Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Italian police raid of neo-fascist militants finds air-to-air missile

arstechnica.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 76 posts

Re: Italian police raid of neo-fascist militants finds air-to-air missile

#21

Post by klez »

benj111 wrote: post #15

How useful is this in actuality? Could I launch it from the ground, or does it need to be launched from the air? Could i just strap it to a Cessna, or does it need other systems (radar?) to work? Does it need the original war head, or can you attach any old explosive device. In short, if I as a potential terrorist wanted to shoot down a plane, would this be a reasonable starting point?

They were trying to sell it, not use it directly. At which point it may end in the hands of someone who might know how to use it or how to retrofit it for other uses.

Re: Italian police raid of neo-fascist militants finds air-to-air missile

#22

Post by praptak »

ryacko wrote: post #16
praptak wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/08/russia-is-... TLDR: Russia backs these groups to undermine Western societies. Nazis admire Putin because of shared disdain for democracy.

I wouldn’t want to associate with Nazis then, clearly they support supremacy, secrecy, and a criminal state. Democracy is associated with fairness, openness, and justice. I would like to think that the US educational system inoculates everyone from those dreadful -isms.

People who feel shafted by society will reject its values. No amount of inoculation prevents that. The best way of prevention is to genuinely care for the rejected.

Re: Italian police raid of neo-fascist militants finds air-to-air missile

#23

Post by mikeyouse »

benj111 wrote: post #15

How useful is this in actuality? Could I launch it from the ground, or does it need to be launched from the air? Could i just strap it to a Cessna, or does it need other systems (radar?) to work? Does it need the original war head, or can you attach any old explosive device. In short, if I as a potential terrorist wanted to shoot down a plane, would this be a reasonable starting point?

Not at all useful, needs to be fired from the air, from a specific outdated French jet weapon system that essentially nobody uses any more. Speculation was that maybe Libya would have a use for it. And yes, its target needs to be painted with a radar for the entire flight.

30kg of high explosive could be useful to a generic terrorist but it's unlikely that the missile itself would have been used.

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/28976/italian-cops-rai...

Re: Italian police raid of neo-fascist militants finds air-to-air missile

#25

Post by krtkush »

benj111 wrote: post #15

How useful is this in actuality? Could I launch it from the ground, or does it need to be launched from the air? Could i just strap it to a Cessna, or does it need other systems (radar?) to work? Does it need the original war head, or can you attach any old explosive device. In short, if I as a potential terrorist wanted to shoot down a plane, would this be a reasonable starting point?

I think the fuel and the explosive in it are individually useful/ valuable. The missile itself is a semi-active radar guided air to air missile and I doubt these guys had the resources to use it is originally intended to.

Re: Italian police raid of neo-fascist militants finds air-to-air missile

#26

Post by klez »

AndyMcConachie wrote: post #20
FDS wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They didn‘t fight on the russian side. For some reason english media mistranslated original press release. https://www.poliziadistato.it/articolo/225d2c47fb2c9ef299497... It says "avevano combattuto nella regione ucraina del Donbass contro gli indipendentisti". So they were fighting against separatists.

Ars Technica needs to issue a correction to the story. Otherwise I'm going to lose considerable respect for them. There's a fine line between making a genuine mistake and lying to your readers.

I think if you point it out to them with a correct translation from the Italian police site they will correct it. Also, they're not the only one who made that mistake. The independent said the same thing. It would be interesting to know where the original mistranslation originated from.

Re: Italian police raid of neo-fascist militants finds air-to-air missile

#27

Post by ryacko »

praptak wrote: post #22
ryacko wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn’t want to associate with Nazis then, clearly they support supremacy, secrecy, and a criminal state. Democracy is associated with fairness, openness, and justice. I would like to think that the US educational system inoculates everyone from those dreadful -isms.

People who feel shafted by society will reject its values. No amount of inoculation prevents that. The best way of prevention is to genuinely care for the rejected.

Then Nazism is truly tragic, for those that follow it are the most prone to rejecting others. It seems so trivial, and yet we fall short.

Re: Italian police raid of neo-fascist militants finds air-to-air missile

#28

Post by mirimir »

FDS wrote: post #10
skrebbel wrote: post #6

Anyone with more insight into all of this than me who can explain why they went to fight on the Russian side? I mean, there surely were neo-nazis around on both sides of that conflict, right? Just different flavours? I wonder how you pick who to support if your core ideology is that "people different from us are bad".

They didn‘t fight on the russian side. For some reason english media mistranslated original press release. https://www.poliziadistato.it/articolo/225d2c47fb2c9ef299497... It says "avevano combattuto nella regione ucraina del Donbass contro gli indipendentisti". So they were fighting against separatists.

And even Google translate:

> The investigations had begun about a year ago when the police headquarters in Turin, coordinated by the Central Directorate of Prevention Police, had monitored some people linked to political movements of the ultra right and who had fought in the Ukrainian region of Donbass against the separatists.

Wouldn't one expect at least that as part of fact checking?

Edit: Damn, so perhaps the poliziadistato.it article got it wrong. At least, according to Wikipedia.[0]

> Forza Nuova leader Roberto Fiore was once closely allied with the Ukrainian far-right Svoboda party, but following the beginning of the War in Donbass, Forza Nuova and Fiore "made a considerable shift to the pro-Russian camp." According to the Political Capital Institute, a Hungarian think tank, Forza Nuova is one of a number of Russian-backed radical right political parties in Europe.

But the supporting cites are from 2014-2015, so who knows?

0) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Force_(Italy)

Re: Italian police raid of neo-fascist militants finds air-to-air missile

#29

Post by napolux »

benj111 wrote: post #15

How useful is this in actuality? Could I launch it from the ground, or does it need to be launched from the air? Could i just strap it to a Cessna, or does it need other systems (radar?) to work? Does it need the original war head, or can you attach any old explosive device. In short, if I as a potential terrorist wanted to shoot down a plane, would this be a reasonable starting point?

Italian here, in the news they said it looks like the rocket was empty. So explosive was probably removed to be used by itself.

Re: Italian police raid of neo-fascist militants finds air-to-air missile

#30

Post by toomanybeersies »

How dangerous is one of these things without the surrounding targeting system? And how useful would this be to a foreign government that somehow doesn't have access to other air-to-air missiles?

It seems to me like a bit of a sensationalist headline, and the more dangerous weapons are actually the small arms.

Post reply on HN