China riots, island tensions and the UN -updated

[FantomOmega]

The misconception that the Japanese navy is weak is quite funny.

In reality their navy is strong enough to sink the Chinese navy in a blink.

The misconception that China is capable of going to war with the US is equally funny, what with the entire Pacific and a Navy that is both better equipped and outnumbers theirs 3 to 1 standing between them and America.

China probably want to use the 'human wave' tactic of overwhelming the enemy with shear numbers

I don't even want to think of the slaughter if the US submarines got involved...

Honestly, I'm no tactician but I don't think it would be a stretch to say we could win a war with China without a single american platoon setting foot on the chinese mainland. All we need do would be to wreck their airfields, naval bases and use our tactical bombers and artillery from sea to take pot shots at choice targets until China eventually gives up.

Again, i'm no tactician and I never went to West point or anything, but to a layman it sounds plausible, no?

That's what bothers me about China, they don't care for 'troop safety' so it would be a one sided slaughter. but how much tech did they managed to steal still makes them dangerous

 

[slacker09]

So if I understand the OP, these islands have been Japanese territory since 1972, but when it turned out they were actually worth something, China started calling dibs? And they're mad because something they never owned was sold without their consent? Or am I reading this wrong?

From what I understand of the history, China owned the Islands for sometime before 1895, then the First Sino-Japanese War occurred, Japan one and gained control of the Islands. Then after WWII the United States had partial control but Japan still owned it. In the late 60's either Oil or Natural Gas was found and in 1972 we turned over control back to Japan. This is when China started being interested since the islands were pretty worthless before then and were only given to Japan as a small part of the peace treaty in 1895. So China did own it before 1895 but for the last 100+ year they have been Japan's.

 

[FantomOmega]

[...]Nazis for all their atrocity's didn't treat their fellow countrymen like SHIT[...]

You've got to be joking... Without being actually funny.

What about their fellow countrymen who were gay? Or had a disability? Or had a different political viewpoint? What about social democrats or communists or even conservatives in Germany? What about those who had a mental disease? Or those who made art or literature that wasn't to the party's liking?

What about their fellow countrymen who happened to be jewish?

I see comparisons to the Nazis here as justified and I did it myself because it's the same transparent and obvious propaganda...

But what you wrote there was just stupid.

Its only now that some viewpoints can be accepted (homosexuality for example) and that was something that that MANY country's shunned but Nazi Germany still treat the general populace as "people" in their own flawed way of viewing human perfection and the rest of the people who did NOT fall under your listed views were OK

China do not see their populace as a whole beyond a high ranking government official as "people" and they're treated poorly regardless if they obey or NOT

I understand what your saying and do agree to some point but your not seeing the broader picture here, perhaps I should have said that SOME of the populace of Germany was treated like crap under Nazi rule, well whatever

 

[ResonanceSD]

What's that? You have ten aircraft carriers? How do think China...?

Spoiler

These are significantly harder to spot than ships.

 

[Robert Ewing]

Eh, Japan and China are token enemies. South Korea and North Korea are the same. England and France are the same. America and... the entire middle east.

I'm routing for Japan... despite the fact they have no chance if this does escalate. Sadly China is powerful beyond all recognition, so what chance does anyone have after the waves of Chinese genocide blacken the west?

England and France are not enemies, their relationship is certainly nothing like North and South Korea.

Woah woah, England and France are FAMOUS historical enemies, this is pretty much the only century we haven't been spilling each others guts out on a field in Belgium.

 

[ResonanceSD]

What's that? You have eleven aircraft carriers? How do think China...?

Fixed that for you.

Spoiler

These are significantly harder to spot than ships.

What are you talking about; it's colorful and on fire, two common traits of noticeable things. Now just imagine what the US version of that would look like.

That is the US version of what that would look like. It's an Ohio-Class SSBN firing a missile.

 

[A_Parked_Car]

Two Words: Area Deniability.

China has actually dramatically downsized and modernized their armed forces. They no longer follow Mao's doctrine of People's War (the PLA has never used human-wave as their core doctrinal line). Instead, they have formed a new system that they are structuring their forces around. I can't remember the exact wording, but it was something about small-scale, high-intensity conflicts under extremely technological conditions. This process has been ongoing since they saw what the US did to Iraq in the First Gulf War. While their armed forces may not be nearly as advanced as the United States, they do have certain tools to use.

The big one is what I started this post with: Area Deniability. The Chinese realize that they can't fight the USN in a straight up battle to the death. The PLAN's (People's Liberation Army Navy) short term goal is to build a functional green-water navy with the simple objective of being able to ferry and support an invasion of Taiwan. At this time they don't have an effective blue-water navy to fight the USN.

Instead, they have invested in so many mobile, land-based anti-ship missile systems that the USN can't get close to the Chinese coast without being destroyed. Now, I'm not sure if this will work around the Senkaku islands, but I do know that it works for Taiwan. This would be combined with all the Soviet rust-bucket submarines they have been buying. The point of the subs isn't to actually sink the USN, but to simply slow it down. Anti-submarine warfare is time-consuming and couldn't be neglected or the USN would risk being severely damaged by the attack of the rust-buckets. The whole point being that the USN wouldn't be able to intervene if the Chinese invaded Taiwan.

Now, obviously these are all defensive measures. China lacks the offensive capability to actually strike the Japanese home islands or the US. At least by any conventional means. We currently don't know how advanced they are in terms of cyber warfare. In fact, we don't have any knowledge of anyone's cyber warfare capability.

Anyway, I'm a military history major and I took a few courses (including a high-level seminar) on Chinese strategic thought, so I'm quite well versed on these matters.

This whole situation is a bit disconcerting. As my Chinese military professor has said, the Chinese leadership are being quite immature and the Japanese are being quite imprudent.

 

[ResonanceSD]

That is the US version of what that would look like. It's an Ohio-Class SSBN firing a missile.

Hmm well now I know what that looks like, thank you.

I may have misinterpreted your intention in the original post. I thought you were saying how China would beat aircraft carriers with subs, but now I'm not really sure what you were trying to say (other than the obvious).

Why use Aircraft carriers?

Why not Zoidb-

Sorry,

Why not use subs? =D

 

[Cid Silverwing]

But the Chinese government has a solid grip on the media, so the only reason these riots are happening is because they want it to happen.

Very much so. They're up there with radical muslims when it comes to anti-democracy.

I'm calling this right now - World War 3, China VS Japan and the world.

 

[BleedingPride]

damn thats not good

 

[Robot Number V]

Yeah, if the US goes to war with China and it lasts longer then say, 6 months, I'm moving to Canada. Bother that nonsense.

 

[elilupe]

I can't find the exact links where I saw the news, but apparently within the last hour, Chinese patrol boats have subsequently left the area near the islands, and then quickly reentered the area. Now there are two Chinese surveillance vessels patrolling.

Also, here is a really interesting look at the historical background behind this problem:
http://kristof.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/19/the-inconvenient-truth-behind-the-diaoyusenkaku-islands/

 

[Platypus540]

Well... shit. This looks pretty bad, I hope there's no real fighting.

At the very least, even if something bad does happen, at least Japan isn't in any real danger (relatively speaking), what with the defense agreement with the US. China, on the other hand, could get seriously messed up if they keep up like this, which seems like something they might do.

Edit: If anything good comes of out of this, maybe it will finally inspire the US to get our jobs back out of China, haha.

 

[RoonMian]

Yeah, if the US goes to war with China and it lasts longer then say, 6 months, I'm moving to Canada. Bother that nonsense.

Only problem is: If the USA engage in a full scale war with another major country then it would be very possible they call on their allies.

Meaning the NATO.

Which would include Canada.

 

[Platypus540]

Two Words: Area Deniability.

China has actually dramatically downsized and modernized their armed forces. They no longer follow Mao's doctrine of People's War (the PLA has never used human-wave as their core doctrinal line). Instead, they have formed a new system that they are structuring their forces around. I can't remember the exact wording, but it was something about small-scale, high-intensity conflicts under extremely technological conditions. This process has been ongoing since they saw what the US did to Iraq in the First Gulf War. While their armed forces may not be nearly as advanced as the United States, they do have certain tools to use.

The big one is what I started this post with: Area Deniability. The Chinese realize that they can't fight the USN in a straight up battle to the death. The PLAN's (People's Liberation Army Navy) short term goal is to build a functional green-water navy with the simple objective of being able to ferry and support an invasion of Taiwan. At this time they don't have an effective blue-water navy to fight the USN.

Instead, they have invested in so many mobile, land-based anti-ship missile systems that the USN can't get close to the Chinese coast without being destroyed. Now, I'm not sure if this will work around the Senkaku islands, but I do know that it works for Taiwan. This would be combined with all the Soviet rust-bucket submarines they have been buying. The point of the subs isn't to actually sink the USN, but to simply slow it down. Anti-submarine warfare is time-consuming and couldn't be neglected or the USN would risk being severely damaged by the attack of the rust-buckets. The whole point being that the USN wouldn't be able to intervene if the Chinese invaded Taiwan.

Now, obviously these are all defensive measures. China lacks the offensive capability to actually strike the Japanese home islands or the US. At least by any conventional means. We currently don't know how advanced they are in terms of cyber warfare. In fact, we don't have any knowledge of anyone's cyber warfare capability.

Anyway, I'm a military history major and I took a few courses (including a high-level seminar) on Chinese strategic thought, so I'm quite well versed on these matters.

This whole situation is a bit disconcerting. As my Chinese military professor has said, the Chinese leadership are being quite immature and the Japanese are being quite imprudent.

While I could be wrong with this, since your post seems very well informed, I feel like you've left out a pretty major factor: the US Air Force. Even if the USN's subs, cruisers, etc. can't get in close, their and the USAF's planes could easily do some damage, at least as a deterrent to Chinese forces. After all, America's jets are, as a rule, at least a generation more advanced than China's, and even taking SAM defense into consideration US planes would probably be able to get in, hurt the enemy, and get out with minimal or no casualties. US planes are even stationed in Japan, so they're already pretty much right there.

Also, ballistic and cruise missiles could be used as well, though that's much less important than the issue of aircraft.

If any of this is blatantly wrong, feel free to correct me, I have a casual interest in military tactics but I'm just a layman .

 

[Platypus540]

My suggested course of action for America: Send a carrier group out there. Not right at the Chinese fleet, but just kind of in the general area. A sort of, "you mess with Japan, you mess with THIS" kind of thing. That should them right up, huh?

 

[Platypus540]

On a more serious note If China decides to steamroll Japan I doubt the U.S. would declare war on them. They will probably put up some half ass defense and then pull out. China is looking strong and lethal. Japan should not take this lightly.

I don't know. The idea that the US wouldn't rush in to help Japan, at least with a show of force, seems pretty unlikely to me. China may be dangerous, but the US military is a lot more dangerous, especially in large-scale war.