Missile Attack Math--Red Sea Version
According to Doug Macgregor—and I assume he has good sources—there is no shortage of crazies a la Nikki Haley who want a war with Iran. They want a regional conflagration, perhaps starting with Yemen. This is nuts.
Douglas Macgregor @DougAMacgregor
If the Israeli / Hamas conflict escalates into a full fledged war in the Middle East, the request for US troops will come at a point in time when the purpose is to rescue Israel.
We are not the great Military power we were in 1991, we are a shadow of our former self.
The American electorate has changed.
The population has changed.
You can't rely on it to come to Israels aid under those circumstances.
1:14 PM · Dec 19, 2023
Douglas Macgregor @DougAMacgregor
A group in Washington has decided the solution to all our trouble is to strike Iran.
They think going to war with Iran will solve all the problems in the Middle East and help us.
They must be responding to donors, I see no evidence of this whatsoever.
This would be catastrophic.
4:29 PM · Dec 19, 2023
But they need an excuse for war. Alastair Crooke suggests that the rest of the world may prove too smart for that:
Israel has seen this before – notably with the 1948 Nakba. The hubristic expectation that this would be the ‘end to it’ – Palestinians expelled, their property plundered and appropriated – ‘End of story’ (it was believed). ‘Problem solved’.
Yet it was never solved. Hence 7 October.
…
The Resistance understands and can see it all: How does Israel get out of this? Overthrowing Bibi? That won’t do it. It’s too late. The stopper is off; the genies and the demons are out.
If the ‘front’ remains co-ordinated, proceeds by consensus; eschews any Pavlovian over-reaction to events that might plunge the region into an all-out war, then:
‘They can wait at leisure, whilst (Netanyahu) labours’ – and errs (Sun Tzu).
Any bets on whether Russia and China are providing advice? I’m guessing Iran’s advice is along those lines, too.
Now the tough part—the math. But the conclusion is simple: If the war gets bigger, the math gets worse, and we’re on the losing end of the math.
HUNTSMAN @maphumanintent
Long post on missile attack math in the Red Sea:
USS Carney has currently engaged 22 (I'm not keeping perfect score) aerial attack platforms launched by Houthi rebels on maritime assets (or the Carney itself) in the immediate vicinity of Yemen and the Bab-el-Mandeb chokepoint. Carney's magazines hold 90 missiles of various flavors and must be replenished *in port.*
There are currently 8 guided missile cruisers and destroyers attached to the Ford and Eisenhower carrier strike groups operating in the Med and Red Sea. Call it roughly 800 missiles in the collective magazines of these vessels, split between various flavors including land-attack platforms not suitable for ship defense. Each ship also has much shorter range point defense platforms.
The primary missiles used for ship defense are the SM-2 and SM-6.
Raytheon had mothballed SM-2 missile production until late 2017, reactivating it for a large foreign sales contract.
These [SM-2s] are the older shorter-range interceptors likely being used by USS Carney to shoot down the Houthi's cheap attack drones.
Production of SM-2's is extremely slow (less than 50/yr) with deliveries split amongst numerous allies.
SM-6's have replaced SM-2's as the future fielded interceptor system, with Raytheon delivering 856 Block 1/1A to the US fleet since 2017. [My quick math—that’s just under 150/yr.] The Navy's goal is to double that number by 2028 scaling to a production rate of 300/yr (currently 150-200) but Raytheon is nowhere near close to that run rate. Each SM-6 presently costs about $5m per unit, with a new multi-year procurement request that cuts the cost/unit in half.
Existing inventories of SM-6's are carefully managed globally, as they are the front line of defense (alongside SM-3's) for hypersonics and other ballistic missiles of the sort China has presently deployed for mischief in the first island chain.
@tshugart3 (defense intel extraordinaire) reported in October that DOD's current unclas estimate is that the PLA Rocket Force has AT MINIMUM 850 intermediate and long-range anti-ship missiles fully operational (that we know of).
The two CSG's currently operating in the Pacific have about the same number of fleet defense interceptors available as those in the Middle East. 800 MAX versus 850 - basically, WESTPAC has little inventory to spare.
NOTE: above math also assumes near-perfect availability of critical strategic materials (rare earth elements, etc) necessary to manufacture said missiles, which Raytheon knows has been suboptimal for years.
The longer the Houthis continue throwing potshots at commercial, USN, and allied maritime assets, the worse the calculus gets.
Supply chains win wars - and we are losing this critical domain.
Yeah, well, the Russians have real world experience with our supply chain problems. Who thinks word hasn’t filtered down to the Houthis?
Cost of an Iranian-made (or -designed) drone: roughly $25K Cost per shot of an Aster 15/30 (Sea Viper): $1-2M I'd say we can probably infer the Houthi's strategy here.
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Rt Hon Grant Shapps MP @grantshapps
HMS Diamond has shot down a suspected attack drone targeting merchant shipping in the Red Sea - destroying the target with a Sea Viper missile.
HUNTSMAN @maphumanintent
[Houthi] systems are built from cheap, scabale components easily sourced.
Gucci missiles built in the US and Europe have glaring supply chain vulnerabilities (critical materials, chips, guidance system components, etc) that are nowhere near addressed.
It ain't about the money.
More bigger wars. Very bad idea.
Has anyone considered the question of reinstating the draft in this country in the event of a national emergency? Talk about a four alarm fire! Would make the Vietnam war protests look like a Sunday picnic. Things just keep getting more and more insane.
We Americans need to sit down at the kitchen table and "do the math" as it relates to the empire that has been foisted on us by TPTB. Economically, it is impossible to sustain our hundreds of far flung outposts and permanent so called "allies", said "allies" BTW are actually blood sucking parasites. Anyone who would volunteer to serve in today's US military is by definition mentally unbalanced, morally bankrupt, utterly foolish.