Naming cruisers after battles, carriers after nearly dead white guys, and the wrong sorts of submarines after States.
As a total civilian I say any Montana should be a battleship. Sorry Uboaters.
<whiney-voice> I sure wish they'd have stuck with the ooouuld naming scheme for warships. BB's, later SSBN's named after States, cruisers and SSN's named after cities, DD's and FF's named after famous warriors, SS's named after fishies, CV's named after battles. But noooooooooo, we gotta go fix what ain't broke. Naming cruisers after battles, carriers after dead white guys, and the wrong sorts of submarines after States.
Sigh.
We don't seem to be building those anymore...
And we should be. If you're going to have a navy at all you need battleships.
And we should be. If you're going to have a navy at all you need battleships.
We don't seem to be building those anymore...
SSNs didn't start getting named for cities till the Los Angeles (SSN-688) class. The 9 classes of SSNs before that they were mostly named after fishies.
http://navysite.de/submarine.htm (http://navysite.de/submarine.htm)
Wasn't there a cruiser name USS Helena Huh? Or did I hallucinate that ...?
They are hard to kill and have an envelope of destruction that is unmatched by any other vehicle. The only thing more murdery is an atomic bomb or perhaps massed (like Soviet level) artillery or heavy bomber formations. All of which have certain downsides.
The only problem is the 25 mile range of the guns. I've heard a bit about rocket-assisted artillery shells, don't know if that can be applied to 16 inchers but lets find out. Can the range be doubled?
The farther you can throw shells the less you need to rely on planes or missiles. And shells are a lot cheaper than either of those things so less direct cost and less risk as you don't need to throw officers at as many targets. And when you have ground troops moving farther incountry they can be covered longer by the big guns. Sure it's nice to have regular artillery at your disposal but I've got to imagine that it's totally awesome to call in 16 inch shells.
Finally if given the choice would you rather have a bunch of Zumwalts or a bunch of Iowas and/or Montanas? That's like asking if you would like a bowl of kale chips or a double cheeseburger.
With modern technology the guns would certainly have more range. But a true blue battleship doesn't really work with modern warfare.
I think you guys may be underestimating the value of having a massive club available. They can do a lot of damage really cheaply.
AHHHH HAAAA HAAAAA. Nothing about a battleship is cheap. trhe shell itself may be cheaper then a Mk 48 ADCAP (may not) but getting the gun and shell to where it's needed is best described as "crushingly expensive"
Within it's envelope you can destroy any target you want for a few grand worth of shells. Compare that to the cost of a missile or the risk of using a plane with crew.
But nothing will get in it's envelope. That's why they were mothballed. Badguys will sit back and throw harpoons or SS-N-19's at it until it's out of SM-2s or they get lucky.
Or perhaps think of them as ocean going tanks. Massive Sea Panzers. That throw giant hammers.
To say they don't fit in modern warfare is like saying ground artillery doesn't fit anymore. C'mon guys these are guns, massive guns, we are talking about. I would expect more love for them from the folks here.
Completely different tactics involved there. not the same thing at all.
Are we not members of the Cult of Kaboom?
Eh, for the money you'd spend getting 16" guns going again, you could probably finalize the Navy's railgun program and put those on instead, to be powered by said nuclear plants.
I don't think you need to up-armor them, so much as reactive and stand-off armor them (in addition to a metric buttload of ADA capability).
Lose the oil fired boilers and drop in a pair of nuke plants (one forward, one aft). Put a bunch of those azipods on it to drive it. Nothing like watching at BB do a pivot steer in the water. :O :O :O
Four Turrets of triple 16" (or 18") guns (I bet you can find the plans and dust them off, still several steel mills in the US, if not, "Hello Krupp!!"). And use the 8 round per minute auto-loading system the Bundeswehr uses in t PZH 2000 (It fire a 5 round TOT barrage with one tube!!! ) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7XFwT4REHg
Throw in a Metric Revload of all kinds of "Fark you and everyone in the same grid as you" missiles, a good ADA suite of missiles and CIWS, plus a super duper Aegis system to control it all. A few drones just to round out the "F YOU!!!" suite of weapons and call it good.
You'd only need a crew of a few hundred, maybe a thousand, tops.
Carriers still do the "Force Projection" mission, but Marines and (new) BB(G)'s do the "We own this here piece of ocean front real estate now" thing.
http://www.cnet.com/news/futuristic-navy-railgun-with-220-mile-range-closer-to-reality/
Only a 5 incher. Still a lot to be happy about though.
Less room needed for powder so more room for shells plus a high rate of fire at a vast range? Yes.
If you're building a huge ship that needs relatively few sailors would it make sense to have analog and mechanical back-ups for as much of the electronics as possible? The room would be there and if you catch an EMP that gets through you can switch to mechanicals while you repair the other system.
Once something is going railgun speed, I think the actual mass of the projectile is a little less important.