In 1941, the United States suddenly found itself in a war that would span a third of the Earth's surface - the Pacific Ocean. They faced an implacable enemy with imperial ambitions, and the Pacific Fleet - or at least, what wasn't on the muddy bottom of Pearl Harbor - was built in part on Great War relics.

Four years later, the United States Pacific Fleet had more modern combat ships than all the other navies of the world combined. The United States, as Admiral Yamamoto warned, had fired up its enormous industrial base to a war footing faster than anyone thought possible, and we drowned the Empire of Japan in steel - and atomic flame.

Today there is another Asian power with Pacific Ocean ambitions, and we have some problems that didn't exist in 1941. //

The primary problem, according to Eaglen, is that China may well win dominance in the Pacific without firing a shot. And, as is always the case, the problem has a lot to do with logistics.

“If they know if this ever got beyond competition to something with the use of violence, we don’t have that capacity to rapidly repair and resupply forward in Asia, and it’s a really long way home to sail and fly things. You see how Beijing’s starting to win without fighting,” she concluded. //

America does have some advantages in the Pacific. Our undersea fleet is the most advanced in the world, and as the Germans learned as early as the Great War, submarines are a great force multiplier.