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Why is it impossible to invade a country without a land bridge when the US have regularly done it in the last few decades? Iraq, Afghanistan, Iraq. I bet China

Why is it impossible to invade a country without a land bridge when the US have regularly done it in the last few decades? Iraq, Afghanistan, Iraq. I bet China could, quite easily, invade Japan, The Phillipines or Taiwan if it wanted to. I bet Australia probably could too. Here's Australia practising amphibious assaults: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e3AEd5BmQgU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e3AEd5BmQgU

vinceguidry 8y ago
Fighting a limited war action is very different from the total war scenario I detailed. China would have a really tough time invading Japan. The country is extremely mountainous, limiting ship landings to a few easily-defensible locations, and air transport is going to be limited by anti air weaponry that can be hidden pretty much anywhere. I'm not saying it can't be done and I'm by no means an expert, but even if that was all China had to do, meaning they could pour the entire resources of the country into it, they'd find it really hard. If they had to fend off Russia at the same time? Forget it. Japan is basically Switzerland and the UK rolled into one. China found it easier to expand a thousand miles to the west than to conquer an island 3 hundred miles to the east. China couldn't even conquer Korea, much less Japan. I'd have to ask Rotty to be sure, but I'm fairly sure that 90% of the war plans end with negotiated settlements rather than complete surrender.
jcranmer 8y ago
> Why is it impossible to invade a country without a land bridge when the US have regularly done it in the last few decades? Iraq, Afghanistan, Iraq. The United States invaded Iraq from Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan from Pakistan, Afghanistan (note that Afghanistan was more or less in a frozen civil war), and Uzbekistan. Amphibious assaults are the most complex and riskiest kinds of military attack. It requires expert command of logistics to keep the landing ships providing supplies and men to the beach, even when the environment may be working against you (such as the tide), and where there is far too much to be crammed into too little space. It requires control of the sea and the skies, because you have masses of ships with masses of people just waiting to be bombed out of existence. Even if you do make it to land, you now have to supply your entire front-lines. If you don't capture a port, or if the port you captured was sabotaged by the defending army, you have to supply your entire assault from a beach that's not really capable of providing the deepwater capabilities to handle cargo ships of serious capacity. In the event of a war, the South Chinese Sea would likely be a contested zone, where neither China nor the US has sufficient control of the area to effect an amphibious assault. It is far from "quite easily."

vinceguidry 8y ago

Fighting a limited war action is very different from the total war scenario I detailed. China would have a really tough time invading Japan. The country is extremely mountainous, limiting ship landings to a few easily-defensible locations, and air transport is going to be limited by anti air weaponry that can be hidden pretty much anywhere. I'm not saying it can't be done and I'm by no means an expert, but even if that was all China had to do, meaning they could pour the entire resources of the country into it, they'd find it really hard. If they had to fend off Russia at the same time? Forget it. Japan is basically Switzerland and the UK rolled into one. China found it easier to expand a thousand miles to the west than to conquer an island 3 hundred miles to the east. China couldn't even conquer Korea, much less Japan. I'd have to ask Rotty to be sure, but I'm fairly sure that 90% of the war plans end with negotiated settlements rather than complete surrender.

jcranmer 8y ago

> Why is it impossible to invade a country without a land bridge when the US have regularly done it in the last few decades? Iraq, Afghanistan, Iraq. The United States invaded Iraq from Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan from Pakistan, Afghanistan (note that Afghanistan was more or less in a frozen civil war), and Uzbekistan. Amphibious assaults are the most complex and riskiest kinds of military attack. It requires expert command of logistics to keep the landing ships providing supplies and men to the beach, even when the environment may be working against you (such as the tide), and where there is far too much to be crammed into too little space. It requires control of the sea and the skies, because you have masses of ships with masses of people just waiting to be bombed out of existence. Even if you do make it to land, you now have to supply your entire front-lines. If you don't capture a port, or if the port you captured was sabotaged by the defending army, you have to supply your entire assault from a beach that's not really capable of providing the deepwater capabilities to handle cargo ships of serious capacity. In the event of a war, the South Chinese Sea would likely be a contested zone, where neither China nor the US has sufficient control of the area to effect an amphibious assault. It is far from "quite easily."