The Armory - Guns, Knives, and Axes

[heydaralon]

The sub that "sank" USS Ronald Reagan.

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-b ... k-us-18383

Does Sweden have a good Navy? I would think the Baltic Sea could be a flashpoint if Russia ever went to war.

[Hastur]

The sub that "sank" USS Ronald Reagan.

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-b ... k-us-18383

Does Sweden have a good Navy? I would think the Baltic Sea could be a flashpoint if Russia ever went to war.

The Baltic sea is to small for navies. We build great subs and anti ship missiles. Missiles that can be launched from air, coast or small surface vessels.
Ships in the Baltic sea are either subs or targets.

[heydaralon]

The sub that "sank" USS Ronald Reagan.

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-b ... k-us-18383

Does Sweden have a good Navy? I would think the Baltic Sea could be a flashpoint if Russia ever went to war.

The Baltic sea is to small for navies. We build great subs and anti ship missiles. Missiles that can be launched from air, coast or small surface vessels.
Ships in the Baltic sea are either subs or targets.

I forget if I asked you this, but why does Russia stop where it does? Why do you think Finland, Sweden and the Baltic countries didn't get assimilated? I know the USSR controlled many of those places, but historically Russia kept conquering east and west from Muscovy until it couldn't. I read awhile back about the battle of Poltava and how the Swedes defeated Russia. Was that the event that essentially decided their fate as an independent country?

[Smitty-48]

The Russians don't have many good options in the Baltic

If you're the Russians, you don't fight in the Baltic

You go strategic and attack the Sea Lines of Communications. Panama, Gibraltar, Suez, etc.

[heydaralon]

The Russians don't have many good options in the Baltic

If you're the Russians, you don't fight in the Baltic

You go strategic and attack the Sea Lines of Communications. Panama, Gibraltar, Suez, etc.

Carter is the one who gave the Panama Canal back to the Panamanians right? Why the hell did he do that?

[Smitty-48]

The Russians don't have many good options in the Baltic

If you're the Russians, you don't fight in the Baltic

You go strategic and attack the Sea Lines of Communications. Panama, Gibraltar, Suez, etc.

Carter is the one who gave the Panama Canal back to the Panamanians right? Why the hell did he do that?

It was on trajectory to becoming an insurgency, the Panamanians were starting to revolt.

America controls these approaches from the sea anyways

It's not a requirement to occupy land, for the Mahanian Eternal Seapower.

Frankly, in the event of war, America could take it back if need be.

More likely that the Panamanians would acquiesce and invite American forces in

As in the event of war, they'd be looking for American protection.

If the shit hits the fan with Russia, the gloves come off, America does what she has to do.

[Smitty-48]

Bear in mind tho, the Russians don't have to invade these choke points to disable them.

This is what makes the SSN so formidable.

They can sit in the approaches with mines and torpedoes, then merchant ships will not sail there.

Things grind to a halt very quickly, worldwide, simply by menacing these choke points with submarines.

[Smitty-48]

To calculate the Russian war plans, you have to get out of the Soviet paradigm.

They're not the Soviets, they're not that big, not even close, so they can't fight like the Soviets.

The Russians would operate asymmetrically, covert and deniable.

They're not going to launch a blitzkrieg, it would be more like war by sabotage

The world is totally dependent on everything flowing smoothly, arriving just in time.

The Russians would exploit that, to bring the West to sue for peace on favorable terms for Russia.

[Hastur]

Does Sweden have a good Navy? I would think the Baltic Sea could be a flashpoint if Russia ever went to war.

The Baltic sea is to small for navies. We build great subs and anti ship missiles. Missiles that can be launched from air, coast or small surface vessels.
Ships in the Baltic sea are either subs or targets.

I forget if I asked you this, but why does Russia stop where it does? Why do you think Finland, Sweden and the Baltic countries didn't get assimilated? I know the USSR controlled many of those places, but historically Russia kept conquering east and west from Muscovy until it couldn't. I read awhile back about the battle of Poltava and how the Swedes defeated Russia. Was that the event that essentially decided their fate as an independent country?

Poltava was a huge Swedish loss. It was our Stalingrad. We never regained our aggressive side after that.
Sweden is hard to invade and we really don't have that much to steal. To much bother.
Russia was founded by Swedes after all so we have a lot of common history.
In WWII Germany didn't have to invade Sweden. We were firmly in their corner and served our purpose as neutral North Germany flawlessly.

[Smitty-48]

The Northern Flank has always been a stalemate

The Russians can't take Scandinavia, NATO can't take Murmansk, so it's static

It's not going to be a central front in the event of war, it basically gets bypassed.

The Russian concern in the eastern Atlantic, is the British

They would ignore Sweden and go straight at the UK

War with Russia is going to be a naval war, Western Europe is not going to be their objective

The war will be against America and Britain, because that is the only threat to the Russians

It's all about the nuclear submarines, Sweden is irrelevant, all of Western Europe will be bypassed

It would be strategic war, they have to beat America and Britain at sea, or be defeated by default.

They can't beat America and Britain head to head, force on force, so again, they'd have to fight asymmetrical

The way to do that is to avoid direct attacks and instead target the Sea Lines of Communication

Bring the global supply chain to a halt, go after the merchant shipping.