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You must have missed the /. post about China's growing submarine fleet, like this one, or the news of their nuclear submarine programs on the Guardian and others, like this one. Or the news that they launched a new class of nuclear ballistic missile subs here, here, here, here, and here.

So, there is no threat to the East Coast, because China is so good about not selling things for profit to other nations, like Iran, Syria, Libya....

Well, one of these has the potential to ruin more than another's breakfast...

The LEMV will hover above Afghanistan at 20,000ft, equipped with the sort of super-powerful cameras that can read a signature on a letter from four miles away. It will be, Taylor says, ‘an unblinking eye’, recording every move made on the ground. In theory, no one will be able to plant a roadside bomb – a device which has claimed the lives of so many British soldiers – without the cameras seeing who did it and, more importantly, where they came from. And, if the LEMV is a success, it could prove to be a tipping point, ushering in a new age of airships.

Talk about big brother... Still, I suppose nobody has considered the possibility that it may just get shot out of the sky by those with a grudge?

Raytheon rock. They collaborated with Taiwan to build Patriot derived Tien Kung surface to air missiles.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sky_Bow_I#Sky_Bow_I

The Sky Bow I (TK-1) (Tien Kung I) is a surface-to-air missile system developed by the Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology in Taiwan ROC. The system itself is a derivative of the U.S. Patriot missile system and was built with technological input from Raytheon.

This means if China decides to attack with its Scud derived DF-15 missiles, Taiwan has a fair chance of shooting them down.

This is important because the US won't sell Taiwan enough PAC3 Patriots to be much use against China's thousand or so DF15s.

Since the issue of net filtering and censorship in China is largely a non-topic, I asked myself why should the Olympics make any difference when discussing individual Countries Law and expecting exceptions to those Laws. In short, what is so great about the present day Olympics?

- Tradition? Seems to me the original spirit of the games has long been lost. It's all about advertising, ratings, and the almighty dollar bill. $10 hot dog, anyone?
- Bragging rights? Aren't there 'World organizations' for this stuff already? Don't the best of the best already compete against each other?
- Excitement? Watching some muscle-head lob a 15 pound aerodynamic (sortof) rock downrange just doesn't have the same pizazz as watching CNN-cam on the front end of a Sat-Killer. Ditto on the ice thing with rocks and brooms (not the vulcanized rock, the other one).
- Nationalism? If they were proud of their country, why do some come to the USA to get professionally paid only to be shipped back home to wear a different uniform for a few weeks? Seems hypocritical.
- Achievement? Oh joy of joys, yet another feel good story about how a gymnast with a hangnail toughed it out. Compare that to the tanks 'guarding' parking lot, I'm uninspired.
- Pride? My valuable medals. 'Nuff said.

"The problem with China invading Taiwan and Japan is that the Chinese navy has far from the capabilities to move its huge army across to those island nations."

But they ARE building large landing craft in an attempt to gain that capability. And they don't even necessarily have to put troops on Taiwan. They could simply pound it to dust.

The Chinese government is determined, one way or another, and by force if necessary, to swallow up Taiwan.

It's certainly known that the Chinese have rubber-coated anti-sonar subs, see:

http://www.sinodefence.com/navy/sub/type039song.asp [sinodefence.com]

If we are ignoring that, someone in the Pentagon needs be retired. Our failure to detect them could have been due to inadequate equipment, or else incompetent personnel or practices, or worse, arrogance. I'm not too thrilled with any of these cases.

It was probably just that they were doing exercises and not on a war footing. Everyone in the sonar room was probably busy looking at the simulated blips that were pre-programmed in. I doubt the sonar was even pinging or that anyone was listening.

http://www.sinodefence.com/navy/sub/type039song.asp

If we are ignoring that, someone in the Pentagon needs be retired. Our failure to detect them could have been due to inadequate equipment, or else incompetent personnel or practices, or worse, arrogance. I'm not too thrilled with any of these cases.

The US and previously the USSR, now Russia and China, have bene in a perpetual race to build the best fighter for over 50 years now, from the days of the F-86 and Mig-15, the F-4 and Mig-21 and F-15 and Su-27/30. Each time, one side has made a major improvement and then the other side has scrambled to keep up. The Mig-15 was the best until the US cougt up with the F-86, then the Mig-21 proved to be more nimble than the F-4 and along came the F-16. The USSR built the Mach 3 Mig-25 to counter a possible Mach 3 XB-70 US bomber and the US built the F-15 to counter that. The the Soviet built the Su-27 to counter the F-15 and the Mig-29 to counter the F-16. Since the late 80's the US has been working on the F-22, which has been both the most advanced jet fighter ever and also the most expensive. It was so expensive that the actual number pruchased has been reduced by two thirds, costnig about $100 million a piece. It is also so sensitive that it will likely never be exported.

To ctach up in this never ending race, Sukhoi in Russia has been working on a similar stealth aircraft to the F-22, called the PAK FA for many years now, and the first example should be flying next year, and Shenyang and Chengdu in China have been working on similar designs, the J-xx and J-13, but I doubt that any of these weapons will ever be used against any of the other. The Russia and Chinese jets are just as sensitive, security wise, as the F-22 is. There is much more chance that the Indians using the PAK and the Pakistanis, using the J-13/14 will duke it out amongst themselves, if Russia and China ever sell the weapons to them, being as sensitive as they are, than any of those fighting against the F-22.

These aircraft are so expensive that losing just one, be it in combat or to accidents mean that you've just lost some $100 million dollars in the case of the F-22. The fact that they will almost certainly not be used in combat against any foe that a F-16 couldn't cope with means that they, along with incredibly expensive stealth ships, stealth submarines, etc, are mostly expensive white elephants, flying around, doing a lot of impressive flight demos, and then eventually being scrapped in 30 years or so when they reach the end of their service lives.

I personally think that while the Japanese could certainly develop one of these aircraft on their own, and might very well do so in the face of the J-13/xx and the PAK if the US doesn't sell them the F-22, I think that a lot of what the Japanese are doing is simply bargaining to get the US to sell them the F-22. The costs of developing an advanced stealth fighter are not to be laughed at. However, as soon as the Russian PAK and Chinese J-13/xx are in active service, the aura of invincibility of the F-22 will decrease, and then I suppose we'll move on to round 6 of the never ending race to waste people's money and lives.

It is apparently a Zubr class hovercraft. Only three in service in the Russian navy as of October 2006. You can see the "shadows" or the other two. Compare the photo in this article to the Google Earth image. http://www.sinodefence.com/navy/amphibious/zubr.as p/

You know what the probelm is with aircraft carriers? They sink. Taiwan is around 200km from the Chinese mainland. Modern ships have point defense weapons which can protect them against missiles, but those are not effective against saturation attacks with massed missiles. The Chinese have a large, modern well equiped air force these days.

NOt only that, but China is now outfitting its first carrier and you can be sure that there will be more to come.

The reasons, however, why China does not want to enter into a conflict with USA, lie more likely with the fact that it would end the trading relationship between them immediately and would almost certainly be extremely damaging for both countries economies: no contracts for Chinese Wal-Mart suppliers and a huge crash in national bonds in the US since China owns so many of them.

Read up on where the Ruskies have been spending their defense dollars. Functional anti-ABM missiles is very possible.

Sunburn/moskit/Brahmos http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/russi a/moskit.htm

The 3M82 "Mosquito" missiles have the fastest flying speed among all antiship missiles in today's world. It reaches Mach 3 at a high altitude and its maximum low-altitude speed is M2.2, triple the speed of the American Harpoon. The missile takes only 2 minutes to cover its full range and manufacturers state that 1-2 missiles could incapacitate a destroyer while 1-5 missiles could sink a 20000 ton merchantman. An extended range missile, 9M80E is now available.

http://www.sinodefence.com/missile/antiship/3m80.a spThe missile is armed with a conventional 300 kg penetrating warhead containing 150 kg of high explosive, or (in the Russian Navy) a 200 kiloton nuclear warhead. Even with a conventional warhead, 3M-80E missile is large enough so that one hit from a single missile could seriously damage or possibly even sink a U.S. Navy major surface combatant, a hit from one or possibly even a few conventionally-armed Moskit missiles might not be enough to halt flight operations on a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier because of the carrier's much larger size and its high degree of compartmentalization. A nuclear-armed 3M-80E Moskit, however, could easily destroy a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier (and any other nearby ships), even if the warhead detonates at some distance from the carrier.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/india /brahmos.htmIndia expects to significantly enhance its long-range strike abilities with the BrahMos cruise missile, jointly developed by New Delhi and Moscow. The supersonic missile -- which derives its name from the Brahmaputra and Moscow rivers in both countries - has a range of almost 300 km and is designed for use with land, sea and aerial platforms. The Indian Air Force (IAF) is reportedly considering the possibility of fitting the BrahMos on its Su-30 combat jets. The production will commence by end of 2003 for induction in the year 2004.

http://www.hinduonnet.com/2005/04/16/stories/20050 41602941400.htmBrahMos is essentially an anti-ship supersonic cruise missile that flies at a speed of 2.8 to 3 Mach (2.8 to three times the speed of sound). It can take out targets 290 km away.

http://www.brahmos.com/Brahmos web page SS-27 / Topol-M / RS-12M(1|2) http://www.missilethreat.com/missiles/ss-27_russia .htmlhe Russian SS-27, or Topol-M, is an intercontinental-range, ground-based, solid propellant ballistic missile. It represents the pinnacle of ballistic missile technology, incorporating modern fuel and warhead designs, as well as being capable of being launched from both missile silos and Transporter-Erector-Launcher (TEL) vehicles. Current Russian accounts stress that the SS-27 is invulnerable to any modern anti-ballistic missile (ABM) defenses. Yuriy Solomonov, director of the Moscow Institute of Heat Technology and designer-general of the Topol family of missiles, has stated that the SS-27 will be the foundation of the Russian strategic nuclear arsenal by 2015.

http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/russia/icbm/rt-2pmu. htmThe single-warhead RT-2UTTH Topol-M is an advanced version of the silo-based and mobile Topol intercontinental ballistic missile. The SS-25 Topol is generally similar to the American Minuteman-2, while the more sophisticated SS-27 Topol-M is comparabl

The Chinese aren't going there as a big PR exercise. If you haven't noticed, the Chinese aren't big on grand, meaningless showboating

They aren't big on big on grand, meaningless showboating, huh?

(Yes, those are people back there)

Since we're all friends now and trust former KGB officers turned quasi-dictators, how bout the Russians give us some of the advanced weapons they've developed since they decided to become friendly members of the world community.
For isntance, how about they give us the new Topol-M road mobile super accurate nuclear missiles that can wobble in flight to avoid ABM systems.
They could give us the supersonic sea skimming nuclear tipped Sunburn missile which does a maneuver before it hits so it can slam into the decks of carriers.
They could give us the docs on how they make their high-speed cavitating torpedoes work.
Or their new Tupelov supersonic bombers.
Or the new Russian Infantry carried fuel air weapons that they used so well in the war in Chechnya.

Taiwan, on the otherhand, has been buying fairly modern US cruisers and destroyers

On the other hand, China just received 2 Sovremennys with 2 more on order. It also launched the indigenous Type 52C, an Aegis-class destroyer capable of fleet defense. Submarine wise, China has 8 Kilo's, 5 Han's, and around 30 SSK's of indigenous design (Ming's and Song's). It's also working on a new Victor-III class Type 093 SSN which reportedly was launched for sea trials in 2000.

as well as maintaining one of the world's most elite airforces (yes, China has the largest airforce, but much of it is Mig 15's and 19's, which don't really count)

First of all, the Mig 15 and 19's were retired in the 1980's. The PLAAF is currently composed mostly of modernized J-7's (Mig-21's) but is rapidly modernizing. Through deals with Russia, it has around 150-200 Su-27's and Su-30MKK's not to mention the F-16 class J-10's that are in production now.

The discussion of air superiority is a moot point anyway because all of the ROC airfields are targeted by IRBM's and will be hit the moment war begins so the ROK airforce won't even be able to take off.

Check out for more info.

The Chinese have a deployed laser system in their most modern battle tanks that is meant to blind and in general disable enemy targeting systems. Probably very much like this is meant and able to do.

Here is a link to a picture and description of the tank: Type 98 MT. On the top of the turret you will see a rectangular apparatus. That is the laser system.