Hi BigBull; Re: "Your histogram comparing '91 to '02 is (I'll be generous) extremely misleading and in my view should be discounted utterly. 1. The US don't need 220 ships to get it done: The Navy can now call on about 20 massive new roll-on roll-off vessels, up to five times larger than the latest commercial vessel."
From the article you posted: "The latest request by the Military Sealift Command (MSC), the U.S. Navy's agency responsible for moving equipment by sea, was the largest so far. It was capable of carrying over 3,000 tons of materiel."
From the article I linked to (in #reply-18000625 ) giving the history of the 1990 logistical move:
"MSC's eight fast sealift ships (FSS), the fastest cargo ships in the world, sped eastward at 33 knots, carrying 24,000 tons of equipment for the Army's 24th Infantry (Mechanized) Division and the 1st Corps Support Command."
history.navy.mil
I note that 24,000 /8 = 3,000 tons. In other words, there has been no significant increase in ship size, as rented by the US Navy, in the past 12 years. They rented small fast ships then, and they're still renting the same ones.
But ships carrying 3000 tons are on the small side. Let's look at what the average container ship weighs (which is more than what it carries, but is on the right order of magnitude for comparison with the RORO ships) (July 2002 Singapore port figures):
Container Number: 1,384
Gross Tons: 30,078,000
Therefore, average GT per ship: 21,732
mpa.gov.sg
Now, about that RORO. Here's the press release:
Military Sealift Command's second new LMSR is christened
Press Release, DoD, April 9, 1997
Large, medium-speed, roll-on/roll-off ship USNS Watson (T-AKR 310) was christened July 26 at National Steel and Shipbuilding Company, San Diego, Calif. Named in honor of Army Pvt. George Watson, who was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions during World War II, USNS Watson will become part of the Military Sealift Command's Afloat Prepositioning Force and used to preposition at sea ammunition, equipment and supplies for the Army.
...
Watson is 950 feet in length, has a beam of 105 feet and displaces approximately 62,000 tons when fully loaded. The gas- turbine powered ship will be able to sustain speeds up to 24 knots.
...
qmfound.com
So here's the facts:
(1) You wrote (your emphasis): "The Navy can now call on about 20 massive new roll-on roll-off vessels, up to five times larger than the latest commercial vessel."
(2) The Average container ship, according to Singapore goverment statistics in July 2002 was 21,732 tons. There isn't room for a 5x factor between even the average container ship and the RORO ships. If the average container ship is 21,732 tons, the "largest" must be larger.
In other words, the press release you used gave numbers that are incompatible with the truth. Yes, there is more capability today, but it's not 5x the capability of 1990. So go adjust the histogram accordingly and you will still find that nowhere near enough stuff has been moved to the region for a war. If a war starts there tomorrow, the US will start using big time transportation just like it did in 1990. What the hell do you think, that the transportation world changed significantly in just 12 years? All this time conservatives have been decrying the collapse of US military readiness under Clinton, but now they reverse and claim that US military readiness under Bush has suddenly become infinite. LOL!!!
By the way, the Gulf War used about 42,000 tons of cargo each day.
Re: "2. Iraq's army has been reduced in size some 50 - 60%, any US invasion force will probably be proportionally smaller thus obviating the need for 200+ commercial vessels. The invasion force will probably be no where near 2 corps as in Desert Storm."
(1) The objective in 1990 was only Kuwait, the new objective is all of Iraq.
(2) The primary losses in Iraq's armed forces are the heavier equipment. They still have lots of small arms, and that is what the tanks are there to defend against.
(3) In urban guerilla warfare, Israel uses (and loses) tanks against the Palestinians, and the Palestinians don't even have anti-tank weapons. The US, in the unlikely event of an invasion, would also use and lose armored vehicles in urban warfare. If we went in without armor we'd use and lose much larger numbers of people instead, which is a bargain the US military will not make. Hell, US forces were rescued by armored vehicles in Mogadishu, and those locals were considerably less well armed than the Iraqis (though better armed than the Palestinians).
(4) Only a small part of the Iraqi army fought in 1990. (You want references? I got 'em straight from the US military.)
Go ahead and name your date that gives when the festivities are supposed to start. I'll bookmark your post and remind you the next day when it turns out that you were wrong, wrong, wrong.
-- Carl |
