> It's a good thing the US is still friendly with Europe. Everything I've read about their (admittedly much smaller) navies is that they're far more professional and better run, ....

I wouldn't be so sure about that.

Norway managed to sink one of their own frigates.

https://www.navytimes.com/news/your-navy/2018/11/13/norwegia...

Germany doesn't have anything left to sink.

https://www.rt.com/news/418484-german-navy-ships-shortage/

Good point about the Norwegian ship, but I have no idea what you're talking about with the German Navy. They have over 60 ships, including 10 frigates, 5 corvettes, and 6 submarines, plus various other support ships. Their close allies in Italy have 2 light aircraft carriers, 3 amphibious assault ships, 4 destroyers, 12 frigates, 8 attack subs, 1 corvette, plus others. Their other close allies in France have 1 aircraft carrier, 3 amphibious assault ships, 14 frigates of various types, 6 attack subs, plus some other frigates and corvettes, as well as 4 ballistic-missile subs. I haven't even gotten to the other powers in continental Europe (Netherlands, Denmark, etc.). All together, they seem to have a pretty sizeable defense force.

Japan also has a pretty sizable Navy with over 120 ships.

Ships afloat does not mean they're operational or combat effective. Some of those ships are quite old and are badly in need of replacement or upgrades. Many of them are under crewed. The numbers of ships are a starting point, but really don't tell much of the story.

None of Germany's 6 subs were operational at the beginning of last year. That may have changed since, but the underlying reasons, poor planning and lack of spare parts, are still there. Only 9 of 15 Frigates were operational and the lead of their new class of frigates, the F125, failed sea trials. The Navy subsequently refused to commission the ship. Admittedly, these are not necessarily crew training issues, but crews without operational ships are not likely to maintain a desirable level of combat readiness. These issues aren't just limited to the Navy; ground forces are also in a bad state.

France and the UK are in better shape, but the Royal Navy in particular has holes in its capabilities where the US Navy is expected to fill in. They're regaining some capabilities with their new (and only operational) carrier, but it's not even clear if it has a functional air wing yet as the F-35B's they purchased only began carrier operations this past September. Another carrier is under construction, but it may be awhile before their carrier based naval aviation becomes combat effective.

The remaining European Navies are pretty small and pretty limited in what they can do. They tend to focus on ASW with some surface warfare capabilities, but are again dependent upon one of the larger Navies for air defense.

Japan may well be the most combat effective of the bunch, but that's a completely different theater of operations.

This isn't intended to be a rah-rah, USA forever sort of rant. Everyone, including the US, seem to have let things slip to the extent that combat effectiveness is becoming questionable.

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/germanys-navy-dead-26...

https://www.dw.com/en/no-more-missions-for-germanys-navy-war...

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/02/20/german-armed-for...

Also, ballistic missile subs don't really matter unless you're planning to throw nukes at someone, in which case the makeup of surface fleets quickly becomes irrelevant.

Only on HN will a thread about the US Navy devolve into public transit.

Funny, but it's not devolution of a comment thread, I'm pointing out that things are falling apart in the US, and the problems in the Navy are merely one facet of a much, much larger problem with the way the government is operating (at both federal at state levels, but most of these issues have a lot of federal involvement, e.g. bridges, and public transit usually spans states because most of our major cities span states, and long-distance trains necessarily are a federal issue).