Pooky

The handbag is a traditional British weapon of political intimidation, dating back to the late ‘70s and 80s https://www.vogue.co.uk/fashion/article/margaret-thatcher-handbag

Unfortunately, it is totally believable 🙁

S-300 is old, too. Turkey got dropped from the F-35 program for opting to purchase the S-400 system from Russia. The S-500 entered service with the Russian military in 2021

The Russians shot one down. 🙁 And we didn’t give any to the Israelis. In fact, the MOD has considered buying the Israeli Rampage stand-off weapon to replace the Storm Shadows we sent to Ukraine.

The radar was targeted to prove a point, that Iran can’t see or stop an Israeli attack. Reports have no more than 3 weapons launched by the Israelis, likely from somewhere over Syria, to show that the weapons can be launched without Iran being able to do anything about them. It also showed that whereas Israel stopped a 300+ weapon attack, Iran never even saw the Israeli attack, which destroyed the intended target with precision and impunity.

It wasn’t a HARM, they don’t have enough range. And the anti-radar weapon type is a red herring. The radar was targeted to prove a point. There are reports out there regarding the weapon type, why the Iranians never saw it coming and why they are now downplaying the whole incident.

If, as the article says, the weapon was launched “far from Israeli or Iranian airspace” then the 160nm range isn’t enough to reach Natanz from outside Iran. Most likely theory now is either a Silver Sparrow, or modified Blue Sparrow air-launched ballistic missile, fired from Syrian airspace. Range is 1,250nm, which is easily enough and the Iranians don’t have much that will pick up a ballistic trajectory. The irony here is that Israel usually uses these without a warhead to mimic Iranian ballistic missile to test their missile defence systems. 🤣

Does it need an active signal for homing? If the missile crew never saw it coming, it’s doubtful the radar ever went active. I’m still going with the anti-radar aspect being a red herring, to throw interested parties off the scent of how they did it. Plus, it fits with the IDF not giving anything away. I mean, they still haven’t said they did it. ☠️

Range is around 60nm, so that doesn’t work in this scenario. Israel’s own Delilah, with a range upward of 160nm is more likely, but again, that’s at 28,000ft. Plus, unlike the M2.0 HARM, the Delilah is a M0.7 cruise munition, so that doesn’t work either. No, this is something else.

Don’t touch the border, unless it’s the House bill and that the steaming pile of excrement that originated in the retirement home, aka the Senate. It may be low-down, dirty politics, but it’s one of the most effective policy arguments the GOP has against this admiration and it’s great grandparents in the Senate come November.

It would be news. ARM’s are not terrain-following weapons. If I recall correctly, they need an active radar signal to target, which means it’s guidance would become active at within the S-300’s active scanning range, which would also mean it needed to be at altitude to get a signal lock (LOS and curvature of the Earth, etc.) It would be a surprise to anyone. A more likely scenario is that Israel had already identified the target and the anti-radar suggestion is a red herring. They may even have had a man on the ground painting the target for final guidance. Lastly, as someone who advocated against an Israeli response, I will hold my hands up and say I was wrong. This response is even better than just taking the win for stopping the Iranian mass attack. It tells them “We can stop you every time, we can hit you any time and there is nothing you can do about it.” If you’re going to send a message, it’s a pretty good one. 👍🏻

Still brighter than Biden 🤣

The world’s most popular airliner is in trouble again. After Alaska Flight 1282 on Jan 5th lost a “permanently” secured exit hatch on climb out, a number of airlines are grounding the type again due to safety concerns Watch: Inside Alaska Airlines plane after part blows off mid-air https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-67900834 Thankfully this time the flight was still in its initial climb-out, low enough to avoid explosive decompression, with all passengers seated and belted in. Boeing must be thanking their lucky stars this didn’t happen at 38,000 ft. The continuing quality control issues at Boeing must be making the execs at Airbus more than a little happy right now.