Posted on 04/16/2015 6:29:30 AM PDT by sukhoi-30mki
Firstly thank you for your service to the nation.
There is of course our new CVL (sort of)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/America-class_amphibious_assault_ship
of course the Americas’ only do 20kts pretty much the same as a container ship.
One wonders if a “sea control ship” based on a super tanker or container might be feasible on the cheap.
The Adm Zumwalt design was only supposed to do 26kts max
Thank you.
Yes, the LHAs are great ships and are superior in capability to what I’m proposing, but then also much more expensive and as you point out, slower.
Any large commercial ship devoid of a central superstructure would be feasible to slap a flight deck on for helo loads; however, it would not be nimble. A DDH could move 800 miles in a day, making it capable of responding quickly and even chasing down threats.
A fast CVL of sorts then.
It all comes down of course to cost. and platform specialization vs generalization
on a far side note...
IF the small next gen SSTAR - reactors work as well as hoped or even 80% low cost nuke DD hulls would be possible.
https://str.llnl.gov/str/JulAug04/Smith.html
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