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America's top nuclear commander described a grim scenario for U.S. forces facing off against a new breed of high-speed weapons that Russia and China are developing.
"We don't have any defense that could deny the employment of such a weapon against us," Air Force Gen. John Hyten, commander of U.S. Strategic Command, told the Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday. This means that, as of now, the U.S. has to rely on deterrence against these so-called hypersonic weapons, he said.
Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., then asked the general to explain what a hypersonic weapon is and what it does. "A hypersonic threat is a system that starts out ballistic, so you'll see it like a ballistic missile, but then it depresses the trajectory and flies more like a cruise missile or airplane," Hyten said. "It goes up into the lower reaches of space and turns immediately back down and then levels out." At that point, Hyten said, the weapon will fly at very high speed, which is where the term hypersonic comes from.
"Both Russia and China are aggressively pursuing hypersonic capabilities," Hyten told Inhofe. "We've watched them test those capabilities."
See also: Russia will put advanced mach 20 hypersonic boost and glide missile into service in 2019
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 24 2018, @05:52AM (6 children)
Meh, I'd rather tax dollars go into a blackhole than fund shitty universities that only create student debt.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by anubi on Saturday March 24 2018, @06:11AM (5 children)
I get nauseous when the politicians do not fund healthcare and schools.... but they could find enough money for "cash for clunkers" to buy and destroy hundreds of thousands of cars.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 4, Interesting) by RS3 on Saturday March 24 2018, @01:50PM (4 children)
We think exactly alike. The only, and big, problem: the more money you pump into something ("fund"), the more people will raise prices, and the more opportunists you'll attract. Too many great govt. programs are abused by greedy "cash cow" hunters. There aren't enough auditors and inspectors to keep up with it.
I wondered if "Cash for Clunkers" was just a publicity stunt. I know they thought it was "trickle-down" economics, but I think people generally don't understand economics, and I see it as rich getting richer. I'll explain:
Being somewhat less well-off than many, I do much of my own auto repair (sometimes it's fun anyway), and occasionally get parts in salvage yards. Around that time ("Cash for Clunkers") I remember finding, and getting parts from, cars much nicer than mine in the salvage yards. That really bothered me. The engines were intentionally destroyed, with tags stating so, and the cars were never allowed to be sold for rebuilding / reconstruct / reuse, and _had_ to be completely scrapped within a few months.
So people who can afford new cars, I'll deem them on the rich side of the line, were subsidized to buy new cars and live well. Those of us on the poor side of that line I've drawn, who can't afford new cars, should have gotten the used cars then passed ours down to the person who has an even worse car, and eventually the bottom of the chain into salvage / scrap.
By giving money to people who can afford new cars, they've enriched the richer segment of the population. By skimming the nicer used cars off of the top and trashing them, they've bypassing the poorer people, whose cars just get older and worse with time and use. Great. Brilliant.
Sorry, I know I'm off-topic, but somehow it all dovetails with money, economics, technology, govt. spending and prioritization, etc...
(Score: 5, Insightful) by toddestan on Saturday March 24 2018, @04:08PM (2 children)
The other thing that bothered me a lot about Cash for Clunkers is that it was supposed to be "green", but if your car's EPA mileage rating was higher than 18 MPG, it was ineligible for the program no matter its current condition or how much of a clunker it really was. So the people who did the right thing and chose more efficient cars got the finger, and the program was just bailing out the irresponsible people who bought into the whole SUV craze a few years previous and now were facing $3-$4/gallon gas.
There's a lot of better ways the program could have been run, but if it was up to me I would have just canned the whole thing as economically irresponsible.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Saturday March 24 2018, @10:48PM (1 child)
Spot on, toddestan. I wasn't aware of the MPG requirement, but I do remember something about MPG being part of the deal.
Please remember, when you talk about things like "people who did the right thing..." - some of us have to drive work trucks. I happen to drive one of the most efficient, but there's only so much you can do when you need to carry lots of heavy stuff sometimes.
I think a MUCH more important metric is the total fuel consumption. Maybe I have a 35 MPG vehicle, but I drive 50K miles / year. Or maybe I have a 14 MPG vehicle, but only drive it 4K miles / year. Again, do-gooders (the govt.) rushing into stupid decisions. My point is: if congress would implement a correction system, like maybe a good network of, IDK, SN moderators? And revise and refine laws, maybe society would start improving.
Maybe a bunch of us need to organize a case study and report on the Linux kernel development model, or SN moderator model, and extrapolate that model into an augmentation / addon for our govt.
BTW, is toddestan near Tajikistan?
(Score: 2) by toddestan on Monday March 26 2018, @11:21PM
Well, I was writing that from a "Greenie" perspective. Though actually, the Clunkers program did have different rules for commercial vehicles, which ended up meaning that very few of them got turned in - because as you might expect, it doesn't make sense to intentionally destroy a productive asset. Unless of course the vehicle was pretty much used up and would have been scrapped soon anyway.... in which case free money!
Of course, I really don't have a problem with people driving trucks and SUVs, it's just that they shouldn't get a handout for doing so. Or for that matter, a handout for driving an efficient vehicle. And certainly no bailouts if you make a poor choice.
I agree on you with the mileage thing. I don't actually drive that many miles a year, and I've kind of wondered if I had a truck and would let people borrow it if they topped off the tank, if I would almost never have to pay for gas. And of course, it's always fun to out-smug the Prius drivers who brag about the mileage they got coming into work by pointing out I biked in and used zero gas.
Actually closer to Uzbekistan :)
(Score: 1) by anubi on Monday March 26 2018, @10:04AM
I have several neighbors that have absolutely decrepit old cars... belching blue-gray smoke. They need a ring and valve job something terrible - but they have to make do with what they have. You don't know how much I wanted the government to "open the car lot" and let people look over the cars brought in for destruction ( after the closeoff date for bringing one in ), with the offer to swap for the one they drove in. It would have gotten rid of a lot of the really old junk cars in my neighborhood with no skin off my back. Not only that, when the poor people get a buck, they would have spent it - in the local economy - which would have been a boost for our local businesses. Call it "gleaning", if you will, if one wants the deal scriptural.
A lot of my neighbors are in the same boat I am in... I do not use the car all that much - but if I am going to use it, its gotta be big enough to put the family in.
If a car has to be crushed, at least let it be a car that has lived a good long life...
If that big diesel mechanical IDI van I bought had have been on the list, it would have been gone forever before I was aware of what it was. It was the last of its kind, and I feel quite fortunate to have one of them. A completely mechanical system... everything is gears, cams, shafts. It wins no award for efficiency, power, or emissions, but its sheer elegance of design makes it quite dear to me.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]