I love "fer sure", "kinda", "gonna", "dunno", "'em" and a few others.

"That's what happened to the Russians. They were doing OK, no great, but were viable UNTIL the US supplied the rebels with Stingers. It was over.

Almost true. I doubt if they'll hook up with the US in this one. We seem to be on the other side, with ties to Russia and several other old-Soviet republics -- "

I didn't mean to imply the Chinese would supply an Afghan tribe with handheld SA missiles. There are a lot of 'em of those missiles out there, held by a lot of different people.

The Saudi Arabians, Chinese and Americans supplied the Afghans with armaments to resist the Russians. Some of the weapons were designed in the US, built in China, and paid for by the Saudis. I read recently that the Saudis contributed more financially to the Afghans than did the US.

American military people didn't want the Stinger technology to fall into the hands of the Chinese, so didn't give the Afghans any of them for years.

And the Russian gunships could kick the crap out of the Afghans in a manner similar to what the US ships could do in Vietnam. If everything went right a temporary superiority could be achieved. Even so, a lot of copters fell to small arms, up to 50 or 51 caliber.

Finally, the US sent Stingers. They were issued to tribes one or two at a time, with no more issued unless they could prove they fired the last one. Sort of like Barney Fife's bullet. (The Chinese got the technology anyway.)

After the Afghans got the Stingers, the Russians started taking unacceptable losses.

It may be that using helicopters against a sophisticated enemy has become like sending infantry charging into machine guns.

Anyway, it stopped working for the Russians. They left.

Arf