Posted on 02/13/2016 7:21:06 AM PST by C19fan
The U.S. Navy’s latest and greatest aircraft carrier, the USS Gerald Ford, when completed, will join the ranks of the world’s most advanced warships ever put to sea. It will carry an air wing with firepower second to none. It will be defended by some of the most powerful naval vessels on the planet. And yet, coming in at an astounding $15 billion dollars—the most expensive naval vessel ever—its time as the symbol of U.S. power projection and military dominance may be over.
Notice I used the words may be over. The simple fact is this: no one really knows for sure, but the trends all point to dangerous times ahead. We do know one thing with certainty—the mighty aircraft carrier is under siege, and without major changes to its capabilities, investing billions of scarce defense dollars seems a disastrous idea.
(Excerpt) Read more at nationalinterest.org ...
We need to be as adroit as Byzantium, who through clever politics lasted 1,000 years.
I try to keep my emotions in check about things like that ... maybe if you try each in turn, it will make you feel better adjusted to the new America.
That’s one of the reasons it was stupid to drop the F-22.
Read Bob Gates book about his time as SecDef - sort of - “you think it was bad from where you sat, you should have seen it from where I sat.” The whole pentagon was organized for the acquisition of systems to fight the wars that went on in their heads and not the wars that were actually taking place on the ground getting soldiers killed every day. MRAP was about the most unpopular acquisition the Pentagon ever executed except among the soldier’s who had to ride around in them, finally protected from IEDs.
I agree !
Some how there is a mind set of one A/C that can do all things...but that always means one A/C that does not do one thing well....
The invention of the Commode perhaps?
Lucius Aurelius Commodus
(AD 161 - AD 192)
Looks like life was pretty good for him ...
“With Perennis in charge of running the empire, Commodus’ life became one long party. Entertaining a harem of, so it is said, 300 girls and women and 300 boys, some of which might have been kidnapped, he indulged in lengthy orgies and revelled in decadent luxuries.”
Like the F-14 for instance?
The Iowa also carried Tomahawks
The Tomahawks, depending on which one have a range up to 1500 miles vs about 23 miles for a 16” shell.
The Iowa requires 1800 men to operate. An Arleigh Burke 300. That’s 6 Arleigh Burkes to equal the manpower of the Iowa. That’s 6 different locations (potential targets) with the capability (on hand) of 96 Tomahawks each (576 total)
The Mark 8 costs about $500 each. Have no idea on the 660 pounds of charge to launch it. The Mark 8 weighs 2700 pounds (kinetic energy) with a 41 pound explosive charge.
The Tomhawks have a 1000 pound warhead at a cost of $1.4 mill each
The next Tomahawks will have air-fuel warheads, making them more powerful.
I love our old battle wagons. They evoke a sense of power and pride.
The reality is they are out of date.
Why modernize a BB at the cost of a modern day Aegis cruiser, with less capability and higher operational costs?
MRAPs of which a sizable number are now property of ISIS ... Civilians always think that war toys are designed and built by people who know what is needed and what they are going to be used for ... surprise! They are build to further some self-serving, idiosyncratic dogma, gaining power and prestige for the Officers in Charge.
this fake negro will be out before long and the pendulum will swing back at least enough to make the lefties howell.
You have more faith in this regard than I.
An aircraft carrier group is extremely dangerous and it is so many miles out. I wouldn’t try to after one, it will not go well for you.
Super cavitation torpedoes can be shredded with a shock wave which collapses the forward bubble. Like hitting concrete. They probably would not be very effective.
NONE of these ships would be so expensive if they were not forced to be built by SHIP YARD BUBBAS (who by the way spend a good portion of their day drilling hole’s in female berthing to watch us change or sneaking into showers to catch one of us naked). Gotta love the Unions.
This article makes it sound like Aircraft Carriers are out in the ocean by themselves.... NOT: Carrier Strike Groups. There are subs, battleships, cruisers and Supply ships out there with them. Carriers protect the smaller ships, the smaller ships protect the carrier. Plus, CVNs are built to withstand a certain amount of Bombings as well as Nuclear War.
Teddy Roosevelt was wise on one front: Great Navy Fleets projecting power. Sailors going on port visits understand this. It is impressive to look out into a harbor from miles away and see a gigantic rusted warship sitting out in the bay. It’s a giant middle finger to bad guys and it says, “hey... our 1950s technology and 50 year old boats are still greater than anything you have. Respect us”.
The democrats want to do away with CVNs and that is what this is really about. They don’t understand them. One Indiana Democrat Congressman came on our ship during decommissioning because he couldn’t understand why it was so expensive to “removed Nuclear Reactors”. What a joke and what a Moron. CNN for months has been promoting the idea of getting rid of Aircraft Carriers. This is just one of the problems of professional politicians and a Congress that has few Veteran Members. It also conveys part of the growing divide between the warrior class and civilians.
I am a huge fan of CVs but CVNs not so much. The air detachment doesn’t care how the snipes are boiling the water. Conventional carriers are much cheaper to build and have the same operational capability as far as the air detachment goes. Crew training is much cheaper too. The Navy shot themselves in the foot demanding all carries be nuclear. They over played their hand.
You are kidding right? Carriers are tough SOBs. Even target ones are almost impossible to put under. They are huge honey combs of watertight compartments.
I agree. It’s silly to act like a Carrier is some vulnerable dinosaur. They are not out there alone either. In the kind of war where a nation would think it was cool to try to sink a carrier, the screening force or USN subs will be aggressively killing anything that gets close.
Use a nuke on a fleet and that will be the last act of that nation.
A USN carrier task force really isn’t really such an easy thing to target, or it would have already been done.
Like C19fan said "Carriers are great for projecting power against enemies who cannot fight back".
Same with battleships against an enemy who could launch multiple Harpoon missiles against them. Even in the 1920's, battleships were vulnerable to bombs, as demonstrated by Billy Mitchell
“SHIP YARD BUBBAS (who by the way spend a good portion of their day drilling holes in female berthing to watch us change or sneaking into showers to catch one of us naked). Gotta love the Unions.”
Feminism, the strange concept that you can put a bunch of naked women into a metal box, and then blame unions when men try to peek at them.
True, but witnessing the parallels is uncanny!!
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