Boydfish

I think that the Canadian-Atlantic rhetoric is getting a tad deep in here, but I'd like to ask a question: Would this proposed "super-province" simply be another level of government, or would the current local governments be absorbed into it? BTW Pellaken, Alberta's oil will run out long after you're dead and gone, so I wouldn't worry after them too much. As well, there are a few things more than oil in the Albertan economy. The simple fact is that there are few parts of the confederation that aren't very well positioned to have exceptional economies. The problem is that the Canadians have designed some of the most inefficient systems and concepts for exploiting them.

So did I. More time? To do what? I also seriously doubt that the Taiwanese Air Force is going to toss away the pilots and aircraft required for the mission you're describing. Yeah, so they'll just get by with the air defence systems that they already have. Are you going to lend Taiwan the magic wand you're waving to "subvert the air defences"? Look, you're not getting it: The PRC can inflict and enforce massive damage to the strategic and economic infrastructure of Taiwan as a whole; Taiwan cannot do that to the PRC, as the PRC has massive infrastructure that lays beyond the reach of even a one-way mission. Taiwan's F-16's, at max fuel and minimal weapons capacity can only reach Bejing one-way. Even then, they'll have a one shot run at it as they'll be in near glide at that point. You're making a vast generalization. I also never said that there is no defence against bioweapons; I just said that they are far more dangerous than nuclear weapons. Whoops, there you go, trying to make a point that unmakes itself: A bioweapon and a chem weapon are two vastly different creatures. Yup, SARS was eventually contained. SARS was a naturally occuring and quite predictable event. You then compare that against a genetically modified Soviet nightmare germ and it's like comparing a stone age sling and a nuke. EMP is to blind electronic tracking systems in order to kill them with greater ease. Pinches? WTF? Non-lethal weapons are to allow the military to contain and control civ populations in rear ech areas, not to use in combat operations. Please read the history of WW1 and it's big follow-up, WW2, which will speak volumes to your theory. I think once you've seen a little bit of the world, both in how humans live in it, as well as how the world lives around humans, you'll see that pretty much all killing is needless. Or perhaps the most needful thing of all. Death is common across all species and things; you can kill every last human on the planet and the world will not end. But before you try, consider that no armed conflict or disaster has ever threatened more than 3 billion lives. That leaves several billion more to kill before we drop below that magic 200 number of people where procreation becomes impossible. Please explain then how the US Armed Forces managed to tactically strike successfully at will in Vietnam, but still lose the Vietnam War. Agreed. Now, you didn't outright say it, but are you implying that the land forces, especially the infantry can "arrest" people? You've got the infantry confused with the cops: The role of the infantry is to close with and destroy the enemy. Everything else is secondary to that mission. I hate to say this to you and shatter your daycare world, but it's perfectly acceptable in the context of combat operations to kill everybody around your target too. It's not nice, but if making him dead requires torching a busload of retarded kids and nuns, you do it. The minute you start making rules of when you won't kill the enemy during combat, they will use those rules against you. I'll give you an excellent example: In the early 90's, when the Canadians first arrived in Yugo, some local militia got the great idea of putting a kid on the top of a bunker and plinking at a CF patrol because they figured that the Canadians wouldn't kill a small child in response. A single Carl Gustav put paid to that idea. Other examples include Somali milita trying similar stunts in Mog with the Rangers by using women and children as human shields; the Rangers just shot anyway. I think you need to stop re-reading Starship Troopers. I never said the infantry are useless. You're the one making the claim that strategic warfare(Even tho' you keep calling them "tactical")is all that is required to win a war.

I'd refute your "arguement", but since all you managed to do was drivel on, you simply failed to come up with anything approaching an arguement. I will note for you one thing lad: Unlike you, who is still probably trying to get weaned off of mommy's teat, I have sat on both sides of the equation of hiring people and thus have practical experience to base things on. Since you are probably not yet old enough to cross the street unescorted, I understand why the concept of experience is beyond your ability to grasp.

Fuel: A nuclear reactor that requires refuelling ~every 14 years. Supplies: That's a question of war rations, start of patrol at time of deployment and countless other questions. Your link, not mine. I won't even point out that the "problem" with North Korea started in the 1950's. There is so much wrong with your theory as to be laughable. You've totally discounted things such as air defence and the fact that Taiwan's air force cannot maintain a high enough tempo to do what you're suggesting. Bioweapons are aimed at populations for the simple reason that they are non-persistent without a human population. Please put down your Tom Clancy book and go tell that to anybody who has even a basic knowledge of bioweapons. They'll laugh at you. Oh my gawd...you're a "Bomber Bill" fan! You think that 6000 years of military science is wrong and that the infantry is unimportant! I could tear apart the rest of your points on nuclear warfare, but with this one statement, you've kinda shown you have no idea what you are talking about: A tactical device is used in a tactical operation akin to a conventional weapon. Attacking infrastructure like cities or factories is a strategic mission.

Actually, NSA stands for "National Security Agency" and it's counterpart in the Canadian confederation is the CSE, or Canadian Security Establishment. CSIS is aimed at your basic counter-intelligence operations, while the NSA, CSE and GCHQ are aimed at electronic intelligence gathering. Since the Canadians only do electronic intelligence, the CSE represents the sum total of the Canadian intelligence gathering capabilities. For the more complex stuff, we rely on MI-6 and the CIA, thus the British and Americans have to tell us everything we ever find out about.

Riff...isn't it past your bedtime? Be quiet, the adults are speaking about important things.

Radiation ain't the death dealer that people make it out to be. Or to be more specific, it won't kill as many as the movies make it out to. Large areas of the planet would be essentially unharmed, depending on weather patterns and targeting methods of the devices. Remember, fallout is only a problem when you need the device to detonate at ground level to wipe out a hardened or hard to kill target. If you're doing the rather mundane of knocking over the typical soft buildings that make up cities, you do that via airburst for two reasons: First, the airburst spreads to blast over a larger area, killing more of the city. Second, vastly smaller amounts of dust become radioactive as a result, allowing you to move in guys with boots and bayonets quicker. The movies like to portray a global nuclear exchange as "end of life", but the simple fact is that it's not going to happen. Will it be horrific? Oh yeah. Figure casualties of around 1-2 billion in the first months, but after that, it becomes an infrastructure restoration footrace. The most common bugaboo that gets tossed around is that of "nuclear winter" killing off all plant life and thus killing the food chain. I hate to cause the unemployment of so many science fiction writers, but the logic doesn't hold. Hydroponics can generate vast quantities of vegtables. Since we can generate electricity from gravity(Hydro)and from that, heat and light, we can literally "wait out" the dust cover. That and the idea that the resulting dust cloud would cover the entire planet is dubious to begin with. Wouldn't that be the Anthrax mailings of 2001?

Britain, depending on how you look at it, either has no constitution or the longest one in history. It is governed by Common Law and custom rather than a strict framework of written down rules. That's why, while admitting my natural bias as being British heritage on my maternal side, I think I prefer the British Common Law system to a franco-republican model: The Westminster Model gives the benefit of the doubt that people will act with common sense and only get involved when they stop doing so; the republic model with it's endless charters, constitutions, bills of rights and civil codes treats all people as stupid as the biggest idiot in the village.

I'm not saying that equal pay for equal work is a bad thing, Luigi, I'm saying that in the past, that doctrine has been overplayed into "equal pay for ANY work". In order for a worker to remain motivated by reward, especially for difficult or complex jobs, there must be pay differences. No, I'm saying that since race is generally a non-factor in employment, race shouldn't be a factor in the selection process, which is exactly what AA is. It literally comes down to two wrongs not making a right. Right back at ya!

The Typhoon and Ohio are similar in rough design features, but the doctrine of use was different. The USN kept the Ohios on deterrence patrols to act as a first strike counterforce, in mirror image to the Delta class Soviet SSBNs. In other words, if the balloon had gone up, the Deltas and Ohios would unload their cells as part of a massive strike. The Typhoons, on the other hand, were proposed to hide out for an extended period post-exchange. From your link: No responsible U.S. politician with any authority or influence has ever advocated Japan going nuclear; few developments are potentially more destabilizing and more counter to U.S. interests in the region. The US doesn't want anybody playing with nukes; notice how they tend to invade countries that try to build them? From your link to the Guardian: The United States does not need to press Tokyo and Seoul to go nuclear. It is sufficient if Washington informs the South Korean and Japanese governments that the United States would not object to their developing nuclear weapons." But the article also makes it clear that the US government has not said that; is not leaning towards that and has a policy of not wanting other nations to develop nuclear weapons. Excuse me, you're not grasping the subtle parts of the issue. Could the PRC overrun Taiwan? Very unlikely. Could such an attack cause massive infrastructure damage to Taiwan? That's almost a given. You're also applying your logic to try and predict the actions of a group that is using a totally different logic set. The PRC are communists, granted, they are the most capitalist communists at the Politburo level, but they are still commies. You do not start a war expecting to lose, you engage in war expecting to win. In 1991, Iraq did not expect the whole damn world to ride to Kuwait's rescue, despite the overwhelming likelyhood of that happening. Taiwan has no realistic ability to hit back to the PRC, with the bulk of their defence assets exactly that: Defensive. Now, if China tosses a heavy punch at Taiwan, the economic cost to Taiwan is going to be high, no matter what the result. As an example, the Nazi invasion of the USSR was also a failure, but the damage was horrific. That damage is what is going to push the Japanese and ROK to develop a deterrence force. Bioweapons are not targeted on places, they are targeted on populations. They are the ultimate indiscriminate killing weapons. Once introduced into a population, they keep infecting and infecting. Nukes do not remove the ability to make war period, they are simply powerful explosive devices. The bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were not exceptionally more destructive than a typical bomber raid in WW2; the part that was shocking was that it was done with a single bomb.

No, it does: The English Bill of Rights was passed in the 1600's. It's much smaller than the US or Canadian equivilants, mainly because they recognized that with our rights already assured under Common Law, there was no need to make a redundant document. That's why the Trudeau Code is so stupid: It adds nothing new; it just phrases it in a francophone accent.

I suppose that the perspective of the PRC has some validity, but for all intents and purposes, Taiwan will not reunify without force of arms. I'm not sure that I understand: The PRC wants to keep the status quo of a non-expeditionary Japanese Armed forces and not do anything that would upset that. A PRC military expedition to Taiwan, successful or no, would trigger a rearmament response, no? Only the most extreme anti-nuke peaceniks would see a global nuclear exchange as a life ender on earth. The simple fact is that a release of a single ICBM or SLBM would almost certainly trigger a full release, but life would still exist post-exchange in a fairly well developed state. Some of the interesting aspects of the theorized "broken back" war stage by both US and Soviet planners resulted in things like the USSR's Typhoon class, which was meant to not particpate in the initial strike, but to hide under the icepack for a year then emerge to wipe out any signifigant infrastructure repairs that the non-communists had made. The US wants the JSDF to take on a larger self-defence component, even to the point of being able to withdraw the forward deployed US forces in Japan, but they do not want to have an IJN sailing around the Pacific with power projection capabilities. You're going to have to prove that. The US has had a firm policy of being against any other nation developing nuclear weapons since 1945. I think the worry would be less of an invasion and more of IRBM strikes. The invasion I was referring to was a PRC attack on Taiwan. Actually, Bioweapons are. A nuke makes a hole, a chemical weapon can render a small area uninhabitable, but a bioweapon can't be stopped easily.

Um, at first I was going to ask if you've ever fired any of the guns you're discussing, but will go for a broader question before that, based on your statements: Have you ever fired a gun? Except the Hind wasn't designed to kill infantry as a primary mission either; it is meant to hunt armor and soft skinned vehicles. Which is also the mission of the Apache, BTW. I suppose the fact that your entire statement is bogus could also be pointed out, as killing infantry is not an equation of rate, rather of effectiveness, but why make logical arguements? Yes, but before we go over the finer plot points of "Red Dawn", perhaps the MANPAD Stingers might have also been a factor? Yep. The AIM-120 Pheonix ballistic AAM. They tend to fly in very tight formation with F-14's. Which part of the blast are you referring to? The pulse? The flash? The shockwave? That's probably not fair, as you have no idea what you're talking about. Except that fallout is created by environmental dust having radioactive elements bind to it and then be lofted airborne in the blast. That's why airburst nukes have less fallout than impact nukes...and those over water have next to none. After the Trinity test, troops marched thru the blast crater less than an hour later with few ill effects.

Luigi, if you read the entire sentence, you'll note that I am actually supporting equal pay for equal work, but not if it leads to the socialist/communist doctrine of "equal pay for ANY work".

British Columbia. Except that most of our ability to function in society is tightly tied to factors that we often have little control over, both positive and negative. As much as society would love to see 110lb nose tackles in the NFL or 300lb ballerinas in the Kirov, the simple fact is that unless you're gifted with the correct body size to do so, you can't do those things professionally. Even beyond the common physical aspects of size, proportion, manual dexterity and raw inate talent in a specific skill set, there is the simple matter of raw intelligence. Some people are smarter than others. Some are masters of nearly everything they try, others hunt a lifetime without success for even a simple task that they can master and others fall in various degrees in between. Except that it's being applied to opportunities, especially as it pertains to "Affirmative Action" type programs. If somebody is the best suited to exploit an opportunity, they should be able to do so. If they are the best suited due to being naturally talented in that area, why should they be denied that opportunity? The entire premise of AA is that minorities cannot compete against "the majority" in a fair competition, so the process must have a slant in their favor. There are even numerous government agencies and quasi-government agencies that hold job competitions for "minorities only". As well, there is no "right" to opportunity, or success for that matter. I can accept that all persons should be given a equal chance to compete for those opportunities, but that's it. All can apply, all can try and if you're the best candidate, you get the job. No points added or deducted for plumbing or skin tone. I strongly doubt aside from being able to understand the appeal of TV shows like "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" on a personal level, there is little that you understand as well as I do, let alone better than I do.

Throwing my hat into the ring here, I'll start by saying that I do not support affirmative action or affirmative action-type programs. The first thing that needs to be understood is that people are not equal. While some of the left-leaning are popping pills or changing their diapers in shock at that statement and some of the more extreme rightwingers are pumping their fists in agreement; let me explain: If we're all equal, we all must be the same. Since everybody has their own unique strengths and weaknesses, that means that anybody who tries telling you that we're all equal because some stupid snot wrote it on a piece of paper is using their mouth to do a wonderful imitation of flatulence. You're not equal to me, in fact, without tooting my horn excessively here, I'm a damn sight more talented in economically viable ways than most. Setting aside the bits that are entirely controllable, like education and the fact that I don't commit serious crimes, some of them are just simple facts of life. My wife can crunch numbers in her head a damn sight faster and more accurately than me. I can crunch things a damn sight faster and more accurately than her. Does either make us "better" than the other? Nope. It just means that I'm better suited to certain jobs and she's better suited to other jobs. I think that we as a civilization would be best served by abandoning the notion of "equal rights" and replacing it with a philosophy more aimed at not holding one person or group of people as being "better" than others. We'd have to be careful not to try for "equal pay for equal work" mutating into a socialist/communist doctrine of "equal pay for any work", but the quicker that we accept that humans have diverse skills and talents, as well as that the world "owes" you nothing, the happier we'll all be.

I believe that the RN can reasonably maintain two task forces indefinately in any ocean in the world, depending on composition. In a pinch, they could deploy three seperate independent task groups for up to six months. That aside, the RN is by accepted definition, a "blue water" navy. The USN is a blue water navy, but is certainly not the definition of what a blue water navy is. By accepted definition, even the Canadian Navy qualifies as a blue water navy, as proven by their deployment to the Persian Gulf. In terms of the Soviet Naval Infantry capabilities, they were not in the "might" category of doing a Falkland scale operation. They lacked the required amount of fast combat support ships to operate that distance from friendly ports.

The Trudeau Civil Code is at best a useless document, at worst it's simply the best example of a franco-republican contamination of our Westminster system of government.

The definition of a "blue water navy" is a navy that conduct warfare operations unsupported beyond the littoral areas of their own or near coastline. A "brown water navy" is one that can't or is optimized for littoral operations. As for the RN not being able to operate in more than one ocean, the facts do not support your theory. They do not routinely do so, but are more than able to do so. They are certainly able to self-deploy at will to the entire Atlantic and Arctic Oceans, as well as the entire Med Sea, Indian Ocean and the Persian Gulf. Didn't a much smaller and scaled back RN conduct an invasion of the Falklands in 1982? Did you happen to notice the Royal Marine Brigade that stomped around Iraq recently? There is literally no coastline in the world that the RN cannot deploy in force to. In comparison to the former Soviet Navy, especially in power projection, the RN was at least their equal, if not outright superior in several critical areas. The Soviet Naval Infantry simply could not have mounted the Falklands Invasion. It's also doubtful that the Soviet era carriers could have stood up to the Mirages like the RN's FAA did. On a strict unit type to unit type comparison, the RN beat the Soviets hands down in nearly every instance. The I-class is a much superior unit to the Soviet VTOL carriers. The T-class SSNs were light years ahead of the Soviet counterparts. The U-class SSKs were so far ahead of the Soviet versions, it's almost impossible to compare them.

OK, let's assume for a minute that your scenario and "facts" are correct: An entire CVNBG can be wiped out with a nuke. As such, building them is a waste of time for the US. Oh great guru of things painted grey, please tell us what composition of fleet vessels isn't going to be slammed hard by a nuke? By you logic, then the USN should be disbanded, as nothing can survive a nuke. As for the US building smaller carriers, like the RN's "I" class, perhaps you've noted the USN's Wasp/Tarawa class vessels? They operate their own Harriers and CAS helos, along with the lift assets for the embarked Marines. Utter crap. The RN is a fully functional blue water navy. They hit their low point in the 70's and have been ramping up since the Falklands War. In fact, the drop off from the RN down(With only the USN having a size advantage over them)is a pretty steep fall.

I think that most people examining the issue of the PRC attempting to annex Taiwan tend not to see it in the scope of both the local political balance and on the larger global scale. The big worry on both a local and global scale would be the Japanese. If China tried to take down Taiwan, the Japanese would go nuts. Figure that they'd have nukes and a couple of carrier groups within five years. National self-preservation would demand it, what with a billion person country with expansionist desires literally knocking at their door. The Chinese do not, repeat, do not want any condition to come to pass that sees Japan rearm. A good historical/political comparison would be the resistence that the Russians had towards a German unification and rearmament. The Chinese were treated roughly by the Japanese in WW2, both in strategic and occupation terms. In addition, a rearmed Japan would be a fear for the North Koreans. This would push the DPRK further towards developing nuclear delivery options. On the global scale, the USAmericans also do not want a rearmed Japan for similar historical reasons, so they'd be forced to respond to the PRC's invasion.

That's unfair Nova! The French have made several major contributions to the art of war and military science! Didn't they invent the white flag of surrender? During the Second World War, they clearly had a well developed special forces capability, as once the Allies had arrived, every citizen of France who was a collaborator was instantly revealed to have "really" been part of the resistance. The exploits and capabilities of the French Foriegn Legion are well known and proven. Of course, French citizens are prohibited from joining this organization, so that speak volumes. The French are also responsible for some of the most vital and instructive quotes on military arts. Who can forget "Guard the cliffs? The British could never climb those cliffs!" or "We are safe behind the Maginot Line". They also achieved an interesting military feat, a decade before the USAmericans: They had their asses kicked by the Vietnamese...before they were supported by the Chinese or Russians.

I think that the bulk of my questions around the Kyoto treaty results from it's supporters refusing to stick to a position point for the entire arguement. For example, the idea that reducing CO2 emissions will stave off global warming is, at best, unproven. In fairness, the position that heavy and even medium industry has an environmental effect globally is a supportable position. Thus, the arguement of "It can't hurt" can be supported to a degree. The problem is that the big offenders, those being third world countries followed closely by developing countries, are given massive exemptions from the provisions of the treaty. My personal solution would be to take a leadership position on environmental standards: Scrap Kyoto, then have nations adopt sliding scale tarriffs on products and goods produced in countries that are not taking due care in protecting the global environment. In other words, if China wants to supply cheap manufactured goods for North America, they need to do so without releasing that giant brown cloud like they did last year.

I understand your frustration with PEI, which is really little more than a municipality with delusions of grandeur, being an "equal" province of the Canadian confederation. The problem is that you can't really expect that the people of PEI are going to accept anything that will "demote" them; nor will any province want to create any kind of mechanism for the Canadians to do that to them. Do you really think that the other seven provinces won't be afraid that the Canadians will then consider the benefits of "de-provincializing" every other province save Ontario and Quebec? They'd have "Ontario", "Quebec" and "Revenue Sources" I'm rather doubtful that any rework of the Canadian confederation would be workable, at least in the sense that the Canadians won't give up the required domination over the rest of the confederation, but my personal suggestion for PEI in the context of a reworked confederation would be that it PEI be designated as the seat of government for the confederation. In other words, like our Australian brothers and our USAmerican cousins, we'd have an area of the confederation that is not part of any of the confederating nations. It's not a perfect solution by any stretch, but it does fix some pretty major problems, like that nations like BC which have numerous municipalities that are larger both in area and population than PEI won't resent it quite as much and that the people on PEI won't feel like they're giving up much.