Our current military readiness

You think we need around 5. Personally, I could not care less what you think anybody needs. I may think that nobody needs a car that has more than 2 doors and 4 cylinders. But as is what you keep saying, that is only my opinion and does not matter in anything.

 

That's nice. So what is the argument that we don't need 20 CBG's. How about 30?

 

And you will not hear me argue otherwise. But they are still not carriers.

They are intended to operate with a Regiment of Marines aboard. That is their mission. Now like most ships in our military it is capable of handling multiple missions. And one of the big improvements over the Tarawa class is that now they can actually operate as a carrier if needed. But they are still not carriers.

The only expected reason for them to operate in that configuration is if we do not have any other carriers available, due to a major war breaking out, damage or loss of our existing carriers, or if they are requested by one of our allies. And only then if we do not need them for their primary amphibious role.

Because to configure them in that way we have to strip all amphibious assets.

 

Actually, this entire discussion is about something completely different, it is about our current state of readiness.

You just keep dragging it into something completely unrelated because...

 

Yes. We are MORE than ready. In fact cut it in half and we are more than ready. NOTHING could be more pertinent to the OP

 

Semantics with a touch of politics.

We had 3 aircraft carriers after Pearl Harbor. The Japanese attacked with 6 aircraft carriers, a total of 300 aircraft. The largest Japanese aircraft carrier was the Zuikaku, now, like it's 5 sisters, resting on the bottom of the Pacific Ocean after being sunk at the Battle of Leyte Gulf. She weighted 32,000 tons fully loaded, held 1600 men and 72 aircraft. The USS America LHA-6 weighs 45,0000 tons, holds 2700 crew and 32 aircraft. Although lesser aircraft, they are all considerably larger and more capable than the Zuikaku's. Is there any doubt that four "non-aircraft carrier" USS America-class LHA's would have easily replaced all the US aircraft carriers and shortened the war even without nukes?

https://padresteve.com/2013/11/30/p...ss-enterprise-uss-lexington-and-uss-saratoga/
Comprised of six carriers, the Akagi, Kaga, Hiryu, Soryu, Shokaku and Zuikaku the force embarked over 300 first line aircraft. The aviators of the air groups aboard the carriers had been training for months to attack Pearl Harbor. Their aircraft had been specially outfitted with Type 91 Model 2 aerial torpedoes designed to run in the shallow waters of Pearl Harbor and Type 99 Model 5 armor piecing bombs modified from battleship shells. These weapons would be employed with a devastating effect on the morning of December 7th 1941.

The three carriers assigned to the Pacific Fleet, the USS Saratoga, USS Lexington and USS Enterprise had been dispatched on missions that took them away from Pearl Harbor that fateful Sunday.

 

How did you arrive at that number of ships for our navy? Where would they be deployed? What would their missions be?

 

And we were also not facing long range anti-ship missiles, that can be launched by aircraft over 1,000 miles from their base either.

In the era of WWII, the only threat from shore was long-range artillery. Horribly inaccurate, but powerful when they hit. Today nobody uses coastal artillery anymore, but there are still shore threats, and they can reach much farther.

There is more involved than sheer tons and number of aircraft. The enemies on the oceans today are in most ways much more formidable in a single ship than an entire battlegroup of WWII.

Take the Slava class Cruiser, of which the Russians have 3. 16 P-500 anti-ship missiles, with a range of over 500 km. 64 S-300 anti-air missiles with a range of over 200 km. Another 40 OSA anti-air missiles, with a range of over 500 km. Not to mention 24 RBU-6000 ASROC and 10 torpedo tubes.

Just that one ship could have laid waste to the entire Japanese strike force that attacked Pearl Harbor.

I think maybe you should check out The Final Countdown. But trying to use 70+ year old ships as some kind of justification for modern ones is a failure.

 

2 east coast and three west coast. One on each coast can always be on deployment and one extra one in the pacific. More than enough to protect our shores

 

What about the Gulf Coast?

What about Alaska and Hawaii? They are American citizens with the same rights to be protected as you have.

And carrier based aircraft don't have enough range to protect the Atlantic and Pacific coasts with just a single carrier on station. It would take at least two on station at all times.

Try again.

 

If alaska and hawaii can not be protected with two carriers then they can not be protected with ten. Russia and china manage to protect their entire countries with one carrier group each. Ten is massive overkill

 

Alaska and Hawaii, let alone Guam and Samoa. They are much farther away, and are also American citizens.

But do not expect an answer, I challenged many times and never got one.

 

Answered. No one is going to attack Guam if three carriers can be there in days

 

no they don't. The Russian and Chinese coasts are extremely exposed to attack. During the 1980s (Cold War) an American admiral commenting on the gaps in Soviet defenses said "they're basically naked up there".

Now, assuming say 7 carriers to protect all U.S. coastlines (two Atlantic, three Pacific, one Gulf, and one available to protect Alaska and Hawaii) you ignore the obvious.

In war time, American naval forces are supposed to operate with at least two identical platforms in each major task force for the sake of redundancy in case of accidents or attacks disabling one. This includes carriers.

So you've just provided a perfect rationale for having FOURTEEN U.S. carriers available.

But I wouldn't go that far. I think the U.S. could get by with 12 active carriers and one dedicated training carrier.

 

At its heart, all complaints about the size of the U.S. military never have anything to do with capabilities or commitments.

Ultimately for almost all of them it comes down to "WE SPEND TOO MUCH!!!"

 

Maybe we need 30 carriers. But somehow Russia and China get along with one and no one in the world has more than two but us. But we need 12. Interesting.

 

We spend more than the next ten countries combined....but you think we need to spend more.

 

Horse hockey, the power structure requires the masses to be kept fearful, anxious, quibbling amongst themselves and subservient to the aristocracy. This is the stuff of police states.

Despite a proposed slashing of U.S. Army personnel to pre-World War II levels, American military might is beyond question.

This chart from April 2013, which is making the rounds again, shows that America's 2012 defense budget surpassed that of the next 10 countries combined.


Defense spending accounts for about 20 percent of all U.S. federal spending. Peter G. Peterson Foundation

We have become what we used to accuse North Korea of, economically cannibalizing the empire at home to project "power” both abroad and against citizens on the streets at home.

 

Our defense budget should be made based on the needs, goals and commitments we have as a nation. Not based on what other nations spend.

But yeah, I've believed for years that our defense budget should be approximately 1 trillion dollars annually with a 5-7% increase in that annually. I can provide hard reasons for that number if you wish.

 

But we need more and more and more and more. Right? Its never enough. We need far more than any other country on the planet. Ten times more.

Time to change the mission to defense of our shores only.

 

And does not consider things like manpower requirements and the needs of excess forces.

It is like a town deciding that it only needs 3 fire stations, and only having enough crews to man those 3 stations. Never taking into account the fact that extra crews are needed for real emergencies, as well as equipment. We have seen the results of this all over California in the last year. With fire crews being overextended so firefighters and equipment is having to be brought in from all over the state and even tapping the military to help take up the slack.

And if our carriers are at sea at all time, when do the crews get shore leave? When do they ever get to see their families if they are at sea almost constantly? Are they supposed to spend 11 months a year at sea year after year?

And what about maintenance? When a ship returns from a 6 month cruise, it then typically needs 3-6 months in normal conditions to be ready to go back out again. Maintenance needs to be done, old personnel rotated off and new personnel brought on and trained up to do their job.

Not to mention that on average a carrier spend 2 years in ten out of service, getting major overhauls and upgrades. Where are the carriers to take up the slack at those times?

Some love to keep mentioning that we entered WWII with only 7 carriers. Which is actually 2 more ships than some in here are suggesting we actually need. Yet what they keep missing is that that was simply not enough and we had to build more. A lot more.

During the war, we built another 33 carriers. And I am talking about fleet carriers. 24 Essex class and 9 Independence class carriers. I am not even counting the over 130 escort carriers that were built during the war.

So for the example of only 5 carriers being enough, I had better get an explanation of how we are going to work those ships and crews nonstop for decades to come. And how in WWII even 7 carriers was not enough, yet 5 are nor the right number.

 

We need more and more and more and more. Other countries don't but we do. More and more and more. It is a joke.

 

Myself, I have long believed that most of the contractors in the DoD (as well as the huge amount of civilian employees) should be trimmed down to the bone. Probably the biggest waste is the sheer number of civilians doing jobs that we ourselves should be doing, for a lot less money.

That was the biggest shock for me when I came back in back in 07. Seeing the sheer number of civilian employees on a modern base. For goodness sakes, they hire civilians to wash dishes in the chow hall! We have civilians guarding our gates. We even have teams of civilians who drive around the post replacing light bulbs. And most of the MWR locations that were manned by our military (gym, theater, stables, dive locker, etc) are now staffed entirely by civilians. Need the stripes in the parking lot painted, civilians. Need the grass cut outside the barracks, civilians. Need officials for a baseball game, civilians. Need your clothes washed while deployed, civilians. Need buses driven on our overseas bases? Civilians.

Right there is probably the biggest chunk of fat in the entire DoD. Even until 1993, those were all jobs done by the military members themselves. Now, they are all done by civilians that make considerably more than those in uniform do.

When I was deployed, the starting pay for a civilian bus driver was $100k per year. And they then got a bonus for staying over a year. I literally knew 2 bus drivers that were worth in excess of $1 million each for driving the bus 7-8 years. They get free food, free housing, free medical, and collect more in a single year than most see in a 4 year military enlistment.

So want to trim the fat start there. No more civilian supply clerk handing out backpacks at a CIF facility at $75k a year. A private can do that, at a fraction of the cost. No more having to wait for hours for some GS-10 with a Masters Degree making $60k+ a year to answer a question about payroll, when an E-5 making $30k a year can do the same thing (and probably faster).

 

Why this neurotic obsession with "our shores"? You seriously think American interests (or American lives) end at "our shores"?

 

Where do Russia's interests end? How about China? Why are we the worlds policeman? The rest of the world needs to start fending for itself. You have just bought into the hype. Cut it in half, close the overseas bases and we will be twice as safe