Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => The O' Club => Topic started by: Toad on December 15, 2001, 01:51:00 PM
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U.S. detects Osama giving orders on radio (http://www.usatoday.com/hlead.htm)
Ya better watch out...
Ya better not shout...
You're gonna die, I'm telling you why..
The RC guys are over your cave.
:D
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It ain't justa hobby anymore.
:D
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RC's.. yah sure ;).
I'm talking REAL RECON here Hang.
RC-135's.
Bet ya they're the ones that picked it up.
:D
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You might be thinking about "RJ" not "RC"... "Rivet Joint" is the name given to the signals collection systems, while the "RC" aircraft maybe equipped with any number or type of snooping systems depending on which program they're focused on.
Not that it's a big deal, just a smallish detail correction :)
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The URL has changed:
U.S. detects Osama giving orders on radio (http://www.usatoday.com/news/attack/2001/12/15/osama-orders.htm)
AKDejaVu
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I have to wonder if the old science fiction devise, of robot wars, is not nearing. Even so, there will always be an infantryman. Machines brake. They can be reprogrammed to send back the wrong info. There will always be a need for human eyes on the battle field.
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Originally posted by Toad:
RC's.. yah sure ;).
I'm talking REAL RECON here Hang.
RC-135's.
Bet ya they're the ones that picked it up.
:D
I was stationed at Patuxent Naval Air Station in the early 1990's. Met my wife there...wife still get's the home town news...article about that funny looking RC (Yes, Remote Control) RECON aircraft.
It was pulled out of testing and taken to Afganistan to join the other prototypes in active service.
Some of them have been shot down already.
They do have listening capablilities (according to the article), as well as cameras and other sensor capabilities.
While stationed at Pax, I got my first taste of US Military RC efforts. The USMC had a detatchment on base for 11 months and the Staff Sgt. who was the Senior Pilot lived 2 doors away from me. :)
He had "THE COOLEST" birds!
Yeah, I think Hangtime said it right, "It ain't justa hobby anymore."
Viper
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Eaql, I was an aircraft commander on RC-135's. I'm fairly familiar with the program. ;)
...and there's no way a Remote Control Drone of the size they are using has the capability of an RC-135.
Yeah, they're handy. But when you care enough to send the very best... Send and RC-135.
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Hummmmmmm so they intercept that radio message but they don't triangulate to get his exact location?...
Strange.
[ 12-16-2001: Message edited by: R4M ]
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RC-135's can triangulate down to pretty small area.
They can pass the co-ords on pretty fast.
However, they can't make a guy stay there when he's done talking.
They have no control over the number and placement of offensively armed aircraft in the area in question.
They also can't stop him from using a landline to a remote transmitter.
There's other stuff but I'm sure you can imagine most of it.
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From all the reasons ,the land line to the transmissor is the most plausible one, Toad (and is probably the case as bin Laden is not an idiot).
And I think that mostly because I'm sure that if there is a RC135 flying to intercept such radio messages, there should be some planes nearby to answer immediately to any "probable" radio interception the RC135 may make. I'm sure is the case.
What I find strange is that there was no answer from the US Side...to bomb a remote transmitter far from Bin Laden, or to arrive when he's not there, is something I understand. No answer at all is something I don't.
[ 12-16-2001: Message edited by: R4M ]
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Hmmm. Don't like the sound of this. No need for courage, strength, endurance? These are exactly the things that create compassion, on a battle field. I fear we will wind up the cold blooded, techno killers, that some think we already are. I'm glad I wont live long enough to see it.
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Doh :eek:
I bow to Toad el grande squeakmeister and will in the future refer all questions regarding beeping and squeeking to Toad, listening Toad.
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Ram.. how do you know they DIDN'T bomb a remote transmitter?
Further, while it's nice to think of these guys as ready for anything, it doesn't always work out that way for a lot of reasons.
We missed a few Scuds in the Gulf War after pinpointing them with an RC or a JSTARS... but the fighters were off refueling or such.
Life isn't perfect and timing is everything (almost).
And eagl... I wasn't a Crow. No squeaks and beeps for me. Front row, right and left seats for my career. :D
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Toad - What did you get to play with? Mostly comms stuff? Play with the camera? I don't remember which seats did what ;) I hitched a ride on one of the RC training jets from Offutt to England. It got a little cold after an hour or two so they woke up some of the squirrels inside those big consoles and had them running laps to warm up the interior of the plane. Here are the explanations we got about what each console did:
"This one uh... it has lights and stuff."
"This one uh... you can see the tape drive and that stores stuff... I shouldn't have said that... Playtime is over cadet, go to sleep." :rolleyes:
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Eagl,
They only let me play with the yoke, rudders and throttle type stuff. :)
Started in <cough> '75 as a co-pilot, left in '80 as an instructor.
But I did have more than a little idea of what was done in the back of the bus.
An amazing airplane for it's time. I got to fly a few sorties on the prototypes of what became the RC-135W just before I left. I never actually flew an "official" W; they were standardized after I got out.
I think though that a crossbreed JSTARS/RC on a 767 airframe would be the ideal platform. I'm sure it's an idea that has occurred to someone other than myself.
Hey, it's only money... and someone else's at that!
<Jeez, I sound like Tom Daschle there, don't I!>
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"Crows" were guys on a diffrent career path.. more beeps and clicks, less stick and rudder.
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Vipe.. those Marines were playing with an Aeroviornment R/C electric sailplane called 'Pointer'. I did a lot of work with that project and got quite a bit of stick time on every prototype.
(http://perso.wanadoo.fr/cacsystemes/pointer_pub.gif) (http://perso.wanadoo.fr/cacsystemes/pointer_2.gif)
You would be stunned to learn the capabilites of some of these platforms nowadays.. A Pointer is dead silent; climbs at 2200 fpm, can stay up for more than two hours and in IR mode at night can provide a IR picture of a bad guys footsteps from up to 5 miles away from the recon squad thats operating it. It's the only drone platfrom designed to be operated right from a battlfield position, flown from either of the 'aboard' cameras, use pre-programmed route and station keeping or be operated and landed via conventional eyeball from the ground R/C mode. The software overlays are truly exquiste.. and it's a pretty good sailplane too. I thermaled one at Dugway for 6 hours some years back. :)
In and of themselves they are but a part of the battlefield picture.. but the guys that have 'em have an immense edge over the guys that don't.
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"Crow" is a term the pilots and navs used in reference to Electronic Warfare Officers... which the EWO's hated. (So that's why we called 'em "crows".)
The EWO's referred to themselves as "Ravens", derived from the squadron patch of the 343SRS. Somehow, they thought "raven" had much more cachet than "crow". ;) (Initially, there was only the 343rd and pilots, navs and crows were in it. When the outfit got larger, the pilots and navs were split off into the 38th SRS.)
Note the sleepy looking crow..
(http://sc.communities.msn.com/tn/22/F0/AirForce/a/43.jpg)
[ 12-19-2001: Message edited by: Toad ]