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Why Iron Dome Might Only Work For Israel
An anonymous reader writes "Many this week have declared Israel's American financed Iron Dome rocket defense system a success. Some have even gone so far to declare it a vindication of Ronald Reagan's 1980's Star Wars missile defense system. Pundits have even gone so far to assume the system could be sold to other nations. However, the Iron Dome may not be the game changer many are making it out to be. Taking out unsophisticated rockets is quite different than advanced missiles: '...the technical and strategic challenges of shooting down ballistic missiles differ considerably from those of shooting down unguided rockets. BMD shares with rocket defense some common technological ground; both require fast reaction time and impressive sensor capabilities, and the Iron Dome project has benefited from technical work on missile defense. However, ballistic missiles in flight behave differently from unguided, sub-atmospheric rockets.'"
Aren't unguided rockets also ballistic missiles? How are they different?
dom
The US provided some funding, they did not fully design or fund technology.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_Dome#Co-production_with_the_United_States
Since it works on artillery shells too, the other place it would work real well is: Seoul.
That word: ballistic, I don't think it means what you think it means
blog.sam.liddicott.com
So some random 'journalists' have attempted to force an analogy and it doesn't work (ICBM defense is analogous to primitive short range surface-surface missiles). Woop de do. Iron Dome is much more closely related to the Patriot system which was designed to hit smaller, slower targets than ICBMs.
Not sure what the big deal is. Wake me up when they get the shark mounted lasers working.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Some say that I'm the handsomest man in the world.
You are welcome on my lawn.
The summary seems to imply that Hamas is launching home-made rockets. Not so. Take a look at http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-F02XpjfWjRA/UK0fVU618XI/AAAAAAAAjDI/HKrb4SO6eXw/s1600/Hamas+Missiles_JPost.jpg
Secondly, Iron Dome isn't meant to be the end-all of missile defense. Israel has deployed a three-level missile defense.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_Dome for short-range missiles
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David%27s_Sling for medium-range missiles
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrow_(Israeli_missile) for long-range missiles
The Arrow system intercepts ballistic missiles.
Will it still work if the same rockets have an off balance twisted fin making them spiral? Will new tactics erase some of the advantages as fewer and larger salvos are launched? Will EW rockets get thrown in with the others to try to jam iron dome radar tracking? How well will it work against larger salvos with a bunch of really cheap cardboard and tinfoil rockets mixed in?
Snowden and Manning are heroes.
At least ten people have pointed out in the last sensationalist article that the two has nothing to do with each other.
No way
Why was this project "American financed" anyway? Israel has PLENTY of money to spend on their own defense. It doesn't make any sense for a country that's trillions of dollars in debt to hand out cash to a country that spends money on luxuries like a universal healthcare system that we don't even have here.
Notice the one big story not covered by the network is the missile attack from Israel on Gaza so far killing 150+ people.
You fund them with $2.5 billion a year, when the USA cannot afford that funding. They in turn need to be at constant war, even with the civilian population of Gaza, just to justify it.
Their 'missile shield' protects them from retaliation fireworks, while they bomb the crap out of the population of Gaza and declare everyone hit to be a 'militant' or a 'terrorist', even the children, women, families, even the UN school they bombed the last time.
Just stop funding them! Really, it's that simple, they'll stop killing people if they have to pay for their own constant warmongering.
Iron Dome isn't meant to intercept ballistic missiles. That's what Arrow is for: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrow_(Israeli_missile)
to the crude rockets? I read somewhere homemade rockets cost $500 to build. I wonder if an Arduino + GPS shield + Servo shield could give effective targeting?
Regan's proposal had the potential to be the most expensive undertaking in human history. All for no clear enemy. Look at it this way it wouldn't stop 911 from happening or car bombs so we're talking an insanely expensive program with questionable benefit. Also the missile defense tests were really problematic. They tended to boast of the time they hit the target and ignored the ten times they missed.
I thought that's why they are developing the Arrow 3 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrow_3#Arrow_3
Maybe they will integrate it into the iron dome system.
One day, some strangers came and slapped a condo on it, cutting off my access to the beach.
The people they setup in the place then began throwing rocks at my family.
My family and I appealed to the authorities, but the largest and most powerful among them are staunch friends of the new people.
There was absolutely no chance of any kind of peaceful negotiation, so it's been open hostility between us ever since.
A few years ago they even invaded what remained of our property and threw most of us off it, then built another condo on it.
We'd love to get our yard back, but it's been too long now.
The grandchildren of the new people call the condo home, and feel the beach is rightfully theirs now.
They won't consider the possibility of giving us even a narrow right-of-way to the sea.
It's a most unfortunate situation, and I don't know how it's going to end.
Iron Dome works on small targets with next to no warning time. In some ways ICBMs are easier because the warning time is much greater and they are much larger.
A kid who can pick flies off the fence with his 22 will have no problem picking off a moose at a hundred yards with his dad's elephant gun.
The fact is that, as far as some people are concerned, Israel can do no wrong and is completely beyond criticism.
Very soon, it will be curtains for Palestine.
Those who do not learn from commit history are doomed to regress it.
Because 90% success rate is bullshit?
Along with the $100,000 price tag.
The AMRAAM missile is some $500,000 and the Iron Dome has to intercept something a lot smaller and faster than an aircraft.
... Palestinians get there dome or do they too need a rock to go in it?
You are a stupid American, and deserve only to fight amongst your fellow Americans. North America is the Queens land not yours!
"The summary seems to imply that Hamas is launching home-made rockets. Not so."
So those Qassam missiles we've been hearing about are not home made, yet your infographic says "origin Gaza/Westbank".
That's almost exclusively what they're firing and they're not much more than bottle-rockets. Not the big scary missiles we hear from the Israel propaganda unit.
The aggressor here is Israel. Endless terrorist attacks on Gaza, endless land grabs on Gaza and the West Bank, asset stealing of Gaza. A slow and steady genocide of Palestinians.
Take the data to figure out exactly where the projectile came from and return fire in seconds.
That is the best system of all.
It's something like $100,000 per iron dome interceptor missle compared to $500 per unguided rocket.
We just need to keep the Palestinians mad at us. We need to keep Israel buying our stuff. We kill a political leader, Pals get angry and attack us, we can then have Israel buy more munitions from us. I was getting worried. It has been a while. Luckily we got that guy and triggered this whole thing. Israel will def be buying some replacement munitions. Some of those rockets got through. I think Tel-Aviv needs to beef up this Iron Dome thing. Who makes that anyway? Unilever?
Turkey is probably wishing they had a few of these to station along their border with Syria right now. Too bad they burned all their bridges with Israel.
OMG, underground missiles!
Technology improves over time.
Once there's a working prototype, it can be improved in thousands of ways that are less challenging to produce than the prototype itself.
Right now, there are some challenges in making Iron Dome into SDI. However, there's also a working model which can be refined until it has SDI-ish capabilities.
If you looked at a computer in the 1970s, you might think it could never simulate a human cell. And yet, we're almost there.
Futurist Traditionalism
"10kg payload bottlerockets eh?"
Vs the Israeli missiles and their 1000-1300 times that payload with better explosives to carry to? Bottlerockets.
Qassam punch a hole in a wall vs Israel flattening an apartment block. They're orders of magnitude different.
. McCain as "Iron Dome" when he writes about him in his diary at night.
True story.
Now, maybe the guy meant intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), or even intermediate range ballistic missile (IRBM) -- the stuff Israel is shooting down seems shorter range -- but ballistic and unguided are essentially equivalent. You could have a non-ballistic unguided missile (an unguided cruise missile, say) but that's worse than useless (it could loop around and come back at you). But a ballistic missile -- once past the boost phase -- is, like something thrown by a trebuchet, guided only by gravity and air drag.
And of course the further away it launches from, the more time you have to figure out what it's doing.
-- Alastair
Look, I understand that the moderator is supportive of Palestine, but why not celebrate the technical achievement? The overwhelming majority of nations worldwide are not capable of achieving more than the Palestines are, so the Iron Dome is a major accomplishment!
They aren't betting the farm on Iron Dome.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrow_%28Israeli_missile%29
http://www.army-technology.com/projects/arrow2/
It's always amusing to watch the reaction to military tech stories on Slashdot
Normally, the attitude is that technology is great, it works, it can be made ever-better, etc. Geeks always have great faith in technology it seems... EXCEPT when it is military technology that runs contrary to left-wing religious dogma; Ballistic missile defense has always been a big sin in America on the left (who have insisted since the early 1960's, as an article of faith, that it would not work). The left in America were so insistent that our missile defenses would be "destabilizing" (they also argued at the same time the opposite idea: that they would never work) that the Nixon administration gave-in and shut down the system we had built. The left in America never made any public effort to oppose the system the Soviets had actually installed, and which remained in-place until nearly the end of the cold war (Apparently, communist missile defense systems worked and/or were not "destabilizing", though I've never been able to figure out which schizophrenic argument was the dominant one there...).
What's interesting is that the US has successfully shot down many missiles over the years and now the Israelis are doing it... and as with all technology the clear trend is always for more and more success, more accuracy, more dependability, etc. On Slashdot, if this were ANY other technology the posts would tend to be nearly universally-positive... but because there is a fear that this would fuel support for American anti-missile defense systems, we see many posts of doubt that this can be extrapolated, criticism of the reliability, caveats about everything; in, short, a complete flip from tech-confidence to luddite-ism.
If the Israelis are emulating the American Manifest Destiny, they may be doing it the hard way.
Wiping out the Muslim population from Turkey to Pakistan would more closely resemble the way it was done in the US.
The question is raised, "can a military occupation defending itself, be defined as self defense?"
If anyone is interested, not all theater 'ballistic' missiles follow a simple ballistic path. The SS-26 Iskander fielded by Russia is able to maneuver to defeat. The US proposed placing anti-ballistic missile defences in Poland (so that Iran can't blackmail Europe once the Iranians finally attain a nuclear weapon, since Iranian missiles now reach Europe). The Russian response had Dmitri Medvedev in November 2008 issuing orders to deploy Iskander to Kaliningrad so they could be used in a first (nuclear) strike on the US missile site. The Russians clearly believe it is evasive enough to beat anti-ballistic missile defences. It is unknown whether the US or Israel systems can cope with this technology (and would probably be classified if it could). The SS-26 would not be stopped by the Iron Dome system and probably not the Patriot. The Israeli Arrow 3 has thrust vectoring so probably could stop it, and the US THAAD system could also possibly handle a maneuvering target.
References: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9K720_Iskander
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrow_(Israeli_missile)#Arrow_3 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/THAAD
Please note I'm not trying to make any political judgements here. I'm just pointing out that the SS-26 is a very capable missile that the builders have a lot of confidence in.
The Palestinian conflict started when the Allies took what was then Palestine and gave a large chunk to the Jews to create Israel. The Israelis then expanded and took over the rest of Palestine (and have displaced 1000s of Palestinians from their homes to create homes for Israelis) and the 2 sides have been fighting ever since.
The mess in Iran started when the democratically elected government of Iran decided to kick out the British Anglo-Persian Oil Company (one of the predecessors of what is now British Petroleum) and take over the Iranian oil reserves). The British and Americans didn't like this and proceeded to overthrow the government and replace it with a government controlled by the British. This then lead to the Iranian Revolution and the current anti-western fundamentalist islamic dictatorship we have today.
The first mess in Iraq started because the west decided to aid Saddam in his fight with Iran (except that after the war with Iran was over, he proceeded to use those same weapons against Kuwait)
The current mess in Iraq started because the west decided to invade so they could overthrow Saddam and in so doing have created another state for islamic extremists to use as a base of operations.
Some people here may not be old enough to remember all the propaganda about the Patriot anti-Missile system's effectiveness during the first Gulf War. The media/public were fed total lies. Patriot turned out not to be very effective at all. Given that Israeli officials are currently the only information source for Iron Dome's amazing 90% success rate, surely we should be highly sceptical. Instead all I have seen in the media are endless uncritical articles about how amazing Iron Dome is.
Correction : that's 'western politicians'.
I didn't invade anyone, never asked for it, and neither did most of the Western population.
And I'm quite sure most the the Israeli's and Palestinians didn't ask for it either.
It's C-RAM. It's a tactical defense, not a strategic one.
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
Israel is just shadow boxing. It plays up the threats it faces and has a perpetual war with Gaza. Under the cover of this war it loots Gaza and steals the land. Over time the aim is to make Gaza into Israel.
Whenever things become peaceful, they stir the pot to keep the fighting going and to create some more enemies to attack.
"Before you judge Israel, think for a second about how we would respond to thousands of them"
And what if it was American that Israel kept bombing? What if it was American that Israel captured land and build houses on? What if Israel bulldozed American houses? Blockaded America? Attacked it's infrastructure? Seized its money? What then??
What I think should happen, is American should stop funding these murderers. It should arrest and prosecute the US politicians who take money to put Israels interests above American interests. It should break the blockade on Gaza and have war trials for the Israeli generals.
American politicians who support Israeli interests over American ones are traitors to their country.
So if the palestinians launch 100 missiles, 75 gets through. That doesn't spell successful or gamechanger in my book.
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
> Of the rockets fired at Israel they only managed to shoot down about half.
This is a "feature", not a bug. The targeting calculation take into consideration the landing point of the rocket.
Well, since Iron Dome appears to be working, the Gaza terror groups are changing tactics. They are now firing volleys of rockets hoping to saturate Iron Dome's ability to intercept, and targeting areas uncovered by Iron Dome. The new tactics worked, as Iron Dome was only able to intercept five out of seven rockets on Saturday, letting on through to explode in a residential area, killing an unarmed civilian. I guess it wasn't one of those "unarmed" rockets we hear so much about. It's amazing how incompetent Palestinians can be when it comes to creating a peaceful, prosperous society, and so ingenious and industrious when it comes to killing Jews.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
One destroyed my friends house, it had an explosive warhead packed around with ball bearings. The entire house was torn apart from the ball bearings, luckily for them they made it into the bomb shelter in time.
One of Israel's greatest strengths would be its military. Hamas cannot compete militarily, it's a losing strategy. Attempting to compete on this battlefield demonstrates the absence of rational thinking.
Israel's weakness is on the morality of preventing Palestinians from forming a country of their own. A wise strategy would be for the Palestinians to fight Israel here, using public opinion (of both reasonable Israelis and the larger world). Look at Gandhi's strategy of non-violent non-cooperation that got the British Empire out of India. Look at how Mandela ended Apartheid in South Africa.
Iron Dome was invented as an answer to small unsophisticated rockets. There are already systems for dealing with ICBM's, the Patriot and Arrow missiles. It's a fundamentally different problem technologically to stop a small short range missile from an intercontinental one.
A small bend on one of the wings to that it spirals when it flies ...
The next upgrade on the Iron Dome is that it calculates predictable parabolic spirals
Th next upgrade to rockets is that one of the wings gets a hinge that makes it behave chaotically
The next upgrade on the Iron Dome is that the claimed of it's effectiveness are exaggerated
The next upgrade to the rockets is an arduino to make them a little smarter
The next upgrade on the iron dome is to install many many more and faster that can shoot down by needing less reaction time
The next upgrade to the rockets is many many more which makes the workshops easier to find
Ad infinitum ...
I can't believe a site full of futurist geeks high on technology would be so pessimistic about a really high-tech problem like missile defense.
I can't find a reference, but I'm pretty sure Iron Dome is the product of a completely different research project than SDI. And they didn't share much, if any. A victory for Iron Dome doesn't validate SDI.
If the Palestines get their way, the gaza strip becomes a sovereign nation and it is perfectly legal to close the borders between nations. THAT is the HUGE elephant in the room in this conflict. The Palestines NEED Israel more then Israel needs them and the arabs don't want them at all.
You see, the occupied territories BELONG to someone. The arab neighbours of Israel who lost it after Israel didn't get wiped out when the Arab nations ganged up together to wipe it out and instead Israel took sizable chunks of their land. If Israel withdraws, possession of those lands should naturally revert to those nations.
Right now all the occupied territories have TWO borders. One with Israel and one with an Arab nation. BOTH sides are closed. In fact the Muslim side tends to be FAR more closed. Egypt has lost many a live dealing with smuggling into Gaza. None of its neighbours WANT a Palestine state on their border or they could have created one ANY TIME THEY WANTED TO. Palestines are trouble, they are the one group who so far has achieved a lot through armed resistance. There is not a single neighbour to Israel that doesn't have its own trouble groups that could take inspiration from this. Hell, just ask Khaddafi. Did he enjoy the people taking power through armed resistance? Didn't think so. A Palestine victory will send the message that armed rebellion works, with the Arab spring a lot know this already but it is a message those in power would care not to reinforce.
An indepedent Palestine state would need to exist on its own, without relying on Israeli resources and infrastructure. The border would be 100% closed. Canadians can't just wander into the US as they please either can they? And those are somewhat friendly nations that just think the other is silly. The border between a palestine state and Israel would be closer to the border between north and south korea and that one is PERFECTLY legal. Sovereign nations do NOT have to deal with each other if they don't want to. And any attack from one may be answered with force by the other, as much force as the attacked side pleases. That is what war is all about after all. Real war, not police actions however twisted they might get.
Do you REALLY THINK that Russia, China and Iran want to send the message that armed resistance by Muslims against a more powerful opponent can work in the long run? The first already has exactly the same problem with Tjetnie, China has its muslims who want independence and Iran is supressing its own population harshly. Why do you THINK that Hamas rockets are still so primitive? Iran wants to build nukes but it can't even build a decent rocket? It ain't rocket science anymore. Hamas gets the absolute minimum support to keep them going but not enough to actually achieve anything. Why do you think the west is the biggest donator of humanitarian support? It is no secret Israel got its economy going on bad land thanks to enormous donations, Israel is the only nations were the taxpayers live abroad and WANT to pay taxes freely. But Muslims ain't poor either, were is the Golf State Marshall plane to kickstart the Palestine economy with a few billions?
No, having the conflict brewing suits most Muslims just fine, shows they are not just rolling over and giving in, that they are making a fist against the great Satans but actually finishing it, one way or another, that would risk the cozy lifestyles of the powers that be.
And if you want to resolve this, why not start on something simpler first.
Sort out the United Kingdom, it is easy, just sort out Ireland, Schotland, Wales and Brittain. They all speak the same language (HA!) so it should be a cakewalk!
Next, the basks, Belgium and oh sort out the European tax havens. Then you can start thinking about Tibet, Korea and maybe then you will be ready to sort out the middle east.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
even the UN school they bombed the last time.
Yeah, and Israel provided a video. You might remember those "secondary explosions" showing that Hamas had been using it for an ammo dump. You know, in violation of international law, which various people love to scream about in regards to Israel but never about the Palestinians.
Om, nomnomnom...
If we study our history we will learn that Hamas started using rockets as it's main weapon only after the security fence made suicide bombings less practical.
When you close off one option for the enemy he will inevitably find a new one, preferably a less effective one
but this is not to say you shouldn't close off his options.
We also need to remember that the modern warfare is more about morale then number of casualties, The Hamas wants as many Israelis as possible to live in fear, killing them is just an added bonus. having an effective defense makes the civilians under attack feel less defenseless.
Re: So if we resurrect Neanderthals, would they have the right to force Sapiens out of Europe? /.'s lack of ability to understand and encode and allow UTF and use the Thorn character is frustrating). And in that, they have a stronger and unambiguous point, don't they?
.
Yes, I guess they would?...? I always assumed that your idea was going to be the culmination in the ending episodes of the GEICO Cavemen TV comedy series.
.
And of course, the Native Americans can leverage their bingo and casino money to finally push all of the settlers and their descendants back into "ye Olde World" (correctly as þe Olde World, but
You are talking total war, the parent is talking incidents, like the recent incident of the north firing a few grenades killing a few people. Not total war but an incident that IF it could have been neutralized, would have reduced the need to retaliation and the risk of escalation.
For the same see Syria/Turkey. A mortar goes wrong and Turkey has to answer with fire. If it could have been destroyed in flight, there would have been no incident.
This is about the prevention of war not about dealing with a full assault.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Yeah, Northern Ireland is a bright light to the world, just ignore the segregation and constant troubles. Have the fences come down? No? Are there still incidents of people attacking each other for being the wrong faith?
Northern Ireland is as much a beacon for resolving conflict as the former Yugoslavian countries. Sure, it is peaceful, because everyone is separated.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
One of the Israeli dead is a Bedouin, nomadic Muslims. But I suppose the wrong kind of Muslims (Historically there has been no conflict with Bedouin in Israel as for the Bedouin it just meant a different government was short changing them, forget Palestines, the racism against Bedouins is undeserved as they have served in Israels army with distinction yet get the flack for the actions of others).
The trick is that Israel is like the west, there might be a lot of Muslims who think western society is foul but life for the average Muslim is infinitely better under Jews/Christians then it is under Muslims. We hear a lot about the Palestinians who really are just the Muslims who fled from Israel when they knew the Arab armies were about to attack, hoping to come back when Israel had been destroyed. The faith of the Muslims who stayed and threw in their lot with the rest of Israel, that one is seldom heared. But it is a sizable group.
Many a nazi sympathizer fled from the fighting they knew was coming to Germany hoping to get back and get everything back once the battle had been won. They were not shown any mercy. I wonder why people expect Israel to treat the Palestines ANY different. Look into the origin of the refuge camps, these people weren't fleeing from violence inflicted onto them, but from violence they hoped would be inflicted onto others.
It changes a lot in my eyes.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
The USSR never developed the means for a large scale invasion. In fact, the only country with the means to land a large army on another continent is... the USA!
D-Day showed what it takes to land an army on an enemies shore and the Channel is a cakewalk compared to the ocean between the USSR and the USA.
The USSR did develop the means to airdrop a large force but not nearly large enough to even remotely threaten the USA on its own ground.
So... what enemy?
But you do need shield if YOU plan to attack first and want to stop people from firing back at you.
Now lets see, what country has done a lot of invasions in recent history?
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Of course it only works for Israel. Iron Dome is a specific solution for a specific problem. You can't take it and apply it to other problems anymore than you can use a Google route from New York to Detroit as a solution for your drive from Paris to Rome.
If you have a sufficiently similar problem, you can check which parts of the solution might apply to you. But everyone who thinks that all rockets are the same should try to land a man on the moon using fireworks rockets.
It's a semantical trap. We call non-identical things by the same name due to some similarity. What we call rockets works on the same basic principle, which is why we call it the same name. But if you know anything about rockets at all, you know that there are vast differences - more like between a model car and a real car than between two different brand cars.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
even the UN school they bombed the last time.
Yeah, and Israel provided a video. You might remember those "secondary explosions" showing that Hamas had been using it for an ammo dump. You know, in violation of international law, which various people love to scream about in regards to Israel but never about the Palestinians.
Yeah, it must have been Hamas weapons. There's no way the explosions could have been natural gas bottles stored in the back of the UN school. You and Israel are completely right in ignoring what the UN says and blindly believing Israel.
> When the intellectuals finally take over the world, and wipe out the fucktards
So - in this case, you agree with OP? Because I'm pretty confused about what kind of social darwinist argument you're making here.
Shooting down missiles with a missile is easiest when it's heading toward you in a straight line, for a considerable time and for a great distance, as you see with an ICBM. Shooting down something that is following a fairly short arc, hasn't been in the air long and is already close ... is way harder.
I was surprised at how well patriot did in the previous war, and rather impressed at iron dome hitting anything at all.
--dave
davecb@spamcop.net
References to Reagan era boondoggles aside, in America we have already perfected the technology for intercepting and possibly destroying missiles that are launched and follow an established inbound trajectory, and do not deploy active electronic countermeasures en route.
It is known as 'baseball'.
Never mind all this war ballyhoo... what I'd really LOVE to see is baseball played with balls that have retro rockets, on-board guidance systems, chaff ejecting radar countermeasures and split into MIRV type multiple reentry vehicles. The batter and catcher would also be drawn into this arms race (perhaps by the literal acquisition of additional arms) by using bats with unfolding surfaces to target each fragmented baseball, mitts that sprout fractal bifurcations to capture each reentry vehicle.
Since the mass of the launched baseball is known, its fragmentation into little pieces and the countermeasures that would evolve could, through nanotechnology, branch down into fractal and quantum infinity.
But at the quantum level the baseball-bits would exhibit both wave and particle behavior. Catchers must employ slit apertures and collectors, could improve their success with magnetic field focusing and plasma filled coils. The referee of the future would call the plays based on the strength of photon emission tallied against the energy-mass ratio of the original baseball to discern its composition and fate.
Whoops, I forget we have already nailed this one too. It is known as 'Astronomy'.
Sorry about the distraction.
Let's go back to talking about Israel.
<blink>down the rabbit hole</blink>
The Palestinians don't need to actually hurt or kill anyone with their rockets. To achieve a positive political end all they need to do is create a situation where people in Israel can never be completely safe. This serves as an argument against the current policy where the Palestinians are being forced into a small area and then walled in. The rockets mean that even if the policy is taken to it's logical conclusion it will never bring total security.
I'm a big fan of disproportionate response. If you slap me, I'll fuck you up so bad you'll apologize if you slap me again in your dreams.
That way, I never get slapped again. And that's kind of the point of a response. Right now Israel roughs up Hamas a bit, they spend a couple years rearming, then and it starts all over again.
If they weren't in between several foreign powers hell-bent on their destruction, suffering constant attacks against their country, usually deliberately aimed at their civilian populations. That kind of thing engenders some sympathy. Israel has survived, what, three attempts to wipe it off the map? The first one was against the combined might of all the surrounding Arab countries.
Need to clarify...
Gaza is not an Occupied Territory. Israel did occupy it after capturing it from Egypt in 1967 when Egypt lost it's war against Israel, however, Israel forcibly removed (using it's own military) all Jews living in Gaza in 2005 and unoccupied the land. Doing so almost led to civil war within Israel, but they succeeded in doing it with the hopes that if the occupation went away, there would be peace.
Following this withdrawal in 2005 the borders were open and there was no naval blockade. All of that stuff came much later after years of Gaza rocket attacks and the kidnapping of Shalit.
The main problem with Hamas...if you listen to them speak...is that they talk about Jerusalem and Tel Aviv and all of Israel as being occupied. They view Gaza as the staging ground for the plans for the total destruction of the Jews/Israel.
Hamas youtube video evidence
http://youtu.be/qMkQGjQ8dWI
My God can beat up your God. Just kidding...don't take offense. I know there's no God.
Yes and no one will break the sound barrier either. People said the iron dome wouldn't work either for the same reasons. Ballistic Missle defense is just the next "it can't be done argument" to be proven wrong.
Attacking and killing a single leader is bad, but, understandable. Hamas counterattack was predictable. The continued Israeli attack didn't gain much more than silent contempt for Israel.
Where's the edit button when you need it?
It's called "preview".
The primary missile it's used to intercept are pretty primitive. Think along the same lines as the kind most readers here would have built out of cardboard from an Estes kit.
The primary missile it is made to intercept is made of metal.
So is it still pretty much a metal cased version of the products seen here?
I would think at some point that someone in whatever amounts to leadership of Gaza would wake up and realize that they are in possession of a 150 square miles of land on the Mediterranean, with only open ocean separating them from Europe.
To me this sounds like a great economic opportunity.
Step 1 -- announce you still disagree with the Israeli government on a broad array of issues involving the Palestinian people, but that you are renouncing all violent means and accept Israel's right to exist.
Step 2 -- announce your desire to improve the lives of Palestinians by developing the economy of Gaza. Given step 1 being done sincerely (and with the acceptance of some kind of third party oversight, at least initially), I would expect a lot of money to roll in.
Step 3 -- Profit. By and large the Palestinian people are educated people and could offer a kind of Singapore/Hong Kong kind of economic opportunity -- no tariffs, low cost labor, close access to European markets & global shipping, etc.
Sure, the Israelis might make it difficult at first but if you have an open and sincere renunciation of violence and a willingness to accept Israel's right to exist, the Israelis will have a hard time maintaining a blockade, etc, especially if some third party agrees to supervise imports/exports to prevent weapons from being imported/exported.
Some people refer to 'The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland' as the UK, are they wrong too?
Apparently so, according to the U.S. Postal Service. When printing an address label for a British destination, Endicia DAZzle shipping software spells it "GREAT BRITAIN AND NORTHERN IRELAND".
Or perhaps you don't realize that even the term 'jew' is used in the perjorative, and so using 'anti-jew' would itself be offensive?
Google's explanation of the inclusion of "Jew Watch" in its search results claims that "Jewish" is less likely to be perceived as pejorative than "Jew". So what's wrong with "anti-Jewish" again?
I hope you're sitting down when you read this: "The West Wing" is a TV show.
It's not real, unless you mean real slanted.
No brain, no pain.
Source? I've heard this before and *never* seen it substantiated. An aside: the fact you got modded so highly without backing your assertion up is kinda worrying...
The evil war-mongering terror-hugging slugs of the Gaza deserve no such defense... People who raise children to be suicide bombers, who celebrated 9-11, who have fired thousands of rockets at Israeli civilians (a war crime) while hiding the launchers at religious sites (more war crimes), who reward the families of suicide bombers, want desperately to push the world back into the seventh century, actually voted to be led by terroists, etc. simply are evil. There is no escaping that. The US has given billions of dollars to the Palestinians over the years and their "leaders" just pocket the money or re-direct it into their war against "the Zionist entity". NOT ONE SINGLE CIVILIAN IN GAZA WOULD HAVE BEEN KILLED BY ISRAEL THIS MONTH HAD THE PALESTINIANS NOT COMMITTED A WAR CRIME FIRST
There is simply no moral equivalence between the sides in this struggle... when the UN told the Jews (who had previously had a nation on the land), and the so-called "Palestinians" (who'd been squatters there for generations without ever forming a country), that they had to share the land the Jews agreed but the "Palestinians" joined forces with all the surrounding Muslims and attacked the Jews, trying to wipe the Jews out rather than compromising. That set the stage and framed the debate. Game over. Palestinian cause invalid. When subsequent attempts by Muslims to wipe out the Jews arose, the "Palestinians" joined those efforts too. Their organizations are dedicated to eliminating the Jews, NOT to coexisting with them. With that dedication to mayhem and death, and that track record of actual combat, the "Palestinians" leave Israel little choice but to fight back when attacked... and of course the response is not proportional... only leaders who are morons engage in "proportional" responses to enemies who attacked their civilian populations.
I'm not a Jew... I'm a distant observer with no "dog in the hunt" but who has long paid attention to the history, and I do not put the word palestinian in quotes as an insult (to people I'd otherwise have sympathy for, given that the current generations were raised in that region and were taught that they were entitled to it) but rather because even Arafat (an Egyptian) himself admitted that the "Palestinian" term was artificial and was used as a political tactic; there never was a palestinian nation or identity at any point in world history... not ever. The Brits did refer to the region as "Palestine" (a word that descends from "Philistine") during their occupation, but the locals never actually had a nation. My opposition to the actions and aspirations of the "Palestinian" people and cause is entirely driven by one thing: I despise evil homicidal barbarians, particularly ones who are big fans of genocide.
The palestinians fire rockets at civilians (a war crime) and celebrate when any civilians are killed. When Israel shoots back at them, the barbarians and their friends scream "We're the victims!". The Palestinians have had numerous opportunities to settle the fight peacefully and have a nation of their own (something they have NEVER had) but they always refuse because they always require an end to the existence of a Jewish nation called "Israel". Fuck them. Their ancestors snuck-in from neigboring lands and squatted on it for generations without ever creating a nation. The Brits came along and tried to sort things out... they carved-up the region they called "Palestine", creating Jordan in the process. If Israel is illegitimate, then so are all the other nations created by westerners trying to teach barbarians to be civilized (like modern-day Iraq, modern-day Turkey, Saudi Arabia, modern-day Iran, etc). Yeah, modern-Israel's creation displaced a bunch of people and squeezed them into less land than they thought they should have, but the Jews did not get all of their ancient lands back either and the palestinians magnified their plight much much worse by repeatedly going to war against Israel... this not only kept reducing the land they still had as they kept losing the fights, but it also legitimized the Israeli position that they need defensible borders and a relatively unarmed eventual palestinian neighbor. Note: even after all the fighting, Israel still officially supports the creation of a palestinian state... but the palestinians still refuse to concede the existence of a Jewish state... so Fuck 'em.
The first shots ALWAYS come from Hezbollah, or Hamas and the targets are almost always Israeli civilians. Even the start of the struggle was an attempt to wipe out the Jews.
The "real villains" are being addressed... everytime some evil Hezbollah or Hamas rat bastard who has targeted civilians with rockets he launches from sites hidden behind his own civilians and/or religious buildings (another war crime) is blown to bits in his car by a smart guy flying a drone.
ronald reagan could be vindicated