Posted on 12/05/2005 12:55:30 AM PST by txradioguy
WASHINGTON -- U.S. Marines, while fighting valiantly in Iraq, are on the verge of serious defeat on Capitol Hill. A Senate-House conference on the Armed Services authorization bill convening this week is considering turning the Navy's last two battleships, the Iowa and Wisconsin, into museums. Marine officers fear that deprives them of vital fire support in an uncertain future.
Gen. Michael W. Hagee, the current commandant of the Marine Corps, testified on April 1, 2003, that loss of naval surface fire support from battleships would place his troops "at considerable risk." On July 29 this year, Hagee asserted: "Our aviation is really quite good, but it can, in fact, be weathered." Nevertheless, Marine leaders have given up a public fight for fear of alienating Navy colleagues.
The Navy high command is determined to get rid of the battleships, relying for support on an expensive new destroyer at least 10 years in the future. This is how Washington works. Defense contractors, Pentagon bureaucrats, congressional staffers and career-minded officers make this decision that may ultimately be paid for by Marine and Army infantrymen.
Marine desire to reactivate the Iowa and Wisconsin runs counter to the DD(X) destroyer of the future. It will not be ready before 2015, costing between $4.7 billion and $7 billion. Keeping the battleships in reserve costs only $250,000 a year, with reactivation estimated at $500 million (taking six months to a year) and full modernization more than $1.5 billion (less than two years).
On the modernized battleships, 18 big (16-inch) guns could fire 460 projectiles in nine minutes and take out hardened targets in North Korea. In contrast, the DD(X) will fire only 70 long-range attack projectiles at $1 million a minute. Therefore, the new destroyer will rely on conventional 155-millimeter rounds that Marines say cannot reach the shore. Former longtime National Security Council staffer William L. Stearman, now executive director of the U.S. Naval Fire Support Association, told me, "In short, this enormously expensive ship cannot fulfill its primary mission: provide naval surface fire support for the Marine Corps."
Read the rest here:
http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/robertnovak/2005/12/05/177720.html
Then go tell it to the survivors of the Oct 1982 Beirut Barrack bombing. Hmm seems the BB really wasn't the right platform for that mission after all.
Nor do I, but as Clausewitz wrote, "war is the continuation of politics by other means" - not the other way around. If you cannot enable the domestic economy to be sufficiently strong to support a military that can win wars, debates over equipment are pretty much moot.
because somebody back home was busy saving money for the Park Avenue crowd at the expense of our men.
Given that we need to have a strong economy in order to have a strong military, your comments seem at best short-sighted, and at worst, an echo of the sorry democrat "tax cuts for the rich" lament, which was more intended to create class conflict than inform real debate.
That kind of BS argument ought to be beneath a FReeper, but is exactly what I expect from a troll. John Kerry, is that you?
Digressing from the topic a bit, but I figure people interested in this thread may find these sites interesting. One is loaded with battleship pictures and info, The other is loaded with very cool color pictures from WWII...Germany, American, Brit, Japanese, Russian.
http://www.ww2incolor.com/gallery/ww2incolor
http://www.warships1.com/US/US_battleships.htm
Build a canal through Pakistan?
"I never have understood why we haven't brought the Wisconsin and Iowa out of mothballs for the WOT."
They're extremely expensive, and are of real use only in an opposed beach landing against heavily dug-in defenders, which we're never going to do.
"And let me know when you figure out how to get Wisconsin and Iowa to Afghanistan."
Have Livermore Labs dig a new canal using thermonuclear explosives?
It's not cheap to man or operate and that is the Navy's primary consideration here.
Aside from the CVN's I don't think that there's another surface ship in the Navy that uses steam boilers. Cruisers & destroyers use gas turbine technology. We would have to start classes for boiler techs, and several other obsolete rates. Doable, but expensive.
The gun barrels on those BB's erode slightly every time they are fired -- meaning they get less accurate and eventually need replacing. Guess what? They don't make those things anymore and they cut-up the replacement tubes. Fire the guns less? Can't really do that either. The powder needs to be tested for potency. If you don't do that you could drop a short round on that Marine observer/recon party that you are supposed to be supporting. Doable, but short-lived.
Survivability? Maybe, but every ship can have it's back broken. Modern torpedos & cheap-@ss mines are designed to do just that. But then you'd have to ask yourself what a BB is doing in a high-threat environment. It's 16-inch guns are likely to be outranged by cruise missiles, meaning it needs carrier support. If you give it a CVN protector, then it ain't so cheap.
I guess the bottom line is that reviving the BB's would detract from the already hard-pressed ship building budget. So it is a stop-gap that actually increases the Gap.
Yeah, and the argument was brought out that air power is more widely deployable (assuming tanker support etc. etc.)..... so, that plus JDAM's = "who needs BB's?"
JDAM's and TLAM's are still expensive as all getout compared with 16" conventional, which you can just trowel on until the target is no longer functional.
We (Boston Naval Shipyard) did the planning which started way back in the early 70s.
No argument there - it's a matter of access to the target.
1983
Well, yeah then. It's thost big long thingies that go "BOOM!" that make the Battleship something to be feared.
If it's over the horizon, then, by definition, you can't see it. But I take your point.
There is NOTHING, and I do mean NOTHING that instills fear into anyone than looking out on the horizon and seeing and Iowa Class sitting off your shoreline.
While it is true that the Aircraft Carrier is the heart of the naval fleet these days, there is NOTHING that projects RAW UNADULTERATED POWER like a battleship.
They have brought these gals out of mothballs in every major conflict we have had since their building... and there is a reason.
I think the only time you can justify the mothball of these 2 great ladies is after you have funded and build a brand new class of them. Something that I think is long overdue.
No, its:
M - I - Crooked Letter - Crooked Letter - I - Crooked Letter - Crooked Letter - I - Humpback - Humpback - I
Agreed.
It is long overdue that a nuclear powered Battleship, was drawn up and built.
But only after it has been built should these ladies enjoy a much deserved permanent retirement.
I'm getting a bad feeling that there are about four or five of you guys who are really just one OMB staff dork sending stuff from the White House basement.
"Cheap" is NOT what the military is all about. It's effectiveness, and results.
Aside from the CVN's I don't think that there's another surface ship in the Navy that uses steam boilers.
Oh, well, that's conclusive -- get rid of the CVA's! Obsolete technology! Bet they even use steam catapults -- how crude! Mothball them all!
Cruisers & destroyers use gas turbine technology.
So what? My car uses internal-combustion technology.
We would have to start classes for boiler techs, and several other obsolete rates. Doable, but expensive.
Well, let's not do anything expensive -- like sending a bunch of MEU's to Iraq! Where are you getting this stuff?! Listen to yourself!
The gun barrels on those BB's erode slightly every time they are fired -- meaning they get less accurate and eventually need replacing.
True of every large-caliber weapon. Get a life. It's the cost of doing business in the war business. And cheaper than uncorking a JDAM or TLAM every time you want to get something done. Where are your priorities? Covering for Dick Cheney?
Guess what? They don't make those things anymore and they cut-up the replacement tubes.
Who the hell did that, with BB's still in the Fleet lists? Let me take a WAG -- Dick Cheney. Did Dick Cheney or his underling sign that order? Or did he buck it up to Poppy to make the BB's finally and for-real go away.....?
You're in the know -- tell us who signed off on that one.
Dick's the guy who ordered the jigs and dies for the F-14 cut up, so Grumman could never build any again. Did he order the spare gun barrels for the 16" Mark II's cut up?
Fire the guns less? Can't really do that either. The powder needs to be tested for potency. If you don't do that you could drop a short round on that Marine observer/recon party that you are supposed to be supporting. Doable, but short-lived.
You're a regular Pollyanna, aren't you? A real optimist, a gung-ho, sunshiny kind of guy -- I'm sure the Byzantine Empire had a general staff full of guys like you.
Winners win. They adapt and overcome. They don't listen to guys like you.
Survivability? Maybe, but every ship can have it's back broken. Modern torpedos & cheap-@ss mines are designed to do just that.
Yeah, and imagine what one of them would do to an Antelope-class PG, or an FF. So what's your point? HMS Nelson had that happen twice in her WW II career, so did USS Saratoga -- wound up taking little part in the actual wartime operations and ended up being expended as a target in postwar atomic tests. Your point being, we should never have built her, nor manned her? With a complement of 90-plus aircraft, maybe we shouldn't have built her -- too big, too expensive to operate and maintain, too many crew, too much training, and those damned steam boilers again! Yeah, better to try to stop Admiral Yamamoto with a destroyer navy, since that's what you're willing to pay for! RNC troll.
But then you'd have to ask yourself what a BB is doing in a high-threat environment. It's 16-inch guns are likely to be outranged by cruise missiles, meaning it needs carrier support. If you give it a CVN protector, then it ain't so cheap.
The answer here is obvious -- retire the CVN's! Too expensive! Too big! Unique propulsion system -- we'd actually have to train people to run this unique propulsion system, and that's too expensive!
Let's all stay home and drink warm milk instead, then everyone will see how nice we are and want to emulate us.
I guess the bottom line is that reviving the BB's would detract from the already hard-pressed ship building budget. So it is a stop-gap that actually increases the Gap.>
Thanks for coming so reluctantly to that ineluctable conclusion -- I know you're only being straight with us -- openmindedness being the hallmark of every Bush/Cheney loyalist.
More Kool-Aid, good sir?
</sarc>
Yeah, well, screw Big Dick Cheney and his power plays, and to hell with Manor Bush and the quisling weevils of the Klinton Dynasty -- screw all those guys, and go Navy! Real guys get it done, and they don't get it done by listening to policy pukes and power sluts who thrive in airless basement offices, handicapping the greasy pole games and otherwise just glowing in the dark like mushrooms.
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