Posted on 09/10/2020 2:07:16 PM PDT by Retain Mike
A number of Proceedings articles and commentaries in the past several years have advanced the idea of saving money and fulfilling the vision of “distributed maritime operations” by building a fleet of more, smaller, lighter ships. For aircraft carriers, that argument tends to take the shape of more “Lightning carriers”—based on the hull form of amphibious assault ships such as the USS America (LHA-6) class—and fewer nuclear-powered carriers of the Nimitz (CVN-68) and Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78) classes.
While LHAs are cheaper to build than CVNs ($3 billion vs. $10 or more billion), the argument misses several key principles that allow CVNs to pack a lot more punch (orders of magnitude more, in fact) and deliver it more economically—and more combat effectively—than the smaller flattops.
(Excerpt) Read more at usni.org ...
I also did not count the U.S.S. Ranger (CV-4) as its combat vessel service was entirely in the Atlantic, mostly for aircraft transport and anti-submarine warfare duty. While never damaged in combat like its sister Saratoga, it too was called back before the end of the war and converted into a training carrier and transport vessel.
So, yes, technically, the U.S.S. Enterprise was the only big combat carrier that survived the war. The other two were converted before the war's end. Survive they did, but not as combat vessels.
A carrier is a primary target not for being a huge target yo, it is a primary target because it is a floating frakin’ base for strike aircraft.....
And the puff piece omits that he biggest CVN of all, the Ford, is so screwed up it cannot be fixed in the foreseeable future and has been relegated to a training ship.
Further the Navy is going to build 4 more identical useless CVN targets. These Brass pleasing targets join the now soon to be scrapped LCS ships, the DD-1000 class destroyers which may be made into missile platforms. Oh and the rail gun failure.
If there is on thing the Navy is good at these days is wasting 10s of billions of dollars on ‘concept’ ships.
In any conflict with a peer like China, the CVNs will have to stand off so far that their planes will be useless.
Puff piece
It's not how many ships you have at the beginning of a naval war. Rather, it is only important how many you have at the end.
We need a mix of conventional and nuclear CV’s.
It is almost impossible to sink a CVN out right. A heavily damaged warship can be repaired but we need to re industrialize the USA. That is the core problem. Thanks Free Traitors™.
Wow the bath tub CV hating admirals are out in full force. Does China pay you to troll these threads?
Time marches on. Space will be the next battlefield, and technology will replace most of what we see of today’s surface navy, imho. Smart, ai enabled, and super fast vehicles will be able to transit great distances very quickly and eliminate much of what today’s carriers project.
Resistance to change is a human failing, and no organization resists change quite like the military. Washington does love these super expensive weapons systems (a large, deep trough for many to feed from), so I don’t expect to see much in the way of change.
What is the range of the Fighter and attack aircraft? Is the larger size the need for more tankers to fuel the low fuel capacity of the aircraft necessitates the ship to operate at longer ranges because of the newer anti ship missles
I see the make believe Johnny Rebs have come out from under the rocks.
Get back under your rock Johnny, your opinions aint worth spit round here.
Carriers exist for the same reason wheels were put on cannon, all about getting the big gun closer to the enemy.
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