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do not underestimate the chinese military. they have enough people to make any effort against NK tough. they also have a good air force, along with other good equipment.
and dont forget that the terrain of NK will cause problems for us as well. if china does get involved in another korean war, it will be just as nasty as it was in the early 50s.
I did not underestimate the Chinese military. I said it was no match for the USA. It won't won't risk a head to head conformation with the US military. While the USA & USSR were spending vast sums for decades to build a 21st century military tech, Mao was sending China back to the stone ages. It is a long long way behind.
On the other hand, if it decides to fight a war with say, India, which seems very possible given the events of the past few weeks, then it's probably better matched.
despite US' military might which nobody denies, it still failed miserably in Iraq. The US is definitely not paper tiger, but there is only so much it is capable of changing in other countries.
Failures in Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Libya, Afghanistan are due to the incompetence of Bush, Hillary Clinton, and Obama. They decided to fight a war of choice with no plans or objectives.
They were not failures related to the capabilities of the US Military.
Modern war is much more dangerous than ever before in an all out war. China has unknown cyber and space warfare capabilities. Imagine airline computer systems were brought down by hackers, economy will quickly fall into a deep recession. There could be domestic riots follows. Military has near 100% reliance on GPS navigation, communication, spy satellites. If satellites were shot down, jammed, or ground stations attacked, planes, missiles and ships can not go from A to B, there'd be no communication for subs ...
I fought in Iraq in 2003 and 2004 and know what the US military can do first hand. Where is your informed opinion coming from?
I was an intelligence analyst for a quarter of a century and spent years studying Chinese military capability. I even discovered some key features in their capabilities that are still in the textbooks.
Compared to China, Iraq is in all ways a very, very small problem. If we're talking about being limited to conventional forces, Iraq is an infinitesimally smaller military problem in every operational and logistical way.
They have jungles, they have deserts, and they have some of the highest mountains in the world...and have military installations on those mountains, in those deserts, and in those jungles.
They also have more than a billion people, and all of them are well-disciplined.
Did you watch the Chinese mass exhibitions in the Beijing Olympics? As an intelligence analyst, I found those both wondrous and terrifying...because that can not be done in the US. No large group of Americans can ever be that disciplined as a large group. We just don't have that discipline in us as a nation.
American forces entering China would be swallowed up. They just wouldn't come out again.
They have jungles, they have deserts, and they have some of the highest mountains in the world...and have military installations on those mountains, in those deserts, and in those jungles.
They also have more than a billion people, and all of them are well-disciplined.
Did you watch the Chinese mass exhibitions in the Beijing Olympics? As an intelligence analyst, I found those both wondrous and terrifying...because that can not be done in the US. No large group of Americans can ever be that disciplined as a large group. We just don't have that discipline in us as a nation.
American forces entering China would be swallowed up. They just wouldn't come out again.
I'd say the South Koreans stand in his way, too, and really do not need the US there to protect them.
The US has been asking the S. Koreans to assume command of all military forces in S. Korea for several years, already, but, the S. Koreans have always declined.
The US troops in S. Korea are a tripwire.
I mean from Kim's perspective. From Kim's view of the board, the South Korean government is a puppet government being controlled from Washington DC.
I've watched ROK forces in action--I know they're tough as hell.
But the USA lacks the industrial and manufacturing base to endure an embargo from China.
What does America still manufacture?
If we were to look at the industrial relationship between the US and China over the last 25 years and compare it to WWII strategy, China has basically done to the US what the US did to Germany. During WWII, the US bombed German industry and technical infrastructure nearly out of existence, all the while building up American industry and infrastructure.
In what was actually an industrial war between the US and China, the Chinese basically gained a new factory for every one that closed in the US.
Here is an example I saw right on my desk. In the early 80s, I was on the Strategic Air Command staff. In my job, I frequently submitted Requests for Proposals into the Commerce Business Daily to have some gadget or widget custom-built for SR-71 or U-2 systems.
The Commerce Business Daily is a government publication that goes out to American businesses--large and small--for government manufacturing contracts: "We need this--can you build it, and for how much?"
Back in the 80s, I'd get a hundred or more proposals from manufacturers and machine shops across the country for every RFP: "We can build that!"
I had a similar job in the latter 90s. But in the latter 90s when I sent out Requests for Proposals...I heard crickets chirping. No proposals came back. These weren't jobs big enough to attract the interest of Lockheed-Martin or Raytheon or General Dynamics, and the smaller companies were gone.
Here is something else: The US Air Force does not do all it's jet engine maintenance. Within the military industrial complex, the Air Force outsources its jet engine overhauls to the same civilian companies that do jet engine overhauls for the civilian airlines.
But the federal government requires the mechanics at those companies to be FAA certified, and that means those certified mechanics make decent wages.
But over the last 20 years or so, more and more civilian airlines have been sending their planes to China for engine overhauls...and Chinese mechanics don't have to be FAA certified. They're dirt cheap.
So the US overhaul companies are losing money, laying off workers, reducing shop space. That was already affecting us by the latter 90s, as we were scrambling to find places to keep B-52 engines operational.
But remember, the US Air Force does not have the option of sending planes to China for engine overhauls.
So I've just pointed out two ways in which the shifting of industrial capability from the US to China already has a direct effect on United States national security...and that's just I could see from where I sat.
Oh, and let's be sure to understand: China had the hearty cooperation of American Big Business and all their political lackeys of both parties the whole time. The American people have basically been sold down the river by big business and politicians.
Remember we're talking about an invasion of the Chinese land mass here.
The United States can muster 2,000,000 soldiers at best, and I suspect the Chinese can muster a lot more to repel an invasion of their own nation.
Moreover, I suspect China can commandeer today the kind of civilian willingness to sacrifice for the war that the US had in WWII, but would not have in any future war. Are Americans willing to give up substantial creature comforts to invade China?
I have no doubt the Chinese can get the overwhelming majority of their population energized to repel foreign invaders.
Direct or proxy war with China is not a good idea. There are white nationalists and BLM riots. During Vietnam War, there were less political division but substantial domestic riots. American casualties with television transparency and domestic riot divisions doomed the war. Under Trump, domestic riots and political divisions are much worse than Nam era and will get much worse for a major war.
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