Ballistic missle defense goes online in Romina. Ww3 approaching

a reply to: Orionhunter88

Any missile system can be turned offensive if you do it right. They'd need a lot of Tomahawks to threaten Russia though. It's slow, non-stealthy, and fairly easy to shoot down, even by relatively weak air defense systems.

iirc, a few years ago Lavarov threatened conventional attacks against the installations themselves.

a reply to: FlyingFox

If they are stupid enough to attack a defensive only system in a NATO country then that is their own death. How quickly Russia forgets they persuaded Obama to drop the plans only to invade Ukraine and threaten NATO countries.

Once again Russian actions creating the very situation they are bitching about.

a reply to: Zaphod58

I don't see any way the BMD interceptors could possibly be used offensively.

The targeting and tracking system is designed for one kind of target with one kind of kinematics in one area of space, and the warheads are inert and have no re-entry capability.

There is no strategic challenge to Russia. The interceptors are far too few, and far too lacking in capability vs modern Russian strategic weapons.

originally posted by: Substracto
In other words, Russia might be offended with a defensive system, just like my neighbours get offended when I'm playing loud music. Nothing new.

It's more like your gangster neighbors getting upset when you install locks and an alarm on your property, and threatening to bust you up.

a reply to: mbkennel

and they play the persecuted card in the end, thats Russia alright.

a reply to: mbkennel

The SM series was also originally designed as surface to surface missiles as well as interceptors. That has recently been added back to the SM-2. The software in the SM-3 borrows some of the same software. It would require a software update but it could be done. As they are now, it would be almost impossible though.

i must say... Romanian women are among the hottest in the world.

Just wanted to put that out there

a reply to: peskyhumans

Globes are your friend. Russia and the us share a border.

WW3... is not good ...

a reply to: Zaphod58

It is true that any missile system can be turned offensive but this is a land based Aegis system... The Mk 41 is already used to launch tomahawks... So they do not have to modify anything.. they just have to load one instead of the other.. They can be fired from each location in every NATO country, plus ships and submarines... So there could be plenty to go around if needed..... And if you would, please share where you got your information about tomahawks. From what i recall, we have different variants.. Some that are pretty fast... No comment on flight capability.. But they are not really easy to shoot down... And they can deliver different payloads as well.. There is a reason Russia is worried about this system being deployed... It worries me too...

But here is a little information that is in the public domain about this system...

The ships are armed with 56 Raytheon Tomahawk cruise missiles, with a combination of land-attack (TLAM) missiles with a Tercom aided navigation system, and anti-ship missiles with inertial guidance. The Standard SM-2MR block 4 surface-to-air missiles with command / inertial guidance remain at the centre of the Aegis system. Both Tomahawk and Standard missiles are fired from two Lockheed Martin mk41 vertical launch systems.

www.naval-technology.com...

. The Romanian deployment would use SM-3 Block 1B missiles from an emplaced Mk.41 VLS launcher, and be controlled by a SPY-1D radar and AEGIS BMD 5.0.1 combat system. An interim setup was formally commissioned in October 2014.

If successfully deployed, this is a defense against short and medium range missiles (SRBMs & MRBMs), with some capability against intermediate range missiles in the 1,850-3,500 mile class (IRBMs). On the other hand, the location of these defenses still leaves central Europe mostly unprotected.

www.defenseindustrydaily.com...

No modification needed... Just loading it with something else.. And if this is to protect Europe, why do the first ones still leave most of Europe unprotected?

a reply to: Orionhunter88

The Tomahawk is a subsonic missile, and always has been. It's also not stealthy. That's one of the reasons that they salvo them in such large numbers. Against a low level defense system, such as those used in Iraq, they've proven to be pretty successful. As many as 6 were shot down in Desert Storm. Against the defense systems that Russia has, they'll have a much harder time getting through.

The current version is the BGM-109C or D with the E about to enter service. There was an antiship version that was removed from service, as well as a ground launched version that was also removed from service.

a reply to: Zaphod58

I understand the capabilities of the tomahawk.. but the point was.. they are all fired out of the Mk 41 VLS system.. So it is a possibility that this system can be used offensively very easliy.. the systems have improved since the 90's as well... And i know the E variant too. I was wondering if you had first hand knowledge of these systems....

originally posted by: combatmaster
i must say... Romanian women are among the hottest in the world.

Just wanted to put that out there

Lol I've met a few in Jackson, Wyoming that swayed me to second that motion.
If you've ever heard the question "Would you like whipped cream on that?" spoken with a Romanian accent, it's all over.


On topic, the EU is definitely going through some interesting restructuring lately.
NATO is right in there staking their claim.

a reply to: tsurfer2000h

Russia has shown it doesn't look to the future, as Putin enjoys living in the past.

Just like America whose stuck in the cold war era days when they believed were the dominated party right? or how they are bullying the Chinese over South China's seas?

As for Crimea if the citizens wanted to return to Kiev and the corrupted backed western government they would already done so.

but their neighbors are tired of the bs coming from Russia

The same neighbors that are occupied by NATO. And have their own internal issues.

a reply to: Raven95

Bullying China....you do understand China built islands in international waters that are illegal?

You do understand the fact that you cannot just build an island and say you own those waters because you built an island there?

As for Crimea...they have no means to fight Russia, and the threat of nukes by Russia keep that from happening. Again you seem to have fallen victim to the same Russian propaganda others have fallen for here.

So those neighbors who aren't in NATO such as Georgia, Ukraine, may have internal issues that doesn't give Russia free reign to invade and annex part of it because they feel like it.

But feel free to show where annexing a piece of a sovereign country is legal because that country has internal problems and you think you should own it again?

a reply to: tsurfer2000h

What the Chinese are doing is nothing that the US has not done. They just built islands instead of claiming islands as territory.. And the islands that China built are in the South China Sea...

U.S. Territories and Outlying Areas are Puerto Rico, Guam, U.S. Virgin Islands, American Samoa, Northern Mariana Islands, Midway Islands, Wake Island, Johnston Atoll,Baker, Howland, and Jarvis Islands, Kingman Reef, Navassa Island,Palmyra Atoll...
And we have a state named Hawaii that happens to be 2,390 miles from the mainland.. All territory claimed by the US... But when China claims territory in the waters off its coast that are on the other side of the world from the US, the US has a problem with it and calls it bullying... So why is it OK for the US to do it, but not anyone else? Because of the nationalistic spirit... It is "us vs. them"... and that way of thinking is what will lead to WWIII....

But feel free to show where annexing a piece of a sovereign country is legal because that country has internal problems and you think you should own it again?

As For Crimea..

About 93% of Crimean voters have backed joining Russia and seceding from Ukraine, exit polls have suggested.

Crimea exit polls

I guess the BBC feel for Russia propoganda too...

Cirmea did not want to fight Russia. A majority of their population are Russian anyway... If they are sovereign then their vote should be enough to show that it was not illegal... The only reason the US does not like it, is because it did not go the way they wanted it.. They had no issue backing a coup in Ukraine... but a vote is illegitimate? Depends on what the Western propoganda machine tells you... We have one too.

I remember when people on this site did not trust Uncle Sam.. But when it comes to foreign policies, then they are telling to truth.. When a war is one of the ways to try and get us out of a financial mess this country is in... They need us to fight.. The ones who profit off of war never do... This is a chess game and they are positioning pieces... If Russia and China were putting missiles on the Canadian border and the Mexican border, the United States of America would go ballistic... Like they almost did with the Cuban Missile Crisis... But we do it to Russia, they should just live with it... It is to Protect Europe from Iran.. Because they are going to bomb them, even though they are trying to do business with them... And the only thing stopping them from doing business is the Sanctions that the US has imposed on them.. We all know the Government always tells the truth about their plans and follow the terms of their agreements.. Step outside your comfort zone as see this from the another point of view.. Or just read the history of the US...

a reply to: Orionhunter88

Artificial Islands are not sovereign and therefore have no territorial sea or territorial airspace attached. So no, its not the same as outlying possessions of other nations.

a reply to: Orionhunter88

I guess the BBC feel for Russia propoganda too...

Cirmea did not want to fight Russia. A majority of their population are Russian anyway... If they are sovereign then their vote should be enough to show that it was not illegal... The only reason the US does not like it, is because it did not go the way they wanted it.. They had no issue backing a coup in Ukraine... but a vote is illegitimate? Depends on what the Western propoganda machine tells you... We have one too.

Only a small fraction of Crimeans voted. On top of that it's been shown that the numbers initially reported were off by a large amount. Regardless, any vote done at the barrel of a gun is illegitimate.

I also didn't realize that people were still pushing this coup narrative. Yanukovych was stealing billions of dollars from the Ukrainian people. His own party voted to impeach him. Russia even said that the elections for his replacement were legitimate. How can you still believe there was a coup when even Russia thinks Yanukovych's removal and Poroshenko's election were legitimate?

a reply to: Xcalibur254

It's so foolish. Russia could have negotiated a swap of Crimea (which does have lots of Russians) for other things, territory and money, and rights for the Ukrainian Navy to keep its bases as well. (Russia stole Ukrainian Navy bases & vessels as well.)

You know, be a friend or business partner, instead of a thug. But Russia doesn't emotionally seem able to treat its neighbors like that, and hasn't for a thousand years. That's why they project onto NATO, falsely, that it is a empire imposed by Washington & London onto European vassal states instead of the truth, a mutual alliance voluntarily entered by mostly democracies.

E pluribus unum applies to NATO.

In 1991 all sorts of nations could have left NATO at the end of the Cold War, just like many vamoosed from the Warsaw Pact. If NATO and Warsaw Pact were similarly evil empires, then you would have seen nations leaving both and forming their own thing---they did, politically, in the EU but they stayed with NATO too. There's a reason for that.