Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => The O' Club => Topic started by: NUKE on March 21, 2003, 08:50:46 PM
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According to Jane's, Israel made more than $3.5 billion in arms sales last year, roughly equal to Russia's massive arms export industry. Only the United States and Britain sold more, Jane's reported.
http://apnews.excite.com/article/20030322/D7PTRROO4.html
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I'd be interested to know who are top buyers.
Especially if put in relation to population count and annual income.
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Originally posted by Hristo
I'd be interested to know who are top buyers.
I just updated my post with the link..... it's in there somewhere
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Turkey, India, Brazil, Canada and Germany. China used to be a major client, but Israel backed off after protests from the United States, Shapir and others said.
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USA is their #1 customer though.
Not that I mind. Israel has a much better system for developing weapons than anybody else. US defense projects often go way over budget and get canceled, like the Crusader self propelled artillery gun that Rumsfeld axed, or the Bradley fight vehicle.
The Bradley development was so screwed up that they even made a movie out of it, called "Pentagon Wars" starring Kelsey Grammer and Carey Elwes.
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I saw "Pentagon Wars". Made me lose confidence in our military.
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Originally posted by davidpt40
I saw "Pentagon Wars". Made me lose confidence in our military.
Yeah, our military is clearly a bunch of inept bunglers. No reason whatsoever to have confidence in them.
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yeh obviously bungling fools...heheh...but..they are some damn deadly bumbling foolks :p
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"Anytime, anywhere, anybody, any kind of repressive regime."
British arms industry motto.
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Originally posted by Dowding
"Anytime, anywhere, anybody, any kind of repressive regime."
British arms industry motto.
I think that's a bit OTT. The only complaint I can remember was the sale of Hawk 100/200 to... was it Timor?
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"Pentagon Wars" was an HBO movie made by a bunch of liberals. You were supposed to lose faith in the military.
ra
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Nexx - if they can get an export license for it, they'll sell it. It's just business.
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Pentagon Wars what funny as hell, almost like I'd imagine watching a Soviet Union made fantasy movie about the US Army...
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Originally posted by davidpt40
I saw "Pentagon Wars". Made me lose confidence in our military.
LOL Terminator 2 made me lose confidence in our future government. I guess I am as stupid as you....
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Not suprised; the Israelis make some truly cosmic stuff that works. They take stuff we initially made and make it MUCH better.
Still wondering why we have to give them ~$3 BILLION a year in military aid when they are as good as they are and are doing so well in the arms market themselves.
Anyone else (US) thinking this? Because with the deficit we're running, I'm going to renew my letter writing to our Representatives about US aid to Israel.
Besides, we're about to eliminate one of the threats they worry about. And give the rest pause for thought.
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Originally posted by Toad
Not suprised; the Israelis make some truly cosmic stuff that works. They take stuff we initially made and make it MUCH better.
Still wondering why we have to give them ~$3 BILLION a year in military aid when they are as good as they are and are doing so well in the arms market themselves.
Anyone else (US) thinking this? Because with the deficit we're running, I'm going to renew my letter writing to our Representatives about US aid to Israel.
Besides, we're about to eliminate one of the threats they worry about. And give the rest pause for thought.
Quite true Toad. I remember seeing a programme on Discovery Wings and it featured unmanned recon planes and Israel were way ahead of any other country in the 80s. One fantastic piece of tactics included launching a mass unmanned recon raid - the enemy switched their SAM radars on to engage thinking it was a major strike but little did they know that following the recon planes were squadrons of Wild Weasel aircraft who then locked onto the SAM radar sites and took them all out. Nice piece of tactics!
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Originally posted by davidpt40
I saw "Pentagon Wars". Made me lose confidence in our military.
The soldiers deciding not to fake the test was inspiring.
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I actually beleave that things like what is depicted in Pentagon Wars is possible.
Just take NASA. Everyone complains that each Shuttle launch costs 500 million dollars. So why can't we make it cheaper? Russian Soyuz rockets only cost 3 million.
Well, the problem is the contractors. They absolutley want the cost to be high. They get paid on a "cost plus" system. The cost of the vehicle plus a 10% extra for profit for the manufacturer.
So, the more expensive the rocket, the better. That is why all those X-plane vehicles that NASA was working on in the early '90s were all canceled. What corporation in their right mind would switch from building 100 million dollar expendable rockets like the Titan rockets (plural) to a 50 million dollar, reuseable vehicle like the X-33, of which you only build two or three of them....ever.
Defense contracts and other big government contracts shouldn't have an unlimited budget. You either build the vehicle for the price specified, or you lose the contract.