USA vs the World

[Az]

No, I didn't.

[Sava]

What you guys aren't thinking about is the internal dissent that the US would face. There would be a revolution if the US ever tried to invade another democratic country like Canada.

[DuncanK]

Floyd hit it on the head

[Sandman]

I am not convinced that the USN carriers can be adequately protected from submarines.

[DuncanK]

All of our carriers are protected by submarines and other antisub ships

[DuncanK]

Originally posted by Sava
What you guys aren't thinking about is the internal dissent that the US would face. There would be a revolution if the US ever tried to invade another democratic country like Canada.

No one said who were to attack first. I was assuming that the rest of the world declared war on us. In that case there would not be dissent.

[David Floyd]

hmm the USN is a mighty powerful force but I don't believe even it could stand up to the rest of the World's combined power. Especially, if you consider that the aircraft and ships the USN uses have been sold to other navies and would be used against them.

Sorry, that's incorrect. The rest of the world does not have an aircraft carrier anywhere near the size or power of a comparable US aircraft carrier. In fact, all they have are helicopter carriers or very small fixed-wing aircraft carriers. If you look at it from a pure numbers perspective, the US still has an advantage. Next, look at carrier defenses - the US has the AEGIS system, including something like 27 AEGIS cruisers. This is more cruisers than the rest of the world combined possesses, as well as significantly superior in quality. The US also has a few dozen destroyers and frigates with great anti-air capabilities, which, again, are superior to the ships of the rest of the world.

Next, submarines. Granted, the rest of the world has more submarines - but most of those submarines belong to brown water navies, and are pretty much coastal diesal submarines. If you want to look at long range submarines (nuclear or diesal) the US is still slightly outnumbered, but the US has a qualitative advantage. This advantage is further accenuated by US ASW, which is superior to that of the rest of the world.

Next, look at the naval air power question. There is actually no question here, but a statement of fact - US naval aviation is by far quantitatively and qualitatively superior to the rest of the world. If you want to put a Sea Harrier up against a Superhornet, or even a Tomcat, good luck.

Finally, coordination. The USN is used to operating as a cohesive unit, with the CVBG as the primary subunit. The NATO navies would be able to operate together to an extent, but, for example, the Royal Navy and Russian Navy would have a lot more trouble cooperating - language barriers, weapons standardization problems, communications, doctrine, etc.

The reason why the world would win is because of industrial output, and sheer numbers... if you combine Russia China EU and India... plus add all of the South/Central America... US coudn't contain South America on its own, as there is barely 300 million people in the US, and even with all the tech advantages the guerilla war against the US would decimate its forces

Why should the US occupy South America? It makes no sense. Simply occupy the valuable areas of Canada near the border - or, if necessary, simply destroy what makes them valuable - and station troops at the Texas/Mexico border, and the Western Hemisphere can't touch the US. Besides, I'd like to see South American economies being able to supply a multi-million man army marching through the South and Central American jungles into Texas, under constant air attack. Simply not gonna happen.

You do make a point about world production considerably outweighing that of the US. That's true, but also remember that these countries have no modern experience in building or operating large naval forces, especially in terms of aircraft carriers. They'd have to design a prototype, work out the kinks, design a suitable carrier aircraft, work out the kinks in that, design suitable carrier escorts, work out the kinks in those, etc. - sure, in 15 years the world might be able to field modern carrier battle groups that could challenge the USN, but I see no reason the vastly superior USN couldn't simply launch strikes against major shipbuilding centers around the world, using attack submarines and cruise missiles. There aren't exactly that many shipyards around the world that have the capacity to build carriers and large submarines and the like. Certainly there are none in Africa, and probably none in Asia, with the possible exception of Japan.

But the question is, could the US or the rest of the world survive a decade long war without going under economically. The answer is "obviously not". Thus the only POSSIBILITY is a short war, with the victor being determined by who gained the largest strategic/tactical advantage in the shortest amount of time. And, because of the immediate vast superiority of the USN, and the hemispheric vast superiority of the USAF and US Army, the answer is clearly that the United States would win.

[Jon Shafer]

Originally posted by Sava
What you guys aren't thinking about is the internal dissent that the US would face. There would be a revolution if the US ever tried to invade another democratic country like Canada.

I thought the situation was purely hypothetical starting with the simple fact that the US was against the rest of the world. We're not worrying about how it happened, just what happens.

[David Floyd]

Oh, and Sava, there's also the relevant point that the rest of the world would revolt at uniting to fight the US, so let's just leave internal dissent aside for purposes of discussion, and look at military ability only.

[DuncanK]

Floyd,

As far a sustaining the war I would agree that the US would not be able to sustain the war as long. I don't think our economy would be the weak point though. War mobilization can keep it going indefinitely. The weak point would be our population. It would take a couple of decades but then we wouldn't have the man power to keep it up. I don't think a war would go that long though.

[David Floyd]

No, economics would kill a world wide war before population would - everyone's economies are so intertwined that Europe and Asia would tank without the US, and vice versa. IMO anyway.

As to population, I don't see a big crunch for that - the US wouldn't need a massive army, just a massive navy and air force. No matter how long it takes, I guarantee you that the US can build more ground-based airpower than the rest of the world can build carriers to support naval aviation (that is, if the world built 10 carriers with 70 aircraft each in, say, 10 years, which is very generous, that's only 700 aircraft - in 10 years, the US could crank out thousands and thousands of fighters).

[DuncanK]

Floyd,

The economy would crash everywhere for sure (except Cuba maybe). And granted the US would probably take longer to get theirs going do to their failure to step away from free market dogma. But after some period the economy would straighten out with some government planning. The economy would not get progressively worse.

[David Floyd]

Well, if you say so, you might know more about it than I do, but I'm not convinced that either the world or the US could survive without the other.

[Demerzel]

Floyd, yes Sea Harriers might not have much luck against Tomcats but what about the other aircraft Europe & World can put up...

F15s ( can cross atlantic in one go with external fuel pods )
F16s
F18s
[ Future : EuroFighters / JSF ]
Saab's newest fighter ( forget its name but extremely capable )
Latest Mig- & Su- fighters

Europe also has plenty of Sentry AWACs for any air battle direction.

Submarine wise, our ( British ) submarines ( & their commanders ) are pretty good for a start and would hold their own I suspect with great support from French & Russian subs.

ASW, Britain again has a pretty good ( ) record in this area as do other nations.

Carriers, yes the USN is pretty much on its own in the carrier market until we build 2 largish carriers in 2010 and then you'll still have a mile long advantage.

However, carriers are still floating objects in a sea and if I remember rightly things that float can sink ( battleships learnt that ). The world would be able to put enough planes & have those attacks co-ordinated by teh AWACs to gain air superiority against any carrier fleet. Then its a question of whether the missiles would get through the AEGIS screen... It's not as if you can hide a big carrier fleet from satellites, they would be wide open to any attack that was launched at them. If you concentrated them to protect themselves, then the rest of the world would just attack in the gap you left open. If you spread them out to protect everywhere, then the world's forces would concentrate on one segment and kill it with overwhelming force.

Plus, where are your vaunted USAF planes going to fly from? Diego Garcia where you like to put your B2s is British territory and all the air bases in Britain would be gone. They'd be forced out of their Korean & Japanese bases too. They'd all be flying from US soil and in any attack would be facing similiar risks to German pilots in WW2, i.e. long flights, running out of fuel, bail out and either get captured or drown...

I'm sure we'll never agree exactly but surely you can see that this pretense of USA can win alone is just totally unfeasible. Yes you have a technological advantage but this isn't a Tom Clancy book where the US wins in 30mins against overwhelming odds, the World's military and industrial might would crack the US like a nut. War on three fronts - i.e. from Asia, Europe and South America would be quite a feat to push back

[David Floyd]

Floyd, yes Sea Harriers might not have much luck against Tomcats but what about the other aircraft Europe & World can put up...

F15s ( can cross atlantic in one go with external fuel pods )
F16s
F18s
[ Future : EuroFighters / JSF ]
Saab's newest fighter ( forget its name but extremely capable )
Latest Mig- & Su- fighters

I wasn't aware you guys had carriers that could launch and recover those fighters.

Submarine wise, our ( British ) submarines ( & their commanders ) are pretty good for a start and would hold their own I suspect with great support from French & Russian subs.

Good luck coordination combined operations with NATO navies and the Russian navy. In fact, for that matter, good luck finding more than a dozen or so modern Russian subs that are in operable condition.

ASW, Britain again has a pretty good record in this area as do other nations.

But currently, the US is superior qualitatively and quantitatively.

The world would be able to put enough planes & have those attacks co-ordinated by teh AWACs to gain air superiority against any carrier fleet.

Sure, if we park the carriers off the coast of Europe. But why would we?

Plus, where are your vaunted USAF planes going to fly from? Diego Garcia where you like to put your B2s is British territory and all the air bases in Britain would be gone. They'd be forced out of their Korean & Japanese bases too. They'd all be flying from US soil and in any attack would be facing similiar risks to German pilots in WW2, i.e. long flights, running out of fuel, bail out and either get captured or drown...

Why should the US be bombing anyone?

War on three fronts - i.e. from Asia, Europe and South America would be quite a feat to push back

War on three fronts? Well, there might be a minor naval challenge in the Atlantic and Pacific, but it would not be a major problem for the USN. The only other front is the Texas/Mexico front, and that would be no problem either.

Of course there's Canada, but Canada's military would be destroyed as an effective fighting force the moment it bothered to assemble.