heeroyui, I can not than you enough for the pictures of the Metorit, I have always loved that missile. So Russian, very fast very big, it even looks gorgeous, thankyou again!!!

There was also a submarine that was rebuilt to carry twelve of those missiles, I dont have the information with me at the moment but il remind myself later and post some pics if I can.

I was including the USAAF raids over japan in my statement, I was simply trying to point out that with the exception of WW2 the west in general has been very civilised in its conduct during war.

Generally in their conduct of wars the US is very good. There will always be exceptions, such as Abu Ghraib or the Mai Lai massacre but these can usually be attributed to the faliure of command structures or simply poor behaviour of troops under stress. Very rarely does one see a policy decision taken that includes ‘barbaric acts’. On the other hand if you look at conduct during the second world war, most notably the RAF’s systematic destruction of German Citys, the Wermacht and SS conduct on the eastern front etc etc, of course that was a conflict very different in magnitude to the ones we have seen since 1945, but the point is that the US is actually very restrained in its use of violence when one considers what it has the potential to do.

The way I see it if the Islamic world wants a Holy war simply becouse the west is sufficiently civilised to develop democratic systems of government, high standards of living, equality for all, and an understanding that religion is simply a form of ignorance, then let them get on with it. But the terrorists and all those who support them need to realise that the people they are fighting have the ability to make the middle east dissapear in a matter of minutes.

I have occasionaly wondered what would happen if the US and its allies adopted a policy of massive retaliation, for instance, suicide bombers blow up a train in the US and a Trident is fired at a major Islamic city. A roadside bomb kills an American soldier in Iraq, so the entire population of the nearest village is slaugtered. Obviously Highly unpopular Internationally but I could see it having an impact.

My instinct says that the first one is probably Russian, the pod behind the first one looks similar to sapsan, as used by the Su-30MK2.

I was under the impression that an Il-76 based Phalcon would have one large bulge forward and one aft, similar to the 707, rather than a dish?