Bulletins and News Discussion from March 3rd to March 9th, 2025 - Austerity And Its Consequences - COTW: Greece

Image is of a crowd protesting in Athens.

Last week, on Friday, hundreds of thousands of Greeks poured into the streets to strike and protest on the second anniversary of the deadliest train crash in Greek history, in which 57 people died when a passenger train collided with a freight train. On this February 28th, public transportation was virtually halted, with train drivers, air traffic controllers, and seafarers taking part in a 24 hour strike - alongside other professions like lawyers, teachers, and doctors.

The train crash is emblematic of the decay of state institutions brought about from austerity being forced on Greece in the aftermath of the 2008 Great Recession, in which the IMF and the EU (particularly Germany) plundered the country and forced privatization. While Greece has somewhat recovered from the dire straits it was in during the early 2010s, the consequences of neoliberalism are very clearly ongoing. Mitsotakis' right-wing government has still not even successfully implemented the necessary safety procedures two years on, and so far, nobody has been convicted nor punished for their role in the accident. The austerity measures were deeply unpopular inside Greece and yet the government did not respond to, or ignored, democratic outcry.

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I just want to make a comment on Ukraine's F-16s, the pause on US intelligence sharing, and how that potentially contributed to the collapse of Ukrainian frontlines in Kursk.
As of a few weeks ago, Ukrainian F-16 fighter jets finally began performing their first frontline combat operations, and we got pictures of them in action. The mission profile they were carrying out: self escort strikes on Russian ground targets in Kursk and elsewhere on the front, as reported by Ukrainian and Russian channels. To carry out this mission, the F-16s were equipped with an interesting loadout: 8 GBU-39 small diameter glide bombs to strike Russian ground targets, 2 AIM-120 AMRAAM air to air missiles on the wingtips to defend against Russian aircraft at long ranges, 2 AIM-9 Sidewinders to defend against Russian aircraft at short range, an AN/ALQ-131 electronic countermeasures (ECM) pod on the centreline to suppress Russian ground based air defences, and 2 drop fuel tanks to extend range. You can see the loadout pictured below.
On the way back, the F-16s were pictured with all their GBU-39s unloaded, and on occasion with an AIM-120 missing, likely fired at a Russian aircraft looking for them. This picture shows a Ukrainian F-16 with all its bombs dropped and an AIM-120 fired:
Whats interesting here is that these F-16s flew these self escort strikes with no HARM anti radiation missiles to suppress ground based air defences (SEAD). They relied entirely on terrain masking (flying low) and the AN/ALQ-131 ECM pod to carry out SEAD on the way to the drop point for their GBU-39s, no HARMs on self protect mode to fire at threats painting the F-16s. Russian aircraft on self escort strikes usually carry at least one Kh-31P anti radiation missile for this purpose.
While this strategy seems to have worked (no losses reported so far), there is one key issue. The AN/ALQ-131 ECM pod must be programmed on the ground, before flight, to counter the specific threats the aircraft is expected to face on its flight path. This requires the ISTAR capabilities to locate the threats within the vicinity of the intended flight path right before the mission (which the USA has), and a party with the know how to program the AN/ALQ-131. It was widely reported that United States electronic warfare squadron members were doing this programming. However, with the pause on intelligence sharing from the US, that means that there is no one to program these ECM pods before flight. Forbes have reported that this has been cut with the pause on intelligence sharing.
So in effect, the Ukrainian Air Force's F-16s are effectively grounded for offensive frontline operations. Without the AN/ALQ-131 ECM pods being updated on a per sortie basis by the United States, they have very limited to no options with regards to SEAD on the way to drop their bombs. These missions now become too risky, Ukraine can't afford to lose an F-16, and none of their Soviet era aircraft have the EW/ECM capabilities required to perform them and get close enough in Kursk, even if they have been modified to drop GBU-39s. F-16s were quite involved in sustaining the Kursk pocket over the last few weeks, likely in a desperate attempt by Ukraine to hold onto the area and prevent encirclement. So now Ukrainian troops are left without any frontline air support, while Russia has air superiority and no longer has to worry about an F-16 firing a cheeky shot at a Russian aircraft. The end result is obvious, just another consequence of the US shutting off intelligence sharing.
I think US intelligence sharing with Ukraine will resume after Russia has taken Kursk. Ultimately, I think the USA under the Trump administration wanted Ukraine to lose Kursk, to try snap Ukraine back to reality about how bad their position is on the battlefield. Shutting off intelligence sharing was only ever going to have one outcome, Russian gains on the frontline, and Russia was always likely to go after Kursk before negotiations begin, Russia has been pounding Kursk hard for weeks now, even before the Trump - Zelensky spat. But without air support, the situation deteriorated rapidly.
- This is a good post. You should repost it in tomorrows thread so more people can see it.
  
  Agreed, super well written and insightful
- lol no country is going to buy US weapons again after they just turn them off on their allies for political leverage
- I wonder what the deal with harms are. I imagine there's a ratio of aircraft to mobile AA where you don't want to do that anymore (in that if you wind up in a situation where you'd use a harm, you should be bugging out, and there's not much reward too). They also may have run out. They're not niche (actually, they are the definition of niche, but theyre not like mega-rare), but especially since SEAD is performed more by stealth aircraft, production/maintenance might be deprioritised.
  I do like them conceptually, they're only useful against advanced industrial militaries and are a passive targeting weapon
  
  Ukraine got very old/early variants of the F-16AM from Denmark, these F-16s have a very weak radar (even weaker than the MIG-29s Ukraine has) and their Link 16 systems stripped out, which is why they're not used in air battles against Russian aircraft. The air to air missiles are there for self protection while carrying out their ground strikes. As for the HARMs, to fire them effectively, the F-16 needs to have the AN/ASQ-213 HARM Targeting Systems (HTS) targeting pod installed. This is a pod that identifies the locations of enemy radars is installed near the engine inlet. None of the Ukrainian F-16s pictured have this pod installed. So Ukraine's primary HARM carriers become their ever dwindling fleet of MIG-29s, with Soviet era sensors modified to use the HARMs. Ukraine's F-16 fleet, in their current configuration, can't fire HARMs effectively with their weak sensor suite, and without the targeting pods and link 16 datalink. If they get the AN/ASQ-213 HARM Targeting Systems (HTS) pods, they can start using HARMs effectively on the F-16, but only then.
  The HTS pod is visible on our left in this photo
  As for HARMs, yeah there comes a point where the ratio of enemy anti aircraft systems vs friendly aircraft gets too high, and you have to retreat unless you have the amount of aircraft to just fire hundreds of HARMs an hour (happened to the NATO coalition forces during the Gulf War, they fired so many of those missiles at Iraqi air defence systems). It's also why ECM is important, along with datalink capabilities so all aircraft can know where the enemy anti aircraft systems are. And dedicated EW/SEAD dual purpose aircraft can adapt and reprogram ECM against new and changing threats in the heat of battle, instead of relying on pre programmed ECM pods. But very few countries have dedicated EW/SEAD dual purpose aircraft.

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