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rgbrock1 wrote:

500N wrote:Yes, it did take the US a while to "catch up" and see who the "other" enemy was

I'm sure the rest of Europe was quite content with the U.S.'s taking awhile to catch up. Had it not been so, I'm quite certain both the Fulda and Hof Gaps would have been, shall we say, very lively places.

That's ok, we had you there as cannon fodder and tank bumps

..and the BX's/PX's were very useful.............

500N wrote:

rgbrock1 wrote:

500N wrote:Yes, it did take the US a while to "catch up" and see who the "other" enemy was

I'm sure the rest of Europe was quite content with the U.S.'s taking awhile to catch up. Had it not been so, I'm quite certain both the Fulda and Hof Gaps would have been, shall we say, very lively places.

That's ok, we had you there as cannon fodder and tank bumps

Those unfortunate enough to be assigned to Cav units at either Fulda or Hof would most certainly have been mere cannon fodder and tank bumps indeed. Just ask 11Fan!

Boac wrote:..and the BX's/PX's were very useful.............

Indeed. $5 for a carton of cigarettes. $10 for a fifth of Jack Daniels. Then again, with an exchange rate - at the time - of DM 4 per $ it was often cheaper to buy things on the German market. Except for cigs and boos. Those two items were a market unto themselves!

RGB:

Except for cigs and boos

You buy boos... The rest of us just wait for Halloween...

We do buy our booze though...

****' amateur...

Airborne Aircrew wrote:RGB:

Except for cigs and boos

You buy boos... The rest of us just wait for Halloween...

We do buy our booze though...

****' amateur...

Boos, booze who gives a rat's ass, what're you the spelling Nazi?

ARSE, unless, of course, your Rat has a pet hoofed mammal of the horse family, which is typically smaller than a horse and has longer ears and a braying call.

rgbrock1 wrote: the Soviet Bear was the predominate "tango"

True if you were in Germany but tell that to a patrol through the Rossville Flats or on Falls Road. Statistically you were in far greater danger in the latter.

When I stayed with my brother-in-law and sister in Berlin it was at Montgomery Barracks -- 3 sides of which were Walled off so to speak. The official advice if the balloon went up was to hang bedsheets from the windows.....IIRC virtually every war game ignored Berlin in that a) it would be rolled over in hours or b) it would have just been left to wither on the vine.

Also on war games, I seem to remember on one that the plain near Hanover and the Fulda Gap were both (battlefield) nuked by our own side -- much to the annoyance of the top brass in Brussels....

Breaking news: Putin's decision to suspend all Russian flights to and from Egypt came about after US and British intelligence services shared intel with their counterparts in the Russian services. Looking more and more like it was an onboard bomb.

ok, gentlemen, relax, and consider Tango = bad guy?
If it's the 'bad' vs 'badder', then I don't know, I'm afraid.

The French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo has been criticised by the Russian government after publishing cartoons of the passenger plane which crashed in Sinai last weekend.

The latest issue of the magazine features a cartoon which shows plane parts and a passenger falling from the sky on to a bearded man in “an Islamic robe”.

The caption alongside the image reportedly says: “Isis: Russian aviation intensifies its bombardments.”

Dmitry Peskov, President Putin’s media secretary called the cartoon “blasphemy”.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/russian-plane-crash-moscow-calls-charlie-hebdo-blasphemous-over-airbus-a-231-cartoons-a6724566.html

Maybe it IS true, after all, that one does not need to cartoon everything?

More to read: http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2015/11/06/the-evolving-intelligence-about-the-russian-plane-crash/

How credible is the story of a jet taking evasive action against a rocket
Which the pilot saw ?

How credible is the story of a jet taking evasive action against a rocket
Which the pilot saw ?

Clearly it is highly undesirable that a civil aircraft would stray into a military danger zone or that such an Egyptian zone would be promulgated near a busy international airport and even worse that the aircraft would be in the proximity of a missile launch, let alone a ground to air missile, as seems to be the case in the near miss being reported with the Thompson aircraft. One suspects that the missile, if it was an anti aicraft missile, did not lock on to the Thompson jet and what evasion action that was taken was simply to scarper and get out of the area.

Still even light aircraft have been known to outmanouevre surface to air missiles, even if only in the short term. During the Angolan bush war a SAAF Bobok (observation aircraft) was shot down during operation Moduler by a SA-8 missile but had previously taken violent evasive action twice before to avoid two other missiles. A bad situation and third time unlucky for the plucky crew of the light aircraft but a damned good show to avoid being knocked down twice before by a relatively sophisticated SAM!

The fact is that tourists and western governments have been in denial about the dangers of terrorism in sharm el sheikh for many years. A work colleague of mine was killed in a bomb blast there in 2004 and there have been many other examples of the typically lax and incompetent Egyptian security resulting in successful terrorist atrocities and Egyptian military mistakes resulting in tourist deaths (vide the Mexican tourist massacre in the Western desert this year).

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-34241680

Aermacchi AM.3 (Bosbok)



Caco

Incidents of aircraft, even heavy transports, that have maneuvered out of the way of surface to air missiles have occurred on multiple occasions for decades.

Reports coming out of SSH indicate that the CCTV system in the baggage area may have been partially broken, baggage scanners likewise and we have reports of 'illegal' access being obtained in exchange for folding drinking vouchers. To read that the Egyptians are complaining about the way they are being treated in this investigation is ridiculous. It appears that 90%+ of the disaster should be placed in their domain.

It highlights questions over how we monitored the airport - for example, what BA had done to ensure security for its scheduled service.

The decision to repatriate without hold baggage was a good, quick solution, but surely now we should have enough 'boots on the ground' to enable proper security measures for both baggage and a/c servicing to enable a faster recovery?

An aircraft shot out the sky so they evacuate everybody, causing angst and frustration for many.
It's not like there was an attack on a hotel like Tunisia, why the urgency to get out ?

Quite why anyone would go to Egypt on holiday is beyond me.
I have met some delightful Egyptians but my overwhelming memory of the place is of aggressive beggars, filth, scams, chaos and crime. The people don't even have the charm that Nigerians have.
I did some work for Egyptair and they were without doubt the most unprofessional and unpleasant people I have had the misfortune to deal with.

Capetonian, I too have had the misfortune of dealing with the Egyptians, carrying out pre purchase inspections of aircraft returning to civilisation, worst people that I have ever dealt with, vile in fact.
I also wonder why on earth anyone would want to go on holiday to Egypt, with all the pleasant choices as alternative destinations, it beats me.

500N, possibly because the nice hotels in Sharm are a juicy target, a savage in a suicide vest would just about be the final straw for the poor sods stuck down there.

So, there are indications in the CVR that it might have been a bomb.

Mr Hammond reaffirmed that the view of the British authorities that it was “more likely than not” that the crash was the result of a terrorist bomb planted on the aircraft before it took off from Sharm el-Sheikh on October 31st. He said there would have to be a major re-think of airport security in countries where IS — also referred to as Isil of Isis — is active if it turned out that they were behind the attack.
“If this turns out to be a device planted by an Isil operative or by somebody inspired by Isil then clearly we will have to look again at the level of security we expect to see in airports in areas where Isil is active,” he told BBC1’s The Andrew Marr Show.
“What we have got to do is ensure that airport security everywhere is at the level of the best and that airport security reflects the local conditions and where there is a higher local threat level that will mean higher levels of security are required.
“That may mean additional costs, it may mean additional delays at airports as people check in.”

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/middle-east/call-for-airport-security-overhaul-after-russian-crash-1.2421678

Looks more like that may mean people will avoid flying? After all, how thorough can the system possibly be?

A few years back (10 or so) I was returning from Niamey, Niger, by Air France. I recall that I went through about 6 different security checks, beginning many hours before the flight, at some of which I was greeted by "do you have anything for me?"

Once out on the tarmac, then AirFrance went through the whole procedure again: ID's, questions, hand baggage and hold baggage rechecks, etc. At the time I thought "what a ridiculous duplication of procedures".

Now I'm glad they did. All civilized airlines should do the same.

Russian plane crash: Airlines selling cheap flights to Sharm el-Sheikh with 15,000 tourists still stranded in resort

Thomas Cook is offering an all-inclusive week, departing on Saturday, for £373 – a 49% discount

Gives a new dimension to 'cheap and nasty'