Eject! Eject! Eject!

[Lonnie]

You guys still didn't answer the question why. Given a choice between N. Korea and the US, do you REALLY think when the shit hits the fan, they are going to foresake their fatted cow (US) for Kim Jong Il?

China maintains relations with N. Korea because nobody else does. That = $$$ for china. But the US equals many more $$$$$$$ for them. When it comes down to it, they'll ask them to step inline. This isn't the 1950's and 60's anymore. The Korean war and Vietnam were wars fought for ideology. Today's wars are fought for $$$$$$$.

In the future, wars will be fought over natural resources. Water will be the new oil.

[DJSapp]

N. Korea is China's puppet, and S. Korea is their manifestation of the US. As soon as some trade relation goes a little sideways (think human rights embargo or tarrif) China calls KJI and tells him to go stir the pot. Whenever you do that, there is always a chance for shit to get out of control.

[Lonnie]

N. Korea is China's puppet, and S. Korea is their manifestation of the US. As soon as some trade relation goes a little sideways (think human rights embargo or tarrif) China calls KJI and tells him to go stir the pot. Whenever you do that, there is always a chance for shit to get out of control.

Why do that an risk nuclear annihilation, when they could just sell off the 8 gazillion Treasury bonds they hold and bring us to our knees that way?


And why do you think they bought those t-bill anyway???

[Rubicon]

You guys still didn't answer the question why.

Why has any nation throughout human history built a military? To use it.

The history of Europe and Asia is one of conquest and empires. Just because America came along and kicked everyone's butt 60 years ago doesn't mean that the imperial tendencies that stretch back thousands of years and have defined those continents throughout history suddenly ceased to exist.

China maintains relations with N. Korea because nobody else does.

China maintains relations with them because they share a border and right now it is more beneficial for them to maintain relations with them than it is to have millions of starving Koreans streaming into their country.

If a cost benefit analysis ever returns a negative result for China they will likely abandon N Korea without giving it a second thought.

[DJSapp]

Why do that an risk nuclear annihilation, when they could just sell off the 8 gazillion Treasury bonds they hold and bring us to our knees that way?


And why do you think they bought those t-bill anyway???

I'm thinking more of a lover's spat, not slipping cyanide into your partners coffee. There are different levels here, not just peace and global thermonuclear war.

The trade issues are more likely to come from the UN and NATO, not just the US (we love us some walmart, and we know they're feeding our consumerism). Smacking S. Korea gets the attention of those bodies and isn't a direct attack on the US. It's a very complicated perception game.

[Garrett]

That's right - we owned the sky and the ground beneath it. I think you're forgetting that Saddam had an Airforce (for a day or 2) and the 4th largest standing Army in the world... and that winning the air war is the key to a quick ground assault.

I'm not forgetting that. You think if we had showed up with merely the RAF the war would have been drawn out and iffy? There is superiority, and then there is useless excess.

The planted artillery shell/IED was never used as a weapon of war, but of creating unrest. No different than a suicide bomber, just less costly.

You can define "war" however you want, but moving the goalposts doesn't change the fact that IEDs have kicked our asses, and we weren't well prepared for that and other absolutely forseeable circumstances after the wars we were obviously going to win easily. Insurgency, war, whatever you call it the results are what matter...and the results aren't very much in the win column for us.

What AK said. You don't know what you are talking about.

So you quote an analysis of the Chinese having new fighters better in many ways than 1970's F15s equipped with 1980's missiles? I don't know what I'm talking about, but you're not exactly making a cogent and complete argument there.

[Jumper Bones]

And a C-17 crashed tonight in Alaska, on air show practice as well. Looks very grim for the 4 onboard.

I'm beginning to hate air shows.

Garrett, sorry I've been wanting to reply to you, been too busy...since the padded room has the 'adult content' disclaimer I can't really click "yeah" while on gov't computers at work...

[Gripen]

Holy crap. There is some buzzword filled pop culture bullshit rhetoric in this thread. I haven't had time in the past few days to form a reply but I'll work on it tonight.


Jumper Bones, as per usual however, is pretty much on the money.

[Rubicon]

Great. But why would China want to start anything with it's largest trading partner? We make up between 1/4 to 1/3 of their exports. That's like cutting off your nose to spite your face.

China is spend a lot of money to build up their military, and many of the weapons systems they are investing in are suited to asymmetrical warfare(anti-ship missiles, submarines, anti-satellite capabilities, etc.). Meaning that they are preparing to fight us. The 'why' is secondary to the fact that they are doing it.

Case in point.

Chinese missile could shift Pacific power balance

By ERIC TALMADGE Thu Aug 5, 5:43 pm ET

"The Navy has long had to fear carrier-killing capabilities," said Patrick Cronin, senior director of the Asia-Pacific Security Program at the nonpartisan, Washington-based Center for a New American Security. "The emerging Chinese antiship missile capability, and in particular the DF 21D, represents the first post-Cold War capability that is both potentially capable of stopping our naval power projection and deliberately designed for that purpose."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100805/...carrier_killer

[Rubicon]

China needs powerful "carrier killer"

* Source: Global Times
* [01:04 September 06 2010]


China's anti-ship ballistic missile (ASBP), known as the "carrier killer," is close to operational, said the commander of the US Pacific Command, Admiral Robert Willard, in Tokyo recently. While US aircraft carriers appear more active in China's offshore waters, concern over China's ASBP is rising in the West.

China has never pursued a policy of confrontation with other world powers, including the US. However, it does need a strategic deterrence. In a bid to protect its own strategic interests, China should not only build its anti-ship missile capacity, but also possess a range of other carrier-destroying measures as well.

http://opinion.globaltimes.cn/editor...09/570320.html

..........

[QuikR12]

why does Canada have fighter jets?

For the airshows.

[Rubicon]

You guys still didn't answer the question why.

Because they can, and they want to prove themselves.

Is the PLA taking over Beijing? Hawkish officers are increasingly seeing their views become China's policy, says Gordon Chang.

...

In addition, there's been a spate of unusually hostile public comments from military officers, especially on their desire to engage in combat with America. In February, for example, a Chinese colonel, Meng Xianging, promised a 'hand-to-hand fight with the US.' Meanwhile, Major-General Yang Yi that same month said China 'must punish the US…We must make them hurt.'

...

The implications of the resulting remilitarization of China are clearly significant. For one thing, Beijing this spring, apparently goaded by the PLA, for the first time expanded its definition of 'core interests' to include its old—and baseless—claims over vast stretches of international water and airspace, including the continental shelves of five other nations—the Philippines, Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia and Vietnam.

Meanwhile, Chinese admirals have been demanding that the US Navy get out of the Yellow Sea and the rest of Asian waters. At the same time, Beijing insists nations in the region acknowledge Chinese supremacy—in recent months China has taken on the United States, Japan and the nations bordering the South China Sea in a series of disputes it has initiated.

The reality is that China’s ambitions know few bounds these days. 'China’s military spending is growing so fast that it has overtaken strategy,' said Huang Jing of Singapore’s Lee Kwan Yew School of Public Policy to London’s Telegraph. 'The young officers are taking control of strategy and it is like young officers in Japan in the 1930s. They are thinking what they can do, not what they should do.'

That arrogance, unfortunately, is the result of the ongoing remilitarization of Chinese politics and policy.

http://the-diplomat.com/2010/09/21/t...on-of-beijing/

[Arty50]

This is, itself, an indictment of developing moneypits like the F-22. And battleships. Both are nearly useless except so far as they can be used outside of their design role.

A lot of talk was made of keeping the battleships around for so long. There was one argument few could challenge though. Countermeasures exist for most every missile. Tomahawks, for instance, can be shot down. To this day however, no one has ever figured out how to stop, much less track, a 16" armor-piercing shell. The first volley would be landing on your beach before you even knew it. Each gun (of which there were nine) could also spit out two a minute. Never mind the fact that each shell costs a fraction of the 7 figure price tag of a Tomahawk. The bombardments during the 1st Iraq War were also critical in selling the feint amphibious assault on Kuwait.

From what I recall, we didn't really know how far we could trust smart weapons at the time. Sure they had a huge impact like no other time in history, but they still missed quite often from what I remember. A lot of lessons were learned and they got much better as a result, but having a battleship or two around to shell the everliving shit out of beach during an amphibious assault was still the gold standard at the time.

All that said, they're really fucking old, incredibly expensive to maintain, and their primary mission has largely been killed off by the modern carrier group. So there's no point in keeping them around anymore, which is why we decommissioned them...and which makes this whole argument moot.