With current force deployments, Russia could steamroll NATO forces in the Baltic states.

In the most optimistic scenario for NATO, Moscow would be able to conquer all the way to Estonia's capital Tallinn in the course of 60 hours, according to a new report from the think tank RAND Corp. 

The report, which attempted to answer the dual questions of what would happen should Russia invade the NATO-member Baltic states and what could be done to prevent such a scenario, paints an incredibly bleak picture of NATO's ability to defend its most exposed states. 

Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia are the three NATO nations most exposed to Russia. Situated between Russia, Russia's principle ally Belarus, the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad, and the Baltic Sea, the three nations — with the exception of a sliver of Lithuania — lack any shared borders with fellow NATO nations. 

This lack of a border, combined with the an ongoing drawdown of NATO forces relative to Russia's revanchist militarism, places the three nations at substantial risk from Russian adventurism.

The RAND report, between the summer of 2014 and the spring of 2015, simulated a series of war games with military and non-military experts in order to understand what would happen during a Russian invasion. 

As current NATO force structures stand in Europe, RAND found that the military organization "cannot successfully defend the territory of its most exposed members." In the best case scenarios for NATO, Russia was prevented from reaching the outskirts either the Latvian or Estonian capitals for 60 hours. 

In the more dire scenarios, Russian forces were able to make it to the capitals in only 36 hours. 

This report from RAND echoes similar concerns of current Chairman of the NATO Military Committee General Petr Pavel. On May 27, 2015 Pavel warned that Moscow would be able to conquer the three Baltic States within two days despite their NATO membership. Pavel believed this would be largely possible due to NATO's relatively slow-moving command structure. 

"On the one hand, one of [NATO's] disadvantages is its complex process of decision making. It is because NATO has 28 members who have to reach consensus on all conclusions," Pavel told Czech news site CTK. 

"From the technical point of view, if I consider how many forces Russia is able to deploy in the Baltics, the size of the Baltic countries, and the density of forces on their territories, the Baltics could really be occupied in a couple of days." 

Russia's ability to conquer the Baltics is due to both the Kremlin's ongoing push to modernize its military in addition to a general decline in NATO's ability to defend itself.

Whereas Russia has undertaken massive pushes to modernize its fleet, with the possible outcome of denying NATO access to the Baltic Sea, and update its air force to deny the US air superiority, NATO military spending has largely fallen. 

As Foreign Policy notes, the US Army has pulled two heavily armored divisions out of Germany and only maintains two in Europe at this point. And in 2015, only five NATO nations met the minimum defense spending limit that the organization urges its members to meet. 

However, RAND notes that simple steps would change the calculus to enough of a degree as to prevent Russia's conquest of the Baltics. By deploying about seven brigades in Europe, NATO could ensure that it would have enough firepower to at least dissuade a Russian offensive. 

Here is the full report:

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Russia has quietly but significantly increased its submarine presence throughout the North Atlantic, leading to a return of Cold War levels of tension. 

NATO Vice Admiral Clive Johnstone, speaking to IHS Jane's 360, said that Russian increase has once again made the North Atlantic a primary area "of concern" to the military alliance.

Additionally, the admiral warned that such levels of Russian activity are nearly unprecedented. 

There is now more reported "activity from Russian submarines than we've seen since the days of the Cold War," Johnstone told Jane's. 

And it is not just the number of Russian submarines in a previously uncontested area that has NATO concerned. Although Russia's navy suffered strongly after the fall of the USSR, Moscow's submarine forces continued to stay effective.

Playing to its strengths, the Kremlin has successfully continued to focus on its submarine forces through both an effort to modernize and professionalize that segment of the Navy. 

US Navy Rear Adm. Dave Johnson said, during a 2014 symposium at the Naval Submarine League, that he was so impressed by the new Russian nuclear guided missile submarine Severodvinsk that he had a model of the submarine built from unclassified data. 

“The rest of the world’s undersea capability never stands still,” Johnson said. 

Johnstone echoed these comments from Johnson to Jane's. Russia, in his view, has made "technology leaps that [are] remarkable, and credit to them."

This sudden Russian expansion is additionally deeply troubling to NATO due to a lack of knowledge about what Moscow's potential plans may be. This, coupled with Russia's perceived willingness to interfere in Ukraine and other neighboring states, has unnerved NATO members. 

"Just outside NATO’s territory we face major challenges that could have direct consequences for Norwegian and allied security,” Norwegian Defense Minister Ine Eriksen Soreide writes. Norway has increased military spending by 9.4% for 2016.

The US has also slated an increase in funds for submarines. Over the next five years, the Pentagon is hoping to have $13 billion for submarine research, development, and procurement.

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The military is full of stereotypes. Contemporary perceptions of the average soldier or veteran often focus too much on one characteristic or miss the mark entirely. Whether it’s interbranch conflict, marriage woes, or political viewpoints, there are very few all-encompassing tropes that fit all members of the military.

Here are six military stereotypes debunked.

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They love war.

World War II veteran-turned-President Dwight D. Eisenhower once said, “I hate war as only a soldier who has lived it can, only as one who has seen its brutality, its futility, its stupidity.” The stereotype of the hyper-masculine soldier is not an accurate depiction of most service members.

In fact, because they’ve seen combat firsthand, they are much less likely to suggest warfare as a primary means of resolving conflict. According to a report from the Daily Beast, “Civilian elites were more supportive of using military force, and for a wider range of scenarios, than were military elites.”

They joined the military as a last resort.

There are any number of reasons why a person joins the military. People often believe that someone joins only because her or she flunked out of high school. However, reasons can be as far reaching as love of country, to familial history, to educational incentives.

According to Blue Star Families 2014 survey, however, “The reason for joining the military reported by the highest percentage of respondents (96%) was to serve their country. Additionally, 74% of respondents said they joined to ‘improve their life circumstances.’”

Regardless of why people choose to join, they put themselves in harm’s way to protect American interests.

Related: Read about the four military stereotypes that Hollywood got right.

They can’t think for themselves.

It’s a common misconception that service members only know how to give and take orders — nothing else. Many people perceive veterans as drones with rigid, set functions.

However, they are often put into situations where they must think and respond quickly to unpredictable situations. The Business Journals, among various employment sites, cite the ability to think on their feet as major advantage when hiring veterans.

The iconic U-2 spy plane debuted in 1955, and it’s still deployable thanks to a meticulous inspection called the Programmed Depot Maintenance every 4,7000 flight hours.

This incredibly complex process requires technicians to disassemble and strip the paint off the entire plane to analyze every part and make repairs. Over 1,800 individual parts are removed and revised and 40,000 rivets inspected. After completion, the aircraft is reassembled and repainted before returning to the flight line.

For a plane that’s flown over the Soviet Union, Cuba, Korea and other places around the world since its secret introduction to the inventory, it has proven its worth. The Air Force keeps 33 of them on standby and plans to keep it flying until at least 2019.

This time lapse video from Sploid shows the entire process in under two minutes:

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In the 1950s and 60s the US Air Force tested flying rockets and ramjets powered by nuclear reactors.

Artist rendering of a modern ramjet missile, the X-51A Waverider. Graphic: US Air Force

If it weren’t for breakthroughs in chemical propulsion that occurred at about the same time, the nuclear missiles based throughout the US and Europe could well be nuclear warheads sitting atop nuclear reactors.

The idea of a nuclear-powered rocket engine actually dates back to World War II. But research didn’t begin until 1955 when teams at both Los Alamos and Livermore national laboratories were tasked with figuring out the basic engineering necessary for the project.

At its most basic level, rockets and ramjets work by superheating air and propelling it out the back of the engine. Conventional rockets and ramjets use chemical combustion to heat the air. The nuclear engines were designed to superheat the air using a heat exchanger hooked to a nuclear reactor.

The research into the rocket engines was dubbed “Project Rover,” and the ramjet research was dubbed “Project Pluto.”

Rover began tests in 1957, and a full-powered test in 1959 was a huge success. This led to an expansion of the program and the construction of new reactors, all of which underwent ground testing. The tests were largely successful, but extreme vibrations in some of the test engines caused a slowdown in progress through the 1960s.

Project Rover’s initial successes allowed NASA engineers to briefly consider nuclear power for the first manned missions to the Moon, but the vibration problems were not worked out in time. Rover’s engine then got the nod for a possible mission to Mars, but the mission was canceled. Without any immediate mission requirements, Rover was declared a technical success and shut down.

The nuclear rocket engine idea has been revived a few times since then, mostly when engineers start to seriously strategize manned missions to Mars. It was also briefly revived as a method of getting the Strategic Defense Initiative ballistic missile shield into orbit.

Project Pluto was even more successful from a technical standpoint. Each ramjet test reactor achieved every one of its major goals, and a number of the tests were declared flawless.

Like the Rover, all the tests were conducted on the ground. Also like Project Rover, Pluto was shut down in favor of chemical propulsion. America had found a way to strike the Soviet Union from across the world without having to fly nuclear reactors over their own land and troops.

Both concepts and their accompanying research are mothballed, waiting for a mission to potentially revive them.

SEE ALSO: Amazing time-lapse video shows a U-2 spy plane getting stripped down in 2 minutes

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Less than one percent of crimes are punished in Mexico, according to a new study that highlights the grave structural and institutional weaknesses that have allowed organized crime to flourish in the country.

According to the new Mexico Global Impunity Index (pdf) published by the Center for Impunity and Justice Studies (CESIJ) at Universidad de Las Américas, only 4.46 percent of crimes recorded in Mexico result in convictions.

However, the report adds, only around seven percent of crimes are actually reported, which when taken into account means that over 99 percent of crimes committed in Mexico go unpunished. The study found the most common reasons for not reporting crimes were the amount of time it takes and a lack of faith in the authorities.

The report also ranked other countries around the globe by assigning impunity scores based on various factors, from crime reporting rates to the capacities of security and justice institutions. Among the countries included in the report, Mexico ranked as the second worst for impunity after the Philippines and the worst in the Americas, with only Colombia coming close to Mexico's score.

The CESIJ blamed a combination of political failures and meddling, weak, underfunded and corrupt institutions as well as the presence of organized crime for Mexico's impunity woes.

InSight Crime Analysis

The CESIJ report highlights perhaps the biggest obstacle to improving security in Mexico — shocking levels of impunity. The reasons for this are varied and deep rooted, but can be traced back to state institutions that are overwhelmed and underfunded and often swing between corruption and incompetence.

Such weaknesses in security institutions mean many people consider reporting crimes to be a waste of time or even risky due to the possibility of reprisals. However, this is just the beginning of Mexico's impunity problems, which continue with a justice system that also lacks the capacity to properly investigate and prosecute crimes, meaning even those that are arrested will often not be convicted.

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When political meddling to either mask governmental failures or deflect attention from scandals is added to this, the result is a malfunctioning justice system in which people have very little faith.

The CESIJ report includes numerous recommendations for lowering impunity levels in Mexico, among them professionalizing institutions, improving transparency and inter-institution cooperation, and building truly politically independent justice institutions. While these are all salient points, improving Mexico's judicial and security systems will also require a budget, capacity and political will that Mexico has so far shown little sign of possessing.

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The US's new Ford class of aircraft carriers will feature many improvements on the current Nimitz class, like new Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System (EMALS) catapults instead of steam-powered ones.

Despite sounding a bit technical, these new catapults are extremely fun to test.

Catapults on aircraft carriers help aircraft accelerate to reach the required speed to achieve liftoff. Because of these catapults, US aircraft carriers can launch heavier, better-equipped planes than carriers of other nations.

The EMALS catapults, which the Pentagon spent $737 million to develop, offer quicker, smoother acceleration that allow the Navy to launch a wider range of aircraft. The new catapults aboard the Ford class represent a small change that will have big repercussions.

In the future, engineers will design new types of aircraft that previous aircraft carriers could not support. "You can now start to do things with aircraft design that you couldn’t do before," Program Executive Officer for Aircraft Carrier Rear Adm. Tom Moore told USNI News.

The Navy tests the catapults not with aircraft, but by launching unpowered cars that approximate the weight of aircraft. In the video below, see how the incredibly powerful catapult sends the car flying hundreds of feet after the launch.

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On February 26, amid the latest round of parliamentary elections, Iranians will vote to determine the composition of the Assembly of Experts.

Although this body is usually of marginal importance at best, it may have a significant role to play in the succession process during its next term, so this election bears watching.

What is the assembly of experts?

In practice, the assembly's sole remaining function is to appoint a new Supreme Leader when the current leader dies or is unable to carry out his duties, so the institution has been largely idle for almost three decades.

Yet the eighty-eight ayatollahs who win the next assembly election will occupy their seats for eight years, and given Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei's advanced age (77), most observers speculate that they will face the challenge of appointing his successor.

This prospect makes the upcoming vote more meaningful than normal, not only for various factions within the regime, but also for citizens who are traditionally much less enthusiastic about assembly elections than presidential, parliamentary, and municipal elections.

Who are the assembly of members?

While the constitution is silent about the qualifications of assembly members, the body itself decided years ago to exclude non-ayatollahs (Article 108 of the constitution allows the assembly to set its own regulations, a right not granted to any other government body).

Each member must be a mujtahid -- that is, a Shiite jurist who has studied enough to gain the right of ijtehad, the intellectual ability to interpret religious texts and have his own opinion on Islamic law (sharia).

Each candidate must possess a reputation for adherence to religion and morality, sound political and social views, strong belief in the Islamic Republic of Iran, and a clean criminal record -- all of these qualifications were established by the second assembly (1984-1991).

The crucial condition is ijtehad. Because the regime owes its legitimacy to the ruling ayatollah and regards its ultimate duty as implementing sharia, it has loaded ijtehad with unprecedented political meaning and functions. Despite the Supreme Leader's extensive personal control in Iran, the Shiite clerical authority is not formally centralized like the Catholic papacy, so the government could not afford neutrality toward the theological and juridical qualifications of those who might want to take government positions or otherwise influence the decision making process and public opinion.

Therefore, the Guardian Council -- a much smaller twelve-seat body whose members are appointed directly or indirectly by the Supreme Leader and wield wide-ranging powers -- has been given responsibility for monitoring the religious qualifications of parliamentary and Experts Assembly candidates (see PolicyWatch 2548, "Iran's Parliamentary Elections: Inside the Candidate Approval Process").

This means that individuals who wish to play a role in government using their religious credentials need to meet the criteria of regime authorities, even if they are well known as mujtahids by the clerical establishment.

The converse is true as well -- if the regime wants to let a cleric occupy a position that is exclusively designated for an ayatollah, it will not hesitate to use political considerations and "regime interests" to justify declaring that candidate as an ayatollah even if he lacks the necessary religious credentials and educational background for that title. Even Khamenei himself was not called an ayatollah until just after he was appointed as Ruhollah Khomeini's successor.

This deep regime intervention has weakened the clerical establishment's authority and distorted the educational system and hierarchy. It has also fabricated a new class of ayatollahs who have little social influence but made their way up the ladder through state media propaganda, other government resources, and politicking. Traditionally, ayatollahs were clerics who were broadly revered in the locales where they resided.

Even if they decided to collaborate with the government, they did not owe their authority to the state -- they acted as autonomous social and religious authorities. Yet regime interference has transformed this hierarchy and diluted the Experts Assembly, whose formal constitutional authority to supervise the Supreme Leader has been wiped away in practice.

This is especially true since Khamenei came to power in 1989. He has marginalized any well-established ayatollahs who might question his religious credentials, instead promoting low-ranking clerics whose political power and financial gains depend on him and the regime apparatus.

When such clerics inevitably win seats on the Experts Assembly, they have no significant social power base or intrinsic clerical credentials, so they tend to avoid making any decisions that would harm the interests of regime stakeholders or infringe on Khamenei's authority. By tasking the Guardian Council with persistently verifying each candidate's loyalty to him, Khamenei has made the assembly a ceremonial institution that passively supports all of his positions and lends him unconditional legitimacy.

Given this decades-long dilution, the assembly is hardly in a position to autonomously determine who the next Supreme Leader will be. For the upcoming election, the Guardian Council has approved only 166 out of 801 candidates.

The overall field is so small that 9 candidates will face no competition for their seats, and the majority will have a 50 percent chance of victory. Iranian "moderates" had hoped to use their recent diplomatic success (e.g., the nuclear deal) to force the Guardian Council to approve their candidates, but they are now in despair. The candidacy of Hasan Khomeini, grandson of the Islamic Republic's founder, was emblematic of their desire to change the equation in the assembly and influence the succession process, but his disqualification demonstrated the hardliners' determination to maintain their monopoly over all such decisionmaking.

Succession process with no pattern

Although the Islamic Republic has a clear legal procedure for designating the Supreme Leader, it has never been followed. Khomeini was a charismatic revolutionary leader who took the office naturally without any institutional decision. And after Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri was formally appointed as his successor, Khomeini had a bitter dispute with him and nullified the appointment only two months before dying in 1989 -- a decision that only the Experts Assembly was permitted to make under the constitution.

Ayatollah Khamenei was appointed on equally shaky grounds. The assembly first named him as successor at a time when the constitution mandated that the Supreme Leader must be a marja -- that is, a grand ayatollah who had a considerable number of religious followers and was considered a "source of emulation." Khamenei did not meet that criterion, so the assembly had to reappoint him three months later, after the marja requirement was removed from the constitution and the amended charter was approved by a supervisory council and a national referendum.

What to expect from the next succession

In his published diary from 1989, prominent regime figure Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani noted that the heads of the government's three branches were holding regular private meeting with Ahmad Khomeini -- the Supreme Leader's son and a major political player -- to discuss succession several months prior to his death.

In contrast, the Experts Assembly appointed Khamenei in a single session lasting only a few hours, suggesting that the decision had already been deliberated outside the assembly for some time by a handful of regime elders.

Today, the appointment process will likely be even more complicated. In 1989, a combination of factors -- including Khomeini's charismatic leadership, the eight-year war with Iraq, and the domestic operations of militant opposition groups -- helped to nourish a certain ideological zeal among Iran's various power centers, sideline divisive factors such as economic motivations and egoism, and maintain civilian political authority.

Despite the regime's heavy involvement in Iran's military confrontations with domestic and foreign enemies, political decisions were made by civilians, and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) was totally subordinated to civilian power circles. Moreover, several grand ayatollahs such as Abu al-Qasem Khoi, Mohammad Reza Golpayegani, and Shahab al-Din Marashi Najafi were still alive, and the clergy enjoyed a relative independence inherited from the pre-revolution era.

The political map has changed entirely since then, however. The IRGC is now a military, political, cultural, and social complex with a nationwide network parallel to the religious network -- for example, next to nearly every mosque is a base for the IRGC's Basij militia. The Guards also hold direct or indirect control over a significant portion of Iran's economy. Although they have managed to remain outwardly united under Khamenei's leadership, their broad reach has spawned different factions with sometimes incompatible interests. When Khamenei dies, the IRGC will use all means possible to shape the appointment of his successor, but factional politics could lead to conflict within the organization.

If the IRGC maintains its unity after Khamenei and swiftly solidifies its internal leadership, the transition to the new Supreme Leader is more likely to be smooth. Yet a crippling crisis within the Corps might jeopardize the stability of the entire political system.

Aside from the IRGC, few other power centers will be able to weigh in on the succession decision. The giant political figures, ideologues, strategists, and other leaders who mobilized people during the Islamic Republic's first decade have since been marginalized. Dozens of new political institutions have been created under Khamenei, many of them with parallel functions, so their overall role has been undermined -- the Supreme Leader broke the big stone into a thousand pieces so that he could more easily control certain institutions while tolerating potential opposition from others.

Any powerful individuals or circles who seek to influence the succession process may therefore be out of luck, since they lack the informal means of heavily swaying the decision on their own and have also been excluded from the formal means (i.e., the Experts Assembly).

As for who will become the next Supreme Leader, speculation is risky at this point. One of Khamenei's sons, Mojtaba, is rumored to be a potential candidate, but he lacks the religious and political credentials. He has been reluctant to appear in public, and his reputation among most Iranians is shaped by his notorious association with the Basij and the intelligence services. Furthermore, the regime's revolutionary and antimonarchial nature has little stomach for hereditary succession.

Any other names are also sheer speculation. What matters more than the identity or personality of the next Supreme Leader is that he will enter office at the choosing of powerful forces, so he will likely owe the IRGC, the intelligence services, and the judiciary more than they owe him. In other words, Khamenei's institutional children will be next leader's institutional elder brothers, protecting him and perhaps controlling him as well.

Mehdi Khalaji, a Qom-trained Shiite theologian, is the Libitzky Family Fellow at The Washington Institute.

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The US military's fifth-generation fighter is no stranger to controversy. 

Lockheed Martin's F-35, which comes with an estimated $1.5 trillion price tag over the life of the program, has faced numerous hurdles and delays.

Despite the setbacks, the F-35 program is ongoing and the Navy, Marines, and Air Force are testing their version of the aircraft.

Here are some of the key problems facing the F-35.  

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Software delays

The Pentagon discovered deficiencies in the plane's Block 2B software system. Block 2B oversees the plane's initial warfare capabilities, like its various data links and live-weapon firing system.

The worst deficiencies were found in the Block 2B's navigation and accuracy software aspects. These software problems slowed weapons integration and flight-testing, and with it the entire aircraft's development.

Block 2B also encountered issues with weapon delivery accuracy. The software still had trouble in the use of radar, passive sensors, friend-or-foe identification, and electro-optical targeting.

The 2BS5 software package, which deals with sensors, also continues to run into difficulties. According to the report, "fusion of information from own-ship sensors, as well as fusion of information from off-board sensors is still deficient.

The Distributed Aperture System continues to exhibit high false-alarm rates and false target tracks, and poor stability performance, even in later versions of software."

Most recently, the F-35 program is expected to miss a deadline for releasing the Block 3F software upgrade. Missing the deadline will likely mean that the F-35 won't be ready for its July 2017 deadline.

In short, if the code fails, the F-35 fails.

F-35B fuel tank redesign

The F-35B was given a redesigned fuel tank ullage inerting system for the fuel systems simulator – in English, this is the part of the plane that prevents potentially explosive interactions of oxygen and gasses in the aicraft's fuel tanks and intake.

Further tests showed that the redesigned system had problems in aircraft integration that would require further hardware and software modifications. 

Russia has been steadily modernizing its military in an effort to offset years of military collapse following the end of the Cold War. 

And, while the majority of the modernization is fairly standard, one particular instance of the Kremlin's push is indeed concerning. 

Desiring to close the gap between itself and NATO, Russia has elevated the use of nonstrategic nuclear weapons in its military strategy. 

This elevation, "risks lowering the nuclear threshold," Brookings Institution senior fellow Steven Pifer writes for The National Interest. 

"And once a nuclear weapon—any nuclear weapon—is used, the possibility of catastrophic escalation would increase dramatically," Pifer continues. 

Pifer notes that the core concern is Russia's development of low yield nuclear weapons. These weapons are key to Moscow's developing strategy of "de-escalation." The strategy, in short, states that Russia would respond to any conventional war which challenges its statehood with some number of limited and strategic nuclear strikes. 

According to The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, de-escalation was first formulated in Russia as a response to the conventional military power that the US displayed during its campaigns against the Serbs in Kosovo.

And, although the threat of Russia's de-escalation strategy is defensive, "such a threat also must be credible. To that end, all large-scale military exercises that Russia conducted beginning in 2000 featured simulations of limited nuclear strikes," The Bulletin writes. 

The doctrine only applies to other nuclear armed nations, especially as it was formulated in response to the US's overwhelming conventional military strength.

The broader problem with de-escalation and the lowering of the nuclear threshold, however, is the relative gray area in which such weapons may be used and what Russia sees as an existential threat to its statehood. 

As Pifer notes, the combination of Russia's de-escalation doctrine, the modernization of low yield nuclear weapons, and Putin's myriad references to potential use of nuclear forces indicates that Russia "could envisage use of those weapons in wider circumstances."

SEE ALSO: If Russia started a war in the Baltics, NATO would lose in 36 hours

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During Desert Storm the 3rd Battalion, 27th Field Artillery Regiment provided artillery support to the 24th Infantry Division throughout the invasion of Iraq.

During one phase of the war they took out 41 Iraqi battalions, two air defense sites, and a tank company in less than 72 hours.

The 3-27 entered Desert Storm with a new weapon that had never seen combat, the Multiple Launch Rocket System. Nearby soldiers took notice, to put it mildly, as the rockets screamed past the sound barrier on their way out of the launcher and then roared away from the firing point.

A first sergeant from the 3-27 told The Fayetteville Observer that the first launch created panic in the American camp. Soldiers who had never seen an MLRS dived into cover and tried to dig hasty foxholes.

“It scared the pure hell out of everybody,” Sgt. Maj. Jon H. Cone said. But the Americans quickly came to love the MLRS.

“After that first time, it was showtime,” Cone said.

Like everyone else during the invasion, the 24th Infantry Division wanted to push deeper and seize more territory than anyone else. That meant their artillery support would be racing across the sand as well. The 3-27 came through and actually spent a lot of time running ahead of the maneuver units, looking for enemy artillery and quickly engaging when any showed.

During a particularly daring move, the battalion’s Alpha battery moved through enemy lines and conducted a raid from inside enemy territory, engaging artillery and infantry while other U.S. forces advanced.

The largest single attack by the 3-27 was the assault on Objective Orange, two Iraqi airfields that sat right next to each other. The 3-27 and other artillery units were assigned to destroy the Iraqi Army’s 2,000 soldiers, ten tanks, and two artillery battalions at the airfield so the infantry could assault it more easily.

The launchers timed their rockets to all reach the objective within seconds of each other, and used rockets that would drop bomblets on the unsuspecting Iraqi troops.

A prisoner of war who survived the assault later told U.S. forces that the Iraqis were manning their guns when the rockets came in. When the rockets began exploding in mid-air, they cheered in the belief that the attack had failed. Instead, the bomblets formed a “steel rain” that killed most troops in the area and destroyed all exposed equipment.

By the time the infantry got to the airfields, the survivors were ready to surrender.

The battalion was awarded a Valorous Unit Citation after the war for extreme bravery under fire.

H/T to The Fayetteville Observer's Drew Brooks and to "Steel Rain" by Staff Sgt. Charles W. Bissett.

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BEIRUT (Reuters) - Tens of thousands of Syrians fled an intensifying Russian assault around Aleppo on Friday, and aid workers said they feared the city which once held two million people could soon fall under a full government siege.

Iran reported one of its generals was killed on the front line assisting government forces, direct confirmation of the role Tehran is playing along with Moscow in what appears to be one of the most ambitious offensives in five years of civil war.

The government assault around Aleppo, and advances in the south of the country, helped to torpedo peace talks this week in Geneva. President Bashar al-Assad's forces and their allies are making a new bid to achieve victory on the battlefield after Russia's intervention ended months of stalemate.

The last 24 hours saw government troops and their Lebanese and Iranian allies fully encircle the countryside north of Aleppo and cut off the main supply route linking the city - Syria's largest before the war - to Turkey. Ankara said it suspected the aim was to starve the population into submission.

Aleppo would be the biggest strategic prize in years for Assad's government in a conflict that has killed at least 250,000 people and driven 11 million from their homes.

Video footage showed thousands of people, mostly women, children and the elderly, massing at the Bab al-Salam border crossing. Men carried luggage on top of their heads, and the elderly and those unable to walk were brought in wheelchairs. Some women sat on the side of the road holding babies and awaited to be allowed into Turkey.

"It feels like a siege of Aleppo is about to begin," said David Evans, Middle East programme director for the U.S. aid agency Mercy Corps, which said the most direct humanitarian route to Aleppo had been severed.

The leader of a prominent rebel group active in northwestern Syria confirmed that government-allied forces were tightening their grip on the northern Aleppo countryside, and that heavy Russian bombing carried on unabated.

Non-Stop Russian Airstrikes

"The Russian (air) cover continues night and day, there were more than 250 air strikes on this area in one day," Hassan Haj Ali, head of Liwa Suqour al-Jabal, a group that fights under the umbrella of the Free Syrian Army, told Reuters.

"The regime is now trying to expand the area it has taken control of ... Now the northern countryside (of Aleppo) is totally encircled, and the humanitarian situation is very difficult," he said.

Syrian state TV and a monitoring group said the army and its allies had seized the town of Ratyan north of Aleppo, building on gains made earlier in the week. Haj Ali said the town had not yet fallen, but that there were "very heavy battles".

The Syrian army and its allies broke a three-year rebel siege of two Shi'ite towns in Aleppo province on Wednesday, cutting off a major supply line from Turkey to Aleppo.

Aleppo, Syria's commercial hub, has been divided for years between a section under government control and areas that are in the grip of rebels. Much of Aleppo, including a UNESCO heritage old city, is largely in ruins.

Haj Ali said most of the fighters on the government side were "Iranian and from Hezbollah, or Afghan".

Iran's semi-official Tasnim news agency said Revolutionary Guard Corps Brigadier-General Mohsen Ghajarian has been killed in Aleppo province, as had six Iranian volunteer militiamen.

The five-year civil war pits a government led by Assad, a member of the Alawite sect derived from Shi'ite Islam, against a range of insurgents who are mainly Sunni Muslims, backed by Saudi Arabia, other Arab states and Turkey. Western countries have also lined up in opposition to Assad.

The Syrian Army Is Gaining In The South

Since 2014, the Sunni jihadist group Islamic State has run a self-proclaimed caliphate in eastern Syria and Iraq, under air assault from a U.S.-led coalition. Russia launched its own separate air campaign four months ago to aid its ally Assad, transforming the battlefield and tipping momentum his way.

But swathes of the country are still in the hands of armed rebels, including Islamic State in the east, Kurdish militia in the north, and a mosaic of groups in the west who have been the target of many of the Russian air strikes.

In addition to the advance in the north near Aleppo, Syria's government forces and allies made further gains in the southern province of Deraa, recapturing a town right outside Deraa city.

That advance could provide a more direct supply line for the army from Damascus and allow it to assert control over most parts of the city.

It has been backed by some of the heaviest Russian air strikes since it began its bombing campaign in September, a rebel spokesman in the area said.

Peace talks convened this week in Geneva were the first diplomatic attempt to end the war in two years but collapsed before they began in earnest. The opposition refused to negotiate while Russia was escalating its bombing and government troops were advancing.

NATO said Moscow's intensified bombing campaign undermined the peace efforts and warned Russia was creating tensions by violating the air space of Syria's neighbour Turkey, a NATO member which shot down a Russian warplane in November.

Russia has accused Turkey of preparing a military incursion into northern Syria. Ankara dismissed this as propaganda intended to conceal Russia's own "crimes". Aleppo was threatened with a "siege of starvation", and Turkey had the right to take any measures to protect its security, it said.

The Strikes Undermine The Peace Process

Moscow says its targets in Syria are restricted to Islamic State and al Qaeda's Syrian branch, the Nusra Front, both of which were excluded from peace talks and officially anathema to the countries supporting the insurgents against Assad.

"Why did the opposition that left Geneva complain about the offensive in Aleppo, which is actually targeted against Jabhat al-Nusra (Nusra Front) and other radical extremist groups?" said Russia's ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva, Alexey Borodavkin.

"Jabhat al-Nusra is a terrorist organisation recognised by the U.N. Security Council. It’s a branch of al Qaeda. The opposition should be happy that terrorists are defeated. But, on the contrary, they were disappointed and left negotiations."

That position is rejected by Western and Arab countries, which say most Russian strikes are against other opponents of Assad, not the banned groups.

"The intense Russia air strikes, mainly targeting opposition groups in Syria, is undermining the efforts to find a political solution to the conflict," said NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg.

Russian violations of Turkish air space were "causing increased tensions and ... create risks", he added.

Saudi Arabia, meanwhile, said it was ready to participate in separate U.S. ground operations against Islamic State. The United States welcomed the Saudi offer, although Washington so far has committed only to small scale operations by special forces units on the ground in Syria.

(Additional reporting by Suleiman Al-Khalidi in Amman, Humeyra Pamuk in Istanbul, Parisa Hafezi in Ankara and Tom Miles in Geneva, writing by John Davison and Peter Graff, editing by Peter Millership)

SEE ALSO: ‘Losing ground by the minute’: Syrian rebels are losing Aleppo — and perhaps also the war

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Vladimir Putin thinks Russian air strikes in Syria have helped turn the war's tide but the pace of the Syrian army's advance has frustrated him, some sources say.

If Aleppo falls, he could get the military and symbolic prize he has been craving.

More than four months of Russian air strikes have stabilized the government of President Bashar al-Assad, the Kremlin's closest Middle East ally, helping his forces find momentum on the battlefield.

But the names and strategic significance of the towns and villages they have recaptured have failed to electrify a Russian public more worried about falling living standards.

Nor has the Syrian army - backed by Russian air power - yet delivered a major victory that Russia can sell to the wider world as proof of its military might and growing Middle East clout.

"There has been some frustration with the Syrian army's performance," one source close to the Russian military, who declined to be identified, told Reuters. "Particularly in the beginning they were making slow progress."

Retaking full control of Aleppo, Syria's biggest city before the five-year war, would change the narrative, say diplomats and analysts, bringing Putin a step closer to his preferred end-game which envisages a Russia-friendly Syrian government that allows Moscow to keep its naval and air base there.

"So far we've heard reports of government forces gaining ground here and there and there have been a few notable successes," Dmitry Trenin, a former colonel in the Russian army and director of the Carnegie Moscow Center, told Reuters.

"But all those successes were rather tactical and not particularly spectacular," said Trenin. "Should Aleppo be placed under full control of Damascus that would be a big psychological boost for Assad and a source of satisfaction for the Kremlin."

Aleppo has been divided for years, with government forces controlling a section and other parts in the hands of rebels.

Tens of thousands of Syrians fled intensifying Russian bombardment around Aleppo on Friday, and aid workers said they feared the city, which once held two million people, could soon fall under complete government siege.

Government troops and their Lebanese and Iranian allies fully encircled the countryside north ofAleppo and cut off the main supply route linking the city to Turkey in the last 24 hours. Ankara said it suspected the aim was to starve the population into submission.

As the Kremlin's impatience for a breakthrough has grown, it has bolstered its forces in Syria. Mostly recently, local media reported it had dispatched its most advanced military jet -- the Sukhoi-35s -- to join its strike force of around 40 fast jets.

It has also intensified its strike rate.

'Useful distraction'

A victory in Aleppo could help lift morale at home where an economic crisis is eroding living standards and real incomes are falling for the first time in Putin's 15 years in power.

Boosted and protected by a loyal state media, a tightly-controlled political system and a dearth of meaningful opposition, Putin's approval rating remains over 80 percent according to opinion polls.

But with tentative signs of social discontent bubbling up -- foreign currency mortgages holders, truckers and pensioners have all protested in recent months -- a headline-grabbing Russia-assisted victory in Syria could cheer downcast voters.

"It would be a useful distraction and a show for people," said Stepan Goncharov, of independent pollster, the Levada Center, saying state media had in the past used Syria to stoke anti-Western feeling and to reinforce the idea that Russia is again a great power.

"Their trick is to remove themes that stir social anxiety and replace them with ones that unite," said Goncharov. "A military victory (in Aleppo) would be a great power moment, a symbol of military might, and would be used to increase support for the authorities."

He said the last time Levada asked, in October, they found that 72 percent of Russians had a broadly positive opinion of Russian air strikes in Syria, but that the subject had since taken a back seat to stories about the economy and what the Kremlin was doing to navigate the economic crisis.

There were some signs support for the authorities was slipping a little because of the downturn, he added.

Carnegie's Trenin said Russians, despite the Kremlin's flashy media campaign, were not actually that interested in the Syria conflict and with memories of the Soviet debacle in Afghanistan still lingering wanted the Kremlin to limit its involvement there.

"For most people this is a war in a distant country," said Trenin, saying voters remained nervous about any suggestion that ground forces might be sent. So far, the official Russian military body count has been just four, three of whom were killed in combat.

However, Islamic State claimed it blew up a Russian passenger plane over Egypt in October, killing all 224 people onboard, in revenge for Russia's Syria campaign.

For Putin, says Trenin, Syria is important but part of a wider play.

"The ultimate goal of Mr Putin is to restore Russia to great power status," he said. "Syria is part of that. But it's also about wider Russian foreign policy and about Putin's own legacy. Syria is the place where this is being decided."

SEE ALSO: 'Weakest position in Syria in years': Russia and Assad may have just delivered a decisive blow to Turkey

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Battlefield realities rather than great power politics will determine the ultimate terms of a settlement to end the Syrian Civil War.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his allies in Russia and Iran have internalized this basic principle even as Washington and other Western capitals pinned their hopes upon UN-sponsored Geneva Talks, which faltered only two days after they began on February 1, 2016.

Russian airpower and Iranian manpower have brought President Assad within five miles of completing the encirclement of Aleppo City, the largest urban center in Syria and an opposition stronghold since 2012.

The current campaign has already surpassed the high-water mark set by the regime’s previous failed attempt to besiege Aleppo City in early 2015.

The full encirclement of Aleppo City would fuel a humanitarian catastrophe, shatter opposition morale, fundamentally challenge Turkish strategic ambitions, and deny the opposition its most valuable bargaining chip before the international community.

The campaign against Aleppo City began in October 2015 and proceeded in several phases. Regime forces enabled by Russia and Iran initially mounted probing attacks along multiple fronts in Aleppo and Idlib Provinces as part of a larger campaign designed to confuse and overextend the opposition.

They conducted shaping operations in the southern, eastern, and northern countryside of Aleppo City in order to draw opposition forces out of urban terrain, relieve long-besieged pockets of regime forces, and set conditions for a future decisive operation to besiege the city, as ISW warned on December 30, 2015.

They also secured core regime terrain along the Syrian Coast against further opposition attacks through a series of rapid offensives in Latakia Province. These gains marked a fundamental shift in battlefield momentum following dramatic losses experienced by the regime in the first half of 2015.

President Assad has used unconventional shaping operations to complement these ground offensives and further strengthen his bargaining position. The regime intensified its campaign of sieges and aerial bombardment against opposition-held pockets in Homs and Damascus Provinces in order to impose one-sided local ceasefires that would allow it to consolidate control in these two vital cities.

These operations in some cases included the use of chlorine gas and other unidentified chemical weapons in violation of international prohibitions. The regime also escalated a campaign of targeted assassinations against key opposition commanders - most notably the Saudi-backed Damascus powerbroker Zahran Alloush - in order to weaken the political influence of its opponents.

These gains strengthen the hand held by President Assad at the negotiating table and incentivize further violence among all sides in an attempt to secure additional concessions during an eventual settlement. The mounting pressure will tend to drive the opposition towards militarily reliable but politically irreconcilable Salafi-jihadist groups such as Syrian al-Qaeda affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra.

Conditions on the ground remain unsuitable for the achievement of any meaningful peace in Syria.

SEE ALSO: Russia just helped the Assad regime accomplish 'in a few days what it had failed to do over 3 years'

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NOW WATCH: Russia's military is more advanced than people thought

Few pilots can claim to be as talented as the acrobatic aces flying in the US Blue Angels and UK Red Arrows display teams. 

Both teams perform choreographed and synchronized displays at incredible break-neck speeds. The teams update their performances every year, according to How It Works Annual Volume 6, and the displays can last up to 30 minutes. 

Although the individual skills and stunts of each pilot is admirable, what sets the pilots of the Blue Angels and Red Arrows apart is their ability to work as a synchronized team.

The teams, consisting of 6 and 9 planes respectively, must be able to effectively fly and perform tricks while maintain perfect distance from their fellow pilots. How It Works notes that aircraft during the displays can fly as close as six feet from each other.

Below are some of the teams' most amazing tricks explained.

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Vixen Break

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Source: YouTube

Rollbacks

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 Source: YouTube

Iconic action characters can always be identified by their weapon of choice. 

Who would James Bond be without his silenced pistol, or Han Solo without his worn-out blaster? Helping us remember the familiar, art director Federico Mauro has created renderings of some of the most amazing and recognizable weapons from movies on a clean background. 

From indie hits like "Army of Darkness" to blockbusters like "Men In Black," Mauro has created impressive visuals that remind us of our favorite films. 

The following photos are republished with permission from Federico Mauro.

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Jack Sparrow's pistol from "Pirates of the Caribbean"

Bonnie and Clyde's pistols from "Bonnie and Clyde"

James Bond's silenced pistol from the "007" movies

There's been no shortage of major stories to break this week. 

From China's president amassing unseen levels of power since Mao to the Syrian government's ongoing Russia-backed offensive, the news has kept on coming. 

With that in mind, we've put together some of this week's most important stories that you may have missed:

• A Chinese defector who went missing in California after his brother's arrest in China revealed some closely guarded secrets of the Chinese military. 
• Based off of the FBI's tracking of violent crimes, Business Insider assembled a list of the most violent city in each state. 
• The Pentagon unveiled some of the weapons and research it wants to pursue with its upcoming 2017 budget. 
• The DEA broke down which powerful Mexican cartels are operating throughout the US. 
• The F-35, the most expensive weapons program in history, is expected to miss a key deadline.

• The Assad regime, with significant Russian backing, is poised to accomplish a potentially devastating blow against the rebels.

• Russia said there are numerous signs that Turkey could be preparing to enter Syria too.
• According to a defense think tank, Russia could force NATO out of the Baltics in 36 hours.

• The US is preparing to sell Saudi Arabia $1 billion worth of arms. 
• Iraq's economy could be on the verge of falling off of a fiscal cliff with dire results.
• Hundreds of thousands of Chinese are waiting in and around mass transit stations to get home in time for Chinese New Year. 
• Stratfor released their chilling predictions for the next decade. 
• South Korean special forces go through this insane knife training to prepare for duty.

SEE ALSO: The world in photos this week

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Raw combat footage from Paktika Province, Afghanistan shows a US Army mortar team getting a 500 pound bomb dropped on their position from their own airstrike.

The video was posted by Funker530, an online veterans community and combat footage archive.

"After spotting Taliban forces on a distant ridge line, U.S. Army mortar teams engage with 60mm mortars. A simultaneous airstrike is called in which accidentally drops a 500 pound bomb on a US Army infantry outpost, mistaking the position for Taliban fighters," Funker wrote in the video's description.

Filmed by a soldier with a helmet mounted camera, the first words heard in the video come in over the radio, as a voice confirms an strike coming in 30 seconds. However, just 10 seconds later a hard blast knocks the cameraman off his feet.

The bomb had struck the hillside just beyond the infantry post. Wasting no time, the soldier collected himself and made a quick pass around the post to make sure no one was injured.

From the upper level of the post, the soldier spots the damage done, and helps his fellow soldier down to make an assessment.

Then, the video cuts to another angle showing the bomb blast from the bottom of the hill. There is a clear sense of panic after the explosion. "That was the bird that dropped that" one of the men remarks incredulously, referring to either a US or NATO plane responsible for dropping the bomb.

Fortunately, not a single injury or death resulted from this grave mistake. The caution of a First Sergeant in the company may have averted a true disaster.

"If it wasn't for the decision of our First Sergeant, three of our guys would have died in that wooden building which was shredded by shrapnel," Funker350 quotes a witness to the bombing as saying.

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NOW WATCH: Russia's military is more advanced than people thought

Ahead of the February 9 presentation of the Pentagon's $583 billion budget for 2017, US Secretary of Defense Ash Carter highlighted a few new weapons the US wants to add to its arsenal.

Carter said that the Pentagon would request $71.4 billion for 2017 that will be used for research and development spending.

It will focus on a few key areas, Patrick Tucker of Defense One writes.

First, Carter unveiled that the Pentagon will continue to sink resources into the development of "swarming, autonomous vehicles."

These vehicles will be able to perform highly calculated and synchronized movements by land, air, and sea. Ideally, such swarms would be highly effective for collecting data and coordinating defense movements.

Carter said:

For the air, they've developed micro-drones that are really fast, and really resilient — they can fly through heavy winds and be kicked out the back of a fighter jet moving at Mach 0.9 ... And for the water, they've developed self-driving boats, which can network together to do all sorts of missions, from fleet defense to close-in surveillance — including around an island, real or artificial, without putting our sailors at risk.

Second, Carter would like to see the US Navy's rail gun system continue to receive funding.

The rail gun uses electromagnetic forces to power projectiles, which can manage to reach ranges of up to 100 nautical miles. That range is about the same for a cruise missile, but a cruise missile can cost the Navy around $1 million while a rail gun projectile can be as cheap as $25,000.

Depending upon the success of the rail gun, Carter would like to miniaturize and expand the program, placing "five-inch [rail guns] at the front of every Navy destroyer, and also the hundreds of Army Paladin self-propelled howitzers."

Carter is also envisioning the creation of an "arsenal plane." The arsenal plane concept, according to Military.com, "would take an existing 'large platform' aircraft, such as a B-52, stock it with a variety of munitions, and have it led into battle by an F-35 Joint Strike Fighter to provide targeting."

Carter notes that such an arsenal plane will essentially function as a "very large airborne magazine, networked to 5th-generation aircraft that act as forward sensor and targeting nodes — essentially combining different systems already in our inventory to create wholly new capabilities."

This combination of legacy and more cutting-edge elements may also become a recurring theme at the Pentagon.

Included in the new budget for 2017 is the aging but still highly effective A-10 "Warthog." The Warthog, which the US Air Force has been attempting to retire, will find continued used under Carter's proposed five-year military budget until 2022.

"The budget defers the A-10's final retirement until 2022, replacing it with F-35s on a squadron-by-squadron basis so we'll always have enough aircraft for today's conflicts," Carter said.

The decision to postpone the A-10's retirement was because of the aircraft's "devastating" role in attacks against ISIS, Carter noted.

Finally, Carter also noted that the Pentagon will continue to dedicate significant resources to the development of cyber abilities.

In 2017, Carter has earmarked $7 billion for cyber, with $35 billion set aside for the next five years.

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