How the United States Lost the Naval War of 2015
1–10 of 47 posts
Re: How the United States Lost the Naval War of 2015
#2Blah blah blah. 'I'm a Navy shill and let me tell you, China's going to kill us all within a very implausibly short-time if we don't shovel billions into cool new ships & weapons. We must eliminate the carrier gap!'
Haven't we heard this story before?
And here I was hoping for an interesting analysis of the Iran wargames and the dismal results for the carrier groups, but all I got was let's build a bigger bluewater fleet.
Re: How the United States Lost the Naval War of 2015
#3For those who can't be bothered reading it, the posited scenario goes something like this:
1. China torpedoes a US aircraft carrier for no particularly good reason
2. China claims that the US aircraft carrier exploded all on its own, and nobody can prove otherwise
3. The US doesn't bother to retaliate
4. The US has thus "lost the Naval War of 2015".
Does this scenario strike anyone as especially plausible?
Re: How the United States Lost the Naval War of 2015
#4For those who can't be bothered reading it, the posited scenario goes something like this: 1. China torpedoes a US aircraft carrier for no particularly good reason 2. China claims that the US aircraft carrier exploded all on its own, and nobody can prove otherwise 3. The US doesn't bother to retaliate 4. The US has thus "lost the Naval War of 2015". Does this scenario strike anyone as especially plausible?
Couldn't the United States send some nuclear-tipped missiles to China in response, and then claim the explosions were simply explosions of the warheads stockpiled in China? I just don't buy 3. as a likely response. Possible, but not likely.
Re: How the United States Lost the Naval War of 2015
#5For those who can't be bothered reading it, the posited scenario goes something like this: 1. China torpedoes a US aircraft carrier for no particularly good reason 2. China claims that the US aircraft carrier exploded all on its own, and nobody can prove otherwise 3. The US doesn't bother to retaliate 4. The US has thus "lost the Naval War of 2015". Does this scenario strike anyone as especially plausible?
Couldn't the United States send some nuclear-tipped missiles to China in response, and then claim the explosions were simply explosions of the warheads stockpiled in China? I just don't buy 3. as a likely response. Possible, but not likely.
And unless step 3 seems not just "likely" but "damn near certain", there's no way the Chinese are going to be dumb enough to attempt step 1.
Re: How the United States Lost the Naval War of 2015
#6Amusing. I enjoyed this part:
The incident—could it really be called a ‘‘war’’?—
Well, when you're making up some hypothetical event in the future, you can call it anything you want. Kind of weird to question it yourself though.
This whole thing is pretty stupid, though. As a former Navy guy, I find it pretty hard to believe that the US wouldn't be able to prove that China was responsible, or that they wouldn't retaliate even if they couldn't prove it.
Re: How the United States Lost the Naval War of 2015
#7For those who can't be bothered reading it, the posited scenario goes something like this: 1. China torpedoes a US aircraft carrier for no particularly good reason 2. China claims that the US aircraft carrier exploded all on its own, and nobody can prove otherwise 3. The US doesn't bother to retaliate 4. The US has thus "lost the Naval War of 2015". Does this scenario strike anyone as especially plausible?
There would be records of the radar track in the computers of the Aegis cruisers in the task force. There may well be evidence of the launch captured by satellites.
ELINT is very powerful, and the US intelligence agencies have been at this game since before WWII. Their sneakiness boggles the mind! They were using signals bounced off of the moon to spy on Soviet equipment, and disguised the whole thing as radio astronomy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFSPHfZQpIQ
If you are going to go up against the US defense establishment, you'd better be damned sure you know what you're doing.
If I were the US, facing such an asymmetric threat, I'd keep most of my carrier groups around for the short term as a boondoggle, then come up with my own novel threat against my opponent's shipping.
(Sub launched cruise missiles, or mines? The advanced 21st century version, of course.)
Re: How the United States Lost the Naval War of 2015
#8Blah blah blah. 'I'm a Navy shill and let me tell you, China's going to kill us all within a very implausibly short-time if we don't shovel billions into cool new ships & weapons. We must eliminate the carrier gap!' Haven't we heard this story before? And here I was hoping for an interesting analysis of the Iran wargames and the dismal results for the carrier groups, but all I got was let's build a bigger bluewater f…
I'd put more resources into cruise missiles launched from submarines and small missile carrying craft with stealth technology.
Re: How the United States Lost the Naval War of 2015
#9And Iraq has chemical weapons, and Iran is a dangerous nuclear power, blah blah blah... Isn't $500 billion a year (50% of the federal budget!) enough for you people?
Re: How the United States Lost the Naval War of 2015
#10For those who can't be bothered reading it, the posited scenario goes something like this: 1. China torpedoes a US aircraft carrier for no particularly good reason 2. China claims that the US aircraft carrier exploded all on its own, and nobody can prove otherwise 3. The US doesn't bother to retaliate 4. The US has thus "lost the Naval War of 2015". Does this scenario strike anyone as especially plausible?
There would be records of the radar track in the computers of the Aegis cruisers in the task force. There may well be evidence of the launch captured by satellites. ELINT is very powerful, and the US intelligence agencies have been at this game since before WWII. Their sneakiness boggles the mind! They were using signals bounced off of the moon to spy on Soviet equipment, and disguised the whole thing as radio astron…
(Sub launched cruise missiles, or mines?)
Nukes.
If I were the US, I'd simply make it an official matter of policy that any attack from a nuclear power would result in an immediate nuclear response, the logic being that once two nuclear powers are at war it's probably going to turn nuclear eventually, so you might as well make the first strike.