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Culture War Roundup for the week of May 27, 2024

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https://news.usni.org/2022/09/28/chinese-launch-assault-craft-from-civilian-car-ferries-in-mass-amphibious-invasion-drill-satellite-photos-show

“Everybody assumed that you had to seize a port first. That those [ferries] were second echelon forces… Somebody else has got to seize the port,” he said. “2021 was the first time we saw them dump amphibious assault vehicles right into the water, which means now those ferries can be the first echelon sending assault units straight to the beach.“

You underestimate the Chinese to your peril. This is the biggest shipbuilder in the world. Is it hard to produce a transport that can disgorge landing craft and amphibious tanks? No. They can do this. You should inherently assume they can do this because it's pretty straightforward. Why is your model of China a country that lacks these basic capabilities? They can build a space station but they can't build a fancy car freighter?

Do I think they can succeed in an amphibious invasion of Taiwan right at the start of the war? No. But it's not that the Chinese military is 'crap', it's that it's a very tough operation they've never tried before. Nor has the US. The US has not fought a major power at sea since 1945.

Chinese amphibious capacity is less than 10 ships, which provides less than 1000 soldiers per trip.

One Type 075 can transport about 800 soldiers. They have 3 in service. They have a host of other amphibious warfare ships as well, type 072s and others... Many, many more than 10. Where are you getting these numbers from? They have an enormous amount of usable civilian capacity.

I can tell by your diction you have some experience here, normal people don't say tube artillery. We are looking at a very serious conflict with a very strong power. The Western world is not well-served by wildly inaccurate and overconfident denigrations of adversaries.

Consider just how much Chinese technology has infiltrated port infrastructure. We need to treat this threat with deadly seriousness, otherwise I suspect there will be a lot of unpleasant surprises in our future.