Re: Blimp Bombing

On Fri, 19 Apr 2002, Hudak, Michael wrote:

> Wouldn't the blimps be pretty much a tipoff that there is/will be
activity
> in the area?	Seems like a pretty big warning sign to me.

Sure, if it wandered over your base at 5000ft in daylight...

If our hypothetical airship is at 40,000ft, offset 30nm+ from you,
visually 'stealthed' and nearly radar transparent, you're only going to
suspect it's around when it starts dropping those glide bombs on you!

Nit I need to pick: a 'blimp' is not what we're discussing here. A blimp
is a non-reinforced gasbag with the gondola & engines slung beneath; an
airship/zeppelin/dirigible has reinforcing material - struts, keels,
whatever - that make the envelope/gasbag rigid. The Goodyear thing over
sporting events is a blimp; the Hindenburg was a zeppelin or airship.
Airships can be much, much larger than blimps.

Hindenburg was over 800ft long; modern plans, using composites instead
of
metals, have postulated quite buildable 1000ft long airships! More
trivia:
Everyone 'knows' that airships are dangerous - but the 13 passengers
killed when the Hindenburg went up were the *only* paying passengers
every
killed in an airship accident...

A good book on hypothetical airships is Dean Ing's "The Big Lifters";
it's
near-future science fiction, and a good book in it's own right. Not
military, but the book's dirigible, "Delta One" is a very impressive
piece
of equipment.

Brian - yh728@victoria.tc.ca -
- http://wind.prohosting.com/~warbard/games.html -

> 
> Mike Hudak
> mihudak@state.pa.us
> 
> Fact is, there's nothing out there you can't do.....
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> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: B Lin [mailto:lin@rxkinetix.com]
> > Sent: Friday, April 19, 2002 1:08 PM
> > To: gzg-l@csua.berkeley.edu
> > Subject: RE: Slow planes was: Battle blimps
> > 
> > 
> > At 80,000-100,000 feet you could concieveably stand off from 
> > the battle area by 20-30 miles and still have a pretty good 
> > view (maybe not in mountainous areas, but still pretty good). 
> >  You could then load the blimp up with a couple of dozen 
> > laser-guided glide bombs then have ground troops use lasers 
> > to target for you.	The advantages would be nearly on-demand 
> > bombing - no waiting for a fast mover to be in the area, 
> > choice of warhead - the blimp would carry a variety of bombs, 
> > not just one or two types, and then you could call in really 
> > big strikes from a single blimp.
> > 
> > That would really change the pace of a battle like that in 
> > Afghsnistan - small groups of commandos supported by 2 or 
> > three blimps.  Once you have a track on the target, you can 
> > deliver a bomb within minutes, rather than having a 
> > complicated and expensive set-up where you constantly have an 
> > attack-bomber on call.  So highly mobile units - commanders, 
> > supply convoys or even massed troop movements can be hit 
> > while the reconaissance data is still good.
> > 
> > You might even be able to have the blimp as a C and C center 
> > flying Predator drones to do their own targeting.  Think of 
> > how it might change low-intensity warfare if a squad leader 
> > suddenly is given the capability to drop a 500 lbs bomb on an 
> > enemy position.  Bunkers, MG nests inside buildings, tanks 
> > would all be highly vulnerable to ground troops with a radio 
> > and a laser designator.
> > 
> > --Binhan
> > 
> > 
> >