Taliban moving scuds into position, target: Pakistan

[StageLeft]

Considering how poor they are in Pakistan, they would be doing them a favor by putting them out of their misery of the scuds actually worked.

Reading this post without first seeing the author halfway through the sentence I knew who had written it.

Gotta agree with ViperGTS. Howard you make yourself sound more and more like an idiot with every post you make.

I wonder how its possible. Just when I think that HS has hit rock bottom for levels of stupidity he manages to dig a little deeper.

Seems a lot of these threads have a good conversation going on until Howard decides to open his mouth....

Yep. Howard stern is heroically ignorant, and yet worse seems oblivious to the fact. Howard, we know you're young because your posts are filled with such great levels of idiocy that its tough to imagine any adult being so asinine.

Then after leaving the board with the sick sense of your great stupidity you leave after making a total ass out of yourself.

 

[DaemoN]

Ok?.

This could be much more dangerous than I think many people realize. The Afganies know they will be destroyed by a U.S. attack. They do not have the backing of any powerful countries to support them like they did during the war with the Soviet Union.

If I?m Afghanistan I see only one solution. Fire the scuds not at Pakistan but rather India. India already hates Pakistan. India will want to retaliate and the only way for them to do that is through Pakistan. All of a sudden you have 3 countries who hate each other at each other?s throats. The worst part is that half of Pakistan is more for Afghanistan than it?s own government.

It could get very ugly SOON.

 

[HowardStern]

<< You know, Howard, I've seen you bitch about how poor you are. >>



I've never commented on my financial situation. My personal stock portfolio is doing quite well this year (in relative terms).

 

[HowardStern]

<< If I?m Afghanistan I see only one solution. Fire the scuds not at Pakistan but rather India. India already hates Pakistan. India will want to retaliate and the only way for them to do that is through Pakistan. All of a sudden you have 3 countries who hate each other at each other?s throats. The worst part is that half of Pakistan is more for Afghanistan than it?s own government.

It could get very ugly SOON. >>



Not if we shoot down all the scuds. See above person's post about it's probably easier to shoot them down now vs 10 years ago, which is most likely true.

 

[Hoober]

ROFLMAO!!!

Iraqi Scud Missile Launcher

ROFL!!!!!!!

That's one of the funniest things I've seen in months!

 

[Nemesis77]

Bob/NYC

I really think you should change your signature. I mean that Mutt-Hamad thingy...There's no reason to insult people.

 

[Yzzim]

<< Not if we shoot down all the scuds. See above person's post about it's probably easier to shoot them down now vs 10 years ago, which is most likely true. >>


Impossible. First off, the US army does not have any military personnel or equipment in Pakistan. Second off, even if they did have the Patroit missile system they still wouldn't be able to shoot down the scuds. Turns out the Patriot missle is a bigger failure than perviously thought.

Video taped showed only a 27% success rate, rather than the 70% previously stated

I don't understand this, but maybe it'll tickle your booty

 

[Bob/NYC]

Nemesis77:

I really think you should change your signature. I mean that Mutt-Hamad thingy...There's no reason

Surely. All it takes is a polite request. You got it.

 

[BCYL]

Anyone has links to this story? I couldnt find anything on cnn.com or msnbc.com...

 

[BCYL]

Anyone has links to this story? I couldnt find anything on cnn.com or msnbc.com...

 

[Dhruv]

Its funny how Pakistan is now getting a taste of its own medicine. After all, they are 1 of only 3 nations to recognize the Taliban as a legitimate authority, and played a major role in creating the Taliban. The taliban had there place and were not always bad. The Mujahideen groups were freedom fighters that succesfully drove the Soviets out in the 80's. Now with nothing else to do they have resorted to oppression, torture, and terrorism among their own people (Afghans usually of different ethnic groups) as well as other nations (i.e. India, Iran, Russia ... Taliban has strong ties with Chechen militants).
Last year, when the Indian airlines plane was highjacked by Pakistanis, it was the Taliban that 'negotiated' with the terrorists in Kanadhar and it was revealed that they were in on the hijacking all along.

On the other hand, it is obviously sad that this is how things are going. I don't see a bright tunnel at the end of this one for a few reasons: a Ground battle will end up in probably 15 or 20 American to one Afghan deaths. I know Afghan people and they are extremely loyal and are literally bred to fight. They will truly risk their lives at the drop of a hat. They are also accustomed to torture techniques and their treshold is far greater than most westerners. They are near Central Asia so they have been at the forefront of many battles for hundreds of years, from Alexander, Mughals, Ghengis Khan, the Scynthians, the Aryans, they are fierce fighters that have generations of people growing up in violent surroundings, not to mention that they are acclimated to the AFghan climate and are very familiar with the terrain. I hope this doesn't become another Vietnam. An air force bombing campaign will be highly inefficient due to the fact that these people have many mountain hideouts and don't operate in ways that we are accustomed to. They don't need to be in a govt. building to conduct war, they can very well do it from a hillside hideout that is difficult to detect from radars. The bombing campaign will likely target civilian targets, people who hate the Taliban more than us anyway.

I think the best chance we have is to fight with the Northern Alliance. These people hate the Taliban more than any other and Masoods (r.i.p.) forces claim that Osama Bin Laden was behind his recent assasination. They know the terrain, and are also fierce fighters that can deal with the Taliban. The weakness in them is that they are conflicting tribes amongst them that only Masood was able to unite.. hopefully American can play the unifying role for them.

I have a lot of worrys for Pakistan right now because as mentioned before, some Islamic hardliners in Pakistan ( a lot actually) are pro Taliban. they may try to overthrow the dictator that overthrew the legitimate government (Musharraf). That will be the worst case scenario, not only for India, but for the world as you now have an officially nuclear capable country run by Islamic extremists. Will they help Sadaam Hussein... i don't want to know.

America needs to get back to the days of covert op's and assasinations because that is the only way we are going to win this war. They need to send huge numbers of spys into Pakistan to make sure the govt. isn't toppled, and full force from the north of Afghanistan to fight with the northern alliance, perhaps send some spies to fight 'for' the Taliban. I'm wondering how the joint Pakistani/Afghan militant groups in Kashmir are faring right now... wonder if they are going to kill each other.. hope so.

 

[bunker]

<< I don't understand this, but maybe it'll tickle your booty >>


What it says is there was an error in the code that prevented the patriot system from accurately tracking the scud.
The timing in the program after constantly running for 100 hours was off by 0.36 seconds. According to that article the scud could travel half a kilometer in that time meaning (my interpretation here) the patriot missle would be aiming at a spot where the scud was 0.36 seconds ago, or half a kilometer away.

You'd have to think they would've fixed that by now. No?

 

[DaemoN]

bunker,

You may be correct about the improved accuracy of the patriot missile system, unfortunately it currently doesn't matter. We do not have patriot missile systems installed and operational all over the middle east. These systems are very precise and difficult to setup and configure. It's basically a dumbed down version of the missile defense system. We've had very mixed results with that so far and it's using current Y2k+ technologies. Systems like that must have precise timing and tons of calibration. We can't just slap them down in the desert and expect them to work. Maybe in a few months they will play a role but at this point they not even in the area we need them in.

Sad but true?

 

[Bob/NYC]

Dhruv:
It is all covert. The US military isn't informing Congress. I know Pakistan isn't with us and they are a dog and pony show. They had to say ok because of our friends in India. Our (which includes India and Indians in America) main concern is beloved patriot nukes in the unstable gov't control.

 

[HowardStern]

<<
On the other hand, it is obviously sad that this is how things are going. I don't see a bright tunnel at the end of this one for a few reasons: a Ground battle will end up in probably 15 or 20 American to one Afghan deaths. I know Afghan people and they are extremely loyal and are literally bred to fight >>



What do you think the ratio was in Vietnam? More like 20 of them for every one of us.
What do you think it was for the Soviets in Afghanistan? I have no idea but my guess there were far more Afghan casualties than Soviet casualties.

Typically partisan/rebel types take big hits in the casualty dept (at least in WW2).

 

[Dhruv]

<<

<<
On the other hand, it is obviously sad that this is how things are going. I don't see a bright tunnel at the end of this one for a few reasons: a Ground battle will end up in probably 15 or 20 American to one Afghan deaths. I know Afghan people and they are extremely loyal and are literally bred to fight >>



What do you think the ratio was in Vietnam? More like 20 of them for every one of us.
What do you think it was for the Soviets in Afghanistan? I have no idea but my guess there were far more Afghan casualties than Soviet casualties.

Typically partisan/rebel types take big hits in the casualty dept (at least in WW2). >>




Actually, I think it was like 100 Vietnamese to American deaths. I didn't mean to bring up Vietnam in terms of us dead as compared to the enemies. I meant to bring it up only as an example of how the terrain and climate are a big disaadvantage to us, like in Vietnam.

 

[bunker]

Howard, please, use some intelligence before you post (not that you've demonstrated that you have any). Don't throw out information as fact unless you know it to be so. I'm talking about the numbers you quote as ratios.

God you are just plain ignorant.

Edit - "In the Vietnam War over a period of 10 years, we killed 2 million Vietnamese
while suffering 58,000 casualties; a 50:1 kill ratio in our favor"

 

[rahvin]

<<Howard, please, use some intelligence before you post (not that you've demonstrated that you have any). Don't throw out information as fact unless you know it to be so. I'm talking about the numbers you quote as ratios.>>

His numbers were actually low.

There were approximately 3million vietnamese killed in the Vietnam war. Ballpark US casualties were around 40,000. Figure out the ratio. The soviets had similar results, much like the US campaign public sentiment turned against the war as casulties ran up without any goals being accomplished.

You don't win wars of occupation where the population doesn't want to be occupied. The US doesn't intent to occupy afganistan, they intend to kill the people responsible and leave.

If Bush is smart he is arranging for Iran to pick the succesor government to the Taliban. (yes I said Iran) Afganistan is too unwieldy and uneducated at the current time, they need a strong theocracy to control the people while their economic situation improves. Like Iran as time goes on and education levels improve the harshness of the theocracy will fade. In addition Iran would love the opportunity to kick the 2million afgani's out of their country and send them home.