Comment by delfinom
3 months ago
The problem is, the US sea power is being dwarfed by China rapidly, who have now surpassed the size of the US Navy and are quickly going to be even larger.
And the US does not have enough missiles for a war with China or even Russia realistically.
It's why there's a panic for artillery shells. They realize any real symmetrical with an enemy that isn't some guys in caves would become a war of attrition through numbers fast.
Lobbing billion dollar missiles as a strategy fails when you run out of money for them.
To the extent that there is a gap in sea or air power, you fix that, you don't waste attention or money on side projects like artillery shells.
The administration claims that it isn't distracted by Ukraine and Europe, and wants to focus on threat from China, but the strategic imperative for increasing shell production is Ukraine and the threat from Russia to Europe. Let the Europeans sort that out. And, if the Israelis want lots of shells, let them sort it out, or better yet do without.
Or acknowledge that you are doing something that is apart from your main strategic focus. It is possible to walk and chew bubblegum. Bubblegum doesn't cost all that that much.
But the pretense that artillery shells are desperately needed for deterrence in the South China Sea is rather tiresome. There are far more important munitions supply gaps. Just because a couple of conservative think tanks wanted to make hay about about sending shells to Ukraine a couple of years ago is political drama, not something actually important.
> The problem is, the US sea power is being dwarfed by China rapidly, who have now surpassed the size of the US Navy and are quickly going to be even larger.
The thing is that size matters in wars of attrition, but experience almost always wins.
China's problem is that they lack the experience the US Navy gained over decades of pretty much non-stop war even if they did not go up any significant adversary since the Vietnam war.