New British flying robot killer death machines renamed 'Protector' The UK Ministry of Defence has tried to rebrand its latest batch of airborne death machines as “Protector” drones rather than their actual trade name of Reaper. The so-called Protector drones are actually based on the latest model of the General Atomics MQ-9 Reaper drone – known in its latest variant as the Predator – which …
As we live in a nation where the most popular "celebrity" in a TV show is only a celebrity because she is in a TV show that is nothing more than a bunch of characterful people watching and talking about OTHER TV shows, it should be no surprise that so many people find "(%)y Mc(%)face" so funny.
I really do worry about who is going to look after me in the few years between retiring and dying... the current up-and-coming generations are about as reassuring as a chocolate fireguard...
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"Perhaps we could call them "goodwill ambassadors"
Isn't that what Trump wanted Farage for?
Come to think of it if you are looking for a name for something that falls from the sky and causes widespread damage while protecting the UK from foreign invaders then "Farage" might be about right.
It would at least present some decent challenges for the newsreader who had to report on Farage barrage carnage of a marriage carriage.
The RN used to give its smaller ships friendly names like Kingfisher or Gannet. Till you remember that kingfishers and gannets are pretty deadly when you're fish-shaped.
There were Flower class sloops in the First World War, and Flower class corvettes in the Second. HMS Daffodil doesn't seem that aggressive.
There have also been several ships called HMS Terrible, the last a 1940s aircraft carrier. Maybe reviving that name would be a little too close to the truth, given the aircraft carriers that don't have any aircraft, the destroyers that can't be used in warm water etc.
<i<The RN used to give its smaller ships friendly names like....Gannet.</i>
Friendly only to people who don't know what a gannet is.
If the twats who give names to military products had thought for about 20 nanoseconds, they'd have realised that instead of "Brimstone", "Hellfire", Statanic Death" or the other usual missile names, they would have had far less of a PR problem choosing names like "Gannet", "Kingfisher", and "Kinell".
I have heard the name change was driven by our former Prime Minister, you know, the one who couldn't organise a referendum, as he didn't feel it would go across well if he announced we were buying drones with too aggressive a name. It's a bit odd as we stopped giving foreign military equipment a different name in WW2 as we found it just got confusing trying to order spares etc. Hence we named the Wildcat the Martlet and the Avenger the Tarpon for a bit until sanity prevailed.
There was a slight logic to the renaming as the UK had a policy with naval fighters being named after birds, naval bombers after game fish, land fighters being named after meteorological phenomena etc. I mean there probably is still a policy we just don't make enough for it to be noticeable now.
There was a slight logic to the renaming as the UK had a policy with naval fighters being named after birds, naval bombers after game fish, land fighters being named after meteorological phenomena etc.
Which is OK if you understand there IS a naming convention.
I spent years dealing with a server called "Skimmer," and it wasn't until I came across the server "Heron" that I understood suddenly. (Of course, the VAX was named "Dodo", but that's another story)
'keeping American names - Surely when ordering parts, they are referred by model number ( ie: An G65HN for the Q479QB-7)'
These days probably yes, but it doesn't help when you're working with allies if you refer to something they use by a completely different name. If you uses the common name they know it's capabilities and limitation, if you use your own they may task it inappropriately or sideline it.
In WW2 the RN in the Pacific found quoting every number you could find on a part plus the aircraft it was for was the only way to guarantee getting the correct replacement. Aircraft weren't just being produced by the original manufacturer and they found unless you got parts from the factory that made that individual aircraft they wouldn't necessarily fit. In a number of cases this was because one factory was using decimal inches while the other was using fractional ones.
It was called Havoc because trying to fly the things in formation caused havoc, they were notorious for having about the same level of pilot visibility as you'd have sitting in a cardboard box in a snowstorm. Certainly not Douglas's finest hour (still better than the Fairy Barracuda, it's party trick was dousing its pilots (in the face) with hydraulic fluid at such high pressures it knocked them unconscious).
You paraphrase FIAT they were both "designed by morons, built by peons".
Do you really think sending robot killing machines (to quote the article) over other countries to slaughter the innocent and guilty alike (if they happen by chance to find a 'guilty' person) is making us safer? How? I thought the use of these was intensifying the hatred of us in countries where they are being used.
Exactly. But then the idea is not to make "us" - the citizens - safer. What's the percentage in that? No, the idea is to stir up outrage and hatred against us. If only one in a million of the people whom we have bereaved and scarred takes up arms against us, that is quite enough to keep the ridiculous fiction of "terrorism" alive and well. Which in turn allows our governments to maintain a fictitious state of war, progressively abolishing our rights and forbidding anty critical oversight of their actions. As witness the fates of Chelsea Manning, Julian Asange, Edward Snowden, and many others whose only "crimes" were to tell the citizens about the illegal actions and lies of their own governments.
Er, how exactly does killing large numbers of more or less random people in faraway countries "protect" the UK? Arguably if the Americans and Europeans had not shoved their armed forces in where they were not welcome and killed (literally) millions of South Americans, Africans and Asians, there would be no "terrorist threat".
Of course our governments would really hate that, because then they would have no excuse for declaring a state of continual war which allows them to get away with progressively removing all our freedoms.
we have a couple of carriers with lots of spare space...
Don't use Watchkeepers then (suggested rename: Warm Milk & Cookies?). Presumably HMS Brenda will be even more likely to have a wet runway than a Welsh airfield. (assuming it doesn't turn out to require cripplingly expensive 'upgrades' to make it float or something)
No matter how "cheap" they are - although any family that was given the cost of a single drone could retire and live in luxury for the rest of their lives - they accomplish nothing except to build up enduring reservoirs of hatred against us. You and I may know it's just a handful of deranged politicians and army officers who are responsible, but to the victims' families and friends it's "the British" or even "the Anglo-Saxons" in general.
From what I understand these drones have gone through the correct certification allowing them to fly in a mixed airspace, alongside civilian aircraft.
Which means for the first time the RAF will be able to fly them within UK airspace, the previous Reapers were never flown here.
Interestingly the whole thing except for the pilots is contracted out to a commercial company, including weapons loading, which means the missiles do not need to conform to UK MOD air certificates it all runs under US standards.
'which means the missiles do not need to conform to UK MOD air certificates it all runs under US standards'
I think there is a reciprocity agreement in place where the UK MoD accepts US DoD airworthiness standards and vice versa. I say I think because I can't remember if it was with the US and we were planning one with A N Other country or vice versa. Similar to how EASA and the FAA accept aircraft certified by each other.
"Which means for the first time the RAF will be able to fly them within UK airspace, the previous Reapers were never flown here".
Which means that, every time you type something critical of the government (or their bosses across the Pond) you should get into the habit of looking up at the sky. Just in case. Keep the window open so you can listen for the sound of motors, and make sure you have a prepared escape route.
"Yes, it was a gas explosion. Keep well back now... Isn't it a shame how careless some people are with their gas?"
It may not be sloppy journalism, different variants of Paveway are manufactured in different places. The ones made in Scotland are Paveway IV and are only used by the RAF and Royal Saudi Air Force and have various extra features. We had to ask the US for export permission for those as it's originally their toy. It's not inconceivable that the UK manufactured variant hasn't been cleared on the Predator and so they'll use Paveway II which is indeed US made.
Just checked, Paveway IV doesn't seem to be cleared on Predator/Reaper/Droney McDroneFace, only on Harrier, Tornado and Typhoon with some trials having taken place on Lightning II.
Was "Pansy" taken?
Or how about "nonce" (not on normal carnage exercise).
I sure hope we don't disagree with the US in the future, our armed farces won't outlast the week.. Even worse..
RAF BOFH: So, you bought drones from our current enemy, and you didn't think to change the Admin password?
RAF BOSS: But we were friends then... It seemed a little rude..
RAF BOFH: And of course, reducing Milton Keynes to rubble was the height of good manners..
RAF PFY: I don't know, I've been looking for a cheap rockery...
Theresa May (TM); what could possibly go wrong?
Yes, I mean, what sort of bizarre culture would associate weapons with wedding celebrations?
Oh do get a life and learn a bit about the world around you.
I am saying this as someone who had to spend three night in 1994 on the floor because of this
There are parts of the world (even in Europe) where the population is armed at least as much as Texas and with actual combat armament, not toys from Wallmart. They also have the habit of firing them up in the air for significant occasions like marriage, childbirth, New Year or their team eliminating Germany or Argentina in the World Cup.
Quoting the news anchor on Bulgarian National TV the night when Bulgaria kicked Germany out of the World Cup finals: "Tonight, Sofia center looked like Rio mid-carnival. The suburbs, looked like Sarajevo". He was spot on - I nearly sh*** myself when every second balcony on Sofia Uni student campus around us opened up with tracer bullets (not just AK47s, there actual machine guns and heavy armament being fired). The really funny bit - the government had no clue just how much the population is armed. They (and the Eu - BG was early in the process of applying for membership) were horrified when they realised that 25-50% of the population have actual real military kit in their house (with ammunition for it).
Before automatic weapons, there were six centuries of gunpowder based weapons. The arabs have had gunpowder since the mid 14th century when the invading Mongols introduced it, so I guess they fired muzzle loading rifles into the air. Bows and arrows are so yesteryear!
When a friend of mine was in Afghanistan in the '70s, he said the locals would often go into the street and fire off their locally made Mauser and Lee Enfield rifles to celebrate almost anything.
So how did they celebrate before automatic weapons? Fire arrows into the air?
That is also on the menu. They do it with a compound bow and bengal fire firework attached to the arrows. It has been a standard feature of New Years Eve for 40+ in Sofia years and counting. It looks stunning versus the background of AK47 tracer bullets coming out of the apartment blocks and so do the fires in the parking lot if you undershoot, overshoot or shoot in the wrong direction as a result of having way too many Slivovica before that.
Not joking - seen the aftermath quite a few times when I used to live there.
As I said - in some parts of the world people are nuts and compared to them your average AR15 yielding Texan Redneck is a harmless boyscout.
While living in Saudi Arabia, I heard my Saudi counterpart's smartphone on speaker with sounds of gunfire. I joking asked "Family reunion?" His reply: "Yes! We were celebrating a wedding!" I asked if they fired the guns in the city, and the answer was yes, they did, but they used the small bullets as they "disintegrate in the air". I corrected him, but not sure if it really sunk in...
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Isn't it funny how people who, in their own country, absolutely insist in the right to bear arms, somehow think it's also their right to kill anyone within 20-30 yards of anyone bearing arms in a foreign country? As in, someone else's country where you have no right even to go without permission from that country's government - and you cannot ever have any right to kill someone just because you don't like the cut of their jib?
Now imagine that, one day perhaps fairly soon, this situation comes to the USA. Anyone who has a weapon, carried openly or concealed, may at any time be obliterated together with anyone else nearby - and just because they had that weapon, it's not even a matter for the justice system.
RAF put their service designation before the base name, the US does it opposite. So, RAF Lakenheath works for the UK, but it would be "Creech AFB in Nevada", or " the USAF's Creech Air Force Base in Nevada"; or something similar.
The USAF, yes. The Navy does it the other way around e.g. Naval Air Station Beeville
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It is most gratifying that your enthusiasm for our planet continues unabated. And so we would like to assure you that the guided missiles currently converging with your ship are part of a special service we extend to all of our most enthusiastic clients… And the fully armed nuclear warheads are, of course, merely a courtesy detail. We look forward to your custom in future lives. Thank you.
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