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Comment by jononomo | Hacker News Reader

What if China actually started trying? They have 3x the population that the US has.

Population is a single, low-resolution parameter into a theoretical ship-building-capacity equation, which really needs a basket of parameters. Raw resource availability, fuel capabilities, naval training, coastline details, etc.

Great Britain historically had a fraction of the population of France and other European powers, but consistently out-produced the rest in ships and projecting naval power.

China produces 12 times as much steel as the US, per year.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_steel_pro...

During a peacetime economy. Don't forget during war time, your factories are being bombed. You're pre-war numbers don't indicate what your war time numbers will be. China's manufacturing tends to be focused around the easter coast and it's rivers. The USAs is spread throughout the country. The USA is pretty good at setting up factories. My understanding is China is more into single large factories. The USA is a net exporter of oil (that greases the entire machine). China is an oil importer (not good when you country is being sieged during war).

You seem to be having a kind of a blind bias. You argue that during war time China will be less productive; and the opposite will be for the US: more productive. As if China can't target/hit back at the US. Both have massive geography and given that the US is likely the attacker, China only has to play defense.

> The USA is a net exporter of oil (that greases the entire machine). China is an oil importer (not good when you country is being sieged during war).

This seems to be their largest risk (if you are playing defense). They seem to be going crazy on solar though.

Again, China's production is centered in a specific area, along the coasts in the east and associated coastal waterways. American production is spread throughout the country. The USA has a distributed highway system for transportation. China has a strong focus on shipping lanes. The USA has a long record of projecting military power. China does not. The USA has a strong 'get shit started' track record. China has a mass produce track record. The American dynamic is better situated to recover production during war time than China.

Solar is not going to fuel missiles, ships, and attack aircraft. It's not going to grease the machines in the factories.

I think the unspoken assumption here is that China is already producing at near-maximum capacity, while the United States is barely trying and has lots of headroom.

Is the assumption correct?

I haven't been able to find a study on America's plan for local naval production capacity given such a conflict, which is kind of stunning to me. Perhaps there are classified studies.

This conflict (assuming it lasts multiple years) would play out across the Pacific, possibly offering replays of old Pacific battles from WW2. Large numbers of naval assets and expeditionary forces squaring off across millions of square miles of blue-water ocean. Lots of naval tonnage attrition.

America is either guarding it's planned production capabilities close to the chest, or they anticipate winning such a conflict quickly without the tonnage attrition I just referenced.

Or my searching skills are weak.

More like 4x, and closing in on 5x. And China has done a good job of tying many smaller nations, globally not just regionally, to themselves economically. That gives them an edge in terms of resource extraction where the US has been losing ground. It doesn't help that the US also sends many "waste" products to China like steel that could be processed and reused domestically.

And then there's just the cluster fuck that is the US defense industry. Who could make aircraft for the US in mass numbers anymore? Boeing can't even figure out if they installed a few bolts, NG can't do basic maintenance without wrecking a plane, LM will get you your aircraft for 5x the initial estimate and a decade late.

> And China has done a good job of tying many smaller nations, globally not just regionally, to themselves economically. That gives them an edge in terms of resource extraction

The US has the capacity, in the event of conflict, to nullify most if not all of the out-of-region advantage China has in resource extraction, unless China’s build up pre-conflict is sufficient to nullify the global force projection capacities provided by the US Navy and the US Air Force to which China currently has no equivalent or counter beyond its region.

(The US usually presents these capacities as being oriented to protecting free resource flow in peacetime, but they can be directed at the opposite purpose equally well.)

Presently, yes. If China doesn't push too hard, though, they've got the right partnerships in place to start building out a global military presence under the same pretenses as the US within its partner nations' borders. Give it a decade (maybe less) of serious effort on their part and they could rival the US globally, not just regionally.

If they decide to start a hot war (say by invading Taiwan) today, then it'd be catastrophic for them. Most of those partnerships would dry up (by being a good excuse to end a bad deal for the partner nations or by force from the US and other nations).

Yeah, but if they do it 10 years from now, it could well be different. Thus the very interesting book, "2034: A Novel of the Next World War", 2022, by Elliot Ackerman (Author), Admiral James Stavridis USN (Author).

The interesting thing was about how India had also advanced in those 10 years from now.

A hot war would massively disrupt trade, among that food. The US provide a significant proportion of food to China. I am not sure if China could survive on a smaller food supply but it would mean austerity if that was the case. Worst case scenario, they cannot use their manpower advantage because they need that for their farm.

Closing in? China's population fell in 2023, whereas the US is still growing.

Ok, 4.1somethingx and closing in on 4.1somethingx. Either way, substantially more than just 3x the US population.

China had an even bigger advantage in population in 1930 (~474:123MM). Population is one factor, but not a determinitive one.

I mean, if there's a WW3 where winning is predicated on "who can make the most planes", then, eh, maybe that might be a relevant question. But that doesn't seem particularly likely; even if there were to be a WW3, it would probably not be a Plane-Building Olympics.

Drones and missiles will be perhaps the most important. One day it will be military robots. And guess who can makes the mass quantities of drones and missiles.

The USA would fight a standoff siege war with China, not a close in war when drones come into play. As to missiles, that's why the USA has developed the (chinese siege weapon named) Rapid Dragon system. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rapid_Dragon_(missile_system)

> not a close in war when drones come into play

What do drones mean to you? It sounds like you think it means “quadrocopter” when it is also used to describe RQ-4 Global Hawks and similar aircraft.

I mean the discussion here is specifically referring to the drone China accells at (quadrocopter) versus the USA such as RQ-4s. So I am referring to what the discussion is talking about.

> So I am referring to what the discussion is talking about.

That is why I am asking. Because it definietly sounds like you think the discussion is about quadrocopters and not say China building many WZ-7 Soaring Dragons.

Is it possible that when the others said that china will build many drones they meant the second kind and not some toy copters? Because that would make their comments make sense.

That wouldn't make sense as China is seen as a uniquely strong powerhouse in the toy drones, but not uniquely stronger the larger unmanned drones such as Reapers.

I don’t think you get it. It’s actually impossible for other countries to beat the US at anything.

Superman Syndrome

You must be making a sarcastic comment, right?

Some people do honestly believe that because god is on 'our' side, the us and constitution were divinely motivated and everything in it was coming from god somehow. All the horrible justifications are still being made today about that stuff.

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