Many things (that are now impossible to quote) were said. In any case, the US has been able to buy these things and can still afford to operate them, so they're relevant.
If you prefer to only look at recent acquisitions, 34 Arleigh Burke-class destroyers were commissioned between 2000 and 2012, 2 more in 2017 and Wikipedia predicts four will be commissioned this year. 14 Virginia-class submarines have been commissioned since 2004 and the rate will apparently increase to two per year with the next block. 66 F-35 were made in 2017 (some for export), with the number set to increase significantly over the coming years.
Right now (or from here on out), this (in italics) may be true for some ship classes, but it's not been shown to be true in general, both in achieved production rates and in affordability. I provided the example of the J-20 (supposedly) costing a third more than the F-35, along with the contrast in the number built per year.
To clarify one thing: I never said it's impossible for China to match or surpass American military acquisitions (over a reasonable time frame). In fact, in
this post I suggested large increases in military spending to get there sooner. What I objected to were specifically these two posts:
Regarding the first one, the US military spending has been very high for decades and will likely continue to be. As a percentage of GDP it's also very close to the lowest it's been since before the Second World War.
Regarding the second one, I objected to the "broken" characterization, plus the "until" part seems to says that the US can't keep up with China right now, which is also false (even if only speaking of acquisitions).
Thanks for answering. I think this basically makes my point. Literally every country except China is described as having broken procurement, getting ripped off, or worse. If only China has non-broken procurement, maybe the standard is just off. Assuming the same relative classification, maybe "broken" should be replaced with "normal" or "standard" and China can qualify for "good" or "great". This may seem like splitting hairs, but I'm sure that people here wouldn't accept derogatory descriptions of China for things that are actually normal or average. Additionally, it's just misleading to use inaccurate descriptions.
Put another way, I'm skeptical of the idea that these countries, which include many of the world most technologically advanced nations with the largest economies and most powerful militaries, have a "broken procurement process", which means they're either incompetent or corrupt. I think it's much more likely that they're actually very good at what they do and have good reasons for most decisions that look baffling from the outside. Of course, this doesn't mean that mistakes can't happen, from incompetence, corruption or otherwise.
If you insist. One obvious example would be the first domestic aircraft carrier, which wasn't wanted by the Navy but ordered by the political leadership (where did I read that?). Politicians overruling the military professionals to procure an expensive, outdated carrier when a much more capable version would be available only four years later sounds suspiciously like a broken procurement process. Or to use a standard you provided, the [Chinese] would be functional if they could produce everything they need, which they can't ([nuclear reactors for carriers, modern turbofans]), so owing to industrial limitations, theirs is somewhat broken. More examples are available.
So maybe the price of ships isn't the defining feature of a country's military procurement.
@latenlazy for the previous discussion
