unforum

[A.J.]

[Headman]

[Headman]

[A.J.]

These ae Navy facilities in the US

[A.J.]

The USS Milius which is Arleigh Burke-class destroyer small sized ship. Firing a Tomahawk missle. Imagine them at night raining down on the Monster

[Saiyan King]

Re: what Military Division and from where?

[detranova]

OK, but what of the pixellated guy who tells them there's nothing they can do? Could he be special ops? The fact that he seems to know what's going on and that he has his identity hidden seems to indicate he's special. Granted he doesn't look like Army Rangers type special forces, but could he be part of some theoretical black ops?

[Saiyan King]

[daisho]

He may be from a special unit/group, I can't see any other unit insignia on what looks to me like a pretty standard ACU, with some MOLLE attachements. The rifle hanging looks to be an M4, also pretty standard, with a foregrip and optical sight attached.

I don't know if they blank out SpecFor faces in news/media covereage in the US, they usually do here in Aus, and I have seen it done for SAS in Britain as well.

[detranova]

[Saiyan King]

Actually , yes, i think you are right, Delta members are definitely held under plausible deniability, in other words, they dont exist. But not sure if that would mean blurring out faces. i mean they could just say that soldier is attatched to so and so battallion or whatever

[rose]

Oh man, I can add some factual information here.

The Intrepid isn't in New York right now as it is being repaired. The likelihood it would become operational at any reasonable amount of time is probably less than zero. Even Battlestar Gallactica was in better shape to actually fight than the Intrepid will ever be. That being said, I have seen actual helicopter landings on the Intrepid - jets, I doubt it.

The Coast Guard has a presence on Ellis Island in the harbor and they are around a lot.

Fort Hamilton is far away. I have no idea how long they would take to get tanks to the city but I think it would be slow going. Could they make it in an hour? I think not, but maybe they could. I have no idea how quickly they can respond to a monster attack.

As far as fighter planes, they fly by on occasion. I think they may be on alert all the time and could probably get here really really fast. They may make regular patrols for all I know.

[Nighthawk]

Fighter planes can scramble from as far as Andrews AFB and be in NYC airspace in minutes, not hours.

[Everything's Magic]

I think they'd know about it, but they might not do something to try and stop it.

[Nighthawk]

Long post 'cause I'm bored.

Now, given a chance, I'm going to have to research this, not because of the movie but because of plausability in general.

Assuming the nearest Army bace isn't on the island, but assume there is an Army facility nearby. There aren't a whole lot of routes they could use to get in to the city in the first place. On common streets, there are only two ways they can get in to the island:

1) Bridges. I don't know how technically possible it is to roll a tank (which, BTW, weighs just shy of SEVENTY TONS) down any one of the bridges.

2) Tunnels. I'm not even sure an Abrams will FIT in those tunnels; haven't been in one in a while.

Now, with those two in mind, in order to use them you have to assume that those two routes are VACANT. If you've ever been in New York City, especially at night, you know that that's a statistical impossibility. These tanks would have to plow through anyone and everyone to get anywhere near "ground zero". Even the Army won't run over its own citizens by the hundreds "for the greater good".

And there's no way to get a tank in to Manhattan the way I've seen it done: through an air drop (from a C-130). Even in Central Park, it's be one neat trick to drop a seventy ton vehicle at night in to such a small area with dead on precision, especially considering it seems like the area's a warzone already.

So that leaves only two viable options:

Option A: An amphibious landing.

This has two problems...

1) Where would you have a high volume amphibious landing on Manhattan? Do keep in mind that the monster is theoretically coming *from* the South end of the island (in the direction of the SOL), so Battery Park and the surrounding area is out.

2) Where would an amphibious landing come from in the first place? Even if there was a military base nearby, do they have amphibious transports just lying around in the harbor for such a situation?

The only way I can see this working is if they were nearby, but offshore, such as an aircraft carrier. Then, at a moments notice, they can mobilize the entire amphibious force and launch them from the carrier directly to shore. Of course, one has to think that a big honkin' aircraft carrier floating in the Hudson would be one hell of a target for our bad guy...

Option B: They were already there

In the footage we see this is not a couple of Army guys that happen to be on the island; this is a full batallion of Army personnel with mechanized infantry and air support.

Also, a batallion of that size will certainly not go unnoticed in Manhattan. It's not like you can throw a sheet over an Abrams or a mobile missile launcher and not expect some eyebrows raised.