In effect you are claiming that by 2035 that there will be 6 carriers ready for military deployment and by 2040, 8 of them.
What I am asking for is show me how you will get to 6 carriers not just built but trained and ready for military deployment by 2035. So far you are insisting that it is reasonable to make such claims but have not shown any projection as to how you actually get to 6 by 2035.
The Ford class is unique because it is the lead ship and so will be 003 or any Chinese carrier that is nuclear powered. It would be unreasonable to assume that there will be no development issues for lead ship and consequently a longer time period to get them to deployment capable status.
For the purposes of my projection, I would envision the lead 003 being launched around 2021, entering service around 2023 and being fully combat capable by 2026, with a second 003 being launched two years later after the first in 2023, entering service around 2025 and being fully combat capable before 2028.
Lead 004 (CVN) I would project as being launched around 2025-2026, entering service in around 2029, being combat capable by 2033. A second 004 would be launched two years after the first in 2027, entering service in 2030, being combat capable by 2034.
That, combined with the two STOBAR carriers, takes us to six total combat capable in service carriers by 2035. Of course the number that would be deployable at any one time would be a function of the peacetime deployment pattern -- but as I wrote previously, the goal would be to deploy them during peacetime in a manner that focuses on readiness and having surge capability for as many of the in-service fleet as possible in event of a high intensity westpac war.
I was referring to your insistence that your claims are reasonable even though they are unsubstantiated in any shape or form. I had asked at every opportunity that you provide your underlying basis to support your claims which you have yet to do so. Unsubstantiated claims grounded on an insistence that your claim is reasonable is what by fiat means i.e simply by brute force
Considering now how much of a divergence in views we have about the future military balance, asking me to provide my "underlying basis" is the equivalent of asking me to articulate my entire vision of the future military balance.
I think I've provided you more detailed answers when appropriate and/or practical (such as your question about how I envision w
.... because facts do matter.
... as if to suggest the facts you choose to sample and your choice of function is the only reasnonable one.
The facts are there are a lot more aim points than generally appreciated in any conflict. It is the reason why the Europeans ran out of PGMs during the Libya air campaign within the first week. It also mean that China does not have near enough long range strike weapons to achieve the desire effects on Guam that would neutralize its threat against any Chinese carrier group. It is not just airfields as they can be easily recovered again and again. There are the mobile LRASM that can be moved around its 74000 acres of land. By my estimate you would need at least 16,000 PGMs to cover the whole island and up to 100,000 based on probability of arrival.
I can also assume that just 2 B-1s carrying 40 LRASM each would be sufficient to eliminate an entire Chinese CBG including its escorts. Making assumption is easy. Such an assumption is reasonable because the LRASM is VLO, is able to operate with ESM to avoid detection, and can cooperatively attack in swarm. The Chinese escorts would have no chance at all.
I think we have different visions of what would be a "desired effect" in regards to Guam. For me, the primary target that Guam poses is the air base; that would be the primary target that would be struck and require re-attack as they are repaired. The rest of the infrastructure on the island and any military forces there would be secondary targets and more appropriate for carrier based aviation and/or LACMs from escorts to strike.
You keep on mentioning nationwide scale air campaigns designed to annhilate an entire nation's air force and air defenses and striking wide ground based military targets as well, the scale of which is inappropriate to compare with the strike campaign that would be used against Guam. The munitions that used against one particular airfield and one particular area of air defenses for the Iraq or Libya campaigns would provide a closer approximation to Guam.
You can absolutely make the assumption that 2 B-1s carrying 40 LRASMs would be sufficient to eliminate an entire Chinese CBG. And I would disagree with it. And that disagreement would likely be a result of differences in belief and assumption of respective military capability in terms of quality and quantity.
I am not casually dismissing your views. I think it is commendable that you are making an attempt to postulate a certain view. I am just asking that your articulate a defense of your views based on whatever underlying analyses that you have in support of it and not defend it based on an argument that it is reasonable because you insist it is reasonable.
As I wrote above and in previous posts, there is such a wide divergence in the views of future military balance that we have, such that it's near impossible for me to answer a question like "what are your underlying assumptions" because that is literally asking me to explain the entire projection of what I envision the future military balance to look like.
I think I've been more than reasonable in indulging your questions given how unreasonably broad they have been, and when you've narrowed to scope more I've also responded with accordingly more detail as well.
The manner in which you've been continuously writing about how my projection was founded on unreasonable assumptions or implying that my projection was not based on facts, can only be perceived by me to be presumptuous.
That's understandable, because as I wrote above, it just reflects the big difference in what we envision the future military balance to be like. But if you want to have a constructive discussion then consider dropping the "holier than thou" attitude towards our respective assumptions for the future military balance.
