The world's newest aircraft carriers

Neither would get within a mile of the ship in the first place...it's not as if any Aircraft Carrier sails alone.

 

All talk until something happens. Super carriers, super missiles, ...... super star destroyers!

It's funny to read this thread knowing who comes from which country. Almost everyone bets on themselves to start.

 

In addition to the previous post:

"The U.S. Navy (and to be frank, the whole U.S. military) is living in a state of total denial. In the next great powers war, or perhaps even in a conflict with a mid-tier power like Iran, at least one of our aircraft carriers will sink to the bottom of the sea. That means thousands of lives could be lost—and there would be very little we could do to stop it.

We need to get used to a very simple reality: the decades-old age of the aircraft carrier, that great symbol of U.S. power projection, has now passed. We can deny the evidence that is right before our eyes, but innovations in anti-ship missiles over many decades—combined with advanced but short-range carrier-based U.S. fighter aircraft and missile defenses that can be easily defeated—have conspired to doom one of the most powerful weapons ever devised.

If the aircraft carrier is a symbol, an expression of U.S. military dominance stretching from World War II to today, then there’s another symbol that perfectly encapsulates its demise: China’s DF-21D, what many experts describe as a “carrier-killer” ballistic missile.

How the missile works is key to understanding what modern-day U.S. aircraft carriers face. The missile is mobile and can travel anywhere via a truck, making its detection difficult. When launched, the weapon is guided using over-the-horizon radars, new satellite networks, and possibly even drones or commercial vessels being used as scouts. The system also has a maneuverable warhead to help defeat missile-defense systems. When it does find its target, it can descend from the sky and strike at speeds approaching Mach 12. Worst of all, the missile has a range of 1,000 miles. A Pentagon source tells me that Beijing has already deployed “many of them—perhaps in the hundreds,” and is “fully operational and ready for action.”

With one report claiming China could build 1,227 DF-21Ds for every carrier the U.S. military sends to sea, Beijing and other nations will have ample budgetary room to challenge our mighty carriers for decades to come.

Now, to be fair, many nations already have various types of missile platforms that could attack carriers and do damage—even send them to the bottom of the sea. The solution seems obvious: Why not park your carriers out of range and attack from afar?

Great idea—except we can’t. Right now, if we tried to strike targets in, say, China or Russia, we would be unable to do it safely because, thanks to our short-range aircraft, we would have to be parked right in range of those countries’ own powerful missile batteries.

Despite all their amazing capabilities, the latest generation of attack planes onboard U.S. aircraft carriers, the F/A-18 and soon-to-be F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, are not long-range strike aircraft, as they’re only able to fly 500 and 550 nautical miles respectively. In a stand-off with a nation like China, this would put our most expensive weapon of war—and, more importantly, thousands of sailors, airmen, and marines—in harm’s way. Since American aircraft carriers sail in large groupings of ships, there exists the possibility of multiple U.S. naval vessels meeting fiery deaths, as they would have to travel close to the shores of other nations that have similar weapons.

Those who continue to defend the aircraft carrier have an obvious solution: missile defenses can stop any incoming attacks and keep the carrier relevant for decades. That seems like a reasonable argument, except for one very basic problem: first-grade math tells us it’s flat-out wrong. As I have said on several occasions, U.S. naval planners in the future will face large missile forces aimed at their ships that could very well overwhelm their missile defense platforms. A great example comes from a 2011 report from the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Analysis, which shows it wouldn’t take much strategic sophistication to beat U.S. missile defenses—just some basic math:

Iran could deploy its land-based ASCMs (anti-ship cruise missiles) from camouflaged and hardened sites to firing positions along its coastline and on Iranian-occupied islands in the Strait of Hormuz while placing decoys at false firing positions to complicate U.S. counterstrikes. Hundreds of ASCMs may cover the Strait, awaiting target cueing data from coastal radars, UAVs, surface vessels, and submarines. Salvo and multiple axis attacks could enable these ASCMs to saturate U.S. defenses…salvos of less capable ASCMs might be used to exhaust U.S. defenses, paving the way for attacks by more advanced missiles.

Taking the above example to its logical extreme, could China, Russia, Iran, or even one day North Korea simply build enough missiles on the cheap and launch them close enough to exhaust the defenses of a U.S. aircraft carrier strike group? Considering that we are currently unable to reload such defenses with ease at sea, our forces would face an unpleasant choice if their missile interceptors were exhausted: withdraw or face down enemy missiles with no defenses.

This is a problem that will only get worse with time. And considering China is already in the process of developing an even longer-range anti-ship weapon—the DF-26, with a range that could attack our carriers as far out as Guam—simple logic suggests the problem will only get worse.

The best way to begin solving a problem is to admit that you have one. And let there be no doubt that if steps are not taken to redefine what an aircraft carrier does—essentially take bombs and attack enemies at long ranges—then the next war America fights against a formidable foe will truly be historic, and for all of the wrong reasons "

Harry J. Kazianis is director of defense studies at the Center for the National Interest and executive editor of its publishing arm, The National Interest. Previously, he served as editor of The Diplomat, a fellow at CSIS, and on the 2016 Ted Cruz foreign policy team.


http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/face-it-the-mighty-u-s-aircraft-carrier-is-dead/

 

How does the US actually benefit from having these ships

I would rather invest the money in education and training or research. Or subsidies to new business. It would do us a lot better. The only things carriers get us is into wars we don't need to be in.

 

We took a tour of the Wisconsin while it was still commissioned c. 1981 but the crew knew it was on borrowed time.

A Chief said that if there was an economical way to computerize and automate the 16" guns she could live forever. The range was over 35 miles, and equivalent to shooting a VW beetle that far.

 

The problem on the battleships was not the weapons. It is that it has very large crews compared to modern warships and that is where the true cost are for the Navy. The newer carriers also show another major limitation of older ships. They don't have the electric generation needed for the new computer systems. That was the greatest limitation of the Nimitz class ships.

 

she sure is pretty... and very dangerous. In the coming proxy wars I can see this vessel doing what she was intended for...provide massive reach.... I don't see the US, Russia and China blowing one another's aircraft carriers up... yet... that's end of world scenario...

 

It will give the other ships a grandstand view.

 

Why should we involve ourselves in those wars?

 

Wars are where history is made. They are the punctuation marks to history.

And to hit a carrier with a missile you have to find it first. Which is not remotely as easy as people think. During the Cold War the U.S. Navy managed to hide supercarriers within strike range of the Soviet Union more than once.

 

You don't have to... just go home and hide under the bed

 

I think we get ourselves in trouble more often when we go looking for trouble. Vietnam comes to mind. European countries seem to do pretty well without a massive military.

 

It went well enough.

The Americans have been lucky since the Revolutionary war. Then and now, all we have to do is not lose.

The Soviets came to understand that we were willing to oppose the spread of Communism with armed resistance. This, no doubt, changed their calculations.

It puts them at the mercy of American, Russian, and Turkish whims. I don't want to be in their position.

 

I don't think the Soviet Union had a lot to do with Vietnam. It never occurred to the US that the NV themselves made the central decisions in the war, but I think that is clear now. We lost the war in Vietnam and the domino's did not fall as predicted. In part because the unified communist world was a myth. Within a few years of fighting us, NV fought communist China and Communist Cambodia. We mistook a largely nationalist revolution that feared China more than us for a communist plot driven from Moscow. We should have cut a deal with Ho.

I don't agree they are at the whims of anyone. Turkey is a joke and the Russian military is a shadow of its old self

 

Of course they did. Indeed, a Soviet-allied Vietnam scared the Chinese enough to go running into American arms.

Sure, but that's not the point. American inaction would've been interpreted, rightly, as weakness.

Easy to say now. One mustn't forget that the French weren't exactly happy partners of ours. We needed the French, and so we lent them assistance in a war that would eventually become our own.

That's what they call "being wrong."

That's what people said about the Russians a decade ago.

Sure. It went from a conventional military that could sweep aside all opposition to a conventional military that could overrun a Europe without American military presence with some difficulty.

 

The 10% figure comes from the U,S. Naval War College and the USNI... "Proceedings"

Naval surface warfare isn't my pay grade (department)

My expertise are NSFS and CAS.

Had three articles published on the USNI "Proceedings." --> https://www.usni.org/about

MOS 0849: Fire Control Party Man

Basically in the sh!t for 13 months spotting naval gunfire support and CAS to kill Charley saving American Marines, soldier and ROK Marines llives

Been there and done that...
NFG Plt, HQ Bartry 1/13
TAD''...
BTL 1/26 ( 1/26)
BTL 2/26 ( 2/26 )

Sub Unit One 1st ANGLICO
NGF radar becon team leader ( Cpl ) ...
In the DMZ in indian country

Last six months in country...
Srgt. NGF Spot Team Leader,
NGF Plt. Sub Unit One 1st ANGLICO ..Hoi An.

 

I think it's too late for regret, America needs to shed it's insecurities and meet what's coming head on, there are others more than willing to take your place. Forget about Vietnam, and accept that European countries do well without a massive military only because there is... America.

 

U.S. Marines loved the Iowa's.

 

These expensive toys are capable of bombing the non-developed countries into a stone age before the armed men from western Europe come. Last success happened in Libya. Syria was a failure and Iran with north Korea stay beyond their possibilities. Carriers are of no threat to a nation with developed plane and rocket industry. So in Baltics these toys would be just for political reasons not far away from home havens. As far as I know these devices so far have a period of 'childhood' with lots of stupid and expensive breakages.

 

Well said - I was going to post the same thing - that a couple of well-aimed missiles could send them to the bottom within half an hour. The next war won't be fought with ballistics, so there's no need for 'hardware', nor the need to spend zillions upgrading Trident.

 

Turkey hasn't got research&development centers as effective as other developed powers. Therefore they can't develop weapons systems like that. With help? Maybe... But still unlikely because why would any world power capable of producing such systems help Turkey to have one without getting any "geopolitical" gains out of it? I say geopolitical because states can print money but can't print geopolitical advantage right? So I believe they should work by themselves to get it.

Just like this:




A little help from the up north black sea region? Last time Turks got that sort of help from that location, they've made it out the prisons. Thanks to Soviet technology and its KGB culture that helped documenting materials as blackmail folders about some prominent political figures who then backed by the west.

 

I've said before that Trident is an absolutely unacceptable expensive white elephant because tit is not "independent as billed. The US can de facto can shut down any British launch it doesn't approve of.

And as best I can judge it's not different to a great many US weapon system... mansion, private jet and yacht money for the tycoons of the defence industry - gifted by corrupt political leaders from the pockets of the taxpayers. It's national socialism for the wealthy few.

 

I can't make up my mind whether western leaders are corrupt, breath-takingly naive, gob-smackingly ( ) incompetent, or just too plain dumb to be leaders.

 

Russia had large amount to do with Vietnam. It was their major ally & armorer. It made it possible for Nth Vietnam to carry on a war it lacked the capacity to win otherwise.

The 'Domino Theory' is easy to mock, but it seemed real enough to the nations of Sth East Asia. When the Vietnam War started in earnest (1963-5) there were communist insurgencies in Malaya/Malaysia, The Philippines, Brunei and Thailand. Indonesia had a huge Communist party that attempted a coup. Those nations had a genuine fear that an expansion it Vietnam might assist those movements as China & Russia did such movements worldwide. Communism didn't need to be 'unified' to assist other Communist movements. China & Russia both helped North Vietnam while they were on the brink of war with each other.

Vietnam invaded Laos & Cambodia in the late 1950s. It remained in Cambodia in large numbers until 1973, during which time it destroyed the Cambodian military at the behest of the Khmer Rouge. It remained in Laos until the late 1990s, having installed a government there. That is two dominoes, both of which endured large scale mass murder & repression following their 'fall'.

Speaking of myths, the 'nationalist revolution' in Nth Vietnam is one of the most persistent. Ho Chi Minh was a committed Communist for decades before he got close to power in Vietnam. He was an active agent of the Comintern before he returned to Vietnam in the 40s to fight the French. There is no doubt that Ho & his followers wanted an independent Vietnam, but they wanted it independent so they could impose Communism on it. That was the aim from the start & they were prepared to do anything to achieve it - including allying with the French to murder non-Communist nationalists. That was also the aim in 'unifying' Vietnam - to unify it as a Communist state. As a result of Communist policies Nth Vietnam murdered 50,000 odd people during a failed land reform program (about as Communist a disaster as is imaginable) and so comprehensively wrecked agriculture in Vietnam that one of the most fertile agricultural regions in the world came close to famine twice between 1977 & 1987.

The triumph of Communism in Indochina was one of the great tragedies of the C20th.

 

Only a completely stupid pig can say that the us helped the Iraqi people.