Regime forces retake a village of Atshan from al-Nusra. It seems important to control the main road towards north (and Aleppo).

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/10/10/us-mideast-crisis-syria-idUSKCN0S40DF20151010

Well the exit strategy is certainly easier than Afghanistan or Iraq since there is already a standing government. However, when you attempt to replace a standing government with a vacuum then you have a problem with exit strategy and usually leave a mess behind when you do.

Standing on its last legs, to be more precise, as this was directly the reason for Russians to intervene. That didn’t stop the Russians to exit Afghanistan before, nor e.g. the US to exit Vietnam (leaving the local friendly regimes hung out to dry), but packing up so soon might be end up as a fiasco for Putin without at least bringing them to a diplomatic table with the rebels as something to show for.

The decision to send Mi-24s as opposed to Ka-52s does defy understanding however. Similarly an air intervention without giving the SAA force-multipliers for their offensive ground operations (anything from portable thermals + optical dazzlers to a few dozen urban kitted T-72Bs) is just pointless. Overall, it is a weird strategy.

Definitely. Seeing those rebel TOW’s plinking off outdated Syrian tanks and paper thin IFV’s with little to no chance of resisting the hits (I didn’t spot any T-72AV’s which might stand a chance, but I’m assuming they’re using some later TOW missile variants, like TOW-2 or I-TOW at least) and spotting the launchers (without modern optics with thermal sights) AND no support helicopters capable of doing the same (i.e. using the obsolete Mi-24P’s) makes one wonder how the Russians think this half-hearted effort will do something here.

Most of what you’re saying makes sense to me, but I can’t help but think that the G. W. Bush Administration (among other key players) behaved in a questionable manner before (and during) the 2003 invasion. AFAIK, there was some “informed” opposition / warnings from former US national security advisers and military officers, academics etc., not to mention some Allied intelligence services, raising concerns about the reliability of some of the intelligence (i.e. “Curveball”), the uncertainty surrounding potential consequences of a large-scale invasion and occupation and so on. I think it’s fair to ask how reliable the Administration’s decision-making cycle really was given the information they had access to at the time.

That’s certainly true since some neocon members of the administration had a long standing agenda to “fix” the Middle East (to avoid the oil price crisis from happening again and again with various wars) so when they finally found themselves in position of power and had an open checkbook after 9/11 if was not unexpected that they would be (intentionally or not) rather biased and thus cherry picking those few intelligence reports which confirmed what they believed in (most of it based on some Iraqi defector’s statements IIRC). Arguably, Iraq was already on its knees by then under those severe sanctions (which ended up hurting the civilians and not the regime), but the people placed in running the post-war Iraq were not up to the task to say the least – dismantling the whole army and security services so quickly into the occupation (as part of the de-Ba’athification process) and putting the questionable Iraqis in charge without some longer carefully observed transitional period thus relaying only on much too few US and British occupational (I emphasize this as their mere presence was easily used or abused to stoke unrest) troops on the ground to maintain any semblance of order turned out to be a recipe for disaster.

Certainly it beggars belief how people in charge could make such biased and ill-informed decisions and thus leads people to suspect much more sinister ulterior motives (like creating chaos), but before we dwell further into OT, I’d just advise on reading more on e.g. the events leading up to and during WWI regarding British policies on the Middle East to see how prejudiced and uninformed the decision makers were and how government decision making process leaves a lot to be desired (e.g. you’ve had numerous government offices competing for their interests and views being put upfront, like e.g. the India office, the Cairo office, the Foreign office, etc.), plus the competition between allied and enemy countries for various interests leading to such conflicting issues such as promising Arab territory both to the French and to some Arab leaders, promising Zionists to help them create their state in Palestine, the occupation and attempted carve up of Turkey’s mainland of today, etc. Perhaps it wouldn’t be too far off the mark to say that the prejudice, arrogance and incompetence of people in charge are more often a rule rather than exception.

wasn’t that the reason the canards were added? to compensate for the heavy nose?

I seem to remember that being the story for the canards on the Su-27M, which had a rather heavy radar due to obsolete tech state of the Russian electronics of the time IIRC. It was removed on the Su-35S, but of course, it has vectored thrust to offset it.

It would seem to make sense to have the canards fitted on the Su-34 to provide additional lift for the heavier frontal part to keep the plane level compared to a more draggy solution of trimming via horizontal tail surfaces only. For the Su-35S the canards probably provide too much drag at high supersonic speeds, but the Su-34 with it’s fixed inlets obviously isn’t bothered by that. The Su-30 variants might be, but I guess it’s still less draggy than the before mentioned trimming via horizontal tail surfaces.

It would be great if someone more “in the know” could chime in.

The long sting might be for CG

This is what I was aiming at with my question as perhaps the earlier prototypes had heavier electronics and thus the stinger had to be longer, but without in-depth knowledge of aerodynamics or the changes in the internal equipment (especially in the nose and the protruding part of the stinger), it’s probably pretty silly reasoning as it seems as a somewhat crude solution.

Now, can you point out to me what “EXACTLY” we missed?

The situation is more complex than just “these people are primitive and need a strongman”. I’ll try again. Iraq and Syria were artificially created by Britain and France (along with most of the countries in the area you mention) in this case putting different ethnic and religious groups together and placing one group to dominate the others. Due to the lack of developed social and democratic culture (as being occupied by the Turks and then the West didn’t give them time to sort out their differences and split up or learn to share power), these divided “nations” operate on a “winner takes all” basis. These two dictators came to power at times of secular Arab nationalism mixed with marxism ideology which helped their minorities to justify/legalize their hold on power over other groups (e.g. both came from religious minority groups which constitute no more than 20-25% of the population). These ideologies died off as they failed to solve the economical and political issues, leaving these archaic regimes in power maintained by force with rising Islamist movements as a reaction to them (Sunni in Syria and Shia in Iraq). These various groups fear being dominated by others so democracy cannot really work without strong safeguards for the major minority groups there as it’s benefits are only appreciated by those with advantage in numbers (e.g. Maliki in Iraq was elected to power and gradually started replacing all Sunni and Kurdish ministers from power and turning to Iran which in turn made possible for ISIS to come back to Iraq and seize power with insignificant forces). So, after being subdued for so long by force, the religious/ethnic identities overpowered the weak national ones rather quickly as crisis struck which is an expected human self-preservation reaction additionally stoked by politicians/religious leaders to grab a hold of power. You cannot overstate enough the fact how this is all happening in context of a wider rising Shia-Sunni conflict with Iran and Saudi Arabia at the helm and the mixed countries such as Iraq and Syria are being the battleground. Add to that that even inside religious and ethnic groups you have unresolved conflicts between modernism and religion, socio-economic classes, political ideologies, the tribal mentality you mention present in the countryside, etc. further complicating matters.

So, US intervention did finally remove Saddam from power, but Iranian Islamic regime has been trying to do that for decades stirring Shia rebellions through the Dawa party (leading directly to the Iran-Iraq war) and the Kurds were constantly rebelling against the Baathist regime as well. The fear of the regime was basically the only thing holding the country together. On the other hand, US (being burned by the Iraq experience) played an insignificant role in Syrian uprising (compared to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey which have much more interest in removing the Alawite regime from power) and you still have a major civil war there. The regime lasted this long only because it cleverly played the Islamist card in the early stages rebellion (helped also by the US staying idle and the Gulf countries and Turkey providing help to Islamist groups) and thus gaining support from most of the minorities and Sunni moderates as well. The bottom line is, these countries were ill-created and forcefully maintained and the check is due for payment as part of a wider conflict in the region. With the external forces running the game, it might take a while before some deal is reached on the ground.

Regarding the Russian intervention, since the SAA seems unable to partake in offensive operations anymore and supposing that the Russians won’t go all in, at best they can perhaps force the non-ISIS rebel groups to a negotiating table, but at worst, they might just prolong the inevitable and directly and indirectly help ISIS defeat the other groups or weaken them enough that they get absorbed by ISIS, thus making matters even worse than they were (except perhaps for the regime which was actively working on such an outcome).

APU. landing shute. Flare/chaff cartridge. And lots of fuel. I’m not so sure about electronic. .

I’ve read speculations about some defensive systems, as there does seem to be some radome at the tip. The APU is also supposedly a much larger unit than on the other Flankers.

What I’m curios about is why the stinger was so protruding by design in the first place – it used to have been even longer on the prototypes IIRC. Was there a need to offset the extra weight in the forward part?

12.7mm has lousy range. They ultimately compromised on the twin 23mm on the Mi-35.

Nitpicking, but they installed those on Mi-24VP’s in the late 80’s and then much later on the export Mi-35M’s. The Mi-35 is the export variant of the old Mi-24V.