CSBA Think Tank agrees with me! Make friends with Russia, prepare to punch China in the throat!

via AOL Breaking Defense.

Wealth, population and thin-skinned nationalism make China the number one threat to the US-led world order, not Russia or Islamic terrorism, writes leading military strategist Andrew Krepinevich. That means the US must build up forward-deployed forces in the Western Pacific, he writes, if necessary at the expense of defending Europe. Russia’s oil-dependent economy and withering demographics relegate it to the second-place threat in the near term, he argues, and in the long term — say, by the 2030s — Russia may become less dangerous than Iran, which Krepinevich’s forthcoming study from the Center for Strategic & Budgetary Assessments ranks currently at No. 3.

The cliff notes version was in the title of this blog.

Make friends with Russia and prepare to punch China in the throat! 

Of course being a think tank they continue to get stuff wrong.  Forward deployment of US forces is militarily stupid.  We put our naval and air power within easy reach of Chinese anti-access weapons.  Assuming a first strike by China, forward deployment could see a major surface ship (or two..maybe even three) sunk before we even know hostilities have begun.

As far as Russia being weaker than Iran?  Not bloody likely.  That would mean a major rebound in oil prices which would benefit Russia as well as Iran and Iran unlike Russia has shown no ability to develop weapons beyond what me and a couple of buddies could build in a machine shop.

My opinion?  They're right on Russia but they need to zoom the timetable.  Kill ISIS now and forget about toppling Assad.  Put Iran back into its cage and get Russia to help us with that (and yeah we'd have to lift sanctions but that's a small price to pay).  As far as China if we can get Russia into our camp, maintain good relations with Japan and Australia (at that point S. Korea would be begging to be part of the team...and even if they don't then we leave them to the tender mercies of the North) and then start doing joint exercises with them in the Pacific I think China would get the message.

Think WW2 envelopment with the target being the Chinese instead of the Japanese.

It's a no brainer.