Well, this is a fine how do you do. Our allies in Asia doubt that the United States could defeat the Chinese Military.
“The overwhelming assessment by Asian officials, diplomats and analysts is that the U.S. military simply cannot defeat China. It has been an assessment relayed to U.S. government officials over the past few months by countries such as Australia, Japan and South Korea. This comes as President Bush wraps up a visit to Asia, in which he sought to strengthen U.S. ties with key allies in the region.”
The Governor of Tokyo, Shintaro Ishihara, has even gone so far as saying “the United States would lose any war with China”
This site has taken the position that there will be a Chinese American war in the future, America is woefully unprepared for this war. Our Navy has been gutted, out Army and Marines are gaining valuable experience in urban warfare, but lack the experience and now the training in conducting large scale land warfare that we had been honed to fight in the 80’s.
The war with China will be a very deadly one. It will involve large scale blue water operations, something that our military is decidedly ill equipped to fight, now. Over the last 15 years the US Navy has focused it policy, training and budget planning on littoral warefare which is operating against the coasts, lobbing missiles at targets in land.
Carriers: 12 (+1 under construction)
NIMITZ (CVN-68) Class has nine active and one building
ENTERPRISE (CVN-65)
There are only two conventional powered carriers, USS KITTY HAWK (CV-63) and USS JOHN F. KENNEDY (CV-67). KENNEDY is in poor material condition (in 2001 he CO was stripped of command because the ship could not be deployed, but has since made two deployments) KITTY HAWK was commissioned in 1961 and is the oldest vessel in commission in the fleet at 45 years old.
Battleships: 0 (2 in decommission/reserve status)
The US Navy owns only two battleships, both decommissioned. This leaves the navy with the largest caliber gun of 5”.
IOWA (BB-61) Stricken for disposal 12 January 1995 but retained as a parts source.
Reinstated on the Naval Vessels Register and returned to reserve status 4 January 1999.
NEW JERSY (BB-62) Stricken for disposal 12, January 1995. Retained in reserve; reinstated on the Naval Vessels Register, in reserve, 12, February 1998. Stricken for preservation in New Jersey, 4 January, 1999. Towed to Philadelphia, 12 Sept 1999 - 11 Nov 1999 for Museum.
MISSOURI (BB-63) Stricken for disposal January 12, 1995. Donated for preservation May 4, 1998, preserved as a museum at Ford Island, Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, June 1998
WISCONSIN (BB-64) Stricken for disposal 12 January 1995 but retained in reserve. Reinstated on the Naval Vessels Register, in reserve, 12 February 1998. Berthed at Norfolk, VA; to become a museum-in-reserve, with the weather decks open to the public, but the ship still maintained in reserve and owned by the Navy.
Cruisers: 23
TICONDEROGA (CG-47) Class - 23 ships of this class of 27 are in service, with more scheduled for decommissioning.
All previous cruises are decommissioned including all nuclear powered guided missile cruisers.
Destroyers: 47 (+8 under construction or planned)
All of the SPRUANCE (DD-963) class destroyers have been decommissioned and most have been or are slated to be sunk as targets, not even keeping them in reserve. This leaves only the 47 (plus 8 planned or under construction) Arleigh Burke (DDG-51) class destroyers in the fleet with no back up.
Frigates: 30 (26 Active 4 Reserve)
20 of the 51 OLIVER HAZZARD PERRY (FFG-7) class frigates have been decommissioned and have been either transferred, or scrapped. All of the KNOX (FF-1052) class have been stricken or sold.
Attack Submarines (SSN): 60
1+6 (building or planned) Virginia (SSN-774) Class
3 SEAWOLF Class
50 LOS ANGELES (SSN-688) Class (86 LA’s built)
Ballistic Missile Submarines (SSBN): 14
14 OHIO (SSBN-726) CLASS
Guided Missile Submarines (SSGN): 4
4 OHIO (SSGN-726) Class – The four lead ships of the OHIO class are being converted to carry 154 guided missiles (tomahawks, vice nukes) and for conducting SEAL operations.
We have a decent navy, but it has lost its focus. The command authority needs to realize that without control of the seas, they will not be able to conduct their coastal support operations.
US Cannot Beat China in a War
China steals Russian Space Technology
Russian Security Agency Confirms Arrests of Space Researchers
MosNews
Russia’s domestic security agency, the FSB, confirmed on Monday that three senior executives at Mashexport, a state-run company dealing with foreign space contracts, were charged with the illegal sale of secret space technology to China, Gazeta.Ru website reported.
Igor Reshetin, the head of Mashexport, and his aides Sergei Tverdokhlebov and Alexander Rozhkin, have been officially charged and placed in custody, the FSB’s public relations department told RIA-Novosti.
Reshetin is accused of illegally selling secret space technology, theft and fraud, the FSB said.
It is interesting how fast China as been able to advance their rocket sciences in just the last ten years or so, it’s almost as if they were getting help from powerful leaders in the industry or at least insider information.
We all know China would only use this technology for peaceful purposes and never use this for something like delivering nuclear tipped intercontinental ballistic missiles or launching attacks against a rival’s satellites. They would only use it for peaceful exploration. Right?
Bombs cause Backfire
Our deepest sympathies to all who have been victims of terror, our Prayers go out to you.
The recent bombings in Jordan have caused anger and animosity to the terrorists cause instead of the anticipated cowering and anti-American feelings that were desired.
Jordanians are mad, they want revenge, they want to see swine excrement Abu Musab al-Zarqawi burn in hell.
“Wednesday's attacks on three Western-based hotel chains will only strengthen the resolve of Jordanians to keep terrorism from breaching its borders” - King Abdullah II.
Jordanians are also rejecting the implication that Islam, their religion, is tied to the attack.
"The world has to know that this has nothing to do with Islam," said Ashraf al-Akhras, who lost several family members when one of the bombs went off during his wedding.
They understand, regret and resent the bastardization of their faith.
Now is the time for America to renew our commitment to fighting terrorists, to take a firm stand and stop lending support and giving hope of victory to terrorists. We can beat them, but only if we keep our commitment.
Never Surrender, Never Appease
In one day fewer than one hundred people are dead at the hands of Al Qaeda. At leas 56 in Jordan and 34 in Baghdad are dead because they were nothing more than a political statement for evil people who would rather kill than to address their disputes in a rational manner.
The left still thinks that we can cut and run and the terrorists will leave us alone, after all, if the terrorists are mad at us for being there, then if we leave they will be happy and will not seek to hurt us.
Just one problem, the attacks of September 11, 2001 were before we were in Iraq. The terrorists want us dead, it doesn’t matter if we give in to their desires, they will not be happy unless we convert or die, it is that simple.
In Los Angeles yesterday, two men were indicted for attempting to purchase man portable surface to air missiles. While no terror connection has been identified, there is only one use for such missiles. You can not use them for drug turf wars; you can not use them for smuggling. They are only good for one thing and that is to destroy air craft in flight. These missiles are designed to bring down super sonic fighters and bombers that have measures built into them to help defeat the missile. There is very little chance that a civilian air liner, which flies straight and at constant speeds, with no chaff, with no flares, could avoid such a missile. The plane would break up and all soles onboard would most likely die. Why would two Asian drug smugglers want with surface to air missiles?
We can not cut and run from Iraq, we can not ignore Al Qaeda. Appeasing them will not work, it will only embolden them. Why can’t the left get this simple fact?
Operation Steel Curtain
No it is not some new HGTV show, it is the name of the military operation being conducted on the Iraq Syria border.
Iraq has about 120 combat battalions and a total of more than 211,000 soldiers and police.
This operation marks the first large-scale employment of multiple battalion-sized units of the Iraqi army in combined operations with coalition forces in the last year.
The operation, which began on Nov. 4, was meant to establish a permanent joint U.S.-Iraqi security presence along the 600-kilometer Syrian border.
Officials said the mission was designed to block the Al Qaida ratline from Syria via the Euphrates River valley and through Iraq. About 2,500 U.S. forces and 1,000 Iraqis were participating in Operation Steel Curtain, centered around Husaybah in the Anbar province.
It is good to see the Iraqi peoples taking up the responsibility of their own defense. There is still a long way to go but this is a milestone that should be recognized and applauded for their efforts.
Was Rosa Parks Act of Defiance Planned?
Yesterday we heard a caller on a national talk radio show claim that Rosa Parks and her defiant act of not giving up a seat to a man on the bus on December 1, 1955 was preplanned. The evidence she offered was that parks had long been a member of the local NAACP and had been involved in a case of the very same nature in an incident that happened on March 2, 1955, a full nine months before Mrs. Parks arrest.
From Wikipedia’s entry on Mrs. Parks:
…she was not the first African American to refuse to give up her seat to a white person. In 1944 Jackie Robinson took a similar stand with an Army officer in Fort Hood, Texas, refusing to move to the back of a bus. He was brought before a court martial, which acquitted him.
The NAACP had accepted and litigated other cases before, such as that of Irene Morgan ten years earlier, which resulted in a victory in the Supreme Court on Commerce Clause grounds. That victory only overturned state segregation laws as applied to actual travel in interstate commerce, such as interstate bus travel.
Black leaders had begun to build a case around a 15-year-old girl, Claudette Colvin's arrest for refusing to relinquish her bus seat. Colvin was a student at Booker T. Washington High School. On March 2, 1955, she boarded a public bus. Colvin was handcuffed, arrested and forcibly removed from the bus when she refused to give up her seat to a white man. She screamed that her constitutional rights were being violated. At the time, Colvin was active in the NAACP's Youth Council. She was advised by none other than Mrs. Rosa Parks. Colvin said, "Mrs. Parks said always do what was right." Mrs. Parks was raising money for Colvin's defense. However, when E.D. Nixon learned that Colvin was pregnant, it was decided that Colvin was an unsuitable symbol for their cause. She was impregnated by a much older man soon after her arrest, which scandalized the deeply religious black community. They felt that the white press would manipulate Colvin's 'illegitimate' pregnancy as a means of undermining any boycott. Some historians have argued that civil-rights leaders, who were predominately middle class, were uneasy with Colvin's impoverished background. The NAACP had considered but rejected some earlier protesters deemed unable or unsuitable to withstand the pressure and trial cross examination of a legal challenge to racial segregation laws. Colvin was also prone to outbursts and cursing episodes. Many of the legal charges against Colvin were dropped. A boycott and legal case never materialized from the Colvin case law.
[Emphasis added]
Is she the hero that she has been made out to be? Is the result of her actions any less important if it had been a planned action, instead of the spontaneous decision of one woman “tired of giving in”?
Some claim that the speed in which the boycott was enacted and that the NAACP was ready for court is proof that it was a planned event.
Wikipedia:
On Monday, December 5, 1955, the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA) was formed. Its members elected as their president a virtual newcomer to Montgomery, a young and relatively unknown minister of Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. That Monday night, 50 leaders of the African American community, headed by Dr. King, gathered to discuss the proper actions to be taken as a result of Mrs. Parks' arrest. E.D. Nixon said, "My God, look what segregation has put in my hands!" Parks was the ideal plaintiff for a test case against city and state segregation laws. While the 15-year-old Claudette Colvin, unwed and pregnant, was deemed unacceptable to be the center of a civil rights mobilization, Dr. King stated that, "Mrs. Parks, on the other hand, was regarded as one of the finest citizens of Montgomery—not one of the finest Negro citizens—but one of the finest citizens of Montgomery." Parks was securely married, employed, possessed a quiet demeanor and was politically savvy.
Mrs. Parks act was good for the country; there is absolutely no doubt of that. If any one claims that her actions were political, they are right. The politics of the time were wrong and her actions and those of Jessie Robinson, Irene Morgan and Claudette Colvin were the first steps in a national movement that lead to a great injustice being corrected. He resolve to be the subject of the test case, whether contrived or spur of the moment, has led to a better America. We still have a long way to go to get to true equality, but because of her we are very much on our way. She never gave up on working for a better America either.
Academy of Achievement
After the death of her husband in 1977, Mrs. Parks founded the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self-Development. The Institute sponsors an annual summer program for teenagers called Pathways to Freedom. The young people tour the country in buses, under adult supervision, learning the history of their country and of the civil rights movement. President Clinton presented Rosa Parks with the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1996. She received a Congressional Gold Medal in 1999.
Our country owes a debt of gratitude to Mrs. Parks. The honors she has received are justified.
Sources for this article:
Academy of Achievement
Wikipedia
AfricanAmericans.com
Collected 11/03/2005
Party Politics are an Excuse for Reverse Racism
The headline of the story caught our eye, but it is the text of the story that should infuriate any self respecting person in our country. Because Mr. Steele has different political views, Black Democratic “Leaders” in Maryland say that it is perfectly acceptable, nay, it is justified to pelt the man with Oreo® cookies, call him Uncle Tom and to depict him as a black-faced minstrel. Because his views are different the “Leaders” think that any attack is acceptable, shot of calling him the “N word”.
One of the people leading this attack is non other than Kweisi Mfume, one time “leader” of the NAACP. Can you imagine the outrage if these statements were made by Mr. Steele about his opponents?
You don’t have to because Mr. Steele is a man of integrity and character.
'Party trumps race' for Steele foes
Black Democratic leaders in Maryland say that racially tinged attacks against Lt. Gov. Michael S. Steele in his bid for the U.S. Senate are fair because he is a conservative Republican.
Such attacks against the first black man to win a statewide election in Maryland include pelting him with Oreo cookies during a campaign appearance, calling him an "Uncle Tom" and depicting him as a black-faced minstrel on a liberal Web log.
Operatives for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) also obtained a copy of his credit report -- the only Republican candidate so targeted.
But black Democrats say there is nothing wrong with "pointing out the obvious."
"There is a difference between pointing out the obvious and calling someone names," said a campaign spokesman for Kweisi Mfume, a Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate and former president of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.
State Sen. Lisa A. Gladden, a black Baltimore Democrat, said she does not expect her party to pull any punches, including racial jabs at Mr. Steele, in the race to replace retiring Democratic U.S. Sen. Paul S. Sarbanes.
"Party trumps race, especially on the national level," she said. "If you are bold enough to run, you have to take whatever the voters are going to give you. It's democracy, perhaps at its worse, but it is democracy."
Delegate Salima Siler Marriott, a black Baltimore Democrat, said Mr. Steele invites comparisons to a slave who loves his cruel master or a cookie that is black on the outside and white inside because his conservative political philosophy is, in her view, anti-black.
"Because he is a conservative, he is different than most public blacks, and he is different than most people in our community," she said. "His politics are not in the best interest of the masses of black people."
During the 2002 campaign, Democratic supporters pelted Mr. Steele with Oreo cookies during a gubernatorial debate at Morgan State University in Baltimore.
In 2001, Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr. called Mr. Steele an "Uncle Tom," when Mr. Steele headed the state Republican Party. Mr. Miller, Prince George's County Democrat, later apologized for the remark.
"That's not racial. If they call him the "N' word, that's racial," Mrs. Marriott said. "Just because he's black, everything bad you say about him isn't racial."
It is simply disgusting that anyone would stoop to using attacks like this, much less members of the man’s own race. If any white person said anything close to these remarks about a black candidate these same people would be up in arms, they would call for the resignation of the person and the press would make sure the story would not die.
It is sad that these “leaders” are putting their politics ahead of race. We are not saying they should embrace Mr. Steele just because he is black. They can run against him on the issues, on his record. To run on his race, is just despicable
50 Cent a Voice of Reason?
We don’t really like to comment on rap and hip hop as it is something that just does not interest us; however we did take notice of rapper 50 Cent and his comments on Kanye West
50 CENT SLAMS KANYE'S 'BUSH IS RACIST' COMMENT
Rapper 50 CENT has lashed out at fellow hip-hop star KANYE WEST for accusing US President GEORGE W BUSH of racism in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.
The IN DA CLUB star believes human intervention could not have prevented the effects of the hurricane, which killed over a thousand people in the US gulf states in August (05), and sees no point in reprimanding the President for something which was beyond his control.
He says, "The New Orleans disaster was meant to happen. It was an act of God.
"I think people responded to it the best way they can.
"What KANYE WEST was saying, I don't know where that came from."
We do not know, nor do we care about 50 Cent’s politics, we do applaud his common sense in this matter. He is completely correct; the hurricanes were acts of God. No man could have prevented them.
