We can see signs that training standards, readiness, and logistics have suffered in the American military behind the veneer of a small military actions against ISIL and the Taliban that highlights the smaller portion of ready forces sent to fight. Dead sailors in collisions, reports of soldier training deficiencies, equipment down from lack of spare parts, and ammunition shortages all show that our own military is not as good as it seems on the surface.
China has a problem that makes their shiny new modernized military less than what it seems. And it isn't just the lack of experience in waging war with all their new stuff.
No, the main problem for China is corruption that makes their military less effective than it seems:
Corruption in the Chinese military has been a problem for thousands of years but the current government is making a major, but largely ineffective, effort to curb these bad practices.
That means China isn't as formidable a foe as paper comparisons would indicate. That's good for us.
But if we hope China will take care of the North Korea problem before we have to do the job, we have to understand that China's leaders may not be able to do the job or may not want to demonstrate in battle that they aren't as good as their image projects to the world.
Of course, North Korea's conventional military has rotted away, so China should be able to deal with it successfully.
But China does have a reason to hesitate before taking on the job, even though failure to do so might lead America to wage war on their border; or worse, if America does nothing to end North Korea's nuclear arsenal, Japan may go nuclear with South Korea and Taiwan following in short order, lest extended deterrence by America fail because America too is vulnerable to North Korean nuclear missiles.
And of course, I did note that while we have problems with readiness to fight and to sustain a fight that our potential enemies likely have even worse problems in those areas than we do.
UPDATE: And bad news. Corruption is not just a problem that happens elsewhere:
The "Fat Leonard" corruption investigation has expanded to include more than 60 admirals and hundreds of other U.S. Navy officers under scrutiny for their contacts with a defense contractor in Asia who systematically bribed sailors with sex, liquor and other temptations, according to the Navy.
Is is any wonder that our ship crews can't seem to navigate safely? Bad things happened to our Navy in readiness and leadership that didn't care enough about readiness. That must be repaired if we want a Navy that can fight rather than a Navy that we only think can fight.
We need to know if this kind of rot has infected the other services, too.
