France To Build New Nuclear-Powered Aircraft Carrier (apnews.com) 244
France will build a new, nuclear-powered aircraft carrier to replace its Charles de Gaulle carrier by 2038, French President Emmanuel Macron announced Tuesday. The Associated Press reports: Macron framed the decision to use nuclear reactors to propel the future warship as part of France's climate strategy, stressing its lower emissions compared to diesel fuel. Speaking at a nuclear facility in the Burgundy town of Le Creusot, he called France's nuclear weapons and atomic energy industry "the cornerstone of our strategic autonomy," and said the nuclear sector plays a role in France's "status as a great power." One of his advisers noted that having an aircraft carrier also helps France project its global influence. Only a few countries in the world maintain the huge, costly vessels.
The new French aircraft carrier will be about 70,000 tons and 300 meters long, roughly 1.5 times the size of the Charles de Gaulle, which has been deployed for international military operations in Iraq and Syria in recent years, according to French presidential advisers. Its catapults will be electro-magnetic, and American-made, and the ship will be designed to accommodate next-generation warplanes and serve until around 2080, the advisers said. They didn't provide a price tag but French media estimate it will cost around 7 billion euros ($8.5 billion).
The new French aircraft carrier will be about 70,000 tons and 300 meters long, roughly 1.5 times the size of the Charles de Gaulle, which has been deployed for international military operations in Iraq and Syria in recent years, according to French presidential advisers. Its catapults will be electro-magnetic, and American-made, and the ship will be designed to accommodate next-generation warplanes and serve until around 2080, the advisers said. They didn't provide a price tag but French media estimate it will cost around 7 billion euros ($8.5 billion).
Lame (Score:2, Funny)
That's weak. Build a nuclear powered aircraft you ninnies!
Actual Carrier (Score:5, Insightful)
Most countries make do with tiny "Light" Carriers, that weigh less than 50,000 tons. Russia currently only has one that is about 42,000 tons
The United States is basically the only country that goes for the Heavy ones, >50k. (The newest is about 100,000 tons.
This is a real commitment to secure France's over seas interests, which they have a TON of. Guadeloupe, French Guiana, Martinque, Reunion, and Mayotte are all pretty far from Europe.
Unlike the United States, they give actual Senators to their territories.
Good for France for standing up for their people, even if it costs a lot to maintain a true nuclear navy.
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The UK has several nuclear powered submarines, they have the knowledge and experience for shipborne nuclear reactors and they chose to go with gas turbines for specific reasons, mainly costs and ongoing maintenance.
The Charles de Gualle aircraft carrier spent a lot of its first 7 years of service undergoing maintenance and issue resolution, including with the reactors, before going for its first major refit and refuelling at significant cost just 8 years into its service life - its these issues and costs th
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Don't... assume HM Government had an attack of competence it didn't happen.
Our carrier has no catapult. It was meant to and designed to have one added in. Except the only company tapped to install the catapult was also the same company who wanted to sell the very expensive F-35B planes which are the only ones you can launch without a catapult. So they quoted almost the cost of a new carrier to install it in a carrier designed with one in mind. Rather than saying "fuck you we'll find another contractor and w
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The Queen Elizabeth class was never originally designed with a catapult as it was always originally intended to be operated with a VTOL style aircraft, but it was designed with the intention that the carrier could be converted to an angled deck and EMALS catapults installed (designed and built by General Atomics, not Lockheed...). Unfortunately it was discovered in 2010 that the previous government had not kept a tight rein on development and such a conversion would have been substantially costly (not impo
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She is also so unreliable and prone to breaking down that when Russia moved her to the Mediterranean in support of their Syria campaign, she was shadowed for the entire voyage by a large tug, just in case she needed to be towed to her destination.
Russia has a smaller GDP (Gross Domes
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The US, UK, France, Russian and China are the only countries to really produce anything >50,000T with China still experimenting with their designs, and Russia barely scraping over 50,000T when fully laden.
United States 11
China 2
Italy 2
United Kingdom 2
France 1
India 1
Russia 1
Spain 1
Thailand 1
To a certain degree you could look at it from the point of view of geography with the US requiring a large number to project its power worldwide while Russians can make do with trucking their guys into most territ
Re:Actual Carrier (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: Actual Carrier (Score:2)
"Instead of building their air and naval capacity, maybe they should get some more people with fancy hats"
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Ha! Good ones. But truthfully, there is no way to wait for a crisis--lead time is much too long. And France has determined to go their own way since DeGaulle.
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It's as much to funnel money to the defence industry as anything.
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I've been thinking of invading one of those countries. Not gonna say which one. Look out France, better hurry!
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There wasn't much of a threat to the Falkland Islands, either. Until there was. [britannica.com]
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There wasn't much of a threat to the Falkland Islands, either.
Yes, there was. Argentina had claims to the Falklands dating back to 1833.
The British presence in the Falklands was very much disputed.
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So who are they defending against?
They should learn from the Aussies.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
By 2038 (Score:2)
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Yeah, but they are building it all with systems based on a 32 bit *nix Epoch.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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That's why it's scheduled for 2038. Schedules always slip, so they will be able to restart their timers from zero.
One Aircraft Carrier (Score:2)
It's going to cost so, so much to build a one off and that doesn't even include the costs to maintain it.
But National Pride, meh.
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If you seek peace prepare for war. Sometimes the goal of keeping a big hammer at hand is never having to use it.
Re: One Aircraft Carrier (Score:2)
Except a carrier is a swiss Army knife. There are plenty of ways it can be used for peace time operations.
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Indeed. I said as much in a post elsewhere in the comments.
A nuclear powered aircraft carrier can drop a lot of trained people on any shore in hours. With them comes a small city equipped with an airport, hospital, cafeteria, power plant, repair shop, and more. If there's an earthquake or hurricane that just flattened much of your city then an aircraft carrier can be an excellent base of operations for search and rescue, bringing in supplies, and on and on. The ship is able to stay on site for weeks or
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Sometimes the goal of keeping a big hammer at hand is never having to use it.
Once they have paid for the hammer, the politicians will notice that many problems resemble nails.
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Good reason to build one (Score:2)
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Right, so we don't built any new nuclear powered aircraft carriers until AFTER China and Russia does. Is that right? They already made the effort of building one each, even if they are floating piles of shit, which means that they fully intend to build better ones in the future.
An aircraft carrier is a big ship. One does not build them on short notice. The plan is to have this ship operational by 2038, nearly 2 decades away. It's going to take years to finalize the designs. Another 5 years or so to bu
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Drones (Score:2)
In the 20 years it will take to get this built, drones will have replaced human powered aircraft and they could have replaced it with a smaller ship
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The big bombers don't fly from carriers.
cuisses de grenouille (Score:2, Funny)
There's something I've often wondered about: do they call scuba-diving members of the French navy "frogmen"? I sure hope so.
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So what happens when one of these sinks? (Score:2)
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Water is very good at blocking radiation.
Re:So what happens when one of these sinks? (Score:5, Informative)
https://what-if.xkcd.com/29/ [xkcd.com]
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The reports also explain the methodology for conducting deep-sea monitoring from both surface vessels and submersibles. The monitoring data confirm that there has been no significant effect on the environment. Nuclear fuel in the submarine remains intact.[citation needed]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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That's how it's been done in the past. There's at least 11 nuclear powered vessels that have sunk with the reactors on board, for example the USS Scorpion.
Sinking a supercarrier is not like sinking the old USS Lexington. A supercarrier never moves on its own; it's part of a carrier strike group, which includes 1-2 guided missile cruisers, a destroyer squadron, and 1-2 attack submarines. When you think of the staggering cost of a supercarrier, it's not just the ship itself and the air wing it hosts; the
Not CDG the airport (Score:4, Funny)
My first reading of TFS was France was replacing the CDG airport in Paris with an aircraft carrier. But no, the editors did their job this time, and they are actually replacing one carrier with another carrier.
Aircraft carriers are the new battleships (Score:5, Insightful)
Extrapolating, even more nimble drones, will be even more deadly against these lumbering steel giants wielding flimsy aluminum contraptions as its offensive weapons.
Future could be extremely fast boats launching drones, or even submarines launching drones.
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Even during The Great War they found out that battleships and dreadnoughts were weak against planes.
And those carriers were really just regular boats with really big and long planks on them.
Have you ever been on a battleship, probably decommishaned(sp)?
Re:Aircraft carriers are the new battleships (Score:4, Informative)
In WWII battleships lost out to airplanes. If airplanes could find a battleship they could attack it more effectively than it could them. Airplanes also had a threat radius of hundreds of miles vs tens of miles for battleships. What carriers allowed for was that threat radius to center at some random spot in the middle of the ocean.
The difference between modern carriers vs old battleships is the carriers have the same threat radius as their opponents. They're also highly mobile and nestled in fleets of defending ships.
While fast boats or submarines with drones, cruise missiles, and whatever else are threats to carriers they need to avoid all the defensive rings around those carriers to attack them. Carriers aren't invulnerable but carrier battle groups are much tougher targets than battleship based forces in WWII.
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While fast boats or submarines with drones, cruise missiles, and whatever else are threats to carriers they need to avoid all the defensive rings around those carriers to attack them.
https://www.news.com.au/world/... [news.com.au]
https://www.popularmechanics.c... [popularmechanics.com]
https://nationalinterest.org/b... [nationalinterest.org]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Bad decision depending on American tech (Score:2)
The irony will be (Score:2)
7 b€ ? (Score:2)
No kidding, they just continue to break public health system during pandemic.
They even fired someone in charge for saying it out loud.
I'm surprised by ... (Score:2)
... the reactions being so negative. EU countries becoming less dependending on the usa is a good thing.
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In the era of asymmetric warfare, do carriers even make sense?
A coordinated simultaneous attack by 100 drones, and no more carrier.
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You'd assume they'd make the effort to have anti-drone tech running, plus think how many drones you could pack onto one of those along with the next-gen aircraft.
I'm suspecting it'd not be an easy nut to crack.
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think how many drones you could pack onto one of those
This is exactly why building a carrier makes no sense.
You don't need a carrier to launch drones. You can launch drones from a frigate, or even a frick'n barge.
Why spend 10 Billion euros when you can spend 1% of that amount?
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Look at a container ship. Just counting the containers above deck, and figure four cruise missiles per container. Can they really stop that many missiles? And if they do fight off the first wave, what about that other container ship?
I'm with you, I don't see how they can keep a carrier alive in a real fight.
Re: really, one each aircraft carrier? (Score:2)
This is why intel wins a war. You really think any enemy with the capabilities you describe could launch such an attack without the intelligence gathering sectors of America getting window it. The time required and the number of Nation states who would pull this off, basically comes down to a US vs China confrontation. Once that happens, what kind of response do you think the US would have? I tell you one thing, it's the surest way we have a future where the Chinese economy is more wrecked than American
Re:really, one each aircraft carrier? (Score:5, Insightful)
Why build a carrier when a barge can be used to launch drones? Because only a ship of this size can accommodate the facilities needed to keep people out at sea for weeks or months on end. If there is another big shooting war that kind of capability comes in handy. If there's another large natural disaster that comes in handy too.
These kinds of ships can act as a hospital ship. The injured and ill can be brought on board from shore or other ships by helicopters. The ship will have an operating room or two. Lots of room for people to sleep and eat. With a nuclear power plant there's no shortage of heat, light, and fresh water. There's the potential to feed electricity to shore from the nuclear power plant. With lots of radios and computers on board they can manage communications for a natural disaster. By being at sea they are insulated from natural disasters that can happen inside France.
An aircraft carrier isn't just a place to launch aircraft from. These ships are floating cities with medical staff, communications equipment, lots of people, and lots of equipment. They can be put to use for a lot of things besides dropping warheads on foreheads. They can also launch a metric fuckton of drones if they want.
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think how many drones you could pack onto one of those
This is exactly why building a carrier makes no sense.
You're too stupid to comprehend it because you think the F-35 is a boondoggle.
But France is going to need exactly one (1) new aircraft carrier, which was already obvious to any observer with half a clue.
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A coordinated simultaneous attack by 100 drones, and no more carrier.
That's a concern, but it's not been ignored by the world's navies. Drones are interesting in that they have strengths like numbers and weaknesses like speed. I think I'd be more concerned about a dozen hypersonic missiles than 100 drones providing target practice for automatic machine gun turrets, lasers, and electronic countermeasures.
There is a pretty good short documentary about drone focused wargames if you are interested.
Black Dart Wa [youtube.com]
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Hypersonic isn't magic.
A hypersonic missile is hypersonic in orbit. It flies at the same speed as other missiles near the target. Otherwise it wouldn't be able to target.
There is a lot of confusion when the capabilities are discussed, because they're placed into a basket. So they talk about things like gliding. That's a giant fireball that your SAMs are already flying towards, and it will be a fireball on the sensors until it is moving slow, at which point it has no advantages over other missiles. The glidi
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"asymmetric warfare" only works against a wuss attacker. If USA went full Roman tactics there wouldn't be any notion of it.
2.25 seconds (Score:3)
> A coordinated simultaneous attack by 100 drones
It takes approximately 2.25 seconds for the Phalanx CIWS to shoot down 100 targets.
The system is a pair of radars and a flir linked to computers which automatically detect, track, and analyze the motion of any incoming objects. When the CIWS determines that any object is a threat to the ship, it fires the 4,500 rounds per minute autocannon, which moves at 115 degrees per second to engage targets in multiple directions.
It can also link to the MK 144, a gui
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When the CIWS determines that any object is a threat to the ship, it fires the 4,500 rounds per minute autocannon, which moves at 115 degrees per second to engage targets in multiple directions.
Completely false, the bridge officer is not actually trained to stand there holding down the fire button in case the computer senses a target.
Instead, they active the computer and it is tracking all those objects, it beeps at the crew, and the crew member presses the fire button and it shoots at however many were flagged before the button was pressed.
The CIWS does not determine a threat to the ship, it has to be activated and may only be activated when the crew has detected a threat to the ship. And it neve
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It may be useful here to distinguish between *identifying* a threat and making the kill decision.
The system DOES distinguish between an albatross and a missile or a fastboat. The system DOES determine whether the object is moving toward the ship or away. The system DOES determine when is the last possible instant to fire - do we have to fire now, or can we wait four more seconds? The system is not armed, automatically firing on any potential threat, in normal port operations.
Also, the system has been dep
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Ps those 48 Super Hornets each carry a six-barrel M61A2 Vulcan cannon, capable of firing 6,600 rounds per minute. You'll need to get past a couple of those before you try to get past the destroyers, before you get close to the carrier.
There's a reason it's been 70 years or so since anyone was dumb enough to try to attack any of America's large carriers. (A transport ship, the Card, was attacked in the 1960s).
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You are, of course, discounting exercises. The USS Theodore Roosevelt was "sunk" in 1999 by a Dutch submarine.
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Doesn't mean the old fashioned stuff goes away. You're still going to have to fly close air support, interdict enemy supply lines, bomb strategic targets, neutralize opposition aircraft. You'll probably be doing that with drones, but they're going to look a lot like current aircraft because they'll perform the same functions. They won't be little things, like consumer quadcopters. They'll be big enough to carry tons of bombs and hundreds if not thousands of cannon rounds.
Sure, sometimes you get stuck in
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Yeah, who needs a navy at all?
It is not a question of needing a navy, but of needing aircraft carriers.
The French (and the Americans) should be building small fast ships that can serve as launch platforms for drones, cruise missiles, and kinetic energy weapons.
The big problem with this is that there is no big comfy chair for an admiral to sit in like there is on the bridge of a carrier.
The solution is to ignore the admirals. Their predictions are always wrong, especially about the future. Even 40 years after Midway, the admirals were s
Re: really, one each aircraft carrier? (Score:4, Funny)
The big problem with this is that there is no big comfy chair for an admiral to sit in like there is on the bridge of a carrier.
The obvious solution to that problem would be for the Navy to buy the yacht that Steve Jobs was building and equip it with a whole battery of big comfy chairs. That way, one ship could replace a whole fleet of aircraft carriers.
Re: really, one each aircraft carrier? (Score:2)
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You are ignoring the cost of the battleship itself.
Yes, cruise missiles cost more than BB-16/45 projectiles. But if you only use the battleship for a real mission once every two decades, that cost of the ammo is the least of it.
Engine size. (Score:4, Interesting)
The big problem with this is that there is no big comfy chair for an admiral to sit in like there is on the bridge of a carrier.
Also, even if you can in theory launch a drone from a large enough zodiac ( ;-D ), France wants to build a non-petrol-depending boat and there's a minimum size for nuclear powered engine.
You need a big enough vessel to fit both the Admiral's comfy chair, and the nuclear engine.
Re:Engine size. (Score:5, Interesting)
This aircraft carrier weighs 70,000 tons. The smallest nuke sub ever deployed was 400 tons. So, less than 1% in weight. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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I don't know that I would call the chair in the bridge of a carrier particularly comfortable.
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That's a great idea. I'll inform the President of your tactical and strategic analysis the next time i see him.
Yes, that was a snarky comment. Indeed in spite of my snark there may be some truth in our comment. Admirals are always fighting the last war, or so the saying goes.
An aircraft carrier is a versatile ship, it has to be because it is expected to be in service for 40 or 50 years. While built for the last war the admirals know enough to build in flexibility. The old steam catapults were built to
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The French (and the Americans) should be building small fast ships that can serve as launch platforms for drones, cruise missiles, and kinetic energy weapons
Because jamming radio frequencies and EMPs are not things that a modern military can do. Until a modern US carrier gets even fired upon, perhaps best not to git rid of the most feared machine in military history. Besides, carrier groups can do all of those things already.
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They have no possible defense against this attack
What kind of delusional world do you live in?
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Which is faster, hypersonic missile, or laser shark?
Pew Pew Pew Pew Pew, Oooh, lookie there, photons are faster than pressurized gastubes after all.
Re: really, one each aircraft carrier? (Score:2)
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Re: really, one each aircraft carrier? (Score:2)
Re: really, one each aircraft carrier? (Score:2)
Can you provide a list of countries that host pirates that also demonstrates that the UN is *dominated* by such countries?
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From the article you linked:
"Several naval ships â" including a Greek and a Dutch frigate, a Spanish warship and the USS Boxer â" rushed to the area while a Spanish marine aircraft and two U.S. Marine Cobra helicopters joined the pursuit"
When three warships and two Cobras are on your ass, that's a really bad day.
I'm a bit surprised they took the pirates alive rather than somebody using them for target practice.
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by the time they are on your radar you are seconds away from being turned into Pate
By necessity, hypersonic vehicles fly high and they're very visible. There's a reason why there's been a lot of investment into stealthy sea-skimming missiles. Your "seconds away" makes zero sense for hypersonic vehicles.
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Do you discount the feasibility of railguns for shotgunnig them with molten high velocity debris at several dozen to possibly 100+ nm away
absolutely you should discount that. hypersonic missiles are not static projectiles, they can easily outmaneuver any such attempt, and you would only get a single attempt at intercept. Even the current US military has admitted they currently have no answer to the new Hyper Sonic missiles, especially those that are stated to reach up to Mach 27 (and they will get faster). that literally gives you around 20 seconds till impact at 100miles.
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You appear to be mixing hypersonic glide vehicles [wikipedia.org] with hypersonic cruise missiles [wikipedia.org] which are not the same thing and have different potential countermeasures. The first would be targeted in launch phase as a ballistic missile. The second would be targeted by aerial defences far out from a carrier. Whether that would work is a different question.
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considering one of the key benefits of hyper sonic is the trajectory can be changed constantly (right up to the last few seconds of flight)
No, this is true of any guided missiles, but it is LESS true of hypersonic missiles precisely because their trajectory is constrained by 1) limited time, 2) limited vehicle design (they'll have fewer seconds and fewer transversal g's to work with). Hence at any point your shrapnel area is SMALLER.
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scramjet engines are precision instruments, unlikely to appreciate extreme airflow disruptions or metal chaff/particulate impacting their inlet at mach-whatever. same goes for the rest of the vehicle.
That approach would be as helpful as a knight in armor throwing up bits of confetti to stop an arrow flying toward him. The hyper-sonic missile will still have plenty of speed to complete the rest of the flight to the target if the jet is disabled. Even if you can stop the engine 5 miles away, it only has to glide for 10 seconds to reach your ship.
If it gets closer to your ship and you try the Phalanx close in weapon, you are trying to stop a mach-3 arrow by shooting BBs at it. The apparent cross secti
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Re:Like how Trump surrendered his ass for rent mon (Score:5, Informative)
France joined NATO in 1949, withdrew from its military command in 1966 but never left NATO, and rejoined the military command in 2008.
France is most definitely a member of NATO.
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Well damn, I don't know how I got that so wrong. I'll read up on it, thanks.
Re: Be prepared! (Score:4, Informative)
Consider that British and the US didnâ(TM)t have to deal with sharing a border Germany. Itâ(TM)s much easier when the enemy doesnâ(TM)t have easy access to you territory.
In many ways Belgium was the weak point, which the British also thought would have resisted a little more.
This is insightful watching on the Maginot Line: https://youtu.be/Q5K6Jg4Smvc [youtu.be]
Re:"Environmental" protests are Moscow-instigated (Score:4, Insightful)
the "environmentalists" were/are sponsored, coordinated, and helped by Moscow
Were you this concerned about Russian interference when they worked to install an incompetent ignoramus as our president?
Now *that* was a brilliant strategic move on their part. This country may never fully recover from the tsunami of idiocy that has ensued.
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This country may never fully recover from the tsunami of idiocy that has ensued.
Yeah, just like we never recovered from that drunkard President Grant. Oh, wait....
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You epitomize the old saying about accountants: You know the price of everything and the value of nothing.
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Re:300 metres of deck space... (Score:4, Interesting)
Hello person of similar username convention:
Actually the French Pacific holdings are mostly safe. The major islands of French Polynesia are mostly tall volcanoes that are in no danger of losing most of their land area to sea level rise. Some small outer atolls will go underwater but the bulk of the territory will stay dry.
The same goes with New Caledonia -- it's a big rugged island as are most of its outlying islands. They're safe.
The only French Pacific territory that's pretty much screwed is Clipperton, as it's isolated and flat, and once it's gone France will lose a big chunk of exclusive economic zone off the Mexican coast. Mexican fisherman are awaiting eagerly for the EEZ to disappear, but in reality the Chinese fleet will doubtless swoop in as soon as they think they can get away with it (they already do today since it's poorly-patrolled).