Modern Carrier Battle Group..Strategies and Tactics

Re: How Do You Sink A Carrier?

THe Yanks are quite capable of sending their own false messages in a similar fashion

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Not is the PLA instruct their people to use coded messages to civilian organs such as the department of fisheries or the Chinese equivalent of the chamber of commerce. Seemingling innocuous messages such as, "major school of fish sighted." They can even use cell phones to phone home, from which point the family members at home can notify the authorities through land lines. Don't make me laugh by telling me, "the naval intelligence will catch wind of that," since deep down everyone here knows there is just no way. They can simply ignore more obvious messages such as, "US carrier group approaching." No one would dare broadcast such a direct message anyways.

Re: How Do You Sink A Carrier?

Geographer said:

fighting experience of US forces is several wars ahead of the PLA.

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ff Actually, I've been thinking about asking this question for a while. Can the fighting experience that the US has be translated to fighting a military with highly advanced weapons and more organized forces. note, I'm NOT saying that this adversary has technologies that are on par with the US, just advanced enough to hold its own.

Ever since WWII, the US has been fighting enemies FAR inferior than itself. The battle tactics developed from these fightings have been mainly for countering guerrilla warfare. How much of these tactics would actually be useful in fighting an enemy that would not use these tactics at all? What if there is a major tank battle that involves, not 20 tanks, but 2000 tanks. or instead of simply sending in sorties of bombers to bomb the toothless enemy with a handful of SA missiles, an air battle involving hundreds of planes from both sides, like WWII, takes place? On this aspect, I think, US is as inexerienced as anyone.

Of course, there is the argument about how soldiers hold their own under intense stress. On this aspect, the US soldiers are indeed much more experienced. However, the same experience does not have to be gained from an actual combat. What about major disaster relief missions, flood, earth quakes and hurricanes, etc? Note I'm not talking about merely pulling people onto your boat after the flood. PLA often sends troops to ground zero before and during disasters, like flood or typhoon, hence the popular phrase "fighting the flood". You, as a soldier or a commander, still need to make decisions appropriately and in a timely fashion. Otherwise, people, including civilians and your own buddies, will die. And make no mistake about it, people do die in these situations (hundreds of thousands annually in China). As far as I know, PLA also loses troops in disasters every year. And you still have to continue on with the mission even people you know dearly have gone. And of course, these situations also test your ability to mobilize huge amount of troops and maintain the logistics, medicine, supplies, etc. Disasters also disrupt transportation and communications, also major targets of your enemy in time of war. You have to fix the roads and bridges and maintain meaningful communication. This, IMHO, looks a lot like battlefield. So in this sense, some military, like PLA, is also very experienced in responding under intense pressure of life and death situations.

Actually, I think one of the major reasons that PLA has been heavily involved in disaster relief missions is to maintain and test its combat readiness.

Re: How Do You Sink A Carrier?

FriedRiceNSpice said:

Not is the PLA instruct their people to use coded messages to civilian organs such as the department of fisheries or the Chinese equivalent of the chamber of commerce. Seemingling innocuous messages such as, "major school of fish sighted." They can even use cell phones to phone home, from which point the family members at home can notify the authorities through land lines. Don't make me laugh by telling me, "the naval intelligence will catch wind of that," since deep down everyone here knows there is just no way. They can simply ignore more obvious messages such as, "US carrier group approaching." No one would dare broadcast such a direct message anyways.

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My response was to vesicles, who suggested a open and civilian communication channel rather than military to prevent a retalitory response from the Americans. Anyway as Wolverine suggested, its just reported sightings by chance, done by people going about their normal daily business, not especially equipped boats, of which the pros and cons have already been discussed.

Re: How Do You Sink A Carrier?

vesicles said:

ff Actually, I've been thinking about asking this question for a while. Can the fighting experience that the US has be translated to fighting a military with highly advanced weapons and more organized forces. note, I'm NOT saying that this adversary has technologies that are on par with the US, just advanced enough to hold its own.

Ever since WWII, the US has been fighting enemies FAR inferior than itself. The battle tactics developed from these fightings have been mainly for countering guerrilla warfare. How much of these tactics would actually be useful in fighting an enemy that would not use these tactics at all? What if there is a major tank battle that involves, not 20 tanks, but 2000 tanks. or instead of simply sending in sorties of bombers to bomb the toothless enemy with a handful of SA missiles, an air battle involving hundreds of planes from both sides, like WWII, takes place? On this aspect, I think, US is as inexerienced as anyone.

Of course, there is the argument about how soldiers hold their own under intense stress. On this aspect, the US soldiers are indeed much more experienced. However, the same experience does not have to be gained from an actual combat. What about major disaster relief missions, flood, earth quakes and hurricanes, etc? Note I'm not talking about merely pulling people onto your boat after the flood. PLA often sends troops to ground zero before and during disasters, like flood or typhoon, hence the popular phrase "fighting the flood". You, as a soldier or a commander, still need to make decisions appropriately and in a timely fashion. Otherwise, people, including civilians and your own buddies, will die. And make no mistake about it, people do die in these situations (hundreds of thousands annually in China). As far as I know, PLA also loses troops in disasters every year. And you still have to continue on with the mission even people you know dearly have gone. And of course, these situations also test your ability to mobilize huge amount of troops and maintain the logistics, medicine, supplies, etc. Disasters also disrupt transportation and communications, also major targets of your enemy in time of war. You have to fix the roads and bridges and maintain meaningful communication. This, IMHO, looks a lot like battlefield. So in this sense, some military, like PLA, is also very experienced in responding under intense pressure of life and death situations.

Actually, I think one of the major reasons that PLA has been heavily involved in disaster relief missions is to maintain and test its combat readiness.

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I cant see a full blown land war in a China V USA happening. Any American Pres who authorized that, would have lost his marbles, besides not all of China is MBT country.

I think no matter how well one trains their soilders, you cant beat battle hardened experience. eg Americas first battle campaign under Patton in ww2, against a underesourced German army in Africa, being beaten.

Re: How Do You Sink A Carrier?

eg Americas first battle campaign under Patton in ww2, against a underesourced German army in Africa, being beaten.

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ffGood example.. And that same army under Patton defeated the Axis in North Africa, Sicily & Italy..etc etc..ff

Training is great but nothing beats the "Real Deal". That's why it is important to send ships to sea and operate them and exercise their war fighting ability to prepare for any eventuality.

Re: How Do You Sink A Carrier?

bd popeye said:

Training is great but nothing beats the "Real Deal". That's why it is important to send ships to sea and operate them and exercise their war fighting ability to prepare for any eventuality.

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I do not doubt that at all. All I'm saying is that the PLA won't be like "deer in the headlight" once in war because of the experience they get from those disaster relief missions.

Re: How Do You Sink A Carrier?

Wolverine said:

The fact that Aegis is interoperable with many other sensors does absolutely nothing to change the fact that that shootdown required the presence of many other sensors. What happens during wartime when you don't have the luxury of assembling all those sensors to be at the right places at the right times?

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What makes you know (believe) that a score of sensors will be absolutely necessary to reproduce the results?
The fact alone that all these sensors were used does at all proof it can't be done without those sensors. It was a first time try without any previous testing. Of course one would use all means available to increase the odds and maybe even more importantly to gain very valuabe evaluation data on this event from all possible perspectives.

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vesicles said:

Ever since WWII, the US has been fighting enemies FAR inferior than itself. The battle tactics developed from these fightings have been mainly for countering guerrilla warfare.

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I find it strange how people always try to make all the combat US forces have seen in the last half century look like kindergarten games.
The then very capable and dangerous soviet supplied SA-2, MiG-19, MiG-21 and so on over Vietnam were for sure not FAR inferior to US war technology and were by no means guerillia equipment. Guerillias around the world would even today be really happy to have these 40-50 year old SAMs or fighters in their posession.

The soviet supplied integrated air defence over Iraq in '91 was definitely not a purly equiped guerillia force either.

And, also imortant, the US military has the mightiest of all forces to train against every day, itself...

Re: How Do You Sink A Carrier?

Scratch said:

I find it strange how people always try to make all the combat US forces have seen in the last half century look like kindergarten games.

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Compared to what people saw in the two WWs, what happened in the last 50/60 years had been child's play. In WWI, a 4-month long battle cost over 2 million lives (please forgive me for unable to remember the name of the battle). It took the US mere days/weeks to completely occupy iraq in 2003. Then after that, it would be all guerrilla. I don't know what you call roadside bombs/snipers, which are THE major source of casualty for allied forces in iraq and Afghanastan, but I call it guerrilla warfare.

Scratch said:

The then very capable and dangerous soviet supplied SA-2, MiG-19, MiG-21 and so on over Vietnam were for sure not FAR inferior to US war technology and were by no means guerillia equipment. Guerillias around the world would even today be really happy to have these 40-50 year old SAMs or fighters in their posession.

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IMHO, one major reason that North Vietnamese could win the Vietnam war was that they mainly used guerrilla tactics, which was not a strength of the Americans. Yes, Vietnamese had planes and handful of advanced weapons, but the main strategy of the NV was guerrilla war. If they came out of the forest and fought the Americans in the open and face-to-face, the WWII style, I honestly don't think they got a chance.

Scratch said:

The soviet supplied integrated air defence over Iraq in '91 was definitely not a purly equiped guerillia force either.

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Hmmm, having one or two advanced systems, such as "the soviet supplied integrated air defence", definitely does not warrant a military a modern force.

Scratch said:

And, also imortant, the US military has the mightiest of all forces to train against every day, itself...

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That is a valid point.

Re: How Do You Sink A Carrier?

Scratch said:

I find it strange how people always try to make all the combat US forces have seen in the last half century look like kindergarten games.

The soviet supplied integrated air defence over Iraq in '91 was definitely not a purly equiped guerillia force either.

And, also imortant, the US military has the mightiest of all forces to train against every day, itself...

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This whole thing is highly off-topic from the original purpose of this thread but...

Fighting in Iraq, Afghanistan and the 20th century wars is not the best preparation for the sort of WWII Eastern Front style massive confrontation that we seem to be thinking of but that is highly unlikely to happen anyway. Most likely, the great powers will only fight each other, on land at least, in short South Ossetia-style conflicts (conventional warfare is still useful, but as nuclear weapons proliferate it sustained conventional conflict will become more rare. It's practically non-existent already.) So the experience that the US has received is applicable to the "wars of the future".

More importantly having NCOs and other officers that served in actual combat and rose through the ranks with that experience is an invaluable leadership asset, for any situation. For years to come the US military will have leadership at the level of companies and lower on through the Joint Chiefs of men that have actually served in real military campaigns; the Afghan and Iraq campaigns might not be the best preparation for say facing down a North Korea armoured thrust at Seoul but in any military situation the experience of combat and strategic logistics will serve the leadership well. Not many other world militaries can say that they have that.

Of course the flip side of a decade of constant war is that there is a constant fatigue on the force; some of the experienced officers may decide to leave. Furthermore these wars constrain America's strategic options and are economically pretty unsustainable...really the whole American Empire is built on a sort inverted economic/military pyramid but that's a different issue.

That was fun but let's get back on topic maybe.

Re: How Do You Sink A Carrier?

Excellent post Finn. You have matured so much over the last nearly five years..

That was fun but let's get back on topic maybe.

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Now I need to put on my mod hat >>> EXACTLY ^^^Gents let's get back on topic.

bd popeye super moderator