quote:

Originally posted by 1967Goat:
I've not been closely following the war in Ukraine, but I think I'd have to agree with Crenshaw on this one.

The "No" votes are people don't think we should be aiding Ukraine? At all? I'm confused.

I don't think it's an "either or" decision, I think both can be done simultaneously

quote:

Originally posted by SIGnified:

quote:

Originally posted by 1967Goat:
I've not been closely following the war in Ukraine, but I think I'd have to agree with Crenshaw on this one.

The "No" votes are people don't think we should be aiding Ukraine? At all? I'm confused.

I don't think it's an "either or" decision, I think both can be done simultaneously

So explain to us how you prioritize Ukrainians higher than Americans?


We can’t even feed our 6 month old babies and under, who don’t have access to breastmilk. Yeah whistle blowers at the border patrol report seeing pallets of baby formula available for illegal migrants at the border.

Maybe that $40 billion would be better left in our own damn pockets, or solving American issues.

Why is their border more important than ours?

quote:

Originally posted by 1967Goat:

Again, it's not an either-or decision. Why can't BOTH be done?

quote:

Originally posted by Underdog:
I have been saying for awhile that Crenshaw is the new John McCain.

quote:

Originally posted by SIGnified:

quote:

Originally posted by 1967Goat:

Again, it's not an either-or decision. Why can't BOTH be done?

Inflation anyone? Let’s just keep printing/spending… Woo hoo!


You must be one of those people that believe in infinite resources, and no consequences.

I can’t help people that think like that.

quote:

Originally posted by sigcrazy7:

quote:

Originally posted by SIGnified:

quote:

Originally posted by 1967Goat:

Again, it's not an either-or decision. Why can't BOTH be done?

Inflation anyone? Let’s just keep printing/spending… Woo hoo!


You must be one of those people that believe in infinite resources, and no consequences.

I can’t help people that think like that.

That’s not how this works. Most of the $40B is in the form of arms, weapons that are already on hand and have an infinite shelf life. We’d likely need to refresh much of the inventory anyway in the future, so it’s not as if we’re just going to add $40B in currency to the system. It will come in the future through defense appropriations, which would have happened anyway.

quote:

Originally posted by SIGnified:

It’s more than double what we budget for our own customs border patrol, But I guess there’s no issue there is there?

$40 billion dollars ain’t for free; no matter how you try to spin it bro .

This is why we are in the inflation shit. People rationalize stupid fucking behavior and then endorse it.

I don’t know about you, but I’ll be fine even if inflation hits 50%.

quote:

Originally posted by corsair:
What's the alternative.....I think Crenshaw, like a lot of urban/suburban/semi-rural Congressional districts won by the GOP, the alternative or competitor from the other side is likely a hard-core AOC/progressive type that has drank the 'woke' Kool-Aid and has repeated all the 'correct' buzzwords & grievances. If anything, he's an incremental improvement towards a true conservative.

While he's not my Congress Critter, I'm disappointed he hasn't been a lot more vocal towards Navy leadership in how they've been running the Navy and handling its junior sailors. Then again, Crenshaw was a SEAL and his understanding and exposure to Big Navy is limited.

quote:

Run Out of Javelins Before Russia Runs Out of Tanks?
April 12, 2022

The United States has supplied Ukraine with thousands of Javelins, the anti-tank missiles that have become the iconic weapon of the war, but the U.S. inventory is dwindling. The United States has probably given about one-third of its stock to Ukraine. Thus, the United States is approaching the point where it must reduce transfers to maintain sufficient stockpiles for its own war plans. Production of new missiles is slow, and it will take years to replenish stocks.

The Russians have numerous armored vehicles, but their supply of trained crews and level of morale are declining. Will Ukrainian anti-tank weapons inflict enough Russian combat losses to produce a battlefield stalemate before Ukraine runs out of its most effective anti-tank weapons?

Javelins―the Iconic Weapon

To review, a Javelin is a long-range guided anti-tank missile that can be carried by one person. Javelins have become the iconic weapon of this war, with pictures of Mary Magdalene, dubbed St. Javelin, holding a weapon and even a Javelin song. It is the most sophisticated, capable, and expensive weapon out of the wide range of anti-tank munitions that NATO and other countries are providing to Ukraine. The United States says it has provided 7,000 to Ukraine.

Infantry anti-tank weapons have allowed Ukrainian forces, which are mostly light infantry, to defeat Russian mechanized forces despite their much greater firepower. It is important to note that Javelins are the most capable and best known of the anti-tank weapon systems but not the most numerous. That distinction goes to the NLAW, an anti-tank system with guidance but not as sophisticated as a Javelin's and lesser range. In addition, other nations have provided their own anti-tank weapons, such as the German Panzerfaust 3 and the Swedish Carl Gustav.

The United States has not published figures about its Javelin inventory, so this must be deduced. According to the Army budget books, total production has been 37,739 since production began in 1994. Every year, U.S. forces use some missiles for training and testing. Thus, there may be 20,000 to 25,000 remaining in the stockpiles. These 7,000 systems represent about one-third of the U.S. total inventory.

That fraction doesn't sound like much; after all, two-thirds of the inventory remains. However, military planners are likely getting nervous. The United States maintains stocks for a variety of possible global conflicts that may occur against North Korea, Iran, or Russia itself. At some point, those stocks will get low enough that military planners will question whether the war plans can be executed. The United States is likely approaching that point.

The obvious answer is to build more missiles (and launch units, the control box that goes on the missile). The United States has been buying Javelins at the rate of about 1,000 a year. The maximum production rate is 6,480 a year, though it would likely take a year or more to reach that level. The delivery time is 32 months; that is, once an order is placed, it will take 32 months before a missile is delivered. This means that it will take about three or four years to replace the missiles that have been delivered so far. If the United States delivers more missiles to Ukraine, this time to replace extends.

It's Not Just Javelins

The United States is providing a wide variety of other systems, such as small arms, tracking radars, and armored trucks (High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle). However, the numbers being provided are relatively small compared to likely inventories. For example, the United States has sent the Ukrainians 50 million rounds of ammunition. That sounds like a lot, but total U.S. ammunition production for military and civilian purposes is 8.7 billion per year. Deliveries to Ukraine comprise less than 1 percent of that.

One system for which inventories and replenishment rates are limited is the Stinger anti-aircraft missile. According to the White House fact sheet, the United States has provided 2,000 Stingers to the Ukrainians. The United States has not purchased any since 2003. At that time, the total production was stated as 11,600 missiles (from the FY 2000 budget documents). With testing and training losses of 1 percent a year, the remaining inventory would be about 8,000. So, the United States has sent about a quarter of its inventory to Ukraine.

In 2003, the last time the United States procured Stingers, production rates were stated as 275 with standard shifts (called "1-8-5") and 720 at maximum production rate. Production lead time was 24 months. That means it will take at least five years to replace the inventory drawdown (two years for lead time and three years for production).

The problem is that the production line is apparently kept alive only by a small number of foreign sales, so it may take longer than 24 months to ramp up. Further, the Department of Defense (DOD) has been thinking about the next generation of short-range air defense systems and may not want to buy more of what it considers an outmoded technology. So, there may be an extended period of risk when the inventory is low, but a replacement is not in the pipeline.

How Many Targets Are There for All Those Anti-tank Weapons?

According to the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) The Military Balance, the Russians have 2,800 tanks and 13,000 other armored vehicles (reconnaissance and infantry fighting vehicles) in units with another 10,000 tanks and 8,500 armored vehicles in storage. Open-source intelligence indicates that the Russians have lost about 1,300 armored vehicles. The bottom line is that the Russians are not going to run out of armored vehicles anytime soon.

What the Russians may run out of are trained crews and morale if the Ukrainians chew up enough armor. The Russians have lost about 40,000 troops, a quarter of their initial combat force, with especially high casualties in their elite units. Reinforcements and replacements can restore some of the numbers, but skills are deteriorating and morale, never high, seems to be declining. So, it is a race. Will Russian combat losses produce a battlefield stalemate before Ukraine runs out of its most effective anti-tank weapons?

Mark F. Cancian is a senior adviser with the International Security Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.

https://www.csis.org/analysis/...ussia-runs-out-tanks

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Whoops, the U.S. Sent So Many Missiles to Ukraine That It Depleted Its Own Stockpiles

Some, like the Stinger missile, have been out of production for years with no easy path toward replenishment.

https://www.popularmechanics.c...les-sent-to-ukraine/

BY KYLE MIZOKAMI
MAY 10, 2022

Daily shipments of U.S. military aid to Ukraine have included thousands of anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles.

These weapons have made a definite impact on the battlefield, but the shipments have also eaten into U.S. stockpiles of arms reserved for war.
Some of the weapons, particularly the Stinger missile, haven’t been produced for years.

The Pentagon’s response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has been swift and nonstop, delivering thousands of rockets, missiles, small arms, and howitzers since the war began on February 24. The Department of Defense is now becoming a victim of its own success, however, having delivered so many weapons to Ukraine that the shipments have made a visible hole in the U.S. military’s own wartime stockpiles. Officials are already negotiating for brand-new shipments, but some weapons—out of production with no easy way to start building them again—won’t come easy.

Since the beginning of the war, the U.S. has delivered a stunning $3.8 billion in military aid to support Ukraine, according to the Department of State. It ships the weapons and supplies via Air Mobility Command transport planes across the Atlantic to military bases in Poland. From there, the equipment is sent by truck and train to Ukraine. The result has been devastating: Russia has lost at least 342 tanks and more than 1,000 armored personnel carriers and infantry fighting vehicles; a significant number of those losses can be attributed to Javelin missiles.

So far, the Department of Defense has sent at least 5,500 FGM-148 Javelin anti-tank missiles and 1,400 FIM-92E Stinger anti-aircraft missiles to Ukraine.

These are big numbers even by Pentagon standards; Mark Cancian, a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies estimates the U.S. has sent Ukraine about one-third of its total inventory of Javelin missiles, and one-quarter of its stockpile of Stinger missiles. The stockpiles are maintained worldwide to ensure the armed forces can respond to emergencies across the globe—from Russia in Europe, to China and North Korea in Asia— and even respond to multiple emergencies simultaneously.


The United States, Poland, and Estonia have sent Javelins to Ukraine, weapons that all three countries will eventually need to replace. The Javelin missile, first issued in the mid-1990s, is still in production. To replenish those stockpiles, Lockheed Martin is set to ramp up production of the Javelin from 2,100 a year to 4,000 missiles a year. Although that sounds like a lot of missiles, it would still take two years at that rate just to backfill America’s Javelin inventory. The company will also require additional time to set up the supply chain to provide parts for the missiles, no small feat considering the global shortage of semiconductors, which the Javelin’s guidance system is reliant upon.


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Another lag in the schedule is a lengthy delivery time, which is currently 32 months— meaning missiles are delivered 32 months after the missiles are ordered. Unless this is shortened by boosting production, it will take nearly three years for the first new missiles to get to troops in the field.


Producing more Stinger missiles will be trickier. Stinger was first introduced in the 1980s, and according to Cancian, the U.S. ceased buying the missiles in 2003. Raytheon’s Stinger production line was sustained for another 17 years on overseas orders, but finally closed in December 2020. The Stinger is a decades-old part design that is obsolete by modern standards, and many of its components, including microchips, are no longer in production. Raytheon’s CEO says it will take six to 12 months to restart the production line, and it will redesign the missile’s seeker, which sees in both infrared and ultraviolet light, to use currently available components.

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Replenishing the supply of Stingers and Javelins will take months to years. Fortunately, demand is now reduced. Thanks in large part to both weapons, the Russian Army is in shambles, and is only a threat to its smallest neighbors; Russia’s difficulties might well make China think twice before making the decision to invade Taiwan. The U.S. and its allies may have bought themselves some time with their decision to send arms to Ukraine.

The supply issues the U.S. is facing could have been even worse if the Army and Marines found themselves fighting a war on multiple fronts. The Ukraine war will force the Pentagon to confront the issue of how to surge production on weapons in emergencies, allowing the government to receive new-build weapons in weeks, not months or years. A future conflict may depend on both government and industry getting this right.

quote:

Originally posted by sigcrazy7:

quote:

Originally posted by SIGnified:

It’s more than double what we budget for our own customs border patrol, But I guess there’s no issue there is there?

$40 billion dollars ain’t for free; no matter how you try to spin it bro .

This is why we are in the inflation shit. People rationalize stupid fucking behavior and then endorse it.

I don’t know about you, but I’ll be fine even if inflation hits 50%.

It appears you didn’t read my post because you have sidestepped my point entirely. Perhaps we should take those aging Javelins, which would need rotation anyway, and send them to the Border Patrol. Would that help with inflation?

Money is fungible. Existing weapons are not. Don’t conflate the two.

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The round consists of the missile environmentally sealed in the launch tube assembly (LTA) and the battery coolant unit (BCU). The round has a 10-year shelf life. The only requirement for maintenance is for stockpile surveillance.
https://www.inetres.com/gp/mil...tiarmor/Javelin.html