Latest F-35 flight tests finish – and US stops accepting new jets The F-35 fighter jet has completed one of its years-long flight testing programmes – just in time for the United States to suspend all deliveries of the new supersonic aircraft. The final flight of the F-35's System Development and Demonstration (SDD) phase took place earlier this week, flown by British BAE Systems test pilot …
How do you conclude that? That pair of crooks Brown & Blair financed the Voyager tankers by their trademark con-trick of PFI, so the actual ownership of the aircraft is widely distributed, and probably mostly owned by foreign banks and debt investors..
As is usual in defence procurement, the complicated structure and bungled procurement increased costs. In this case by about £2 billion.
The bottom line is that governments p**s themselves at having their "Credit rating" lowered by credit rating agencies and banks.
The same credit rating agencies that said CDO's which were made up 95% of mortgages from "John & Jane Q Crackhead of Sh**hole, USA" were AAA rated.
PFI is not "live now, pay later," It's live now, (taxpayers) pay forever.
But, on topic. This is another "triumph" for the 23 000 men and women of MoD Procurement.
Whilst I had absolutely no time for Blair & Brown's shenanigans with PFI (being a rather traditional old style centre-left Labour chap myself) I pose a little question with regard to political history. Who was it and which party was it that introduced that goldbricking scheme PFI? Clue, it was not either of the aforementioned nor was it the Labour party ("Nu" or otherwise). If you need further guidance I will simply say that the shysters concerned are the current governing party of the U.K. I repeat, that I hold no brief whatsoever for Blair and Brown's use of that piece of hows-your-father but let us not pretend that they were the only guilty ones here.
Whilst I had absolutely no time for Blair & Brown's shenanigans with PFI (being a rather traditional old style centre-left Labour chap myself) I pose a little question with regard to political history. Who was it and which party was it that introduced that goldbricking scheme PFI?
They did indeed pioneer this form of shystering. BUT they actually made little or no use of it when they first invented it, and have signed few if any contracts since we were rid of B&B. So on a purely technical basis, you're correct, the Tories invented. On a practical and legal basis, the answer to "who knowingly fucked the British taxpayer with PFI?" the answer is simply "the Labour party".
And looking at the that worm Corbyn parroting Russian arguments over Salisbury and Syria, your argument appear to fir the Labour party standard approach, of trying to evade accountability.
....got into power by being more Tory than the Conservative Party offerings, the sad thing here is that this was what was required to get elected to government in the UK.
Saddest of all was the rejection of the concept that a political party as a champion for the rights for people who go to work for a living was either representative or desired.
Given that most people have to work for a living then you would have to pretty stoopid to vote against your own interests and yet here we are, seems bread and circuses never gets old.
Brown & Blair financed the Voyager tankers by their trademark con-trick of PFI,
Cough... Sputter... Cough... Sputter...
This is not called Trademark trick. It is called "Greek Accounting".
it's called socialism
No, its classic capitalism.
Neither. It is an accounting fraud plain and simple. Misrepresenting the debt level to fib the credit rating.
Exactly what the Greeks did.
It will be interesting how many of those are around. This dates from the same period when the UK Government sold all of the Green Goddesses as well as the snowplough and road construction equipment from the country strategic reserve. I enjoyed the quality snowploughing delivered by it during the winter of 2011-2012 while travelling through Europe (some of them were even still with UK number plates). I believe the replacements including the equipment presently used by the Highway Agency have all been bought on PFI.
So it will be quite interesting how much of the REAL UK debt is concealed this way and how far are we really from a Greek Style financial incident. The official number is 222Bn which is 1%. I smell a rat - it is probably more.
Corporatism is what youre thinking of.
Corporatism and capitalism are synonyms, or at least as alike as to make no difference. Every free market reform we get here in the US leads to more corporate control and higher wealth concentration. The nature of the free market game is that once you start to win, you can rig things so you keep winning.
"It is an accounting fraud plain and simple. Misrepresenting the debt level to fib the credit rating. "
Absolutely. It's one of the many 'modern' practices which make the City so special, one of the reasons why the UK can't possibly do without them (unlike every other country in the world, bar a handful).
"Exactly what the Greeks did."
Not just the Greeks, as you've observed already. But no one should blame (just) the Greeks. The advisers to the relevant governments and organisations have a responsibility too. And who might we find there? Well, we find Goldman Sachs etc, obviously.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/radio4/entries/fba91847-2c24-394f-a088-99fbb6973b51
"[...] To get inside the walls of the Eurozone, the Greeks needed to convince the European Union that they had met various irksome rules about inflation, government deficit, and government debt.
[so they] called Goldman Sachs and asked them to structure a clever financial deal that put a lot of Greek borrowing off the books. And it wasn't just Goldman Sachs - it's been reported that there were all kinds of ways in which the Greek government of 11 years ago managed to make their macroeconomic statistics look trim and healthy. [...]"
Sound familiar at all? Nothing to do with PFI, obviously.
An allegation obviously rejected by the parties who profited. But then they would say that, wouldn't they.
> > it's called socialism
> No, its classic capitalism.
This is polarisation. So fucking stupid, there is no need for everyhing to come only from one end of a spectrum or another. Idiotic. Following a preferred political party like supporting a football team.
Desperate. No wonder we are in so much shit.
@werdsmith:
I'll 100% agree with the polarization bit.
The singular point of polarization continues down the path. We're headed back to the 40's and 50's era "cold war" mentality and militarization stances, without the economic growth potential.
As for the F35. I find it amazing that it has taken a huge chunk of my life to get the damn thing to this point. In the mean time, we've had two complete generations of commercial aircraft designed, developed, built, certified and put in service.
There is something happening here, and we don't know what it is....
As for the F35. I find it amazing that it has taken a huge chunk of my life to get the damn thing to this point. In the mean time, we've had two complete generations of commercial aircraft designed, developed, built, certified and put in service.
There have been no major innovations in commercial air travel since the Concorde. The mission requirements are all well understood, and not subject to major changes. It's been about building the same airborne buses over and over, with a tweak for more efficiency here or to squeeze in a few more seats there. One of the most popular airliners, the 737, was initially designed in 1967 and is still being made.
The F35, on the other hand, was designed to be "one jet to rule them all" so its mission requirements are complex and ever-shifting. It was trying to do a lot of relatively new things. A lot of its problems have been software-related, which isn't surprising because requirements for it to integrate with other systems are massively complex.
What you're seeing is a combination of baroque government procurement and bidding rules (enacted incrementally over the years to try to prevent Fraud and Abuse™), distributing a project out over as many congressional districts as possible to make it impossible to cancel, and an aircraft that's trying to do an unprecedented number of things at once -- probably too many.
In classic capitalism, companies go bust, and the taxpayer doesn't carry the can - the investors might get their fingers burnt though.
What happened in the USA and the UK?
In the USA, "too big to fail" banks (and even chunks of the auto industry see e.g. GM being rescued alongside the TARP programme) were financially bust so the taxpayer was forced to carry the can. The armaments industry is basically an extension of government anyway in the US.
In the UK, 'industry' was and is allowed to fail for the last few decades. Taxpayer support is mostly only available to finance companies and the arms industry.
Slightly longer version: the difference between capitalism and corporatism:
http://www.economicpolicyjournal.com/2009/11/explaining-difference-between.html
See also
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2012/sep/06/did-obama-save-us-automobile-industry/
Nothing new about British Governments dipping deep into the public purse to save the pockets of their relatives and friends, been at it for centuries, The East India company was on an almost permanent drip of public cash till they bungled so badly as to trigger the Mutiny and finally the Government had to come clean and nationalise the lot.
bungled so badly as to trigger the Mutiny and finally the Government had to come clean and nationalise
And, entirely coincidentally, the cash that used to find its way into the pockets of the frinds of the East India Company now found its way into the pockets of friends of the Government..
Or in modern-day parlance, they pulled a Halliburton/Iraq.
Question has been answered last night - She did. The parliament has officially been told that they can f*ck off and have no say in a May's world.
If you are not scared you should be. Compare the usual pictures of her sitting depressed with the 4 pot plants and the pictures of her positively glowing last week. We saw her smile for the first time as a prime minister - in anticipation of a possible WW3. Postcoital glowing look in a premonition of WW3 setting... Jesus wept...
F35 did not participate, they fired around 30 cruise missiles and 70 stand-off ones. The latter so UK and France can pretend to participate too. Now Trump can pretend that he has jerked-off successfully on Faux news. Provided he does not try to continue to jerk off we can congratulate the Russians for successfully negotiating and maneuvering out of a WW3 scenario while dealing with lunatics.
All targets were in the "destruction of evidence" category. You have a team from OPCW on the ground, you are in a position to request immediate access to a facility which the Syrians are obliged to grant in under 24h under their 2013 "bail" conditions and what do you do - jerk off...
All of this was combined with the ridiculous blooper when UK got caught at the UN last night using a ruse which whole of Europe teaches their kids when they are in kindergarten to avoid doing what is known as: "The guilty one runs unchased." The polling in some Eastern European countries for believing what UK says on Salisbury was as low as 13% two weeks ago. I would expect it to be under 5% - all of this self-inflicted. Same for Russia - we actually gave Putin yet another 10% or thereabouts of public approval rating. We also fell in public for a trick which even 7 years olds in Eastern Europe smile and avoid. Idiots...
If Corbin has a pair he will be calling a confidence vote. My guess is that he has not grown one yet so she will achieve her aim of replicating (at a May scale) her idol's post-Argie success against Labor.
corbin is a madman in his own right. He fires off randomly in the complete opposite to May. When it turns out he is wrong his excuse is that he needs to promote an opposition view.
They are both bad for the country. Even a team of accountant bursars (only a team of salesman would be worse) could do a better job.
corbin is a madman in his own right
Madman or not if he does not accept the challenge and carry it through successfully we are screwed.
May effectively demonstrated that she can do anything she bloody pleases and the Parliament has about as much say as the Chinese Parliament.
I already wrote to my MP congratulating him with his new role in the world. I suggest you do too.
My MP is SNP, he doesn't need chivying along. I do get replies when I urge him to back this or that early day motion though and I've met him. The SNP will speak sensible and real words of condemnation about this but you will have to look at their media feed because the MSM cannot bother to report what the 3rd largest party at Westminster thinks. Instead they will ask the geriatric leader of the 4th largest party.
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The polling in some Eastern European countries for believing what UK says on Salisbury was as low as 13% two weeks ago. I would expect it to be under 5% - all of this self-inflicted. ..... Voland's right hand
Is this tale true ........ Independent Swiss Lab Says 'BZ Toxin' Used In Skripal Poisoning; US/UK-Produced, Not Russian
It might easily explain why so much evidence around Salisbury has been spirited away by armed home forces.
And when true, what does it tell everyone about the true current state of Western intelligence and politicians?
* Apart from the obvious answer that madness and mayhem are endemic and systemic in politically inept and corrupt systems of remote mass brainwashing administrations.
Is this tale true .......
We do not know. Yet. We will learn this week.
However, when Russians threaten with a document at Lavrov level, they may in fact be in the possession of it.
So if they claim they have the original of the tests, put the f*** cards on the table and Boris and Co will have some explaining to do.
Same as with the "staged" gas attack document.
Instead of shouting Borisenities (that should make it into the Oxford dictionary one day) at them, call their bluff. Cards on the table gentlemen, let's see what you have.
If not, it is them and Boris competing for Pinocchio of the week which is business as usual.
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we can congratulate the Russians for successfully negotiating and maneuvering out of a WW3 scenario while dealing with lunatics
Putin is going to be annoyed with you for calling him a lunatic..
(No glory on any side in this fight. The Russians are arming and enabling a weak puppet[1] in hock to his backers and generals who uses chemical weapons on his own population and the US/UK/France are holding a live-trial of their weapons system in the hope that more people will buy them.)
[1] Much like the US did in their anti-communist cold war days. Nothing really new under the sun.
.....with no aircraft! An aircraft carrier, which even when the aircraft turn up (when?), doesn't have enough support vessels to form a decent "carrier group".
*
All this would be fine if the UK had billions to spare after we've paid for unimportant things -- like the NHS!
*
So (exactly) what sort of austerity is it we're living through? Philip Hammond may know....but he's in a minority of one.
with no aircraft!
With useless aircraft. While no aircraft participated in the airstrikes in Syria on both sides, the footage from there demonstrated something a lot of analysis predicted when the F-117 came out - that Stealth will provide only a temporary advantage.
Most observed (note - I am not saying confirmed as both sides are throwing propaganda at each other) kills were courtesy of Buk-2M operating in "Stealth Killer" mode. Missile goes up to pre-defined coordinates and looks in a "pre-programmed direction". At that point its own radar head turns on and it looks DOWN on the target. When looking from ABOVE all currently existing Stealth aircraft including the F35 have only a marginal radar signature reduction. They are, in fact, no different from a pre-historic Mig-23 or F-104 radar-wise. The missile comes down on it like a sledgehammer and there is one F35 less flying.
The only way to deal with this is to go back to the days of Gulf-War 1 and Kosovo and jam anything and everything. At which point who gives a shit that the aircraft is stealthy or not. In fact, the aerodynamic disadvantages required by stealth make it easy pray to Gen-4 dogfighters like the EuroFighter, Saab, Mig-27+, Mig29 and the Rafale.
While Americans can afford wasting money (or at least they think so) on a development of superweapons that will be obsoleted shortly, countries with lesser GDPs cannot. In fact the biggest losers as of this weekend are in this order - Russia (the Su-57 program) and Nato participants in the F35 program. The ones laughing all the way to the bank are the French with the Rafale.
There is another lesson in this. We are fixated on Russians threatening to sell S300, S400 and S500 to Iran and other "rogue states". Wrong fixation. While we have continued to fixate on this they have sold their real "anti-Stealth" solution to 20 odd countries, half of them "rogue states" and in quantity - 20+ units to some of them including North Korea. To add insult to injury we have now provided them with real-life footage on how that sh*t works under real conditions so they can sell more. And they will (despite Almaz Antei being under sanctions since MH17).
That thing can fire with its radar taken out, it can fire on vis with the main radar inactive, it can fire blind to pre-defined coordinates and judging by the footage it can do it in the exact way it takes to remove an F35 out of the equation.
The Syrians knew precisely which targets the various missiles were directed towards and approximately when, this saved Macron and May from the small risk of being indicted for murder at a later date but also made it far easier for the Syrians to bring a portion of the missiles down, in a genuine war that would not be the position and much shorter radar detection ranges would be a considerable asset.
Dispute Resolution Counselor? What a brilliant turn of phrase. It made me splutter coffee! I'm going to steal this phrase and apply it to myself. Have a pint.a
Back in my days as a Dispute Resolution Counselor, I had an opportunity to take notes for some flag officers at a tech interchange. Basically all the beltway bandits and septic think tanks were trying to get feedback on their hardware wet dreams from men who had actually been on the pointy end. I was just there to fetch coffee, zip flies, and take notes. Effen hillarious:
Septic think tank: "sirs! Do you want lasers? Directed energy?
Flag: no, all I want is a fscking radio that works!
Septic think tank: um... Pause... How about shape memory alloys? VTOL?
Flag: I want a fscking RADIO that WORKS! Beats table.
Septic think tanks: I know! Vertical takeoff sharks with freakin' lasers!
Two whole days of my life, gone.
Mission creep? Yes, we've met. Needs on patrol are rather simple - you need body armor and a weapon that work. You need food and water. You need comm that comms. You need a leader worth following and fellow men you can rely on.
Where it gets all pear shaped is when you need a mission you can believe in and have trouble figuring out what that hell it is. Think I will end this post right there.
Attitude Adjuster (with a nod to the late I.M. Banks)
On a side note, I am amazed that Lockeed, after perpetually running late, overbudget and with a shoddy POS of an aircraft, has the balls to refuse to pay for correcting issues with, what... the coating on screws, basically?
I wonder if DoD is not escalating a trivial dispute to hold their feet to the fire re costs in general. Would be about effin time with that mangy, flea-ridden, gold-plated albatross. Maybe the UK coulda done that with the +2B estimates from BAE for cats on their glorified helicopter carriers? Aww, well, too late.
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