Many have a vague idea of what the USA is in military terms.
The situation is as follows. If the USA were to lose a tanker plane every day to accidents, being shot down, or damaged, by the end of the year they would still have four times as many as China and Russia combined.
This despite the fact that the H-6U is a copy of the Soviet Tu-16, and half of China’s modern planes don’t fit its boom, and Russia still hasn’t replaced the Il-78.
This is purely “Stratotankers” and “Pegasuses” in operation against a likely adversary.
We don’t even consider the fleet’s “Hercules,” the fact that most carrier-based aircraft can refuel each other to extend their range, and that about a hundred “Pegasuses” are in various stages of readiness in shipyards.
Then I open Facebook and there it is: “NATO turned out to be a paper tiger, the global South showed its strength, losing a tanker changes everything.”
Damn, but this is madness; the USA can do what no one else on the globe can—bomb another continent from Britain, make a chain of tankers in the air, and hover in the air for days.
For example, at the end of June 2024 during Operation “Project Magellan.” The newest Boeing KC-46A Pegasus flew (assigned to the 22nd Air Wing from McConnell Base). They simply made a nonstop round-the-world trip: took off, headed west, and after 45 hours landed at the same base, having circled the entire globe.
How is this physically possible? First, there were several shift crews on board. While some piloted, others slept right in the cargo hold. Second, other American tankers refueled this tanker several times in the air along the way.
Before this, they had a record of 36 hours (in 2022), but the 45-hour circumnavigation beat everything.
It was a pure demonstration of logistical muscles: they showed that their fleet can stay in the sky for days and transport aviation to any point on the globe without relying on ground airfields.
Then I remember that hundreds of millions of people believe they will be greeted by 72 young virgins in the afterlife. Young, inexperienced, wildly eager for them, becoming virgins again every morning, made of light.
And their own earthly wives, who after death will undergo maintenance, will also become young virgins and will rule this glowing harem.
LOL, spending at least 15 minutes on each huri and half an hour on the wife—this is 18 and a half hours of pure time. Leaving 5.5 hours in a day for sleep and eating. So heaven is hard work in three shifts on a conveyor. Eternity. Is that not exactly hell?
And then I understand that believing in “paper NATO” and the “mighty Global South” is not the most severe form of collective madness. People just really want to believe in fairy tales so that life is not so scary. Some—in a heavenly harem at a price list, others—in that America will collapse from the loss of one plane, while five hundred of the same stand on bases around the world and can remain airborne for days.
And only thanks to Zucker, may His heap not diminish, can we see these crazy worlds and be filled. Thank you, Zucker.
In the header: American aerial refueling and strategic transport aircraft KC-46 Pegasus refueling the American strategic military transport aircraft C-17 Globemaster III. Photo: Boeing
