Current US Military

[Smitty-48]

Well, if you're so spooked by substitute drama teachers, probably everybody seems like a terrorist to Americans, who knew?

For a nation who fancies yourselves to be tough guys, you sho do cower from a lot of bogeyman, what's up with that?

[Speaker to Animals]

Best to shoot first and let the legal system give us a free pass. SOP.

[Smitty-48]

Come and take this Maple Leaf from my cold dead hands, Hoss.

[Speaker to Animals]

We'll keep it safe just like the Stanley Cup.

[Smitty-48]

Captain Sidney Crosby and President Mario Lemieux are welcome to their stewardship of the Dominion Hockey Trophy, enjoy.

Hold that Maple Leaf high in America, ambassadors of the Crown, we salute you.

[Okeefenokee]

I was on a c-130 getting ready to take off once, and the crew made all of us get out of the plane and stand on the edge of the runway.

One guy climbed on top of the wing and jumped up and down on it for a minute until another crew gave him a thumbs up.

Then they told us we could get back on. We were not an encouraged bunch.

[Speaker to Animals]

I was on a c-130 getting ready to take off once, and the crew made all of us get out of the plane and stand on the edge of the runway.

One guy climbed on top of the wing and jumped up and down on it for a minute until another crew gave him a thumbs up.

Then they told us we could get back on. We were not an encouraged bunch.

LOL, wtf?

Did the engine on that plane not start? Could have been a fuel transfer issue. I am not familiar with those aircraft in a maintenance context, but I doubt there is anything out on that wing other than fuel tanks (with probes), fuel lines, engine and flight control.

If it was a flight control thing, I doubt they'd have taken the plane unless it was an emergency. More likely a fuel probe was stuck, or it was a fuel line or something minor.

Also, there's a good chance they were fucking with you. It's kind of what we do in the Air Force.

[Okeefenokee]

I was on a c-130 getting ready to take off once, and the crew made all of us get out of the plane and stand on the edge of the runway.

One guy climbed on top of the wing and jumped up and down on it for a minute until another crew gave him a thumbs up.

Then they told us we could get back on. We were not an encouraged bunch.

LOL, wtf?

Did the engine on that plane not start? Could have been a fuel transfer issue. I am not familiar with those aircraft in a maintenance context, but I doubt there is anything out on that wing other than fuel tanks (with probes), fuel lines, engine and flight control.

If it was a flight control thing, I doubt they'd have taken the plane unless it was an emergency. More likely a fuel probe was stuck, or it was a fuel line or something minor.

Also, there's a good chance they were fucking with you. It's kind of what we do in the Air Force.

Before they made us get off there was a weird thing where the engines would spin up, and then back down. They did it several times, and I remember noticing it wasn't normal. So yeah, maybe a fuel issue.

[Okeefenokee]

After almost a decade of reporting on the Army’s crucial networks, I’d thought they’d started to get things right. Boy, was I wrong.

At a hearing this afternoon of the House Armed Services air and land subcommittee, the Army left lawmakers shaking their heads when they announced they plan to shut down the controversial WIN-T program — except they aren’t really shutting it down: They’re going to keep buying it for a year. They’re also planning to buy other hardware and software that’s not 10 years out of date, as much of the current network equipment is.

These decisions are all products of the sweeping review that Chief of Staff Gen. Mark Milley ordered of all the services’ networks, not just WIN-T. Milley sees the current systems as too vulnerable to jamming and hacking, too big a target for artillery, and too immobile for rapid maneuver. Those are tolerable weaknesses against the low-tech Taliban or Islamic State, but crippling in a high-intensity war against Russia or China. Milley faces the risk that, in the next war, the US Army’s communications will get shut down — as the Ukrainian Army’s networks were in 2014, paralyzing them against the Russian invasion.

WIN-T is heavy and took– on average– 40 to 50 hours to get equipment up on air at 16 National Training Center exercises, Crawford said. That’s not exactly the speedy, mobile, adaptable system you’d need on a modern battlefield against, say, the Russians, who can spot a target with drones and have artillery rockets inbound in minutes.

https://breakingdefense.com/2017/09/arm ... e-network/

[K@th]

So they are doing training here with black hawks this week. Every night, starting around 8:00 and going until 11~ish, we hear them. On the first night, we thought there was some sort of man hunt going on. I guess a lot of people were calling and complaining, because there was a story in the paper on Tuesday.

On Tuesday, they were flying in a pattern that goes right over our house, so every 10 minutes or so, the whole house would start shaking. Last night we only heard them about every half hour.

Very cool. We have the windows open this week because it's cold, so it's extra loud. Really loud. They are flying pretty low.