191–200 of 299 posts
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Is making rad bombs trivial? Can you just dump nuclear fuel out of the sub and stick it in a gun-type bomb with no prior experience?
Pretty much, yes. Enrichment is the hard part and US subs have fuel enriched enough for a gun type nuke.
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You know what else is as old as the hills? Those guidelines. https://web.archive.org/web/20140702092610/https://news.ycom... It might have been an illusion before but I personally think HN feels more like Reddit nowadays compared to then.
Society is becoming Reddit and it seems HN is following suit. The next logical step is for society to become 4chan, and we are off to a smashing start here, no?
Still, I sometimes wonder if there is some internal denial around the chang(ing/ed) culture of HN.
This feels like a submarine piece. http://paulgraham.com/submarine.html
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> Europe has been unwilling to throw their cards in with America 100% Why should they? America is an unreliable partner. They torpedoed a good deal with Iran, mismanaged the withdrawing from Afghanistan, have been a nuisance regarding the building of pipelines between Germany and Russia and an overall destabilizing force in the Middle-East. Trump did happen. The fastest Europe separates itself from the American spher…
> The fastest Europe separates itself from the American sphere of influence, the better. And now you know why the US and UK didn't give the slightest shit about how mad France got about this deal. NATO is dead, the US is leaving Europe for better or worse, wanted or not. And keep in mind I'm just doing my best at an interpretation/observation. Everything you cite here from the perspective of some or many European nat…
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Actually, as mentioned multiple times in the past couple of days by former French Ambassador to the US Gerard Araud, diesel was an Australia demand, which required France to modify its subs (all nuclear powered) and added complexity to the project. According to the former Ambassador, it would have been much easier and cheaper for France to supply Australia with nuclear subs.
Then why is it the US's fault Australia changed its mind?
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Their job isn't to chase other submarines next to Chinese waters. That is suicidal. Chinese submarines are almost as stealthy as the Virginia class, and they'll have to operate in the middle of Chinese anti-submarine warfare. That is to say, they won't survive long. Their job is to actually sink the merchant ships. The US can't do that easily with surface combatants, because getting close to a strait means compromisi…
What are the political costs of blockading the Malacca straights? China sentiment worldwide is at rock-bottom due to wolf warrior diplomacy and belt and road corruption, Xinjiang, etc. Hell, public sentiment for boycotting the Beijing Olympics is >50% in Canada. If china invades Taiwan, I'd be surprised if most countries don't jump at the chance to screw over china. It might not even be necessary to work that hard at…
The world is much more than the US and Canada. The EU itself would face a terrible economic crisis.
There's no way of blockading only China. The US has no way of knowing if a boat is going/coming from Cambodia, Vietnam, or even South Korea without stationing assets very close to the border with China, which we know is really not practical.
The vast majority of countries in the world will simply not care if China invades Taiwan. Why would they?
The BRI is actually seen as a positive, not negative, by a lot of people in developing countries that benefit from pretty good deals and development. China knows it needs the BRI to hedge against a US blockade and thus make it not worthwhile, so they're willing to give pretty good deals comparatively.
I assure you, the vast majority of the world will not mind. What they will mind is the US blocking off 30-50% of their foreign trade in a blockade and causing a massive economic downturn. There's no way around that.
100 days of straight reserves is a lot. If they're still importing from Russia at full capacity that's even more, around 150 days, and they would certainly increase the reserves before any kind of invasion. That's without rationing, which they certainly would do. By rationing non essential civilian use, and increasing Russian imports as well as domestic production, and increasing reserves, they would last a year. That's a full year for them to construct more domestic exploitation, more imports from Russia and Central Asia, and alternatives. The war might very well be over by then as both sides run out of precision munitions.
As far as action in the SCS, I just don't see it lasting more than a month, unless the US is trying to impose a blockade. What would the contention be once China has invaded Taiwan? There is no way the US could invade and liberate Taiwan back, so what would be the point? Just shooting at civilian ships and try not to get found from a submarine while lacking air superiority surrounded by Chinese sonobuoys and UUVs? I don't see the strategic goal that would lead to a confrontation in the SCS for months after the fall of Taiwan, nor do I see how US surface ships could survive.
As for companies not wanting to do it, have you considered that many of those companies are Chinese? What do you expect them to do, nothing? Some are even Chinese state-owned enterprises.
I could even see the PLA making these ships unmanned as bait in the SCS to get submarines to shoot at them with passive sonar rigged in unbeknownst to the submarine, triggering a launch of China's air-launched anti-submarine torpedoes.
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> Actually, France has far more territory in the Pacific than the UK, and better positioned too. This is kind of like a nice piece of trivia. France has 0 ability to protect those territories and they're pretty much useless to any other country except in the event of a war in the Pacific, in which case the US would be using them as basis (or China or Japan or whoever but definitely not France). Sure France could sail…
> France has 0 ability to protect those territories France has nuclear-powered submarines carrying nuclear ICBMs. Of course they can defend their islands. > Sure France could sail the Charles de Gualle to the Pacific France has a permanent navy presence in the Pacific. They don't need to get an aircraft carrier there. Aircraft carriers are useless against a modern army anyway. It's all about submarines. > because Fra…
Let's not pretend that France is going to go to nuclear war to over these territories.
> France has a permanent navy presence in the Pacific. They don't need to get an aircraft carrier there.
I mean so does the Philippines. The question is what are they going to do with it?
> Aircraft carriers are useless against a modern army anyway. It's all about submarines.
I'm not really sure that's true. And why would it be less true with better detection technology now than it would have been in World War II where aircraft carriers were what mattered?
A submarine will have to find the carrier fleet and evade defenses. No easy feat. Navies have been battling submarines for decades so it's not like it's some big secret weapon.
> That's the second economic block in the world. There is plenty they can do to piss off America if they want to.
I think this is wishful thinking. The US is far stronger than the EU is economically, and any sort of actions harms the EU too. So there isn't really much they can do.
> They could think it's in their best interest to be more concilient with China for example. That's how diplomacy works.
and that's why the US is going behind Frances back, creating and strengthening alliances with the Uk and Australia. The US has come to believe that the EU is more interested in playing both sides, which doesn't benefit the US.
> Russia is a nuclear power and one of the largest country on the planet, a country full of natural resources.
100%
> They are also quite close to China and an important link in the new silkroad which is an important part of China global strategy.
I wouldn't be so quick to toss Russia into China's lap. The silk road is mostly marketing. Some economic development but it's a ho-hum affair.
> You can't just dismiss Russia. It's foolish.
Sure I can. What exactly are they going to do? Bother Europe? It's not 1970 anymore. My point isn't that Russia doesn't have capabilities. My point is they don't really have much to do that they aren't already doing and most of it is targeted toward agitating Europe which, appears to not want the US's help with.
My observation: 1- US probably predicts that China is gonna breakthrough the first island chain in the next 10 years. 2- France needs to reconsider her Indo-Pacific stratrgy because Aussi explicitly shows that it's going all in with US instead of trying to follow some sort of independent strategy. 3- Win for whoever in EU who supports self defense and a more consolidated Europe. 4- First time a non nuclear country (A…
>1- US probably predicts that China is gonna breakthrough the first island chain in the next 10 years. I think the nuke boats / unicorn tech transfer is sweetner for AU hosting more US assets. Starting ASAP. Just announced more US bombers will be stationed down under. With bombers come ABM, and with ABM, might as well as throw in IRBMs. IMO, it's foot in door for improve US positioning in AU, who has already sunk cos…
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I don't understand why France sticks with the USA/UK at this point as they treated as bull-crap. I am sure they could strike a good deal with the Chinese and be better off: like leasing land in the Caribbean Sea or making a joint venture in some weapon. France don't really care about the China Sea in the end. They should be as "pragmatical" as the Aussie !.
US is able to output harm while China doesn't have that ability.
It seems like a bit of an overreaction. Is shipbuilding that important to France?
Also genuinely curious. With no judgment, I want to understand the French perspective here. And can anyone weigh in on whether these deals getting scuttled is so rare. Esp for advanced military equipment, I’d think that it’s quite common.