Nice, very nice!

The Germans have bought a winner… (unlike the US Army).

Well, the article DOES mention the USMC Harriers… more than one time.

My biggest problem, however, is with the statement “because they can only carry eight troops at a time, a third of the Osprey’s capacity”!! 😮

from:
http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/ac/ch-46.htm
“14 troops with aerial gunners”…

from:
http://www.navalhelicopterassn.org/helo%20page/ch46.htm
“Payload:
Combat: max. of 22 troops and two aerial gunners
Medical evacuation: 15 litters, two attendants”.

Someone is exaggerating things to support a point of view that, to me, needs no such distortions to be valid. 🙁

The speed & range improvements alone justify the aircraft… but it was designed to have the same troop and cargo capacity as the CH-46.

“Just how will the targeting be easier with a low viz dark badge painted in RAM paint??? Or was this an attempt to be funny???”

The nice, white circle in the middle of the dark underbelly?

Not very low-viz, even if it is small!

“Aircraft is definitely there and looks intact, although partially buried in the sand.”

But just which Bf-110, and exactly where, and when were those pics taken, and were they taken from a documentary or video made by someone else to add credibility to the scam?
:rolleyes:

“as for the lasers, had no idea they were coded!!!! how can you code a simple wavelength of light? interesting”

As GarryB said, frequency shifts for contineous-emission type lasers, and pulse-coding for pulse-emission types.

Most (if not all) military lasers are of the pulse-coded type, for the simple reason that pulse lasers put out a more powerful “beam” for the same weight and power input of a CW type. (100 watts in for a 35% “on” output cycle as opposed to a 100 watt input to a 100% output cycle means the pulse laser output is at least twice the strength).

The higher power output means a longer effective range and a better ability to work through haze, smog, dust, and water (fog/rain/clouds).

It is also much easier to build a codeable (variable gaps between pulses) pulse laser than it is to build a variable-frequency laser.

And I should know, I performed intermediate-level maintenance & repair on the AN/AAS-33A Laser/FLIR system on USMC A-6E Intruders from 1982-1989!

Lots of firings of the laser on my test bench.

Somewhere I have seen that, between selling them off, robbing them of major parts (like wing sections, etc.), and corrosion, etc. from being in storage, there are only about 18 S-2 airframes left in AMARC which could reasonably be reactivated for carrier service.

There are, on the other hand, lots of fresh, newly retired S-3s… which could be fitted with a much lighter radar (like the Ericsson PS-890 Erieye phased array radar?).

However, is it in any way legal to attack the shipping of a neutral nation, that is nowhere near the combat area, and which is not involving itself in any way with either belligerant nation? 😡

Note (from the legal brief):
“Respondent United Carriers, Inc., a Liberian corporation, chartered one of its oil tankers, the Hercules, to respondent Amerada Hess Shipping Corporation, also a Liberian corporation. The contract was executed in New York City. Amerada Hess used the Hercules to transport crude oil from the southern terminus of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline in Valdez, Alaska, around Cape Horn in South America, to the Hess refinery in the United States Virgin Islands. On May 25, 1982, the Hercules began a return voyage, without cargo but fully fueled, from the Virgin Islands to Alaska. At that time, Great Britain and petitioner Argentine Republic were at war over an archipelago of some 200 islands – the Falkland Islands to the British, and the Islas Malvinas to the Argentineans – in the South Atlantic off the Argentine coast. On June 3, United States officials informed the two belligerents of the location of United States vessels and Liberian tankers owned by United States interests then traversing the South Atlantic, including the Hercules, to avoid any attacks on neutral shipping.”

Or does being at war entitle Argentina to sink any ship of any nation they want, anywhere it might be, if they can reach it? 😡

At least the Belgrano was a warship of one of the belligerant nations!