Obama Plans to Take Off America's Pants

Originally posted by vor78

Originally posted by mnemeth1

Those boats are invisible when deployed.

I absolutely disagree with you on that one. Both the United States and the Soviet Union built a fairly large number of attack submarines during the Cold War designed with the sole purpose in mind of tracking and destroying opposing ballistic missile submarines before they could launch.

I was a sailor aboard a CG out of San Diego. I have participated in numerous ASW exercises.

I'm here to tell you that those boats can not be tracked.

Period.

Our boats are completely invisible, other nations boats are basically invisible as well. All the technology in the world will not find a US SSBN that does not want to be tracked.

reply to post by mnemeth1

If a country deems it necessary to launch a full scale nuclear attack against the US, whether we destroy 0, 24, or 1000 cities in retaliation doesn't make a bit of difference anyways.

It makes all the difference in the world to have the capability to take everyone down with you. It is just like a bar fight, sometimes the best deterrent to a bar fight is to appear crazier than the biker gang that wants to kick your ass for hitting on one of their girl friends. See if you seem willing to win at all costs and to impose pain on them regardless of whether they "win" or not you make the idea of fighting seem not as worthwhile to them.

Originally posted by Mr Sunchine
reply to post by mnemeth1

 

If a country deems it necessary to launch a full scale nuclear attack against the US, whether we destroy 0, 24, or 1000 cities in retaliation doesn't make a bit of difference anyways.

It makes all the difference in the world to have the capability to take everyone down with you. It is just like a bar fight, sometimes the best deterrent to a bar fight is to appear crazier than the biker gang that wants to kick your ass for hitting on one of their girl friends. See if you seem willing to win at all costs and to impose pain on them regardless of whether they "win" or not you make the idea of fighting seem not as worthwhile to them.

Not really.

No matter how many of them we kill, the nation is still dead.

It doesn't matter if we kill 0 or a billion in retaliation, ultimately the US is a smoking crater and that's all that matters.

Click here for more information.

reply to post by mnemeth1


If they cannot be tracked and are invisible, then why did your carrier group conduct anti-submarine warfare drills?

Obviously, they can be tracked or no one would even bother trying. The submarine crew can make the task very difficult, but very difficult does not equate to impossible.

President Obama is now on tour selling worldwide nuclear disarmament - but who’s buying it? Nobody wants to be the first to disarm – the U.S. least of all. So how’s it supposed to work? We all “let go of the rope” at once? That kind of teamwork might happen in boy scouts, but in foreign politics??

We're realizing that the days of conventional warfare are numbered: The power to destroy the world several times over simply isn’t much good when you share the same planet with your enemies. We can't un-invent the bomb, and we’re not really on the way to ending all wars (Sorry, Obama). We can only make open war unthinkably risky. The beauty of a cold war is that you can enjoy all the suspense and compelling drama of real combat without spilling a drop of beer.

There’s one thing that might solve the arms deadlock: Ultimate surveillance. If everyone knew what new weapons of mass destruction everyone else was building, we could all disarm with a firm handshake and a fake grin slapped all over our faces, knowing that we've got a sophisticated network of surveillance satellites to keep an eye on naughty presidents. Not to mention a secret stash of “just in case” treats, like my mother used to keep in case of unexpected house guests.

Rather than a balance of power based on rockets, we could have a balance of power based on knowledge and trust. In fact, we can probably just about genetically engineer pigs with wings. Let us not forget the power of optimism and the importance of the freedom of choice. What do you prefer? People listening in to your phone calls and taking satellite pictures of your house, or an arsenal of nuclear missiles silently contemplating their final destinations? Heck, why settle for one when you can have both? The future looks bright – all we need to do is increase high street spending!

I would argue having a fleet of SSBNs with fake missiles on them would be enough of a deterrent alone.

Even if the US secretly destroyed ALL of its nuclear stockpile, yet retained a fleet of SSBNs with fake missiles on them - that alone would be sufficient.

If nuclear war erupts, the number of missiles the US has is immaterial.

The point of deterrence is to make the other guy think he might get hurt in retaliation - not to actually hurt the other guy.

reply to post by mnemeth1


See you are missing the psychological component. A lot of things related to war are psychological deterents. You are right from the logical standpoint of if we are all dead what does it matter. However, you are wrong in not understanding the psychological deterrent to your enemies if they know even after most of your country is vaporized you are willing to return the favor.

Ignorantly simplistic logic. Point of fact. According to Janes China, Russia have 5 hunter killer subs to our one. We are also not dealing with only the type of warfare we have in the past. Nearly every conflict from now on will be hit and run. No pitched battles or fronts. To reduce some of our nuclear stock pile is fine but let's not throw all our hopes on a misguided idea that this will somehow cause others to lessen their approach to nuclear proliferation. The fact is that so many of the worlds nations would not comply! Most would see this as foolish and elevate the threat level! Way to many Lord Chamberlains here!

Zindo

[edit on 3/1/2010 by ZindoDoone]

Originally posted by vor78
reply to post by mnemeth1

 

If they cannot be tracked and are invisible, then why did your carrier group conduct anti-submarine warfare drills?

Obviously, they can be tracked or no one would even bother trying. The submarine crew can make the task very difficult, but very difficult does not equate to impossible.

The US conducts ASW drills to give the submarines practice killing surface ships.

That's basically the only reason.

reply to post by mnemeth1


You are to be continually applauded for your little-engine-that-could spirit. Your entire argument for having 2 subs was deconstructed so thoroughly that even you admitted you're wrong. But here you are, still chugging along. Go get 'em tiger!

Even though I'm on the opposite side of you on this I have to admire your moxie for not being horribly embarrassed into silence by your basic factual errors like most people on these boards (myself included) - or, in fact, anywhere - might have been.

Sorry, I know this is an extremely serious issue, yet I can't help but chuckle at the thread title:

Obama Plans to Take Off America's Pants

The first thing that comes to mind is Obama dressed as Michael Jackson and Uncle Sam as a little boy.

All we can do is laugh.

Originally posted by zenser
reply to post by mnemeth1

 

You are to be continually applauded for your little-engine-that-could spirit. Your entire argument for having 2 subs was deconstructed so thoroughly that even you admitted you're wrong. But here you are, still chugging along. Go get 'em tiger!

Even though I'm on the opposite side of you on this I have to admire your moxie for not being horribly embarrassed into silence by your basic factual errors like most people on these boards (myself included) - or, in fact, anywhere - might have been.

2, 4, doesn't make all that much difference to me. My point being all we need are enough submarines to maintain at least one at sea.

I would be perfectly happy with eliminating ALL nuclear weapons except for the SSBN fleet. Hell, keep all 14 boats around. The point being, we don't need ultra-overkill and thousands of nukes around to have an effective deterrent.

Obama would have to do some ridiculous cutting in order to wipe out the US nuclear deterrent.

For some reason I doubt Obama is cutting anything.

Originally posted by Alxandro
Sorry, I know this is an extremely serious issue, yet I can't help but chuckle at the thread title:

Obama Plans to Take Off America's Pants

The first thing that comes to mind is Obama dressed as Michael Jackson and Uncle Sam as a little boy.

All we can do is laugh.

That's the first thing that came to my mind, too ... and I wrote the title.

BTW - off topic. I posted a thread in "US Political Madness" that contained a link to the PDF version of court charging documents recently filed in a criminal case in Wisconsin. It's quite a controversial - and potentially ground breaking case. I didn't even make a comment in this thread - just a link to, and excerpt from, papers filed by a prosecutor in Wisconsin that are in the public record. The thread was quickly deleted. I posted another thread in boards business notifying the community the thread was deleted. It, too, was quickly and efficiently censored/deleted.

I have no doubt that this thread will be shut down and - probably - my account disabled / expunged pretty quickly for bringing this up. Interesting for a site whose mantra is "deny ignorance."

Originally posted by mnemeth1

Originally posted by zenser
reply to post by mnemeth1

 

2, 4, doesn't make all that much difference to me.

So why are you participating in this thread, again?

reply to post by mnemeth1

For some reason I doubt Obama is cutting anything.

Well you do have a point there. Given Obama's track record of doing the opposite of everything he says he is going to do, then we should expect nuclear warhead manufacturing to start back up in a few weeks.

Originally posted by mnemeth1
The US conducts ASW drills to give the submarines practice killing surface ships.

That's basically the only reason.

I doubt it, but in any case, that doesn't explain why the Navy also uses aircraft specifically for that role.

BTW, apparently these guys didn't get the memo.

Originally posted by zenser


So why are you participating in this thread, again?

because your whining about "dramatic reductions" as if this is somehow going to undermine our deterrent.

I'm simply pointing out Obama could eliminate practically all of our stockpile except for a handful of subs and the US would still have an effective deterrent.



[edit on 1-3-2010 by mnemeth1]

reply to post by ProjectJimmy


It's really too bad the OP refused to read this comment...as he "doesn't have time"

but it has some good points that help prove that disarming to the extent that is mentioned is not a bad thing.

OP, I'd suggest going back and reading it.

Originally posted by vor78

Originally posted by mnemeth1
The US conducts ASW drills to give the submarines practice killing surface ships.

That's basically the only reason.

I doubt it, but in any case, that doesn't explain why the Navy also uses aircraft specifically for that role.

BTW, apparently these guys didn't get the memo.

They use them because they cost money.

Sounds ridiculous I know - but that's why.

They are completely ineffective unless tracking a pile of crap ancient azz sub built by Neanderthals.

ASW operations might be semi-effective against a hunter killer attacking a convoy - but they sure as hell aren't going to find a US SSBN that doesn't want to be tracked.

Against US hunter killers, ASW operations are entirely ineffective since they will launch cruise missiles at the convoy a long ways out.