MIGleader said:
Beaurocracy is slow. mr. bush certainly would not be able to mobilize u.s forces in less than a week.
I think this statement hit the nail on the head!
You see.....
Sea Dog said:
I know for a fact that USN readiness is alot higher than what you describe. [...]
What I'm trying to say is that you probably have 4 carriers out in the Pacific today. You probably have 1 or 2 Pacific side carriers in port. Maybe one of them in a maintenance cycle...maybe both. And you have at least 2 somewhere near the Indian Ocean. I'm still standing by the fact that 5 carriers groups of varying densities will be ready to conduct operations to support the mission as a total force within 72 hours. Plus we're not even counting the amount of SSN's that are currently out there already also. There are some today that would be able to conduct ASuW, ASW and Deep Strike Missions within hours if called to do it today. And yes, USAF readiness is equally high. They could conduct war operations today if called to do it within a few hours.
..... it's not that you're wrong Sea Dog. You paint a very impressive picture of the US Armed Forces as being this all capable, super professional, efficient fighting machine. I'm sure IN THEORY this is what is supposed to happen.
But let's face it. Look at all the screw ups the US has experienced since 9/11 (including 9/11 itself). I mean, I don't wanna get into politics here, but the reality of the US Armed Forces is that they make MISTAKES, sometimes BIG MISTAKES. Mistakes that cost many unnecessary American lives....
So I'm just pointing out, what your talking about is a purely theoretical US Armed Forces, which as real life has demonstrated, is really different from the way things work.
So applied to Migleader's example: theoretically, the US
should be able to detect a build up. But they've made bigger goof ups before, and they can definitely miss this one too.
You certainly are thorough. That's some good analysis you've done here, Totoro. A definitely interesting read. I don't disagree with anything here really. Other than current operational readiness of USN CSG's as a coherent sea based strategy. While I don't have the insider info like you alluded to earlier, I was part of 1 CVBG (7th Fleet) and did some ops work on the La Salle (6th Fleet). I know for a fact that USN readiness is alot higher than what you describe. You're kind of assuming that these groups are sitting in port right now waiting for the call. And they'll have to cross great distances to get to the "battlespace". Many of these units are already within range conducting ops. Alot of these forces are conducting naval ops today as we type on this forum. In the Pacific you have 6 carriers in various states of readiness and in the Atlantic you have the same. The "Big Stick" sometimes goes to the Persian Gulf IIRC. And there's usually at least 2 carriers in the Indian Ocean supporting ops there. While you might have two carriers undergoing training support, they can swap their mission for the real deal while underway. These carriers are fully functional and loaded for war, especially after 9/11. You might have 2-4 carriers undergoing refit or maintenance cycles at any time. These are both a mix of Atlantic and Pacific assets. 
