“People think, increasingly it appears, that we shouldn’t be doing this. Well, let me start by saying we haven’t lost a single American in this war,” McConnell said. “Most of the money that we spend related to Ukraine is actually spent in the US, replenishing weapons, more modern weapons. So it’s actually employing people here and improving our own military for what may lie ahead.”

cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/4085063

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[–] Harrison@ttrpg.network 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Add to that, the Russia air-defense systems have proven very effective.

Proven effective against cold-war era planes maybe. There have been a few improvements in the past 50 years. Those same Russian air-defence systems proved themselves effectively useless against the F-117 in the Balkans, and the F-35 is miles above the F-117.

Vietnam and Korea proved that 1950s and 1970s era technology was not up to the task, not that it was not possible. The main issue with both was the lack of accuracy.

The US can't sustain minor campaigns of shelling random cities in the Global South without running out of munitions.

"Running out" in this case meaning dipping below normal stockpile levels.

[–] vacuumflower@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 1 year ago

Those same Russian air-defence systems proved themselves effectively useless against the F-117 in the Balkans

There's been some improvements in the past 20 years too, sometimes even not only on paper.

Anyway, the biggest problem of the ex-Soviet militaries is their incompetence, not their tech. The systems employed are up to the necessary tasks and sometimes more adaptable than NATO systems, it's just that even their normal operation sometimes can't be achieved by people using them.