from the it-just-goes-on-and-on-and-on-and-... dept.
The B-52 bomber gets first full IT upgrade since 1960s, and it's now LAN party ready. Digital facelift and networks give the Stratofortress a new lease of life.
The US Air Force's 10th Flight Test Squadron recently took delivery of the first B-52H Stratofortress to complete a refit through the Combat Network Communications Technology (CONECT) program. It's an effort to bring the Cold War era heavy bomber into the 21st century way of warfare-or at least up to the 1990s, technology-wise. While the aircraft received piecemeal upgrades over the past 50 years of flying, CONECT is the first major information technology overhaul for the Air Force's B-52H fleet since the airplanes started entering service in 1961. A total of 30 B-52s are due for the CONECT upgrade, at least based on the funding allotted for this fiscal year. The most visible part of the upgrade is the crew's workstations. New "multi-functional color displays" (MFCDs) replace the analog instruments and monochrome displays previously used by aircrew.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Dunbal on Tuesday May 27 2014, @01:12PM
And on craigslist an ad has appeared offering to bomb anyone's target list at $5000 per target...
(Score: 5, Funny) by VLM on Tuesday May 27 2014, @01:21PM
You know how flaky those craigslist sellers are, every time they're hired they blow up a wedding party instead. Never as advertised.
(Score: 2) by davester666 on Tuesday May 27 2014, @05:24PM
Hell hath no fury like an ex...
(Score: 4, Informative) by VLM on Tuesday May 27 2014, @01:33PM
I was trying to figure out what "or at least up to the 1990s, technology-wise." means from the article.
The best I can get is Link16 (I guess you could call it conceptually like .mil, or more specifically airforce, bluetooth between vehicles, but only similar to that in concept...) replaced TDL which uses the SIMPLE line protocol and SIMPLE was rolled out as a standard in the late 90s. So, much as any motherboard you purchase today that has a PS/2 interface is "stuck in the 80s" and therefore obsolete and a useless waste of money, then this new system is similarly stuck in the 90s. Its really weird how the author has an axe to grind, although he does a good job of not providing details most of which would not help the grind very much so he does a good job that way.
(Score: 2) by Geezer on Tuesday May 27 2014, @01:56PM
Unless the motherboard you purchase today is a hard-core gaming system that uses PS/2 to optimize keyboard input versus the USB or wireless alternatives. :)
(Score: 2) by VLM on Tuesday May 27 2014, @02:19PM
Yes maybe bad example. Perhaps... that motherboard uses a heatsink fan with a brushless motor, and those initially rolled out commercially in the 60s so only a hippie hopelessly stuck in the 60s would use that brand new motherboard, that motherboard is half a century out of date.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Geezer on Tuesday May 27 2014, @04:20PM
I am that hippy hopelessly stuck in the 60's...and I use liquid CPU cooling. :)
(Score: 2) by tibman on Tuesday May 27 2014, @02:22PM
Not only that but the military is probably not interested is putting the latest COTS into their bombers. They already have a proven satellite communication system that off the shelf civilian hardware cannot talk to.
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 3, Funny) by zocalo on Tuesday May 27 2014, @03:15PM
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
(Score: 2) by el_oscuro on Wednesday May 28 2014, @01:27AM
I think they played Defcon [introversion.co.uk].
SoylentNews is Bacon! [nueskes.com]
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Tuesday May 27 2014, @03:42PM
After the upgrade, the B-52 is now capable of roaming where it wants to, without wings, without wheels.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 2) by GlennC on Tuesday May 27 2014, @03:48PM
And without anything but the love it feels.
Sorry folks...the world is bigger and more varied than you want it to be. Deal with it.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 27 2014, @06:29PM
The missions for this thing are:
1) Deliver nuclear weapons.
Since the days when the other side had an arsenal of 100 each megaton-sized bombs, this has been a suicide pact.
(Mutually Assured Destruction: MAD; another word for that is insanity.)
There is a reason "military intelligence" is so often used as the prime example of an oxymoron.
2) Carpet bombing to destroy the homes and lives of civilians.
These are crimes; the latter is called murder.
This stuff has been against the rules of war for as long those have existed.
High altitude bombing is an imprecise practice and, in the 21st Century, there are better methods to destroy legitimate military targets.
This situation assumes that a WAR is under way--a war DECLARED BY CONGRESS; this has not been the case since September 2, 1945.
There has, however, been A LOT of American imperialism and aggression.
It also assumes that that military engagement was *not* based on lies.
We haven't been anywhere close to that in my lifetime.
-- gewg_
(Score: 3, Informative) by The Opportunist on Tuesday May 27 2014, @07:25PM
Your treatment of the laws of war is not very accurate.
Carpet bombing only becomes a violation of the laws of war when employed to target civilians or without regard to the lives of civilians (see Article 51 of Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Convention). Should the carpet bombing operation be directed against a target known to be outside of a civilian populated area or in an area with a minor civilian population, then the target becomes lawful. A prime and not infrequent example of a B-52 engaging in lawful bombardment would be when be when the crew targets an airfield, large military facility, or highway conveying troops and materiel. In these instances, the inaccuracy of the munitions would not prevent it from being carried out lawfully so long as the military takes precautions to ensures that there would not be an excessive loss of civilian life (see Article 57 of Additional Protocol I).
What your analysis also fails to account for is the updated munitions set that the B-52 can carry. Crews now have extensive access to precision guided missiles which can be deployed to reduce or eliminate unintentional civilian causalities (some B-52's are even adapted to deliver cruise missiles). In fact, the utility of the B-52 lies in the versatility of its operational roles. Not only can it deliver conventional ordinance, but also anti-ship missiles and other non-nuclear ordinance. While its previous operational roles during the Vietnam war may have been at times controversial and dubious, its more recent actions in the first Gulf war were mostly in conformity with the laws of war.
It's odd that you mention indiscriminate bombing or civilian targeting being in contravention of the laws of war for so long as they've existed. This is especially surprising in light of the fact that indirect bombing (and the nuclear bomb) is a comparatively recent innovation (aerial bombing only coming into practice during the Great War while artillery lacked sufficient range until the late 19th century to attack defended cities).
Unfortunately, the laws of war have not always adhered to an ideal conception of morality. It was not until the adoption of Additional Protocol I in 1977 that indiscriminate bombing became verboten. And civilians only became protected by the Geneva Conventions in 1949 from military targeting. The earlier Hague Conventions were mostly concerned with mitigating the suffering of combatants.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 27 2014, @10:02PM
Carpet bombing
"If it moves, shoot it; if it doesn't move, bomb it."
Hamburg, Cologne, Frankfurt, Dresden, Tokyo, Haiphong, the fields of Cambodia and Laos: Murdered civilians. Anyone with a conscience recognizes that fact. Learn from Howard Zinn.
It is a morally bankrupt concept--completely indiscriminate.
When executed from the altitudes at which a Stratofortress operates, especially so.
It is absolutely medieval. [google.com]
targets an airfield, large military facility, or highway conveying troops and materiel
...and flying hours and hours from Diego Garcia [wikipedia.org] before encountering a piece of land of any size [vtourist.com] shows how ridiculous this weapons platform is.
Submarine-launched cruise missile. Flattop-launched strike fighter.
If the target is some place one of those can't get it, a BUFF [google.com] isn't going to get to it either.
anti-ship missiles
Sea-launched cruise missile; strike fighter. No need for a BUFF; that's just mission creep.
If these ships are such a threat to the USA, shouldn't shore batteries manned by residents of the USA be able to deal with them?
It sounds like you are talking about aggression.
the laws of war have not always adhered to an ideal conception of morality
We agree. Warfare is a morally bankrupt process.
-- gewg_
(Score: 2) by wantkitteh on Tuesday May 27 2014, @10:23PM
Please do not feed the troll.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Wednesday May 28 2014, @06:53AM
Obviously you are not at all familiar with Canon Law (not even close to "cannon law") on the subject of non-combatant immunity. Nor the "De Jure Belli ac Pacis" of Hugo Grotius. Both of these predate the Hague and Geneva Conventions. And I would suggest a look at General Orders 100 of the Army of the Union (US, also known as the "Lieber code" after its author, Francis Lieber). The irony here is that the parent post is more knowledgeable than the correcting expert. But isn't war hell? And so upgraded B-52 war must be even more so.
(Score: 1) by The Opportunist on Wednesday May 28 2014, @10:24AM
Dear Aristarchus,
I omitted a discussion of Canon law, the works of Grotius, and the Lieber code due to time constraints. However, you're correct to note that any proper historical analysis of the laws of war needs to address these sources of law before making conclusions.
I am reluctant to admit these sources because of their uncertain status in past conflicts. To start, the Lieber code never attained status as an international instrument, but merely purported to restate what Francis Lieber thought were the norms of the time. Even then civilian causalities were inflicted with relative impunity during the Civil War on both sides. On Sherman's famed march to the sea thousands of civilian homes perished through arson and demolition. At other times, confederate cavalry regiments entered Northern towns to kill male civilians of service age (in one instance hundreds were slaughtered). Towns under siege by the Union army were shelled without regard to civilian life (thankfully artillery was not nearly as destructive or long in range as of yet). General Order 100 may have been a progressive code, accepted by both belligerents to the conflict, but it was not uniformly enforced in practice by the executive of either the Confederate or Union governments.
As for Hugo Grotius's treatise on the jus ad bellum and jus in bello, this writing never became widely practised or accepted during his life or immediately thereafter. We must recall that Grotious's works were generated in response to the atrocities committed during his life, not by what he observed in practice. More than a million civilians died during the Thirty Year's war without any meaningful or widespread justice being meted out to those who carried out these of depredations. I would hardly claim that his work produced an international norm against killing non-combatants or protecting civilian property (at least during his life time).
On the subject of canon law I am not entirely knowledgeable. Yet from what I can gather, it was actually chivalric codes that regulated warfare and not canon law during the medieval period. Most of canon law and its writers of this period were concerned with jus ad bellum (the use of force between nations), not jus in bello (the conduct of hostilities). Those canon writers that did opine on jus in bello made only passing and vague references to the protection of non-combatants. (Please see Lynch, "‘Protecting the non-combatant’: Chivalry, Codes and the Just War Theory", pp. 60 and 62).
With none of the above am I claiming that these sources are neglected today. Grotious is now an authoritative influence on the laws of the war, as is Lieber. However, their immediate impact was less significant and it was not until the 20th century that humanity truly formed international norms regulating the conduct of war. Enforcement may still be patchy, but at least the majority of nations accept these norms as valid. Some even prosecute their own soldiers through court martial for laws of war violations. This represents a stark difference from the historical position where the laws of war were just another form of victor's justice. By this measure, the protection of civilians is only a more recent development.