If the whole world attacks the US, can the US survive?

So NOT fighting Soviet Russia and possibly starting a global nuclear war is cowardly? Are the Soviets cowardly for not fighting the U.S. too then?

 

What a daft response.

You said no one but Russia could hit the US with a nuclear attack. That's incorrect.

The UK trident system is permanently deployed at sea, with no other parties privy to their location. Each missile has a 7000+ mile range. I don't see how you think that the UK could not launch these nukes at the US.

Yes, MAD would be inevitable but that would be the same if the US attacked the UK!

With regards to what is and isn't currently deployed, In war time, or if a threat was realised, all of the UK's warheads would be on subs. All subs would be at sea. There is a limited deterrent deployed now, as there is limited threat!

Thats the reality. You expect me or anyone else to think that the US could stop the UK's at sea nuclear arsenal from being used? Don't be silly!

So, lets return to you original point. Your incorrect. Russia is not the only nation that could attack the US with a thermonuclear arsenal. You made that claim and it is ridiculous.

Which returns me to a point I make all the time - Any nation with a nuclear arsenal, which it is able to deploy, is as "militarily" powerfull as any other. if you really believe the US has a monopoly on military power, then your an idiot, frankly.

 

So, you think that the rest of the worlds current fleets, supplemented by the thousands and thousands of attack aircraft would not be able to do anything about 11 carrier groups?

 

Show me where I said that?

 

That is more or less correct. It would be a hell of battle, but no. The world's Navies would be relegated to mostly Submarine warfare (which would be a threat). Only a handful of countries even have aircraft carriers, and not a single one on these carriers even come close to their U.S. counterparts in terms of aircraft and capabilities.

Where are these thousands of attack aircraft? What single point on earth could the "world" bring thousands of attack aircraft to bare on a single point? Obviously, the U.S. fleet would stay away from the immediate coast of Europe/China, but more than a few hundred miles from the coast it would be a killing ground.



Here's a fun little chart:

 

Comment #28

 

I said capable of engaging in MAD (mutually assured destruction). The vast size of the U.S., tiny size of the U.K., and limited number of U.K. nukes mean that it wouldn't be able to come close to destroying the entire continental United States before it became molten rock. Of course Britain/France/China could hit the U.S. with a limited number of nuclear weapons (mostly from Subs) but it wouldn't be anywhere near what the ensuing U.S./Russian attack could be.

 

Are you serious?

Ok. Heres the known inventories of just a few choice air forces: -

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_Air_Force#Aircraft_Inventory
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_active_United_Kingdom_military_aircraft
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luftwaffe#Aircraft_inventory
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Air_Force#Aircraft_inventory
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People's_Liberation_Army_Air_Force#Aircraft_inventory

As for your picture. Congratulations. Your aircraft carriers are bigger! Presumably that picture is to prove that your Penis' in the US are bigger than the rest of the world's penis combined? Aircraft carriers are for taking aircraft somewhere that requires them, far from your own shores. What exactly is your point?

If the world was vs the US, we wouldn't need aircraft carrier fleets. We could just bas planes close to US borders.

Your funny. Please carry on!

 

The UK's nuclear arsenal would be sufficient to destroy the US. You believe that the 250 or so Active warheads would be merely an inconvienience to your little world?

The economy would immediately be ruined. All of your major cities would be immediately destroyed. The fallout would see long/mid term death of pretty much all citizens. The burning city would ruin the air, possibly even having global climate implications. Your food chain would be stalled. Your crops would be un-farmable.

The US would probably return in kind, with their excessively large nuclear arsenal. (thats a point.What exactly have you got 10's of thousands of warheads for? Seriously? Are you that insecure over there?! You think its more intimidating than a few hundred? Hate to break it to you, but it isn't!)

So, I'll say it again, The UK is capable of initiating MAD... and you are wrong.

 

So how many of those aircraft are capable of naval operations? Of course the total numbers of aircraft in these Air Forces is several thousand. However, only a small number of them are capable of attacking ships and, more importantly, they're spread all over the place. Russia's Air Force is spread over tens of thousands of square miles. Do they have the command and control to launch a thousand+ aircraft sortie? Do they have the appropriate number of anti-ship missiles? What about the language and doctrinal differences?

Stop with the personal attacks kiddo.

How would you base planes near the U.S.? How would you get British, French, Russian attack aircraft to bases near the U.S.?

 

So, your seriously suggesting the US could defeat the rest of the world? that is what you are seriously getting at? That the US is inaccessible too the rest of us, via such as Canada, Mexico, Brazil and beyond? That getting planes close to your carrier fleets (Which you said would be deployed all around the world, shutting down cargo routes) is an impossibility ? That the rest of the world would be at the mercy of your 13 or so carrier fleets and would be destroyed.


I could continue with the intricacy's of this theoretical war with you, but I feel it is pointless. You believe the US can take on the world and it is clear that your opinion on that will not change, regardless of how ridiculous it seems to the rest of us!

I feel that debating with you is like playing chess against a pigeon. I could be the best player in the world, but you would still just jump on board, poo everywhere, knock all the pieces over and still strut around triumphantly.



(Oh and with regard to the personal attacks, what personal attacks? I merely corrected your misunderstandings.)

 

Each Trident Submarine has 32 warheads. They carry only 16 missiles on them meaning they can only hit 16 targets. The U.K. only has 4 trident Submarines and in a BEST case scenario could keep 2 of them actively at sea (probably only 1 though). So, if EVERYTHING worked out perfectly these two submarines could strike 32 U.S. targets. These submarines would be subject to U.S. ballistic defense missile systems as well as heavy anti-submarine operations. The largest UK warhead is 100KT. Whether they could arm EVERY one of their missiles with 100kT is probably unlikely. The warheads are about 5 times as powerful as the ones dropped on Japan.

The U.S. has 450 Trident missile delivery systems which can each launch anywhere from 3 to 12 warheads with a yield between 300-400kT. In addition the U.S. has 14 Submarines carrying the exact same missiles that the British Trident class carries. They also have a large arsenal that can be launched from bombers, I won't add them in though.


The United Kingdom is 94,060 square miles

The United States is 3,794,101 square miles

In summation, in a nuclear war the United States would be firing at least 20 times as many nuclear weapons (with larger yields) at a country 1/40th of its own size.

32 nuclear weapons 5 times larger than Hiroshima/Nagasaki, while quite devastating, wouldn't even come remotely close to destroying the U.S. in a MAD scenario. If this was the case the U.S./Soviets wouldn't have developed stockpiles in the tens of thousands with thousands of launch vehicles. They would have just had a handful of Subs with 16 missiles as the British do.

 

Stop putting words in my mouth. Try and be calm and reasonable. I said that in the short term (2-5 years) U.S. naval superiority would make life very difficult for the rest of the world. In those first 2-5 years the U.S. Navy would likely be able to take on the rest of the world's Navies combined (albeit with heavy casualties). I said nothing about the conflict at large, though naval power would be more than sufficient to deter any invasion of the continental U.S. The rest of the world is significantly behind the U.S. in power projections. Something that would be absolutely vital for them to cross thousands of miles of ocean to invade a massive power.

It took the U.S./U.K. several years to assemble an invasion force large enough to land on mainland Europe. The allies had naval and air superiority at the time as well as the benefit of the Eastern front to draw away German resources. In invading America the rest of the world would not have the luxury of a great big island right next to the target.

In such a war Canada and Mexico would be isolated and either occupied, or more likely, pushed to join the U.S. It would take enormous fleets and constant fleets of merchant vessels to send the millions of men and thousands of aircraft to South America. Remember the Battle of the Atlantic? That was a brutal campaign that cost thousands of lives and millions of tons of cargo. During every minute of that battle the British/Americans had overwhelming naval superiority. The Germans didn't have 11 massive carrier fleets to interdict them. The "World" Navy wouldn't have anywhere close to the naval assets to protect their merchant fleet.

Trying to comment on the size of someone's Penis is generally considered personal insults. I understand though, not everyone can keep a cool head and be civil in discussions.

 

I'm thinking Ted Nugent, armed with a cross-bow, would probably be enough to handle the UK panty waists...

I kid, I kid.

The UK has some kick ass tanks...I saw a Challenger 1 tank up close and personal in Gulf War I and it's impressive.... It's the only tank in that conflict that did not suffer any losses due to enemy fire. The reason, it gets the first shot off...vital in tank warfare...
it can hit a target up to 3 miles away...4.8 km.

In my opinion, the Challenger 2, successor to the Challenger 1, is superior to our Abrams main battle tank; the only issue is there weren't a whole lot of them built.
Challenger 2 is, again in my humble opinion, the best main battle tank in the World at the moment. It's proven itself in combat.

 

Your wrong again.

The Vanguard class subs are capable of carrying 16 missiles each, each missile capable of carrying up to 12 warheads. Each sub is capable of carrying up to 190 or so warheads. All subs are usually at a state of "readyness", with one at sea. In the current climate, that is all that is required. ( however, of course, a MAXIMUM of 1 may be not "ready" due to maintenance.) Effectively, the UK's entire nuclear arsenal is deployable if need be... it was planned that way. If we wanted or need to have all ships out, with all nukes, we would and could do that.

So, there you have an actual total of 64 missiles, carrying the entire UK stockpile of approx 250 warheads (MIRV warheads, I should add, which makes the actual effect of smaller warheads much greater and also makes all known anti-ballistic missile systems which you talk about unreliable. This is part of the reason from the SMART II treaty between the US and Russia - to prevent another arms race).


Of course, the US has a larger stockpile and can return in kind. I don't see what your trying to get at? That is MAD is it not?

I don't see how the US being geographically larger and having more nukes, correlates at all with whether or not the UK could instigate a MAD scenario?

 

That Ted Nugent bit made me actually LOL! I can take the banter!

I do (of course) agree with the Challenger 2 being the best.. they are great pieces of kit. Chobham armour - another great UK invention!

 

The Brits designed and built one heck of a nice tank.
It went through Iraqi (Soviet) tanks like butter in the Persian Gulf War...over 300 destroyed with no losses; the successor tank, Challenger 2 has fared very well in Op. Iraqi Freedom also...it's armor stands up well to IED's and RPG's.

 

Thats a great picture by the way.

Infact, if you chuck in a few obese people (Floridian perhaps?) on Bass and Drums, with Golden Arch tattoos on their chests, it would pretty much some up how the rest of the world see's the US.

 

We have plenty of granola eating hippies to counter the gun loving rock n' roller Ted Nugent...

America is very diverse.

 

Much like the UK. Except, apparently, we have bad teeth.

 

To me, it is more like they live seperated from reality.

In places like California they think that whatever they want, they get. They are like a region filled with little children, still waiting for Peter Pan to return and rule Neverland. They pass these meaningless laws and resolutions, and think that it really means something. They demand that they be kept safe, but scream at anything that is actually done to make it so.

It is not that they are "fairy like", as much as totally detached from reality. They scream about violence in the street, then scream again when laws are made that stops drug dealers from congregating on street corners. Then once the law is overturned, they then scream again because the drug dealers are in front of their houses.

Personally, I hate the West Coast. The people are delusional, and think that they have the perfect solutions to everything. High taxes, free everything to everybody, war is wrong, no nuclear power, no oil power, only green power, but don't you dare raise my electric rates to pay for it. Electric cars, fuel cell cars, no drilling, no refineries, but don't you dare raise my gas price.

Most of the nation sees them as a giant joke, but they don't get it. They go on about how they are ignorant fools, like all the racists that live in Idaho. But none of them see that those racists moved to Idaho from California (Richard Butler moved from Palmdale to Hayden Lake to build his "Aryan Nation compound).

And even more sadly, they are a state dependent on their neighbors (they do not make enough electricity or have enough water to support themselves). Yet they complain when another state wants to build a power plant or dam for water, because they claim they will "screw up" their state.

And yes, I am from California. Next week I am moving back to California, and I wish I did not have to.

 

The rest of your argument is as faulty as that one.

The UK is prepared to use nuclear weapons against rogue states such as Iraq if they ever used "weapons of mass destruction" against British troops in the field, defence secretary Geoff Hoon has told MPs.

http://web.archive.org/web/20021020052015/http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/1883258.stm

And every statement I have ever seen is the same. Only to be used if such weapons were used against them or their troops first.

 

True. And I have never heard any serious claims that the US (or anybody else) could take out the Soviets or Russia either. I certainly do not believe they can.

 

Got that right. They could not even get together to stop genocide in their own back-yard.

 

Did you even look at what the parity of forces was in the Gulf War?

950,000 to 650,000. In an offensive war where it is generally accepted that the attacker needs 2 to 3 times the number of forces in order to be successfull.

According to traditionally military theory, the US and it's Allies should have been heavily punished. That should have dragged on for weeks, with horrible casualties for the invading forces.

Instead, it lasted a matter of days, with more people killed in accidents then in combat.

And why should we fight Russia? We have no more reason to fight them they they do to fight us. I absolutley love how some in here consider us bloodthirsty, yet those of us in the military generally reject the idea of useing force in most instances.

Seems to me more like a case of self projection onto others.