Ray

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"Some have learnt many Tricks of sly Evasion, Instead of Truth they use Equivocation, And eke it out with mental Reservation, Which is to good Men an Abomination."

I don't have to attend every argument I'm invited to.

HAKUNA MATATA

Tronic

hmm... ours have rocket pods i believe, i don't know if any other air force flies them with missiles on em.

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Nabha Sparasham Deeptam
-Touch The Sky With Glory

Garry

Hi Ray, I guess that Mi-17 is not really good platform for acurate bombing.... they are basically made to be trucks. I totally agree that it is very robust. As for rough.... I was flying on a VIP refitted Mi-17.... except for terrible noise it was looking very nice inside and outside.

I read that it can be fitted with air to surface missiles.... yes it is fitted in armies but any helicopter big enough can cary a pod with unguided air to survace missiles as a secondary capability. Then any chopper is a millitary hardware!!!

Mi-17 requirees less hours of maintanance per flight hour than its direct competitors - heavy helicopters American S-92 and European EH-101. It is actually better in this terms than even much lighter Black Hawk. As for the cost per flight hour it is estimated at $800 for hour on civil Mi-17s..... it is around 4.5 times cheaper than cost of flight hour of S-92.... and probably much cheaper than an hour of EH-101. Many compare Mi-17 cost per flight hour to much lighter western helicopters.... but this is not correct. In its heavy family Mi-17 remains cheapest for maintainance.... and with VK-2500 engines it is on par in terms of fuel efficiency.

I actually heard that Palestinians will get some of their helicopters refitted to VIP transport. Is it really a millitary hardware?

canoe

Well given the political situation in the middle east this purchase makes perfect sense.

The Mi-17's are cheaper, easier to acquire (politics) and are less of an issue to lose. Hamas knows if things go reallly south with the Isrealies it won't matter what choppers they have, they'll either be shot down or bombed on the ground.

The other aspect is it will be easier for Hamas to get parts for Mi-17's even if there under sanctions from everyone else.

To be honest I'm not even sure why Hamas would waste their money with military choppers. I'm assuming there planning to buy these to use them as weapon platforms. They'd be better off buying portable anti-tank weapons and surface to air missiles. Maybe if they bought a crap load of flares and reflective tape they could dump them all over the roads to *attempt* to clutter the Isreali aircraft's infrared sensors. Combined with alot of smoke it could at least make it aggrivating for the Isrealies.

Kontakt Era

Hmmm...dont the Iranians give a lot of aid to Palestine? They probably got the money from there for these weapons right? In any case, why would Isreal be worried? This little deal is a parady if u think about it. Maybe the government wants this to suppress domestic violence from various other warlords. They probably arent trying to wage war.

glow

Well if it wasn't Russia it be China. You want it they got they don't care who's buying

Kontakt Era

idk its just it seems so like grimey tat Russia would actually stoop to the point of selling any type of arms to a place filled with raging lunatics. i mean they're part of the security council....arent they supposed to KEEP the peace? lol

Onyxnine

Jerusalem is the key. Whoever holds Jerusalem holds the fulcrum of world history. We should first and foremost be supporting Israel in their struggle against the Arab states, and Iran.
Hamas can buy all the used Russian equipment they want-- as many have pointed out, they can neither maintain nor effectively operate sophisticated military equipment-- and the Russians aren't going to let their fingers get burned through too close an association w/Hamas.