"This is not the Soviet Army I was trained to fight nor the Army that went into Afghanistan. I could write books on their failure to adhere to proven practices starting from the BTG which were nothing more than coy+. While Russian munition expenditures cannot explain all their failures, they certainly do not explain their lack of success. The lesson here is the Chinese may very well face similar meatgrinding situations given the lack of maneuver room. 60,000 artillery rounds a day is not bringing them any closer to victory."60,000 rounds/day may or may not have any relation at all to a Taiwan conflict. I have no doubt that China's assumption going into Taiwan will be that of a meat-grinder situation. OTOH, I have my personal doubts as to the ability of the Taiwanese and its military to sustain such a war. I feel like the Taiwanese military is less military than the Ukrainian military, and the Taiwanese are in general less martial than Ukrainians. The actual word that came to mind was less "feral". It could be a meatgrinder, or the Taiwanese could fold like a lawn chair. I give it about 50/50 odds.
"I see where the 14 beaches come from. They included bn size which while harrassing, I do not consider it sufficent size to threaten div, let alone corps and army level RES.
This Bloomberg's map of which only 3 are suitable for Bde level up landings
https://www.bloomberg.com/toaster/v2/charts/2a1fb12a801548c0971a9eb0c0e43f52.html"
This map does not provide any independent corroborating evidence for your claim that only 3 beaches provide brigade-level or higher landing sites.
"D-Day is precisely the lesson that should be taken. We didn't actually bust out in full mode until we got Antwerp. Before that, those rolling pontoons were under strain to actually support the invasion and it was a race who could get their armies there before the other and that was after the Allied air forces plummel the Wehrmact logistics train."
I'd like to see a link describing this.
"Civilian ships actually need deeper waters. Hence they can be stopped further out, necessitating a even longer exposure to fire."
I don't see any reason civilian ships can't use the same pontoons, just further out.
"You responded to a post that I was responding to. Rip2 made the comment that China would make short work of Guam, Japan, and Hawaii should the US take out TMSC. My comment was to explain why that would not be the case. I was trained for WWIII so I have a very good educated guess at munition expenditures."
But you don't have the necessary information on China's stockpile of weaponry or how fast the expenditure would be or how fast the Chinese manufacturing industry could replenish the stockpile.
