DJ Yoshi, midway wasn't about ships, it was about the airstrip. We didn't have long-range bombers that could land on carriers at the time, we needed somewhere to stage them from. Without the ability to bomb Japan early in the war and disrupt their industry, they would have had a lot more resources to throw at us. In the long run, Japan lost because it had inferior technology. They were using WWI era weapons.

I have no doubt that America would have won eventually anyway - but that's more because I'm American than anything else.

Now, who says we are losing in Iraq? Well, stop thinking that. We aren't. It is a stalemate - and it's a stalemate because of the American people, not because of the American army or the Iraqis or even Iran. We aren't willing to let our army do what it needs to do to stop the violence, because the only way to stop it seems to be to kill all of them.

Wow 2 argument threads at once!
Anyway yes i really doubt that we will have any more world wars. Inter-world wars however are still a possibility.

Even if we didn't get them early on, after time we would've eventually recaptured the asian theater from them (albeit with heavy losses) and they would've been starved of resources. There's just no way that they could have won, even if they had an extra three or six months (which is what midway would've given them.).

It would have been way longer than that. With no carriers in the PTO, they would have had free reign to mop up the rest of our navy, and probably at least given a pearl harbor as serious pounding before reinforcements arrived. And by that time they would have secured their natural resources better in the East.

Also, I don't see how we could have gotten to the Asian theater effictavly with out control of the Pacific.

The US would have pulled back the the West Coast and built new carriers. The handful of ships that were destroyed at Pearl were replaced in a matter of months by the shipyards here on the West Coast. They could literally build a new destroyer in a month at one of the docks. Four or even more dry docks in a shipyard. The math is really quite simple. There were four major shipyards here in the Bay Area building new Navy early in 1942. By mid 1942 the US Navy in the Pacific was far larger than it was prior to Pearl Harbor. You really have no concept of how efficient the industrial war machine that supplied WWII really was.

Oh I do, I'm just saying that it would take longer than you think. We really crushed the IJN by 1944. Without the steady victories from Midway on, Japan would have had more time to train it's pilots and recuperated enough to put up a good fight. I mean, we could have done it, but it would have taken a good long time just to defeat the IJN, which was necessary before we could start taking islands back.

By 1943 Japan's carrier's were almost worthless because their pilots had so little training. They had some really good planes, and with the pressure off long enough to train them, our victory would have taken awhile.

They didn't have the industry or the resources to do match the US in that kind of war. Even with the US out of the picture, they never made it to the oil fields in South East Asia. Without oil, even the best equipped army in the world gets stalled out.

I do, which is why I said what I did.


Roach: China is extremely limited in any of its military ambitions.

Here are China's options:

- Invade the Middle East by crossing the Gobi Desert or across the Himalayas. As I mentioned, the only route is a two-lane highway China and Pakistan built jointly along part of the ancient Silk Road. China would need to use Pakistan as a staging area for their troops as they trickle in, and it could easily take months before they are prepared for any sort of ground invasion.

-- Expanding on the previous option, China doesn't have very many possible targets once they are in the region. Pakistan is an ally and critical to any sort of troop movement in the region, so alienating the Muslims is not an option. As I mentioned, the only other option would be India who they are not hostile toward and would be an essentially unwinnable war (population of 1.1 billion). Look at how the Iraq war is going to see why it's a bad idea to attempt something when you don't have enough troops.

- Invade Russia or Mongolia. Mongolia they might be able to get away with in spite of their international support but an invasion of Russia would end in rape.

- Taiwan. The US would never allow this and I could even see it getting China expelled from the United Nations. If you are the leader of China, this is probably the best action to take if you ever wanted to see the US Navy engage in wide-scale shore bombardments.

- North Korea, which the world would really appreciate because we're going to have to do it sooner or later.

- South Korea. Everybody likes South Korea.

- Japan, which is probably the most likely on this list but also the least likely that China would be able to get away with it. Japan is not only an ally of the United States, but they are also working toward remilitarization.

- Comedy option Singapore.

- Indonesia, which would guarantee that China won't have access to any oil reserves ever. Also, this is stretching the limits of what China's navy is capable of doing in terms of a troop deployment.

- Australia. Which won't happen because the Australian Navy could pick off the Chinese troop deployment waterwings and pool noodles from several hundred miles away.

Japan not an ally? Since when?

Not ONLY.

Shush.

I'm sorry, Jon, I don't see the Russia option as "rape," nor the Taiwan option. China is currently building up its entire military at a massive rate, faster than the U.S. and Russia predicted, even dumping money into next generation weapon systems with Russia (who admittedly insult China's ability to work with their technology (though the Russians said the same about even the East Germans during the Cold War)), threatening the U.S. with stealth-tracking technology, super-cavitating technology (which is practically a joke, but the recent Chinese sub surfacing within firing range of a U.S. carrier is enough to make people sweat), and new missile technology that promises to fly around U.S. detection equipment. Richard Lawless of the Pentagon has noted a few times that the current military trend of China is more than enough to worry U.S. military experts. The U.S. has maintained a presence outside of Taiwan; however, whether the American public is willing to lose thousands of lives over Taiwan is questionable. Especially considering that China has been purchasing troop and weapon transport platforms from Russia for the past two years. In fact, China has been doubling (in some cases more than tripling) their amphibious attack capabilities annually since late 1998. Russia has slowly been breaking ties with China; it has been canceling contracts with China. Russia's military capability is laughable, it's questionable at this point whether a majority of its vehicle crews have regular training on their equipment and with drug usage spiking recently in the Russian military, it's questionable that their basic foot soldier is capable of holding out in a fight.
China has extreme nationalism. They're running out of resources, and their attempts to outbuy the U.S. at fossil fuels are failing them. 1/6 of the world is about to no longer be able to operate their farming equipment, and they have few friends in the world. Continue to tell me I'm wrong, I really don't mind, but as much as I'd love to take credit for the Kashmir idea, it was far more respectable minds that came up with it, and you'll have to excuse me if I take their word over yours

Paragraph it and i'll read it.

Stop whining. Theres already 2 paragraphs.

Singapore isn't a comedy option; they have one of the largest oil refining capabilities in the region.

I suspect Roach doesn't care if you read it.