things to read-- Sukhoi 33 edition

photo courtesy Aeroweb.lucia.it

Brian Beutler has Petraus's doctoral dissertation online in PDF, here. (It's pretty long.)

meanwhile, Castro criticizes the 2008 candidates. I find it hard to believe that Castro, wily old survivor that he is, might be unaware that when he criticizes Obama or HRC he only gives them credibility in many quarters over here.


from Rahul Mahajan's Empire notes, "The Real Iraq-Vietnam Analogy":

With Vietnam, we struggled hard and mostly successfully as a nation to make sure we didn’t learn the true lessons of the war. And with Iraq, we are on track to the same achievement, although this time it seems the path will be much easier.

This is a similarity that George Bush, a man who seemingly has never learned anything from anything or anyone in his entire life, is well positioned to appreciate.
[...]
Perhaps we could have learned instead that the cold war and the war on terror were not just mis-executed but misconceived?

We have apparently learned, from both of these wars, that America’s legendary good intentions are apparently not enough to ensure a good outcome. Perhaps we could have learned instead that it’s very easy to assume you have good intentions, but that, on close examination, it often turns out that you really don’t?

from the Jerusalem Post(via Xymphora, here)
"Analysis: Russia uses Syrian port to demonstrate its power in the Med"

In January 1996, the Russian Navy aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov came very close to Israeli territorial waters. On January 27, it launched several advanced Su-33 fighters, the naval version of the Su-27. The jets ventured into Israeli air space near Haifa. IAF planes were scrambled to intercept, but a skirmish was avoided.

The incident was kept secret for six years and was only revealed in 2002 in an article in the Israel Air Force magazine.

According to the report, Russian planes entered Israel's airspace at least twice and several F-16 scrambled for an intercept mission after an intrusion alert was received.

One assumes, nevertheless, that the Clinton administration became apprised of this at the time.


and Wikipedia's Russian Air Force entry notes that:

Russia resumed the Soviet-era practice of sending its bomber aircraft on long-range flights at a permanent basis in July and August 2007, after a 15-year unilateral suspension due to fuel costs and other economic difficulties after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Patrols towards the North Pole, the Atlantic and the Pacific Ocean were reinstated, bringing the planes often close to NATO territory.

Does GWB miss the cold war,when other people fought in his place and he got to fly for the Texas Air National Guard by day and party every night with booze and cocaine? Is he hoping to start another one?


see also BBC News: "Russia restarts Cold War patrols"