Is China's power overrated?

China is not a problem yet but they will be, have no doubts about it.

Economics: China has one huge problem that they are addressing as I type. Infrastructure and Logistics, China's ports can't handle the volume. Ships that want to load or unload in the ports are forced to wait for day’s even weeks sometime. They are aggressively renovating and creating new ports to address this bottle neck. Same is to be said about roads and or highways they have an awful struggle trying to get their products to port due to their poor roadways. They are building new roads and highways, this is going to greatly increase their GDP possibly triple it. Then you have the fact that the government is beginning to embrace capitalism and the Chinese are ecstatic about it, for the first time in history their government is letting them make extra money for working harder, hence the cell phone boom going on in China. With 1.4 billion people getting their first look at being able to get ahead by working harder they are going to blow the west away economically. Remember these are not the pussified westerners that have no idea how good they have had it since WWII, these are people dedicated to work with not much to show for it, they love their country, and have been breed to honor and obey their government. Within 20 years they will blow past the USA economically and that will give them everything they need to pass the west militarily.
Military: China will use their massive increases in GDP to build a military that no nation will have the economy to compete with. They have gone from a green navy to a yellow navy and they are bent on attaining a blue navy, this will be realized in the next 20 to 30 years. They are spending a lot of money on catching up to the west and everything new that is developed is aimed at defeating US military units. They have a laser they are installing on their tanks that disable targeting ability’s of the M1A1 Abrams and a myriad of other items they are developing and producing to take on US units. I am not saying they are planning to go to war with the US or other western nations it’s merely a good practice and common sense to aim at defeating the best available.
China will dominate this planet, it’s only a matter of time, unless they turn back to socialism and I think they are smart enough to not make that mistake again.

 

China is one of the most dangerous countri s in the world to our way of like and Obama will not stand up to them but in fairness neither did Bush.

 

This is highly reactionary conclusion. China is an emerging global actor with power status on the horizon, but is not there yet. There are innumerable setbacks to its rise, too many to explain in great detail. Bearing this in mind, the United States has an interest to garner cooperation with China to ensure that its inevitable culmination to global power status does not upset our status on the world stage.

 

China isn't a problem. American leftists are the problem.

 

And are you aware of where Okinawa is? South Korea?

And if China starts making agressive moves in the region, I expect that a lot of traditional US allies we be welcoming the US back to one degree or another simply for their own protection (Philippines).

One thing the Philippines has learned, that if we are told to close the bases in a resonable amount of time, we will do so and leave. In 1992 the last US forces departed the islands.

Oh, and seems I spoke to soon. A joint Philippine-US base is in the works now for Subic Bay.

http://manilastandardtoday.com/2012/10/03/joint-ph-us-base-in-the-works-in-subic/

http://www.sunstar.com.ph/pampanga/local-news/2012/10/04/us-submarine-dock-subic-friday-246391

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/283508/us-assault-ship-due-in-subic-for-goodwill-visit

 

This is great.
Just as with the commies, Islam is becoming the old threat and the *****s are taking over as the new great enemy of the west and free world.

How long before some idiot bombs a Chinese restaurant because they're forcing Confucianism on the US people?
Watch this space.

 

The thing is, most people even to this day still have absolutely no idea what the entire war was really about in the first place.

At the time of that war, Argentina was under the control of a failing military junta. The "Dirty War" had been going on for around a decade, A coup 5 years earlier had put the military in charge of the country, and it was starting to rapidly crumble. In a great many ways, that was more intended to be a "Patriotic War" to raise support inside Argentina then to actually seize the islands themselves.

The leaders knew that they could not be held against the British, but it was hoped that the war would give the people an outside enemy to focus on, and let them rebuild their nation around that patriotic fervor. And in many ways, it did work. However, once the war was lost, along with the flagship of their navy and the bodies, the rage redoubled against the Junta and it collapsed shortly afterwards.

So it has nothing to do with backbone, they actually thought they had achieved their goals. They got their own people (and other nations) to focus on another enemy, and one that had invaded them in the past. However, the government was already starting to collapse before this happened, so the invasion did not save it, and ultimately may have sped up it's collapse.

 

If the Philippines was going to spend $20 billion on it's navy over the next 10 years, they want 3 new conventional submarines, planes and helicopters. Which new ships, subs and aircraft would you advise the Philippines to buy to patrol their waters and defend against possible China aggression?

 

I would recommend Guided Missile Destroyers. In fact, they probably missed a real deal by not buying the Kidd class destroyers that Taiwan bought a few years ago. But for that money, they could purchase around 12 brand new Arleigh Burke class destroyers.

http://www.defensenews.com/article/...4/Saudi-Arabia-Mulling-BMD-Capable-Destroyers

And we still have some pretty good relations with the Philippines. I would not be surprised if the Navy and State Department was not able to actually come to some agreement to sell them some of our older Burke class destroyers, one of our Ticonderoga class Cruisers, and some good rebuilt aircraft (like the A-4AR). Although for patrol aircraft, the P-3 would actually be an excellent choice.

For a nation like the Philippines, the Burkes would be a great choice. They already have people who are familiar with working on them (back when Subic Bay was a US Navy Base), they are fast, and have some pretty good flexability for multiple missions. And with 1 or 2 of the Ticonderoga class cruisers they can work very well together (both use the AEGIS system).

And for subs, I am not sure how much those would help them. I honestly think that other then for uses like ballistic missile launchers (where the idea is to stay far out to sea away from everything), the use of subs is pretty much dead against technological enemies.

If they were really worried about Chinese Subs, I would also suggest throwing in one of the Tarawa class ships (1 is awaiting disposal, one is in reserve). These "baby flattops" can carry 6 Harriers, and up to 12 Sea Knight helicopters. Simply throw in a dozen of the S-70 (export version of the SH-60), and that gives them both a limited patrol capability with fighter support, but also a real good ASW capability.

There are some (*)(*)(*)(*)ed good deals available for US allies in buying our surplus military equipment. And I am sure for that amount, the US would be more then willing to sell some pretty good stuff to the Philippines.

But I would not bother with the subs. Unless you are a real super power, they simply are not all that effective in modern warfare.

 

The Strategic Maritime Military Analysis Group on Facebook asked the question to it's member just wonder what you thought. It's very interesting most people say the Philippines should get more missile boats so they can hide behind islands and do hit and run missions against the Chinese navy. The 3 submarines were a add on to the project to make it abit harder. I was going for ships like the Formidable class frigate and Challanger class submarines. I never thought to US would sell that cheap, I will pass on what you have said here and see what the other members say.

 

That would actually be a good idea. The subs should really only be used to gather intel or sink something underwater. Unless they have invisible subs like we do, it won't do any good. They will be picked up on sonar. It think that would benefit the Philippians well to hide while they attack.

But as far as China's ground forces go. They have 300,000,000 man army. If they just march them forward in a straight line, we couldn't stop them. But everything goes the same way. Usually your greatest advantage is your greatest disadvantage. How easy would it be to drop a bomb and kill 1 million of them. Where do you put 300,000,000 troops. Well you put them in sardine cans and march them forward. Their casualties would be very high with our air superiority.

Their numbers would quickly fall until they got a managable number of people. At that point they would have low moral having lost huge numbers in their ranks.

China is dangerous in China. America is nasty everywhere.
China would have to destroy our navy and then desimate our Air Force before they ever land a single person. But they can't so China-men will never march in my front yard.

If China ever started marching west, we have to destroy their navy and fire missiles till they ran out of factories. Unless the Chinese army can swim well, they will stay in China. They just have too many people to take over the world.

When the world is taken over, it will be a unanimous decision.

 

Well, the Kidd class destroyers were pretty much the same as the Arleigh Burke class, and we sold all 4 of them to Taiwan for $732 million. And with the number of small islands that make up the Philippine chain, there are multiple places for them to hide, without having to go to the expense of a new "stealth ship".

And the reason I suggested the Burke and Ticonderoga class ships is that we either have them in storage for disposal now, or will have them in that status in the future. And these are really powerfull ships since the AEGIS combat systems let them all communicate with each other.

And the weapons they each carry is of a longer range and more power then those on the frigate you mentioned. The Challenger has 32 anti-air missiles, with a max range of 20 km. So they can't even fire on an attacking aircraft that fires anti-ship missiles, the bost it can hope for is to destroy the missile itself. An older Burke has up to 90 RIM-67 missiles, with a range of 180 km. A significant stand-off advantage.

And as far as China having enough soldiers to walk over any enemy, how are they going to walk to the Philippines? We do not have to worry about stopping them from marching 300 million soldiers to the Philippines, the Pacific Ocean will do that for us.

However, a handfull of Burke class destroyers and 1 or 2 Ticonderoga class cruisers will make a very warm welcome for the incoming troop transports.

 

Inchin' their way to dat 200 million man army in Revelation...

Asian Powers Increase Military Spending
October 15, 2012 - A new study shows that over the past decade, five Asian powers have increased military spending to levels among the highest in the world, with China leading the way.

 

Please don't use the term "*****s." It's offensive.

Muslims and Chinese aren't the problem for this country. American leftists are the sole problem.

 

Most people outside the US think it's the rightwing that's the problem.

 

I know. But foreign opinion is irrelevant to the internal struggle between the American left and the American right. The two sides in America have both decided that coexistence is no longer possible. In such an existential domestic struggle non-Americans have no input.

 

I am not sure about the US letting Burkes be sold, the US becoming short of ships and the Burkes are the best ships in the world. But 2 Ticonderoga's for about $1 billion would be very good, even better if the Tomahawk could be included, but that wishful thinking on my part. Tarawa class also would be very good but I question the Philippines navies ability to fly Harriers, Tarawa class could also be used to retake islands taken by the Chinese like the Scarborough Shoal. The Formidable class frigate has the aster 30 missile which has a range of 120 km, in 2016 the UK will start operating the sea Ceptor missile to replace the aster 15 missile both of which are short range missiles, sea Ceptor can be doubt packed increasing the number of missiles to over 50.

 

There is a correlation between the growth of Chinese military power and development of the coalition of its neighbors in opposition. China intends to restore the Middle Kingdom at the expense of its neighbors. That doesn't work for China's neighbors.

 

Actually, the original class of Burkes are 20 years old, and on their next scheduled major maintenance are going to be getting significant upgrades. I would be willing to bet that if an ally showed interest in purchasing them, the Navy would sell some and simply build newer ones.

As for the Ticonderogas, they would probably be best used as a flagship and C&C center.

As far as a Tarawa being used for "retaking an island", they only carry about a Battalion of Marines, that is not very many. I think their best use would be as an ASW platform, as well as disaster relief (one of these could carry a lot of supplies). And I do not really question their ability to operate Harriers. Remember, we had a large Navy base there for decades, and a lot of their sailors operated with ours. And I am sure that there are at least some that operated the Harrier with our Marines. And actually if this ship had a wider deck, I would actually recommend a fixed wing turboprop aircraft instead for recon purposes. But because of the width of the deck and the lack of catapaults or arresting gear, it is pretty much restricted to helicopter and Harriers (or F-35B when it comes out).

A country like Taiwan or the Philippines really does not have much of a chance to defeating a nation like China on it's own if it decideds to attack them. But with a strong enough force they can make it expensive for China (or any other nation) to do so, and hopefully delay them for long enough for a larger ally to rush support into the area.

And I am not sure how much good Tomahawk missiles would do, since those are primarily land attack missiles. And there would not be much use for those in such a conflict, more missiles like Harpoon would probably more desired (although there is an anti-ship Tomahawk). But they could wait a few years, and just use the LRASM when it becomes available (estimated 2015-2016). These work on the same missile launchers the Burke class Destroyers have.

 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...oopers-storm-island-during-mass-exercise.html

 

Someone needs to teach those paratroopers how to clear bunkers/houses.

 

The other members of SMMAG disagree with you about submarines and Tarawa, saying subs have use giving the enemy another problem to think about befor attacking the Philippines, they say Tarawa is to big for what the Philippines is looking for. They do agree with you about the Ticonderogas, but disagree about the Burkes as they are still the main force in the US navy.

 

Yea, I peeked over there, and it was about what I expected. Little accurate information, lots of people trying to sound like they know morre then they do.

For example, the claim that the equipment stripped from the cutters the Coast Guard sold the Philippines. One person claimed they were just thrown away, not true. They were put into storage as spares, since the CG still uses the Hamilton class cutter.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BRP_Gregorio_del_Pilar_(PF-15)

And another claimed that shallow waters are great for a sub to operate in, when actually it is quite the opposite. Shallow water is where subs do not want to be, because they are so easy to spot from the air. Shallow water may be good to prevent their being spotted by SONAR because the lack of depth can prevent emissions from traveling far and getting lost in the clutter of background noise. But their biggest threat is actually being spotted by aircraft. During WWII, some of the most effective sub hunters were actually blimps.

And the Philippines is a giant collection of islands surrounded by shallow waters. Actually a very poor place to operate subs out of, especially in a defensive manner. They would have to go way out to sea and hope to catch the fleet en route for an invasion, when they will be looking the hardest for such behavior. My gut instinct is that such subs would be among the first casualty, therefore essentially a waste of money.

Yet another says that the Navy might decomission some of the Ticonderoga cruisers. Well, they have already retired 5 of them, 1 is available to museum donation, 1 has been scrapped, 1 was sunk in an exercise, and 2 are awaiting disposal (scrapping or sales to ally). This is pretty easy to obtain information.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ticonderoga_class_cruiser

And I notice that none of them said a word about the Kidd class destroyers. However, one of them made a comment that the "Burkes were to new to be sold". That is pretty much nonsense, since the oldest ships in that class are around 20 years old. And the Kidd class destroyers were 21 years old when they were decommissioned.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kidd_class_destroyer

This tells me that they really do not do much research before they make posts. Myself, I consider a great many things, including research I do for each post, examples of other ships and classes, and considering other things. Such as the proposed sale of Burkes to Saudi Arabia, and the fact that the Flight I and II destroyers are either getting expensive upgrades, or will be getting them soon.

They seem to have largely ignored the Tarawa, because they do not understand the use I proposed (it seemed to have missed you also). But let me try to explain it simply.

Burkes: Forward air defense, primarily using its missiles to bring down incoming missiles and aircraft.
Ticonderoga: Command & Control, also missile defense for any that "leak" through the Burkes.
Tarawa: ASW, possably a VSTOL for light air to air defense.

This is not a force designed to "defeat the Chinese", but to slow them down until help from allies arrives. Your question asked for ships to prevent an invasion, which is actually not what I would choose to do. Personally, I would suggest for that mission working more on aircraft. We saw in the Falklands what fighters with anti-ship missiles could do to a fleet, and it was not pretty. Even if the missiles do not strike, it keeps the foe nervous and breaks up a lot of fleet cohesion every time a fighter starts to get within range.

The people in that group seem to be what I call (not in a derisive manner) "equipment wonks". They concentrate on the shiny gadgets and blinkenlights, and not on the actual strategy and tactics of warfare. This is why I would concentrate on a force that tries to slow down the invading force, and allows the time for allies to come to their assistance. Subs would not really do that, they might get lucky and get 1 ship before they become a reef for fish. Destroyers on the other hand are fast enough to keep ahead of such an invasion fleet, making them slow down, and small enough to hide behind the large number of small islands in the chain, allowing them to conduct hit and run attacks as they draw close. In addion to providing valuable intelligence for the Air Force to do it's job.

This is strategic thinking, not thinking of ships against ships, broadsides and boarding parties. We saw in WWII, that aircraft are the biggest threat to ships, not other ships.

 

Facebook is like that people trying to be smart. But their are some military people in the group, I thought their knowledge would be a good yours, I also don't think they took my post seriously. I understand what you would be trying to do if China attacked, you told me earlier on in the thread. The Burkes would be the best ship, but we disagree, you think the US would sell them, I don't, when a new Burke costs over $2 billion. I think he was talking about the Mark-41 Vertical Launch System Variant that were ment to be decomissioned next year, rather than the Mark-26 Twin-Arm Launcher Variant. Do you think the Philippines has the infrastructure for a ship the size of Tarawa? I have added Tarawa to my navy because of the roles it can fill, along with 2 Ticonderoga's. I still don't see the US selling Burkes, their for I am sticking with 4 Formidable class frigates.

 

Yes, I think that if some ally made a serious offer for some of the older Flight I and II Burkes, the Navy would be willing to sell them. Upgrading and keeping 20 year old ships running can get expensive, especially when they are going to be taken out of service for an extended amount of time for refits. I am sure that if the State Department went to them and said "Hey, the Philippines want to buy those 5 Burkes that are about to go in for refit, what if we sell them and you get 5 new ones for fiscal years 2018-2024", I bet the Navy would jump at it.

And yes, the Philippines has the infrastructure for the Tarawa. Remember, for over 70 years we had Philippinos serving in our own Navy, and we are talking about a simple flat top, built in the early 1970's. This is not even as sophisticated as the WWII era carriers, it is a simple transport with a flight deck, no catapault launch system, no arrestor cable landing system. Just a transport ship with an elevator and a flat deck. And this ship was part of the WESTPAC fleet for decades, so I am positive that there are Philippinos that actually worked on it when it was still in active service.

And yes, they have facilities. They possess what was the Subic Bay Naval Station, which regularly supported Nimitz class carriers.