You might remember that the Ronald Reagan was sunk by a Swedish stealth submarine in 2005 [1] and that there is little hope to save the Baltic and Taiwan if Russia and China decide to occupy them [2].
[1] https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/war-games-swedish-ste...
[2] https://breakingdefense.com/2019/03/us-gets-its-ass-handed-t...
Carriers were/are? more for the vast supply lines going towards the areas where e.g. Swedish/Japanese stealth submarines would be bottling up Russian/Chinese assets near their coasts.
China in particular has thousands and thousands of miles of neck extending into and out of the Indian Ocean.
[1] https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/navy-ships/news/a1...
With a proper counterattack, they can be liberated. The war isn't over just because the attacker says so.
Not to be melodramatic, but we should all keep in mind how terrible a war would be.
On the other hand if a war breaks out and the US gets in the middle of it because of power projection (like in the South Chinese sea) then the other side didn't start it, they escalated. You don't see PRC warships, army bases, etc. as a mainstay everywhere around US borders and coastal waters. If we did the US would instantly escalate to WW3.
And China isn't forced to go to war with the US over Taiwan. What's your point?
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27346478
> In other wargames: > You might remember that the Ronald Reagan was sunk by a Swedish stealth submarine in 2005 [1] and that there is little hope to save the Baltic and Taiwan if Russia and China decide to occupy them [2].
> [1] https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/war-games-swedish-ste...
> [2] https://breakingdefense.com/2019/03/us-gets-its-ass-handed-t...
> Key Point: Why are we still building aircraft carriers when even Sweden can sink them?
Oi.
Still a fair question, though.
Answering a conventional strike in international waters with a nuclear one (and at different target instead of the original attacker, since you can't really nuke a sub) is crossing the Rubicon, there's no going back from that.
And that’s exactly how it should be and has been since ww2. You use nukes when someone else uses nukes. No exception. In a perfect world this keeps the balance
If they are in international waters than nobody will care. But China doesn’t have the resources to build ships to routinely project power off the US coast. Ask yourself - why are they building empty skyscrapers? Couldn’t they build ships instead?
Chyna fear is very overrated.
If the USSR had put nukes everywhere around the US, even in international waters, we would not be here to discuss this today so yes people do care, a lot.
As to why they "build skyscrapers instead of warships", that's already explained in the comment you reply to. In short: because China isn't going the route of massive military to become top dog. It will become top dog without raising the part of its GDP it already spends today. Why spend a lot more on ships now when everything points to you being both richer, more technologically advanced and with better industrial capacity in 30 years than the US? Unless something significant happens China will win "the war" without firing a single shot while on the other hand the US will likely need ICBMs to "win".
You can double check if you want but pretty sure U.S./E.U. adversaries like China and Russia already do flybys and have ships sail close via international waters. It’s good for a quick media hit in western countries but nobody who is serious or matters really cares about it. The U.S. does this all the time - called freedom of navigation exercises. The Chinese or Iranians will saber rattle a bit for no good reason other than strengthening their crappy, despotic regimes, but nothing comes of it.
Re China: I think you’re wrong, largely. First, China as a whole should be wealthier. It has 4x the population. It should have 2x-3x the GDP of the U.S. yet it doesn’t. Interesting.
Second, building empty skyscrapers is a hallmark of collapsing nation states of planned economies. It’s motion for the sake of motion. It’s like a broken window fallacy.
The U.S. has some very interesting advantages and certainly doesn’t need nuclear weapons to win “the war”. It’s winning it right now as China faces a population catastrophe and the U.S. continues chugging along like always.
Again, Chyna (Trumps terms) fear is overrated. Not sure what people/Trumpists are so worried about.
> Why spend a lot more on ships now when everything points to you being both richer, more technologically advanced and with better industrial capacity in 30 years than the US?
Not sure any projections are really convincing here. And the U.S. isn’t even trying as a unified country and is spending massive amounts of money wastefully (Iraq/Afghanistan, etc.).
That said, while incidents like Sweden "sinking" a carrier have happened and embarassed the Navy, carriers have been present in multiple wars since WW2 (Vietnam, Persian Gulf, Iraq War) and haven't been sunk. If it's really that easy, one would think it would have happened when enemies actually were motivated to inflict such a loss. This suggests that the wargame conditions aren't very reflective of actual doctrine.
The red force in the millenium challenge had access to significant capabilities that Iraq and Vietnam did not have access to such as incredibly accurate anti-ship cruise missiles.
https://warontherocks.com/2015/11/millennium-challenge-the-r...
Yes they’re expensive. Yes they’re more vulnerable than in the past. But they can do things nothing else can. Is there another cheaper way to set up a complete airbase wherever you want 10000 miles from home?
An interesting question is whether you actually need a mobile airbase which necessitates large quantities of costly defensive weapons ( The new Ford carrier sails with 6 1.8 Billion dollar Arleigh-Burke class Destroyers ).
Considering a tomahawk costs roughly 1 million dollars, it may be more efficient for the Navy's power projection goals to use more portable missile platforms instead of a mobile airbase.
That was the idea between both the “arsenal ship” concept that hasn’t (yet) materialized, and the SSGN conversion of a number of Ohio-class ex-SSBNs, which has.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrier_Strike_Group_12#2019_d...
It's possible that this was an atypical deployment.