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Can You Answer These Questions?

TheHammer

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Being a Navy vet myself, I have to wonder about what I’m seeing from the Trump agenda concerning a rebuild of the military.


I’ve ask this question several times in the past without any satisfactory answers coming from anyone on a political forum, old Navy vet friends, or letters to my congress critters. Why does America have and keep consistently in commission 11 nuclear powered aircraft carriers and sometimes just 10 in commission and now Trump is calling for a 12 nuclear carrier Navy and a whole new class of nuke carriers?


As far as I can determine, the rest of the world combined only has 2 nuclear powered aircraft carriers, one in China and France has one. Why the American overkill?


Why aren’t the multi-billion dollar nuclear carriers simply sitting ducks in a world of highly technological weaponry?


As far as I know, it takes at least a dozen other ships just to protect the carrier and it takes over 2000 crew mwmbers for a single carrier.


What in hell is “conservative” about a dozen nuclear powered aircraft carriers?
 
In the world of politics, it relates to either a "Mommy syndrome" or a "Daddy syndrome". I will wait and see if one of our more accomplished posters (of which we have many) can explain it better than I can.
 

It's not conservative. But, aircraft carrier task forces certainly are valuable in maintaining American hegemony. What confuses me about Trump---well, maybe not "confuse" since he is a con man and I get that cons talk out of both sides of their mouth--is that he keeps saying we need to focus on our own country while he's promoting more investment in hegemony.
 

You may recall a little dustup in the Pacific back in '42 between a few US carrier groups and a few Japanese groups. That win by the US put a dead stop to Japanese expansion in the Pacific and showed, beyond any doubt, the power of a carrier group.

Carriers are the key to being able to prosecute an air campaign across pretty much 80% of the globe. We don't need a friendly ally to let us use their air fields is we have a carrier group or two and that means a lot. That means a WHOLE lot.
 
We need at least 20 CVNs and the support ships to go with them. We also need new classes of both missile and attack nuke subs.
 

Probably the threat from the 60 plus military aircraft each can hold, and the combined firepower of the task group that accompanies it. Then there are the submarines that are reported to typically prowl the depths beneath them.

It's quite conservative to stand and wave, while carrying a stick bigger than anyone wants to even imagine.
 

Like 12 to one or make that 13 if we count the French carrier? With today's technological weaponry, why aren't the massive carriers just sitting ducks for subs and long range missiles?
 
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Wasn't that a world of (ZERO) long range missiles and (ZERO) very quiet nuclear powered submarines? Wasn't that a world where the Japanese already had several aircraft carriers and were building more and had a Navy at least equal in ships if not superior to America?
 
a777pilot said:
We need at least 20 CVNs and the support ships to go with them. We also need new classes of both missile and attack nuke subs.
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Please relate WHY.
 
TheHammer said:
Like 12 to one or make that 13 if we count the French carrier? With today's technological weaponry, why aren't the massive carriers just sitting ducks for subs and long range missiles?
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Perhaps it's because of today's military technology that they aren't sitting ducks. With rail guns and lasers being deployed within the task force accompanying the carriers, the ducks may not be sitting like you imagine they are.
 
ocean515 said:
Perhaps it's because of today's military technology that they aren't sitting ducks. With rail guns and lasers being deployed within the task force accompanying the carriers, the ducks may not be sitting like you imagine they are.
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LOL! That's right, besides how much of a sitting duck are Air Force bases that don't move at all?
 
a777pilot said:
LOL! That's right, besides how much of a sitting duck are Air Force bases that don't move at all?
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On point.

Think about it. So someone decides to launch a missile at a carrier. With current technology, the battle group knows exactly where it was launch from. Various defensive weaponry is deployed to destroy the threat, and the gun slinger is vaporized.

No question carriers are a big, massively expensive target. I am confident the military leadership is fully aware of this and operates these task forces with such knowledge in mind.
 

What about a national debt BIGGER than anyone wants to even imagine?
 
a777pilot said:
LOL! That's right, besides how much of a sitting duck are Air Force bases that don't move at all?
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The answer is, as much or more! So why do we have so many all over the world? Your not long on explanations, huh?
 
TheHammer said:
What about a national debt BIGGER than anyone wants to even imagine?
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The money is there for this county's defense. All we need is the courage and political will to stop paying for services for illegals. They need to go home, then apply to immigrate here legally.
 

You watch too many war movies. First permission from the President would be necessary. Secondly how about several long range missiles being launched from land bases and submarines all at once at several or all carriers and the United States? Who responds to that to accomplish a vaporization of the enemy? What country today can even do that, so WHY the gigantic super expensive carrier muscle flex? It's all insane and Hollywood fantasy in my opinion!
 

It was. However, technology has only made the role of the carrier more important. The ability to project massive amounts of military power, especially denial of air space, pretty much anywhere within 400 miles of an ocean is hugely important.
 
a777pilot said:
The money is there for this county's defense. All we need is the courage and political will to stop paying for services for illegals. They need to go home, then apply to immigrate here legally.
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So you're going to provide the proven national financial figures that show that you can cut off enough welfare payments to illegals to pay for just a single nuclear powered carrier, right? Me thinks you need some economic education sir!
 
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It would have to be a country who would launch long range land based missiles and from submarines all at once. That country would cease to exist after such an act of war. I would think that would be quite to deterrent to taking such a unilateral action.

If the United States were at war at the time against that country, I am confident it's known, and even unknown, capabilities would be taken into account, and actions to protect the battle group would be in place.

If you're a vet, you know this would be true.
 
Lutherf said:
It was. However, technology has only made the role of the carrier more important. The ability to project massive amounts of military power, especially denial of air space, pretty much anywhere within 400 miles of an ocean is hugely important.
Click to expand...

Where's the global threat that accounts for 12 nuclear powered aircraft carriers? What nation, or nations have the where-with-all to attack America militarily and defeat her? Or better yet defeat her if she only had 6 instead of 12 nuclear powered carriers? It's insane and a militaristic elitism and stupidity, in my opinion?
 
TheHammer said:
You betcha! What God made America the World's police force and defender of other people's borders?
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Great question! I would think that we ought to be protecting OUR borders.

I am a true believer in Naval power. CBG's (Carrier Battle Groups) lessen the need for ground bases to protect vital national interests. I would think you would agree that we, the USA, needs to reduce our ground footprint around the world.
 


Well, that is why your opinion of military matters don't count for much.
 

So name the existing country today that has such capability. There are none. So why the 12 nuclear powered aircraft carrier muscle flex? We're looking at and talking about insane OVERKILL here not to mention the whopping debt we're running up. It's nuts!
 
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