There's a certain cynical part of me that thinks if I were China wanting to wage war through the backdoor, this is how I'd do it. But not just one bridge... I'd simultaneously or within hours, two days tops, hit all six major spans across the Mississippi to cut the country in half, plus the major ports on the eastern seaboard. RIGHT before my troopships sail into the west coast ports to link up with the preassembled-in-place army of "immigrants"...

I know, "what about airlift?" China has been very aggressive about developing mobile missile launchers the size and outward appearance of standard shipping containers. Remember those six bridges and having a ship take each out? Yup, six floating long-range SAM batteries just waiting to ruin AMC and CRAF's day. Bonus, load some cruise missiles and all kinds of juicy infrastructure targets get put on the table.

My absolute nightmare scenario is this combined with heavy-EMP nukes preplaced and hardwired into Chinese airliners set so that once an activation signal's sent and the plane flies into a given area... I know, a full-on Starfish Prime has to be near-orbital, but if you wanna shut down the grid just zapping the powerplants and distribution centers will pull the plug just as well. And sending more Typhoid Marys with COVID 2: Biowar Boogaloo as the first wave...

Seriously, if you haven't read Unrestricted Warfare you need to. It's some damn scary shit and you won't be sleeping for a while afterward... but the more aware we are of just how underhanded, dishonorable and ruthless they're willing to be, how wiling they are to sacrifice their own and why demographics mean they may soon HAVE to, and the equipment and capabilities they have or re developing to do those dirty deed with, the better our chances of successfully wargaming out countermeasures.

With all the currents, tide, wind, etc it would be damn near impossible to time the loss of power at just the right moment to cause the boat to strike the bridge

Looking at this pic of the port side the anchor chain is mostly vertical. I can't find any pictures of the starboard side anchor chain. I would guess that it got ripped off by the bridge

I would suspect the the starboard anchor bit, or at least grabbed more than the port anchor, and that's what turned the ship. Sad to think that if they hadn't dropped anchors they might have coasted right under the bridge with no harm done

Look at a map of DC. Notice the number of bridges leading into it?

Seattle is worse. 1 bridge south on I5, 1 bridge north on I5. One bridge east. 3 bridges out and that city is basically toast.

Still need West Coast ports to unload the troopships and materiel once they go Boots On Ground... drop those bridges means POS becomes useless as a staging area.

Now I'm not saying this necessarily WAS a deliberate attack, but it makes a hell of a conceptual dry run for one.

I was leaning to believe this was just a horrible accident cause by mechanical failure..... but hearing this discussion, I'm not too sure now....?...? It would have taken several people willing to throw their reputations and livelihoods away and/or a second by second monitoring of the ship with the ability to disable it remotely --- both highly unlikely, but not impossible....

https://www.bitchute.com/video/5QrcNZyrWPjX/

Captain Hee Tu High

and Bosun Ding Bang Ow

Very interesting scenario. I'll have to find a copy of the book you mentioned.

In my opinion, troops (if any) would come last. After much damage has been done. If they came early, they'd be mowed down. They would NOT stand a chance at all. Too many of us would still be in the game, with food still available, and an unholy amount of ammo on hand. (I'm not talking about grocery stores or gun shops. They'd be cleaned out overnight.)

FJB AND BUTTPLUG!!

https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780971680722

I'd expect the germ to drop first, then several months later a mix of "wolf in sheep clothing" airliner EMP's and neutron-bombs, then "The People's Republic generously offers shiploads of humanitarian relief" for Bye-Bye Bridges. My thought on the Eastern port blockage/Western landing was they'd want to choke off any opportunity to respond, keep assets in the east bottled up and the west isolated long enough to land and consolidate gains. My bet is at first they wouldn't even take entire states, just to the Cascades/Sierra Nevada where the major mountain passes are "fatal funnels" more easily defended.

The rub is the logistics... how many troops would they need and how to keep them fed, clothed and supplied. If I was them I'd have the first wave ditch the QBZ's and grab AR-patterns so that they can loot us for resupply on them. Also the timing, trying to preserve things worth seizing to help consolidate control while hamstringing resistance.

Oh hell, who are we kidding? If Trump and Xi went to war, Comrades Turdferg/Kotex/Newscum would welcome their new Chinese overlords with open arms... start with the handgun and SAR registries to mark Deplorable resisters for 3am visits.

Is this the Black Swan event lats of people have been warning about? The first one of more?

I agree with D-bag (just fun-ning with ye) I mean Diamondback: a hot war with dChina would go a lot like that, but I could see a bunch of barely-under-the-radar sneak hits like this to tenderize the nation first.

My nephew is a civil engineer in Maryland. His firm and a few other big firms were called to the governor's office to consult. The best guess is two, or so, months just cleaning up the wreckage.

Hell, I STILL think COVID was an opening move on such a Long Game... barring a miracle, we WILL see war with the Red Dragon within my lifetime. Possibly within you Old Guys'.

What would china gain by going to war with us?

I see a civil war first, then China coming in.