I don't think the PLAN uses USN strength to determine what their capability should be. They also know that it's utterly impossible for the US to activate more than about 6 carriers into the Western Pacific, and that China has no need to counter the Americans carrier for carrier. Instead, the PLAN and PLARF have access to anti-ship missile types that the Americans don't have, and these are ideal for knocking out CBGs.
Well atleast 6 then, and it depends if US will be able to use one of its european vassals to send help or not, And fair fair about anti-ship missiles, still I dont mean right now but a future one ( where assuming usn has finished more carriers and have fixed its issues so they can field more)
Right now, there's no appetite for an unprovoked attack on China, and this is unlikely to change in the future. The first factor for this is that the US needs allies, and these allies will abandon them if there's such an attack. The second is that a war like that is impossible to justify to the American people. Yes, they're mostly idiots and they'll believe almost anything, but that's simply not enough in this case. And the most important is that the American military is increasingly aware that they can't win. There's no way to do enough damage with a initial strike without using nuclear weapons, and the US will probably lose the subsequent war.
None of these factors will improve for the the US in the next few years, and it will be simply impossible by the inflection point. My guess is that this point will be around 2035, by which time China's military will be on par with the American one. Another way to gauge this is to look at the rhetoric coming from American military and political leaders. Right now, they're all about "deterrence" - when the Americans go for a different tact, this mmessaging will change.
Yeah I dont mean right now at all, but in the future, From my pov it entirely depends on how the next few years play out from us-pov, if us's vassal states will actually spend 100's of bn's and let usa squeeze them, how de-dollarization plays out further.
Well just the dollar thing alone matters the most, if it drops enough /investors leave/move enough they are toast.
They will be able to sell to public, they are pretty good at selling things to their public(selling a genocide right now), assuming this will be life/death for the empire, nothing will hold them back,
And while I agree that actual us military personal prob know that China is peer now, politicians are ones that will make decisions, and they are very 'invincible' in their feelings. Imagine someone like Hegseth being the defsec at the time?
And I do believe if they do a reverse-pearl harbour they still start with first-strike tact nukes.
And fair about the messaging, but from my pov these are their 'early' days, the '1930 for gemany' if you will.
I don't see a war in Trump's second term. If there's an imminent war, Trump and Xi wouldn't be inviting to see each other. A war between China and US will tank the stock market by 50% which the American people cannot afford to have. That will guarantee a GOP lost in the upcoming election.
Oh not during Trump's term at all, nope.
From my pov Trump is the caesar paving the way for eventual augustus to finalize things down the line (more authoritarian control of usa)
Again this is just my pov