So, which is more unsettling -- this latest development in projected US military technology...

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...or the fact the name of the country is now apparently CONUS?

"CONUS! Building better cones for you!"

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 15:28 (twenty-two years ago)

I say they all bend over so we can kick them in the conus. (NOTE: I have not visited the link.)

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 15:42 (twenty-two years ago)

Who do the Neo-cons con? They CONUS.

And yeah, the rest of the world is really going to be happy about us building that thing. "We've got our eyes on you, people! If you so much as burn a flag, we will rain remote-controlled terror from your skies in less than 2 hours!" Americans are so damn lovable, aren't we?

― JesseFox (JesseFox), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 16:07 (twenty-two years ago)

why i could just eat you

― stevem (blueski), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 16:09 (twenty-two years ago)

Saying "glide bombs straight from the conus" has me all wet and itchy.

― Sommermute (Wintermute), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 16:12 (twenty-two years ago)

Or to put it another way, "MEIN FÜHRER! I can WALK!"

― Sommermute (Wintermute), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 16:16 (twenty-two years ago)

the problem I have with this is that HCV sounds too much like HGV. I can't prevent myself from imagining it in Eddie Stobart livery and a ruddy-cheeked 50-year-old with a checked shirt and a sunburned right arm leaning out and asking somebody if they know the way to Tehran.

― j0e (j0e), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 16:20 (twenty-two years ago)

furry dice of mass destruction

― j0e (j0e), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 16:25 (twenty-two years ago)

This is like if the US was the teacher scolding her students for throwing spit-balls by throwing faster more accurate more deadly spitballs.

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 16:48 (twenty-two years ago)

I saw some other crazy story where they had some type of crazy new electronic gun setup that could shoot a million rounds a minute.

Why they would need to shoot that many rounds a minute, I don't know, but that is what the crazy story at the CNN site was stating.

― earlnash, Tuesday, 1 July 2003 17:09 (twenty-two years ago)

Our government already has the power to blow up the world, so it's not like this makes much of a difference in terms of "DEAR GOD NO"

― Curt1s St3ph3ns, Tuesday, 1 July 2003 17:20 (twenty-two years ago)

(As an aside, anyone who's done military work has seen plenty of CONUS before.)

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 17:56 (twenty-two years ago)

I assume that Hawaii, Puerto Rico ect ect are the ONUS (Oceanic United States).

― MarkH (MarkH), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 18:45 (twenty-two years ago)

are you people really unfamiliar with the term continental united states?

― James Blount (James Blount), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 18:52 (twenty-two years ago)

I had never heard that ridiculous acronym before, at least.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 18:55 (twenty-two years ago)

well let me drop another bombshell - guess what POTUS stands for?

― James Blount (James Blount), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 18:56 (twenty-two years ago)

President Of The conUS

― Stuart (Stuart), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 18:59 (twenty-two years ago)

That million round per minute gun doesn't fire a million rounds, just as you don't have to drive 30 miles to be doing 30mph.

― Stuart (Stuart), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 19:00 (twenty-two years ago)

>Why they would need to shoot that many rounds a minute, I don't
> know, but that is what the crazy story at the CNN site was stating.

You could do a lot of interesting things, such as the "wall of bullets" mentioned in the article. In theory. No one has still explained to me how you could build a practical device that carried 1,000,000+ rounds of ammo. Even if you could carry 100,000 rounds, that's a 6 second burst before you run out.

"Smart" bombs have shown to be very overhyped as it is. This CONUS thing will be worthless without good intelligence to figure out what you want to hit in two hours. And judging by how the Iraq war went, our intel sucks. (multiple failed Saddam assasinations, No WMD, etc)

― fletrejet, Tuesday, 1 July 2003 19:04 (twenty-two years ago)

"Smart" bombs have shown to be very overhyped as it is - depends on which smart bombs you're talking about

― James Blount (James Blount), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 19:13 (twenty-two years ago)

I have to say CONUS is standing in the corner wearing the dunce's cap on this one.

The MOnumentally Mistaken US, or...

― Momus (Momus), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 19:31 (twenty-two years ago)

am I the only one who thinks this works against the rumsfeld doctrine?

― James Blount (James Blount), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 19:44 (twenty-two years ago)

Fletrejet: How on earth can a SAW gun have a firing rate of 750 Rounds/Minute when the magazine only carries 200 rounds?!?!

Uh... because you run out of bullets after 16 seconds. 200 rounds in 16 seconds is 750 rounds per minute. 1000 rounds in .06 seconds is 1,000,000 rounds per minute. This million round gun probalby has multiple barrels and is electronically triggered. It also probably uses a caseless round where the bullet is fused to the charge instead of being held together by a shell, so you don't have to spend time throwing the shell out of the chamber, you basically just run a line of rounds through the barrel and they fire the instant they're aligned.

The "wall" of bullets application is exactly why they call the Close In Weapons System on navy ships that can shoot down incoming missiles and artillery the "Phalanx" - and it only fires 3000 rounds/minute. It's capacity is 1550 rounds.

― Stuart (Stuart), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 19:49 (twenty-two years ago)

Why, James?

― Stuart (Stuart), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 19:50 (twenty-two years ago)

In other words the United States will be able, using aircraft based on its own territory, to strike at individual targets without warning and without the need for foreign bases.

So basically, our big, bad and mighty will be able to continue what they already do, without bothering with those irritating diplomacy measures....

(*ahem* my inner cynic has just started screaming...)

― Nichole Graham (Nichole Graham), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 19:51 (twenty-two years ago)

Nichole, don't you hate it when we have to sell out and compromise our high moral standards to some shitbag neighboring country just to use their bases or airspace to attack the enemy?

― Stuart (Stuart), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 19:52 (twenty-two years ago)

Stuart, since when has the US operated any differently?

― Nichole Graham (Nichole Graham), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 19:58 (twenty-two years ago)

That's a mean thing to say about Canada, Stuart.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 20:00 (twenty-two years ago)

differently how?

― Stuart (Stuart), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 20:00 (twenty-two years ago)

we haven't attacked canada... yet

― Stuart (Stuart), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 20:01 (twenty-two years ago)

and when we do we won't be negotiating for basing rights

― Stuart (Stuart), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 20:01 (twenty-two years ago)

nichole are you under the impression that countries whose bases we use aren't compensated?

― Stuart (Stuart), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 20:02 (twenty-two years ago)

It makes Reagan look like a dreamy-eyed peacenik with his sweet little Star Wars fantasy.

― jewelly (jewelly), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 20:05 (twenty-two years ago)

nichole are you under the impression that countries whose bases we use aren't compensated?

I don't doubt that they are compensated, but there is usually a lot of hand-shaking and/or arse-kissing that first needs to go with the process; with this new piece of tech, the US will skip all that...and bomb the crap out of percieved enemies.

Why?

Because we'll have the newest "toy"...until the others get wise, and create their own clones.

― Nichole Graham (Nichole Graham), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 20:10 (twenty-two years ago)

nichole is right in pointing out that this technology is pretty much designed to remove any logistical obstacles to unilateralism.

― James Blount (James Blount), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 20:23 (twenty-two years ago)

Because we'll have the newest "toy"...until the others get wise, and create their own clones.

US spends 4% of GDP on defense. Taken as a sum this is the scariest amount of money poured into military research anywhere on Earth. The Chinese et al. can try to get wise all they want, they'll still be well and good behind us by a couple of decades. Hint: None of our submarines are diesel. Practically every other sub on the planet still is.

It is not a toy. It is a tool for ensuring continued supremacy. All nations do this. Sometime in the future we may trade ostensible empire for multinational hegemony, but even then, increasingly effective weapons are no less essential.

He who would have peace must prepare for war.

― Millar (Millar), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 20:36 (twenty-two years ago)

peace =/ continued supremacy

― amateurist (amateurist), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 20:38 (twenty-two years ago)

power vacuum = chaos

― Millar (Millar), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 20:39 (twenty-two years ago)

playing the fascist is fun

― Millar (Millar), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 20:40 (twenty-two years ago)

Stuart: I am not the fucking idiot you want me to be. My point was that if you want to shoot 1 megaround/minute, you have to carry huge amounts of ammo or you will run out very quickly, making it pretty pointless. The pictures of the gun make it out to be a small, portable device, not some huge ship mounted gun.

The Phalanx has 30 seconds of fire. At a meground/minute, it would blow its load in about 0.1 seconds. Possibly if it were computer-controlled, you could have it shoot in very very very short bursts.

― fletrejet, Tuesday, 1 July 2003 20:43 (twenty-two years ago)

Possibly if it were computer-controlled, you could have it shoot in very very very short bursts.

indeed!

― Millar (Millar), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 20:44 (twenty-two years ago)

>It is not a toy. It is a tool for ensuring continued supremacy. All
> nations do this. Sometime in the future we may trade ostensible
> empire for multinational hegemony, but even then, increasingly
> effective weapons are no less essential.

We've had the ultimate deterent for direct war against the US for years - our nukes. And for terrorists and the like which MAD doesn't work on, we are better off spending money on intelligence rather than fancy toys.

― fletrejet, Tuesday, 1 July 2003 21:04 (twenty-two years ago)

He who would have peace must prepare for war.

And how far must these "preparations" go? If the object of possessing these weapons is to bring peace, does this mean we must continue to build pieces that are more powerful than the previous one? Where does it end? The resources that we use to build them will eventually run out. Then, we may have to burn the older weapons for scrap.

― Nichole Graham (Nichole Graham), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 22:53 (twenty-two years ago)

weapons don't bring peace nichole, they maintain it: deterrent factor (that said I don't think 'deterrence' is the motivation behind this)(it is behind 'star wars' though)

― James Blount (James Blount), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 22:55 (twenty-two years ago)

(and it should be noted there hasn't been a major world war since the development of nuclear weapons)

― James Blount (James Blount), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 22:57 (twenty-two years ago)

If the object of possessing these weapons is to bring peace, does this mean we must continue to build pieces that are more powerful than the previous one?

Yes, because otherwise, someone else will (and if you are "someone else", then also yes, because someone else already has, and you must defend yourself)

Where does it end?

If the human race is extinct, turn to the LAST PAGE.
If the human race still exists, READ THIS PAGE AGAIN.

― Millar (Millar), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 23:03 (twenty-two years ago)

in disagreeing with james I think this weapon is one of the most powerful deterrent systems we could possibly field given conventional technology

― Millar (Millar), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 23:12 (twenty-two years ago)

As a deterrent, it would only scare other countries for so long, however. Then, more millions would have to go into research to create a newer weapon.

― Nichole Graham (Nichole Graham), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 23:20 (twenty-two years ago)

nichole - that's different from every other military advance how?

― James Blount (James Blount), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 23:39 (twenty-two years ago)

James, that's the sad thing: all these years and advances in technology, yet the US is still relying on the same tired strategies

― Nichole Graham (Nichole Graham), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 23:49 (twenty-two years ago)

ha - if you believe this trend started with or is specific to the us you're very mistaken (ie. we didn't start the fire)

― James Blount (James Blount), Tuesday, 1 July 2003 23:55 (twenty-two years ago)

Am I the first person to notice that the HCV conception painting is almost identical to the Aurora (which was the secret Area 51 airplane that supposedly never existed, but caused sonic booms all over the LA basin in the late 80s/early 90s)

― Chris Barrus (Chris Barrus), Wednesday, 2 July 2003 00:08 (twenty-two years ago)

I thought the Aurora was supposed to replace the Blackbird?

― James Blount (James Blount), Wednesday, 2 July 2003 00:17 (twenty-two years ago)

I wouldn't be surprised to see more advanced airframes co-opted to build UAVs from here on out - the F-22 and the JSF are well and good obsolete from a price-to-performance ratio compared with some of the UAVs already in advanced stages of development. Deep Blue, meet carrier landings.

― Millar (Millar), Wednesday, 2 July 2003 00:33 (twenty-two years ago)

and it should be noted there hasn't been a major world war since the development of nuclear weapons)

Wulll...right, not world war as such. But so what? The two things we called "World Wars" -- which was really all part of the same thing, with a halftime break -- were just that era's expression of warfare. Warfare naturally changed afterward, because the political circumstances changed. But that just meant that the big guys didn't face off directly. There was always war going on -- maybe nothing as concentrated as WWI or II, but if you tally up the last 50 years, there's a pretty big pile of bodies. Our weapons have not brought us peace. And they will continue to not bring us peace. Peace isn't what they're there for.

― JesseFox (JesseFox), Wednesday, 2 July 2003 03:54 (twenty-two years ago)

maybe nothing as concentrated as WWI or II - ding ding ding! - no nuclear weapons and the us vs. the soviet union and the us vs. china are wars, not occasional incidents

― James Blount (James Blount), Wednesday, 2 July 2003 04:08 (twenty-two years ago)

Yeah, and that's an advance of sorts, but it's one of those walk-halfway-to-the-door traps. You can keep building your military presence and deterrent capabilities ad infinitum, or until you bankrupt the country (hello Russia, hello Louis XIV, hello huge stinking heap of collapsed empires), but none of that ever actually produces "peace." There's big difference between people not hitting you because they're scared and people not hitting you because they don't want to. Long-term, I'm much more interested in fostering the latter than the former.

― JesseFox (JesseFox), Wednesday, 2 July 2003 04:42 (twenty-two years ago)

And also, I don't think you can call what went on during the Cold War just occasional incidents. Our proxy wars were constant, and they were brutal. Add up the death tolls from Southeast Asia, sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America from the last 50 years. It's a big, huge number.

― JesseFox (JesseFox), Wednesday, 2 July 2003 04:45 (twenty-two years ago)

but they were still proxy wars

― James Blount (James Blount), Wednesday, 2 July 2003 04:49 (twenty-two years ago)

For us. Not so much for the people in them.

― JesseFox (JesseFox), Wednesday, 2 July 2003 05:29 (twenty-two years ago)

no offense - but in terms of scale they don't compare

― James Blount (James Blount), Wednesday, 2 July 2003 05:38 (twenty-two years ago)

are you really saying there's no difference between a regional conflict and a world war cuz hey, war's war?

― James Blount (James Blount), Wednesday, 2 July 2003 05:39 (twenty-two years ago)

No, I'm saying that we're still fighting world wars. The forms have changed, for the better, but not as much as we'd like to pretend -- I mean, the worldwide war toll for the Cold War era was in the millions -- tens of millions if you count collateral damage like poverty and starvation. We're not going to have another World War II, any more than we're going to have another War of 1812. We haven't eliminated world wars, we've just gotten somewhat smarter about fighting them. It's an advance of sorts, but I'd still feel a lot safer with a government that wasn't so fired up about protecting me. We can't enforce a pax americana at gunpoint. It doesn't work. (See: history of the entire human race.)

― JesseFox (JesseFox), Wednesday, 2 July 2003 06:16 (twenty-two years ago)

counterargument: 12/7/1941, 9/11/2001

― James Blount (James Blount), Wednesday, 2 July 2003 06:22 (twenty-two years ago)