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The U.S. needs a shipbuilding revolution

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Re: The U.S. needs a shipbuilding revolution

#441

Post by ramblenode »

Spooky23 wrote: post #405
throw0101c wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This will never succeed because the economies of scale are nonexistent without dominance in the commercial shipbuilding market. War planners should have pushed to repeal the Jones Act decades ago The US used to subsidize the salaries of US merchant marines on ships (US salaries are higher than Filipino ones) so that there would be a trained population, but that was stopped in the 1980s because subsidies are bad, so…

US shipbuilding died because the industry died. Modern shipping is a fundamentally different industry. It wasn’t killed by foreigners, it was killed, just like the railroads, by the interstate highway system and trucks. We don’t need 150 piers and train freight/ferry terminals in NYC because we can stage trucks from a limitless number of truck terminals. Less capital cost, less labor, less wasted inventory, less chok…

> Less capital cost, less labor, less wasted inventory, less chokepoints

I don't think this is a fair comparison without considering the subsidies that go to trucking, which are substantial: the interstate highway system, manufacturer and consumer auto subsidies, municipal tax codes and development that favors single family homes (further bolstering auto and road industries).

Consider that most of the damage done to roads is done by heavy trucks, but the cost is spread across everyone. That is effectively a huge subsidy.

Re: The U.S. needs a shipbuilding revolution

#442

Post by ramblenode »

ethbr1 wrote: post #181
lupusreal wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The nature and number of the naval assets that China is building suggests that China invading Taiwan is actually very likely. Westerners who don't understand why China would want to do that get hung up on their lack of understanding, think it an irrational act (bad for trade, etc) and therefore unlikely for China to do. What they're missing is the concrete evidence of China preparing to do it. Those amphibious landin…

Bingo. The terrifying thing about China's shipbuilding and armament focusing is "Why would they be building these specific things if they weren't planning on invading Taiwan?" The focus on amphibious capability doesn't have a lot of dual purpose use...

"31 Amphibious Ships are 'Not Enough,' Expert Says" [0]

I guess the US is about to invade Cuba.

[0] https://www.nationaldefensemagazine.org/articles/2023/4/5/31...

Re: The U.S. needs a shipbuilding revolution

#443

Post by jabl »

Ekaros wrote: post #197
jabl wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps Xi Jinping and his henchmen should also look at a map? In case they have trouble understanding, here's a hint: Taiwan belongs to that large part of the globe which is "not China".

Just like Panama and Greenland?

Yes. Or sort-of, at least. China is making serious military investments that seem targeted at achieving a capability to invade Taiwan while fending off US efforts to foil such an invasion. In contrast, I've seen no indication that the US is seriously considering taking Panama or Greenland by force except for the bluster from the chief blowhard. Still, that mark of shame will take a long time to wash off.

Re: The U.S. needs a shipbuilding revolution

#444

Post by jabl »

FrustratedMonky wrote: post #380
MostlyStable wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is already moribund to the point of uselessness, yet it is still imposing enormous economic costs on the entire country. If it's goal was to maintain the ability of the US to build and staff ships, then it has utterly and completely failed, and yet it's costs remain. I have never heard a compelling argument why we should keep it. Without it, we probably wouldn't have a thriving US shipbuilding industry, but we wou…

Yes Jones act is failure. But, not seeing how allowing foreign built ships, with foreign crews, owned by foreign companies, somehow leads to a stronger US shipping industry.

The argument I provided in the message starting this subthread that you answered, was to repeal the Jones Act COMBINED with enacting other subsidies and investment to revitalize US domestic shipbuilding and the maritime sector. Merely repealing the Jones Act without any of the other measures would indeed lead to a quick collapse of what little is left of the US civilian maritime sector.

(Nuclear option: US Navy ensures Freedom of the Seas only for US flagged vessels. Your Liberia-flagged ship gets attacked by pirates, or even some state actor? Ask the Liberian navy to come to your help. And no, this isn't really a serious suggestion that would be in the US interest.)

Re: The U.S. needs a shipbuilding revolution

#445

Post by jabl »

jjk166 wrote: post #299
jabl wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems an unintended side effect of the Jones act was to insulate the US shipbuilding industry from international competition, leading to them resting on their laurels while the rest of the industry worked hard to improve productivity (see Japan, South Korea, and lately China). Which makes it even harder to repeal, since with a repeal of the Jones act the wildly noncompetitive (civilian) US shipbuilding industry wo…

This is a false narrative. US shipbuilding did not rest on its laurels because of the jones act. The Jones Act was passed in the 1920s; US shipbuilding rose to a dominant position while it was in place. The US lost that position only after the 1980s cessation of subsidies to domestic shipbuilders. Ironically this was a move to stop foreign nations from subsidizing their shipbuilding industries, but it was never recip…

US shipbuilding was last competitive in the 19th century when building wooden ships. US yards were not capable of matching UK yards (the market leader at the time) on price, due to higher steel and labor costs. What the US WAS capable of and the UK wasn't, was to quickly scale up production and produce huge numbers of standard ships during the world wars (well, the vast majority of the WWI ships missed the war). Yes, this was an astounding achievement, and the Liberty ships were crucial to Allied victory in WWII. But competitive on price with UK yards they were not.

https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/why-cant-the-us-build-ships

Good point about the Jones Act acting to make domestic road (and rail) more attractive. Then again, aren't domestic road and rail freight also protected by similar cabotage laws?

Re: The U.S. needs a shipbuilding revolution

#446

Post by deadfoxygrandpa »

vaccineai wrote: post #434
digitalscribe wrote: post #432

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, but most of this is uninformed gibberish. The PRC and its army (the PLA) have experienced nothing short of a breathtaking modernization for both the country and military. Most of the points raise are simply wrong. > 1.) too much corruption within the military. also no real war experience for 40 years China has corruption, yet is able to modernize and build up the military at a pace exceeding the USA's, which s…

> China has corruption, yet is able to modernize and build up the military at a pace exceeding the USA's, which spends at least 2x more. There's no evidence that China can wage a real war against Taiwan, much less near peer, despite having the units on paper, due to the corruptions. Russia has shown that because of military corruption, it's a paper tiger, much like China. There's a reason Xi Jing Ping is trying despe…

china's "broke" because it owes money to itself, specifically to its own central bank. that's not as big a problem as privately owned debt because it means there are potential political solutions if the will is there. the problem is flexible.

also, china is not suffering from deflation. re-read the articles talking about it. they're talking about "deflationary risk", as in, there isn't deflation but there are concerns of potential deflation in the future. there is actually very small (positive) inflation in china

thirdly, china does not import 80% of its food. it imports 80% of its soybeans and some other specific items, but not food as a whole. there is a national policy to rely in domestically produces food for what are seen as the staples like rice and vegetables. imports are mostly in "luxury" food items such as soybeans for livestock feed and stuff like milk, with the idea being that in some sort of extreme situation people would have to cut back on meat and such, which would be survivable

Re: The U.S. needs a shipbuilding revolution

#447

Post by lupusreal »

jjk166 wrote: post #359
ls612 wrote: post #345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The game theoretic problem with this scenario (and thus why a Pacific escalation scenario is so dangerous) is that China has essentially all of its forces in the area around China, whereas the US and its treaty allies have their forces scattered around the world. Thus even if the US has a bigger military most of it won't be in theater on day 1 of a conflict, leading China to have every incentive to move as fast as po…

A naval invasion of Taiwan would be among the largest military operations in history, requiring immense preparation both to produce the necessary equipment and to move it into position, to say nothing of moving and training all the participating forces. In the era of satellite surveillance, the US would know months if not years in advance. They would almost certainly preposition forces in proximity both as a deterren…

Chinese naval assets, most particularly their large transports and landing craft, would be extremely vulnerable to antiship missiles. They're building those anyway, which suggests they have some sort of plan to use them after the antiship missile threat has been eliminated in the region. The most plausible way to accomplish that is to paralyze the American response by having Taiwan capitulate very fast, before the invasion actually takes place. Starting and finishing the war with the rapid destruction of key American military bases and surface assets (almost certainly using missiles, not a "sneaky carrier group") could shock Taiwan into a rapid capitulation, which in turn could neutralize (politically) the American fast attack subs that could otherwise decimate the vulnerable invasion fleet (which they are building, regardless of how little sense it makes to us.)

Re: The U.S. needs a shipbuilding revolution

#448

Post by lupusreal »

aylmao wrote: post #374
ls612 wrote: post #345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The game theoretic problem with this scenario (and thus why a Pacific escalation scenario is so dangerous) is that China has essentially all of its forces in the area around China, whereas the US and its treaty allies have their forces scattered around the world. Thus even if the US has a bigger military most of it won't be in theater on day 1 of a conflict, leading China to have every incentive to move as fast as po…

> Thus even if the US has a bigger military most of it won't be in theater on day 1 of a conflict, leading China to have every incentive to move as fast as possible and present a fait accompli to the West. I disagree. I've think we've seen and will continue to see China acting slowly on this, because their primarily incentivized to not attack. This, on three fronts: - China is not looking for a vassal state. It's loo…

A very quick war against American forces in the region followed by Taiwanese capitulation could leave the Taiwanese public largely untouched by the war, which would serve the CCP's goal of national reunification. This hinges on the US dropping out of the war and licking their wounds after Taiwan gives up on the first or second day, rather than continuing the war even though the Taiwanese government has now 'consented' to the invasion. China's perception of the social circumstance of America is therefore, arguably, the most important consideration for the timing of this war. The best time to do this is when Americans are demoralized and doubting their own righteousness in world affairs, doubting the competence and merit of their military leadership, with their own problems to worry about at home, with isolationist-inclined leaders.

10 years, plus or minus a few. That's my guess.

Re: The U.S. needs a shipbuilding revolution

#449

Post by indymike »

pphysch wrote: post #316
machiaweliczny wrote: post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, Hitler mostly lost a war due to megalomania and spending 1/4th of naval budget on big destroyer instead of producing more ubots.

How did lack of Uboats make him lose the Eastern Front?

Failure to disrupt US shipping lanes to the Allies resulted in Germany having to fight much better-equipped Allied forces. A tank, a howitzer, or a truck on the bottom of the ocean is not a threat. The amount of equipment shipped to the USSR by the US is staggering as well, and one can argue that the Eastern Front would have collapsed without those supplies. More U-boats likely would have dramatically changed the war.

Re: The U.S. needs a shipbuilding revolution

#450

Post by FrustratedMonky »

jabl wrote: post #444
FrustratedMonky wrote: post #380

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes Jones act is failure. But, not seeing how allowing foreign built ships, with foreign crews, owned by foreign companies, somehow leads to a stronger US shipping industry.

The argument I provided in the message starting this subthread that you answered, was to repeal the Jones Act COMBINED with enacting other subsidies and investment to revitalize US domestic shipbuilding and the maritime sector. Merely repealing the Jones Act without any of the other measures would indeed lead to a quick collapse of what little is left of the US civilian maritime sector. (Nuclear option: US Navy ensur…

Ok. I agree with that. And your original comments.

Guess this thread overall had devolved into 'just repeal' and let the 'free market' toughen up the Americans that have gotten weak. Free market will sort it out.

Subsidies and Investments are correct, but deemed 'bad' by the people wanting to cut government.

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