Re: [FYI] World's Longest page on tracks vs wheels

John Atkinson wrote:

> --- Richard and Emily Bell <rlbell@sympatico.ca>
> wrote:
>
> > > That's generally a given in real combat.
> > >
> >
> > It wasn't true in Viet Nam,
>
> If we plan to fight as we did in VN, we plan for
> failure.

Viet Nam was a problem because noone had an overall view of where all of
the US aircraft were, and there were enough US planes, all over the
place, that there was no easy way to know without actually looking, that
the target was north vietnamese.  Most of the aircraft in the skies were
american, so they were forced to verify their targets.	In a central
european WWIII scenario, the same thing happens over Germany if the
AWAC's are forced back (except that there is a larger percentage of
soviet planes).  The unavailability of reliable IFF forced the US to
fight the kind of air combat that its aircraft were only marginally
capable of operating, but at least they didn't shoot down their own
aircraft.

>
>
> > was occassionally false in Operation Desert
> > Storm,
>
> When?

When Canadian pilots were almost told to engage what later turned out to
be returning USN F/A-18's.

>
>
> > the time.  For nations with a second rate (instead
> > of third rate)
> > airforce, an AWAC is not that hard for the
> > determined enemy to kill (if
> > it cannot radiate, it may as well be dead), so there
> > may not always be
> > someone who knows where all of the good guys are.
>
> Who has even a second rate air force that the US is
> likely to go to war with in the next 15 years?

That question cannot be answered until after the fifteen years has
expired.  China and India are possible, but unlikely and renewed
tensions with Russia are not completely beyond the realm of possibility,
until the economic, legal, and political systems appear to be working
(just not likely).

>
>
> > It is only a given in naval combat over the high
> > seas, as, in some spots
> > unpopulated by civil skyways, all inbounds are
> > hostile.
>
> If it's a warzone, then there is no civil aviation.
> If there is, then someone pretty much comitted
> suicide.

Not all combat is in warzones.	The USS Vincennes only thought that it
was under attack.  There are also situations where friendlies and
hostiles are mixing it up, and you can't be sure what the missile is
locked on to.