Saturday, April 28, 2012

Gracie's Favorite Gun - Isn't She Cute?

via Packing Pretty where Gracie has this to say.

My favorite firepower system is not available for civilian procurement, it does not fit in a holster and can not be set beside the bed for home defense. Nope, my favorite gun literally has a plane built around it.

For those of you who don’t already know, I love a well armored bird. And the A-10 Thunderbolt II (also known as the Warthog) is my favorite firepower system.


I don't know what to think about the pretty one, Gracie, but I do know what to think about all the pro-gun guys who keep telling us that they are the bulwark protecting us against tyranny.

What's your opinion?  Please leave a comment.

29 comments:

  1. Not an A-10 hater here. Quite the contrary, but I got to call B.S. on much that was said here. First, even the pilot corrected the voice over. The gun shoots a 30mm cartridge not a 30 caliber one.

    Second, at 3:50 the voice over stated some facts that could confuse the heck out of most people. The stats are for the size of the entire cartridge but the entire cartridge does not travel down range, only the bullet does (which is still pretty big).

    Third, while the gun on the A-10 is impressive other aircraft use similar multi-barrel guns that pierce armor . . . And most bullets out of most guns travel faster than the speed of sound.

    The A-10 has a fascinating design It is tuff and durable but what it can do has often been overrated. It is still a plane which means the engine can FOD out like any other. A common air-to-air missile can take it out. It can take some small arms ground fire which many planes cannot do.

    Let me ask you this question Mike - What successful coup d'état had an A-10 at any point to get the job done? The "tyranny" the founding fathers feared most came from collective entities that could afford expensive weapon systems (and the legions necessary to maintain them) like the A-10.

    And BTW - the majority of U.S. servicemen, like the ones in the video are "pro-gun guys".

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    1. That's bullshit, Dave. The founders probably figured any tyrannical government would use every means at its disposal to suppress the people. Why wouldn't it?

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  2. You probably should stop trolling Daily Kos. Your joke is tired.

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  3. "The A-10 has a fascinating design It is tuff and durable but what it can do has often been overrated. It is still a plane which means the engine can FOD out like any other. A common air-to-air missile can take it out. It can take some small arms ground fire which many planes cannot do."

    It will take a whole hell of a lot more than small arms fire.

    http://www.cradleofaviation.org/history/aircraft/a-10.html

    The A-10 is really the only weapon in the U.S. military that can do its job.

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  4. As someone who was in the U.S. Air Force as a maintainer I can tell you that a handful of nuts and bolts can take out an engine thus taking the plane out of the fight. Granted its engines are purposely spaced apart so one catastrophic failure will not result in another. However, fodding out an engine is like Forrest Gump and his box of chocolates - you never know what you are going to get.

    I like the plane and what it will do. But I also know it, like any other aircraft, has its limitations. And there are other weapons systems that can do its job.

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  5. BTW - How could anyone think this aircraft is ugly? It may be just me but I think this is one of the better looking planes out there.

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    1. Didn't COBRA have jumpjets that looked like that in GI Joe back in the eighties?

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  6. "I like the plane and what it will do. But I also know it, like any other aircraft, has its limitations. And there are other weapons systems that can do its job."

    Name one.

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  7. That's simply an awesome plane. I love the way that the 30mm gun sticks out just below the nose. Its profile is unique and quite unmistakable.

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  8. mikeb32000 said "...but I do know what to think about all the pro-gun guys who keep telling us that they are the bulwark protecting us against tyranny."

    We've been protecting the American people from tyranny for over 200 years. You have noticed that the government hasn't turned into a dictatorship, right? It's ok to say thank you, it's not required, but is appreciated.

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    1. Bill, you're either suffering from delusions of grandeur or you're whistling in the dark. Either way you're dead wrong.

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    2. or someone is jumping to conclusions.

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  9. Mikeb, we have two good protections against the kind of tyranny that you hinted at:

    1. The budget required to build enough of those aircraft to go after the population of the United States would be prohibitive.

    2. The vast majority of U.S. service personnel would never turn their guns on American citizens in support of a tyranny.

    Those are in addition to the huge resistance that would arise if an American government attempted tyranny.

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    1. Greg, I'm not even going to allow myself to get sucked into such a ludicrous discussion. Do you hear what you're arguing? You're really talking about this as if it is within the realm of possibility.

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    2. I'm not saying that it would be pretty, but a tyranny can be beaten. There are always more of us than there are of them. It takes the will to fight--to kill and to die--but life in a tyranny is no life at all.

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    3. That is delusional nuttiness.

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    4. Why? Don't just throw taunts; be specific.

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  10. "We've been protecting the American people from tyranny for over 200 years."

    Citations required.

    "You have noticed that the government hasn't turned into a dictatorship, right?"

    I have also noticed that the anti-elephant charm on my doorpost has kept marauding pachyderms out of my yard; or maybe that's laughable nonsense, like your assertion that you and the other gunzloonz are what has kept the U.S. from becoming a dictatorship,

    "It's ok to say thank you, it's not required, but is appreciated."

    Okay, now i know you're a fucking Poe.

    "1. The budget required to build enough of those aircraft to go after the population of the United States would be prohibitive."

    "Red Dawn" was not an historical documentary, son. The gummint wouldn't have to "build enough of those aircraft to go after the population of the United States..."; they would have to kill enough people, indiscriminately to show that they were serious and a lot of the same folks who blithely accept that cheap oil is a "natural right" would go back to watching "american Idol" and listening to Rush (who would have been bought off by the folks who needed his services to demonize you "patriots") and clucking about the threat to security requiring that those FEMADHS camps get built!

    " The vast majority of U.S. service personnel would never turn their guns on American citizens in support of a tyranny."

    You can ASSERT that premise with the exact degree of certainty that I can assert that the vast majority of LAGO will NOT fire on U.S. troops or civilian authorities--whether out of respect or fear of reprisal.

    Shay's rebellion was put down by a duly constituted group of state militias*, the Whiskey Rebellion demonstrated that even with the gunz the rebels--who sought to form a separate state, one not subject to U.S. control--wavered, when faced with a superior and resolute government force. The War of Southern Treachery showed us that even LARGE, well armed and capably led formal military units might not prevail in a conflict with a determined, larger and better armed federal force.

    Not that I suspect or worry about imminent attack by federal troops, in the establishment of a dictatorship, I'm comfortable in assuming that the majority of U.S. citizens would absorb the "news" about it from the talkingshitheads, check to make sure that their little slice of life's pie was still the same size and go on about their lives.

    * Nothing like what you gunzloonz think you are.

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    1. You and your citations, man. Let's see, sometime in June, 1775, a bunch of pro-gun folks got together, trained a little bit and then told that tyrannical government that they were serving to go pound sand. You might remember that, I'm sure you were just a boy at the time. When you were a little bit older, mid 1800s, there was this other little skirmish where the pro-guns folks opened up a can of whoop ass. Imagine the tyranny if every one was anti gun. Or do pro-gun military people not count?

      Okay, now i know you're a fucking Poe.

      I don't know what that is.

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  11. "You and your citations, man. Let's see, sometime in June, 1775, a bunch of pro-gun folks got together, trained a little bit and then told that tyrannical government that they were serving to go pound sand."

    Your interpretation of the events of 1775 is more than a little bit revisionist. Pro-gun folks? I don't remember being taught that there was a groundswell of opposition to people owning gunz back then--seeing as hunting was the way a lot of folks obtained meat AND the fact that there actually were marauding bands of disaffected native americans, among others, roaming a largely ungoverned hinterland.

    The people in the rebelling colonies were not "serving" the British Crown, unless of course they were public officials of the colonial gummint (here's a hint, not too many of them would be at those early conclaves that were discussing throwing off the yoke). They were british subjects, at least those who were not french, indian, spanish or what have you.

    "When you were a little bit older, mid 1800s, there was this other little skirmish where the pro-guns folks opened up a can of whoop ass."

    Oh, dear, Billy; you didn't read down to where I mentioned the War of Southern Treachery? tsk, tsk. That worked out spectacularly well for the pro-slavery folks.

    "Imagine the tyranny if every one was anti gun. Or do pro-gun military people not count?"

    I don't have to, there's Somalia as an example and Iraq and Afghanistan and a bunch of other places that have supplanted the rule of law with the rule of the gunz. None of them are shining beacons of hope and love.

    Is it lead poisoning from doing all of those handloads that has fucked your brain up to the extent that you can't be logical?

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    1. "Pro-gun folks?"

      They certainly weren't anti-gun.

      "Oh, dear, Billy; you didn't read down to where I mentioned the War of Southern Treachery? tsk, tsk. That worked out spectacularly well for the pro-slavery folks."

      I was referring to the MX-AM war, but this is another good example of a pro-gun group defending against tyranny and oppression,unless you are pro-slavery.

      "supplanted the rule of law with the rule of the gunz"

      or another example of criminals just not obeying the law.

      "Is it lead poisoning from doing all of those handloads that has fucked your brain up to the extent that you can't be logical?"

      Just because you can't follow logic, doesn't mean that I'm not logical. I think that would mean that perhaps your medication is too weak.

      BTW, I don't hand load. Most of my recreational shooting is with a .22 and I don't know if there is even a die to hand load .22s and my employer supplies my .40 cal ammunition.

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  12. Apache Chopper.

    THUNDERBOLT I (P-47)

    C-130

    Mig-23/Mig-27


    I am not saying they can do every job as well as the A-10 (again I like the plane) but fill similar rolls they can and have. The A-10 is great for what it is and does but it does not defy the laws of physics as some would have us believe.

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  13. "Apache Chopper"

    http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/aircraft/ah-64.htm
    and
    http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/aircraft/ah-64-specs.htm

    The A-10 is faster, can deliver more ordnance, requires a single crew member, costs somewhere in the same range as the Apache and has about two hours loiter time over target.

    The P-47 and MiGs are not in U.S. military inventory.

    The AC-130 flies slower and generally higher than the A10. It has much greater range, a crew of 13, costs approximately 10 times as much as the A-10 and is a much bigger target. Not apples and oranges, apples and watermelons.

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  14. Didn't anyone appreciate my witty double entendre in the title?

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    1. To borrow a line from George S. Kaufman, your writing is full of single entendre.

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  15. Nowhere did you or I specify that something had to be in the current U.S. inventory. The A-10 Thunderbolt II was named after the P-47 Thunderbolt for crying out loud.

    The Apache can hover. A-10 Cannot.

    AC-130 carries a can carry a howitzer and a whole host of goodies the A-10 cannot.

    P-47 cheaper and simpler as it was a WWII plane.

    The migs mentioned could do several things better than an A-10. Fly faster, higher etc.

    If killing tanks is the job than many other aircraft can and have done that. Again, I like the plane but its not like Zeus folded some paper and sent the thing down from Mt. Olympus.

    And I still see no takers on the fact that there has yet to be a successful coup that had the A-10 on its side.

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  17. "Nowhere did you or I specify that something had to be in the current U.S. inventory. The A-10 Thunderbolt II was named after the P-47 Thunderbolt for crying out loud."

    Really, I must be very confused. That wasn't your comment that said:

    "I like the plane and what it will do. But I also know it, like any other aircraft, has its limitations. And there are other weapons systems that can do its job."

    Cuz, if it wuz, FAIL.

    "The Apache can hover. A-10 Cannot."

    The A-10 can fly 400+ mph, fly inverted, climb at about 9K ft/min and deliver it's weapons in a steep dive. It's also a very tough piece of equipment. The Apache is a twin engine helicopter with the two engines NEXT to each other, so if one gets hit, they both go. If Wiki's numbers are accurate, one A-10 had been shot down as of the table shown here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aviation_shootdowns_and_accidents_during_the_Iraq_War) v 27 Apaches.

    The AC-130 is not as agile, nor does it have the ability to dive on its target and deliver effective fire. It is a great weapons systems—as is an aircraft carrier—but it does not do the same job.

    There are NO P-47’s available. The P-47 WAS a great aircraft, carrying the load of escort duty in the European Theater –plus being the premier CAS aircraft in both theaters--until the P-51 with it’s longer range became available (with the superior Merlin engine). It had eight .50 Cal. Machine guns, 4 in each wing. It’s firepower was awesome, but nothing like that of the A-10.

    “The migs mentioned* could do several things better than an A-10. Fly faster, higher etc.”

    None of those things were done—nor is it likely that they will be-- for the U.S. military. According to at least one source, the MiG 25 (NATO designation; “Frogfoot”) was a great CAS aircraft. While similar to the A-10, the MiG 25 was faster and more lightly armed and armored. Extreme speed was a PROBLEM that the A-10’s design solved for the USAF. Since the A-10’s “work environment” is close to the ground, being unable to reach higher altitudes than its service ceiling is not really a problem.

    The USAF and the rest of the military, particularly the grunts, seem to like the A-10 just fine. Sexy, it ain’t, efficient, it is.

    “If killing tanks is the job than many other aircraft can and have done that. Again, I like the plane but its not like Zeus folded some paper and sent the thing down from Mt. Olympus.”

    The A-1o was DESIGNED to do nothing but Close Air Support. Flying slower than most jets, faster, by far than any helicopter—and massively outgunning any helicopter. The A-10 wasn’t built to do anything but blow shit up, whether fixed or mobile, in support of troops. I never intimated that the A-10 was superior to any other aircraft, except in its designed role.

    “And I still see no takers on the fact that there has yet to be a successful coup that had the A-10 on its side.”

    Nor have there been any successful coups using theater tactical nukes, Polaris submarienes or any of a number of other tried and true weapons systems. What is your point? If you asked the Libyan rebels last year if they would like to have the use of a few A-10’s, I’d bet the house that they would have said, “YES!”.

    * Mig-23/Mig-27, from your earlier comment

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