/k/ - Weapons

>>640722

When was it shot down?

>>640729

It wasn't it just crashed cause humans not aliums were driving it

>>640722

>5 or 6 bladed tail rotor

Is it just me or does it look like it has (had) just 4 blades.

Especially in the second pic it really looks like a 90 degree spacing.

Don't discount the possibility of it being a device owned by US allies as well. Could have been a foreign model for obfuscation purposes in the preparation for the assault.

>>640747

This. The US could always use plausible deniability.

>It wasn't OUR helicopter

>>640736

I find it hard to believe a cold-war era "stealth" troop transport helicopter would still be hyper-classified to the point of never being publicly displayed when all the 1st generation stealth platforms (F-117 and B-2) were revealed as soon as the USSR collapsed. Even the commanche was publicly displayed, I even got to see both airframes flying together during the development program as I lived only a few miles from Sikorsky's HQ, test field, and manufacturing center.

I just find it particularly strange that literally nothing more has been learned about this large, manned aircraft in the 7+ years since its existence (and half its criticsl components) was confirmed in such spectacular fashion. What purpose is there in keeping it 100% secret when China literally got to inspect the tailrotor section under Pakistani obaervation? Not only is the fact that the US has an operational stealth troop transport out of the bag, the US didn't even make an effort to muddy the waters by releasing fake details about the other half of the helicopter. They just buried the issue and pretend like it never happened.

What did the Pakistanis do with that part anyways?

Did they put it in storage? Sold it to Russia? Tried their own experiments with it as if?

>>640819

They shipped it off to China.

>>640805

>1st generation stealth platforms (F-117 and B-2)

You're forgetting the Sea Shadow. It stand to reason they would have at least tried to make a transport helicopter since they did have a program for literally everything else.

The thing they all have in common is that THEY DON'T WORK.

My guess is the helicopters stayed under wraps is:

1.) They work. Stealth planes are a fucking gimmick that is at best a good support for SEAD missions and it's kinda inexpensive for ships, so why not. However the discreet insertion of commandos through helicopter is a real thing with normal helicopters, having an helicopter with noise reduction (there a lot of Vietnam era research into that) and radar reduction, combined with advanced instruments for night flying and very low altitude flight is something very desirable. And if the US did make a breakthrough in both (and we know they did due to cold war documentation on the subject) it stands to reason it's still secret up the ass.

2.) There isn't many. The thing reeks of small scale skunkworks, they might be operated by people from the 160th SOAR but they're certainly NOT USAF property.

People have forgotten but the original stealth and spy planes were never bought and built through the US armed forces but via the CIA. The same is true of the original MD500 that were heavily modified in what is today the "Little bird", those were Air America custom orders to much smaller workshops that would order from Hughes and then modify them.

Making custom works for let's say a dozen (maybe only 4) is far much easier to do in secret than trying to get Congress to fund an entire part of the air force.

>>640836

>they wouldn't have used the Blackhawk

I agree that the likelihood of this being a modified Blackhawk is practically nil. The Blackhawk's frame/monocoque is designed around that slick forward landing gear and its ability to wothstand an 11g crash landing. By the time you've figured out a way to convert that monocoque to retracing landing gear you might as well have started with a clean sheet design.

>And if the US did make a breakthrough in both (and we know they did due to cold war documentation on the subject) it stands to reason it's still secret up the ass.

The thing that keeps tripping me up is that everyone knows we have this thing and some (China, Russia) likely got to inspect it firsthand. You'd think the glow-in-the-darks would at least try to plant seeds of misdirection as to the actual details of the design that will appeal to foreign military observers. I guess the blatant proaganda piece that is the movie Zero Dark Thirty sort of counts (I distinctly remember the marketing for the movie focusing on how closely they worked with intel spooks in productjon for purposes of "realism") but absolutely no one in the Chinese/Russian/etc defense sector would find the helicopter design from the film to be anything close to believable. How hard is it to pull an Iran and roll out a fiberglass prop that looks like a bloated, stretched Comanchee with the same tailrotor design as the real thing? They'd have to actually be competent at making the prop unlike Iran and their civilian market GPS unit in place as a "glass cockpit" but no one would blink an eye if the windows were blacked out for "national security reasons".

The whole thing was bullshit, anon. Bin Laden was dead possibly even before the actual 9/11 attacks, certainly in the intervening decade. THEY literally saw a Hollywood script THEY liked as an Obama 2012 campaign ad and just declared it real.

>>641889

I doubt it. I'd say that bin Laden being alive the whole time and living comfortably in a different country than the one we invaded is pretty much what I expect of Western militaries.