US modern ability to mass produce tanks

[Abbott]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by The Commissar:

while beatnicks and hippys hold anti-war protests that totally demoralize the more powerful country.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

You forgot to mention..

Highly educated professionals, future leaders of those powerful countries, everyday folks who believe in peace, everyday folks who do not believe in the current issues at hand, economists, those against the worlds police force and on and on…

While publicizing radicals as the only anti-war movement makes good propaganda it always is a much deeper issue. I for one grew up with a World War II veteran father, enlisted on my eighteenth birthday and was overjoyed the minute I stepped off the bus for boot camp. Being a soldier was my goal in life and I feel it is an honorable profession. I believe the military offers a unique, challenging and respectable career for many.

As I grew older and watched and learned from my elected political officials I learned about propaganda by all governments. If one or more of my sons (I have four) did not agree with the “Why we are fighting” or did not want to shed the blood of his fellow man I would support that decision 100% and do whatever I could to protect them from a draft. It is not just “Beatniks and Hippies”.

[ 04-12-2001: Message edited by: Abbott ]

[Chupacabra]

Besides, are there even any beats around anymore? I mean, since Ginsberg died...

[Abbott]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Chupacabra:

Besides, are there even any beats around anymore? I mean, since Ginsberg died...<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Things just have not been the same since Timothy Leary died.

[Aloid]

Have you looked under a new M1A2 lately?

The sticker says made in China...

(like everything else these days)

I hear they just acquired plans for the P3 Orion. We should just buy them from China at this point, would be cheaper.

I figure that if we ran out of tanks and aircraft, the situation would be such that tac-nukes would be viable. (as scary as that sounds).

Aloid

CM CM CM CM CM CM CM CM CM CM CM CM CM CM CM

[Abbott]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Aloid:

I hear they just acquired plans for the P3 Orion. We should just buy them from China at this point, would be cheaper.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

That is hilarious Aloid, good post!

[Micheal Wittman]

I happen to be a beatnik, complete with a little goatee and a few abstract if not downright twisted views on life and alot of

things init :cool: daddy oh

Since opinions are like assholes, everybody's

got one. I think I'll throw one out, the "US"

over rates itself, never underestimate your

opponent.

[Warmaker]

Low intensity conflicts are predicted as the most commonplace type of warfare in the near future. It's much easier to have small groups of people want to kill each other for stupid reasons than having superpowers annihalating each other. The superpowers know that the end result, whether win or lose, is not good.

For a while the U.S. military, due to the Cold War, was pretty used to fighting pitch battles against the Russians. Cities were generally avoided due to the cost of fighting in such terrain.

Lately though, with events taking place ever since Somalia(well, for the U.S. at least)more and more emphasis has been put into training for MOUT(Military Operations in Urban Terrain). Not a pleasant thing to think about but good training and equipment will carry you. The worst thing that can happen is political meddling, i.e. Somalia, where tanks weren't allowed since they were deemed to look "too offensive" in nature to the Somalis. Utter B.S. to risk the ground troops in such ways, and am still sorry about those poor Rangers.

[ 04-13-2001: Message edited by: Warmaker ]

[BloodyBucket]

In the future, all international conflicts will be resolved by winner take all games of Combat Mission. The loser will be sent to the closest Peng thread.

[von Lucke]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Mannheim Tanker:

Someone still has to pay for all of those toys, though. The gov't could write out trillions of dollars in IOUs, but only at the risk of completely destalizing the economy. It's pretty clear that nobody can afford a war at the scale of WWII (in terms of intensity, land area and time). A modern war would likely have to sacrifice at least one of these factors (eg have a low intensity conflict over a long time period, or a high intensity, short conflict like in the Gulf).<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

When I was with the 101st back in the mid-80's they deployed the entire division for a field exercise, supposedly to run for an entire month. We came limping back in after three weeks due to lack of supply and higher than expected maintenance problems.

Now I realize this was 15 some odd years back, but the 101st was (and is) one of the more high-tech high-maintenance divisions in the US Army, and the problems we had then maintaining effective status in the field probably still apply today. I think any large scale mobilization on the part of any modern army would run into significantly more complex logistics problems then what Eisenhower had to deal with in Northern Europe.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Jeff Heidman:

With one shot kills a reality and the extremely lethal nature of modern weaponry, modern large scale warfare is going to be win or lose with what you have NOW, not what you can build a year or two from now.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Very true. That's why major powers usually stockpile equipment, because it would take too damn long to replace all that expensive high-tech rolling stock. And, as someone else mentioned, the USA now farms out so much of it's manufacturing to over-seas interests, that in the event of WWIII we'd be severely handicapped by even a half-assed blockcade.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted bt Panzer Boxb:

Now I don't believe that if a conflict broke out on the scale of WWII that we would be trying to mass produce a super complicated piece of equipment like the M1 Abrams tanks but rather try to dumb it (or produce another, less sophisticated model) down a bit so we could produce more and less training would be required.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Ever see a Cadillac-Gage Stingray? It was a private venture between GMC (the mechanicals) and Royal Ordinance of England (the 105mm gun and sighting), built for the export arms market. We could always go back to building M60's as well.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Chupacabra:

I also believe that unconventional warfare is going to become the norm rather than the exception, and that tanks and planes will become increasingly less important<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I sort of agree with this. When yr talking about one of the "haves" (like the USA) going against one of the "have-nots" (like say, Somalia) --- yes, I can see how it would turn out that way. It's always been like that, where one state so totally outclasses the other that a stand-up fight would be totally one-sided. Plus which, there's the USA's reluctance to pound the snot out of some third-world country, "just because we can". So, of course, limited deployments will be in order, which lend themselves well to turning into the sort of sniping match described.

On the other hand, if you have two 3rd-worlders of equal strength (and equal hatred), you're still going to see plenty of "conventional warfare". Iran vs. Iraq immediately springs to mind, with India vs. Pakistan on the short list for another go-round.

[Guest ckoharik]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by von Lucke:

On the other hand, if you have two 3rd-worlders of equal strength (and equal hatred), you're still going to see plenty of "conventional warfare". Iran vs. Iraq immediately springs to mind, with India vs. Pakistan on the short list for another go-round.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

One thing I forgot to mention was that in the future we might not be seeing a threat from a single super power but rather a group of like-minded, pissed off groups (say, the Middle East) that idividually we (the U.S.) could take out but combined would prove to be insurmountable given our force/logistical restrictions. That doesn't even go into the possibility of multiple simultaneous conflicts around the globe.

On the subject of AFVs (Alternate Fighting Vehicles) I have seen many concepts for lower tech, low cost units that could supplement (not replace) the MBT yet they are usually terminated before any meaningful evaluations can be done. Heck, we could probably pull the plans out for ye ole Super Pershing (CM connection for the day) and mass produce them. I'm sure a revamped 90mm would still be an effective weapon for infantry support/light armor engagments.

While I agree that the majority of conflicts will be low intensity I wholeheartedly disagree that large scale, long term conflicts are a thing of the past. If we were to believe that then we would continue to be completely unprepared to meet the threat once it appears. :eek: