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Mike Black Profile picture
Mike Black
@MikeBlack114
Former USAF aircraft/munitions maintenance officer, current basically doing the same thing but not wearing camo pajamas to work Views are mine, not AF/DoD/etc
Sep 25 • 25 tweets • 7 min read
If you've been looking for what I can best describe as an air domain focused version of Littoral Commander, do I have the game for you Image From Phil Bolger at the AF Wargaming Institute at Maxwell

Sep 16 • 9 tweets • 2 min read
Gonna be great watching a bunch of idiots go googoogahgah over this while no one asks whether physics is still physics GA-ASI is really good at wringing every bit of efficiency out of any design, usually at the expense of other attributes (which is fine within the tradespace) and their design obviously reflects that

Apr 1 • 8 tweets • 2 min read
These people are mentally ill The folks who are suffering from an ailment (psychosomatic or otherwise) and have convinced themselves not only is it the work of the Kremlin but the USG is deliberately covering it up are one thing, but the folks grifting off of this are the lowest of the low, beyond contempt
Feb 3 • 10 tweets • 2 min read
Nukes, notably the only weapons system area within DoD where folks have been saying the last 25 years "there's a bow wave coming that's gonna cost $," oh wait Which is my overarching point with this...no one is willing or able to take a holistic look at the investment choices needed to maintain a given overall national security posture, balance that against the topline, and make real choices, with real consequences
Jul 8, 2023 • 41 tweets • 12 min read
I've had folks hit me up asking for sources/background on the DPICM/UXO rate discussion. Unfortunately there's not one good gold standard source, because it's not like anyone is doing peer reviewed studies on the UXO rates of US submunitions And the people who should know best (DoD) can't exactly be trusted given their demonstrated repeated obfuscation and repetition of incorrect statements on the subject

So this will attempt to lay out the facts as best anyone knows them and provide some of the technical background
May 21, 2023 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
This is like the domestic politics version of tHe MiLiTaRy Is ApOlItIcAl

The idea that invoking a constitutional provision, however argued, is an 'end run' around the 'political process' while what the GOP is doing is politics as usual is peak busted ass DC pundit brain The wild thing is consider what assumptions are baked into the "be careful what the GOP will do with this" bit

Because we all know he's not saying anyone should be worried about a future GOP President threatening to unilaterally raise the debt ceiling
May 20, 2023 • 9 tweets • 2 min read
Hey @SebastianBae, more satisfied LC customers

AF AMMO SNCO, AF Weapons/Mx SNCO, and Marine Air Winger turned AF civ/reservist logistician

90 minutes to play the three turns of the learning scenario, including set up and rules explanation Highlights and feedback:

Multiple elements of folks being put onto dilemmas due to gameplay w/real world equivalents (my fav was "whaddya mean my log unit can't resupply my ship with missiles" my dude let me introduce you to this thing called VLS)
May 7, 2023 • 8 tweets • 2 min read
Anyway super stoked to see a bunch of GOP pols point to that horseshit do-nothing bill that passed last year as yet again proof as to why it is completely outside the bounds of decency to ask for something else to be done The only way you fix this is by more tightly regulating all semiauto centerfire rifles capable of accepting an external magazine. That's it. You put them under a NFA-lite regime, and you do it with exactly that direct of language
May 7, 2023 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
It's particularly egregious with guns because a lot of the public's view of bullet wounds is from WWII war movies, where you grab your chest, a red splotch appears, and then you crumple over and die quietly a few seconds later Not quite as nice as dying in your bed, but overall a fairly peaceful way to go

Not, say, a child's brains splattered all over a sidewalk, or another child's face blown completely off their skull, or someone screaming in pain before they pass out while someone breaks their ribs
May 6, 2023 • 9 tweets • 2 min read
This is such fucking stupid discourse, although it's unsurprising bridge "I will fight to the last Taiwanese" colby is all for talking about it publicly The guy you are QTing is a CCP propagandist, what interest could they possibly have in painting the US as an outside aggressor only interested in power and themselves as the reasonable alternative to defending asia for the asians
May 6, 2023 • 8 tweets • 2 min read
It's not 1941, we aren't cutting off 80% of China's oil imports (or whatever the equivalent of that is with semiconductors) Putting me in the position of somehow arguing on the same side of the cheese is an incredible accomplishment
May 5, 2023 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
One thing this piece glosses over is in between his CENTCOM staff gigs he did a stint as the USAFE/A3, where he cowrote this ASPJ article: Untethered Operations - Air University airuniversity.af.edu/Portals/10/ASP… It's noteworthy because that's one of the first (might be THE first) articles publicly discussing, in a holistic way, most of the things that eventually became ACE
May 5, 2023 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
Lol

The best part is that pushing for this in the manner he's doing will make it harder to accomplish his ostensible FP goals, which is fine with him because he doesn't actually believe in any of the shit he says This isn't at all true (Obama nominated two Republicans as SECDEF ffs), beyond "yes we think basic human rights are an important part of maximizing inclusion in national security spaces and will appoint folks who agree"

Which used to be bipartisan-ish

May 5, 2023 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Lol what That likely wouldn't even be libelous on TERF island, much less here in the land of the free
Apr 22, 2023 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
This is one of the worst examples of a headline that is directly contradicted by the actual story Random jihadi dickheads "aspirational plotting" (aka running their mouths on what they'll do one of these days, also they can throw a dead goat over them mountains there) != staging for concrete planned future attacks
Apr 22, 2023 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
what's bizarre to me is the idea that the IRF is solely comprised of the 82nd's IBCT has been allowed to stand for so long suffice to say that the DoD's Immediate Response Force is in fact comprised of just a bit more than 1 Infantry Brigade Combat Team

I mean rah blood on the risers etc, but I feel like even the morons at the Pentagon might plan to have a few more forces on hand for any contingency
Apr 22, 2023 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
on a side point, it's actually fairly interesting (given the current climate) to note that the PRC has historically been little to no factor in US defense force structure planning from a nuclear perspective their minimum viable deterrent has been zero factor in US planning, beyond giving targeteers additional targets to hit for not really any good reason in early versions of the SIOP
Apr 22, 2023 • 26 tweets • 5 min read
in the interest of folks (not alex) actually learning something, quick rundown on the history of US force planning policy and why wE cAn'T fIgHt TwO mAjOr ThEaTeR wArS is an extremely wrong way of looking at things to start, the US military has never been sized to fight wars against two peer (or whatever we're calling Russia these days) adversaries. About the only time you could argue that would be 1944-45; even the pre-war force planning was two ocean navy + expandable skeleton in the Army
Apr 21, 2023 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Oh come on Richardson getting cashiered was not the start of ~political woke GOFOs~ or whatever the hell this is trying to suggest
Apr 21, 2023 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Oh fr? All Taiwan needs to avoid artillery suppression is air defenses?

Wonder why the PLA built these then Image It is amazing how these dipshits (and I know this is a zero follower tHeRe ArE oNlY tWo GeNdErS idiot, but the cheese RTs them all the time) have failed to study the most basic tactical aspects of this war they claim to care so much about
Apr 21, 2023 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
And I assess you're a Putin loving moron who works for an insurrectionist Guess you didn't quite grasp the "domestic" part of that oath you took