Posted on 04/30/2024 4:02:07 PM PDT by hardspunned
The Israeli Air Force is set to bid farewell to its aging Patriot missile defense systems in the coming months, replacing the batteries with more advanced air defenses, the military said Tuesday.
In February, the IAF said it was in the process of closing several Patriot batteries, and its staff would be trained to operate the Iron Dome instead.
(Excerpt) Read more at timesofisrael.com ...
deorbiting needs propulsion, and quite a lot of energy. Also re-entry generates lots of heat, more so than powered flight. And the thing stays hot.
Rocks don’t just “fall” at orbital speeds.
There are a heck of a lot of smart guys who have been working these problems for decades.
Well missile defense has been around for a while; long enough for unfriendly countries to look for ways defeat the missile shield. That the problem with having so many powerful toys. People fear and fear motivates people to look for ways to circumvent so their weapons get to their targets. The unfriendly countries aren’t like the US, where hubris and a need to show off your capabilities. (shock and awe). They don’t show off what they have, usually. Before the war started in the Ukraine, both Russia and China showed they have weapons capable of taking out satellites.
Shh! You'll interrupt their circle jerk.
It's so cute they think the Patriot was developed to take down Scuds, etc.
Unfortunately for Israel and the West, the Iranian ballistic missiles not meant to be targeted and shot down, hit their targets. Those three targets, two air bases and an intel outpost, have the absolute best air defense both Israel and the U.S. can field. The Iranians didn’t even need to use their hypersonic missiles. Talk about overkill. No wonder the Israelis put up four chintzy quad copters in retaliation and folded. Imagine what the Russians or Chicoms are capable of.
I was wandering through Comdex and checking out some new products. Standing next to me was Jerry Pournelle. We didn't speak. Just a coincidence of interest in products at the same time.
IIRC, in the first month of action Iraq fired a total of 48 at scuds against American positions that had the new Patriot interceptors. Only 1 of those scuds hit target. The other 47 were either blown out of the sky by a Patriot, or the Patriot exploded near enough to the scud to deflect it off course. 47 out of 48 is a good success rate.
Later in the war the military tried to use the Patriot to intercept scuds not coming directly at targets near the Patriot. In other words, the Patriot would have to chase down the scud. That's when the "failures" would happen (in quotes because the first version weren't designed for that, though it was probably good ways to test it to learn what had to be upgraded). That's what the "Star Wars" mocking media told us about over and over in the Iraq war to "prove" they were right all along to say that Reagan's missile defense was a pipe dream and couldn't happen. But that'd be like saying a submarine is a failure if it can't act well as an aircraft carrier -- something it wasn't designed to do. And of course, lessons were learned since then (in part from testing the early Patriot beyond it's original intended scope) and newer versions can handle those situations better.
It seems like the Patriot Act ended up being much like the Patriot Defense System:
It was originally aimed at one set of targets (foreign terrorists), but then was "upgraded" for a different set of targets (American Citizens).
Its a common evolution in military history.
The German 88mm AA gun became a mainstay of their antitank arsenal. The French 75mm 1897 field gun ended up being developed into the main armament of the Sherman tank (they could share ammunition). The Thunderbolt and Corsair were developed as air superiority fighters but ended up primarily used as fighter-bombers.
On and on its a long list.
I first met Mr. Pournelle at a party in Philippe Kahns estate in Santa Cruz. After that, several times at Science Fiction conventions. My wife knew him quite well, being a habitual attendee at these things.
Could Ukraine Get Israel’s Mothballed Patriot Air Defense Batteries [ PAC-2 GEM-T version 1999 versions ]?
As Ukraine sits in dire need of air defenses, Israel will reportedly place all its Patriot systems into storage over the next two months.
https://www.twz.com/land/could-ukraine-get-israels-mothballed-patriot-air-defense-batteries
Nice. There were 3 people in my DeMolay chapter that were frequent dinner guests at the home of Gene Roddenberry. They contributed many concepts that ended up on the Star Trek series. I was never a part of that, but found it interesting. I always read Pournelle's articles, so his name was familiar on that chance Comdex encounter.
David Korn (of Korn shell fame) is the only person of note that I interacted with in the past. I worked for PacBell and had full source to the Korn shell. I ported it to 30 different platforms. When I found a portability issue, I sent it to David. Most of the time I received a "thank you" and the update was applied. David was a regular attendee at UseNIX, so we did have a few in-person chats. The last time I saw him, he had his entire family in tow at UseNIX. His son was speaking at the event.
If you believe Iran fired almost 200 fixed wing drones, 30+ cruise missiles, and over 100 medium range ballistic missiles in order to inflict almost zero damage as some kind of warning, put down the crack pipe...
And Bugs only had 35 years to retiremen!
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