Comments by "Edward McLaughlin" (@edwardmclaughlin7935) on "Can Europe’s missile defence system defend against Russia’s latest hypersonic missile? | BBC News" video.

  1. So these 'swarms of drones' have managed, despite the best efforts of the RAF and the USAF, to evade all countermeasures so that not one example has been shot down or otherwise acquired, and there is no evidence that they are anything to do with Russia. How are we - and more pertinently, the Russians - to know that the Aegis missile installations have only a defensive capability? The naval version can be configured to act defensively, taking down incoming missiles; but also offensively to target enemy ships. It would surely be possible to have a similarly alternating role so that the Polish Aegis missiles could be used to target deep into Russia in a pre-emptive decapitation strike? Perhaps understandable then, that the Russians would regard these installations as a threat. Imagine if Russia or China were to cut a deal with Mexico or Canada, to site such systems close to the US border - how would that be greeted? In fact how did the US react when Russia set about putting missiles on Cuba, in retaliation for the US's Jupiter missiles being sited in Turkey? It was precisely to guard itself from foreign aggression (basically from Europeans - in the main Britain) that the US very wisely adopted the Monroe Doctrine which, since 1832 has forbidden any threat in the hemisphere of US territory. Yet, that same concern for security, when displayed by Russia, is labelled in the Western MSM as 'Russian Imperialism'. Why the huge imbalance? The whole point of this discussion seems to have been to throw a towel over the Dnipro Oreshnik strike - given mention yes, but made out to be no big deal. The truth is that with the Oreshnik, NATO finds itself presented with a whole new weapon category to deal with. The Russians have shown that they are in possession of something that gives them the ability to cause damage that previously would require the use of nuclear missiles. Combining extreme accuracy, hypersonic speed and devastating destructive yield, the Oreshnik opens up new possibilities and is not to be dismissed as readily as our BBC expert would suggest.
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