Time for the AIRSHIP again.

[MoDyna Profile]

http://www.military.com/soldiertech/0,14632,Soldiertech_Walrus,,00.html?ESRC=soldiertech.nl

[Chacal Profile Website]

Interesting, but...

Akron
Macon
Shenandoah

Unless the airship technology has changed a lot, this is not true:

The WALRUS airships will offer a number of advantages over current airlift and sealift transports. To begin with, they can operate from "unimproved" areas, land or sea, without a need for storage hangars or ground support. They will also be weather tolerant, [...] Finally, with operating costs significantly lower that either ships or conventional aircraft, the WALRUS airships could provide logistical support to deployed UAs for a fraction of what it would cost to do so conventional airlift or sealift assets.

Airships were abandoned because they were too fragile in bad weather (especially when docked), because they couldn't cope with strong currents and updrafts, because they required extensive and costly ground support. They were also much slower than airplanes, and extremely vulnerable to missiles of all kinds.

Nevertheless, I dream of driving such a beast.

[LordShard]

Well currenty airships, the blimp part has to be 50-75% destroyed tfor it to crash. They don't have very much airpressure to bullet holes don't do much to them, you'd have to attack the conopy hanging from it it destroy it. Airships have come a long way since WWII days.