Nansha has become a nightmare for the US Navy, with two US military aircraft crashing in the South China Sea, releasing important information: the true combat power of the US military has been fully exposed!

Who could have imagined that Nansha has become a nightmare for the US Navy. A US Navy MH-60R "Seahawk" helicopter crashed into the South China Sea while on a mission, and within half an hour, an F/A-18F "Super Hornet" fighter also crashed in the South China Sea.

This is not the first time. In October 2021, the US Navy's nuclear submarine Connecticut (SSN-22) collided with a mountain in the South China Sea and has not been repaired to this day;

In January 2022, a F-35C belonging to the 147th Fighter Attack Squadron (VFA-147) crashed in the South China Sea during its first combat deployment with the Carl Vinson (CVN-70);

One or two crashes may be coincidences, but three or four are not. Especially, within half an hour, two aircraft were lost from the Nimitz carrier.

Crashing two top-tier carrier-based aircraft within half an hour is a heavy blow that any aircraft carrier battle group would find difficult to bear.

Keep in mind that the Nimitz carrier had only been deployed for seven months. The main reason is that the carrier is too old, and due to the U.S. government shutdown, the U.S. military has not received their salaries. U.S. Navy sailors joined the military to earn dollars. "Unpaid labor" is not something U.S. military personnel would be willing to do.

Additionally, the Nimitz carrier was commissioned in 1975 and has been in service for over 50 years. According to plan, it will be retired next year, and this deployment is its last combat deployment. Therefore, during the deployment period, some failures or problems on board might not be taken seriously by the U.S. military. An aging ship operating beyond its scheduled time, coupled with poor maintenance, obviously increases the likelihood of problems occurring.

But this also released important information, that is, the real combat power of the U.S. military. With the current serious aging of U.S. Navy ships and aircraft, the real combat power of the U.S. military has declined significantly. In the U.S. Navy's active fleet, more than half of the carriers have exceeded two-thirds of their designed service life, and the average flight hours of the F/A-18 fleet far exceed the safety threshold.

Compared with the rapid modernization of the Chinese Navy, the U.S. Navy is facing an unprecedented equipment aging crisis. Once mighty maritime hegemony now has to rely on these "grandfather-level" equipment to maintain its facade.

It is therefore not hard to understand why the U.S. aircraft carrier groups can't even cope with the Houthi rebels.

Original article: www.toutiao.com/article/1847103194718411/

Statement: This article represents the personal views of the author.