Originally Posted By Azzurri

I hope not.

 

Star has lots of strong guy friends that wear combat leather chaps.

 

It just wouldn't be a fair!

 

I shouldn't get worked up over somebody who hides behind his keyboard and I can't muster any anger when I look at that avatar.

Originally Posted By ActionJack

Originally Posted By Azzurri

I hope not.

 

Star has lots of strong guy friends that wear combat leather chaps.

 

It just wouldn't be a fair!

 

I shouldn't get worked up over somebody who hides behind his keyboard and I can't muster any anger when I look at that avatar.

You mean our Blue Bunny tandem?

let me refresh your memory.

http://www.janes.com/products/janes/defence-security-report.aspx?ID=1065931706

The US Navy plans to retire 12 ships in the coming years of 2013 & 2014.

These ships being cut would be 9 Ticonderoga Class Cruisers & 3 Whidbey Island Class LSD's. In the next coming years of the decade, the US Navy will be faced with some limitations. There is the loss of these 12 ships, then the decommissioning of the USS Enterprise will occur in a few years while the USS Gerald R. Ford will be commissioned a year or two afterwards. While this is occurring, another carrier will enter dry dock for routine maintenance which will lower the total available carriers to 9 for a select period of time.

However, the cutting of the Ticonderoga Class Cruisers will only have short term consequences. The Arleigh Burke Class Destroyer is still in production with 61 currently built & as many as 75 could be built; which would fully make up for this loss. Also, the San Antonio Class LPD is still entering service & the America Class Amphibious Assault Ship will eventually enter service, with 12 currently planned to replace the 8 Wasp Class & 1 Tarawa Class Amphibious Assault Ships. Also, the Spearhead Class Joint High Speed Vessels' will also supplement this along with the growing numbers of (yet still limited) Littoral Combat Ships, along with the awaited Zumwalt Class Destroyer.

There will be reductions, most likely due to immediate budgetary needs, and then a gradual increase in USN capabilities.

Originally Posted By GDS_Starfury

let me refresh your memory.

 

http://www.janes.com/products/janes/defence-security-report.aspx?ID=1065931706

... However, the cutting of the Ticonderoga Class Cruisers will only have short term consequences. The Arleigh Burke Class Destroyer is still in production with 61 currently built & as many as 75 could be built; which would fully make up for this loss. Also, the San Antonio Class LPD is still entering service & the America Class Amphibious Assault Ship will eventually enter service, with 12 currently planned to replace the 8 Wasp Class & 1 Tarawa Class Amphibious Assault Ships. Also, the Spearhead Class Joint High Speed Vessels' will also supplement this along with the growing numbers of (yet still limited) Littoral Combat Ships, along with the awaited Zumwalt Class Destroyer.

There will be reductions, most likely due to immediate budgetary needs, and then a gradual increase in USN capabilities.

do you know that our current active fleet is roughly 238-240 ships of all classes?

are you aware that we currently have about 18 amphibious ships?

are you also aware that the 'phibs that being built are far more capable then those being retired?

do you understand the idea that there was never any way the Navy was getting 33 gators and that by going high at first

theyll actually end up with the numbers they need?

maybe if you payed more attention to 'toys' and less attention to alarmist opinion you might have a better grasp of reallity.

Originally Posted By Azzurri

You mean our Blue Bunny tandem?

I'm disturbed ... that's some seriously twisted stuff.  Well played.

join us

resistance is futile.

Originally Posted By GDS_Starfury

do you know that our current active fleet is roughly 238-240 ships of all classes?

are you aware that we currently have about 18 amphibious ships?

are you also aware that the 'phibs that being built are far more capable then those being retired?

do you understand the idea that there was never any way the Navy was getting 33 gators and that by going high at first

theyll actually end up with the numbers they need?

What I understand is that ALL bets now are off; as usual, no plan survives contact with the enemy which in this case is Congress.  Personnel reductions alone will make 17 amphibs a stretch.  You want to know where the Navy is going; where they perceive their weaknesses and the challenges they see, try reading Proceedings, Marine Corps Gazette, and Navy Times!

Your capabilities are built around policy and doctrine; how you deploy and train is how you're going to fight.  Certainly in an all out war you can combine all your assets to create any capability possible (example in Operation Iraqi Freedom Task Force Tarawa), but a likely skirmish with China won't see things like the shooting down of satellites, massing of amphibs for ASW, or even allies with capabilities we don't have.  Those things are stopgaps, workarounds, and bluffs to Chinese challenges.  The Navy recognizes this; why can't you!

I bet the Chinese repo man can't wait to get his hands on that beauty!

Mysterious Symbols in China Desert Are Spy Satellite Targets, Expert Says

... The 65-foot-wide white lines that make up China's grids are not made of reflective metal as many news sites have suggested. "They have gaps in them where they cross little natural drainage channels and the lines themselves are not perfectly filled in, with lots of little streaks and uneven coverage. I think it's safe to say these are some kind of paint," Hill said, noting that if they were made of white dust or chalk, the wind would have caused them to streak visibly.

The calibration targets are larger than might have been expected, he said, suggesting that the satellite cameras they are being used to calibrate have surprisingly poor ground resolution.

http://news.yahoo.com/mysterious-symbols-china-desert-spy-satellite-targets-expert-132005935.html

The Global Times, a newspaper produced by the Communist Party-controlled People's Daily group, has been much more bellicose, says the BBC's Damian Grammaticas in Beijing.

An editorial warned it was "certain" that if "Australia uses its military bases to help the US harm Chinese interests, then Australia itself will be caught in the crossfire".

Luo Yuan, a senior officer at the People's Liberation Army's Academy of Military Sciencestold the paper that while neither the US or China wanted to start a war, "if China's core interests such as its sovereignty, national security and unity are intruded on, a military conflict will be unavoidable".

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-15739995

Wow, that is aggressive language. If China is claiming the South China Sea even within national boundaries of other countries there then it is likely it will come to a shooting war. It might be 20 to 50 years away. In that situation I fear Vancouver may become a Chinese beachhead in North America. It has a massive Chinese population.

Fingers crossed that they're mostly Taiwanese!

Second or third generation are fine, they understand western culture even if they keep Chinese fashions. It the ones that were schooled in China that may actively support it.

Originally Posted By KevlarSocks

Wow, that is aggressive language. If China is claiming the South China Sea even within national boundaries of other countries there then it is likely it will come to a shooting war. It might be 20 to 50 years away. In that situation I fear Vancouver may become a Chinese beachhead in North America. It has a massive Chinese population.

 [...]

Second or third generation are fine, they understand western culture even if they keep Chinese fashions. It the ones that were schooled in China that may actively support it.

What is it that we should 'fear'?  

I believe the idea to start 'fearing' this group as a threat is wrong and misguided.  Why do we not also place other groups under the same umbrella then? (i.e. India, Pakistan, Russia?)

Originally Posted By endfire79

Originally Posted By KevlarSocks

Wow, that is aggressive language. If China is claiming the South China Sea even within national boundaries of other countries there then it is likely it will come to a shooting war. It might be 20 to 50 years away. In that situation I fear Vancouver may become a Chinese beachhead in North America. It has a massive Chinese population.

 [...]

Second or third generation are fine, they understand western culture even if they keep Chinese fashions. It the ones that were schooled in China that may actively support it.

 

What is it that we should 'fear'?  

o we need to place them under suspect now?  I believe that many of those who have already left China, understand that the government there is corrupt, and ruthless.  There are many reasons they have left it.  Some are just not on the right side of the political fench family wise.  I know many friends (and related family now) that just managed to survive the Cultural Revolution, and their descendants took their advice and left as soon as they could after Tianamen.  Some just don't have the right connections or friends.  Without these, you do not have a future in China.  That's just how it is.  The level of corruption is far beyond what we complain of here in the West.  

 

I believe the idea to start 'fearing' this group as a threat is wrong and misguided.  Why do we not also place other groups under the same umbrella then? (i.e. India, Pakistan, Russia?)

I'm not so sure.  I've met Chinese from the PRC who are students here and they appear extremely patriotic and defensive of their homeland.  A recent CNBC exposé on China reveals that many college age Chinese today are completely unfamiliar with the events at Tiananmen Square; it has been well surpressed.  Calls for more freedom from these same young people have essentially been bought off by access to city jobs which mean higher pay and a better life.  One girl, in one of my classes, from mainland China said that America was grossly misled and uninformed when it came to Tibet.  Her father owns a factory with over a thousand workers who live in dorms at the factory and she had spent some time in school in Japan too.  Basically she's no country bumpkin completely ignorant of the world.  I think Chinese propaganda has been very effective in China especially with the young, while in the U.S. there's been a drainage of patriotic fervor and faith in government.

That is fine for her.  I would not bet my money on China in the future. It is pretty unstable, and people know they are corrupt.  The cost of living has really gone up on the coast, and manufacturing has shut down and gone south to Vietnam, Thailand, Myanmar etc.  Believe it or not, it's getting expensive for them as well.  Especially if you want a kid or two.  

There are those that will be patriotic, because a patriot is a patriot, no matter what color you paint them.  Of course they will love their country, I don't question that.  

What I question is labelling people here as suspect just because of their origin.  The world is not black and white, do we really need to resort to McCarthyism-like thinking?

Originally Posted By KevlarSocks

 In that situation I fear Vancouver may become a Chinese beachhead in North America. It has a massive Chinese population.

 

I think you are crying wolf on this one. Most of the multi-generation Chinese have adapted to Canadian cultural and political lifestyles. The last big migration was just before 1997 where there was a huge influx of Hong Kong business and cultural people who decided to vote for a democratic western lifestyle instead of risking of losing everything to the Chinese takeover of the former British colony. Neither of these two groups are likely to flip allegiencies wholesale to Red China in light of Tianmen Square which is still fresh in their minds.

Some of the recent émigrés from the mainland could be different. They grew up marrionated in party political dogma and the party's version of history. Some of these people have a sense of manifest destiny of the mothercountry and have a really distorted version of history. Some of these ideas include the great evil America of course, the worthless Japanese, the superiority of Red Chinese foreign relations in their non-interference with other country's internal affairs, and even "how they conquered Vietnam in 12 days when the great America squandered 12 years to accomplish nothing." How these people react to future political tensions is not clear but you have to remember why they are here in the first place. They are the nouveau riche of China, and despite their political pre-indoctrination, they are smart enough to know where the better lifestyle is to raise their families and preserve their wealth. I'm sure they know all about the corruption and all the "bubbles" that are about to burst in their command economy.

As for "a Chinese beachhead in North America," you may be right about Vancouver. It might be a beachhead of what a democratic and a true free market / free world China would look like if it was allowed to exist.

Originally Posted By endfire79

That is fine for her.  I would not bet my money on China in the future. It is pretty unstable, and people know they are corrupt.  The cost of living has really gone up on the coast, and manufacturing has shut down and gone south to Vietnam, Thailand, Myanmar etc.  Believe it or not, it's getting expensive for them as well.  Especially if you want a kid or two.  

 

There are those that will be patriotic, because a patriot is a patriot, no matter what color you paint them.  Of course they will love their country, I don't question that.  

 

What I question is labelling people here as suspect just because of their origin.  The world is not black and white, do we really need to resort to McCarthyism-like thinking?

 

 

The only one taking it to extremes is you.

Chinese are very nationalistic. If the party leaders do something to enhance the nation at the expense of small Asian countries many Chinese nationals wil not care if it breaks international law. They will fight whoever blocks China's ambitions. It may be that many in the asian community here demonstrates against any aggression. That is typical Canadian. Anyone who thinks there will not be "activism" from people that were indoctinated in Chinese schools in cities all over the west is a fool. Some will rally on each side. Many will stay out of it. 

Originally Posted By KevlarSocks

 

Chinese are very nationalistic. If the party leaders do something to enhance the nation at the expense of small Asian countries many Chinese nationals wil not care if it breaks international law. They will fight whoever blocks China's ambitions. It may be that many in the asian community here demonstrates against any aggression. That is typical Canadian. Anyone who thinks there will not be "activism" from people that were indoctinated in Chinese schools in cities all over the west is a fool. Some will rally on each side. Many will stay out of it. 

I think a more accurate statement would be that the Chinese political leaders know how to play the nationalism card with the populace. Like all other despotic governments out there, point your fingers at the exploitative outside devils. The political leaders have lots of examples to bring up to get everyone's attention.

As for what you are suggesting, tell us more and the where abouts of those Chinese madrassas in Canuckistan?

Originally Posted By endfire79

That is fine for her.  I would not bet my money on China in the future. It is pretty unstable, and people know they are corrupt.  The cost of living has really gone up on the coast, and manufacturing has shut down and gone south to Vietnam, Thailand, Myanmar etc.  Believe it or not, it's getting expensive for them as well.  Especially if you want a kid or two.  

 

There are those that will be patriotic, because a patriot is a patriot, no matter what color you paint them.  Of course they will love their country, I don't question that.  

 

What I question is labelling people here as suspect just because of their origin.  The world is not black and white, do we really need to resort to McCarthyism-like thinking?

 

 

 

 

I don't disagree at all nor do I think my post suggested otherwise.  I'm merely commenting on the notion that Chinese from the People's Republic living abroad are not patriotic and fully supportive of the homeland; I believe they are.  My perspective is that they are more than a little different from the Nisei or their parents during WWII.  That doesn't mean they need to be herded into concentration camps but in event of a war (not just a skirmish or clash) it would be irresponsibly stupid not to take precautions against 5th column activity.

anyhow.... back to one of AJ's other concerns.

minesweeping!

Originally Posted By GDS_Starfury

anyhow.... back to one of AJ's other concerns.

minesweeping!

 

U.S. Navy Announces Successful Mine Neutralization System Live Fire Test

Last Updated: 11/16/2011*

The Navy’s Program Executive Office, Littoral Combat Ships (PEO LCS), successfully conducted the first complete detect-to-engage sequence for the Airborne Mine Neutralization System (AMNS), demonstrating the system's ability to fire an Archerfish destructor against an inert target.

A critical component of the littoral combat ship’s mine countermeasures mission package, AMNS is designed to explosively neutralize mines located during minehunting operations. Delivered from an MH-60S helicopter, the system deploys up to four expendable neutralization vehicles. The vehicle is controlled from a console on board the helicopter through a fiber optic cable. It performs positive identification of a mine before warhead detonation.

Seaborne mines continue to menace naval and maritime forces worldwide. Mines are used to attack ships approximately 200 times more than any other weapon. Raytheon’s AMNS, the U.S. Navy’s standard for organic airborne mine clearance, has been designed to counter this threat.

Read the Navy’s press release to learn more about this significant program milestone.

http://www.raytheon.com/newsroom/fea...ovation%20News

 

Video for the BAE Archerfish:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IY1SbZdCD04&fmt=18

Uploaded by baesystemsinc on Apr 27, 2010

A low cost single shot mine destructor which can be integrated into the Talisman UUV mission system, locates, classifies and destroys all naval sea mines. Selected by the US DOD as the common mine neutralizer solution, Archerfish can be deployed from airborne and surface mine counter-measure assets.


http://www.baesystems.com/Sites/SAS/...fish/index.htm

Again with the toys.  I refer once more to 1941 and the Pacific B-17 deployment.  Note the word deployment.