involving some sort of malfeasance. But if all you know is that a dog bit someone, you wouldn't naturally assume there is some big crime behind it. Similarly, I wouldn't assume there is something horribly wrong in this case.

To: tejek who wrote (604654)	3/22/2011 6:28:05 PM
From: Brumar89	Respond to of 1575191

O doesn't want it out that a plane he sent into combat was shot down - Mechanical failure is cover story. $#!+ Just Got Real Posted by Jay Tea Published: March 22, 2011 - 6:00 PM This morning, it was announced that an American F-15 had gone down in Libya. However, the Pentagon reported it was mechanical failure, not enemy fire -- and the two crew were recovered safely by a V-22 Osprey. Now, I'm a bit of a military buff, so I'm going to get a bit geeky here and extrapolate like hell from what little information is available. The F-15 was originally a single-seat fighter. There are three variants that have a crew of two. The F-15B and F-15D are trainers, and therefore quite unlikely to be used in combat. But the F-15E is the "Strike Eagle" model, designed to fight its way through enemy defenses, attack targets on the ground, and then fight its way back out. So, in all likelihood, it was a Strike Eagle that went down. But what does that mean? It means that we sent a plane into Libyan airspace with the purpose of attacking ground targets. More specifically, with the purpose of destroying vehicles, buildings, and killing people. That, folks, is an act of war. So far, Obama's had a relatively easy war. All the casualties have been on the Libyan side. That came very, very close to changing last night. Two American pilots went down in a hostile nation. One managed to escape, but another was taken by Libyans -- fortunately, rebels who were glad to see an American and helped him get rescued as well. Rescued by a V-22 Osprey, which was crewed by four Marines. Which put four more American lives at risk. No Americans have been killed thus far, and no one apparently injured. But it could happen. Because that's what happens in war. And make no mistake -- we are at war. So far, President Obama has been insulated from that particular burden of office. Yes, came into office with two wars going on, in Afghanistan and Iraq, but he was distanced from them -- he "inherited Bush's wars." This time, though, it's all on him -- and ordering American service members into harm's way, knowing that you very well might be ordering them to their deaths, is one of the most stressful things a president does. Never in his life has President Obama faced anything even close to this level of responsibility. Until his election, he'd never held any kind of ledership or executive position, let alone where he holds the literal power of life and death over so many. For all our sakes, I hope he finds the strength to succeed in this. I just wish I had more reason to be optimistic. wizbangblog.com