Hey, Secretary of Defense nominee Pete Hegseth . . . I just found something you can cut in the Pentagon budget.

Photo above - World War 2 ends with Japan's surrender on a US battleship. The US is now bringing back a pair of 1940's era battleships to bolster our nation's defenses. Not a joke . . . for real.

Isn’t it enough that we have ELEVEN aircraft carrier groups? Each with an entourage of more than dozen support ships guarding the big enchilada? Carriers can't survive 5 minutes without submarines, guided missile cruisers, destroyers, frigates, and who knows what else.

Now a pair of 80 year old battleships are returning to duty. Commissioned in 1942-44, the Wisconsin and Iowa. Entered active duty before the end of World War 2. Before the invention of broadcast television and the hula hoop.

Generals (and admirals) always spend their careers preparing to re-fight the last war. Apparently we are getting ready for a repeat of World War 2. The Wisconsin and Iowa are equipped with 18 inch guns, the largest ever fitted to any ship. These behemoths can hit targets up to 24 miles away. Unless someone fires a cruise missile in their direction first - range 1,000 miles. Remember to watch out for torpedoes, too!

The Russians are using legacy "capital ships" against Ukraine. But a Russian heavy cruiser was destroyed almost immediately by a homebuilt Ukrainian drone. Apparently, Russia thinks it’s refighting World War 2 also.

Attention please, outgoing Biden administration (and incoming Trump administration). World War 3 has already begun. The weapons are hacking, infrastructure attacks, disabling GPS and cellular networks. Using cheap orbital payloads to kill military satellites which have no defense, and no way to shoot back. Puleeze . .. we don’t need two battleships, and the flotilla of support vehicles each will need.

The pentagon has 490 generals, and at least 62 admirals. The incoming Trump administration plans to “transform” America’s defense by forcing a bunch of them to retire. I humbly suggest that leaving the Iowa and Wisconsin in mothballs go to the top of the our spending cuts.

I’m just sayin’ . . .

Iowa and Wisconsin Battleships Return to Service: A Controversial Move Amid Evolving Naval Strategy

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whowasthatmaskedman · 70-79, M

The way America fights wars, there is a reason for those ships as a way of delivering artillary support within fifty kilometres of the sea. And the armor on those ships can withstand a lot of punishment as well as launching missiles.. Still. If America stopped beating up smaller nations a long way from home, these would not be useful.. So...Yeah...😷

trollslayer · 46-50, M

Maybe we need to change the way we fight wars - considering how some are using exploding pagers and others using internet trolls to fight - and win.

whowasthatmaskedman · 70-79, M

@trollslayer And maybe designing a force to defend within your region, rather than push aggressive force across the world to make sure oil and other trade interests are supported would be a great idea.😷

swirlie

@trollslayer

Maybe we need to change the way we fight wars

The reason the USA lost the Vietnam war and lost the war in Afghanistan as well, was because of the way that the US fights wars.

whowasthatmaskedman · 70-79, M

@swirlie Historically it is virtually impossible for a foreign nation to win a war as an invader without the support of the local population. In both cases the Americans treated the locals badly enough to seen as invaders.😷

swirlie

@whowasthatmaskedman
That would then explain why the US has lost every war it started in the last 107 years.

whowasthatmaskedman · 70-79, M

@swirlie I wasnt going to go there. But since you mention it......😷

swirlie

@whowasthatmaskedman
OH NO! Did I speak out of turn again? 😅

The bottom line is, the US has a lot of fancy hardware for warfare in it's arsenal, but the American culture itself is not a culture that actually understands the fundamental relevance of war, which means that the American culture does not comprehend the concept of warfare which is why they keep losing.

Sort of like playing a board game of Monopoly where a player will not ever win a game of Monopoly if they don't understand what the true essence of the game is about, which means you cannot win at Monopoly by default unless you're either playing Solitaire Monopoly by yourself over in the corner, or your opponent is Donald Trump who doesn't actually understand the concept of business in the real world, anymore than Americans understand the concept of warfare outside their classroom simulators.

This is also why Trump has never been the one who makes business decisions at Trump Corp, which is also why the US military retreated from Vietnam and Afghanistan and went home empty handed, minus 78,000 of their own soldiers.