Chinese Naval Might

[David Floyd]

OK, then decipher this:

If we are in a war with China, and some pissant Third World MIddle Eastern nation is still shipping oil to China via overland pipelines despite our diplomatic efforts to curtail such shipments, then you better damn well believe we will resort to military options to prevent oil shipments to China.

[Drake Tungsten]

Of course, that would turn the opinion of oil-producing countries against America, along with much of the rest of the world. Meanwhile, the Chinese can just run down their strategic petroleum reserve and bask in their PR victory, all because they were smart enough to build pipelines to access oil imports rather than build a blue-water navy with which to challenge the USN.

[David Floyd]

Interesting enough, most Middle Eastern oil supplies Europe and Japan rather than the US. Also, you seem to forget that we currently occupy Iraq, and there is basically no chance of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait turning against the United States, given that we essentially subsidize their national defense. Forgive me for not being worried if we interdict Chinese oil supplies, after exhausting diplomatic options, in a country that is supporting China rather than the US in a potential conflict. Oooh, scary

[Drake Tungsten]

Oil-producing countries would certainly never embargo the US for political reasons, let alone an attack on one of their own for doing nothing more than selling (or transporting) oil.

edit: It should also be noted that Russian oil flows through the pipelines you're so keen on bombing, so the US would be provoking Russia while engaged in a war with China. Great idea.

[Patroklos]

all because they were smart enough to build pipelines

Are these the imaginary ones that even if they did exist have no hope of providing for seaborne oil independance anyway and that that are also imaginary smoking ruins in the event of any hot war?

[Drake Tungsten]

Are these the imaginary ones

Are you really this stupid? I already provided two links in this thread, one to an oil pipeline that was fully completed this summer and one to a natural-gas pipeline that should be finished by the end of the year. How about you go read them and educate yourself rather than continuing to make an ass out of yourself in front of everyone?

[Patroklos]

Why don't you point to us on the map where these massive game changing oil pipelines are?

You provided the map, not me. Of course there are pipelines into China from Russia and other places, the point is Drake (and you know this you are just being deliberatly difficult) is that there is no way that China can shift enough of its oil imports to pipeline sources as to make their vulnerablity to naval blockade a nonissue. This is both because the volume transfered by this method will not be sufficient, and because such pipelines it is not possible to adequetly defend against an adversary such as the US.

You had a very simple position, that adequate pipelines will exist within the OPs timeline to make their inability to import oil via the Indian Ocean a non issue. You have failed miserably in supporting it.

[Drake Tungsten]

Why are you laughing, you ****? You're the one who just got pwned on your moronic "imaginary pipelines" argument...

Sadly, your other arguments aren't much better.

[Patroklos]

Oh noes, you are typing insults now! Surely I am bested

[Drake Tungsten]

What else am I supposed to do? When I provide informative posts, you either don't read them or can't understand them. You then claim I'm imagining things and, when proven wrong, laugh as though you aren't the ****ing clown in this exchange. You don't deserve anything other than my contempt at this point.

[Patroklos]

Are there any grownups reading the tread who wish to continue with the topic? Drake has moved on to temper tantrums.

[Felch]

So now we have imaginary pipelines and imaginary drydocks, awesome

The whole point of the article is that the drydocks aren't imaginary. Thanks for coming out.

[Darius871]

Yankee Serb disagreeing with you = final victory.

[Patroklos]

The whole point of the article is that the drydocks aren't imaginary. Thanks for coming out.

No, the point of the article is that by 2015 "China's cost advantages in "metal-bending" industries will compare very favorably against U.S. naval shipbuilders who are best known for gross cost overruns, long delays, and problem-ridden deliveries."

Which means that they are not in currently in existance, which means they have to be built, which means they themselves will not be building hulls for several years, which means the claim that China will have as many ships as the US (they most mean tonnage, as just by hulls they already do) inside a decade is horribly stupid. This is not hard to understand when you do your reasearch and understand China has built 7 destroyers in the last 10 years and are maybe working on another 2-3 right now (they are buying some Russian hulls, but that is irrelevant to their ship building arguement). There is nothing to support the OPs timeline.