not a chance, there is a huge qualitative difference between advanced, professional armed forces and conscript based militaries.
the pak army would have a hard time fighting even a small 1st world military like Canada or the Netherlands simply because their training alone makes them far far more effective fighters even before you consider their technological advantage.
Another interesting article about this topic:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-18237029
Makes cases for and against .
I think it’s interesting china doesn’t have any real carriers. The article says they prefer missiles. They must know something we don’t? Ah yes. Lots of missiles > carriers. Asians are much smarter than us.
Thats true, if we are playing on a level playing field in solution like in a video game, where either side is allowed to do whatever it takes.
But armies like Canadians have “rules of engagement” and CNN watching them.
Are you nice Canadians gonna storm into the village and massacre every last male down to the infant born yesterday? Are you then gonna impregnate all their women forcibly? Because if you want to actually win a war against Pashtun irregulars then that’s what you will need to do. Don’t think Canadians have the stomach for Genocide. Tim Hortons, yes.
So Plantir and 1Recho, it seems like you generally are agreeing with my ranking (w.r.t Russia and Japan)? I thought it was pretty fair. I did ammend it to say I may have overlooked S Korea and I tend to leave India off because of qualitative factors, but overall, I think pretty fair.
Getting back on topic, it sounds like we are mostly republicans. Well, the Eisenhower kind anyway.
pakistani’s army is a professional one,not a conscript one.
it’s highly trained too.it has to be, They’ve fought two wars in the himalayas at sub-zero temperatures
yeah that worked amazing for you didn’t it?
is that right?
what about the 100,000 + bengalis raped and the genocide in east pakistan?
the war right after independance when the boundary lines were drawn was brutal.it doesn’t affect the average population becauase of the locations at which they’ve been fought but to disregard it is just stupid.
they’ve been severe casualties.
and im not sure you know a thing about kashmir
^ I’m pretty sure ChickenTikka does know all that, he’s just being himself.
I read another article, sorry don’t have a link, that said China was focusing on missiles because they know it will take 30 years to reach the level of carrier capability that the US has today. I believe if they could have the equivalent of 10 Nimitz-class carriers in 10 years they would do it in a heartbeat, but they can’t so they are focused on smaller ships and missles. If you look at the link BS provided, you’ll see that they actually have far more ships than the US, they just tend toward amphibious assault ships and coastal patrol ships. Can’t blame them really, why build a whole bunch of carriers to police the world while the US is still perfectly happy to do it? Everytime the US keeps the oil flowing out of the mid-east, they keep it flowing to China too.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_aircraft_carrier_programme
This wikipedia article references several statements and articles by the Chinese government regarding their current carrier program (and see the one at the end of this post).
Your facts and assumptions about China’s lack of a carrier program are flawed and frankly uneducated. It’s a well known fact that China is currently developing carriers and has stated they have a need for at least three and have several under development currently. Additionally, they purchased an old one off of the Russians several years ago for use as a training and development platform. The fact is, it takes decades to develop a carrier program versus 5 years for a missile program. So, I think your lack of knowledge on the topic is showing again. Never ceasing to amaze me. Keep finding innacurate articles though. Good job!
I mean, you can’t maintain the air tempo required for an overseas offense with out a carrier. That’s been stated and covered and you’ve failed to put up any decent rebuttal there. So now, you’re saying, “hey look threats exist for carriers”. No crap dude, it’s war, this isn’t a newsflash to anyone. But missiles don’t change the fact that you still need a carrier for overseas operations, and to manage policy. China is developing carriers as we speak because they recognize this. They will not fully have sway in their region until this has become a reality.
And here’s an article from… you guessed it (probably not though)… TODAY! Talking about China’s first upcomming carrier trials in open seas (using the old Russian hull they bought):
http://www.deccanherald.com/content/317125/chinas-first-aircraft-carrier-go.html
“Before every aircraft carrier truly matures and becomes capable of fighting in a war, it must go through trials on the high seas,” Zhang, who is also a deputy to the legislature the National People’s Congress, told China Central Television.
"Based on Liaoning’s success, China, which this year allocated USD 115.7 billion budget, was expected to construct more carriers to emerge as a major maritime power."
CT, your whole flawed premise is that China sees the future and knows what we don’t, yet all they see are carriers (despite their vaunted missile program that the US has said they can handle just fine ). So maybe you should tell them that their missile system solved that problem, because they apparently have less faith in it than you do. Not to mention, if you’d actually bothered to read your own article , it clearly mentions the Chinese carrier development, and has every major military source in it saying carriers are still necessary to project military power. It simply argues that the UK doesn’t need one because of the US’s carriers.
Missiles don’t give you strategic offensive capabillity other than to blow up absolutely everything (they can be used in a tactical offensive). Carriers do.
The other reason is that they’re just thinking creatively. They’re not falling into the trap of “to negate a carrier we need a carrier of our own” fallacy and finding alternative ways of neutralizing these assets.
Dude, nobody thinks that way. You don’t negate carriers with carriers. You use carriers to project policy and power overseas. Carriers don’t fight one another. Military tactics work like rock paper scissors. You use subs, ships and missiles to hit carriers. You use carriers to assist land forces. They’re investing in carriers because India is, and frankly, you can’t be a governing force or military pressence beyond your borders without them. Sure, you can defend yourself, but that would be the extent of your influence. These maneuvering missiles are cute, but they’re not creative or unstoppable. They’re a continuation of a project originally launched and advertised by the Russians in like the 60’s or something.
I agree with the broad strokes of what you’re saying, but in all out war carriers would fight each other…if they could. The Battle of Midway being a great example.
A solid arguement could be made that it’ll never happen again seeing as how there’s no other navy capable of getting anywhere near a US carrier. I guess I’m saying you’re right in the context of modern warfare, but we shouldn’t forget one of the coolest battles of all time was based around 3 US carriers vs 4 Japanese carriers.
True. But I guess what I’m getting at is this. People often assume that the way war works, is that you see them sending x units of y one direction, so you send (x+1) units of y at their force. So they picture tanks fighting tanks, infantry fighting infantry, jets fighting jets, etc. And this does happen. But it’s not optimal, and it’s not how militaries are designed. Ideally, tactics and strategy work like an incredibly elaborate system of rock paper scissors, where strengths are pitted against weaknesses, ie subs and missiles to hit carriers, carrier battle groups to stop subs and missiles, carriers to launch air assaults against ground targets. Carrier vs carrier or rock verse rock happens when things have sufficiently broken down into all out melee akin to goaltenders coming out of the net to fight center ice in an ice hockey game. Which is usually a pretty significant event when it happens… ie carriers at midway.
Which actually raises a good question: if the Enterprise took on Battlestar Galactica, who has the advantage? The Enterprise is modeled on a heavy cruiser. The Galactica is a carrier.
I think Kirk would seduce both Starbuck and Sharon, and Sharon would defect and introduce a virus, then decide to run off with Spock.
Edit: Midway was a cool battle.
In these sorts of comparisons, Star Trek always wins, because they have all sorts of magic technology like transporters and force shields. Star Trek is really about politics between different civilizations/species, with some futuristic universe conceived as a backdrop.
Battlestar Galactica (the new series, anyway) is written to be grounded in reality - well, to the extent that you believe that a robot space rebellion is plausible. The fighter planes use machine guns instead of lasers or particle beams. Battlestar Galactica has a ribbed armored hull instead of “deflector shields”, and it is armed with nuclear weapons and flak cannons.
One scene in Battlestar Galactica is when Apollo ejects from his space fighter and realizes that he has a small leak in his space suit. He ponders his life while slowly running out of oxygen. This is a situation that you could imagine happening to real astronauts. In contrast, Star Trek has somewhat campy story lines, like when Ryker gets an evil clone due to a transporter accident. Or that weird episode from Voyager where some guys get mutated into lizards or something.
Maybe a better comparison is Battlestar Galactica vs. Imperial Star Destroyer.