@ElwoodBlues The Harpoon is an all-weather, over-the-horizon, anti-ship missile developed and manufactured by McDonnell Douglas (now Boeing Defense, Space & Security).
The regular Harpoon uses active radar homing and flies just above the water to evade defenses. The missile can be launched from:
Fixed-wing aircraft (the AGM-84, without the solid-fuel rocket booster) Surface ships (the RGM-84, fitted with a solid-fuel rocket booster that detaches when expended, to allow the missile's main turbojet to maintain flight) Submarines (the UGM-84, fitted with a solid-fuel rocket booster and encapsulated in a container to enable submerged launch through a torpedo tube); Coastal defense batteries, from which it would be fired with a solid-fuel rocket booster.
The Harpoon missiles can be fired from US fighters or bombers. Ukraine doesn't have any. They can be fired from a ship that does have a harpoon launch system built in. Ukraine doesnt have any. They can be fired from submarines with a harpoon launch system. Ukraine doesn't have any. Or they could even be fired from dedicated land based harpoon launch systems set up in a coastal battery. Ukraine doesn't have any.
[quote]Of course, it’s much easier to deploy, train on, and test a new (at least to the Ukrainians) weapons system when there’s not already a war. Meaning that the best time to give Ukraine Harpoons would have been at some point between 2014 and last month.[/quote]
Sounds like the "why no Harpoons" talking point is one of those typical right-wing talking point that's built around an unspoken lie. In this case, the lie being the assumption that Ukraine has the appropriate fire control system.
@ElwoodBlues The Harpoon anti-ship missile is probably the most common weapon of its type in the West. Since it entered production with McDonnell Douglas (now part of Boeing) in 1975, over 7 000 have been produced, equipping hundreds of ships around the world at the relatively cheap price of around $1.5 million. This weapon system is versatile, capable of also being launched from aircraft, trucks, and submarines.
Unfortunately, the Harpoon would be of no use to the Ukrainians as their navy was essentially taken over by the Russians in 2014 during the invasion of Crimea. They have nothing with which to mount Harpoons on.
Since the Russians also control most of the Ukranian coastline, shore batteries are out also.
As for the MiGs, Russia could easily deploy enough fighters to deal with them, not to mention the continued obliteration of airbases and airfrields the MiGs would have to deploy from.
What Ukraine needs is more anti-air weaponry to keep Russia from achieving air supremacy. Russian air supremacy would greatly hinder the ability of Ukrainian ground forces to move without being subjected to debilitating airstrikes.
@sunsporter1649 So can you dig up a photo of radar dishes for fire control of Harpoon missiles? These would be rotating dishes; no phased array for Harpoons!
@sunsporter1649 Dude, you still need a fire control system to transfer the very specific target data to the weapon in the very specific format the Harpoon internal radar requires.
AND you need to train the personnel. The perfect time to train Ukrainians on Harpoon would have been during the Trump presidency. Oh, wait, Trump was too busy trying to extort a fake investigation from Ukraine, so he was blocking weapons transfers instead of expediting them.
