Navy Matters. A blog you should check out.

Navy Matters.

A blog I recently discovered and you should check out.  If its not on your daily list of spots to stop by then correct yourself and subscribe!

Indian- Indigenous Light Combat Helicopter

Task Force Jaguar. The Apache Attack Helo.

H-8 Stealth Bomber. The next shoe to drop from China.

I had fun with a series of posts on a Chinese strike on an American Carrier Battle Group.

A light Google search reveals the next shoe to drop from Chinese design bureaus will be a stealth bomber---the H-8.

Several Chinese language blogs are talking about it and it just plain makes sense.  A glaring hole in Chinese force projection is the lack of a bomber with hemispheric reach.

A nation that is putting up a space station, has designed its own stealth fighter/striker and is producing 4.5 gen fighters surely is capable of producing a modern bomber...at least equal to the B-1.

Yet we still haven't seen it.

And that's why I predict the next shoe to drop from the land of the Dragon will be a stealth bomber.

Imagine designing a defense for a carrier when they have several regiments of homegrown stealth bombers to throw into the mix.

SOCOM in Afghanistan. We're doing it wrong.

Green Berets in Afghanistan via NATGEO.

Was talking to some friends about the ass sore that is Afghanistan and we all came to the same conclusion.

We're doing it wrong.

More specifically, SOCOM is doing it wrong.  They're about to have free reign (again) to operate the way that they want to and while they have conventional forces in country providing support (and will once they become lead force again) they're concentrating on raids, raids and more raids.

This might be a cultural issue, since the Commanding Officer is a Navy SEAL.

It might be part of an actual plan.

But from the outside looking in at SOCOM, it really appears like this should be a US Army Special Forces show.  I mean seriously.  THINK ABOUT IT!

AQ is done in country.  The only enemy that remains is the Taliban.  This is a classic Foreign Internal Defense Mission.

Everything else we're doing is not going to work until the politics of the simmering civil war is solved.

Rights for women?  Not gonna happen until they solve their issues.
Educating girls?  Same.
Religious freedom?  Ditto.
Reconstruction of the country?  You're kidding me right?

Only the Green Berets are culturally equipped to deal with Afghanistan.  US Marines, US Army and allied forces are not the forces to lead this fight.  Unfortunately the bureaucracy has settled in and thinking about winning the fight has taken a backseat to running a war.

Afghanistan is a Green Beret fight.  It probably always has been, but now it should be obvious to all.  Last week we had 10 US service men killed about our supposed allies.  Its past time to accept the reality of this situation. 

To solve Afghanistan you assign a Special Forces Group to the country and get everyone (including other SOCOM units) out of their way.  Then you do yearly assessments of progress made.  After 10 years at war, giving SF two more might not seem fair but when you consider the treasure expended in this effort its more than the Afghan people deserve.  If SF can't turn it around in that time frame then its a done deal.  That's how you solve Afghanistan.

Space Exploration Vehicle.

Fixing the fleet. USS America class should be the next carrier.

Embarrassing.

During the aftermath of the earthquakes in Haiti, the US Navy rushed an aircraft carrier with a skeleton crew on board to provide assistance.  It had no manpower to search for survivors or provide assistance.  It didn't have helicopters to move supplies ashore.  It was a case of image over substance.

All this leads to the situation the Navy finds itself in today.  Too few aircraft, too much ocean and not enough ships to go around.

The solution is simple.  Fix the Navy by adding an angled flight deck to the America class LHD and get numbers, reinvigorate rotary winged aviation in Navy use and get almost 40 F-35C's (or F/A-18's) on board.  Oh and be advised.  We've done this before.  We did the same thing to straight decked aircraft carriers after World War 2 and we were served well by the modifications.

Putting angled flight decks on the America class would be the first step to the Navy buying Ford's not Ferrari's.  We should start the planning today.

UPDATE:
A world war 2 aircraft carrier was under 30,000 tons in wieght and carried 100 aircraft.  When they were refitted witth hurricane bows and angled flight decks they still came in under 50,000 tons and operated primitve jet aircraft...meaning weak engines and avionics.

We can make a 40,000 ton carrier with an angled flight deck out of the America class and still operate 50 aircraft. If we take the space used for Marines and equipment then its beyond doable, its easy!  It can be done today, all it takes is the will.

Where are the pics?

Just a bit of blog promotion here.

If you're into military photos without all the glaring watermarks that some blogs paste onto their photos (even though a military journalist took them and only request that they be given credit) then look at my bar at the top of the page.  You'll see a label called SLIDESHOW.  Click on it and it'll take you to my collection.  Enjoy.