Ramstein air base in Germany experiences potential incoming missile scare

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/38131/ramstein-air-base-in-germany-experiences-potential-incoming-missile-scare

by SEJeff • 6 years ago

146 74 6 years ago

ulzeraj3• 6 years ago

I heard Russian missiles in Kaliningrad can reach any place in Poland and Lithuania. I wonder how did they managed to keep that piece of land surrounded by ex-soviet republics that are basically not very fond of Russia to say the least.

baybal2• 6 years ago

Very easy, Baltic republics were in no way capable of waging war right after the independence, let alone get out with any hope of territorial gains.

And historically, USSR always been placing military members from ethnic minorities into weakest, and most "cannon-fodderry" military units, predominantly foot infantry, and motorised.

Even ethnic Russians from more far away places were likely never to see any advanced military hardware.

ulzeraj3• 6 years ago

Thanks. That was an honest question. No idea why I got downvoted multiple times.

azernik4• 6 years ago

Depends on the ethnic minority - the USSR had very fine-grained distinctions between "reliable" and "unreliable" ethnic groups. For example, Armenians (because of their hostility to NATO-member Turkey) were very much allowed into combat units, which gave them their enormous advantage against Azerbaijan in the early-90s wars. Ukrainians and Belarusians were also considered part of the "core" USSR ethnic groups.

Whereas the Baltic states were only conquered in 1940, and were considered extremely unreliable.

jacquesm2• 6 years ago

Because they likely would have pulled a 'Ukraine' on Lithuania if it came to that.

cnorthwood• 6 years ago

although Lithuania is both in the EU and NATO which would make it a very different proposition

ulzeraj3• 6 years ago

Well the fact that Kaliningrad is part of the Russian federations means that they did pulled an Ukraine on Poland and/or Lithuania.

I'm not an expert and by any means I'm giving opinions here but I thought Crimea, South Ossetia and Abkhazia were territories were Russia at least has an historical or cultural excuse to claim. Again, not that I agree on those claims. On the other hand Kaliningrad was never part of Russia. It belonged to Poland and then to Germany. It was annexed by the Soviet Union in 1945.

I guess the reason Kaliningrad exists is that Poland and the Baltiks were in no means to fight for territory and Germany doesn't care.

est31• 6 years ago

Kaliningrad's original population was German. After WW 2 the red army displaced them, and Stalin settled ethnic Russians in the city. So unlike the areas around it, it's truly made up of Russians.

azernik4• 6 years ago

After the collapse of the USSR, none of the states around Russia were in any condition to confront the Russian Federation itself. All of the little post-Soviet wars were among the smaller Republics.

dmurray• 6 years ago

"Anywhere in Poland or Lithuania" is a 500km range. Probably half the world's militaries could launch missiles that far, plus some non-state actors - of course it's in range for Russia.

swebs• 6 years ago

The land originally belonged to Germany, who made a vow to never expand their borders beyond a certain eastern point after reunification. So only Russia really had a claim to it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_on_the_Final_Settlement...

iSnow• 6 years ago

Kaliningrad was annexed into the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic ie. Russia proper end of WW II. Any surrounding countries literally would have had to start a war with Russia to occupy it.

Cu3PO422• 6 years ago

I live in Kaiserslautern, which is right next to Ramstein Air Base. I just want to say I find it somewhat strange—unsettling even—that I hear about this for the first time from an article I happened to find on HN, but not the German national alert app, local news or even social media.

azalemeth• 6 years ago

I wonder if that means, that, well, the system works. There wasn't an incoming missile strike: part of the early-alert system sounded and another part -- a much more human part -- interrogated the data further and decided to not declare a loud alarm that could have potentially severe consequences. And, well, no missile strike came.

Trombone124• 6 years ago

No, the article recounts the base sending out a live warning to base personnel.

If you've sent an alert to the soldiers on the base, you've decided the warning is genuine, so the conclusion must be that they don't inform the surrounding areas as soon as they've accepted a warning as accurate.

wbhart3• 6 years ago

There actually was a very loud alarm. From memory it was about 9:30am this morning (technically yesterday). One can hear the alarms on the base from Kaiserslautern fairly easily, though normally they are just drills.

sailingparrot• 6 years ago

but not the German national alert app

You are in a way complaining about not getting a false positive. Surely, if you had received an alert when nothing happened, you would take the next alert less seriously.

La1n• 6 years ago

But if they don't get that false positive, it'd not be weird to assume they also wouldn't get the true positive (or at least not as early as the people living on the base).

IfOnlyYouKnew• 6 years ago

If it's a nuclear attack, I'd rather not be warned. It's not going to be single missile, so let's get it over with. Plus, it's almost guaranteed to be a false alarm.

If it's conventional, it's not going to be targeted at the entirely unimportant city but at the base. Even if it hits the city, it won't affect more than a small fraction of it.

kopakabana• 6 years ago

You didn’t happen upon someone on an island playing with a remote controlled Pterosaur did you?

They might be able to get you a helicopter ride to NORAD, so you can stop it.

Trombone124• 6 years ago

US defence planners: "Attacking with all nukes as soon as we get a warning of an enemy launch is the only rational way to use these weapons"

US missileers: "I'ma wait a bit to see if maybe it's just Joyce that forgot to update the spreadsheet today before destroying the world"

littlestymaar• 6 years ago

Fortunately this sort of common sense was shared by Russian soldiers too: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983_Soviet_nuclear_false_alar...

vbezhenar2• 6 years ago

There are rumours about automatic Russian system Dead Hand which is supposed to launch hidden nuclear missiles automatically if everything is lost. It’s horrifying to think about bugs in that system.

lldbg• 6 years ago

I've thought a lot about this and I am pretty sure this is propaganda to further the Mutually Assured Destruction doctrine, and that no nation would launch nukes except when directed by the highest authority. There would be no difference in efficiency of MAD, since it's all about what the adversary thinks. I am sure people smarter than me have gamed this out and evaluated the risks of launch under false premise vs risk of non-effective deterrant.

joshxyz• 6 years ago

Funny how every once in a while a great fraction of our lives is saved by some individual's second thoughts LOL

Gustomaximus• 6 years ago

Theres a buch: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_nuclear_close_calls

And seems to one missing where there was a test message sent as a real one to a US commander.

And likely more than here we'll never hear of.

galacticaactual• 6 years ago

There's a great 1995 movie called Crimson Tide which explores this further.

mmaunder• 6 years ago

For a detailed video describing the Aegis Ashore missile defense system that protects Ramstein go here: https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/products/aegis-combat-s...

And some deployment history: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aegis_Ballistic_Missile_Defens...

Dobby2020• 6 years ago

These are all Russians hackers who compromised a control panel on the base! Russians have an agreement with Trump to srart a local nuclear war in EU, to postpone Biden's inauguration in January.

hazeii• 6 years ago

False alarm due to Geminids?

toxicFork2• 6 years ago

Possible technical question: how do people detect missile launches? Do they scan the skies? Do they have sound/vibration pattern detection? Satellites?

Update: In the article I see: "Still, we have no idea what early warning system triggered the alert. America's infrared early warning space-based sensing layer stares at the earth from many vantage points in orbit day and night. Historically, it provides the initial warning of a ballistic missile launch via detection of the missile's hot boost-phase plume. These satellites, especially the newer ones, can also detect a greater variety of infrared events, as well, including artillery fire, aircraft crashes, smaller missile shots, and even the launches of cruise missiles. "

smdz• 6 years ago

I was wondering the same. Still not sure how they detect whether that is incoming or just flying to a different destination?

toxicFork2• 6 years ago

I guess once you detect a launch you start tracking systems and making guesses, if you see it heading towards a particular direction, alert anyone in that direction. Once you get a decent trajectory, alert more specifically.

hotfire911• 6 years ago

According to reddit (1), it was part of an exercise and there was a mistake with accidentally issuing a non-exercise alert.

(1) https://www.reddit.com/r/AirForce/comments/kblzkx/only_at_ra...

jamisteven• 6 years ago

This reminds me of when Hawaii had that "false alert" of an incoming nuclear missile and it was supposedly just a user error.

Ramstein air base in Germany experiences potential incoming missile scare

Related Stories