CVN Gary Hart

[Flash]

I think you misunderstand. I meant to reintroduce battleships, i.e. redesign and build new ones. The last battleship design(Iowa-class) introduced was in the 1940s. Methinks something better and more effective/capable could be thought up with the wonders of modern engineering. And you can always make new parts.

Do you realize how much a battleship would cost nowadays?! And what type of weapons would you put on a modern battleship? The really big guns of old? Battleship guns have not been made for over 60 years, is it really worth the investment in research and development needed to make new battleship guns? That would be needed because I am fairly sure the largest naval guns made in the last 50 years have been 6 inch ones. A gun turret on the Iowa class needed a lot of manpower, requiring a gun crew of 50-60 sailors.

That is just the gun piece of the equation, what about the entire research and development cost for a new class of capital ships? The Navy has to constantly defend its massive investment in carriers, a battleship just does not bring enough to the fight for the investment required.

Only one country has made an attempt since the end of WWII to make a battlecruiser/battleship equivalent, the USSR with the Kirov class 'cruisers'. Arguably they were modern versions of battlecruisers, and what did they bring to the fight that an Aegis cruiser or destroyer doesn't? About 30 more missiles? That's it for that much investment?

I am about as much as a fan of battleships as anyone, one of only two reasons that I would have volunteered to be a SWO, but they are just not practical in today's Navy and the wars we now fight.

 

[Brett327]

Do you realize how much a battleship would cost nowadays?! And what type of weapons would you put on a modern battleship? The really big guns of old? Battleship guns have not been made for over 60 years, is it really worth the investment in research and development needed to make new battleship guns? That would be needed because I am fairly sure the largest naval guns made in the last 50 years have been 6 inch ones. A gun turret on the Iowa class needed a lot of manpower, requiring a gun crew of 50-60 sailors.

That is just the gun piece of the equation, what about the entire research and development cost for a new class of capital ships? The Navy has to constantly defend its massive investment in carriers, a battleship just does not bring enough to the fight for the investment required.

Only one country has made an attempt since the end of WWII to make a battlecruiser/battleship equivalent, the USSR with the Kirov class 'cruisers'. Arguably they were modern versions of battlecruisers, and what did they bring to the fight that an Aegis cruiser or destroyer doesn't? About 30 more missiles? That's it for that much investment?

I am about as much as a fan of battleships as anyone, one of only two reasons that I would have volunteered to be a SWO, but they are just not practical in today's Navy and the wars we now fight.

Exactly. People who think it's a good idea to bring back some kind of Battleship think in terms of nostalgia, not capabilities.

Brett

 

[Uncle Fester]

Well, I dunno. I agree that the perpetual Congressional meddling over keeping the Iowa-class in mothballs rather than scrapping them was mostly driven by nostalgia, not to mention the Freudian love of great big-ass guns. But I think there is something to the argument that at least part of the merit of capital ships is in showing the flag, simply existing and being able to show up. One only has to see how the Iranians flip their $hit every time a new carrier shows up in the Gulf. But we just can't afford to expand the carrier force; perhaps by investing in new heavy surface capital ships (CGNs, battlecruisers, whatever), we would add to our "presence" capabilities for less cost. I think the idea of a battlecruiser is of more merit than the admittedly marginal increase in firepower.

 

[whitesoxnation]

And how many tomahawks do we have? Maybe a swo can answer that... but my SWO friend was telling me about how his DDG never leaves with a full loadout.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/munitions/bgm-109-inv.htm

 

[Flash]

Well, I dunno. I agree that the perpetual Congressional meddling over keeping the Iowa-class in mothballs rather than scrapping them was mostly driven by nostalgia, not to mention the Freudian love of great big-ass guns. But I think there is something to the argument that at least part of the merit of capital ships is in showing the flag, simply existing and being able to show up. One only has to see how the Iranians flip their $hit every time a new carrier shows up in the Gulf. But we just can't afford to expand the carrier force; perhaps by investing in new heavy surface capital ships (CGNs, battlecruisers, whatever), we would add to our "presence" capabilities for less cost. I think the idea of a battlecruiser is of more merit than the admittedly marginal increase in firepower.

I think that the impact showing the flag with a destroyer and/or cruiser is sufficient enough in many cases. Like I said before, a CGN/Battlecruiser is just not enough return on investment.

 

[Hozer]

Exactly. People who think it's a good idea to bring back some kind of Battleship think in terms of nostalgia, not capabilities.

Brett

Capabilities? How about GPS precision naval gunfire. Granted only to about 60nm now, but is projected to increase into the 250nm range.

 

[scoober78]

Capabilities? How about GPS precision naval gunfire. Granted only to about 60nm now, but is projected to increase into the 250nm range.

Which buys us what exactly? Perhaps I'm in over my waders here...but with precision strike capabilities from aircraft the only real advantage to naval gunfire bombardment is cost over a long duration bombardment...which I suspect, given the more mobile nature of warfare thesedays...isn't as big an advantage as it once was.

 

[HeloBubba]

Only one country has made an attempt since the end of WWII to make a battlecruiser/battleship equivalent, the USSR with the Kirov class 'cruisers'. Arguably they were modern versions of battlecruisers, and what did they bring to the fight that an Aegis cruiser or destroyer doesn't? About 30 more missiles? That's it for that much investment?

My favorite Soviet ship. Still, they only finished four of theses things (actually, they only got three of them commissioned before the "collapse") and only two are still around.

 

[Hozer]

Which buys us what exactly? Perhaps I'm in over my waders here...but with precision strike capabilities from aircraft the only real advantage to naval gunfire bombardment is cost over a long duration bombardment...which I suspect, given the more mobile nature of warfare thesedays...isn't as big an advantage as it once was.

In short, manpower.
A DDG can do what a CVN can insofar as sustained precision attack within certain geographic limits (but it is expanding).
5300 man ship vs. 200 man ship.
A CG magazine with 500 precision rounds translates to over 100 sorties of loaded out Rhinos.
Tanker hits every 7 days vs. independent ops.
VLS Tomahawk still there as more punch.
50+ CG/DDG vs. 4-5 deployed carriers.
It's a manpower beancounter's wet dream.

Mobile nature? look at the CVOA's in the NAG, everybody knows the limitations/parameters of the CVOA. Small boys have much greater geographic flexibility.
You said it, cost.

I'm not saying small-boys will ever supersede CVN's, at least not in the immediate future, but there is a RMA coming for SWO-daddies.

 

[BigRed389]

In short, manpower.
A DDG can do what a CVN can insofar as sustained precision attack within certain geographic limits (but it is expanding).
5300 man ship vs. 200 man ship.
A CG magazine with 500 precision rounds translates to over 100 sorties of loaded out Rhinos.
Tanker hits every 7 days vs. independent ops.
VLS Tomahawk still there as more punch.
50+ CG/DDG vs. 4-5 deployed carriers.
It's a manpower beancounter's wet dream.

Mobile nature? look at the CVOA's in the NAG, everybody knows the limitations/parameters of the CVOA. Small boys have much greater geographic flexibility.
You said it, cost.

I'm not saying small-boys will ever supersede CVN's, at least not in the immediate future, but there is a RMA coming for SWO-daddies.

The proposed LCS/DDX combo...if it ever works out as planned and gets funded(big ifs), promises to lead that RMA big time.

You get a whole lot of capability in fairly small, very fast, survivable ships that can get around anywhere, and "should" be cheap enough to mass produce to the point that they can BE everywhere. Which is something even a modern "battleship" couldn't do. If they're so big that you need so much manpower and can only afford so many, it's not providing anything a big deck carrier wouldn't do better.

 

[Cleonard19]

I guess you could supposedly create a new "battleship" using the new rail guns that are supposed to be arriving on the battlefield in the next ten years. In which case a nuclear powered "battleship" would be feasible based solely on the energy needs of such a weapon. Then again, you could just put it on a nuke cruiser and be good to go too. Battleship would just be more badass.

 

[BigRed389]

Do you realize how much a battleship would cost nowadays?! And what type of weapons would you put on a modern battleship? The really big guns of old? Battleship guns have not been made for over 60 years, is it really worth the investment in research and development needed to make new battleship guns? That would be needed because I am fairly sure the largest naval guns made in the last 50 years have been 6 inch ones. A gun turret on the Iowa class needed a lot of manpower, requiring a gun crew of 50-60 sailors.

That is just the gun piece of the equation, what about the entire research and development cost for a new class of capital ships? The Navy has to constantly defend its massive investment in carriers, a battleship just does not bring enough to the fight for the investment required.

Only one country has made an attempt since the end of WWII to make a battlecruiser/battleship equivalent, the USSR with the Kirov class 'cruisers'. Arguably they were modern versions of battlecruisers, and what did they bring to the fight that an Aegis cruiser or destroyer doesn't? About 30 more missiles? That's it for that much investment?

I am about as much as a fan of battleships as anyone, one of only two reasons that I would have volunteered to be a SWO, but they are just not practical in today's Navy and the wars we now fight.

Lemme guess...the other one was PHMs.

 

[Lawman]

Lemme guess...the other one was PHMs.

Hey those were friggen cool.

 

[BigIron]

The proposed LCS/DDX combo...if it ever works out as planned and gets funded(big ifs), promises to lead that RMA big time.

You get a whole lot of capability in fairly small, very fast, survivable ships that can get around anywhere, and "should" be cheap enough to mass produce to the point that they can BE everywhere. Which is something even a modern "battleship" couldn't do. If they're so big that you need so much manpower and can only afford so many, it's not providing anything a big deck carrier wouldn't do better.

LCS program tanking for now....

 

[scoober78]

one of only two reasons that I would have volunteered to be a SWO

The other...