And that means what exactly? That the US can take more men to war in places like Iraq and Afghanistan. Russia does not seem to do that much nowadays... Why do they need such a large Navy?
Oh I forgot the French aswell, but apart from the UK and France, nobody else would really care unless the US was doing war crimes. Russia just invaded Georgia and has large anti insurgency operations. They are a much less powerful navy because they don't have the money, but it just over took the UK and France as the 3rd biggest spender on defence.
Not really. The thread is about the possability of invasion, not military spending. The two have little to nothing to do with each other. After all, consider this: In 1861, if you took the GDP and industry of each of the states and then lined them up next to each other, it is obvious that the South had little chance. Yet they started a war anyways. One has absolutely nothing to do with the other.
Chine would not invade the US, simply because it can not invade the US. Try to turn your mind back to 1944, before the Atom Bomb had even been invented. Look at what kind of manpower and equipment was needed to conduct an invasion of another country via water. Look at the size of the fleets needed for such actions as D-Day, the Invasion of the Philippines, the Invasion of Okinawa, and the proposed Invasion of Japan. Look at the sheer numbers of not only manpower but equipment, and tell me that China has even 1% of what would be needed to conduct such an operation. This is why such an action will simply never happen. Throw away all of the nukes in the world, and it still will not happen simply because no country on the planet at this time has anything even close to the required Naval assets to conduct such an operation. The US probably has the closest, but still not even enough to even take on a repeat of Tarawa or Iwo Jima. Those are the plain and simple facts. Hide behind whatever you like, it is not nukes that prevent such an event. It is simple logistics.
And cast your mind back to 1945, when the Manhatten Project realised its dream in the creation of Little Boy and Fat Man. Weeks after these were dropped, WW2 was finished. The World of War changed that day. Invasions of powerful countries were over forever, unless the antagonist wished to invoked worldwide catastrophe. Has it ever occured to you that those sizes of Naval fleets are not required today because the leaders of the world know that they would be completely pointless if the country they invaded could retaliate with a nuclear attack? Or if one of that countries allies would do the same? Again, refer to the Cuban missile crisis - The US was powerless to do anything but discuss the issue with the Soviets, and put contingencies in place for apreemptive or retaliatory strike. The UK has never signed up to a non-first use policy, exactly for this reason. You really think that naval fleets govern whether or not a country could consider invading another? Thats frankly ridiculous. So your saying that the US could invade Russia? The fact is, it couldnt. not because of the logistics, but because of the perosn in control of the button.
The UK defence minster said it will never use nuclear weapons unless it's troops or British territory is attacked first by WMD's, so if Argentina in the Falklands had use chemical weapons the UK could have use nuclear weapons, or if Syria attacks British bases on Cyprus with chemical weapons the UK could use nuclear weapons against Syria. It's not like the UK is going to use them willy nilly and doesn't have proper command and control in place. Pakistan is the only dangrous nuclear power without proper command and control, it has never said or signed anything saying it will never strike first. Which is why I hope Iran Kahn wins the Pakistan election, he may not like the US but he will also wants to get rid of Pakistan's nuclear weapons. There is also a debate in the UK right now about Scottish independence and what would happen to our only nuclear submarine base in Scotland, the twits are saying Scottish independence speeds up nuclear non-proliferation, but all it would do it force the UK government to spend billions of pound to build a new base somewhere in England or Wales. Have you ever hear of Pax Americana? Where the US dominates the oceans of the world and protects shiping lanes under treaties with other nations, that's why the US has a large fleets, why can it have this large fleet because of it's huge economy, something Russia doesn't have. What happens after the Russian's and Americans hit each other which nuclear missiles then what, the US has the ability to then land thousends of troops on Russian soil, Russia can't do anything, Russia couldn't take out all the US submarines, carrier groups, bases around the world. Mushroom naver said anything about the US being able to invade Russia.
Wrong, the UK retains the right to first use against a non-nuclear (or WMD) attack on its soil....AND stated once that it may use them if WMDs were used on its troops abroad. That does not mean they will fire them off "willy-nilly". If an enemy landed on British shores, the UK would consider nukes. Disparities in population and geographical size are the reasoning. Infact, it is widely believed that a nuclear armed sub was stationed near Argentina during the Falklands.
Excuse me, can I stop laughing now? Now I invite you to go back to that list I posted earlier, of all the Invasions since the end of WWII. And now try to tell me again that invasions are a thing of the past. Specifically to this little play you probably have never heard of, Inchon. Where over 40,000 troops were landed. Nope, no invasions there. Never gonna happen.
So going off what your saying, why didn't the UK just end the war and fire some nuclear missiles at Argentina? Oh that's right because they didn't use WMD's against us, and which tinpot nation Argentina is going to defeat the UK armed force. How close to the Falklands was the submarine stationed?
Actually I am pretty sure I have, but it may have been another thread. But not even the US has the capability to do any kind of major invasion anymore without a major build-up in an allied nation first. We simply lack the kind of sealift assets needed to do something like that today. Most people do not realize that "Operation Desert Shield" was mostly a cover and defense web in order to build up the kinds of troops and equipment needed to retake Kuwait from Iraq. That was a major operation, and it took months to build up the needed supplies and material. And unless we can do something similar in say Georgia or Poland, there is no way we could do it against Russia. We have the closest kind of Navy required, but we do not have it anymore. During WWII we moved multiple Divisions to battlefields all at the same time. I do not think we can move much more then 2 Regiments today. And we completely and totally lack the kind of heavy firepower that is needed to assault a hostile shore anymore. I think the largest guns carried on our ships now are 5" guns. Nothing that even comes close to the 16" guns that are on our Battleships, and almost required to take hostile shores.
Actually, I have neither found any references to this. And I find it very strange that this would have happened, since with the range of a Polaris Missile (over 2,000 nautical miles), putting one into harms way in a war zone would be absolutely stupid in the extreme. I might accept that, if "near" means something like off the coast of South Africa, or in the Pacific off the coast of Peru. Getting one of those much closer would be so imbicilic it would be hard to describe.
Grow up. GIF's are for teenagers. And I am going to redirect you the point i made very clearly earlier - Invasions of great powers, or countries with 100% support support of such a power, will never happen again unless the antagonist accepts the possibility of Nuclear War. North Korea is neither of these things. Intervention in the Korean civil war had the backing of the UN. The North had commy support, but Russia and China were alone against the rest of the World - They had very little choice but to sit back and watch. They could not really justify to the UN that an invasion form the North was a good thing could they, besides, they didn't really care i dont think. It was not Cuba was it? So why did the US never invade the Soviet Union then? Or Vice Versa? look up "The Cold War" - There's lots of information about it on the Internet. Why has there been no intervention in Syria? Nato were quick off the blocks in Libya? Oh, thats right, Russia and China say no!
LOL! Plan an invasion of Russia in Poland?! LOL!!!!! Russia didn't even let the US put a missile shield in Poland!
Inchon is why unclebob is wrong. After WW2 the US made huge cut backs to it's amphibious capabilities because they thought they could just use nuclear weapons. So what in your view would be needs for US to do a amphibious invasion of a medium power with a good military like say Brazil? Would the US not have enough capabilities if it restored it's reserve and NISMF fleet to active service?
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha, retard. China had nothing to do with the Korean war, and Russia never tryed to plant mines befor the invasion of Inchon, no they never did that as the rest of the world was against them. There are many reasons why the NATO doesn't want to go into Syria, it has almost nothing to do with Russia or China being against it. First off Syria is a rather important country, next to Israel and Turkey which the US could mass troops, but what would the benefit to the US be? Egypt is a cockup, Syria would become the same, Turkey will just have to hold it's nerve. Also Syria is hurting one of Iran's main allies and the Russia are putting in million of dollar worth of equipment, just like the Chinese did in Libya, where as the US is getting Gulf allies to do it.
In particular, why didn't the UK just Nuke Argentina? Why didn't the UK just attack another nation with Nuclear weapons, when that nation invaded one of the UK's small colonies and did not kill a single civilian? Because doing that would be almost as stupid as your question.
Moderarators - Personal insult. "Retard". Mushroom is getting frustrated it seems? I meant the Battle of Inchon - China did not intervene when the west the West prevented the Norths invasions of the South. With regards to Syria, what did the US gain from supporting the overthrow of Gaddafi? Not much, But Russias interest were not as strong. And I notice you avoided the Poland question. You're probably going to use Obamas offical excuse for the U-turn i reckon.
Uhhh, yea, right. That explains why PATRIOT has been in Poland for the last 2 years, right? http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304177104577309840874143260.html Nope, no missile shield here! Oh, and I hate to tell you this, but there is no "Missile Shield", in Poland, or England or even the US for that matter. It simply does not exist anywhere. At this time, ABD means PATRIOT and AEGIS class ships with the SM3 missile. THAAD is coming online, but it is still probably a decade or more from full deployment. And those fancy rockets you see flying from Alaska do have their use, but it is pretty limited and it is still very much a "test system in development", that we have been told will be deployed within the next "3-5 years" for over 15 years now. And not that I would expect Poland to support such a proposal, that was an example of what would be needed, nothing more.
I said retard, I wasn't called you a retard, I just said it. China did invade Korea though to help the North and the Russians did try and mine befor Inchon. It was mainly Sarkozy and Cameron that wanted Gaddafi killed, I think we know why. Syria is up to Turkey and Israel, the US will do what they want, not Russia. I avoided the Poland question because I know nothing about.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_missile_defense_complex_in_Poland Russia said no. USA did not do it. Simple.
Don't do it. Period. If you have to do an invasion, do everything in your power to make it a land based invasion, from a neighboring friendly nation. I am even going to throw in something not many people know of. During the Gulf War, Saddam absolutely obsessed over the Marines that were floating around in their transports, and with the BBs that were throwing those great big honking shells over 20 miles away. He had a huge percentage of his assets lined along the coast, to repel the Marines when they stormed ashore. And he and his forces watched very closely as once a week or so the Marines loaded up on their carriers, went out and made "practice runs" in preperation to the expected massive amphibious landings outside of Kuwait City. And while he was looking at what was right in front of his nose, he totally missed the actual stroke that came right up his... well, you know. Then those same Marines got onto their helicopters and secured the airport, from the air. http://www.history.navy.mil/wars/dstorm/ds5.htm Those are just some excerpts from a really good review of Marine operations during the Gulf War. And trust me when I say that an Amphibious Assault is absolutely the most stupid, costly, and insane way to ever plan on doing a military operation. Because unless you are both extreemly lucky and extreemly good, it comes off as a disaster if you win or loose. It is like 2 guys getting into a knife fight. Even the winner is messed up and spends a long time healing from the woinds. And no, the US would not have enough capability without massive changes. Including reactiviation of all the Battleships, building scores of new troop transports (we do not even have many in the reserve fleet, most have been scrapped or sunk). And you had better plan on a major expansion of the Marine Corps, probably back to WWII levels when they had 6 full time Divisions (instead of the current 3 Divisions and 1 in reserve).
Uhh, I did not post that, care to try again? And oh yes, China did not intervene at all. Those 1.3 million Chinese were just migrant rice pickers. And those were not tank divisions, those were covored tractors for the bad weather. And the aircraft, those were 12 air divisions worth of jet powered crop dusters.
