[APRPEH]

yea the costs were pretty high. but we know what a bad guy in a small raft with a big bomb can do to modern ships too. the bomb that tore a gaping hole in the side of the gmd USS Cole would have left a flash mark on the side of the New Jersey. surface skimming antiship missiles would not penetrate the armor plate either (so i have been told).

[Gator101]

That's true.

I once heard a story that after a kamikaze hit on a US battleship the next command that came over the loudspeaker was "Sailors, man your brooms!"

(...of course I have heard the same story to describe a hit on a British carrier which had an armored flight deck)

[Robert A Cook PE]

From WWII on, even ONE hit on a DD (or FF) sized ship has taken out that ship: After just one hit, EVERY destroyer (which are now cruiser-sized: CG-47 etc are on essentially Spruance hulls) has lost power, command & control, fire control, or propulsion.

Several that have been hit (even if the shell or missile doesn't explode) have sunk from secondary fires. Those that hit a mine or water-level blast have been lost for years of repair.

But EVERY one has lost the ability to keep fighting after only one hit. The list includes some 40-odd destroyers: only a few such as Sheffield, Stark, Cole are well known.

We had two DDG's off of Vietnam that got hit shrapnel from near-misses that lost their radar for example. No radar = no fight back.