The John Batchelor Show

Monday 7 May 2018

Air Date: 
May 07, 2018

Photo: Sukhoi 57 — Сухой 57.
A.  The JSC Sukhoi Company (Russian: ПАО «Компания „Сухой“») is a major Russian aircraft manufacturer, headquartered in Begovoy District, Northern Administrative Okrug, Moscow,[2] and designs both civilian and military aircraft. It was founded by Pavel Sukhoi in 1939 as the Sukhoi Design Bureau (OKB-51, design office prefix Su). The Russian government merged Sukhoi with Mikoyan, Ilyushin, Irkut, Tupolev, and Yakovlev as a new company named United Aircraft Corporation. According to some experts, Sukhoi are arguably the best military aircraft on Earth.
B.  In the late 1980s, the Soviet Union outlined a need for a next-generation aircraft intended to enter service in the 1990s. The project was designated the I-90 (Russian: Истребитель, Istrebitel, "Fighter") and required the fighter to have substantial ground attack capabilities and would eventually replace the MiG-29s and Su-27s in frontline tactical aviation service. The subsequent programme designed to meet these requirements, the MFI (Russian: МФИ, Russian: Многофункциональный фронтовой истребитель, Mnogofunksionalni Frontovoy Istrebitel, "Multifunctional Frontline Fighter"), resulted in Mikoyan's selection to develop the MiG 1.44.[19] Though not a participant in the MFI, Sukhoi started its own programme in the early 1990s to develop technologies for a next-generation fighter aircraft, resulting in the S-37, later designated Su-47. Due to a lack of funds after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the MiG 1.44 programme was repeatedly delayed and the first flight of the prototype did not occur until 2000, nine years behind schedule.[19] The MiG 1.44 was subsequently cancelled and a new programme for a next-generation fighter, PAK FA, was initiated. The programme requirements reflected the capabilities of Western fighter aircraft, such as the Eurofighter Typhoon and F-22 Raptor. Following a competition between Sukhoi, Mikoyan, and Yakovlev,[citation needed] in 2002, Sukhoi was selected as the winner of the PAK FA competition and selected to lead the design of the new aircraft.
 
JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW
Co-hosts: Gordon Chang, Daily Beast; and Thaddeus McCotter, WJR, the Great Voice of the Great Lakes
 
Hour One
Monday   7 May 2018 / Hour 1, Block A: Tom Joscelyn, Senior Fellow, Foundation for Defense of Democracies; & Senior Editor for FDD's Long War Journal; and Bill Roggio, FDD Senior Fellow, Long War Journal; in re: ‘Desperate’ Taliban ‘has lost ground,’ Pentagon spokesperson wrongly claims.  Wrong!
Islamic State continues to battle Assad regime, allies   Since mid-April, the Islamic State and the Assad regime have been engaged in an intense battle in the southern neighborhoods of Damascus. ISIS claims to have killed or wounded hundreds of Assad's soldiers, but its figures cannot be independently verified. Meanwhile, the so-called caliphate continues to fight the Syrian government and its allies in other areas as well, including in eastern Syria.  The Taliban neither is "desperate" nor is it "losing ground" in Afghanistan. Pollyana-ish press briefings cannot paper over the fact that things are currently not going well.
Monday   7 May 2018 / Hour 1, Block B: Tom Joscelyn, Senior Fellow, Foundation for Defense of Democracies; & Senior Editor for FDD's Long War Journal; and Bill Roggio, FDD Senior Fellow, Long War Journal; in re: Badakhshan: Two or three districts of twenty-nine controlled by Taliban. Afghan mil claims something else. When Penatgon press secretary says, “We’re gaining ground against the Taliban,” I [know that’s entirely inaccurate,]    . . . Security there is really bad.
ISIS in Syria; Russia, Iran. Southern Damascus: Yarmouk refugee camp. Street-to street, bldg-to-bldg fighting, ISIS daily puts out videos and others – some beheadings and grotesque images. Put a helmet on the heard of a Syrian soldier, then dropped him on his head from a height to kill him. ISIS recruiting worldwide seems to have diminished somewhat and we don't know how many fighters they have in Syria now – some say 5,000; some, 12,000. 
Monday   7 May 2018 / Hour 1, Block C: Gordon Chang, Daily Beast and Forbes,com, in re: China: the competition will continue through thi century and into the next. Not try to solve China’s aggression, but [keep it at a low simmer]. CCP puts SAM missile on three of its reefs in the Spratleys (where 6 countries claim the land).  This destroys shipping in the South China Sea.  US airmen in Djibouti have been injured by Chinese lasers.  Chaotic msg of an aggressive mil combined with a deceptive trade policy. Of what is this evidence? Probably an indication of Xi Jinping’s general direction – govtl Party units have free rein to take the US on; permission from the top. The US has always been loath to take on Beijing and we've given it much too-wide a berth. In Djibouti, first time since the Korean War fighting that China has injured our service personnel; if we don’t impose costs on Beijing, then we know it’ll wind up with dead Americans. We need to impose very high costs right away. China is moving in very dangerous directions; here’s got to be a change in Washington mentality, seeing that we’re no longer at peace. They're rushing back toward the Communist Manifesto, again; and Wang Yi’s announcement that Xi’s political [theory] hasn’t been this [good] since 300 years ago – that was the Treaty of Westphalia.
We’ve got to understand what China is thinking: US does bot have sovereignty.  Feb 1945 Yalta – Stalin, Churchill, FDR  - pres was extending toward Stalin the dream of a peace org (UN, spoke of a Utopian future.  Facing him: Stalin, saying Poland Poland Poland – he wanted territory for it!
Xi is like Stalin: he wants territory – South China Sea, etc – while we want a peaceful future. 
The
The old “end of history” garbage.
Monday   7 May 2018 / Hour 1, Block D: Bruce Bechtol, Department of Political Science and Criminal Justice. Angelo State University, in re:  DPRK, Iran and Syria have such [profound] illicit banking connections that we’ll never slow the flow of cash among them. Last fall, Pres we need to go after their banks, their hundred o=s of shipments monthly, and Houthis, Mozambique, Angola, et al. Can't do this without help from our allies, which Pres Trump ha quietly been doing. Takes months; if we do, then not too long ahead they could be in a hurt locker.
Every dollar transaction clears in New York, so we know all that occurs.    African countries often say they're buying rice, or fish, or kimchee.  They will not help us. Ethiopia, Mozambique and some others are actually recipients of US foreign aid and use the money to buy arms from North Korea.
Mil inspections have to be t times of our choosing; we must make t clear that we don’t lighten pressure till we have that Only thereafter can we discuss normalization off relations. One sine qua non must be human rights. Greg Scarliatou. 
First: must get entirely rid of the threat to the US!
What site for mtg?  Hope not Panmunjon – too favorably symbolic to DPRK. 
 
Hour Two
Monday   7 May 2018 / Hour 2, Block A:  David M Drucker, Washington Examiner, in re: We’re on the eve of a momentous, historic and ironic decision by Pres Trump on the backchannel negotiations of the Iran deal.  Pix of John Kerry negotiating with Javad Zarif after the Israelis proved that Iran has repeatedly lied over the years.  Congress is unusually quiet tonight.  Adm hasn’t yet publicly answered what the strategy will be henceforth.   True that Trump can be mercurial.  We need to know what that is.   [No we don’t right now! – ed]   Factor in Russia and China.
Senate and House Foreign Affairs: how does this play in their h0me states? . . . At this moment, Trump getting good marks for his handling of North Korea.  . . . How abt John Kerry wanting to be on camera negotiating with the Iranian foreign minister?  Bizarre. [Treasonous – ed]  . . . Here’s a former State Secy undermining the work of the current State Secretary. Widespread yawning, which is [very odd].  Thaddeus: I consider the Logan Act to be unconstitutional, but this is [not good]. Nothing wrong with any president pulling us out of an executive agreement [which distinctly is not a treaty]. 
Monday   7 May 2018 / Hour 2, Block B:  Jim McTague, Barrons, in re: Millennials’s spending.
Monday   7 May 2018 / Hour 2, Block C: Andrew C McCarthy, National Review; and he served as an Assistant United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York; in re: Three different pleas/indictments:  Gen Flynn; Mr Manafort; the indictment f the Russian form Concord and 13 trollsters in St Petersburg.    . .  A great deal of exculpatory material abt Flynn tat was concealed – even the public stuff was held back.  The agents who originally interviewed Flynn said plainly that they believed he had not lied to them.   . . They opened a counterintell investigation against Flynn: has to be that he’s thought to be an agt of a foreign power and engaging in activities that [break] fed law – a 30-year decorated combat veteran of the US mil; in 2016 wrote a book describing Russia as an implacable enemy of the US. . . . Judge T S Ellis said: “You’re trying to squeeze Manafort in order to get to Trump.”
Monday   7 May 2018 / Hour 2, Block D: Andrew C McCarthy, National Review; and he served as an Assistant United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York; in re: Eighteen lawyers on staff.  Rogozin hired attorneys and showed up in US Court – Mr Mueller wd have to prepare to try a case he never thought he’d have to try, and also turn over all the evidence! TGM:  The Kremlin must be laughing and laughing at us. 
 
Hour Three
Monday 7 May 2018/ Hour 3, Block A:  Tyler Rogoway (@Aviation_Intel), The War Zone;  & RealClearDefense, in re: Sukhoi 57 .  No, The Su-57 Isn't 'Junk:' Six Features We Like on Russia's New Fighter [http://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/20434/no-the-su-57-isnt-junk-six-fe.... Russia’s 5th generation fighter aircraft, formerly known as the T-50 and now officially named the Su-57, has been in the news a lot lately. India’s decision to finally walk away from the joint program could be a catastrophic blow to the jet’s future, which followed an abortive deployment to war-torn Syria late last February. Russia’s inability to afford decent sized production lots of the new jets and the aircraft’s ongoing engine saga also have taken their toll on the program. And above all else, the aircraft’s degree of low-observability (stealthiness) has long been in question, as it lacked many of the key features that define modern stealth fighters. But none of this conclusively means the Su-57 doesn’t have some redeemable qualities and features that are worth pointing out.
Monday 7 May 2018/ Hour 3, Block B:  Tyler Rogoway (@Aviation_Intel) & RealClearDefense, in re:
Monday 7 May 2018/ Hour 3, Block C:  John Tamny, RealClearPolitics, in re: Trade.
Monday 7 May 2018/ Hour 3, Block D:  John Tamny, RealClearPolitics, in re: Trade.
 
Hour Four
Monday 7 May 2018/ Hour 4, Block A: A Noble Cause: American Battlefield Victories In Vietnam,  by Douglas Niles (part I of II) 
Monday 7 May 2018/ Hour 4, Block B: A Noble Cause: American Battlefield Victories In Vietnam,  by Douglas Niles (part I of II) 
Monday 7 May 2018/ Hour 4, Block C: Nine Days in May: The Battles of the 4th Infantry Division on the Cambodian Border, 1967, by Warren K. Wilkins
Monday 7 May 2018/ Hour 4, Block D:  Nine Days in May: The Battles of the 4th Infantry Division on the Cambodian Border, 1967, by Warren K. Wilkins
..  ..  ..