Originally Posted by
AGS Man
Ken V
I'm sure that what the Ford Battle Group achieved was highly commendable and carried out to the best traditions of the USN. However your rant on carriers and fixed base ops is perhaps a little one sided. Let's be honest, one conventional ASM can stop or even sink a carrier. It takes an awful lot more or escalation to a Nuke to take out a land base.
Let's be honest? The claim that a single ASM can hit never mind take out a carrier is not anything approaching honesty. And honestly, how many land bases have been "taken out" without a single shot fired? Essentially
every US land airbase in Vietnam was "taken out" with the stroke of a pen in 1973. The same thing happened to all the US airbases in the Phillipines in 1991. Indeed Clark AFB was the largest oversees US military installation prior to its closure. And if memory serves, the land airbase on the Falklands was "taken out" by a single bomber and a single stick of bombs.
And on the subject of honesty, what would happen if the Russians lobbed several cruise missiles onto the Kandahar airbase the way the US lobbed several cruise missiles on the Shayrat airbase base in Syria? Probably the same thing. A lot of rhetoric and saber rattling, but precious little else. Now what would happen if the Russians lobbed those missiles at a carrier? By definition, that carrier is sovereign US territory. Do you honestly believe the US response would be the same? Honestly? If the US response would be different (and almost certainly be far more violent and forceful) do you think the Russians would think twice before doing it?