In A Fairy Tales World...

Pardon me, I mean today's Pentagon's press-conference. I have no problem with Lord Austin parading himself as a hack, who he is, but at least we all know his serious attachment to Raytheon and those perks one gets in connection to this corporation. So, saying stupid things is Austin's task, despite the fig leaf of officialdom afforded to him by his SecDef position. But Milley, My God! Dude, any self-respect left in you? 

GEN. MILLEY: So Missy, the -- I'd offer two things. One is, you know, what's the military problem to solve here with the air power? And it's control of the airspace, and you can do that two ways. You can do that air-to-air or you can do that from the ground to the air. In terms of the most effective and efficient and cost-effective way to do that right now for the Ukrainians is from ground to air through air defense systems, and that's what they've been provided from the beginning if this war 'til now. And that's important, because what you want to do is protect those assault forces from Russian close-air support and/or attack-helicopter support, and they've got air defense systems, the Ru- -- Ukrainians do, that can do that. The casualties that the Ukrainians are suffering on this offensive are not so much from Russian airpower; they're from minefields, minefields that are covered with direct fire from anti-tank hunter-killer teams, that sort of thing. So it's minefields. So the problem to solve is minefields, not the air piece right this minute. And that's what the coalition is trying to provide them: additional mine clearing, MICLICs, line charges, Bangalores -- that sort of thing, in order to continue to work their way through the minefields.

And then he proceeds:

So I'm confident that they can do this, and especially if they execute the tactics, techniques and procedures that they've been taught, which they are doing, and execute these operations at night, which would deny the Russians the ability to use any of their airpower anyway. So the real problem is the minefields. It's not right now the airpower. Now, having said that, just do a quick math drill here. Ten F-16s are $2 billion, so the Russians have hundreds of fourth- and fifth-generation airframes. So if they're going to try to match the Russians one for one, or even, you know, two-to-one, you're talking about a large number of aircraft. That's going to take years to train the pilots, years to do the maintenance and sustainment, years to generate that degree of financial support to do that. You're talking way more billions of dollars than has already been generated. So the key thing is to focus on air defense, focus on the blocking-and-tackling sort of offensive combined arms maneuver, which is artillery, as both long-range and short-range artillery, and then get in your engineers and your mine-breaching equipment. That's the kind of stuff they need. That's what they want. That's what they're asking for. When I talk to Zaluzhny, that's what he's asking for, so --

Comrade General Milley, I have news for you--US Army (in general, NATO) "training" is laughed at by... Ukies themselves. The reason being that the US Armed Forces have exactly zero people who know how to fight modern multi-domain war of such scale. Zilch, nada and, in related news, Russians have very good Night Vision/FLIR systems on all of their attack helis and all fighter and CAS aircraft. But the passage about "matching" and Air Defense is stupefying. The US (and NATO) do not have AD survivable on the modern battlefield. This has been demonstrated to a dramatic effect. And this applies to each and every weapon system supplied by NATO to 404. So, I have a "secret" for Milley--US fighting doctrine is a joke built around mythology of the "dominant" air-power, which didn't encounter REAL air defenses and air forces like... NEVER. Today's statements by Jake Sullivan are really telling.  Boy, how I wish to quote Tolstoy again, but I will not. 

Just to demonstrate. Here is Ka-52 cockpit with both pilot and weps having very good night vision/FLIR cameras and MFDs.

Here is SU-35 cockpit with very good night capability.

Same goes for SU-30SMs, and I am not even talking here about full netcentricity in the A-50, Su-57, Su-35, Su-34 and Su-30SM2 combat circuit allowing both sensor/data fusion and constant exchange of data/targeting between each-other. This is "slightly" more complex than just having a number of aircraft as opposed to integrated combat force whose combat score, including both air (especially BVR) and ground kills makes many people in USAF very uncomfortable. Hey, at least Milley learned that real AD matters. Didn't Jake Sullivan point this out today? 

And here is the deal. Real professionals know that what is transpiring today is THE FIRST real modern age war in which NATO's best ever military proxy has been torn apart by Russia and one can almost smell the fear in NATO today. Naturally, they never saw anything like this and are not designed to fight like this, not to mention the level of casualties VSU sustains every day. No NATO country, especially the US, is capable of sustaining that. So, naturally, professional envy, sour grapes and hatred begin to affect the thinking in Pentagon. And it shows, because the only coping mechanism today is to tell tactical, operational and technological fairy tales, spiced up with a lot of wet dreaming and fantasies. We saw it at this Pentagon's press-conference.