8 ms·
It's been discussed for decades that the US would run out of precision munitions in any multi-week conflict. The presumption was that the US would either be in
by lumost 1mo ago
It's been discussed for decades that the US would run out of precision munitions in any multi-week conflict. The presumption was that the US would either be in a nuclear war at that point, or a ground campaign would complete the task along with dumb munitions.
That the US decided to expend it's precision weapon stockpile on a conflict of choice with no ground or dumb bombing campaign to fallback on is a mystery for later generations. It is not unbelievable that Iran is capable of blocking a dumb bombing campaign indefinitely, or that the viable targets for such a campaign are politically untenable.
- cyberax 1mo ago> That the US decided to expend it's precision weapon stockpile on a conflict of choice with no ground or dumb bombing campaign to fallback on is a mystery for later generations. There is no mystery. A dumb bombing campaign requires air superiority, and Iran actually has reasonable anti-air defense. They're not a bunch of guys running around with AK-74s. The US absolutely can achieve that. But it _will_ result in aircraft losses, and it requires detailed planning. Both of these are not acceptable anymore.
- Terr_ 1mo ago> Iran actually has reasonable anti-air defense. They're not a bunch of guys running around with AK-74s. To help put that in perspective versus Iraq: Iran's GDP today is a ~7x stronger than Iraq's was (in 2003) relative to the US GDP at each time. In other words, bigger economy, better-equipped military. Plus having ~2x the population, and ~3x the land area.
- wbl 1mo agoThe US is always going to slap a JDAM kit on for better effect.