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US army next-gen guided-bombs are essentuially UAVs with 90% explosive
filling. They are big and will show up on radar. At this point the gun turns
and fires at the bomb/missile before it gets close enough to do damage.

Firing at it, and inflicting enough damage to give you a decent chance
of surviving, are very different things. Bombs are a tough target
precisely because they're wrapped in a thick steel case and the filling
is nowadays rather insensitive: you're trying to (a) inflict lethal
damage on a rather small guidance unit, and (b) hoping that the
munition's ballistic course then lands it where it won't harm you or
yours.

It would increase a fighter's patrol endurence from hours into days at
little extra fuel cost. That's not silly. That's *very* useful for a
cash-strapped military.

Who's flying and how do _they_ cope with 96 hours at a time strapped
into a cockpit?

And
what makes you think that things like AWACS will be able to fly in the near
future? Very simple rockets could be built as first stages to older
missilbes, or clusters of older missiles, which could put them in enough
danger that commanders draw them back beyond their useful distance. If
something cannot be used as effectively it's as good as badly damaged.

Why is this only valid for the US side?

Even if they slow the USAF down an hour, that's an hour's warning more than
a country without such a system woudl get.

So what? This might be crucial for El Presidente to empty his safe,
round up a few of his favourite mistresses and catamites, race to the
airport and fly away from the warzone. Doesn't stop the US force from
achieving _its_ aims, particularly if they included "get rid of El
Presidente".

America's boastful tendencies do not change the laws of physics. Stealth
aircraft do not reflect radar back at the origin radar - but they do
reflect. If you have an array of linked radars the others may well pick up
the reflected radar pulses, even if the origin array does not.

Absolutely true. When you get that working reliably and usefully in
practice, patent it and become wealthy.

The purchase of a few AWAC systems (minus aircraft) would not break the bank
of most middle-ranking nations. Linking them together is a computer problem.

They're only useful when flying: AWACS grounded because someone cratered
their runway are just as useless as AWACS you never bought.

Again, reducing the range of US navy fighters by 200miles is going to be
worth it!

That's a standard planning assumption, you're adding nothing. (The
published figure is actually 25 miles, not 100... the sea is large and
even a CVN is small by comparison with missile search ambits)

Plus they have to keep supply-ships away by a similar margin. That
would have a devistating impact on the army's ability to fight a sustained
battle.

This is the standard planning assumption for the USN: it's not healthy
to be in sight of the coast. How do you plan to add to that?

By contract, obscenely cheep. Could probably be done for a quarter billion
dollars. In any population you usally get enough people who will fight, and
in war the actual guns and AT weapons will usually fall into their hands.

Fight for what, is the problem? And how do you cope with the minor issue
of bank raids and other robberies by cheerful criminals using these
Government-issue weapons for unauthorised ends?

After that it boils down to tactics. An RPG-7 can disable any tank in the
world with a good side-shot. And massed against the front they can do enough
damage to disable one.

Trouble is, getting enough shots from the front, or a good flanking
shot, is a lot harder than the armchair theorists seem to think. And the
costs of unsuccessful attacks tend to be high, and the Lessons Learned
are not widely promulgated among the attackers.

You'd think so wouldn't you? Or at least the government would like you to
think so. Truth is that western reactors have more safety systems than their
russian equivolents, and therefore really are safer. But all that safety
gear counts for very little when it's burnt or blown up,

Russian reactors use carbon moderators, that is, very pure coal. US
reactors use water for moderation.

Which burns better?

Also, compare the standards for containment buildings, which you have to
get through before you can burn or blow through anything directly
associated with the reactor core.

At the very least the sudden and violent removal of several
cooling towers would have a disabling effect on power-outout, causing
brown-outs over a large areas and many days.

Quite so, but the same goes for hitting any power station or substation.

--
When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite.
W S Churchill

Paul J. Adam MainBoxatjrwlynch[dot]demon{dot}co(.)uk