Assad's Helicopter

As I write this, the Syrian military is mounting an offensive against the city of Aleppo. A statement from the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights  (or this one?) quoted in the Guardian reads,

"Helicopters are participating in clashes at the entrance of Salaheddine district and bombarding it," the group said in an emailed statement on Saturday. "There are also violent clashes at the entrances to Sakhour district."

The helicopters in question may be the Russian-made Mi-25 gunship. The  embedded clip is of Indian Mi-25s at a military demonstration. The Guardian reported that two high-level commanders defected to Turkey after being ordered to turn this weapon on civilians in Aleppo. According to the article, the big choppers

 "are remorseless killing machines able to fire 64 rockets on each mission and 2,000 machine gun rounds of varying calibres. They can stay in the air for four and a half hours."

More importantly for the lightly armed FSA fighters opposing them, one of the defectors states,

"You can't shoot them down. It's impossible. They fly at an altitude of 4.5kms, above the range of a Kalashnikov."

The helicopter was famously used by the Soviets against the mujahideen in Afghanistan. According the helicopter's wikipedia page, the mujahideen nickname for the aircraft was "Shaitan-Arba", or the devil's chariot. Fighters on the ground could only avoid the aircraft until they received the famous "Stinger" heat-seeking, shoulder-fired missiles from the CIA. After the introduction of the Stinger, the helicopter crews suffered very high casualty rates. The basic method can be seen in the creepy Chechen home video below.