Why Doesn't the Navy Have Battle Cruisers?

Naval Sea Systems Command ^ | May 16, 2018 | Kelley Stirling

[wny]

Carriers Lexington and Saratoga were under construction as the USN’s first battlecruisers, they were converted to carriers after the Washington Naval Treaty

[Larry Lucido]

Ping.

[Rurudyne]

The battle cruisers were more or less immediately misused by the Admiralty who never seemed to know what to do with them. The frigate commanders in the days of ships of line wouldn’t have had their issues. Were they were only used against smaller ships, support landing or to harass the battleships from a distance as intended they would have done a sterling job.

Even then, they wouldn’t have benefitted from the status as battlecruiser the way frigates before them had (it was considered bad form for a rated ship to attack a frigate, so unless one attacked a ship of the line it often could and was expected to toddle off).

[Phlyer]

Burke class DDG is 10,000 tons and carries 96 VLS missiles with a 1,000 mile range?

None of which could penetrate to the vitals of an armored ship. It is possible to sink any ship, but it takes specialized weapons (or nukes) to sink an armored ship. As nations quit building armored ships (except US CVs, which have a surprising amount of armor), nations also quit stocking armor-piercing weapons. As a result, there isn't anything in anyone's current inventory that could put an Iowa-class BB at risk (again, aside from nukes, which do tend to change the nature of things).

And an Iowa-class BB could go just about anywhere it wanted to with virtual impunity - making a great trip-wire that adversaries would have to respect. No small ship or ordinary planes/weapons would put one at risk. After a Burke runs its magazines dry, it can either run away (leaving the BB in control of the contested area) or wait until the BB gets close enough to sink it. For that matter, fifty Burkes would have the same effect - and result.

Again, an Iowa-class BB could be sunk, but it would take such a huge commitment (e.g. nukes) that doing so would move things from the regional/brushfire class into a truly world war class - which few adversaries can or would do over 'brushfire' objectives.

As a point of reference: No US battleship was sunk while alert and underway with reasonable maneuvering space - despite the fact the Japanese Navy had bigger ships and more of them, plus the world's best (at that time) torpedoes.

[Rurudyne]

These are really heavy cruisers intentionally misclassified as destroyers.

[Vermont Lt]

In a war they would end up as artificial reefs.

Capital ships are no longer the method of projecting power.

[Calvin Locke]

Maybe, but IMHO, it looks like that class was an attempt to up the ship-to-ship capabilities of the Atlanta class anti-aircraft cruiser.

[Phlyer]

. . . very small carriers.

Which work just fine in calm seas. But if the sea starts to pick up, the deck gets to moving so much that nothing can land on it. A significant reason US CVs are so big is so they can operate in (nearly) any weather.

And then there is the fact there is a large infrastructure (repair shops, etc.) that can be spread among a larger airwing on a bigger ship. The planes per dollar numbers for small carriers are terrible - and they still can't operate except in good weather.

[Rurudyne]

American capitalism under the influence of things like retirement funds or pools of money invested by insurance companies: making more money in the short term by going out of business.

This is the REAL problem the country has.

Not if we have something to serve in the battlecruiser role.

[Mariner]

“None of which could penetrate to the vitals of an armored ship.”

You don’t have to sink it in the moment.

Just blow the antennas off it and blind it.

Then send aircraft, or subs if you can spare them to finish it off. At leisure.

Without advanced radar every warship is little more than a barge. And A target barge at that.

[Mariner]

“These are really heavy cruisers intentionally misclassified as destroyers.”

CORRECT.

[Rurudyne]

Which is also kind of to the OP’s question: they had to be because politically there’s a strong bias against even mere heavy cruisers.

So the navy build *wink*wink* destroyers.

[ealgeone]

And an Iowa-class BB could go just about anywhere it wanted to with virtual impunity - making a great trip-wire that adversaries would have to respect. No small ship or ordinary planes/weapons would put one at risk. After a Burke runs its magazines dry, it can either run away (leaving the BB in control of the contested area) or wait until the BB gets close enough to sink it. For that matter, fifty Burkes would have the same effect - and result.

Let a concentrated air attack happen against the Iowas and they would have suffered the same fate as HMS Price of Wales.

[Snickering Hound]

After the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal in Nov 42’, South Dakota had to go all the way back to New York for repairs and was out of the war for months.

Unarmored upper works were shot to pieces but propulsion was fine and she was in no danger of sinking.

Definition of mission kill.

[thinkthenpost]

Well to be devil’s advocate depending on the load out of the destroyer (SM-2, SM-3, SM-6, ESSM, Tomahawk, VLS-Asroc (not even sure VLA ever deployed)) not all 96 have that thousand mile range.

[Seruzawa]

Battleships do make sense for support of amphibious operations. When one considers that the Pentagon can spend 2 billion on each B2 and Lord knows how much on a ridiculous strike fighter the idea that pulling out a Battleship and upgrading it is impossible is itself ridiculous. I’m not saying that we should. But we could. One BB could support Marine amphibious operations at a fraction of the cost of a Carrier. Heck during Ww2 they have 50ft accuracy at 25 miles range.

Plus they are simply cool ships.

[GOP Poet]

bookmark

[Kozak]

Don’t forget HMS Hood either....

The guns of a battleship with speed of a cruiser,
and the thinner armor of a cruiser too...

[Riley]

Bump

[Mariner]

Correct.

But the AA missiles are four to a tube. They likely carry at least 40 of those per ship.

And these have a range of only 300 miles...one per tube:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AGM-158C_LRASM

So, yeah, a standard “strike” payload is probably only 40-50 tomahawks. And a whole lotta hurt for everyone else.