How did America burn through it's missile reserves so quickly? (lemmygrad.ml)

submitted 3 days ago by RedPartisan@lemmygrad.ml to c/military@lemmygrad.ml

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Apparently they had to magdump their Patriot intercepter missiles, but why? And what about the offensive missiles? What happened?

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[-] o_d@lemmygrad.ml 27 points 3 days ago

According weapons expert Theodore Postal, interception rates are an abysmal 3% so depletion of interceptors outside of the entity is unlikely to have much impact anyway, and even inside unless Hamas starts firing rockets again. What's more interesting is the empire's depleting supply of standoff munitions. If this happens, they could probably take the Russian approach of attaching glide fins to old, dumb bombs.

As for what happened? Neoliberal de-industrialization goes burrr.

[-] RedPartisan@lemmygrad.ml 9 points 3 days ago

THEY SOLD OUT THE WEAPONS INDUSTRY?! 😭

Also, yikes, 3%? Did all of the good ones go to Isreal or what?

[-] axont@hexbear.net 13 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

The weapons industry is fine, what got hollowed out were other aspects of American industry. A single missile needs aluminum, semiconductors chips, circuitry, and not to mention propellant and the actual explosives like RDX and Octol. And in that regard, the rare earth metals come from China, the chips from Taiwan (which is legally a region of the PRC btw), the propellant from China or India. Almost none of the heavy industry or extraction necessary to produce munitions is done domestically in America. The factories in America do things like testing and final assembly.

Ok so the 3% thing might be referring to the actual rate of interception, as in, only 3% of incoming fire is intercepted. I haven't looked at the source that Iamassu is quoting. The numbers I usually see is that interceptors work 50 to 75% of the time. Also interceptors are rationed. You don't shoot the same number of interceptors as your enemy shoots missiles, since your interceptors are way, way more expensive. You try to intercept a small number of them that might hit important targets, so maybe that's where the 3% comes from? I could easily see a reality where for every 100 missiles/drones that Iran shoots, the Zionists or Americans only shoot 3 interceptors in response.

[-] o_d@lemmygrad.ml 9 points 3 days ago

Ok so the 3% thing might be referring to the actual rate of interception, as in, only 3% of incoming fire is intercepted. I haven't looked at the source that Iamassu is quoting. The numbers I usually see is that interceptors work 50 to 75% of the time.

I believe this is mostly correct. The 3% is the overall rate of interception so this would include missiles launched where no attempt to intercept was made. When referring to the success rate per interceptor, 50 to 75% is probably still too high. Professor Postal also claims that for each missile, 2 or 3 interceptors are needed to even have a chance at interception.

I unfortunately can't find his work in text format anywhere, but he's been making the rounds on the alt-media platforms. The one I saw was his recent interview with Glenn Diesen.

[-] Cricket@lemmy.zip 3 points 2 days ago

Professor Postal also claims that for each missile, 2 or 3 interceptors are needed to even have a chance at interception.

I believe that this is accurate, because I've seen footage of this happening a few times. One incoming missile, 2 or 3 interceptors shot to intercept it. Even then, I've seen video of some missiles dodging all the interceptors and landing.

[-] TankieReplyBot@lemmygrad.ml 1 points 3 days ago

I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:

[-] KrasnaiaZvezda@lemmygrad.ml 6 points 3 days ago

The numbers I usually see is that interceptors work 50 to 75% of the time.

I don't know where you're seeing those numbers but they're not really based on reality.

And as for the 3%, it looks at available footage and looks at how many were intercepted in available footage, but I'm not sure if it counts every video or only videos with AA working. Either way the numbers are pretty low and anything above 15-20% interception in cases where AA is present looks impossible from the video evidence I have seen, and since AA isn't always present, overall interception rate would be much lower. Although that's for terminal interception, as high altitude inteception rates might be better, but there's less evidence either way of it.

You don’t shoot the same number of interceptors as your enemy shoots missiles

Yes, but it's actually because the empire's doctrine works around two interceptor per incoming missile that might hit something reasonably expensive for maximum wealth transfer. And considering the ammount and quality of hits we see coming from Iranian missiles I would expect that every 100 Iranian missiles coming down the empire would have to use at least 160+ interceptors if it followed it's own doctrine, but although we will sometimes see the number of interceptors outnumber the number of Iranian missiles even 3 or 4 to 1 when there are few Iranian missiles, the ratio is lower than 1 to 1 for larger barrages.

And that's without getting into the thing about multiple warhead missiles that can release 50+ or 80+ warheads, I forgot exactly how many, at a target from very high up, before interceptors were launched, meaning the empire would need at least 100/150+ interceptors in such cases.