HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: chip@tct.com (Chip Salzenberg)
Subject: Re: How good is the Mig29 vs F16/F18 ?
Organization: TC Telemanagement, Clearwater, FL
Date: Tue, 6 Oct 1992 23:35:53 GMT


From chip@tct.com (Chip Salzenberg)

According to fcrary@ucsu.Colorado.EDU (Frank Crary):
>The question is, does the American technological edge amount to more
>than ten years of research and development? Apparently it doesn't.

In any case, the airframe is only part of the story.  The avionics
(especially the programming) in F-16s and F18s of today is greatly
improved in comparison to original designs, and I'd be hard pressed to
believe that the ex-S.U. comes close to the U.S. in that department.
-- 
Chip Salzenberg at Teltronics/TCT  <chip@tct.com>, <73717.366@compuserve.com>
    "My favorite phenomenon is when someone mails me or posts to this
     group, either calling me a newbie or telling me that my postings
     are not relevant to alt.non.sequitur."           -- Matt Welsh
From: ppugliese@pimacc.pima.edu
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: More info concerning FUSSR CVs
Date: 15 Oct 92 16:39:05 GMT
Organization: NCR Corporation -- Law Department


From ppugliese@pimacc.pima.edu

Just to add a little more confusion to the issue of FUSSR CVs,
I just received my copy of the IISS's Military Balance 92-93.

On p91 there is the following text;

	"The KUZNETSOV carrier, commissioned in late '90, was trans-
ferred from the Black Sea Fleet to the Northern Fleet in Dec. '91.
The carrier KIEV has been prematurely retired from the Pacific Fleet 
& a 2nd carrier of the class is in long refit. Two large carriers are
under construction in the Nikolayev South shipyard in Ukraine. It ap-
pears that work on fitting out the VARYAG (launched in late '88) has
been suspended awaiting funds from a foreign sale; work on the larger
ULYANOVSK (laid down in '88) has stopped & dismantling has commenced.
All Yak-38 V/STOL a/c have been withdrawn from service, leaving the
KUZNETSOV as the only carrier capable of operating fixed-wing a/c."

How to reconcile the with the recent statement from a Ukrainian gov.
official stating that there is yet another a/c carrier that will be
put up for sale is beyond me, unless he was referring to the VARYAG,
that is.

PHIL
From: dasher!patter@uunet.UU.NET (24224-guthrie)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: Bofors 40mm AA in WW2
Date: 12 Oct 92 16:32:39 GMT
Organization: Bellcore, Livingston, NJ


From dasher!patter@uunet.UU.NET (24224-guthrie)

In article <BvytKF.rp@law7.DaytonOH.NCR.COM> anthony@cs.uq.oz.au (Anthony Lee) writes:
>
>The German 37mm anti-tank gun was used widely in early part of the war.
>Were they scrapped in favour of bigger calibre ?

Not exactly, but they were increasingly replaced with the 88mm as the
Allied tanks grew larger and more heavily armoured. A Sergeant Schmidt,
who fought in North Africa, stated that when the British brought out the
Matilda tank, the Afrika Korps was forced to begin using the 88mm FLAK
gun (anti-aircraft) as a PAK gun, and to reduce the range at which they
opened fire to 6,000 meters. The 37mm, (light PAK) was much more easily
deployed than the 88 (which weighed something like two tons), and stayed
in action. It was highly effective against something like a Stuart, for
example.

patter@dasher.cc.bellcore.com
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
                    |
George Patterson -  | I'd rather fight an entire army than battle an
                    | idle rumor.
                    |              Major General Smedley Butler
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: sci.military
From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Subject: Re: Neutral particle beams (was Re: Russia's OPERATIONAL Star Wars Defense System)
Organization: Computer Science Department University of Rochester
Date: Tue, 6 Oct 1992 23:39:24 GMT


From dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)

In article <BvnF7G.JF7@lawday.DaytonOH.NCR.COM> d89-jsp@nada.kth.se (Arthur Sparrendahl) writes:

> There has been a lot of talk about *neutron* beams for industrial
> use lately. How are they accelerated? I didn't actually understand 
> the process but I think they accelerasted protons and passed the
> proton beam through a beryllium foil. Anyone know anything about
> this?

This is a different matter entirely.  The protons react with beryllium
nuclei, causing emission of neutrons.  It is a quite inefficient
process (most of the protons stop without undergoing nuclear reactors,
unless they are very energetic), and the neutrons come spraying out
with a large spread of tranverse momentum: not useful as a beam
weapon.

	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu

Newsgroups: sci.military
From:     Will Martin <wmartin@stl-06sima.army.mil>
Subject:  Re:  Release of Tactical Nukes
Organization: NCR Corporation -- Law Department
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1992 16:39:15 GMT


From     Will Martin <wmartin@stl-06sima.army.mil>

>From whitman@nssdca.gsfc.nasa.gov (Rusty Whitman)
>I've been trying to determine what happened to the tactical
>nuclear weapons in the former USSR.  There is a good accounting
>of the strategic weapons but hardly a mention of the tactical 
>weapons.   This, combined with the unrest at several military
>bases makes me wonder who has control of the tactical nukes, and
>if one were to get "loose", whether it would be immediately usable.
>I assume the Soviets would have put safeguards on their tactical 
>nuclear weapons similar to whatever the U.S. has implemented.

Hi!
I don't know who is going to see this -- the last sci.military mailed
Digest was over a week ago, and it had contents that seemed to date
from a week before, and I'm now just catching up on it myself... So
this may have already been discussed to death. If so, sorry...

Anyway, I happened to be tuning around on the TV a month or two ago and
ran into a guy discussing this specific issue on the religious
broadcasting network TBN.  The man's name was Grant Jeffries, and he
has written at least one book that treats this exact subject.
Unfortunately, I cannot give you a book title. I don't know if it would
be listed in Books in Print under his name, or if they do not include
these religious-group publishers.

He was saying that he had specific information from trustworthy sources
in the Israeli military that Iran had gotten at least three former-USSR
tac nukes. Now, a lot of these sorts of folks, who view the events of
history in the light of Biblical prophecy, are widely denigrated and
ignored by the "mainstream" media and their views are discounted. But
they may have sources that "secular" researchers cannot reach. So what
they say may be true and may be false, but it should be evaluated
objectively and not dismissed out-of-hand.

So if you can find his book(s), you may find some worthwhile info
therein. Or maybe it will be nonsense. But it is a source worth
investigating.

(Unfortunately, I have never run across anything else nearly as
interesting anytime I  tune in TBN since that one incident! Sad that
they waste all that broadcast time when they could be presenting their
messages in the context of this sort of alternative news service and
discussions...)

Regards, Will
wmartin@st-louis-emh2.army.mil OR wmartin@stl-06sima.army.mil
From: apiary!busht@uunet.uu.net (Terry Bush 3443)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: Performance of Greek armour against Persian arrows.
Summary: Some contradictory references
Keywords: archery, long bow
Date: 15 Oct 92 16:35:41 GMT
Followup-To: sci.military
Organization: SEMATECH, Austin, Texas


From Terry Bush 3443 <apiary!busht@uunet.uu.net>

"The Book of the Long Bow," pg 49-101 would seem to contradict the
earlier post. The English long bow at a 100 pound draw was capable
of piercing plate armor at 100 yards.  Battles at Crecy, Poitiers,
and Agincourt are cited as examples. "Early Bow Design and Construction"
by McEwen, Miller and Bergman in Scientific American June 1991 says
that the English long bow was technologically unsophisticated compared
to the Japanese and Egyptian bows of a much earlier era.  The finest bows
were the Turkish recurves. The Ok Meydan has marble pillars marking
memorable arrow flights.  The longest is 972 yards and the shortest is
625 yards. The modern flight record is 768 yards and was set with a foot bow.
Most modern compound bows are inferior to the Turkish recurve of antiquity.
See "The Bow" by Rausing. The draw on some Turkish war bows approached 
500 pounds.

Armed armies of archers of Turkey, India, Mongolia, Japan, and China
defeated Germanic and Slavic armies armed with early muskets and rifles.
Given that archery's pre-modern technology reached its zenith in Asia,
it seems quite likely a Persian arrow could pierce bronze armor. 
Newsgroups: sci.military
From: "Charles K. Scott" <Charles.K.Scott@dartmouth.edu>
Subject: Re: Opinion on Japan being "forced" to attack
Organization: Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1992 15:25:57 GMT


From "Charles K. Scott" <Charles.K.Scott@dartmouth.edu>


From "Charles K. Scott" <Charles.K.Scott@dartmouth.edu>

In article <Bw0oGK.L9I@law7.DaytonOH.NCR.COM>
jaskew@spam.maths.adelaide.edu.au (Joseph Askew) writes:

> With all due respect to the writer of this, the *only* reason Japan entered
> the Second World War was because the Americans forced them to.

Sigh.  I'm reluctant to agree with this for several reasons. 1. There
is seldom a time in history when one and only one reason can be pointed
to as THE reason an event occurred, especially an event that
precipitates a country's entry into global conflict. 2. The Japanese
had been rattling sabers and issuing racist political retoric for
almost a decade by the time they attacked Pearl Harbor.  The surprise
wasn't that they attacked, but that they attacked there.  3. The
Japanese at that time were extremely xenophobic, distrusting all non
asian countries and claiming that their culture was divinely ordained
to rule Asia, it didn't seem to matter that these other country's
didn't think so. Japan felt it was her right to bring all nearby
cultures under their rule.  Korea is still smarting from Japanese
domination more than 50 years later.  4. Japan invaded China in almost
the same fashion that Iraq invaded Kuwait.  World reaction was more
subdued at that time than today because the Chinese and Japanese were
considered "slants" and "gooks" and weren't worth worrying about (the
attitude of the day).  Unfortunately for the Japanese, others did worry
about the invasion and subsequent atrocities perpetuated against the
Chinese which led to US sanctions against Japan in an effort to get
them to withdraw from China.  Japan refused, claiming that the
conquered area should stay within Japanese rule.  5. The Japanese
Government at the time in question was so thouroughly militeristic that
several cabinets were formed and failed because the military didn't
have the people in power it desired.  With the military in control,
only military solutions for questions of economic future were
considered.

Under the circumstances, it hardly seems proper to blame United States
as the sole antagonist.

Corky Scott

Newsgroups: sci.military,soc.history
From: military@att.att.com (Bill Thacker)
Subject: 50 Years Ago: Tuesday, 6 October, 1942
Followup-To: soc.history
Organization: NCR Corporation -- Law Department
Date: Tue, 6 Oct 1992 23:27:46 GMT


From military@att.att.com (Bill Thacker)

Tuesday, 6 October, 1942

The United States and the Soviet Union conclude a further Lend-Lease
agreement, by which the USA is to deliver 4.4 million tons of supplies by
July, 1943.

Germany's Army Group A captures Malgobek in the Caucasus.  The city was an
important Soviet oil center.  

Josef Terboven, Germany's Reichs Commissar for Norway, declares a state of
emergency in the Trondheim and executes 25 Norwegions for acts of sabotage.

The Italian submarine Barbarigo reports the sinking of an American Idaho-
class battleship off the African coast.  In fact, the victim is a merchant
ship.

The RAF stages a night bombing raid on Osnabrueck.

--	--	--	--	--	--	--	--	--
Bill Thacker			            military@att.att.com
Send submissions for "50 Years Ago" to military-request@att.att.com

"In addition to the many functions which the fleet air arm performs, the
naval dive bomber has one in particular.  It extends the gun range of the
fleet by the use of the bomb and, like our gunnery, its function is to
land the first salvo on the enemy decks." - Admiral William V. Pratt,
US Navy, Retired
Newsgroups: sci.military
From: 	Nick Zentena <zen@hophead.canrem.com>
Subject: References to Normandy?
Organization: The Hop Head Saloon
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1992 15:25:49 GMT


From 	Nick Zentena <zen@hophead.canrem.com>


From 	Nick Zentena <zen@hophead.canrem.com>

Hi,
        Could someone please directed me to any good
        references on the invasion of Normandy?
        e-mail would likely be best.
        Thanks
        Nick

*****************************************************************************
I drink Beer I don't collect cute bottles!
zen%hophead@canrem.com
*****************************************************************************
From: henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: New IR Jammer on Apache helicopters?
Date: 12 Oct 92 16:29:22 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology


From henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer)

>From meyer@bittersweet.crayola.cs.psu.edu (Andrew G Meyer)
>>  You can't jam IR! 
>
> It is my understanding that you *can* jam IR.  From what I understand, IR 
>seeking missiles use some sort of scanning pattern, and if you know that 
>pattern, you can send out pulses of IR to make the missile think that the IR
>source is in a different direction then it really is.  This, of course, will
>not work against *imaging* IR, but IR AAM's don't use this...

Andrew is correct.  Most IR-homing missiles are, to some degree at least,
descendants of the original Sidewinder.  To minimize component count,
especially in the expensive and hard-to-build sensor, Sidewinder used a
single IR sensor behind a rotating mask ("reticle").  The mask pattern
was chosen so that the farther off-center the target was, the larger the
signal the sensor saw, and hence the larger the correction passed to the
fins was.  The direction of correction was determined by the timing of
the signal.  (This is a slight oversimplification.  Reticle design was
a black art about which not much has been published.)

The interesting part of this, of course, is that it assumes that the
IR source does not itself vary on time scales comparable to the reticle's
rotation rate.  A bright IR source that blinks at roughly the rotation
rate will drive such a system crazy.

Even with reticle-based systems, there were countermeasures that could
be applied, such as having part of the reticle clear and discounting
any variations that also appeared during that part of the rotation.
But in general it's hard to deal well with blinking sources with such
a system.

Imaging IR is just starting to appear in missile seekers.  It's costly
and complex by comparison, although it does do much better against most
countermeasures if the system has enough smarts in it.
-- 
MS-DOS is the OS/360 of the 1980s.      | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
              -Hal W. Hardenbergh (1985)|  henry@zoo.toronto.edu  utzoo!henry
Newsgroups: sci.military
From: wilson@b11.b11.ingr.com (Jon Wilson)
Subject: Sparrow guidance
Organization: NCR Corporation -- Law Department
Date: Fri, 9 Oct 1992 22:32:10 GMT


From wilson@b11.b11.ingr.com (Jon Wilson)

> 
> 	Can anyone tell me what guidance system the sea sparrow  has. I

...

> [ mod note -- I believe the Sea Sparrow is a "beam rider", where the
> launching platform keeps the target illuminated with it's radar, and the
> Sea Sparrow "rides the beam" to impact the target ]
 
 
Early versions of Sparrow (early 60's) used beam riding technology. In beam
riding guidance, the launch platform keeps a narrow radar signal centered
on the target. Receivers in the missile keep it centered in the "beam"
until it reaches the vicinity of the target. This guidance is fairly
inaccurate but was useful with large missiles with big (or nuclear)
warheads, like the old Nike series.
 
Current versions use "semi-active radar homing", in which the launch platform
illuminates the target with continuous-wave radar signals and the missile
homes on the reflection from the target.
 
 
Jonathan Wilson
DEC Systems Support
Intergraph Corporation
wilson@b11.b11.ingr.com
From: fcrary@ucsu.Colorado.EDU (Frank Crary)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: WWII -- Why didn't Japan invade Hawaii?
Date: 12 Oct 92 16:32:27 GMT
Organization: University of Colorado, Boulder


From fcrary@ucsu.Colorado.EDU (Frank Crary)

In article <BvxpGy.1py@law7.DaytonOH.NCR.COM> pstinson@pbs.org writes:
>The submarine can lay just
>as strong a claim to being the real weapon of the future.  In fact the U.S.
>fleet submarines of World War II were responsible for more tonnage destroyed
>than all the aircraft carrier task forces.

Further, it was submarines that defeated Japan's main goal in attacking
Pearl Harbor: To keep the United States from interfering in the
capture and economic consolidation of the East Indies.

                                                      Frank Crary
                                                      CU Boulder
Newsgroups: sci.military
From: Raymond Man <raymond@jupiter.ame.arizona.edu>
Subject: Bofors 40mm AA in WW2
Organization: NCR Corporation -- Law Department
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 1992 16:33:24 GMT


From Raymond Man <raymond@jupiter.ame.arizona.edu>


From Raymond Man <raymond@jupiter.ame.arizona.edu>


Under the Geneva Conventional, AA guns could not be used against ground
troops. However, against armour vehicles might be in a different
category. The Bofors are only effective against lightly amoured
vehicles, I think I have read about its use against eg. half-tracks.

The Bristish had a very good 3.7" AA gun which could have been used
in the same role and with the same effect as the 88 had it not for
the stubborn refusal of the British high command to divert AA
resources for AT role.

Newsgroups: sci.military
From: Scott Silvey <scott%fraud.Berkeley.EDU@ucbvax.berkeley.edu>
Subject: Re: Sparrows and the Turkish DD
Organization: UC Berkeley Experimental Computing Facility (XCF)
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1992 15:32:56 GMT


From Scott Silvey <scott%fraud.Berkeley.EDU@ucbvax.berkeley.edu>


From Scott Silvey <scott%fraud.Berkeley.EDU@ucbvax.berkeley.edu>


%     Is the Sea Spaarowe meant to be a fall-back weapon for an anti-ship
%   role?  I did not think they could even be used against ships.  I'm
%   GUESSING that there is no way that 2 missles that could NOT track and
%   home on a ship could hit a ship 3 miles off by accident.  What are this
%   missile's capaibilities vs a ship?

The point is that the Sea Sparrow is capable against radar reflections.  ;^)
Since the Turks don't have stealth destroyers yet, the Sea Sparrow must have
thought it saw a very large cruise missile comming in very low over the 
water ...

I haven't heard why they were painting the destroyer with a weapons director,
but a previous posting speculated that the radar was slaved to an optical 
sight which some sailor was using to examine the destroyer.  If that is the
case, why was the radar even turned on?  Does the Sea Sparrow follow the 
reflections of a search radar?  Does the weapon director radar have some
simultaneous non-hostile function besides painting small missiles with a high
intensity radar signal?


Scott Silvey
scott@xcf.berkeley.edu


Newsgroups: sci.military
From: rovero@attu.oc.nps.navy.mil (Josh Rovero)
Subject: Re: B-70
Organization: Naval Postgraduate School,Monterey CA
Date: Sun, 11 Oct 1992 16:24:11 GMT


From rovero@attu.oc.nps.navy.mil (Josh Rovero)


My dad worked on the nuclear airplane, or at least on reactor
control design for it.

They were projecting 500,000 pounds at the time (late 50's, early
60's).  The biggest conventional transports are bigger than that
now.

-- 
Josh Rovero   (rovero@oc.nps.navy.mil) | or Internet 5346p@cc.nps.navy.mil 
Department of Oceanography, Code OC/Rv |      Bitnet 5346p@NAVPGS 
Naval Postgraduate School              |              
Monterey, CA  93943   (408) 646-2084   |

Newsgroups: sci.military
From: meyer@bittersweet.crayola.cs.psu.edu (Andrew G Meyer)
Subject: Re: New IR Jammer on Apache helicopters?
Organization: Penn State Computer Science
Date: Sun, 11 Oct 1992 15:23:19 GMT


From meyer@bittersweet.crayola.cs.psu.edu (Andrew G Meyer)

In article <Bvvwvq.G9o@law7.DaytonOH.NCR.COM> hhtra@usho21.hou281.chevron.com (T.M.Haddock) writes:
>
>From hhtra@usho21.hou281.chevron.com (T.M.Haddock)
>
>In article <Bvq4q8.DJH@law7.DaytonOH.NCR.COM>, mccd@rosie.uh.edu (R. Golshan (713)-743-1540) writes:
>|> 
>|> From mccd@rosie.uh.edu (R. Golshan (713)-743-1540)
>|>       I went to the Houston airshow this past Saturday.  Apparently the Apache 
>|> helicopter is now  equipped with a new IR jammer.  I asked one of the pilots
>|> about the device that was installed on the top of the helicopter, and was told
>|> that they have installed the device on the helicopter about  one week ago.  I 
>|> was told that the device is a Radar Jammer, however, due to the way it appears 
>|> I beleive it is more likely that it is a new IR jammer.  It was a relatively 
>|> small cylinder which had ten mirrored sides, and had three mirrors on each 
>|> side(A total of 30 reflectors).  It looked exactly like a Disco light!  It 
>|> seems like a new counter measure against Stinger missiles.



>
>  You can't jam IR! 


 It is my understanding that you *can* jam IR.  From what I understand, IR 
seeking missiles use some sort of scanning pattern, and if you know that 
pattern, you can send out pulses of IR to make the missile think that the IR
source is in a different direction then it really is.  This, of course, will
not work against *imaging* IR, but IR AAM's don't use this, probably because of
the expense.  Perhaps someone on here can expand on this...I really don't have
a great grip on the technology, but I have read that some of the first IR 
jammers were large...in Vietnam, they were mounted on the ramps of C-141's, and
the ramp was left down on takeoff to provide protection against VC SA-7's. 


>  TRAVIS
>  hhtra@hou281.chevron.com

  Andy Meyer
  meyer@crayola.cs.psu.edu     meyer@satie.psu.edu

Disclaimer:  I may not know what I'm talking about, but no one else is telling 
me what to say!

-- 
This is a test signature file.
If this works, than it will work..
If id doesn't, it wont
:w