We’re not completely ignoring ISIS, we’ve been bombing them. What we aren’t willing to do is put a lot of boots on the ground because Syria is not that important to us. So yes, in terms of realpolitik they are only a slightly larger annoyance to us than say Boko Haram. Who we are ignoring.

We don’t use them anymore but the F-18 can use TER and I think MERs. So the 500lbs load is somewhere between 8 and 24 without using the center station. If we went back to saturation bombing we’d bring these back.

An F-18 carries four 2000lb bombs in comparison to 24 on the B-1. So six F-18s is equivalent to one B-1 for that load out.

Worked for the Romans. Not many Carthagenians around.

The best thing the French could do is call the Turkish ambassador in and state “We’re sending the Kurds 80 AMX-10RC we’re going to retire anyway, some VABs and heavy artillery and the French Foreign Legion to train. What you want in compensation because it’s happening starting tomorrow”

Obama, the guy that had Osama killed and his dead carcass dropped into the ocean? The guy that is willing to kill bad guys with hellfires in so-called friendly countries? The guy that authorized the Stuxnet cyber attack on Iranian centrifuges?

Collateral damage most likely.

Woah…really? Some of the more nasty fighting was between folks that were “all the same religion”.

Which word in “World War” confuses you? Sure we could go but

Yes, I meant unmanned NASA. Manned space is a different beastie.

I would love to follow the Swiss model. I’m pretty certain that for the RTKBA folks not so much.

Jeez louise, these are the core components of a SAM battery and probably the most expensive bits. There’s no reason to ship these to Syria without also shipping the TELs unless these are replacements needed to reconstitute an existing damaged S-300 Syrian installation. Which IIRC they ain’t got any until recently to…

Here is your premise:

Because the whole meme that the US people in 2015 doesn’t understand the military and that there’s some great divide between civs and veterans isn’t supported by data or history.

No, what I’m saying is that if we gave NASA the same missions that the USAF/NRO has they’d get it done for half the price.

As much as folks bitch about the inefficiencies of NASA they do a whole lot better job than the USAF in terms of bang for the buck.

It’s a stupid article comparing current service vs WWII. No shit it’s dramatically less.

Actually, current percentage of population in uniform is not an all time low at 0.46%. In fact it’s on par with the War of 1812 (we probably should have stepped up our game on that one), Mexican American War and Spanish American War. While the chart is from 2004 you can see that most peacetime percentages prior to…

“The country wants to come out and thank these veterans,” said Paul Rieckhoff, executive director of IAVA. “We’ve already seen one celebration in St. Louis, and we’re hearing from other communities who want to do more. Rather than have a scattering of parades here and there, we think it should be a coordinated effort.”

Nothing wrong with the Judge as long as you get the rounds designed for it. It’s just a tad expensive to practice with at $0.80 a round for Federal #4 buck compared with $0.20 for 9mm from wallyworld.