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A man owns the most advanced private air force after buying 46 F/A-18s

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Re: A man owns the most advanced private air force after buying 46 F/A-18s

#21

Post by throwanem »

tomcam wrote: post #5

> He now holds eight licenses with the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms (ATF), allowing him to own military machine guns and cannons, as well as thousands of rounds of ammunition to fire through them. Dude is totally not an intelligence asset of any kind. Just an enthusiast.

I mean, I've known people who owned ATF-licensed automatic weapons. They're scarce because no new licenses have been issued since the '86 ban, but prices for grandfathered weapons tend to run in the order of tens of thousands of dollars, depending on what you want and who's selling.

If you're looking for conspiracy theories, looking past the ownership of large numbers of military jets, to the handful of rich-enthusiast-grade small arms, seems like a weird flex.

Re: A man owns the most advanced private air force after buying 46 F/A-18s

#22

Post by [deleted] »

0xff00ffee wrote: post #17

I used to have a single shut-down in 2nd amendment arguments. When my opponent would claim that the 2nd amendment gives civilians the power to overthrow a government, my favorite response was to compare poorly armed and trained americans to essentially the Taliban, and follow that up with: and then the US would drone/bomb you to oblivion with their air force superiority, like how Israel dominated the no-air-force Mid…

[deleted]

Re: A man owns the most advanced private air force after buying 46 F/A-18s

#23

Post by hencq »

olivermarks wrote: post #14

It's not clear aside from the fig leaf of 'being a Navy contractor' whether this is a mercenary for hire airforce. I wonder what regulatory control there is on a private airforce located in the US?

It's actually pretty clear, since it says what they do right in the article:

> He was also one of the early pioneers of the then-fledgling, if not wholly experimental, adversary air support market. In the early 2000s, he joined forces with the Airborne Tactical Advantage Company (ATAC), which was blazing a trail with their contracts with the Navy to supply fast jet targets and electronic warfare pod toting adversaries that mimic everything from enemy cruise missiles to fighters for Navy and Marine fighter aircraft and Navy surface combatants to train against.

In other words, they provide targets for training for Navy aircraft.

Re: A man owns the most advanced private air force after buying 46 F/A-18s

#24

Post by WhyKill »

haberman wrote: post #16

> He now holds eight licenses with the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms (ATF), allowing him to own military machine guns and cannons, as well as thousands of rounds of ammunition to fire through them. I'm very curious what these licenses say about how he is allowed to use these machines. What kind of work is he allowed to take? Who is he allowed to shoot at?

Just to answer. None of your concerns are covered by the license he has (Special Occupation Tax aka SOT). With a SOT7 + one of the other ones you can own and transfer machine guns and Destructive Devices legally. This is the same license a gunsmith will get to manufacture and sell(transfer) firearms incidentally.

No this is not a license to kill.

Re: A man owns the most advanced private air force after buying 46 F/A-18s

#25

Post by komali2 »

0xff00ffee wrote: post #17

I used to have a single shut-down in 2nd amendment arguments. When my opponent would claim that the 2nd amendment gives civilians the power to overthrow a government, my favorite response was to compare poorly armed and trained americans to essentially the Taliban, and follow that up with: and then the US would drone/bomb you to oblivion with their air force superiority, like how Israel dominated the no-air-force Mid…

He has to have at least 6 various ATF licenses to arm, and load, weapons on his planes. Incidentally, if we were going to let civilians arm themselves, imo that's the only way to go about it - make it an extremely licensed, yet free, process.

But you're still not wrong - I have the same opinion. In any case 2nd amendment arguments on fighting the USA are moot - the 2nd amendment doesn't legalize fighting the USA. Guns or not, if the USA decides you're the enemy, you're automatically a terrorist regardless. And terrorists have not had any issues getting guns.

Re: A man owns the most advanced private air force after buying 46 F/A-18s

#26

Post by asciimike »

SloopJon wrote: post #4

I'm amazed that this is even possible. I seem to recall that there are countries with unusable fighter jets, because the U.S. will no longer supply parts and expertise for maintenance. The article indeed states: "the purchase does include all of the RAAF's F/A-18 spare parts inventory and test equipment, valued at over a billion dollars alone."

> I seem to recall that there are countries with unusable fighter jets, because the U.S. will no longer supply parts and expertise for maintenance.

Turns out the US has this problem as well... my brother is a Harrier pilot, and it seems to me like the US has mostly run out of spare parts for them. They bought a number of RAF Harriers for parts, but even so, it's a question of whether the F-35 will actually be ready in time to replace those squadrons.

Re: A man owns the most advanced private air force after buying 46 F/A-18s

#27

Post by ceejayoz »

paulie_a wrote: post #6
SloopJon wrote: post #4

I'm amazed that this is even possible. I seem to recall that there are countries with unusable fighter jets, because the U.S. will no longer supply parts and expertise for maintenance. The article indeed states: "the purchase does include all of the RAAF's F/A-18 spare parts inventory and test equipment, valued at over a billion dollars alone."

At one point Pepsi had the sixth biggest Navy in the world. https://www.businessinsider.com/how-pepsi-briefly-became-the...

The Knights [edit:] Hospitaller briefly had a decently sized bomber fleet after WWII, as well.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_Military_Order_of_Ma...

Re: A man owns the most advanced private air force after buying 46 F/A-18s

#28

Post by jakear »

0xff00ffee wrote: post #17

I used to have a single shut-down in 2nd amendment arguments. When my opponent would claim that the 2nd amendment gives civilians the power to overthrow a government, my favorite response was to compare poorly armed and trained americans to essentially the Taliban, and follow that up with: and then the US would drone/bomb you to oblivion with their air force superiority, like how Israel dominated the no-air-force Mid…

It's not about the civilians being able to overthrow the government, it's about the government not being able to overthrow the civilians. When wrongthink starts being criminalized, would you prefer to be defenseless in your home, or have some - feeble sure, but some - means of protecting yourself? Or would you rather just prefer to think wrongthink will never be criminalized?

I believe The Clash puts it best:

    When they kick at your front door
    How you gonna come?
    With your hands on your head
    Or on the trigger of your gun

    When the law break in
    How you gonna go?
    Shot down on the pavement
    Or waiting in death row

    You can crush us
    You can bruise us
    But you'll have to answer to
    Oh, guns of Brixton
The Clash - The Guns of Brixton

Re: A man owns the most advanced private air force after buying 46 F/A-18s

#30

Post by ceejayoz »

ardy42 wrote: post #20
burlesona wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah I had to follow a bunch of the links to figure this out, but in short, he runs an air combat training company, and the Air Force and Navy pay him to field a training “adversary” for the military pilots to fight in mock combat. From further reading it sounds like the idea here is to get a diverse and different field of aircraft. I guess the NATO forces can practice against each other, but it’s not realistic in th…

> Yeah I had to follow a bunch of the links to figure this out, but in short, he runs an air combat training company, and the Air Force and Navy pay him to field a training “adversary” for the military pilots to fight in mock combat. The thing that I don't get is why would the US hire him to provide adversary aircraft that it already operates? I could totally understand them hiring someone who operated a bunch of ex-…

"Aggressor squadrons" train very differently, to mimic potential adversaries combat doctrine. The aircraft may also be modified to perform more like the aircraft they're simulating. They're even painted differently, like this F-15 in Russian-style camo:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6a/F-15E-80...

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