...so just where is this massive battle going to take place?

 

Board games like Risk make it easy for a massive pile of armies to 'invade' where there is a nice, neat dotted line.  In the real world there is a matter of LOGISTICS.  China was able to supply (and fight) the Korean war, and Viet Nam - contiguous lands.  Then what?  Russia?  India?

 

I understand you are an Aussie - but please tell me how China will be able to deploy and just as importantly supply troops when there are hundreds of miles of open ocean to content with.

 

In WWII the Japanese were able to supply troops and materiel to Guadacanal at night with relative impunity - today we'd just wait until they were a hundred klicks out and rain Harpoons down upon them.

 

Ultimately though you have to make the case of what they could gain from such actions.

 

Reactive is right...you do need to get out more. 

Part of it was dramatically increasing the numbers of troops deployed (the surge), part of it had to do with courting the Iraqi Sunni communities and empowering them to take on the insurgency, and possibly the most important part of it relates to improved surveillance methods that made it very hard for insurgent leaders to stay hidden, despite Petraeus undoubtedly being an excellent commander and quite possibly being partially behind these developments I would think giving him sole-credit is stretching it a bit.

 

A lot of what happened still isn't public-domain, I'm sure in time we'll look back in due amazement as a more-complete picture emerges. This link below should give you some indication; now that the US military isn't there to watch from a few hundred sensor blimps & UAV's (and now that the US presence is no-longer welcome) the Iraqi govt wants to install a quarter of a million CCTV cameras to give them the sort of capability they need to keep insurgents from re establishing themselves. 

 

nytimes.com/2012/01/30/world/middleeast/iraq-is-angered-by-us-drones-patrolling-its-skies.html?pagewanted=all 

 

Re other points: look I'm not a Grammar-Nazi - half of anything I write here comes out mangled anyway due to forum software it can just make it very difficult to read and probably builds a degree of bias against what you write..

I wonder what would happen if the USA found this little rock sticking out of the water outside of shanghai harbour built a house on it and said: "This and everything 55 km from it is now US territory.(Oh yes and that includes Shanghai)" I mean really, this seams like piracy, and the only thing i will agree with scott about is that Adolf Hitler used the same technique (Hoping that people said: oh it just a little thing why bother doing anything) but of course AH was on a much much grander scale. Of course so far all the chinese seem to have claimed is some ocean with maybe things underneath, other nations have done worse without beeing compared to AH.

Myhandle...Western powers did that in the 1800s, but ultimately got kicked out of their colonies in the latter half of the 1900s.  China is playing this game in uninhabited areas that are at least relatively close to home,  but as I have pointed out China is horribly geographically constrained.  This nasty little game they are playing is self-limiting and does not affect the US or even Australia one bit.  

 

We need to be more worried about China buying their way into our economy and our governments than we do about them invading with their still relatively impotent military. 

From oracle to polymath to strategic genius.

 

I'm beginning to think you're somewhat deranged.

 

That is all. 

 

 

R 

"Its so Amazing  to no that the U.S would of been crushed from so shitty terrorist if it was not for me. not Deranged just saved mass U.S & Iraqi life's." 

 

 

 

 No offence intended but you are delusional, not mildly either.

 

R 

scott, no one is kidding or exaggerating in the least when they say your posts suggest you have problems. Maybe this persona is something you only use on message boards and you're a sharp fellow when you're away from your keyboard, but if you honestly believe what you post you should seek help.

Are na mate. I no 100% clown boy and  nun taken mutt boy.

So...from mild-mannered apparel manufacturer to wanna-be Secretary of State/Chairman of the Joint Chiefs/NSA Director to...wait for it...a Rastafarian?!?

 

Dial up the lithium, dial down the weed, and then join us in friendly banter that is at least somewhat grounded in reality.