Do Battleships have a futue?

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by el freako


I'd like to see them protect it from 500 cruise missiles (which together cost around half of the value of the carrier and probably a quarter of the whole task force)

I'd like to see any nation in the world other than the US put together enough platforms to launch 500 cruise missiles and have the launch platforms live long enough to fire them against a carrier battle group.

[gunkulator]

All US ships have at least one Phalanx: a close in weapons system that is essentially a gatling gun. It is crudely aimed in a direction and then continually puts up a wall of depleted uranium until its radar sees no more targets.

CivII players can appreciate the irony of how a phalanx can defeat a cruise missile.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by Azazel

I think that a battle group will get it's heart torn out by a single wave of 200 missiles. imagine 200 cruise missiles launched simultaneously, or in swift succession. I don't think that the air defences could handle that.

What range of ASM's are we talking here? The bigger ship launched Soviet models had ranges of a little of 300 miles, and for the most part, you trade range for payload. Launching a wave of two hundred close enough to simultanously would take about 15 good size launch platforms. (AEGIS cruiser firing TASM's, etc.) That's more firepower concentrated in a surface battle group than any navy has, and it also requires additional ships for ASW and FAD duties.

It would financially break most countries and take them years before they could put together a blue water navy like that.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by gunkulator
All US ships have at least one Phalanx: a close in weapons system that is essentially a gatling gun. It is crudely aimed in a direction and then continually puts up a wall of depleted uranium until its radar sees no more targets.

CivII players can appreciate the irony of how a phalanx can defeat a cruise missile.

CIWS takes several seconds to engage each target. If you have 6-8 missiles enter CIWS range, most will get through. It's up to the AEGIS cruisers and destroyers, and the air intercept capability of the carrier's fighters to prevent anything from getting into CIWS range.

[Az]

I am talking shore based launchers.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Moving up someplace like the gulf would be dicey, but there'd be no problem anyplace where you have maneuvering room. At standoff range, the missiles have a lot of inbound flight time, and generally there's a capability gap between the effective strike range of the carrier's air group and the much lesser range of the missile batteries.

[Az]

What's the Tomahawk's range?

[Illyrien]

Keep in mind that cruise missiles can be launched from planes, thereby giving it a much longer range than a converted battleship ever could.

A Carrier can project power quite far, much futher then land-based or the hypothetical battleship can, therefore carriers still have some value.

[ColdWizard]

Originally posted by Azazel
What's the Tomahawk's range?

about 1000 miles, iirc. Tomahawks are used against land targets though.

[CyberGnu]

Kramerman, good post

[korn469]

also you can convert Ohio class ballistic missile submarines into cruise missile platforms as noted here

http://www.chinfo.navy.mil/navpalib/cno/n87/usw/issue_6/ssgn.html

one little factoid about this possibility

Maximum Strike - Launch tubes 3 through 24 would be fitted with 7-pack cruise missile canisters. The SSGN would have the potential to fire all 154 (22 x 7) missiles in as little as six minutes

[Odin]

I guess you are right, Kman. I was thinking about this when I was using AEGIS Crusiers in CIV3, I was thinking of some kind of battleship-AEGIS Cruiser combo.

[Berzerker]

Azazel - You can flood any ship or battle group with missiles, so why have a fleet at all? If 2 or 3 cruise missiles at a million a piece can sink a smaller ship like a destroyer, the comparative cost is and will be in favor of the cruise missiles. Carriers do what no other ship can, carry planes. Attack technology always precedes defense technology, but you don't give up valuable attack capabilities offered by floating airfields just because the current defense can be overwhelmed.

[yavoon]

battleships are extremely useful as seabased artillery. it wsa a shame we decommisioned so many.

[Kramerman]

Originally posted by Odin
I guess you are right, Kman. I was thinking about this when I was using AEGIS Crusiers in CIV3, I was thinking of some kind of battleship-AEGIS Cruiser combo.

Well, I dunno of anything like this in the works, but I do know of an ultra modern trimaran battleship on the drawing called the LEVIATHAN. It will be 750 feet long, but due to its design adn propulsion would be amazingly fast and agile (things called azipod thrusters on the sides help make it incrediblely dexterous), its design also giving it great durability and even stealthy features. Its secondary armory would be multiple missile launchers and aropund 80 unmanned ariel and underwater vehicles. Its main armament will be two rail guns, both theoretically will be able to launch potentially guided shells 500 miles at speeds of over mach 10!. Its still on the drawing boards tho, probably wont be seeing this thing for at least another 20, or 25 years.

In the meantime many new futuristic destroyers are on there way to production, or will soon be entering production, such as theh DD-X stealth destroyer, which should debut around 2011, and the CG-X crusier, which should come out around 2018. Stealthy features are another way that helps modern navies try to defeat the threat of radar guided missile attacks, but missile attacks will still be a threat.