On Tue, 20 Nov 2007 22:54:17 -0800 (PST), Alex Luzhanov
wrote:


In all seriousness, I doubt that the Russians will make a committed
attempt to match the United States navy, dollar-for-dollar and carrier-
for-carrier. I think the Chinese and Iraqi example, of using
asymmetric warfare, in this case mines, submarines, and cruise
missiles, or leapfrogging the whole "aircraft carrier" stage using
UAVs, is more likely and probably more productive. The Russians are
not stupid enough to waste their money on matching an obstacle that is
easy to bypass.


My views exactly. A CV group has an effective strike range of under
300 miles. We are talking about carrier based mass attacks, the only
option when attacking a large country with modern defences. At that
range the CV group is very vulnerable to land based mass missile
counter attacks and land based air strikes. That's a lot of very
expensive assets that can sink, and all concentrated in the same small
area of ocean. The monetary and manpower investment for the enemy is
a lot less than the cost of one carrier air group.