It's a fictional BBC news segment covering a "serious incident" between NATO and Russian forces.
"Tensions between NATO and Russia have been growing over the past few years, and the continuing military build-up in the Baltic region is increasing concerns that a serious conflict might be a real possibility. This dramatization depicts one possible scenario. We hope that it shows how fragile our world is, and how quickly it can be changed by military and political decision-makers who do not speak for the tens of millions of people whose lives they may well destroy."
It's only tangentially related to the conversation, but it's such an excellent work of art that I can't help plugging it. The authors appear to be anonymous, which is interesting. If you were affected by the movie Threads or any other nuclear fiction, you might find this video similarly powerful.
[1] http://infoproc.blogspot.com/2017/02/on-military-balance-of-...
[2] http://infoproc.blogspot.com/2016/09/balance-of-power-in-wes...
PS: Remember, we where doing optical recognition for missiles twenty years ago. So, reasonably close is going to be a hit most of the time.
I know, I worked on some of them.
> However, consider people have had a long time to prepare for aircraft carriers without a direct conflict between major powers and aircraft carriers are easily tracked in real time by satellites.
As I mentioned in another reply, it isn't as easy as some people seem to think to find and track a CVBG by satellite. As I also mentioned, I'll go into more detail when I'm not on my phone.
> Further, they might as well be sitting still in terms of a high mach (AKA 10+) missiles.
I'm not aware of any hypersonic cruise missiles in that range, and those that approach it have relatively short ranges. I would need to look at this further.
> PS: Remember, we where doing optical recognition for missiles twenty years ago. So, reasonably close is going to be a hit most of the time.
Longer, I believe. Image recognition for terminal guidance is not foolproof, though. Plus, as with any weapons system the countermeasures groups have not been sitting still.
But the real problem is more basic. They are very high value targets an can be taken out for vastly less money than they cost to produce.
Taken with a grain of salt: China might not actually be 'there' yet, but they are progressing toward that goal.
Anyway, I would need to look into that. Chinese claims have a tendency to be blown out if proportion, particularly by the media of their neighbors.
Why would China be working on conventional ship-to-ship missiles if they expected a nuclear war? They'd just use ICBMs / long-range missiles.
I'm sure that when China does the same, they're not imagining the cost of war against, say, Australia or Mexico. they invoke the bogeyman of American military hegemony.
[0] https://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/06/13/f35_pilots_report_h...
https://news.usni.org/2017/06/14/aviation-leaders-still-unsu...