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Guessing they had some test engineers...terrible loss.

Eight confirmed dead. Him Him 🥃

8 on board

Don't think so, that is the bird that has been testing the new AESA.

Testing the new engines? Supposed to start this year.

Fire truck slowly rolls around, chooses what to spray, then let's her water rip.

Fingers crossed they punched but those photos and videos don’t look good.

Fuck...looks like right on the runway too? Overhead footage shows there's nothing left. Low airspeed and low altitude are not good at all for the upstairs guys getting out. I don't even want to imagine about the N/RN.

Prayers to the crew. https://www.fox13now.com/us-news/military/b-52-crashes-at-edwards-air-force-base-in-california

I wish we'd be alive 150+ years from now to (hopefully) get a look at this period with (again, hopefully) clearer eyes on the totality of the last decade in relief. I think the Biden pardons now make sense given the multi-failed indictments from the DoJ. I thought it was shitty at the time, and while I still don't agree (bad policy, worse precedent) I understand. I'm expecting tons of pardons and an attempt at a self pardon out of the current admin. Always appreciate your comments even if we disagree.

Isn't that equally good though? Either no calls on flops, or cards for flops. I'll take a violent game of futbol over a flop fest with lots of whistle.

So setting aside the service members who died, aircraft we lost, facilities damaged, and stockpiles depleted let's see where we are at. Allies lost faith in our ability to defend them and pissed off our European allies for blind siding them. Chucked by Israel continously. Destroyed Iran's airforce and navy (as if they were ever a threat). Disrupted the global economy and validated Iran's ability to exert control over the strait and region using mines, drones, and ballistic missiles. Traded a deal that unfroze $1.7B of their cash for a deal that's going to unfreeze $25B of their casb and give them another $300B of our cash allegedly. Replaced extremist leadership with even more hardline military extremist leadership. Traded an inspected and managed uranium stockpile for unknown results but certainly not what's claimed. If the B-2s did the work they claimed last year, why are we here again? Any limitations not included in this deal. Explicitly excludes any missile program related concessions despite those on here saying that was a key flaw of Obama's deal. OH and killed a bunch of school kids making another generation or three of anti-american extremists in the region. Did we win daddy?

Did you happen to watch the Ivory Coast V Ecuador game yesterday...it was the complete opposite. At times it was like WWE and the refs were calling nothing.

And they've started issuing cards for flops, maybe this sport might finally take off in America.

I am cautiously optimistic like you, but not jumping up and down yet. Have you seen the outline of the deal? From what I read it differs from JCPOA in that it is performance based. The sanctions come off and the blockade ends when the straight opens. Eventually free up $25B of Iran's money as they meet other milestones. I much prefer a deal like this versus flying an airplane with pallets of cash just because they said they agree. As for the enriched materiel, they have "supposedly" agreed to no nukes and a plan dismantle their nuclear program, details to be negotiated... Indeed. They have far less traction these days and with the mid-terms approaching it is obvious Trump wants a deal in place, and oil back to $60 a barrel. Even with the back and forth oil is down 26% in the last 30 days and 4% just today at $74.50. I want you to be wrong, not to spike the ball but because I don't think any of us wants another forever war our kids have to fight. I will disagree for now, the jury is still out because a few things have happened. Iran's Air Force and Navy are completely toast. Yes they can still project power through TBMs and Drones but they are strategically in a much different place. Not saying it was worth it, just providing my BDA. Also, this fight reignited the discussion about building a bypass canal. A huge effort that likely won't happen but as an alternative plan the Gulf nations are investing heavily in extensive, multi-billion-dollar overland pipeline networks to secure their energy exports. The UAE operates the Abu Dhabi Crude Oil Pipeline, which pumps oil from the Habshan fields to the deep-water port of Fujairah on the Gulf of Oman, bypassing Hormuz completely. The UAE is aggressively accelerating a second parallel pipeline to double this export capacity. Saudi operates and is expanding the East-West Petroline, which transports millions of barrels of oil per day from the Eastern Province directly to the Red Sea port of Yanbu. And efforts have resumed to build the multi-billion-dollar proposals for a Gulf Strategic Energy Corridor, a network of pipelines linking Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the UAE, and Oman to the Arabian Sea. Amen

Fellas/sock-puppets, there are no tin pot dictators that trusted the US prior to this. Smoking Ghaddafi ironed that out for them all. Everyone gets kid gloves after getting nukes, and death by unga bunga before that. Iran knew what it could do with the straight. That was true before the advent of drones or this most recent boondoggle. We argued about this same topic on this board 20 years ago, and that was one side of that argument then. Freedom of international water ways isn't a natural state of things, it is put in place by a global police state under the threat of war. Everyone had a good idea that said threat wasn't real anymore, and was just letting it ride for mutual benefit and caution.

This problem is an easy fix but there is a lack of political appetite to actually solve this - same could be said in this country until recently.

ah, he’s mad. What’s the bullshit again? What exactly do I not have knowledge of? Be specific. Let’s get back to the thing that you keep dancing around. What have we accomplished strategically? Multiple propagandists on this site stated this all was worth it to stop Iran from getting a nuke. Womp womp, well that talking point seems a bit dumb. Don’t they have the exact same amount of nuclear material, a more hardline government, a distrust of the US, and now understand that they can control the Straits of Hormuz anytime they want with shitty drones they can make themselves? On top of that, I predict that this deal terms will give them a disgusting amount of reparations that you all will cheer for like lemmings.

.. looks like we might actually have a deal. Credit where credit is due, Trump seems to be *slightly* less completely controlled by Israel than I previously thought. The jury is still out on if any of this holds. I have a sneaking suspicion Israel is going to start leveling Lebanon or maybe just directly attack Iran again in an effort to spoil this whole thing, but this is at least progress in the right direction. It will also be fun to watch the inevitable Levin/Shapiro/Neocon meltdown. A few weeks back they were telling us what a staggering success this all was, and now you can already see the pivot to the “we need to go back in and finish the job” narrative. I said weeks/months ago I would be happy to be proven wrong if this doesn’t turn into a multi year boondoggle. And at least for the moment it appears I was wrong, and I’m quite happy about that. I’ll still maintain this accomplished virtually nothing of strategic value and even did massive strategic harm by proving to the world Iran can gain huge negotiating power through their ability to close the strait. But at least some progress! Maybe some of our dudes will even get to start coming home.

I appreciate that you lap up IRGC bullshit and continue to run your mouth about things you have no knowledge of. Seriously, is your side hustle as a contractor for IRGC PA? Take a break bud, you need it.

Are strikes on water reservoirs good? Just happened btw. How about desalination plants? I appreciate that you guys are doubling down on the “targets have always been military things” line.

War is foggy, nuanced and without 100% perfect execution. There were some things discovered after the fact that won’t be discussed here. Bottom line, it was an unfortunate event, but it was not a purposeful targeting of a known, non-military target.

I have a thesis on why Trump is fucked up. He doesn't drink beer. If he sipped IPA, chugged Modelo, had a Presidential Beer Fridge with everything from Treehouse to Pliney, and partook daily, who knows.

No idea on the "who's more strict" question. Poking around yielded this Reddit thread, which had some discussion. I'm sure there is more info out there. It's been a long time for me, and maybe things have changed, but the AF used to use a pretty wonky test for depth perception, that threw a lot of people off. There were various "techniques" for passing it (moving your eyes back and forth while taking it, it's never the first or last dot, etc). Lots of stuff out there. Like @brabus said, your age would be working against you for a ANG slot (albeit not impossible). There are study guides out there for the AFOQT that can help a lot. If you really wanted to fast-track a pilot's license, there are training programs that will allow you to do that too. Regarding "I may eventually need to spend significant money pursuing FAA medical certificate before I can even begin PPL training on my own dime," what makes you think that? To get a PPL, you only need an FAA Class III physical (as far as I know, it's been awhile). An FAA Class III is not a high bar, as I recall, it was just a basic eye exam and physical. As long as you could see decent-ish, and were basically healthy, you were good to go. Certainly, if there is something that is going to be a showstopper for an FAA Class III, it's going to be a showstopper for an Air Force Initial Flying Class I.