Cobras and Blackhawks still seem to be moving off the shelves.
prolly cuz made in usa now just means junk...junk made to sell and fail... which needs replacement and updates to the next model, etc.... and repeat sales
gone are the days when made in the usa meant pride in workmanship and lasting value....replaced by bs marketing and advertising...what America has become and gone...
Semper Watching!
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There’s also the tendency of administrations cutting off access to munitions and spare parts when they decide they don’t like you.
Between using Chinese manufactures and likely backdoor spy technology, I certainly can’t blame them.
Not opposed to giving crap to Muslims though. Let them kill each other as long as the guns, ammo and other hardware we give them degrade to bricks after a few uses.
They V-22 certainly had problems and killed far too many Marines but now, they are highly praised. Many people thought the Stryker would not cut it either but it was far better than armored Humvees.
The problem is the complexity of our equipment from aircraft to rifles. There is a reason the AK-47 is still used by millions, including our guys during Iraq. It works and is easy to maintain/build.
At some point relatively soon, cheap light anti-aircraft weaponry will outpace the active and passive countermeasures that super-expensive planes can deploy, and we’re going to need to go back to a high volume, low price strategy in order to sustain a combat aircraft loss rate much more like WWII’s than we’ve seen in Afghanistan and Iraq over the past 13 years, where we’ve lost very few aircraft.
Obama has spent 180 days golfing since he took office. Every Republican should carry around a golf ball. Don’t say a word about it. Just let it be seen.
ITAR. It is a huge pain in the butt for any other country trying to buy our stuff. Our state department gets all up in their business for even fairly innocuous stuff. They would rather not deal with it.
Upgrade and relaunch the CH-46 and be done with it. Lift, transport, shielding, multi-mission capability, redundancies.