War, What Is It Good For

Yes that is the first thing I would do, get all of the RC tanks I could, somehow manage to load them all up with real ammunition and then have a bit of a battle somewhere. I would then set up a battlefield, get all of my mates to control different tanks and just have a full battle in the middle of a park or something like that. You could have helicopters that have the ability to drop things on the tanks too, it would be fantastic!

Dogfights

This time instead of tanks we could actually have RC planes and set up a major dogfight in the air, that would be cool. On the other hand I think with this one it would be even more important to use some kind of ammunition that would make the plane crash because blowing up planes all over the place would simply be awesome!

There are many other things that you could do such as airlift in soldiers using RC helicopters which would then land on a RC boat and you could even create like a short film with many RC vehicles to put onto YouTube and that would be fantastic, it has been done before but with money you could achieve something similar to Robot Chicken or something like that.

So try it and have a bit of fun with an RC vehicle!

Tactics/ Planning

The measurement is very important before the battle has even begun. Planning stages usually have around 3 or 4 major questions that need to be answered and a couple of them are, how many troops do they have, do we have enough firepower to rip them apart? These are all things that generals need to be thinking of before the battle even starts and it would be impossible to win a war without measurements in the planning stages. One of the best strategies even created was of course Hitler’s Blitzkrieg (lightning war). This was combination of tanks, infantry, artillery and air power all deployed at rapid speed and it was very successfully used to break enemy lines and proceeding without the need to worry about flanking.

Weapons

Measurement is actually very important when it comes to weapon creation too and the most famous example really has to be the atomic bomb. All kinds of measurements were used and are still used today such as pressure measurement and level transmitters. Weapons like the cannon would have never of come into existence if it wasnt for careful calculations and measurements.

The big problem comes because measurements are getting easier to predict which is simply because of the computers we have. On the plus side this means a bomb detonated by an ally will hit the target with no civilian casualties but from a terrorist there could be some real public losses.

Spying

Many RC helicopter as well as the more traditional RC aircraft are actually used for spying and obviously the planes are used more because they can go higher, are quieter and have longer lasting fuel on them. Many spy planes are based on the RC designs and if it wasn’t for the invention of these it may not have been possible to win many of the battles that both the USA and UK have won over the years.

Police Work

Many people have questioned the new way that the police are using RC helicopters, to spy on suspects to see if they are right about them. It is only recently that this has started to occur because the noise of the choppers has been almost cut out. They are now able to listen and watch so they can provide evidence in a court of law against a suspect.

Bombing?

These helicopters can also deliver small bombs to targets and this is something that is quite dangerous because this way of approach can be pretty unexpected.

Hobby

One of the big reasons that these are bought is simply to have a bit of fun with them, although it takes a lot of skill to even get them up in the air. Although this isn’t the best use for them it is one the people use the both and there are many competitions out there for this kind of thing.

Of course if you are not into those copters why not have a bit of a look into those RC tanks, they are pretty cool to drive too.

The Invasion of Panama

In the midst of more prolonged U.S. military operations like the Vietnam War, the ISAF/NATO invasion of Afghanistan and Operation Iraqi Freedom, it is easy to forget about all the smaller but politically significant and controversial invasions carried out by the United States. If you wish to recap the 1989 United States invasion of Panama or read up on an event that took place when you were still a kid, this article provides a brief summary of the invasion and the events that led up to it.

It was know by the codename Operation Just Cause, the U.S. attack of Panama happened in December 1989 during the Presidency of George H.W. Bush. The result of the invasion was the deposing and capturing of de factor Panamanian leader and dictator Manuel Noriega. President-elect Guillermo Endara who had been prevented from taking power by Noriega was put into office and the panamanian army was disbanded.

The operation was being planned under the name Blue Spoon but it was renamed Just Cause due to it sounding better and due to PR reasons. The invasion of Panama was the first time the newly developed HMMWV (Humvee) saw actual combat. (Click here if you want to know more)

U.S. relations with General Noriega spanned back to 1959 when Noriega became a U.S. intelligence asset recieving his pay checks from the CIA; he kept this job for more and 20 years and was paid a salary upwards of USD 100 000 per year. During his time working for the CIA he helped sabotage missions against FMLN in El Salvador and sandinista forces in Nicaragua, he aslo helpedthe Drug Enforcement Administration in their efforts to prevent illegal drugs from entering the U.Sfrom South America. Simultaneously, he rebuffed demands made by U.S Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North to provide military assistance to the U.S backed Contras in Nicaragua, and refused requests by Salvadoran rightist Roberto D’Aubuisson to restrict the movements of FMNL leaders in Panama.

In 1983 Noriega promoted himself to full general and enforced his role as the de facto ruler of Panama. During the early 1980s, U.S. President Ronald Reagan negotiated with Noriega, asking him to leave his position in exchange for not having to face a series of drug-related indictments in the U.S.

Noriega declared the presidential election null and void in May 1989 and tried to maintain power with the use of military force. A coup to depose Noriega from power failed and this casued additional pressure on Bush to put force behind his retoric and do what was required to solve the situation.

A few hours after the start of the invasion, on the morning of December 20, President Bush announced the official U.S. reasoning behind the attack.

• Safeguarding the lives of U.S. citizens living in Panama. (An unarmed U.S. Marine had been killed a few days earlier and incidents were U.S. citizens had been beaten, brutally interrogated and threatened with sexual abuse had allegedly occurred.)
• Defending human rights and democracy in Panama.
• Combating drug trafficking.
• Protecting the neutrality of the Panama Canal.

The invasion of Panama provoked international outrage. On December 23, a draft resolution demanding the immediate withdrawal of United States forces from Panama was vetoed by France, United Kingdom and USA, but on December 29, the UN General Assembly voted 7520 with 40 abstentions to condemn the invasion as a flagrant violation of international law.

Corvette from the flower class

A corvette is a small and easily manoeuvrable, lightly armed warship. If you are looking for info about the corvette car you can click here.

Originally, a corvette was defined as a warship larger than a sloop-of-war but smaller than a frigate, and would typically have a single gun deck. During the Age of Sail, corvettes were commonly used to patrol the coast, support large fleets, and engage in minor wars. Corvettes also participated in so called show-the-flag missions. The name corvette was first used in the 1670s when the French army started to use them.

During the early years a standard Corvette was 12-18 meters (40-60 feet) long and measured 40-70 tons burthen. They were lightly armed with 4-8 small guns on the gun deck.

Eventually, larger and larger vessels were included in the term corvette and by the year 1800 some corvettes were over 30 m (100 feet) long and measured 400-600 tons burthen. USS Constellation was one of the largest corvettes with sail and it measured 54 m (176ft); a U.S. corvette constructed in the year 1855 and mounted with 24 guns. The sheer size of her made some naval experts refer to her as a frigate rather than a corvette.

The design of corvettes changed to adapt to newer times when the age of sails ended. The first modern corvettes were the Flower class corvettes, a class of 267 UK Royal Navy vessels named after flowers. Among the first modern corvettes you also find a Canadian corvette class namned after cities and towns. Both classes were used in the battle of atlantic to protect convoys from German submarines.

It should however be mentioned that the flower class was never designed for this but for offshore patrolling and was therefore ill equipped to protect convoys in the open seas. Longer vessels would have been more suitable for open ocean work, while more heavily armed vessels would have been more apt at anti-aircraft defence. Another problem with the flower class corvettes was that they were only marginally much faster than the transport ships, this was not a big problem at the beginning of that battle for the atlantic but did increasingly become one as german subsmarine got faster and faster. Eventually, the Royal Navy started using frigates as escorts instead. From the smaller ship building yards that couldn’t construct frigates, a new corvette design emerged developed to suit the new needs. These Castle class corvettes were introduced rather late in the war and some of them remained in service well into the 1950s.

The Royal Australian Navy built their own class of corvettes for World War II; the Bathurst class corvettes. They were primarely meant to be used as mine sweepers and designed after the Bangor class minsweepers, corvettes in this class was namned after Australian towns. A total on 60 Bathurst corvettes where commisioned but only 36 was meant for the Royal Australian Navy, of the rest 4 was for the Indian Navy and 20 for the Brittish Admirality.

The bathurst class corvettes were as earlier mentioned designed to be mine sweepers but the WWII forced them to be used in a long row of different areas such as anti-submarine warfare, troop transportation, convoy transports and for bombarding enemy positions. In many situations the lightly armed corvettes had to perform duties for which they were ill equipped considering their small size and slow speed.

WW2

Again WW2 wasn’t a time in which tanks made the most of cable ties and multicore cables but it has to be the time where tanks were used to win battles rather than just as an extra. In fact without the tank it would be safe to say that WW2 would not have been the same war at all. During this time the tank really came into play and it was turned from a heap of metal to the best used weapons system in the war.

Heinz Guderian who was a tactical theoretician actually stated before WW2 that “where tanks are, the front is” and this of course became reality during the course of WW2.

Hitler actually used tanks as the main part of his hole Blitzkrief idea. He made use of the combined arms of both tanks and infantry as well as in tank radios to gain advantages of forces that actually had better tanks than he did. Hitler used his idea to get a hold of France as well as Poland. Hiter is the whole reason that the Allies looked into making the tank the war machine that it became. France was defeated in a matter of weeks and it was this that kicked the Allies up the backside to get them to build better tanks.

Of course the most famous tanks of the war included the Tiger and the Panther for the Germans and the Sherman, M4, T28 and of course the SMK for the Allies.

Tanks in WW2 were the cause of many, many deaths. The number of people that died in the war was 56,125,262 but the number of people that died because of tanks was a lot too.

During the Cold War tanks became very popular again as each side was trying to make more than the other and they are of course used everyday still today. Many tanks now have thier own fan accessories.

The trench warfare was getting sides nowhere which is why the tank was actually introduces by the British in 1916. To hide their true purpose the British pretended that they were water tanks to help transport water to the troops which is actually where the word Tank came from.

These are just a few of the many tanks we have seen since that famous battle of Somme.

WW1 is when the first tank entered the battlefield which is why the article is going to start there too.

The “Mother” or Mark I was designed by Britain in the middle of WW1. However the D1 was actually the first tank to ever be used in an actual battle. The tanks first battle was not actually the Somme but Flers-Courcellette but the Somme is often used as it is more famous.

Because of the rain and the fighting the mud hud been churned up a lot of times and this is what made Tank Warfare almost impossible. The main issue with the tanks was actually that they were always getting stuck in the middle of a battle. The first tank battle actually occured in 1918 and was held between six tanks, three from the British and three from the Germans despite Germany only making 15 tanks during the war. Although the British came out on top in this case it is clear that both of the sides had some serious problems.

So although none of these tanks had mil spec cables within them they still proved to be feared in the battlefield and without a doubt they at least made a small impact on the war effort.

In part two WW2 will be discussed in detail as the way that tanks were seen was changed for ever and the way the world fought battles was also shifted.