US Military News, Reports, Data, etc.
- Thread starter tphuang
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TerraN_EmpirE
Tyrant King
Are you sure that you want to base your meme response for Xi on an image of Asssad? You know he’s kinda had to downgrade his standards of living lately. He’s not exactly living the highlife anymore.
This is an implicit acknowledgement that the current military balance between the US and China no longer necessarily favor the former in the most relevant contexts.
If he was speaking privately, he might as well as say: "We are getting 100 B-21s so we can partially or hopefully restore certain advantages that we once possessed against the PLA years ago."
Like ambassadors and federal judges, American general and flag officers are nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate.
So if you're an officer looking to put a star or an additional star on your uniform, sounding or appearing articulate within the context of the current global political environment may help secure the attention or even favor of elected officials essential to your next promotion!
One of most persistent myths in Air combat from 2010s onwards is this remake of original manned fighter into CCA somehow making it better.
It doesn't work like this. You're getting, at best, a gimped manned fighter, for a price of one.
It just wasn't built for it.
Cope. PLA don’t have copium tradition like the Americans.
Not really, since an F-16 is not really the kind of fighter you want to be flying in WESTPAC against China in the first place. At least as a CCA, it's a more expendable asset than a manned F-16.
Even if this was feasible on a manufacturing level, it's getting increasingly more dangerous on a fiscal level. The country is running a budget deficit of $1+ trillion dollars every year. This is nearly ~3.7% of GDP today, dangerously close to the GDP growth rate. Possible future tax cuts, increased tariffs, inevitably increasing social spending, and your proposed military expenditure expansion... this will likely outpace GDP growth.
Increasing Debt-to-GDP ratios is all fine and good, and we don't really have a clear idea on how far we can push this lever, but it is risky. The solvency of United States is ultimately dependent on USD's primacy as a reserve currency and our dominance of the global economy and financial system. It is increasingly dangerous to strain this status quo.
The Pentagon likely has an enormous wish-list for things it needs to compete and possibly defeat China in its own turf. I don't think we are capable of fulfilling that wish list even if we spent the money, and I am becoming increasingly convinced that it's also fiscally irresponsible to do so.
I'm not a debt hawk, debt was not an issue in 2008, but it has become a bigger issue as the years have gone by, and it is most definitely an issue now in 2024. There are no easy answers to our strategic situation, but in times of uncertainty, I believe it's best to bide your time and focus on the fundamentals. IMO, it is unfortunately a time to look inward, even if that means abandoning many of our security commitments.
The problem is it won't perform anything close to intended, it just isn't meant to be automatic, and any such automatization of federated 1970s architecture(advanced for it's time, but not 50 years later!) will by default be roundabout.
But you'll spend every single proper fighter dollar maintaining it, and you won't be able to put it out of box like a proper CCA.
I think we had this discussion on this forum about j-7 hordes.
Tldr: it'll suck; if you want cca, any stupid incr1 aircraft will be better in every single way.
It is totally and completely possible to convert 4th generation aircraft like the F-16 into drones.
What is not possible, or more precisely, what is highly unlikely to be cost effective in the current market, is to convert F-16s into CCAs with the expectation that they'll be almost as capable as F-16s piloted by humans.
A lot of folks like to note the conversion of J-6 and J-7 fighters into drones, but forget that not all drones are equal. These legacy fighters were converted into target drones and decoys. Likewise, it shouldn't be too hard or expensive to convert some of these into one way attack ("suicide") drones, assuming that hasn't happened already.
However, if you're looking for something reasonably reusable, probably best to go for a greenfield project rather than a brownfield project in this instance.
It was more for the expression, and I did clarify it was "Xi's translator"
TerraN_EmpirE
Tyrant King
Considering that the U.S. has flying B21 prototypes and its existing B2 fleet compared to Chinas still vapor H20… Xi’s translator did hear correctly.
Still it was a hilarious choice of image to use. To be fair of all the despots in Czar Vladimir’s Pokédex Assad at least has a trade he can fall back on. Given Russian casualties I am sure Dr. Assad can open up his eye surgery clinic.