Analyst: We don't have enough weapons to fight China

Hotair ^ | 01/23/2023 | Jazz Shaw

[SeekAndFind]

I’m pretty sure most of us were already clued in on this subject despite the almost complete lack of coverage the story receives in the legacy media these days. But now we have a report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington to confirm it. Even as we continue to send literally billions of dollars worth of ammunition, weapons, and other military hardware to Ukraine on a monthly basis, our own military has run critically low on those supplies. In one of many possible bad scenarios looming on the horizon, if we were forced to either go to war against China or even supply Taiwan at a level needed to help them fend off an attack, we would not have enough of a military stockpile to do so. The largest part of the problem comes with our defense companies who produce all of this equipment. They can’t keep up with the demand and it would take quite a while for them to ramp up to the level where they could. (Wall Street Journal, subscription required)

The war in Ukraine has exposed widespread problems in the American armaments industry that may hobble the U.S. military’s ability to fight a protracted war against China, according to a new study.

The U.S. has committed to sending Ukraine more than $27 billion in military equipment and supplies—everything from helmets to Humvees—since Russia’s invasion of the country last year. The infusion of arms is credited with helping the Ukrainian forces blunt Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion in what has become the biggest land war in Europe since World War II.

But the protracted conflict has also exposed the strategic peril facing the U.S. as weapons inventories fall to a low level and defense companies aren’t equipped to replenish them rapidly, according to the study, written by Seth Jones, a senior vice president at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank.

According to Seth Jones, senior vice president at CSIS, the defense industrial base in the United States is running at its maximum capacity. But that capacity is currently fixed at the peacetime levels we have grown accustomed to. But while the United States isn’t technically at war in Ukraine, we are burning through ammunition and weapons at a wartime pace. This is not a sustainable situation.

In order to weather what Jones describes as “a China-Taiwan Strait kind of scenario,” production capacity would have to increase considerably. Answering critics who counter by saying that we were in Afghanistan for 20 years and didn’t have these issues, he points out the differences between the battlefields. For the last decade of the Afghanistan war, the United States employed a “troop-intensive” strategy. There was fighting on an almost daily basis, but very few sustained pitched battles. There wasn’t all that much of an exchange of missiles and heavy armor, with the troops spending a lot of time looking for smaller pockets of terrorists.

Ukraine is fighting a war far more reminiscent of world war 2, with constant exchanges of rocket fire and air defense weaponry. The consumption rate for ammunition and related hardware is vastly greater. And if China tries to come across the Strait of Taiwan, that will likely be primarily an air and sea battle, also eating up vast numbers of rockets and shells.

The number of Javelin shoulder-fired missiles and antiaircraft Stinger systems we have sent to Ukraine thus far would take seven years each to replenish under current production levels. The same goes for the 155 mm and Howitzer shells we have been shipping to them. In one of the more chilling portions of the CSIS study, they predict that if a similar engagement with China broke out suddenly across the strait, we could begin running out of critical munitions in literally less than a week. And China will be able to hold out for far, far longer than a week. They’ve been stockpiling ammunition and armaments for years without using them for much of anything aside from training exercises and local skirmishes.

The solution is available, assuming the money for the military budget is there. (A big assumption at this point.) The White House would need to start ordering new stockpiles at a pace sufficient to get the defense manufacturers to ramp up their production levels significantly. But they can’t do that overnight and the clock may be ticking. We really should be relying on our NATO partners to start supplying a lot more of what Ukraine needs, but they have relied on us for their defensive needs for so long that they don’t produce much of anything by comparison. We’re in a tenuous position right now, but the people in Congress and at the White House who insist we have to keep supplying Ukraine “for as long as it takes” don’t seem to be willing to do anything about it.

[Nextrush]

Gaslighting from the MIC we have a big nuke advantage over China that’s for sure.

[ClearCase_guy]

China would be a naval war. China needs to import a lot of food and fuel. And China funds itself by exporting a lot of goods. A strong navy could really interrupt their import-export business. And as I understand it, the Chinese navy is mostly designed for coastal defense rather than defending supply chains far from home.

I don’t think it is in our interests to mess with China. But if we did, I think we could cripple them without using up too many weapons.

[Mouton]

We are NOT going to fight a land war in China. IMO we could not even take and hold Hong Kong.

[toddausauras]

Why would the compromised u.s. government want to fight their bosses?

[Qwapisking]

Isn’t that the point? Deplete the arms, the oil reserves and we lose. Then blame Trump.

[Spktyr]

The problem is that they have land links to the rest of Asia and while those can be cut, it can be difficult given what has to be overflown to get to them. Blockading their coast will hurt them, but it won’t shut them down; they’ll just divert to their land links.

[devere]

You are correct. We could blockade the Straits of Malacca with 2 ships and 60% of China’s oil supplies would be stopped. China knows it and they are not going to invade Taiwan. Even if they “won” it would be a disaster for them.

[DesertRhino]

that’s what we need right now, a land war in Asia.

[DesertRhino]

“China would be a naval war.”

Well, our destroyers are deadly in ramming attacks.

[Secret Agent Man]

This is conventional weapons. This is why we’re sending everything to be quickly wiped out by russia in ukraine. So we cant help taiwan. Joe and China have this arrangement as what he must do.

[Jonty30]

Hence the reason for the war in Ukraine.

[Cronos]

Taiwan, rather the Republic of China, is an island and can defend itself.

Besides which, Japan, Vietnam, India are Chinese neiand highly wary of China

[Cronos]

You do realise that Taiwan, ie the Republic of China, is an island?

[familyop]

Then we need more funding for our military forces.

[nathanbedford]

To the degree that this alleged shortage of weapons to defend Taiwan has occurred because we have foolishly supplied Ukraine with weapons is advanced to generate opposition to the war in Ukraine, it is a case of the tail wagging the dog.

The issue is, should we be supplying weapons to Ukraine? Should we be committed to defend Taiwan either with naval power, airpower, troops on the ground in Taiwan or by way of distant blockade in places like the Straits ofMalacca? Should we be committed to supply Taiwan with armaments to defend itself along the lines that we are currently supplying them to Ukraine? Should we consciously avoid these entanglements?

These questions should be answered with resort to the vital national interests of the United States. If the answers to these questions are in the affirmative, the military-industrial complex should be galvanized to produce the weapons required to enforce whatever option is deemed to be in the national interest.

The said history of America time and again is that it has found itself involved in wars for which we were utterly unprepared. With the size of the budget currently devoted to preparedness, it is inconceivable that we have not space and funds enough to acquire the logistical supply required. Too often in our history we have left our national defense be orphaned in the budget process. One need only judge our preparedness on December 7, 1941. Shockingly, a short five years later we were appallingly unprepared for our "police action" in Korea.

Has the debacle of Afghanistan fallen into the memory hole?

If in the downturn, that I expect will be far more painful than our politicians are currently contemplating, is so severe that there is a shortfall of money for defense then and only then should budgeting considerations dictate national defense strategy. Otherwise, national defense requirements should dictate defense budgets.

Our national defense budget is so big that it is time to question whether we are allocating funds properly. For example, we have to review the role of aircraft carriers on a cost-benefit basis. A multibillion-dollar aircraft carrier with its support ships and logistical trail can buy an awful lot of other weapons at a time when aircraft carriers are becoming more and more vulnerable when confronting nations like China that are possessed of hypersonic weapons.

It is time to let national defense considerations be judged on a rational basis and stop letting the tail wag the dog. Are we buying aircraft carriers because the military-industrial complex feeds off them? Are we to change our policy in Ukraine because we're short a few Stinger missiles?

Are we incapable of rational defense planning because our planners are not concerned with national defense but with defense boondoggles?

[Night Hides Not]

Where did that saying come, “never fight a land war in Asia”?

[familyop]

"Has the debacle of Afghanistan fallen into the memory hole?"

In 1991, President George H.W. Bush said that the War on Terror might go on for 30 years and would require much patience. Many people chatting about politics have failed to realize the purposes of interventions in the Middle East.

One purpose was to prevent invasions and thefts of energy resources in the Middle East. Another was to discourage further direct attacks against the West. Another yet, was to prevent Iran from expanding in the Middle East and forcibly turning more nations against the West, at least to some extent. And yes--oil.

[familyop]

Your comments about defense were well informed, logical and well worth consideration. There are differences of opinions on many less important issues between the various nations, but thank goodness for Germany and the other members of our defense alliance!

[familyop]

"Are we buying aircraft carriers because the military-industrial complex feeds off them?"

We have kept them at least until now, because they are mobile airports. :)

I'll leave the question of keeping them to the generals and admirals. Would our aircraft be less vulnerable on land in the vicinity of our enemies?