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that makes me really nervous.

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I'm not nervous .... I'm getting REALLY pissed ... our guys have been on the ground for almost 24 hrs. now and havent made contact ... and you know the commie chits are "gropeing" our goodies. We should have sent in an extraction team hours ago! ... dayummit .... sorryazz politicians.[:(!]

I seriously hope they remembered to destroy the electrics and throw the codes overboard before they landed in China.  That would be some bad shit.  

 And what is this bit with not letting the crew talk to us?  We are not at war, not wanting to give up the plane I can see but holding on to the crew is just crazy.  Do the Chinese have a death wish or something?

Lock-n-Load

Them Chinese got a lot of nerve claiming that our guys purposely rammed their poor little fighter jet with our big nasty propeller plane. I suppose that the 24 people and tons of sensitive electronics gear on board gives it a lot more mass and makes it a veritable airborne battering ram.

I wonder if our pilot shouldn't have pulled a Captain Kirk maneuver and ditched it out at sea. Hate to second-guess a guy put in a spot like that, though. Hope somebody anticipated this type of thing and put some thermite or something on board.

American EP-3 1....Chinese fighter 0. They should have bought American!

I think that crew was gathering air defense info. IIRC.  Now think about this.  We are finalizing an arms sale to Taiwan basically so they can keep mainland China at bay.  China has done some serious sabre rattling over this.  Our response?  Get intel in case we have to lend a helping hand, which by treaty we are commited to doing, when China makes a move on Taiwan, which is inevitable IMO at this point.  

As far as the crew, they will be fine.  China wants to find out what we do and don't know.  As far as the aircraft it has probably been gone over with a fine toothed comb several times by now.  As for any intel, it should have been destroyed, and as far as onboard equipment, who knows?  One thing for sure, the relationship between us and China has definitely soured since GW took office.  China has their hands in the middle east also.   There were reports that they were involved with Iraq.  China could be the BIG ONE.  

It was 12 years ago that peace was breaking out all over, now there are hotspots on every continent.  And several on most.  I look for China to move on Taiwan when and if we get back into the middle east.  They will take advantage of us being spread too thin hoping they can take Taiwan before we can respond.  So we know this and that's why there is a pending arms sale to Taiwan, so they can hold them off long enough for us to intervene.  China knows that we don't have the resources to be evreyplace at once and might be banking on such a senario.  Who knows but I read 10 years ago about this and so far the report I have read has been right on the money.  A war senario with China is real and one that poses the most risk right now as they are a nuke counry.  As for the mideast, we can handle anything there in the same time frame or less than we did wth Iraq but China would definitly be a long term campaign.  If it ever came to an all out conventional war, we would have to draft, and civilian corporations would have to convert to military hardware.  They have much manpower and resources.  A formidable enemy.  But we still would kick their commie asses back to the Jurrasic Period!  You know we Americans are pretty sick bastards.  We don't like to send the troops to fight but when we do, we just love to kick ass.  Bush Sr. went to war and his rating went through the roof.  Gonna be interesting to watch the next 3-4 years unfold.

anything new, I either hear that our men are in safe hands  of china. Or that thier still hold up in the plane with orders for china not to touch the plane. very hope this don't turn into another Iran hostage type deal.

Dam it M15, now you got me looking thru my videos for my "Walking Tall" collection. He sure did kick alot ass with that stick[:D]

Remember the Pueblo? I hope thoese guys destroyed the most sensitive equipment.

If war is on the horizon, better now than later. Sure, they can nuke the west coast and in the process I'll probably fry, but I doubt they will have anything left to go home to.

Pure speculation, but my guess is that it was forced down and the collision occurred when the EP-3 first failed to cooperate.  There would be no excuse not to ditch in international waters and let the PJ's save the crew otherwise.  They must have threatened to shoot them down after the nudge.

This is part of the Clinton Legacy.  Maybe Bill ought to offer to go over and negotiate them out.  No, they will probably turn them over to Jesse Jackson.

I can't believe that these guys landed this plane in Chinese territory. What were they thinking.  They should have flown that plane into the ground and ejected if it could not fly, instead of giving them more technology.
It would have been completely explainable as it was "unflyable" anyway.
Probably costs us billions to redesign/reinstall/reinvent technology to counter what they just got.

Maybe we setup the whole scenario.  We got a shot at latest C3 response from PRC and an on the ground look at the Hainan resources.  Why think the gear on the Aries is the latest?  There was certainly a realtime data uplink so the people and equipment could have been considered expendable if we wanted the intel bad enough.  Too many unusual details at present.  China probably wants to be rid of the whole thing as bad as we do.

Arock out.

I dont buy the idea that they were on any kind of information gathering/recon mission in Chinese airspace. What dumbass commander would send an aircraft with the radar signature of Rosie O'Donnel's ass into hosile airspace?? If we were going to do that, we would have sent something that would not get caught, to avoid an international inncodent.

DBA, I thought about that, but the crew response leaves me puzzled.  If the incident occurred in international airspace (ie. feet wet), what why and how did the platform land at what I understand to be an inland base?  I know we have better intel resources, but they would not trigger a response like flying a barn door right down the Chinese throats.  The resource in question could have been selected to elicit a predicted response.  And yes, over the decades we have chosen to put our proud men and women in harm's way for scenarios like this.

Arock out.

Good point. But there is also the possibility that our boys did have "wet feet" and were FORCED by their fighters to land on Chinese soil.


THIS JUST IN----->
As I was typing this post Fox News reported that it is RUMORED that the "Chinese siezed the EP-3 and the crew was imprisoned." They then showed a bunch of Chinese protesting the American aggression.

IF this is true........ it looks bad.

Any volunteers to go in there with me to get our boys??? President AUG.... I await your orders......

[uzi]

DBA, Condoleeza Rice lives for moments like this.  She and Jean Kilpatrick should not be messed with.  I appreciate your input.

Arock out.

Bush speaks-

"I am troubled by the lack of timely response." and he calls for US Embassy personel to have immediate access to the crew.

This happened on SATURDAY and we haven't even talked to our crew yet. This looks black and white to me. It looks like they have some hostages....

DBA, international politics being a big chessgame, if we're looking for a play to take the focus off Taiwan or justify the transfer of upgraded hardware their way, this might work.  At least as different from the Gulf of Tonkin, we've got a bent airplane to show.

Arock out.

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Send in the Stealth Fighter and have a bomb drop right on that P-3.  Let the Chineses figured it out and put together the pieces. By the time they finished up, the technology will be obsolete.

By the way, the pilot of that P-3 should be elevated to "Super Ace" for downing an ennemy  Jet Fighter without firing a single shot!  I know those Navy pilot are good but this is real good.  GO NAVY!

My Dad was in Army Intel for a while, and one of his assignments was to fly over N. Vietman, Laos, and Cambodia, among other "places."  In his case, they flew in U-21s (RC-12s) and there orders were not to get captured.  If they survived the crash, they were suppose to set off the charges to destroy the aircraft. The standing orders were not to let the plane fall in enemy hands, and not to get captured.  This was to be prevented by any, and all means necessary.  This makes me wonder, why did the pilot of the Navy plane land in China?  Why did he ditch out in the China sea, where the aircraft would have sunk, and the men could be rescued.  While it is the Chinese's fault for the collison, there is no excuse for handing the Chinese an EP-3 and the chew with the knowledge to tell them how to use it.  The CO of the aircraft knows that when he comes back that he is facing a general court marshal, so the question remains, why did he land the aircraft in China.  As much as I feel for those men, I think that the CO is screwed.

How many did we leave behind in China and North Korea, later on in Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos?  I am ashamed that our government wouldn't do more for the people who gave everything for this country.  

Big Rod- As I said in another thread, there is a possibility that they were FORCED to land in China. They might not have given our boys a choice. That one Chicom pilot had to be pretty pissed after he saw his buddy go down.

THIS JUST IN-------->

"US crew moved to a Chinese 'guest house." According to the Pentagon...

Two theorys -
The delivery of this plane to the Chinese was intentional to give them phony technology.

They were forced down but destroyed all sensitive data and equipment.

Read this article - supposidly there are only 12 of these as the NSA Echelon System is onboard and they are very costly.

I can't believe they would land this plane without destroying everything unless it was intentional delivery of bogus stuff. Unless Clinton was flying the plane then all bets are off.

[url]http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2001/4/1/234033.shtml[/url]

Fox News reported the crew's last radio transmission was, "armed Chinese troops are preparing to enter the aircraft."

The Chicoms said they will let US officials speak to the crew at 5pm (dont know what time zone) tomorrow.

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2001/4/1/234033.shtml

============
Bush Policy Called Insane

According to one Asia expert, the electronic intelligence flights off the Chinese coast are part of a deliberate effort by the Bush administration to draw a sharp Chinese response.

"The U.S. Navy flying spy missions 62 miles from the Chinese coast is simply insane," stated Japan Policy Research Institute president Chalmers Johnson.

"We bait the Chinese with these spy flights, we needle the North Koreans over military movements inside their own borders and antagonize the Russians over an American turned spy while tunneling under their embassy in D.C. This kind of cowboy diplomacy is a form of Clint Eastwood machismo."

"It all adds up to that we are just now starting to pay for the election of George W. Bush," concluded Johnson. "The Chinese were completely justified in taking this action. The Bush administration is deliberately going out of its way to antagonize Beijing."

==============

I can't believe this guy!  The Chinese "were completely justified" in ramming the EP-3 and making it go down?  This guy is an idiot!!  God damn!!!

So I guess during the cold war, if the Soviets had flown within 62 miles of our shores, it would have been justified for the U.S. to ram the Soviet plane and bring it down?  What kind of crap is that?

Seems as though the Navy has has some difficulty the last few months.

First we have Soviet Su-27s flying over our aircraft carriers WITHOUT a CAP in the air.  The first response is an EA-6B which of course those Sukhoi's are all over like flies on stinky stuff.  Now we have EP-3 Orion so far away from any help that they freakin' land in China!!!!  I won't speak for the crew or their mission, they were in contact with their superiors.  But it would seem to me that the LAST place to put that would be china.  The will, and are already reverse engineering that sucker so bad it's not funny.

Just doesn't seem like the Clinton military is in the shape they claimed afterall huh?

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HEY GUYS MAYBE THEY(UNCLE GEORGE) WANTED THEM TO HAVE THAT BIT OF INFO? NOW IF THEY HAD OUR SR-71 THATS ANOTHER STORY!!!!