In my un experienced opinion small ships in flotillas are the way to go, costs less to man built and repair but costs more to try and find all ships. Even if you find them you can never be too sure so always remains a doubt…

How many harpoons or antiship missiles could you stick in a pkg?

Russia has just signed a deal to sell oil to china, why would china risk nuclear war with Russia when it can just buy the gas and oil at market prices. Only thing stopping them in selling gas to china is the difficulty in setting up a pipeline.

No matter how much in decline the Russian armed forces may have been in they still have a few nuclear missiles…

ah there was a link sorry, ill read it… links broken maybe but i managed to find the article i think through google search..

[url]http://www.warshipsifr.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id…

Just read it, it under estimates China and its readiness too much..for that matter of the BRIC nations.. Otherwise a nice piece. China has been studying the USN doctrin significantly and also operational methods it may not have perfected its own methods but that doesnt mean they will not be any good at all.

some recent news of the Chinese coast gaurd activities, I would say that the Chinese know exactly how to control the seas and that they are already mature, http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jul/26/china-coastguard-confronts…

also do not understand the point in the article mentioning the French Navy in the Indian Oceon..Major players in the Indian Oceon will be USN, PLAN and the Indian Navy.

Lets see what Air Sea Battle finally turns out to be thats going to have a big effect.. at the moment even the 10 people in the USN who are forming this probably dont know what it means.

USNI.org makes for some interesting reading but you have to take into account that they are trying to scare people into funding more ships… http://www.usni.org/print/27169

maybe a pinch of salt should be taken with this as the Royal Navy is still evolving… but interesting read none the less … https://medium.com/war-is-boring/410c3a93ad1f

One more read… http://www.informationdissemination.net/2013/04/strength-in-numbers-rem…

This the last one is more interesting and although the USN might not follow it, could be interesting for other navies in South-east Asia and east Asia to follow. Its almost what the Chinese are already doing very effectively but building a combined coast gaurd with lots of small unarmed boat which although can not fight can ocupy land (occupy sea space) and create a threat of escalation to military if they were ever to be fired upon etc..

furthermore as a lot of the pacific and Indian oceon is dotted with Islands that could be used as hiding or hop of points it makes more sense in the Asian context to use cheaper more affordable (or even just affordable) ships to deny/confuse/keep busy a force which has spent loads on its boats…

Link’s broken.

And another good read, where simply put, things are not as simple as people like to see it

http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/139609/christian-le-miere/chinas-unarmed-arms-race

Good article..nice read.. I read that just yesterday…Robert d. Kaplan is another writer to watch for some very well put together articles…
http://www.foreignaffairs.com/discussions/interviews/qa-with-robert-kaplan-on-china

http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/66985/robert-d-kaplan/monsoon-the-indian-ocean-and-the-future-of-american-power
http://www.foreignaffairs.com/discussions/interviews/qa-with-robert-kaplan-on-geopolitics-in-the-indian-ocean

Tempest, no one is claiming that Asia has taken over in naval terms,army I would say yes, I am just saying that everyone has excepted that Asia is having a slow arms race because they know that china will get even more bullish and brash soon as it thinks its got an advantage..same has happened on the land border.

It’s only natural for china to have a big navy it’s almost it’s destiny…but the countries surrounding it are worried about the attitude of the PLAN when it does mature…it’s already behaving pretty borishly according to some countries perceptions.

Vietnam, Malaysia, Singapore, Japan, Australia, Philippines are all bracing them selves…

Also lets be accurate its not western naval power but the USN…. And that’s not going to decline so fast as the RN or other navies…

I didnt mean to make the thread go at a tangent, but just wanted to say that the richest country doesnt always win the war and that Its pretty much a given that the threat from China is spuring a lot of countries to invest in diesel submarines etc around south east Asia.

on the side, the Taliban vs Nato lets see..for the moment it looks like a complete reset..

USA doesn’t make diesel subs.

Perhaps you could list some examples — from the industrial age please.

Just my opinion but….

Vietnam – France was it until 1954? , Vietnam – USA, Vietnam – China… Russia-Afghanistan, NATO – Taliban as much as NATO and the USA would like to claim victory the fact that they are now sitting down to talk to the TALIBAN hints at a different thing…the ones I can think off…

Then minor skirmishes, USA in Somalia….also not sure how the GDP of Israel compared to the GDP of the Arab countries back in 1970’s although not a nation vs nation fight comparing combined GDP

My opnion is that any war in south east Asia isn’t going to follow the blips of Iraq and Afghanistan but could be a reset to older methods….

USA doesn’t like diesel subs because it cannot detect them easily and on the other hand it doesn’t have use for short range subs….but South Asians countries like them, that’s why Vietnam has ordered 6 upgraded kilo class subs…

i wonder how oilprices will affect 6 gen designs.
To me these drawings seems to about “buisness as usual”, but…
In the real world, it going to be extremly expensive to fly these two turbine petrol guzzlers in a two decades. I think the requirements will change.
i think the fighter will not be a fighter in that sence, only a weapons carrier with extreme sensors. no fun anymore 🙁

http://www.roperld.com/science/minerals/Oil_USGasolinePricesPrediction.htm

But also, i think these designs will not be developed until 2050. F-35 will be the US platform for a long long time. it will only be refined over the years in new revisions.

The oil is a good point which the USN is trying to figure out how to deal with. what i don’t understand is how does the navy think it will get money to fund the new aircraft..

My understanding is that it is already struggling to defend the need for the marine corps and also ability to keep what it thinks will be the minimum number of ships at sea.

also supercruise is good to have but it is a requisite, trade in the supercruise requirement for other functionally important requirements.

There was a news flash on defense aerospace a few weeks ago that the MMRCA was going to have a massive number bump… has anything come out?