Could your shop make artillery rounds?

[MichaelP]

And this ^ is another reason to nip the bastards in the bud.

 

[Ries]

I know you guys all think the NYT are communists, but this is actually a good article on the subject.

From Rockets to Ball Bearings, Pentagon Struggles to Feed War Machine

The flow of arms to Ukraine has exposed a worrisome lack of production capacity in the United States that has its roots in the end of the Cold War.

www.nytimes.com

and their links are interesting to follow.

for instance, this is a good read on the subject:

Empty Bins in a Wartime Environment: The Challenge to the U.S. Defense Industrial Base

The U.S. defense industrial base is not prepared for the international security environment that now exists, including to deal with China. The United States should take several steps now to strengthen the industrial base to improve deterrence and warfighting.

www.csis.org

and this one:

The U.S. Industrial Base Is Not Prepared for a Possible Conflict with China

To deter a potential conflict with China, the United States must act quickly to resolve key challenges in its industrial base.

features.csis.org

Aerojet Rocketdyne, which builds key parts of missiles, pretty much every missile, is backlogged on orders to the tune of 3 times their annual gross income.

a few years ago, in 2016, we basically ran out of air to ground precision missiles for the air force- due to a few minor "non-war" skirmishes. You remember the intense fighting in 2016, right?
As in, we dont have munitions in storage, we dont have sufficient capacity to make them very fast at all, and we run out if we shoot just a few measly syrians and afghanis.

Empty Racks | Air & Space Forces Magazine

The Air Force is expending its precision weapons almost as quickly as it receives them.

www.airandspaceforces.com

I am not in favor of a continuous state of war, or just shooting at any thing that moves- but I do think that we need to have an industrial base that can supply the military, and especially as we shift more to the current drone/missile warfare model, we need to make it at home.

 

[standardparts]

I know you guys all think the NYT are communists, but this is actually a good article on the subject.

From Rockets to Ball Bearings, Pentagon Struggles to Feed War Machine

The flow of arms to Ukraine has exposed a worrisome lack of production capacity in the United States that has its roots in the end of the Cold War.

www.nytimes.com

and their links are interesting to follow.

for instance, this is a good read on the subject:

Empty Bins in a Wartime Environment: The Challenge to the U.S. Defense Industrial Base

The U.S. defense industrial base is not prepared for the international security environment that now exists, including to deal with China. The United States should take several steps now to strengthen the industrial base to improve deterrence and warfighting.

www.csis.org

and this one:

The U.S. Industrial Base Is Not Prepared for a Possible Conflict with China

To deter a potential conflict with China, the United States must act quickly to resolve key challenges in its industrial base.

features.csis.org

Aerojet Rocketdyne, which builds key parts of missiles, pretty much every missile, is backlogged on orders to the tune of 3 times their annual gross income.

a few years ago, in 2016, we basically ran out of air to ground precision missiles for the air force- due to a few minor "non-war" skirmishes. You remember the intense fighting in 2016, right?
As in, we dont have munitions in storage, we dont have sufficient capacity to make them very fast at all, and we run out if we shoot just a few measly syrians and afghanis.

Empty Racks | Air & Space Forces Magazine

The Air Force is expending its precision weapons almost as quickly as it receives them.

www.airandspaceforces.com

I am not in favor of a continuous state of war, or just shooting at any thing that moves- but I do think that we need to have an industrial base that can supply the military, and especially as we shift more to the current drone/missile warfare model, we need to make it at home.

Actually I don't think the "NYT are communists".
The current NYT is left leaning like much of the media and has a history of supporting the narrative the current Administration feeds them.
Want to sell increasing the defense budget? Get media to run articles pleading military funding needs.
It's not like you or most of us have any insider knowledge to verify most if what the media reports, but no doubt China and Russia have assets that do. If the U.S. military is not capable if waging war all over the world, then maybe the current Administration needs to scale back of being the world's police-person.

 

[Milland]

Because allowing bullies to run rampant without constraint is always a good idea.

Maybe we should scale back school security because that's inconvenient and expensive?

 

[mhajicek]

BAE Systems successfully tests artillery shell with double the range

BAE Systems and the US Army have successfully test fired a Sub-Caliber Artillery Long-Range Projectile with Enhanced Lethality from a 155 mm XM907E2 cannon at the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico with double the range of current precision guided munitions.

newatlas.com

Give away the old stuff to make room for the new.

 

[604Pook]

I think the super complicated, super expensive weapons/systems are needed, but there also needs to be more economical, large quantity, "cheap tech" developed. Unfortunately the western world is not very setup for cheap, large scale production of that stuff. China rules the cheap chip making world and production.

 

[William Payne]

So who was producing all the stuff fired in the middle east?

 

[ghost of christmas past]

And if we talk about the legal side of the issue, in Vietnam the United States defended its ally, an independent country that was attacked.

Sweet Mary Mother of God, is that what they taught in the Soviet Union ?

Why do people say stuff that is so blatantly FALSE ? Even the goddamn history channel has actual facts online now. Dick and Lyndon have been dead for years. Lets try this

THERE WAS NEVER A COUNTRY SOUTH VIETNAM. NEVER EVER EVER NOT EVEN BACK TO THE DAWN OF TIME.

Go spend ten minutes to read the real world actual facts history of that area before you make a total fool of yourself. Anyone who believes that 1960's stupid shit cannot be trusted about anything else.

 

[Rob F.]

I think the super complicated, super expensive weapons/systems are needed, but there also needs to be more economical, large quantity, "cheap tech" developed. Unfortunately the western world is not very setup for cheap, large scale production of that stuff. China rules the cheap chip making world and production.

But here in the Military Industrial Complex land land of grift and profit above all else who will make any real money making cheap simple dumb artillery rounds?

 

[ghost of christmas past]

But here in the Military Industrial Complex

It's funny that BAE is one of the biggest players in the US. What does the 'B' stand for, I wonder ?

land land of grift and profit above all else who will make any real money making cheap simple dumb artillery rounds?

I have to shake my head in wonder at all the miiltary wizards here, extrapolating from their fever dreams. "Xi is preparing for war !" Yeah, like TR can read chinese or bothers to go look at anything M. Xi has ever said in his entire life. Oh, he said this to parliament ? I bet England was happy to hear the speech. China does not have a parliament. Something I learned with nc machines - you better get it right if you expect the machine to believe you. Or maybe nc machines are smarter than pm posters ...

But the funniest part is, "what if china invades taiwan ?!?!"

First off, china owns that island. Has since 1945 when the US wrote that into the articles of surrender and japan signed it. The people there now are welcome to go wherever they like but the dirt belongs to the prc because the prc is china.

But ignoring that, and ignoring the fact that the prc has demonstrated 75 years of restraint in the matter, if they did decide that enough nancy pelosi visits was enough and did decide to invade, there's not a damn thing the US could do to stop it. Nothing but get some people killed, which is something the US historically revels in, but in the end, as in a week later, it's all over. Formosa is tiny. China is not.

Do you people have any idea how many is a billion and a half ? Or even three million ? There are commonly more people in one mainland city than all of taiwan put together.

Taiwan is not even 100 miles away from fujian, a morning's run in an outboard. Or in 50,000 outboards, each with 1,000 lbs of explosives/ammo and ten guys onboard. That's nothing to china, a morning commute on the subway in any city. This ain't some pissy little place like new york, there's literally hundreds of cities twice that size and larger. You can't count that high. How many missiles does the entire US Navy have ? And oh yeah, the entire us Navy is not there and can't be there in four hours.

That's a simple example. If the prc wanted to invade taiwan there's not a damn thing you could do about it. So maybe it would be smarter to realize that's not their interest and double smarter to quit trying to provoke such a response.

No one ever claimed americans ere smart but this is way beneath stupid. There's not a chance you could do a damn thing to stop it, it hasn't happened in seventy-five years, without provocation there's no reason for it to happen, why the fuck can't you just mind your own damn business ? And quit saying stupid shit about "xi jinping this, and xi jinping that" when you can't speak three words of chinese, can't read even one, don't bother to actually find the real translations of what he has said, don't even know that china doesn't even have an effing parliament, you just run off at the mouth with yards and yards of stupid, dishonest, untruthful crap. Why ? Does it give you a thrill ? A little frisson of dread, like watching a scary war movie ? Be a hero like john wayne, who stayed home and made inspirational movies for the duration but boy was he a big talker !?

Buy yourself a rifle and go be a mercenary like the laughing killer, otherwise shut the eff up, please.

 

[TAIWA NUMBA WAAN]

Seems like this thread has gone a bit off the rails and devolved into political rants, I was hoping it would be more technical than this.

I read a 1973 study from RAND on artillery shell production, that was right at the time they came out with the HF series steel alloys specifically for artillery shells. They reason they prefer it is because it splits into the most fragments compared to other steel alloys. But the shells they made before, as well as all the other countries that have been making howitzer shells out of other alloys, means that just about any steel, or even non-steels, would work. So long as the metal doesn't squash from the G's under its own accelerated weight in the cannon barrel, it works.

I stick by my original thesis that American machine shops could (and should) be cranking out thousands of howitzer shells and cases every day from solid bar stock, or even tubes with threaded end caps - there is a wide range of acceptable designs for the various artillery rounds made over the last hundred years. The hot forging process to mass produce them was the most efficient and cost effective way to do it in the past, but the current reality is that the US can no longer produce them in sufficient quantities, and cannot scale up production in a reasonable time frame due to that fact that there are so few heavy machinery companies building in the USA nowadays. And people keep mentioning the Haas TL-1; no, I wouldn't want to use one of those.......but there are plenty of higher power, beefier cnc lathes on the market that would handle a 6 inch steel bar quite easily.

 

[ghost of christmas past]

the current reality is that the US can no longer produce them in sufficient quantities,

Why is this a problem ? Mexico attacking again ? Them Canadians getting unruly, eh ? What other countries are in range of artillery from the US ? Even Cuba is too far away.

How about MINDING YOUR OWN FUCKING BUSINESS FOR A CHANGE ?!?!

And no, Ukraine is not your business. It may be Hunter's business but that's too damn bad, if he wanted to play there and is losing his ass, not our problem.

 

[Milland]

How about MINDING YOUR OWN FUCKING BUSINESS FOR A CHANGE ?!?!

Why haven't you written the Congo Defense Department? After all, they must need to make artillery shells too.

And no, Ukraine is not your business. It may be Hunter's business but that's too damn bad, if he wanted to play there and is losing his ass, not our problem.

Hunter? He's busy tipping back a beer to celebrate the indictment of the guy who tried to shakedown the Ukraine President. Remember him? Ronald Rump or something?

 

[ghost of christmas past]

Hunter? He's busy tipping back a beer

I'd heard the same thing, that's what he's good for.

When all that noise came out it seemed quite silly, a drunk son of the veepee making a little hay off his name in some derelict corner of the world.

But now .... what was a bright american kid son of vee pee doing in ukraine of all places, ten years ago ? Why wasn't he whoopin' it up in florida rotc, like the rest of the drunk kids of ne'er-do-well politicians ? Ukraine ? Does make you wonder a little ...

 

[Milland]

But now .... what was a bright american kid son of vee pee doing in ukraine of all places

I'd ask what the RU soldiers were doing in Ukraine, except we know - they were murdering civilians, raping women, stealing children (as well as appliances and anything not bolted down), and for fun, destroying whatever they could.

Gosh, it's too bad putin couldn't actually run a functioning country, instead hollowing Russia out through corruption to the point where in desperation he attacked a thriving neighbor. Pity, if Russia didn't put sociopaths into power perhaps the world would be a better place...

 

[Milling man]

I stick by my original thesis that American machine shops could (and should) be cranking out thousands of howitzer shells

I think many Americans will have a fairly fair question about why they HAVE something to Ukraine
In the position of the Pentagon administration, I would consider a voluntary program, with the motivation simply the cost of production. Well, patriotism there and all that. As I said, if 100 factories make at least 10 shells per month, this is already +1000 shells per month. This is not enough.

 

[ghost of christmas past]

In the position of the Pentagon administration, I would consider a voluntary program, with the motivation simply the cost of production.

As long as they pay for it with their own money, that's fine. But they can kiss it off as far as getting mine goes. Stuff like social security, medicare, national parks, museums, schools, transportation, air and railroad safety ? maybe even pay down some of the debt ? Might not have to have banks reporting every transaction over fifty cents if we didn't piss away trillions on stupid wars ? There's plenty of stuff to spend money on, let the people who want wars pay for it themselves.

 

[Milland]

There's plenty of stuff to spend money on, let the people who want wars pay for it themselves.

I'd be very happy to see Russia pay for this war. All the costs, for all the bloody bodies, destroyed infrastructure, stolen children, ruined towns...

All paid for. With interest. And I'm delighted to help the Ukrainians get their payback.

 

[ghost of christmas past]

I'm delighted to help the Ukrainians get their payback.

Absolutely no problem, go ahead and donate. Heck, buy a ticket and fly over, put your money where your mouth is.

But me, I am sick of the assholes in Washington who run the US down the toilet so they can play soldier. I can look out the windows and see what you can accomplish by spending on your own country, on things that make life better, instead of invading vietnam, iraq, afghanistan, syria, south america, all those places that were a total waste of trillions of dollars and got us NOTHING. Just like this idiotic ukraine clusterfuck.

This whole thing is mentally-retarded. You want to contribute ? Go ahead. But quit spending US taxpayer money on stupid, pointless shit.

 

[Bill D]

You guys better not trash talk about president Xi of China.. He is so perfect a dear leader that they changed the rules to make him president for life. No need for any wasting time and money on elections like Pooh boy has to.
Even trump had to run for relection since he is less then perfect.
Bill D