The Military Thread

Jesus Christ, Afghanistan and Iraq aren't won and Trump wants to open another wound in the world?

Iraq...some progress has been made, IMO, although YMMV is in effect. Afghanistan...nope, history repeats, nobody can occupy the place successfully in the long term. It's been conquered, yes, but the occupiers have never hung around for long before they have to leave in defeat.

Yeah, he does...but his favorite is still the nuclear button. Which Mattis is trying to drag him away from.

It should be noted that a good half of the military still consider this a last resort, while others want the go-ahead, as seen in the brief interrupting arguments in the last paragraph.

Looking at what regular soldiers are saying, aside from the standard "we goin' this Tuesday boys" joke, they're not too confident about the odds, especially with the tunnels.

edited 14th Jan '18 5:11:30 PM by TheWildWestPyro

Trump still wants his War President popularity boost then?

It would seem.

Someone should tell him that those boosts are usually temporary, that the previous cases were more popular than he was before the incidents in question, and that these things usually occur happen in the case of defensive conflicts.

It would be a waste of effort to try and explain anything to the Great Pumpkinhead. He doesn't know, doesn't care, and anything that contradicts what he already believes is "fake facts." And if you can actually catch him in an outright lie, he'll reverse himself and insist that he never said it in the first place.

Allegedly Mattis and McMasters are still trying to wrestle Trump away from the button while the military is split on diplomacy vs intervention. Tense times.

Arguably one of the scariest things about fighting North Korea is that, even as backwards as they seem sometimes, the whole place still has Nothing Is Scarier hanging over it.

edited 15th Jan '18 2:35:51 PM by TheWildWestPyro

US moves ships, bombers towards Korea ahead of Olympics.

Article goes into detail about the B-2 spirit bombers, and talks a little about the F-35 near the end.

https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20180116_02/

Lavrov is suspicious of the JSDF having anti-air missiles and has doubts that they'll have full operational control over it.

Oh look the Russians being hypocrites. In other news water is wet.

edited 15th Jan '18 7:16:33 PM by TuefelHundenIV

The Ruskies are the midget with a big right arm. Anything that threatens their military image they will oppose.

AEGIS Ashore has no offensive weapons - if it did they would be LRASM or Tomahawks. Hardly anything that would dent "Mother Russia".

Its like being mad some one buys bodyarmor. ._.;

It also ignores the fact there are any number of other missile platforms the Japanese could use like oh I don't know ships, subs, aircraft. A land based system even with nominally offensive weapons would at best be defensive in nature because of the range limitations of even the longest legged VLS cruise missile fielded by the US. They would be in effect area denial assets.

edited 15th Jan '18 11:20:50 PM by TuefelHundenIV

I’d presume that the defence system does protect some offensive weapons around it however, so it’s less getting body armour and more putting on body armour while carrying a shotgun.

Thing is the Russians has no leg to stand on, because they’re Russia, this doesn’t threaten MAD between Russia and Japan, hell can any Japanese offensive weapons protected by the system even hit Russia?

No, although there's discussion now about creating some form of deterrent against North Korea. Cruise missiles and the such.

Outside of the time-honored tradition of sicking Godzilla on their enemies, I'm not sure Japan has MAD capability with anyone.

Nope, no nuclear weapons.....

Though some diet members keep pushing for MAD capabilities insisting its the ultimate defensive weapon with no offensive use, and I would be inclined to agree.

Granted, I'm pretty sure that would cause outright riots among the public. Also, nukes ain't exactly cheap.

Any thing with the military causes protests with the public, it is one of the most divisive issues in the country.

https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/nhknewsline/quotesoftheday/20180111/

Onodera has an interesting quote regarding the use of AEGIS to defend the Japanese archipelago when he visited Hawaii.

Navy plans on charging the two COs onboard the collisions last year with Negligent Homicide

Seems over the top tbh.

Seems about right, the level of negligence needed for such an event to happen to staggering.

edited 16th Jan '18 9:45:50 PM by Silasw

Rank Hath Its Privileges, Rank Hath Its Responsibilities.

Anyways, isn't the tradition to put the officer on charges to give him the chance to clear his name? I seem to recall more than one Admiral being left to live in disgrace because he was fired rather than charged.

edited 17th Jan '18 7:21:46 AM by AFP

Depends on "fired" - Holly McGrath got to keep her bennies after a rank bust. Despite her Captain Bly antics. LTC Sinclair was busted from General after sexual assault and he gets to retire with a pension and can shop on post.

I remember that Great Britain executed an admiral for a military defeat. The US Navy can demote and kick out some Captains and Admirals to put the fear of the Goddess in the officer corps.

Some swiss media outlets have reports that Saudi Arabia is keeping an eye on the Iron Dome. Ironically, the two don't have diplomatic relations, but have shared interests against Iran.