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Originally Posted by RN7
Military Rivalry: Attack by a foreign rival? America doesn't have a military equal since the Soviet Union collapsed. Russia remains the second most powerful military nation in the world, but it's not up to taking on America anywhere outside of its own territory. China is the number three military power and is the second largest defence spender. It clearly is on a path to establishing some sort of parity with America in the Pacific and it might partly do so by 2030, although that could depend on its future economic situation and if it can bridge the very wide technological and logistical gap that America has over it. However beyond the Pacific (really the Far East) China's military power will never match America's. The only other serious rivals are India, Japan and Europe; India is to poor and Japan and Europe (most of it) are American allies.
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I'm not suggesting a military invasion of the continental U.S.A. by either China or Russia, nor am I predicting the total collapse of American government and society. I am trying to reimagine the original T2KU but update the run-up using today's global security issues.
That said, I respectfully disagree with your military assessments. I think that you overrate American military power and underestimate the Chinese and the Russians. Defense spending is not the only metric for military power. America's defense spending is so high relative to free-spending China because we're currently funding a war, and we have been for over a decade (two wars for a good chunk of that time). Our budget has been focused on replacing beat-up Humvees with MRAPs, while China's has been spending their defense Yuan on brand new multirole fighters, scores of fresh frigates, and hundreds of modern MBTs.
I will grant you that the U.S. still possesses the most capable force on the planet, but its capabilities- especially those of its land forces- have been degraded by two long counterinsurgency campaigns and increasingly deep budget cuts. Even at the height of its power, just prior to the so-called surge in Iraq, manpower-wise we were scraping the bottom of the barrel and analysts were predicting that we would be unable to fight another campaign should trouble arise elsewhere in the world (like North Korea). That was during two "low-intensity" conflicts against insurgent forces.
We're positing here two high-intensity conventional wars on opposite sides of the globe across two oceans- against China in Korea and Vietnam and Russia in northeast Europe. Our military has been shifting away from preparing to fight large-scale conventional for the past three decades. Our heavy armor force has been shrinking steadily during that time and looks set for further contraction. Strykers are not Bradley IFVs. Some of our NATO allies have gotten rid of their MBTs completely! I really don't like how we match up on land against China, and even against Russia, on their turf, we'd be hard pressed. There's no question that we'd need the draft, and a major effort to rapidly increase production of neglected military hardware like MBTs and IFVs. National Guard units would be shipped to Asia and Europe, not waiting for a surprise Mexican incursion.
Our navy is still the world's most powerful blue water force and will likely remain so for some time, but China's navy is growing at an alarming rate. Chinese military technology has taken great leaps forward during the last 30 years. They've developed anti-satellite weapons, hypersonic ballistic anti-ship missiles, and their own indigenous stealth fighter. Its land forces no longer rely on 1950's era Soviet MBT knock-offs. We're not talking the screaming hordes of the Korean War anymore (and we couldn't decisively beat them then, when Communist China was only a year or two old).
The trends are clear, RN7, and they're alarming. U.S. military power is waning while China's, at least, is on the rise. I don't see these trends reversing anytime soon and we're looking ahead about 20 years too. Look for Putin to pump more money into the Russian military as well. We're still badass, but not nearly as badass as 25 years ago. And China's military, although still high-volume, is increasing its quality each and every year.
Now, with all of that out of the way, I don't think it's too much of a stretch to imagine some kind of break-down of national security in the CONUS after the war goes nuclear. Even Mexican paramilitaries could cause problems in the American southwest.
We're simply trying to create a gameworld with lots of options for military-themed adventures, both in foreign fields and in the continental U.S.