Gawdzilla wrote:Jesus_of_Nazareth wrote:Gawdzilla wrote:Counter-battery fire would make the ranging shots fatal to the Iranian arty.
Yes.
But the Iranians wouldn't care. Artillery easy to replace / stockpile.....the men are expendable........and a salvo (or 3?) from 50 guns onshore won't need to be accurate to the nearest inch. Might not sink the Carrier - but pretty hard to miss......
You have no idea how this would play out, do you?
Well, even the USA would not be dumb enough to go Nuclear over something like this - sets a precedent that Nuking folk over small conflicts is OK (or only to cover embarrasment). And that
would come back to bite USA on the bum.
Gotta stop thinking in the Western mindset of what constitutes a victory - the USA won't be invading and even if they did couldn't hold Iran (The only way is killing every man, woman and child - and litteraly flattening every city, town and village - I am not personally against that - don't hear a peep from Carthage nowadays
), therefore the most the USA could hope to acheive is "Regime Change" (with no guarantee that the new (or a later) regime won't be as equally hostile).......and no matter what PR spin is applied to that, it's still not a Win for the USA. Iran will still be your enemy (even if they lie to you that not the case) and the people not only undefeated but with another couple of generations worth of hatred (a culture going back several thousand years does not forget the past - unlike some newer countries). The only people who may fear the USA is the leadership - and no guarantee that they won't be prepared to suffer the consequences for the greater good / longer term interests of their country.
Most in the USA probably don't realise that in an Iran war they would mainly be fighting......the Chinese. and the Chinese would not even be present, nor firing a shot!
USA is broke - an Iran war would cripple the USA beyond recovery (touch and go at the moment)....Chinese must be sitting in Beijiing with fingers crossed - and giggling
....besides, USA just spent a decade or so losing 2 wars against 3rd world peasants demonstrating that they can't win wars - and becoming a laughing stock. Wining all the battles does not a Victory make.
Having said all that, would be a good idea for the USA to have a war - and win it. But for that gotta pick on something far easier than Iran. Maybe Grenada is getting a bit uppity again?
The USN and USAF will be open when this comes down. It won't be one big fat target waddling through the area by herself.
