Invasion of Grenada

Grenadians had a few BTRs that gave US forces trouble early on in the invasion. 82nd was equipped with M47s as a precaution.

>m16s and woodlands camo
Fuck that’s æsthetic

ikr

Only other conflict we get with that is Panama.

Weirdest thing about it is that Grenada now celebrates the day the US invaded as a Thanksgiving because they freed the political prisoners, but still fought the people to do so

...

Majority of Grenadians didn't really care for the Communist government, especially after the previous Prime Minister, Maurice Bishop (who ironically was a Communist himself) was executed.

>US intervention is still a public holiday in Grenada

my ex-gf was from Grenada, she said its all propaganda, most people there resent the US but are too cowardly to say anything about it. She used to say Cuba were good and helping Grenada with medicine and trade and construction and that Reagan sperged out because he was worried about the US students on the island becoming hostages of the Cubans

Fortified positions, user.

>What was the world reaction when this happened?

Theres country called grenade?

>What was the world reaction when this happened?
Well Wikipedia is your friend.

>The more I read about this invasion, the weirder and more random it comes across as.
Well then either you are reading some shitty sources or you don't understand politics.

>I understand the motives for the US Invasion
If that was true then why would you call it weird and random?

>but does anyone else find it weird that the world's most powerful nation would invade and openly bully an island of 90,000 that had an army that was a glorified police brigade?
Wut? You claim you understand but then you say this... A guy with ambitions leads a military wing of a political party to overthrow the current dictator of a small country in your backyard. Killing and arresting several of the leaders. Causing disorder which can and will be exploited by your main opponents (The Russians and the Cubans).

>Its like a prize fighter picking on a weak teenager and beating him up
No it's not it's simply politics. Countries have political goals and they have several tools to achieve those political goals. One of those goals is to stop the spread of hostile influences in your neighbouring area and keeping it stable so it doesn't become a hotbed of illegal activities, military activities or otherwise. One of the tools they have at their disposal is diplomacy. Diplomacy works great if there is a compromise to be had but when you're facing an ideological enemy you can't exactly compromise. So then the other political tool is force. Often some sort of diplomatic or economic pressure but sometimes the armed forces are used.
(To be Continued.)

(Continuation.)
Your analogy tells me you really don't understand politics at all and you should probably read and reflect a bit on the subject. I mean international relations isn't an honorable fight with victory conditions and the defeated guy gets saved by the bell and goes home to Ireland with a shittonne of cash to fight another day. It's a no holds barred fight to the death and the rest of the world are simply cheering you on. The countries that can defend themselves stave of death a bit longer the countries that can't or refuse to defend themselves get defeated and defeat often means bad things (For examples look at the occupied countries under the USSR or Third Reich).

Also remember this world we live in is constantly changing and nothing is set in stone. People think that the US is this great Empire that for some inexplicable reason can never fall and will always be the dominant power in the world. But history teaches us that no empire is eternal and there is no rule that says that the US has to be the dominant force or that the west has to be the light of civilization and we may be squandering both these legacies with our current policies (Both US and western policies in general.)

>my ex-gf was from Grenada, she said its all propaganda, most people there resent the US but are too cowardly to say anything about it.

Pretty much everyone in the world resents the US/the west but mostly not because of intenventions or such it's mostly becuase we have huge riches and the charm of living the simple life in some shithole country kind of wears off after a while. This is one of the reasons, I think, the west has troubles dealing with the third world right now. We're not used to facing people who simply hate us for our skin colour or our success. So we can't even begin to imagine that people might just hate us regardless of what we do. In my country we have accepted a lot of immigrants and we have given them lots of social benefits and lots of chances but they still regard us as shit.

>She used to say Cuba were good and helping Grenada with medicine and trade and construction
Well obviously. But what she doesn't understand because she obviously doesn't understand politics is that countries don't just help eachother out of the kindness of their heart. If a country pumps in a lot of money into your country they're expecting something back from you.

>Reagan sperged out because he was worried about the US students on the island becoming hostages of the Cubans
No that was just a minor point. The big geopolitical picture was always "Oh there's an island in our backyard that is going full communist and potentially causing trouble. We should probably put out this dumpster fire before it gets out of control". Obviously your ex isn't the sharpest knife in the drawer.

the first time I learned about this is when I read The Night Stalkers: Top Secret Missions of the U.S. Army's Special Operations Aviation Regiment
>160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne)
>Its missions have included attack, assault, and reconnaissance, and are usually conducted at night, at high speeds, low altitudes, and on short notice.

apparently they kicked major ass, pic semi-related

You seem angry. Why are you angry?

The 160th actually botched their combat debut pretty badly. When they tried to land a Delta Force team at Richmond Hill prison, they lost one UH-60 to ground fire and the rest aborted (against Delta's orders) and were diverted to a nearby aircraft carrier to offload the wounded. The next day, they were supposed to take a combined force of Delta Force and 82nd Airborne to take the Calivigny barracks. They took AA fire again and took evasive maneuvers, except this time, the Black Hawks were flying too close together and three helicopters wound up colliding with each other, killing or wounding dozens of US soldiers.

M47 Dragons were only slightly more useful than a well-thrown rock.

Possibly one of the worst designed weapons to be issued en masse in the post WW2 US military.

>No that was just a minor point
except its not. Iranian Hostage Crisis was still fresh in everyone's minds and even the head of the CIA at the time wrote in his memoirs that Reagan was haunted by the notion of a similar situation happening with the american nationals in grenada

your ex is a commie

>4-1 FA
That's my old unit

were you in Grenada?

>having to hump both your rifle and its ammo, and a fucking 40 pound anti tank weapon to fight GRENADA
I would be lmao'ing @ my life

Childhood is thinking that Vietnam was peak aesthetics for the US military.
Adulthood is knowing that Grenada was.

No. I was in it when it was in Fort Riley, Kansas. The battalion colors had a GRENADA streamer attached. The guiddon in the picture bares the regimental organization.

>being this angry
Go do ya shooting thing american.

Cool

>Adulthood is knowing that Grenada was.

Nirvana is realizing Panama was

Best generation; made its country great
V/S
Retards who sperg out against Millenials and make fantasies about making their country great again even though they were the ones who fucked it up

You're both wrong. Desert Storm was clearly the best

Technically speaking it was an american aggresion against the UK.

>Retards who sperg out against Millenials and make fantasies about making their country great again even though they were the ones who fucked it up

I don't think Vietnam vets are the ones responsible for that, John McCain notwithstanding.

The last great American generals were all Vietnam Veterans

>inb4 someone posts "Meme Dog" Mattis

Mattis served during the final years of the Vietnam period so we'll count him.

It would be, except for all the damn woodland MOPP suits, albeit it's more excusable than the US military wearing them in FUCKING 2003.

Operation Restore Hope was peak desert war aesthetic

Army MOPP suits are still in desert pattern lol

World viciously condemned the US for it, much like they did with Panama. US went full Israel and didn't give a damn tho

We honestly enjoy war.

The entire invasion was a clusterfuck. Fortunately the Grenadans and Cubans were even more inept than US forces or things could've gone very differently.

Wasnt it Gothic Serpent

Operation Gothic Serpent was a supporting operation to Restore Hope (the US peacekeeping continent in Somalia) which was part of UNISOM II (all UN forces in Somalia).

This

A well thrown rock dosen't give away where you are with a massive sound emission, so they're actually worse

>Possibly one of the worst designed weapons to be issued en masse in the post WW2 US military.

t. someone who's never used an M320 grenade launcher

The M47 was considered on par with crashing your Zero-sen into an Iowa-class

At least a Zero could in theory do some serious damage if it hit the right spot.

>ywn live in the timeline where the Nazis wage post-war insurgency to the Western Allies
>ywn patrol the Teutoburg Forest with an M14 rifle slung over your shoulder
>ywn blare "It ain't me" from a UH-1 Iroquois while flying over German helmets in the Alps looking for Viktor Karl

I thought Cubans were among the better Latin American armies?

At least Americans bother with trying to come up with a decent cover story before invading anyone. Israel just tells everyone else to fuck off and just does it.

Chad punative invasion vs virgin liberation

>fighting alongside communists

I don't recall any engagements where US and Soviet soldiers actually fought side by side, they just sorta ran into each at the Elbe.

Contrary to popular opinion, the US is actually well-liked abroad. According to polling done by Pew Research I believe, it's really only the developed Euro countries that have a greater negative opinion of the States than positive.

>Vietnam
>84% favorable
niqqa what

Ascension is realizing Panama had the best aesthetic, while Desert Storm had the best ethos.

to add to this that was taken after Trump took office, US favorability in some of those states was quit a bit higher before then (Mexico was completely reversed from that poll in the Obama years). only big one that saw gains was Russia
enemy of my enemy is my friend
the US is seen as a counterbalance to the eternal Han north of the border.
though I'd add vietnamese people seem to genuinely like the US even ignoring that

>what is Pakistan

Vietnam was never really all that into socialism, they just hated the French and the assholes in the Saigon government. When they saw the mess in Cambodia and intervened, China soured them to it for good because apparently it's not ok to stop genocidal maniacs if they have your own ideology.

Also since they "won", they have no feelings of butthurt against the US.

>Vietnam was never really all that into socialism

The PEOPLE of Vietnam were not that fond of socialism, it was forced on them by the party in Hanoi. The same party that thousands of Americans and Vietnamese lost their lives fighting. We should not forget that.

Amazing sources there my friend

>be French film crew sent to Grenada to shoot a boring ass nature documentary
>wind up getting hours of footage of Operation Urgent Fury instead

youtube.com/watch?v=teUOOLSsi7k

Grenada, more like Grenade-'er

M47s were a mistake, America has been stuck with those pieces of shit with 30 years now, probably handed them out like candy at Grenada hoping they'd lose them in the jungle.

To be fair, Grenada was the first time they were used in combat and like someone else pointed out, it was hardly Kursk out there.
I'd say their shitiness was more confirmed in the Gulf War.

He has just formulated a developed opinion on the topics hes come here to discuss.

Why does that make him angry?

Why cant you do the same?

I know this isn't /k/ but what's so terrible about the M47

Someone plz answer

>Being a shoulder-fired SACLOS system, Dragon had the problem that while there was no real recoil on firing, the soldier would suddenly be relieved of the weight of the 20-pound missile, which could throw the sight violently off-target and cause the missile to ground itself: for this reason, Dragon was only supposed to be used with its supporting bipod deployed. It was not a well-liked weapon due to being difficult to use: like TOW, there is a short delay between pulling the trigger and the missile firing during which the user will tend to tense up, which was much more problematic for the shoulder-launched Dragon. Moving the sight too quickly will cause the missile to ground itself, not helped by it being notoriously sensitive to small movements. Dragon also has a fearsome backblast with a "danger zone" almost a hundred feet long to the rear in a 90-degree arc, making it practically impossible to fire in a built-up area or indoors without knocking out most of a building's walls first. It was further not liked due to the requirement for the gunner to remain exposed in a seated position for up to 11.5 seconds while the missile is tracking (after kicking up a huge cloud of smoke to give away their position), a tendency for the control wires to break (largely because unlike most wire-guided missiles, Dragon rolls in flight: necessary to bring the banks of thrusters into position but not at all good for the command wires), frequent thruster failures causing erratic missile behaviour, and the regular thruster firing making it impossible to not tell when one had been launched. A report by the US Army found Dragon's hit rate under combat conditions to be a dismal 20%. Dragon's single-stage HEAT warhead was quickly rendered obsolete by developments in reactive armour, and by the time it was actually employed in full-scale combat in the Gulf War, it was considered a weapon of last resort.

imfdb.org/wiki/M47_Dragon

It's fucking unreal how aesthetic that look is. I wish it were the way they remember the look of US forces the way the brits are with the redcoat or Romans with the Segmenta.

It is attributed to both a Vietnamese fighter of the Black Flag Army against the French in the late 19th century or Ho Chi Minh: Better sniff French shit for 10 years than eat Chinese shit for 1000. Replace French with American and you've got the situation for them.

As for like or dislike of the US, I imagine a lot of countries dislike us but also know the alternative is so much worse it's the traditional backseat driving whining.

at least they're in a lot of movies

youtube.com/watch?v=aleGdcn295w

also being a serviceman for NATO during the 80s must have been a fucking dream

It was a deplorable outrage of American imperialism and fascist aggression. Grenada was experiencing real independence and strived to build a socialist nation in the Caribbean with the help of their Cuban and Soviet comrades, and because of that and for the fact that they didn't have a Rothschild Bank since the revolution in 1979 for nearly 4 years now, the American imperialists invaded Grenada and overthrew an independent socialist nation.

Calm down Fidel. And how are you shitposting from Hell?

What is the M47's actual effectiveness against tanks presuming it hits? Has it ever successfully knocked out an enemy tank?

America's pretty unpopular in the Muslim world right now. For fairly understandable reasons.

So I good idea in concept but the technology hadn't caught up to it yet?

It's perfectly fine at destroying tanks (provided the operator dosen't flinch and the cable doesn't break), they're still used in Yemen, they just suck dick compared to Konkurs and MILAN for crew survival

Reagan had to save face after Hezbollah gave the US a bloody nose and ran circles around the military and intelligence forces when they tried to retaliate.

a) They hate the Chinese way way more and b) more than 70% of all Vietnamese alive today were born after the Vietnam war (seriously).

didn't the SEALs get lit up pretty bad?

They generally do. For all the hot shit the SEALs get handjobs for at least one team gets completely fucked sideways in every conflict

lel

actually the opposite of that but whatever

doubtful, Lenin's critique of imperialism was spot-on and fit Vietnamese history to a T.

very nice

U.S. Special Operations Forces were deployed to Grenada beginning on 23 October, before the invasion on 25 October. U.S. Navy SEALs from SEAL Team SIX with Air Force Combat Controllers were airdropped at sea, miles from land to perform a reconnaissance mission on Point Salines, but delays in the insertion pushed the mission into the middle of night during a storm with low visibility and high waves, resulting in four SEALs drowning upon landing. The bodies of Machinist Mate 1st Class Kenneth J. Butcher, Quartermaster 1st Class Kevin E. Lundberg, Hull Technician 1st Class Stephen L. Morris and Senior Chief Engineman Robert R. Schamberger were never recovered. The survivors continued their mission but their boats flooded while evading a patrol boat, causing the mission to be aborted. A SEAL mission on the 24th also was made unsuccessful due to harsh weather, resulting in little intelligence being gathered in advance of the impending U.S. intervention.

>>Except the weak teenager is constructing a secret airbase to smuggle weapons and stir up revolutions against your friends.

The AirSTRIP was to be a commercial one and the contractors used (merican and eurpean companies) claimed that it didn't have military capabilities.

>>b-b-but it could have acted as a refueling point for the soviets!!!

True but that wasn't the original claim, regarding this fictional airforce base the US kept changing their story.

>>Either mild disapproval or complete indifference. Grenadians themselves largely welcomed the US intervention and it's still a public holiday in that country.

11 members of UNSC condemned the action(only for the motion for the U.S. to veto the motion) as well as the UN general assembly.

Overall the invasion was a good thing, but don't eat U.S. propaganda so eagerly, people where pissed about this and from the view of the rest of the world the U.S. acted out of turn.

No, the thing sucked.

It was wire guided. After the missile launched, an infrared flare was lit in the back of the missile. You kept your sight on the target and the flight controller on the launcher would compare where you're aiming with where the IR flare is and send corrections to the missile along cables that spool out from the back of the missile while it flies. This works well enough with the current TOW missile, but is fucking horrible with the M47. This is because the M47 rotates in flight, which twists the cables and adds more strain to the very thin wires.

And why does it rotate? Because it's steered by firing off tiny rocket motors placed along the sides (little ball things in the pic). Can you see how much of a fucking rube goldberg mess this thing is?

>wire snags/breaks on something in it's 1000m flight to target
missile takes off in random direction
>IR flare doesn't light
missile take off in random direction
>malfunction in one of the 60 boosters
missile takes off in random direction
>flinch after missile is launched because the thing you're holding all of a sudden becomes 30 lbs lighter
missile follows flinch, most likely straight into the ground
>everything goes well and works
Set up in the open and then give away your position with a massive backblast and then just fucking sit there for up to 11 seconds while the missile tracks to target praying whatever you just shot at doesn't have friends that can see /kill you.

-lub, /k/

SEALs are not special forces and i just dont get why they're considered one. They're just divers that get tortured for a few weeks to make them perform but not given training outside the very specific thing they are meant to do... Which is diving. They're pretty much wet, bruised up rangers.

>doubtful, Lenin's critique of imperialism was spot-on and fit Vietnamese history to a T.

Red Chinese Imperialism was a bigger concern for little old Vietnam.

You forgot the part where American forces found the following being held in a warehouse at the airport or nearby

>12 APCs
>12 anti-aircraft guns
>291 submachine guns
>6,330 rifles
>5.6 million rounds of ammunition
>total Warsaw Pact, Cuban and local forces on Grenada, totaled no higher than 2,000 strong at the time of the invasion

If you find enough arms to equip an army three times the size of the one you encountered, it's safe to bet those weapons were being re-routed elsewhere.

When have the Chinese not been Vietnam's biggest threat? They've been fighting each other for 1000 years.

>12 apcs
>an army

Truly they were on the brink of overrunning the mainland usa

>Truly they were on the brink of overrunning the mainland usa
>implying those APCs weren't being sent to someone who would evenutally use them to attack an ally of the United States

How dumb are you? Stop the Cubans, stop the Soviets.

>and a partridge in a pear tree