Hot Eagle Still Alive?

A pdf from April of last year:
http://www.aiaa.org/tc/sos/ws2009/Re...enta tion.pdf
The Marine carrying vehicle here looks like a over-sized Navy Space
Cruiser from the 1980s: http://www.up-ship.com/apr/extras/scruiser1.htm
And rides on a Kistler rocket booster.

Pat

This sounds nuts, if you launch an RLV into a hostile domain w/o the
necessary support infrastructure you loose the R part of the RLV.

How is this plan any cheaper/easier than just forward basing personell as
needed using conventional transport? Yeah, you have to plan a litte better,
a little item known as strategery.... ;-)

OTOH see my response to Space Shuttle Jr. for a more practical application...

Dave

In sci.space.history Pat Flannery wrote:
David Spain wrote:
This sounds nuts, if you launch an RLV into a hostile domain w/o the
necessary support infrastructure you loose the R part of the RLV.

The idea is you retrieve the vehicle later at your leisure after you
secure the area it landed at from the enemy.

But it is going to sink into the sea in the middle of the forbidden
zone, and not retrieved by its occupants...

rick jones
--
I don't interest myself in "why." I think more often in terms of
"when," sometimes "where;" always "how much." - Joubert
these opinions are mine, all mine; HP might not want them anyway...
feel free to post, OR email to rick.jones2 in hp.com but NOT BOTH...

David Spain wrote:
This sounds nuts, if you launch an RLV into a hostile domain w/o the
necessary support infrastructure you loose the R part of the RLV.

The idea is you retrieve the vehicle later at your leisure after you
secure the area it landed at from the enemy.


How is this plan any cheaper/easier than just forward basing personell as
needed using conventional transport? Yeah, you have to plan a litte better,
a little item known as strategery.... ;-)

The whole idea is half-baked, but that's never stopped the military
before when it came to anything involving space, which really turns
their crank.
There's a pdf he
http://www.redstone.army.mil/history...e/redstone.pdf
....that includes a version of the Redstone missile that's supposed to be
used to deliver cargo to front line troops(pages 155-159).
That's the sort of stuff that happens when you have a new technology and
go looking for a mission of some sort for it to perform, rather than
seeing a need for a new mission, and developing the technology to
perform it.

Pat

Rick Jones wrote:
The idea is you retrieve the vehicle later at your leisure after you
secure the area it landed at from the enemy.

But it is going to sink into the sea in the middle of the forbidden
zone, and not retrieved by its occupants...

We shall remotely navigate it through the Sea Of Fire, and land it near
Mingo City, where our minions shall seize the crew and force the females
to wear scanty clothing.

Ming the Merciless

On Feb 2, 1:17 am, Pat Flannery wrote:

If you can get the spacecraft and troops out of the landing area via a
aircraft or helicopter, you could probably get them in that way also.

Not necessarily. The spacecraft coming in is not interceptible by many
militaries, while a helicopter woudl be. And when the troops come in,
they make a mess of the local environment (taking out radar
facilities, SAM sites, causing a general ruckus, whatever), so that
the slower aircraft can come in and extract them.

The point of a system like this is that it drops troops into some
distant site with little to no warning, and at high speed. 45 minutes,
and a platoon is on-site. While they are doign their thing, the B-2's
and cruise missiles and whatnot can be laying waste elsewhere,
clearing the way for the extraction team.

Fred J. McCall wrote:

:The idea is you retrieve the vehicle later at your leisure after you
:secure the area it landed at from the enemy.
:

If you can do that, why do you need to rush a single squad in?


That is the fundamental logic error in the whole concept.
If you can get the spacecraft and troops out of the landing area via a
aircraft or helicopter, you could probably get them in that way also.
Also, putting thirteen Marines down in the middle of enemy-held
territory sounds like a great way to do a small-scale recreation of the
Battle of the Little Bighorn.
This concept is too crazy even for the Marines...this program needs to
be transfered to the SEALS ASAP. ;-)

Pat

wrote:
On Feb 2, 1:17 am, Pat Flannery wrote:

If you can get the spacecraft and troops out of the landing area via a
aircraft or helicopter, you could probably get them in that way also.

Not necessarily. The spacecraft coming in is not interceptible by many
militaries, while a helicopter woudl be.

When it's hanging under its parachute as it descends to land, it's going
to make a sitting duck target for anyone on the ground, particularly
given the fact that it's still going to be hot from reentry, making it a
IR homing missile magnet.

And when the troops come in,
they make a mess of the local environment (taking out radar
facilities, SAM sites, causing a general ruckus, whatever), so that
the slower aircraft can come in and extract them.

The troops aren't even going to have a Humvee to get around in, so you
had better hope that all their targets are in near proximity to their
landing site.
About the only thing this system would be good for is some sort of
commando strike to emplace something like a backpack nuke.
And if you are going to blow something up with a nuclear weapon anyway,
you might as well send it there on a cruise missile, saving a whole lot
of bucks over this way of transporting it while eliminating the whole
troop/landing vehicle extraction problem.

The point of a system like this is that it drops troops into some
distant site with little to no warning, and at high speed.

It will show up on radar as it enters the atmosphere, make a sonic boom
as it gets into the target area, and then float down under its
chute...that's not very subtle.

45 minutes,
and a platoon is on-site.

This is only supposed to carry 13 troops; that's a section or squad, not
a platoon, which is 25-40 troops.

While they are doign their thing, the B-2's
and cruise missiles and whatnot can be laying waste elsewhere,
clearing the way for the extraction team.

Again though, what exactly are the 13 guys going to be able to
accomplish? They've got their rifles, some grenades, a light machine gun
or two, maybe some demolition charges, no means of transport to get them
around once they land, and no means of withdrawal till they can be
reinforced or some sort of extraction system comes along.
It's more like something out of a Sgt. Fury And His Howling Commandos
comic book than a rational troop delivery system.

Pat

On Feb 2, 10:46 am, Pat Flannery wrote:

It will show up on radar as it enters the atmosphere, make a sonic boom
as it gets into the target area, and then float down under its
chute...that's not very subtle.

And not very visible to bin Laden in a cave.


Again though, what exactly are the 13 guys going to be able to
accomplish?

Kill everyone in the room. Liberate the hostages. Secure the nuke.
Whatever. And then hold the position until the regular forces get
there an hour or two later.

wrote:
On Feb 2, 10:46 am, Pat Flannery wrote:

It will show up on radar as it enters the atmosphere, make a sonic boom
as it gets into the target area, and then float down under its
chute...that's not very subtle.

And not very visible to bin Laden in a cave.

Which the troops can enter as they go rolling down the mountainside
after landing.
The problem is figuring out which particular cave he is in, as there are
a lot of them to choose from.

Again though, what exactly are the 13 guys going to be able to
accomplish?

Kill everyone in the room. Liberate the hostages. Secure the nuke.
Whatever. And then hold the position until the regular forces get
there an hour or two later.

Kill all the Nazis while they are watching a movie. ;-)

Pat