(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Ukraine needs an Air Force - Russia needs a miracle. [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.', 'Backgroundurl Avatar_Large', 'Nickname', 'Joined', 'Created_At', 'Story Count', 'N_Stories', 'Comment Count', 'N_Comments', 'Popular Tags'] Date: 2023-02-10 This is really the bottom line for Ukraine I think, and it is more than just about an air force. I do completely agree with General Hodges take on this war and have since it started. He is a great commander. Great vision I think. Great sense of history. Just a straight up guy. Says exactly what he means. I have sure not been bashful about Ukraine needing an air force to end this. They just do. Faster they get one the faster this ends. It has to be F-16s or maybe some F-15s and I think A-10s for ground attack once in an air superiority situation. Maybe even gun ships if the sky was clear enough I guess. It is real simple why It will need to be American 4th generation fighters. There is only about 60 Mig 29s out there in NATO countries. About 500 Typhoons/ Eurofighters. About 900 Tornados if you count those. There are over 4,000 F-16s. Really just math. And we are sure phasing F-15s and F-16s out as we turn to F-35 5th generation fighters and I think likely a 6th generation fighter is coming. F-16s are indeed a multi role fighter. But I do think they fly too fast and need more punch then a 20mm cannon for low level stuff - strafing and the like to attack formations. SO yeah — I sure do think they need slower stuff with more guns to hit low — which it can, with cover above. SO low level fights need to be with something like Warthogs or similar. They need to be able to strike in like diamond fours, circular and repeating strikes and put out fields of fire to break up infantry and armor formations. I know our fighters in WWII, an individual fighter, could strike about a 100 yard width. More or less. The pilot would set the guns to converge at a given distance. I know dad set them for 350 yards — more or less than that shoots a field of fire in a given area. In a diamond four — four fighters are coming at you constantly with four behind that and four behind that and four coming behind that, you know? Repeating patterns. A circle — and there would be three other groups behind them. I think usually four diamond fours at a time. 16 planes. So you can see — nothing gets out of that field of fire alive. Nothing. I still think four wings are needed— about 280 fighters to pull it off. I believe Ukraine thinks that too more or less. The absolute and complete bullshit that their pilots can’t handle these quickly — is complete bullshit. Like an excuse or something for not doing it. Just amazing how fast one can learn something if you are stressed enough, ain’t it. Ukraine has sure proven that in spades. Same for ground crews. Jesus Christ, they can fucking hire contractors for support for this if necessary. Now I really do think we took this into account some time ago in any event. Safe bet that there is more going on behind the scenes that are not public in any event — and they are not stupid. Russia bluffs and puffs — our military will sneak up behind you and hit you with a baseball bat! I know. Really — if there was an AVG today (google it) — there would be lines around the block of our ex - pilots if it came to that. Thousands of ex-pilots and all out there. Fuck, I grew up with those guys. Complete ego maniacs, certain they are indestructible. So self assured, so cocky. I think why it makes them so likeable. Really, they are more like hunters. In fact they are hunters. And real fucking good at it. So are Ukrainian pilots right now! That Mig-29 is a 4th generation fighter you know. Just like an F-16 is a 4th generation fighter. I’d remember that. Aren't reinventing the wheel here. And if it were our guys up — boy will they get paid a lot. I think an AVG pilot in China got 4K per kill — something like that. I mean the Army was paying 150 a month at the time. Hodges is right about this you know — if Russia is going to throw their hail Mary in the east — Ukraine should strike to their right and go after Crimea. He is absolutely right that the Russian center will implode. Crimea is the war. The east will collapse after that is taken back. And I think that will be the swan song for Putin IMHO. I am so sure he is right in this. Jesus — Ukraine does NOT have to win there in the east — just hold and turn it into a 3 to 1 defensive advantage. And just contain and tie their force up. Bleed it out. Russia is losing probably at least 3,000 effectives a day killed and wounded. They can’t last that long here. Crimea is held together with a VERY tenuous LOC. Three bridges and a port. On the M17 and M18 highway, the bridge at Kerch and an already untenable port at Sevastopol. Don’t really need to attack the peninsula directly I think— just lay siege and it will be untenable. Crimea is the war. All ends where it starts in the final analysis. They do need to attack at Melitopol though I suppose for various reasons. But I think Ukraine is so close to pulling this off — I really do. I sure as hell hope so. One thing for sure — Ukraine is really good at war. I want them in NATO — they are so fucking good. As good as we are — maybe better in a way. Total respect for them. Probably the next two months are going to be decisive — one way or another — cause Russia is going to throw everything they got at Ukraine now. They have no choice and they are not ready. But they know that if they wait too long Ukraine could be really loaded for bear. I am sure many think this way — that if Russia is struggling to supply there soldiers now then how in the hell could it hope to supply additional forces for these attacks? Lets do the math — say they somehow come up with 300,000 soldiers and lose 90,000 effectives a month equals they are totally screwed. IMHO I really do not have much time to post now — so you know. [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/2/10/2152099/-Ukraine-needs-an-Air-Force-Russia-needs-a-miracle Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/