Word: ospreys
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Dick Cheney's first target in a second Bush administration may well be to finish a job he never completed as defense secretary in the first Bush administration: Kill the Marines' controversial MV-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft program. He got a tragic boost in that quest last night when one of the hybrid planes crashed in the North Carolina woods, killing all four Marines on board. The Pentagon is still trying to perfect - and buy - the Osprey a decade after Cheney vainly tried to scrap it during his tenure as defense secretary. The corps, backed by powerful allies...
...This morning, in the wake of the crash, Marine Commandant Gen. James Jones grounded the Osprey fleet and asked Defense Secretary William Cohen to convene a panel of experts to review the program. The Marines also asked the Pentagon to postpone an imminent decision on whether or not the aircraft is ready for full-scale production...
...time is ripe for Cheney to take action: Last April, an Osprey crashed in Arizona and killed 19 Marines (the corps ultimately blamed the tragedy on its dead pilots). Two weeks ago, Phil Coyle, the Pentagon's top weapons-tester, said the Osprey is "more difficult and costly" to keep flying than the 30-year old helicopters it is designed to replace. In fact, it breaks down twice as often. More critically, it's not ready for military missions: It hasn't been approved for the vigorous maneuvers required in combat and lacks the required gun, and Marines...
...Back in North Carolina, Marine officers said a "Mayday!" emergency call - with no further elaboration - was heard from the cockpit moments before the accident. The Osprey was heading back to base after a routine training flight from its base at the Marine Corps Air Station at New River, N.C. Witnesses to the crash heard the Osprey's engines powering up just before impact, which suggests the pilots realized they were in trouble and were trying to take corrective action...
...word was popularized in the 1960s to fit the U.S., the only holder of the title today. China will have neither the material wealth of the U.S., nor its global military reach. But looking at the rise of China through the narrow framework of numbers of automobiles or Osprey helicopters doesn't come to grips with the country's sources of power. Defining a superpower in terms of economic and military size leaves out the power that comes from being able to upset the system, even when done unintentionally. A new definition of superpower must take account...