How would you fight China?

[anotherlife]

How would us 250 million Americans fight the 1 billion ++ China in a war? They can just keep coming with more and more men and more and more money. How would the US stay its foothold against them?

 

[Emir]

The only winning move is not to play.

-Joshua, from WarGames​

 

[anotherlife]

The only winning move is not to play.

-Joshua, from WarGames​

But is "not to play" an option? The British Empire didn't give this option to the then isolationist China in the 19th century.

 

[Emir]

The only winning move is not to play.

-Joshua, from WarGames​

But is "not to play" an option? The British Empire didn't give this option to the then isolationist China in the 19th century.

Are you seriously claiming modern China is analogous to Victorian Britain?

 

[TheOldSchool]

A direct war with China is probably the end for everyone. That's why China and the U.S. will never attack each other. We may fight economically, but hell if the U.S. economy is destroyed we'll still have thousands of nukes and no one will want to mess with that.

 

[Wonky Pundit]

A war with modern China would be suicidal, yes. Both countries have plenty of nukes. (China also happens to control almost all the world's supply of several minerals our economy now depends on.)

 

[Flopper]

Ain't gonna happen so why waste time on such a question.

 

[Mr. H.]

It's a Mutually Assured Destruction Mutually Assured Destruction Mutually Assured Destruction Mutually Assured Destruction world.

 

[JakeStarkey]

Neither the USA nor China are going to fight each other.

However, they will use proxies as they did in Korea and Vietnam to fight each other.

 

[Unkotare]

(China also happens to control almost all the world's supply of several minerals our economy now depends on.)

Not really, but they are just about the only place actively mining them.

 

[MikeK]

How would us 250 million Americans fight the 1 billion ++ China in a war? They can just keep coming with more and more men and more and more money. How would the US stay its foothold against them?

I have repeatedly advocated restoring the draft as the only means we have of keeping up with the clearly superior numbers in the Chinese military. They vastly outnumber us and if they move against us the only hope we would have is to use nukes, which would mean Armageddon.

An active draft will flood our civilian population with millions of trained soldiers who could be called up and deployed in a matter of weeks rather than the months it takes to train raw recruits. If we'd had such a pool of easily deployable grunts at the outset of WW-II we could have overwhelmed the Japanese in the Pacific and prevented Bataan, Corregidor, and numerous other defeats we suffered there in the early stages of the War. We were caught with our pants down back then and we should not let it happen again.

We have for too long been smugly dependent on our nuclear capabilities but the era of that advantage has passed. China has nukes, too. So does Russia, Pakistan, and N. Korea. It's possible that Iran already has them or if not will have them soon. We can no longer rely on that option because a nuclear exchange could mean the end of civilization. So we need to have more trained soldiers on inactive reserve status.

We need more boots to put on the ground or we can be overrun. In spite of what the money-grubbing military politicians in Washington tell us the days of the foot soldier are far from over. We were warned by General Shinseki that to prevail in Iraq in the time frame proposed by the Bush Administration would have called for at least 350,000 more troops, which we didn't have. Consequently we've been there for ten years now at a cost of more than a trillion dollars, the loss of 4,400 lives and 36,000 disabling injuries.

The Military Industrial Complex is responsible for the current emphasis on technology because drafting and training foot soldiers doesn't put as much money in its pockets as does manufacturing exotic machinery and Star-Wars gadgetry.

 

[MikeK]

A direct war with China is probably the end for everyone. That's why China and the U.S. will never attack each other. We may fight economically, but hell if the U.S. economy is destroyed we'll still have thousands of nukes and no one will want to mess with that.

Oh, really?

Thousands of nukes is absurdly redundant and is nothing more than a statement of our national insanity. How many nukes do you think it would take to destroy civilization? China has that many. So does Russia. And they are not the only nuke-equipped militaries which are expanding their arsenals day by day. So forget nukes. Those days are over, unless we wish to incinerate ourselves along with everyone else.

We need foot soldiers to put in the way of foot soldiers. And right now China is way ahead of us in that capability.

 

[GHook93]

How would us 250 million Americans fight the 1 billion ++ China in a war? They can just keep coming with more and more men and more and more money. How would the US stay its foothold against them?

Tell that to the Vietnamese! After we left Vietnam, China invaded! China thought they could send millions over the border in a blitz! After one month over 100K Chinese were dead and the Chinese were running back over the border with their tails btw their legs!

 

[TheOldSchool]

A direct war with China is probably the end for everyone. That's why China and the U.S. will never attack each other. We may fight economically, but hell if the U.S. economy is destroyed we'll still have thousands of nukes and no one will want to mess with that.

Oh, really?

Thousands of nukes is absurdly redundant and is nothing more than a statement of our national insanity. How many nukes do you think it would take to destroy civilization? China has that many. So does Russia. And they are not the only nuke-equipped militaries which are expanding their arsenals day by day. So forget nukes. Those days are over, unless we wish to incinerate ourselves along with everyone else.

We need foot soldiers to put in the way of foot soldiers. And right now China is way ahead of us in that capability.

One side would nuke the others foot soldiers. That's why neither side will send foot soldiers.

 

[Mr. H.]

I suppose Ping Pong diplomacy wouldn't work the second time around.

 

[Unkotare]

How would us 250 million Americans fight the 1 billion ++ China in a war? They can just keep coming with more and more men and more and more money. How would the US stay its foothold against them?

I have repeatedly advocated restoring the draft as the only means we have of keeping up with the clearly superior numbers in the Chinese military. They vastly outnumber us and if they move against us the only hope we would have is to use nukes...

Ridiculous. We are more than capable of containing China's conventional armed forces as it now stands. Hell, we can prevent them from overrunning Taiwan right now.

We wouldn't be marching in formation at each other across a big, open field, for cryin' out loud.

 

[Unkotare]

Bear in mind too that the enormous numbers of 'troops' that China has on paper are not all exactly Special Forces. A lot of them are retired military who are still officially on the books, and students who completed a compulsory couple of weeks training - often part-time.



All a moot point anyway.

 

[MikeK]

One side would nuke the others foot soldiers. That's why neither side will send foot soldiers.

If only that were true.

 

[Mr. H.]

We must fight China by loving them.

Long time. No?

We do them boom-boom.

 

[Unkotare]

How would us 250 million Americans fight the 1 billion ++ China in a war? They can just keep coming with more and more men and more and more money. How would the US stay its foothold against them?

US can't fight its way out of a wet paper bag. It can only bomb.

Oh, were you worried that some people had forgotten what an idiot you are? You really shouldn't be.