I was browsing Wikipedia, and came across this monstrosity:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lun-class_ekranoplan
Look at the size of that thing! It's like something taken right out of Red Alert.
And this isn't some weirdo prototype thing, it was in active use for approx. 10 years...

I thought Howard Hughes passed away . . . ;)

Someone just stuck wings on a boomer submarine. That is all manner of awesome and impractical in one!

The division between real-life military tech and the bizarre things you see in strategy games isn't as wide as most people think. In fact, I'm pretty sure that in a lot of cases the armed forces of major powers like the U.S.A and Russia are significantly MORE advanced than stuff you'd see in Command and Conquer... although we don't have orbital ion cannons, mostly because they're banned by international treaty.

The Spruce Moose flies! Get in Smithers!

I don't see anything about it crashing, at least it was in use for a little while after the fall of the Soviet union. But whatever happened they must have thought it was a waste of funding, because it ended up here:
http://igor113.livejournal.com/51213.html
Those pictures are pretty sad; while the Wikipedia picture i attached to the first post made me think of Red Alert, these ones looks like they've been taken straight from STALKER.

Ah, the ekranoplan. US intelligence had a tough time of it trying to figure out what it was based on the first spy satellite images. Some kind of ... battleship with wings? Wtf?

that was a truly badass plane. and one of the main reasons why I think that the Cold War Era was, comparatively to nowadays, a fantastic era.
I mean, at leat you knew that the Communists were the arch-enemies!! the geopolitics were way simplier back then... :)
Anyway, those photos are sad. I'd love to see it fly, but it won't happen...

*gun clicks*
I said, get in.