Libya

[Zombie]

What do you think about the international intervention in Libya? Should those countries have intervened? Should the US be involved? Is this a reaction to the poor international involvement in the Rwandan and Darfur genocides?

[3278]

How bad was this before we went in? The Daily Show has been on break [and I haven't gotten home to watch last night's], so I haven't really gotten any news on this at all.

[Nicephorus]

I think it's like this. A long civil war would be hell on oil prices. It was looking like the rebels would be wiped out within a month. After that, you could expect attacks on oil facilities. Combine that with the fact that Ghaddafi is a windbag and a jerk who has managed to piss off everyone in the last 40 years.

It's also presents itself as an easy intervention. Most of Libyan civilization is along the coastal road = easy interdiction by strafing vehicles on roads. The population and the army are smallish. There are tribal differences which will flare up afterwards but not the extreme ethnic differences of Iraq or Afghanistan. There is also no equivalent of Iran or Pakistan to give shelter and support of counter revolutionaries. Hopefully, the U.S. will try to mediate from a distance this time. The U.S. is still half the active forces - hey, they're half of the world military - but it's nice to have the front face be someone else for a change.

[Bonefish]

The important part is destroying the air power. Planes and helos can make a mess of infantry: if you want to get a feel for that, play Battlfield 2(a first person shooter) when one tema has control of both helicopters. It's just a fucking pain to deal with in the game, and for the rebels, I imagine it's even worse. Knocking out tanks is also handy: if you reduce this to an infantry on infantry battle, then the Rebels, with superior numbers, can grind out Laffy Taffy's loyalists.

It's also a chance for France to prove they can fight, and who doesn't want that?

Now some may argue about foreign interventions, and all that good stuff. I'd like to point out that the US may not have existed if not for foreign intervention in the revolutionary war. And there's atleast an outside chance the new government that sweeps in may be better than Laffy Taffy.

I will miss Laffy Taffy's antics, howeve.r They were somewhat comical. Guess I'll just have to hopeKim il Jung and Almahjidi(oh, whatever his name is!) can pick up the slack.

[Salvation122]

How bad was this before we went in? The Daily Show has been on break [and I haven't gotten home to watch last night's], so I haven't really gotten any news on this at all.

At one point the Libyans were turning anti-aircraft flak cannons on civilian protesters. Later they started running close air support missions against them.

So, pretty bad.

[Zombie]

...play Battlfield 2(a first person shooter) when one tema has control of both helicopters.

That was a pain in the ass. It should also be in the UN reports. "In light of dual helicopter dominance in Battlefield 2, we felt it necessary to bomb the fuck out of Libyan air force bases."

[Bonefish]

...play Battlfield 2(a first person shooter) when one tema has control of both helicopters.

That was a pain in the ass. It should also be in the UN reports. "In light of dual helicopter dominance in Battlefield 2, we felt it necessary to bomb the fuck out of Libyan air force bases."

I brought up that as a similarity. Air power has a dramatic effect on military operations: if one side has air superiority, then they can pretty much make your life living fucking hell. Wanna get guys somewhere? Better not load'em on trucks and ride down the high way, or you're going to get shot the fuck up. Need mortars or artillery to prep an assault? Does you no good if your mortars get shot while providing support. You cant even in the open in large groups, or you're going to get shot the fuck up.

Having trouble getting food, water, ammo to the guys fighting? Well, if the enemy controls the skies, that's going to be even more pronounced. So we blow up their airpower, and now Laffy Taffy's boys have to rely on their ground assets, which can do nearly as much as the air force. No helicopter gunships breaking up assaults, taking out their cars being used for transport, no more blowing up the rebels when they go home or rest in civvie areas.

Airpower is a force multiplier, always has been. Tanks are also there, and taking these away from Laffy Taffy evens the field between him and the rebels, and doesn't require that much in terms of troop investment. Some form of UN peacekeeper force is going to hit the ground, but it may not necessarily be American dominated, for once. The french have historic ties to the region, and despite them being, well, French, they'll probably be more welcome than Americans.

[Zombie]

I liked the reference. Upon second reading, my comment could have been mistaken as sarcastic in a bad way.

[Bishop]

I thought it was sarcastic as fuckall. But still funny.

[3278]

I think Bone was really just looking for any excuse, however small, to continue sharing his views on military tactics. When he's got more smart stuff to say, he'll often just grab whatever's lying around, quote it, and just start talking. I find it endearing.

How bad was this before we went in? The Daily Show has been on break [and I haven't gotten home to watch last night's], so I haven't really gotten any news on this at all.

At one point the Libyans were turning anti-aircraft flak cannons on civilian protesters. Later they started running close air support missions against them.

That was sort of my impression from what little I'd heard. Ana asked me yesterday what was going on in Libya - and she cares less about international current events than I do, which is saying something, so I definitely wanted to be able to give her some kind of useful explanation - and this was basically the image that I presented. I hadn't heard about the AA cannons, but "no fly zone" in this situations always means, "We don't want the military to be able to drop bombs on civilians."

And I'm...I don't know, basically all for this. I have my reservations about defying sovereignty, but whatever: who said that was some kind of absolute that can't ever be defied? My views on this are much less cut-and-dried than they used to be. But okay, I'll stipulate that having the UN take military action to prevent the wholesale slaughter of unarmed civilians is "a good thing." But here's where the problems start, for me.

For one thing, it would really be pleasant if our government [and the UN] would develop some kind of consistency in these things. The US response - and I place blame for this squarely on the Obama administration - to the recent uprisings in that corner of the world has been extraordinarily varied, and can be roughly overgeneralized like this:

Tunisia: "Wait, is something going on? Oh, did...did something just already happen? Um, good job, guys?"

Egypt: (Before it looked like success was possible for the revolutionaries.) "Oh, hey, guys, you be careful over there. Don't get yourself in any kind of trouble, eh? You...you know we can't help you out, right?" (Once success looked possible.) "Oh, hey guys. Good work, there. Getting some independence. That's nice for you.... Sorry about the tear gas cannisters, eh?"[/i]*

Libya: "Hey, UN. We're going to take care of these people, right? Yeah, sure, we've got some spare guys, no problem. Maybe a couple of you could help out? If it's not too much trouble?"

Bahrain: "Whoa, hey everybody. Calm down. You know, it's not worth fighting over."

Certainly each of these cases is different, and difference in response should be expected, but the US government [and, again, the UN] responses seem to have been chosen by having a seizing epileptic throw darts at notecards with options like, "Storm the shit out of those fuckers!" and "Shame the protesters until they weep and flee."

My second objection is more to the current function of the UN as it relates to the American military getting constantly fucked by circumstances outside their control. Look, I understand East Timor doesn't have a single aircraft carrier in the Mediterranean to spare, but surely someone, somewhere has to have said, "Not to be a dick, but our military's kind of busy taking care of some other problems near here, and our guys are starting to get a little tired. Could we get some help from someone other than the British, the French, and the Dutch? Russia? China?

Certainly, when you have the largest military and the most advanced military technology, it's only natural that you'll be used in that capacity in your international club of nations; there's just no sense in having Vietnam send warplanes to help out. But we need to all do a better job of splitting both responsibility and privileges in the United Nations: there shouldn't be five nations with more power than anyone else, and there shouldn't be a handful of nations doing disproportionately more than others.

We need a new UN charter, and a new way for the UN to do what it does. We need a UN with massive power closely restrained, with equitable costs and benefits, which is empowered to take action against member nations, for which the benefits of membership are great enough to encourage all to join, whose ultimate goal is the sustainable safety and security of the planet and its inhabitants, without any more judgment or interference than is absolutely necessary.

*And I absolutely understand that we had reasons to be so non-committal, with Mubarak a sort of ally-ish person, and the Israel issue, and our recent track record of wandering around that part of the world "nation building." I get it. But the way the Obama administration handled this was still wrong. That said, it's a lighter shade of wrong than the shit the last guy did. Pretty refreshing.

[edit]Okay, looks like The Daily Show just did ten minutes on almost exactly all of this on Monday. I could have just posted a link to people funnier than me.[/edit]

[Bonefish]

I think Bone was really just looking for any excuse, however small, to continue sharing his views on military tactics. When he's got more smart stuff to say, he'll often just grab whatever's lying around, quote it, and just start talking. I find it endearing.

Indeed. Though I'd like to say that this isn't just me talking out of my ass or anything, I can provide some pretty good sources for this stuff.

[Salvation122]

My second objection is more to the current function of the UN as it relates to the American military getting constantly fucked by circumstances outside their control. Look, I understand East Timor doesn't have a single aircraft carrier in the Mediterranean to spare, but surely someone, somewhere has to have said, "Not to be a dick, but our military's kind of busy taking care of some other problems near here, and our guys are starting to get a little tired. Could we get some help from someone other than the British, the French, and the Dutch? Russia? China?"

Unfortunately, there's really no one else with the ability to project force like we can. A single Nimitz-class carrier air group is the most powerful air force and navy on the planet. We have eleven of them. We have thirty or forty VTOL carriers; the French have one, the Italians have one, the British have two. The Russians have, like, half of one that's sitting in drydock rusting, the Chinese have one or two under construction. India might have one, I don't remember off the top of my head. That's just about it.

[Bonefish]

And our navy has an army bigger than most nations dedicated land force. That's a plus. It's really pretty retarded when you think about it.

[Nicephorus]

Actually, Libyan planes are small in number and in size overall. The helicopters are more effective but also limited in number Libyan air ability is limited, especially if some special forces guys or a defecting general showed the rebels how to use their AA guns against aircraft instead of mainly as light autocannons/big machine guns. RPGs are also effective against helicopters that are hovering to shoot. A bigger threat is a batalion or so of self propelled guns and the old but reasonably effective Russian tanks and APCs.

That's why it's good yet surprising that the UN mandate was vague and said "do whatever you want if you can justify it as killing fewer civilians. It seemed to have caught the Arab League off guard that it meant more than a no fly zone. A strict no-fly zone would have ground vehicles untouched and wouldn't have impacted logistics and wouldn't have been nearly as effective.

[Bonefish]

Libya HAD Su-22s, Migs and most importantly, Mi-24s. Those are enough to be real big fucking problems. And unguided AA and RPG-7s require alot of numbers and luck to down aircraft.

And also, a "no-fly zone" doesn't just mean we shoot down aircraft. It means we shoot down air planes, we blow up C3 vehicles, radar vehicles and any ground anti-air assets. Because you can fly patrols if someone operates a SAM battery below you.

[Nicephorus]

The SU-22 isn't that great and the bomb load isn't that big. It's like 1/5 of an F-15 in impact and that they appear to be coming in low and slow due to lack of flight time. A hovering helicopter is fairly vulnerable. If a deep strike isn't needed, an artillery piece firing for an hour is more effective than a bombing sortie from a light craft.

I realize that a no-fly zone includes ground targets, as what happenned in the Kurdish zone. But the French took out several tanks the first day which goes beyond what's needed to enforce a no-fly zone. This and similar strikes appear to have encouraged gov tanks to leave Misrata.

[Bonefish]

The SU-22 isn't that great and the bomb load isn't that big. It's like 1/5 of an F-15 in impact and that they appear to be coming in low and slow due to lack of flight time. A hovering helicopter is fairly vulnerable. If a deep strike isn't needed, an artillery piece firing for an hour is more effective than a bombing sortie from a light craft.

No, the Su-22 isn't great. But having a Su-22 when your opponent has... RPGs and AKs/PKMs for the majority of their anti-air? Well, it's like saying that an Acutek .380 ain't a good gun, but it's still a gun, and if you don't have one, you're still fucked.

The 5 Su-24s they had on inventory each were able to carry up to 8000lbs of Ordnance, and that's hella good for bombing rebels. And yes, Artillery is more effective than bombing sorties, as long as you're targeting things on the front-lines. Attack aircraft can range out over hundreds of miles and interdict supplies, reinforcements and rally areas.

Air-power is jsut amazingly fucking good. Haven't you played battlefield? Dual-helo dominance is BRUTAL!

I realize that a no-fly zone includes ground targets, as what happenned in the Kurdish zone. But the French took out several tanks the first day which goes beyond what's needed to enforce a no-fly zone. This and similar strikes appear to have encouraged gov tanks to leave Misrata.

Well, Good Frenchies...

[Nicephorus]

Air-power is jsut amazingly fucking good. Haven't you played battlefield? Dual-helo dominance is BRUTAL!

Nah, I haven't done much wargaming lately, and computer versions were never more than a sideline. Back in the day, SL (prior to ASL), SPI's central front series and the like were cool. Though I tended to play strategic like A3R, IR2, and F&E.

[Bonefish]

Air-power is jsut amazingly fucking good. Haven't you played battlefield? Dual-helo dominance is BRUTAL!

Nah, I haven't done much wargaming lately, and computer versions were never more than a sideline. Back in the day, SL (prior to ASL), SPI's central front series and the like were cool. Though I tended to play strategic like A3R, IR2, and F&E.

Battlefield 2 is a First Person Shooter, that really gets into the idea of different roles. When you've got something like 20+ guys on a side, with multiple armored vehicles and helicopters swerving around, it gives you a bit of insight towards the modern battlefield: it's the closest civilians are likely to get, unless we're journalists(or PMCs). I'm not saying it's gospel or anything, because after all, it is just a game.

But on some maps, there's a helicopter(1 per side), and often one side will manage to get control of both helos. Then, you really get a feeling for the air superiority thing, as Helos swing by and destroy your APCs and Tanks, forcing you to dismount and fight on foot. Not being able to ferry four or five guys to a critical objective, because a fucking Ka-52 keeps blowing you up on the way in? Annoying.

But that's what air power does in the tactical theatre: it allows you to reach behind the front lines and fuck with everything that keeps the engines of destruction running. You can interdict reinforcements, hit artillery positions in the rear, attack the command structure, etc. Artillery can really do that, due to the limits of range(I think 22miles of so is the upper limit for most arty).

Now, I have no problem with blowing up tanks and SP guns as part of this "no-fly zone" thing, because western airpower is really fucking good at doing that, and it will minimize civilian casaulties. Our firepower heavy modern armies arn't so good in closer quarters, with irregular warfare. But, so long as we don't get caught up in putting boots on the ground, this is actually a fairly sanitary method of fighting.

[DrunkenMaster]

Battlefield 2 is a First Person Shooter, that really gets into the idea of different roles. When you've got something like 20+ guys on a side, with multiple armored vehicles and helicopters swerving around, it gives you a bit of insight towards the modern battlefield: it's the closest civilians are likely to get, unless we're journalists(or PMCs). I'm not saying it's gospel or anything, because after all, it is just a game.

Now all you need is the local Battle Space Owner(BSO) to personally clear every round of ordinance fired from your air assets. In order to make it even more realistic, let him know that if even one round misses its target, the owner of the server will claim damages and the guy with the highest kill/death ratio's xbox/computer will be taken away. This will also be true of any ordinance fired indirectly, so if that tank decides it wants to be artillery for a little while, each round must be accounted for.

Second, your air assets can only have flight times of 1 minute per match before they have a 5 minute downtime and the pilot roster has to be filed in the previous match. In their downtime, they have to switch pilots. Also, take a coin and flip it in the air. Heads is good weather. Tails is bad weather. You can't fly in bad weather. Wait one minute and flip the coin again. If the gamers are from another nation(you're playing with furriners), they can't communicate with you via headset and they can't fire unless being fired upon. If they are fired upon, they must fly back to home base, regardless of whether you need backup. If they are from Germany and they fire, when they land their gaming platform will be taken away and any German players on your team can now only defend checkpoints. If they are from France, they won't be able to fly as they only have one helicopter in country and it is reserved for viewing by touring french VIPs. If they are Aussies, you are cleared hot. If they are from Italy they will fly the helicopter to the enemy base and sell it to them.

I think I'll stop there. What was the point of this? You can teach an overview of tactics with games. I've done it,other people I know have done it, and it can be effective to get the basic concepts down, much like X and O charts for playbooks in other sports. And that is about as in depth as you can get. Tactics is not operations is not strategy, and trying to walk the dog through that from an xbox game to a real world military/political boondoggle is not going to get you anywhere but wrong.

Bone, I realize you were simply making a point about air power and its roles in the modern battle space. You are well read and have a passion for military and other histories and that comes across. But (and this is just me) it sounds like you are trying to speak with authority on a situation in which you have no experience. I don't have that experience or knowledge either. I'm not trying to be an asshole here, but I take this stuff kind of personally.

[Bonefish]

Bone, I realize you were simply making a point about air power and its roles in the modern battle space. You are well read and have a passion for military and other histories and that comes across. But (and this is just me) it sounds like you are trying to speak with authority on a situation in which you have no experience. I don't have that experience or knowledge either. I'm not trying to be an asshole here, but I take this stuff kind of personally.

Aww, c'mon man. I think it's pretty clear that if I'm comparing something to a video game, I'm not speaking from any great authority or experience. After all, it's a fucking game. That I don't even own, but have occasionally played.

I'm not sure why we're worried anyway: the French got this. Seriously though: it seems the european nations have most of this covered from what's deployed. This is a prime time for the US to back off and let some other nations take the "policing" thing over.

[Grifter]

What?! You're trying to tell me that thirty odd plus years of playing video-games hasn't prepared me for actual combat?! What a waste!

[Crazy Elf]

What?! You're trying to tell me that thirty odd plus years of playing video-games hasn't prepared me for actual combat?! What a waste!

Depends what you played. I myself played a lot of Zelda and I've found that I can beat the crap out of just about anybody as long as I have a sword and shield.

[Bonefish]

What?! You're trying to tell me that thirty odd plus years of playing video-games hasn't prepared me for actual combat?! What a waste!

Depends what you played. I myself played a lot of Zelda and I've found that I can beat the crap out of just about anybody as long as I have a sword and shield.

What if they have guns, or... arrows?

[Crazy Elf]

Depends what you played. I myself played a lot of Zelda and I've found that I can beat the crap out of just about anybody as long as I have a sword and shield.

What if they have guns, or... arrows?

Well I have a shield for those. What concerns me more are fireballs unless I have a mirror shield.

[Jeff Hauze]

Or god forbid, if it's a Dark Elf Mage in some weird cave in the woods, that has magnetic powers.

[Crazy Elf]

Or god forbid, if it's a Dark Elf Mage in some weird cave in the woods, that has magnetic powers.

You just need a harp for that, and that's not Zelda it's Final Fantasy IV.

[Jeff Hauze]

You just need a harp for that, and that's not Zelda it's Final Fantasy IV.

Yes, we adults were busy talking about an actual good game, none of that princess silliness. You know, a proper game that has a guy named Cid.

Edit: I missed Bulldrek. Libya to Zelda in no time at all.

[Crazy Elf]

Yes, we adults were busy talking about an actual good game, none of that princess silliness. You know, a proper game that has a guy named Cid.

None of that princess silliness in Final Fantasy?


The entire plot is driven by people trying to kidnap a princess that wears MMA gloves.


The entire plot is driven by the pwettiest wedding ever!

So perhaps Zelda does have some princess silliness, but at least she don't worsen matters by getting involved. She has the sense to stay out of the way and let the men deal with the issue. As it should be.

Edit: I missed Bulldrek. Libya to Zelda in no time at all.

Ditto.