“the distant question of supercarrier vulnerability” – fail. Yes, by all means frame the issue as a regional problem, but don’t discount a very real threat as “distant”. Also, we have a Navy and a Military BECAUSE diplomacy often fails. Talk is good, but talk is cheap. Having a Navy in the future that is survivable and able to project power is not.

Yeah, ++ on the above comment, I keep trying to wake up but the nightmare keeps getting worse. At least it is interesting though, who knows what stupidity or horror will happen next.

I dunno…

Consider the consequences of us going nuke again. It would give an excuse for all those yahoos out there to go nuke themselves against countries that don’t have a prayer of defense. What would prevent that whack job with the bad hair in NK launching one of his across the DMZ as “punishment for “running yankee imperialist dog crimes of humanity?” Once mushroom clouds start popping, then all bets are off for sanity on the part of the dictatorships of the world, not that their playing with a full deck anyways.

If some country is stupid enough to try a biological/chemical attack against the US then don’t we have enough conventional weapons in the toolbox to make life miserable for them? I’m thinking of every bridge, airport, powerplant, military installation, government building reduced to smoking rubble in a short amount of time– and every asset we have used in that process. Even though the use of nukes in WWII is, was and will always be justified– there are still those people who think that we shouldn’t have used them. Me? My dad was transitioning to B-32′s at the time Tibbets dropped Little Boy so if it wasn’t for that I wouldn’t be typing right now.

We should be concerned about a Chinese ASBM, but the level of terror being seen reminds me of the anti-ship cruise missile scare of the late 1970s and early 1980s. There was a threat, but it could be met.

The whole ASBM scare has the earmarks of a hidden kill-the-carrier-Navy agenda.

What does diplomacy have to do with China’s ASBM?

I agree this it is not in the Navy’s purview regarding diplomatic tools being used to deny a enemy a weapon. However, that is the State Department’s job. We need to engage them on that. It is also DoD’s job to strike up this conversation.

But, the Navy does need to worry and do something kinetic about it.
‘War in the context of everything else’ is a real thing. But, we need to remember to each keep our lane towards the same goal.

Sorry for the double entry. AFG isn’t exactly known for it’s connectivity.

I didn’t know China had its own version of Aegis missile defense system on its ships. That’s pretty advanced for them…

As for intercepting ASBMs, does the US navy have to rely on Aegis solely for this? Can the air wing on the carrier assist? Also, doesn’t the ASBM rely heavily on satellite for targeting? If so, can it be cheaply defeated by using lasers to disable Chinese satellites?

Diplomacy may also mean some form of arms control agreement limiting the deployment of ASBMs along with limits on the number of ships allowed in the Pacific…

Before we get TOO excited, let’s remember that we’re talking abut trying to hit a tiny, moving target from hundreds of miles away with a rather significant delay in data transfer back and forth (compared with the relative speed in the changing overall situation). While I agree China is coming on hard and specifically intends to eventually challenge the US for dominance in the WESTPAC, they’re nowhere near close to being a creadible threat yet.

HOWEVER, I’n not discounting them and I do think if we intend to win this game we had better take them seriously, believe what they say they intend to do and take counter-measures now, not later! China is a country we MUST always have an obvious prohibitive military advantage over if we want to avoid an actual hot conflict. This is not a time or a place to “hope” diplomacy will work. Diplomacy won’t gain us anything against China unless we also hold a winning military hand.

I see a prevalence from Americans to see world dominance as their birthright. To me China’s attempt to strengthen its military is what any other country in their situation will do – for self defense. It doesn’t help when it is surrounded by nations that it has historically not been in good terms with.

If you want to find fault in China’s push for a carrier killer then blame it on the US’s meddling in its Taiwan affair. BTW even if this program is successful it will merely put a little dent on US world dominance in the seas around China.

Every countries have the right to self-defense, and in doing whatever necessary to guard their own backyard. NO country however should have the right to world dominance.

hmm… what about all the civilians killed by US forces on non-war zones? etc etc…. US looks like a fascist force (“for good”) to lots of people outside the almighty empire of the bald-corpse-eating eagle