Time to give the Marines a overdue appendectomy

[DinoDoc]

Keep the Marines. No real rationalization for that, but...Keep the Marines.

Gibbs.

[Hauldren Collider]

If the air is still being contested then you really don't want to be sending large groups of men on helicopters. To move large numbers of soldiers via chopper you're going to need big helicopters. Big, slow helicopters that make wonderful targets for the enemy to send tumbling out of the sky. One man with a shoulder mounted launcher can make a chinook go bang.

On the other hand, you'd need big slow boats to get them onto the beach, so if the air is still being contested, then they could sink your boats. Plus, it takes a lot less technology to sink a boat than it does to shoot down a helicopter. Most navies have lots of small missile boats that go incredibly fast, are hard to hit, and could presumably easily wipe out one of those D-Day-esque landing crafts. Or hovercrafts. Or what have you.

Also, bigger helicopters aren't necessarily slower.

[kentonio]

Where are these hypothetical helicopters staging from?

[regexcellent]

[kentonio]

So basically you're already going to have to ensure sea defence, but instead of landing boats you're going to risk an air infiltration? Sounds like a pretty risky idea.

[Hauldren Collider]

I disagree. Helicopters don't need beaches and maneuver extremely quickly, which greatly complicates defense for the adversary.

[kentonio]

I think you're just too used to America having air superiority. Take that away and things change very quickly.

[Felch]

Of course we're used to America having air superiority. Take that away and any invasion is off the table.

[Hauldren Collider]

I think you're just too used to America having air superiority. Take that away and things change very quickly.

Actually, what we're used to is air invulnerability. Our fixed-wing aircraft are essentially invulnerable, thanks to our huge technological advantage in electronic warfare and stealth. Our military really hates putting pilots at any sort of risk, which is honestly a little stupid. But we'd still have air superiority even if we fought a country with similar technology, just because we have so many goddamn planes. We'd never even attempt an invasion without air superiority.

Israel seems to have electronic warfare that is as good as ours, or at least very good. They're confident enough in it that they'd rather use their EW systems with the fighters they import from us than ours. They don't have our stealth tech yet, but they will when they get the F-35. And I'd be incredibly surprised if they didn't have a few secret weapons and tech that we don't know about.

[kentonio]

Actually, what we're used to is air invulnerability. Our fixed-wing aircraft are essentially invulnerable, thanks to our huge technological advantage in electronic warfare and stealth.

Good point.

Our military really hates putting pilots at any sort of risk, which is honestly a little stupid.

Not really. Pilots cost insane amounts of time and money to train to a high level, not to mention the vast cost of a modern plane. Why would you risk them if you don't need to?

But we'd still have air superiority even if we fought a country with similar technology, just because we have so many goddamn planes.

For a while sure, but both China and Russia are capable of maintaining vast militaries.

We'd never even attempt an invasion without air superiority.

Well not ideally, but you really don't know what the future is going to hold. If there ever is another big war, it's not as easy as to say that under no circumstances would America ever do x. It's far from inconceivable that at some point you might need to land a significant amount of troops without the guarantee of completely clear skies. As I pointed out before also, with helicopters all it takes is a guy on the ground with a SAM and your landing is in real trouble.

Israel seems to have electronic warfare that is as good as ours, or at least very good. They're confident enough in it that they'd rather use their EW systems with the fighters they import from us than ours. They don't have our stealth tech yet, but they will when they get the F-35. And I'd be incredibly surprised if they didn't have a few secret weapons and tech that we don't know about.

I'm not sure why you mentioned Israel, but you can expect China to be fielding stuff comparable to the US in the quite near future too.

[kentonio]

DP