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Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 10:36:56


Post by: Do_I_Not_Like_That


Our brand new, shiny aircraft carrier (£6 billion to build) sets sail for sea trials.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-40402153

But to get straight to the point, as a keen student of military history, I've been watching youtube videos on anti-ship missiles, and they scare the gak out of me

So are aircraft carriers turning into floating bullseyes, or will they endure for a few more years?

I don't want to see my hard earned tax money end up on the bottom of the ocean.



Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 10:54:43


Post by: chromedog


If an aircraft carrier is parked off your backyard, you can assume it isn't alone.

It's friends also pack a fair amount of missile and other weapon countermeasures. So it's not like you will just be shooting at the one big ol' target. Sure, you can shoot at the big thing, but bear in mind, ALL of its friends will also be shooting at you.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 11:02:22


Post by: jhe90


Plus it can Maintain a defensive pose many miles out with its aircraft.

it can reach out and hit a target in hundreds of miles around the ship, plus missile range with air to ship And air to air missiles.

it can command the sea for 2-300 + miles around it


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 11:06:07


Post by: Frazzled


As long as you don't pick a fight with the Chinese, Russians, Americans, Israelis, or Japanese you're probably ok. Also, New Mexico-they just hurl radioactive muties at you via catapult. Oh and Australia. They have guided flying great white sharks there.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 11:07:54


Post by: Do_I_Not_Like_That


These are all good points, but what defence is there against those super-fast anti-ship missiles of death? Or railguns in a few years time.

This ain't the 1940s anymore.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 11:09:41


Post by: Skinnereal


Hopefully they didn't use the Titanic as a template to build this one.
There'll have developed many ways to take a hole on the side since Argentina (being the last Royal Navy sinking?).


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 11:13:29


Post by: Jefffar


Super fast anti-ship missiles are countered by hyper fast anti-missile missiles.

Railguns aren't combat ready for a while now and won't have the range to be fired at a carrier from outside of the carriers defensive network for even longer than that.

The scary thing against carriers is a submarine. Repeatedly in NATO exercises, a lone diesel electric submarine has gotten into position to launch torpedoes at carriers.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 11:23:03


Post by: Do_I_Not_Like_That


Jefffar wrote:
Super fast anti-ship missiles are countered by hyper fast anti-missile missiles.

Railguns aren't combat ready for a while now and won't have the range to be fired at a carrier from outside of the carriers defensive network for even longer than that.

The scary thing against carriers is a submarine. Repeatedly in NATO exercises, a lone diesel electric submarine has gotten into position to launch torpedoes at carriers.


Diesel submarines? I thought advanced sonar, anti-sub helicopter patrols, and of course, a screen of destroyers, would have made the submarine obsolete? How the hell did they get so close?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 Skinnereal wrote:
Hopefully they didn't use the Titanic as a template to build this one.
There'll have developed many ways to take a hole on the side since Argentina (being the last Royal Navy sinking?).


Yeah, the Falklands was the last major naval conflict. It's an area of military history I'd recommend to anybody.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 Frazzled wrote:
As long as you don't pick a fight with the Chinese, Russians, Americans, Israelis, or Japanese you're probably ok. Also, New Mexico-they just hurl radioactive muties at you via catapult. Oh and Australia. They have guided flying great white sharks there.


True, but we still have our giant Winston Churchill robot in storage from WW2. Don't mess with that


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 11:41:49


Post by: AlmightyWalrus


 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
Jefffar wrote:
Super fast anti-ship missiles are countered by hyper fast anti-missile missiles.

Railguns aren't combat ready for a while now and won't have the range to be fired at a carrier from outside of the carriers defensive network for even longer than that.

The scary thing against carriers is a submarine. Repeatedly in NATO exercises, a lone diesel electric submarine has gotten into position to launch torpedoes at carriers.


Diesel submarines? I thought advanced sonar, anti-sub helicopter patrols, and of course, a screen of destroyers, would have made the submarine obsolete? How the hell did they get so close?


Diesel-electric submarines are orders of magnitude more stealthy than nuclear because they don't have a nuclear reactor that needs constant cooling. Further, when Russia is your biggest potential enemy you tend to focus on countering nuclear submarines, rather than random Swedish submarines that you have no reason of fighting in the first place.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 11:44:23


Post by: Do_I_Not_Like_That


 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
Jefffar wrote:
Super fast anti-ship missiles are countered by hyper fast anti-missile missiles.

Railguns aren't combat ready for a while now and won't have the range to be fired at a carrier from outside of the carriers defensive network for even longer than that.

The scary thing against carriers is a submarine. Repeatedly in NATO exercises, a lone diesel electric submarine has gotten into position to launch torpedoes at carriers.


Diesel submarines? I thought advanced sonar, anti-sub helicopter patrols, and of course, a screen of destroyers, would have made the submarine obsolete? How the hell did they get so close?


Diesel-electric submarines are orders of magnitude more stealthy than nuclear because they don't have a nuclear reactor that needs constant cooling. Further, when Russia is your biggest potential enemy you tend to focus on countering nuclear submarines, rather than random Swedish submarines that you have no reason of fighting in the first place.


Good point.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 11:46:10


Post by: jhe90


Jefffar wrote:
Super fast anti-ship missiles are countered by hyper fast anti-missile missiles.

Railguns aren't combat ready for a while now and won't have the range to be fired at a carrier from outside of the carriers defensive network for even longer than that.

The scary thing against carriers is a submarine. Repeatedly in NATO exercises, a lone diesel electric submarine has gotten into position to launch torpedoes at carriers.


They cam solo shorter ranges battery only. Very quiet as no engines, cooling, just electric propulsion systems.

Yes. Rail guns are planned 100 miles so far...
Far short of the carriers 300 + mile air screen + missiles.

And. Even if they get them, the escorts bow have them maybe. And you gotta gunnery duel.

Plus a carrier with air can hot a wider range of targets, do wider duties and also act as a centre unit for stores, gear and support smaller ships abit.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 13:00:16


Post by: MDSW


There will always be the need to get your air power to its destination in force. Protection of the carrier is the duty of the carrier task group, which consists of many other vessels and aircraft. Heck, even in Sci-Fi there is the big cruiser with all its small fighters out in space, so this type of military practice will never go anywhere for a long time.

Albeit, my knowledge of the current systems might be a bit outdated (I retired from the Navy with 20 years quite a while ago...) the Exocet type missile that cruised the top of the waves was the ship destroyer threat back in the 80's and still is today. Even back to the 80's, we had CIWS weapon systems (which are amazing) on every ship to counter missile threats as a last resort. I am sure they have advanced significantly since way back then on better countermeasures. My one son is a Naval pilot right now, so could probably rattle off a lot more than I can.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 13:22:20


Post by: Co'tor Shas


CVs/CVNs are still very much the terror of the seas. The only real other class that counters them are submarines (as they say, the only other class of ships that submarine captains see are targets ). Anti-ship missiles are powerful, but not so much that they negate everything else, especially with the more recent focus on anti-missile defense and stealth. CIWS (close-in weapon systems) are fun. Some sort of railgun equipped battlecruisers (BC/LC) may some day compete with CVs, but that's not happening any time soon.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And in regards to submarines, it's still moreso helicopters equipped eith dipping sonar and ani-sub torpedoes that really scares them. AFAIK.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 13:30:45


Post by: djones520


Yeah, Aircraft Carriers are still the king of the sea, and are going to be for a long time yet.

Here is a somewhat basic look at why killing an aircraft carrier is a pretty daunting task.

http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/five-reasons-us-aircraft-carriers-are-nearly-impossible-sink-17318


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 13:34:50


Post by: jmurph


Yeah, don't forget warfare is a constant struggle of measures and countermeasures. Anti-ship missiles are not the end all of warships. Keep in mind ships can survive hits depending on a number of factors, as has been demonstrated in several encounters. And that assumes the missile ever gets fired. The whole point of combat air patrols is to use the superior maneuverability and range of aircraft to sink would be attack missile boats. Anything that slips past this must contend with the rest of the warfleet and its anti-missile measures (including missile boats). CIWS are the last resort, but still capable defenses.

Railguns are still research at this point and we still don't know if they will turn out to be practical. Especially when they seem to be less effective than existing missile technology but have much higher logistical demands.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 13:57:48


Post by: djones520


And my brothers across the sea, I hope you don't take offense to this, but my god is she an ugly ship.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 13:59:44


Post by: Frazzled


Carrier groups have not faced an equal opponent in going on eight decades. Whether or not they can survive in the modern era is completely in the air (pardon the pun).

There are few instances where 80 year old technology survives the next war. I would not want to be on one when that war starts.

One carrier countermeasure that hasn't been mentioned-nuke.
Its problematic in that the countries that would pose a threat to carriers (and alternatively have carriers) have nukes as well, and they were a definite fear in the Cold War.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 14:06:10


Post by: djones520


It's a good thing that the technology on these ships is pretty much of the current age Frazz.

We didn't have Aegis in WW2...


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 14:09:47


Post by: Do_I_Not_Like_That


Jut noticed something: did you guys really name a carrier after Gerald Ford?

Never let it be said the Americans don't have a sense of humour.

I'm going to kill two birds with one stone and save myself the bother of starting another thread, but are there any modern naval wargames out there? Carriers, destroyers, battleship, that kind of thing.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 djones520 wrote:
And my brothers across the sea, I hope you don't take offense to this, but my god is she an ugly ship.


It's worse than that - from what I've heard, the fighter jets for it won't be ready for another 5 years or something


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 jmurph wrote:
Yeah, don't forget warfare is a constant struggle of measures and countermeasures. Anti-ship missiles are not the end all of warships. Keep in mind ships can survive hits depending on a number of factors, as has been demonstrated in several encounters. And that assumes the missile ever gets fired. The whole point of combat air patrols is to use the superior maneuverability and range of aircraft to sink would be attack missile boats. Anything that slips past this must contend with the rest of the warfleet and its anti-missile measures (including missile boats). CIWS are the last resort, but still capable defenses.

Railguns are still research at this point and we still don't know if they will turn out to be practical. Especially when they seem to be less effective than existing missile technology but have much higher logistical demands.


China's efforts to gain islands in the South China sea make an awful lot of sense to me now.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 MDSW wrote:
There will always be the need to get your air power to its destination in force. Protection of the carrier is the duty of the carrier task group, which consists of many other vessels and aircraft. Heck, even in Sci-Fi there is the big cruiser with all its small fighters out in space, so this type of military practice will never go anywhere for a long time.

Albeit, my knowledge of the current systems might be a bit outdated (I retired from the Navy with 20 years quite a while ago...) the Exocet type missile that cruised the top of the waves was the ship destroyer threat back in the 80's and still is today. Even back to the 80's, we had CIWS weapon systems (which are amazing) on every ship to counter missile threats as a last resort. I am sure they have advanced significantly since way back then on better countermeasures. My one son is a Naval pilot right now, so could probably rattle off a lot more than I can.


Good insight


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 14:15:54


Post by: Frazzled


 djones520 wrote:
It's a good thing that the technology on these ships is pretty much of the current age Frazz.

We didn't have Aegis in WW2...

Didn't have ICBMs and computer viruses turning your Aegis into a blank screen either.

ut noticed something: did you guys really name a carrier after Gerald Ford?

Its the only carrier that occasionally trips in the middle of the Pacific for no reason. : )


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 14:21:29


Post by: Easy E


A note about those Diesel subs. Most of the Chinese submarine fleet is diesel/electric submarines.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 14:24:47


Post by: djones520


 Frazzled wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
It's a good thing that the technology on these ships is pretty much of the current age Frazz.

We didn't have Aegis in WW2...

Didn't have ICBMs and computer viruses turning your Aegis into a blank screen either.



Neither of these are a threat for the system.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And not just a carrier, but a whole class of carriers have been named after him.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 14:30:44


Post by: Do_I_Not_Like_That


When people name warships, they usually go for things such as: Terror, doom, invincible, victory etc etc

And given America's military history, you'd expect it to be named Sherman, or John Paul Jones, or that guy who was naval secretary in 1823 or something

But Gerald Ford? God almighty! From what I've heard, he was the first president to get lost in the White House.

That is not a name to strike fear into the hearts of America's enemies.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 14:31:04


Post by: Frazzled


 djones520 wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
It's a good thing that the technology on these ships is pretty much of the current age Frazz.

We didn't have Aegis in WW2...

Didn't have ICBMs and computer viruses turning your Aegis into a blank screen either.



Neither of these are a threat for the system.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And not just a carrier, but a whole class of carriers have been named after him.


Did you just say a nuke is not a threat to a carrier battle group?


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 14:34:39


Post by: djones520


Well if you're just going to go around saying things are useless because of Nukes...

It's basically the equivalent of godwining a thread.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 14:36:10


Post by: Spetulhu


 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
But Gerald Ford? God almighty! From what I've heard, he was the first president to get lost in the White House.


Now now, he might get lost - but that also means the enemy don't know where he is. Not knowing where an enemy carrier group is, that's scary!

As for the nukes, well, if someone upgrades a conflict to nukes the carriers are irrelevant and losing them is the least of our concerns...


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 14:38:41


Post by: djones520


 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
When people name warships, they usually go for things such as: Terror, doom, invincible, victory etc etc

And given America's military history, you'd expect it to be named Sherman, or John Paul Jones, or that guy who was naval secretary in 1823 or something

But Gerald Ford? God almighty! From what I've heard, he was the first president to get lost in the White House.

That is not a name to strike fear into the hearts of America's enemies.


Most of our carriers are named after US Presidents. Ford actually served on an Aircraft carrier during WW2. It's a fitting name as far as I care.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 14:45:14


Post by: Do_I_Not_Like_That


Spetulhu wrote:
 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
But Gerald Ford? God almighty! From what I've heard, he was the first president to get lost in the White House.


Now now, he might get lost - but that also means the enemy don't know where he is. Not knowing where an enemy carrier group is, that's scary!

As for the nukes, well, if someone upgrades a conflict to nukes the carriers are irrelevant and losing them is the least of our concerns...


I'll say this to djones as well, but the selective use of nuclear weapons against a carrier group, shouldn't be ruled out.

For example, imagine a war between China and the USA over Taiwan or something. China might calculate that using ONE nuclear weapon to knock-out a US carrier group might be worth the gamble.

If the USA lost a carrier group to ONE nuclear weapon, wouldn't the USA think that a nuclear retaliation, that could wipe out half the Earth, is not worth it?

Yes, losing a carrier group would be a big deal, but I don't think anybody would risk nuclear Armageddon over it. The USA might retaliate by nuking ONE Chinese city as a proportional response or something,

but I think the USA would chalk up the loss of a carrier group as 'acceptable casualties' in that scenario.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 15:00:52


Post by: Frazzled


 djones520 wrote:
Well if you're just going to go around saying things are useless because of Nukes...

It's basically the equivalent of godwining a thread.


Its not a Godwin. that was Soviet strategy in the event of a major war with the US.

Carriers are fine against the People's Republic of Slabovia, but they have not been tested against a first rate power since their inception.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 15:06:18


Post by: whembly


Frazz... if our enemies are at the point of using nukes on our carrier fleet...

We have bigger problems.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 15:07:19


Post by: Frazzled


 whembly wrote:
Frazz... if our enemies are at the point of using nukes on our carrier fleet...

We have bigger problems.


This is true.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 15:21:04


Post by: sebster


A lot of people make the mistake of thinking weapon platforms purely in terms of counters. A kills B, therefore B is obselete.

But it doesn't work that way. The first issue with any weapon platform is whether it fulfills a role for you that can't be done better by another platform. Aircraft carriers give you mobile air superiority. Nothing else does that.

And sure, a carrier is a huge investment in a single ship, but if you want to be able to operate air missions around the world this is the only way to do that. So you recognise the threats, invest in counter-measures and accept there will always be some level of risk. Such is life. This is just the price of having useful, war winning military assets.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 15:33:31


Post by: Henry


 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
It's worse than that - from what I've heard, the fighter jets for it won't be ready for another 5 years or something

That's materiel appropriation for you. You don't get everything you want when you want it. It blows budgets horrifically. If we got the fighters first we'd be complaining the boats won't be around for five years making Lightning II an even bigger waste. The carriers were ordered before the strategic defence review that killed the Harrier. The carriers were seen as a good investment even without aircraft to go on them so were spared in the review. Increased international co-operation on expeditions was supposed to save money for many countries in Europe. We bring the boats, the French bring some jets, we all have a jolly time burning Avtur over the middle east and the 2% GDP we're all supposed to be spending actually achieves something.
God knows what the plan is now that we've decided we don't want to work with the rest of Europe on anything.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 15:49:23


Post by: jhe90


 sebster wrote:
A lot of people make the mistake of thinking weapon platforms purely in terms of counters. A kills B, therefore B is obselete.

But it doesn't work that way. The first issue with any weapon platform is whether it fulfills a role for you that can't be done better by another platform. Aircraft carriers give you mobile air superiority. Nothing else does that.

And sure, a carrier is a huge investment in a single ship, but if you want to be able to operate air missions around the world this is the only way to do that. So you recognise the threats, invest in counter-measures and accept there will always be some level of risk. Such is life. This is just the price of having useful, war winning military assets.


Ground based air bases are easier to disable, track and political issues. having your own mobile runway is far more practical.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 15:54:44


Post by: Ouze


I've never seen a carrier with 2 islands before.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 15:59:42


Post by: jhe90


 Ouze wrote:
I've never seen a carrier with 2 islands before.


Advantages of the two island configuration on the Royal Navy carriers
Instead of a traditional single island, a current ship design has two smaller islands. The forward island is for ship control functions and the aft (FLYCO) island is for flying control.

Advantages of the two island configuration are increased flight deck area, reduced air turbulence over the flight deck and increased flexibility of space allocation in the lower decks. The flight control centre in the aft island is in the optimum position for control of the critical aircraft approach and deck landings.


http://www.naval-technology.com/projects/cvf/


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 16:08:29


Post by: Ouze


Thanks.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 16:10:20


Post by: feeder


The 6 billion pound price tag includes the HMS Prince of Wales, due 2020. So 3 billion for the HMS QE, I guess?


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 16:19:10


Post by: Co'tor Shas


 feeder wrote:
The 6 billion pound price tag includes the HMS Prince of Wales, due 2020. So 3 billion for the HMS QE, I guess?

The Charles de Gaulle was 3b euro, and Japan's Izumo-class costs about $1.5 a piece, so that sounds about right.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 16:51:22


Post by: Spetulhu


 feeder wrote:
The 6 billion pound price tag includes the HMS Prince of Wales, due 2020. So 3 billion for the HMS QE, I guess?


And that's the increased price for delaying the project - IIRC waffling about, indecision etc cost the taxpayers about 1,5 billion of that price tag.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 17:52:52


Post by: Whirlwind


 djones520 wrote:
It's a good thing that the technology on these ships is pretty much of the current age Frazz.

We didn't have Aegis in WW2...


Just don't ask them about the operating system then. Brand new ship, uses Windows XP (the one now vulnerable to hacks and that Microsoft don't support).

I hear all new planes for it will include a credit card machine so they can pay the 100 bitcoins to launch....


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 18:06:14


Post by: AlmightyWalrus


 Co'tor Shas wrote:
Japan's Izumo-class costs about $1.5 a piece


I knew the Japanese were efficient, but damn!


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 18:09:37


Post by: Frazzled


 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
 Co'tor Shas wrote:
Japan's Izumo-class costs about $1.5 a piece


I knew the Japanese were efficient, but damn!


Not only that, but their aircraft transform into giant robot suits that can spray clouds of missiles to thumping rock music.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 18:12:53


Post by: feeder


 Frazzled wrote:

Not only that, but their aircraft transform into giant robot suits that can spray clouds of missiles to thumping rock music.


Artist's impression pictured:




Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 18:13:00


Post by: WrentheFaceless


 Frazzled wrote:
 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
 Co'tor Shas wrote:
Japan's Izumo-class costs about $1.5 a piece


I knew the Japanese were efficient, but damn!


Not only that, but their aircraft transform into giant robot suits that can spray clouds of missiles to thumping rock music.


Dont forget the massive laser cannon


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 19:07:26


Post by: Easy E


 WrentheFaceless wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
 Co'tor Shas wrote:
Japan's Izumo-class costs about $1.5 a piece


I knew the Japanese were efficient, but damn!


Not only that, but their aircraft transform into giant robot suits that can spray clouds of missiles to thumping rock music.


Dont forget the massive laser cannon


Documentary footage from the testing phase of the Japanese aircraft carrier.... pretty neat.

Spoiler:



Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 20:48:14


Post by: Co'tor Shas


 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
 Co'tor Shas wrote:
Japan's Izumo-class costs about $1.5 a piece


I knew the Japanese were efficient, but damn!

Lol, $1.5B I mean

Although being a Helicopter Carrier (or helicopter destroyer as they call it to get around their own constitution ) it doesn't have a catapult, reducing costs somewhat. The whole design was unofficially made to be able to converted into a fixed-wing craft if necessary though.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/27 23:01:47


Post by: jhe90


 Co'tor Shas wrote:
 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
 Co'tor Shas wrote:
Japan's Izumo-class costs about $1.5 a piece


I knew the Japanese were efficient, but damn!

Lol, $1.5B I mean

Although being a Helicopter Carrier (or helicopter destroyer as they call it to get around their own constitution ) it doesn't have a catapult, reducing costs somewhat. The whole design was unofficially made to be able to converted into a fixed-wing craft if necessary though.


It can still take vtol fighters and such.
Helicopters and vtol not too different and needs not a catapult or catching gear.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 00:03:41


Post by: Co'tor Shas


 jhe90 wrote:
 Co'tor Shas wrote:
 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
 Co'tor Shas wrote:
Japan's Izumo-class costs about $1.5 a piece


I knew the Japanese were efficient, but damn!

Lol, $1.5B I mean

Although being a Helicopter Carrier (or helicopter destroyer as they call it to get around their own constitution ) it doesn't have a catapult, reducing costs somewhat. The whole design was unofficially made to be able to converted into a fixed-wing craft if necessary though.


It can still take vtol fighters and such.
Helicopters and vtol not too different and needs not a catapult or catching gear.

AFAIK, there would need some deck changes so it can regularly take the emissions from the VTOL (those jets aren't like simple rotors), but just those changes to the launching areas and that would work. For now though, it's only equipped with ASW and rescue helicopters (I think it can take attack helicopters, they just haven't to not antagonize the Chinese more than they already do).


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 02:59:02


Post by: sebster


 jhe90 wrote:
Ground based air bases are easier to disable, track and political issues. having your own mobile runway is far more practical.


Yeah, and its the political one that's huge. Having to go cap in hand to a neighbouring country to ask them if you can please use their airfields is pathetic, doesn't always work, and normally involves giving concessions that may or may not be related to the incident.

As a member of a part of the world that doesn't have the kind of force projection granted by a carrier, I can promise you it's not a position anyone chooses to be in.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 09:53:43


Post by: jhe90


sebster wrote:
 jhe90 wrote:
Ground based air bases are easier to disable, track and political issues. having your own mobile runway is far more practical.


Yeah, and its the political one that's huge. Having to go cap in hand to a neighbouring country to ask them if you can please use their airfields is pathetic, doesn't always work, and normally involves giving concessions that may or may not be related to the incident.

As a member of a part of the world that doesn't have the kind of force projection granted by a carrier, I can promise you it's not a position anyone chooses to be in.


Co'tor Shas wrote:
 jhe90 wrote:
 Co'tor Shas wrote:
 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
 Co'tor Shas wrote:
Japan's Izumo-class costs about $1.5 a piece


I knew the Japanese were efficient, but damn!

Lol, $1.5B I mean

Although being a Helicopter Carrier (or helicopter destroyer as they call it to get around their own constitution ) it doesn't have a catapult, reducing costs somewhat. The whole design was unofficially made to be able to converted into a fixed-wing craft if necessary though.


It can still take vtol fighters and such.
Helicopters and vtol not too different and needs not a catapult or catching gear.

AFAIK, there would need some deck changes so it can regularly take the emissions from the VTOL (those jets aren't like simple rotors), but just those changes to the launching areas and that would work. For now though, it's only equipped with ASW and rescue helicopters (I think it can take attack helicopters, they just haven't to not antagonize the Chinese more than they already do).


Yes, for one you also have to be very carful on political agreements, gotta watch it incase they rescind permission and that can feth up a enitre wartime strategy, there vulnerable to regional political issues.

Far easier to have a carrier that's 100& under own control and able to do as it pleases.
UK needs one as we have intrests in places we may not have political situations to get basing agreements.

And two.
Yes. VTOL probbly would but thats a sea that takes weeks, over say months to fit out for catapults and aresting gear.
Plus training and vtol just is far easier.

B. Yeah, a attack helicopter at end of day is still a helicopter. (also I might add the Falklands sea harrier vs regular air force. You need to make adaptions to work longer term out at sea. The regular air force can work and we have used apache off a sea going heli carrier too in Lybia I believe but the reg hariers needed more work to keep airborne and its harder conditions on a non modified aircraft. )


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 14:12:30


Post by: jmurph


You also can't relocate a ground base to a more convenient location or a theater on the other side of the world.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 14:37:48


Post by: Do_I_Not_Like_That


 jmurph wrote:
You also can't relocate a ground base to a more convenient location or a theater on the other side of the world.


The US military has bases on nearly every continent. I often wonder why they bother with aircraft carriers.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 14:42:56


Post by: Frazzled


 jmurph wrote:
You also can't relocate a ground base to a more convenient location or a theater on the other side of the world.


You can't sink a ground base.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 15:04:58


Post by: djones520


 Frazzled wrote:
 jmurph wrote:
You also can't relocate a ground base to a more convenient location or a theater on the other side of the world.


You can't sink a ground base.


Last January I was involved in an exercise where the "air base" I was on was nearly overran by an armored battalion. So I beg to differ.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 15:23:08


Post by: Frazzled


 djones520 wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 jmurph wrote:
You also can't relocate a ground base to a more convenient location or a theater on the other side of the world.


You can't sink a ground base.


Last January I was involved in an exercise where the "air base" I was on was nearly overran by an armored battalion. So I beg to differ.


Despite common belief, an armored battalion cannot be so heavy as to actually sink a base, unless that base is in Louisiana of course*


*Or New Mexico and by that it means the base goes critical mass and then nuceler, which is a daily occurrence there.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 16:13:31


Post by: djones520


 Frazzled wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 jmurph wrote:
You also can't relocate a ground base to a more convenient location or a theater on the other side of the world.


You can't sink a ground base.


Last January I was involved in an exercise where the "air base" I was on was nearly overran by an armored battalion. So I beg to differ.


Despite common belief, an armored battalion cannot be so heavy as to actually sink a base, unless that base is in Louisiana of course*


*Or New Mexico and by that it means the base goes critical mass and then nuceler, which is a daily occurrence there.


We were in Louisiana.

Game. Set. Match.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 16:23:11


Post by: Frazzled


 djones520 wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 jmurph wrote:
You also can't relocate a ground base to a more convenient location or a theater on the other side of the world.


You can't sink a ground base.


Last January I was involved in an exercise where the "air base" I was on was nearly overran by an armored battalion. So I beg to differ.


Despite common belief, an armored battalion cannot be so heavy as to actually sink a base, unless that base is in Louisiana of course*


*Or New Mexico and by that it means the base goes critical mass and then nuceler, which is a daily occurrence there.


We were in Louisiana.

Game. Set. Match.


How did the tanks get past the gators?


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 16:36:39


Post by: Grey Templar


 Frazzled wrote:


How did the tanks get past the gators?


Like Lawyers and Sharks, Professional Courtesy I imagine.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 19:38:57


Post by: Kilkrazy


To put it simply, manned aircraft are still one of the best, cheapest and most flexible ways of delivering a wide variety firepower on to targets. They have the principle disadvantage of needing a substantial fixed ground base from which to operate. The aircraft carrier removes this disadvantage.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 19:41:29


Post by: jmurph


 Frazzled wrote:
 jmurph wrote:
You also can't relocate a ground base to a more convenient location or a theater on the other side of the world.


You can't sink a ground base.


Molepeople disagree.



Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 20:00:09


Post by: Frazzled


 jmurph wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 jmurph wrote:
You also can't relocate a ground base to a more convenient location or a theater on the other side of the world.


You can't sink a ground base.


Molepeople disagree.



NO ONE EXPECTS THE MOLEMAN INQUISITION!*


*Dude I remember that movie! Man it was bad.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 22:28:34


Post by: jhe90


 Kilkrazy wrote:
To put it simply, manned aircraft are still one of the best, cheapest and most flexible ways of delivering a wide variety firepower on to targets. They have the principle disadvantage of needing a substantial fixed ground base from which to operate. The aircraft carrier removes this disadvantage.


Any enemy with satellite capable systems can happily also scan your vase, GPS all your key targets etc and in time of war bracket you with greatest ease.

A carrier is mobile. Alot harder tp track.
Cannot be taken out with a first strike as easily.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 22:49:24


Post by: Wulfmar


Carrier seemed pretty viable last time I was there.

Additional: Just spotted a comment: The Phalanx is used to shoot down anti-ship missiles - think of it like a huge chain gun. They're not shooting missiles down with other missiles, only a wall of bullets.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 23:09:48


Post by: Co'tor Shas


 Wulfmar wrote:
Carrier seemed pretty viable last time I was there.

Additional: Just spotted a comment: The Phalanx is used to shoot down anti-ship missiles - think of it like a huge chain gun. They're not shooting missiles down with other missiles, only a wall of bullets.


No, that's what the RIM RAM is for


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 23:12:15


Post by: Wulfmar


 Co'tor Shas wrote:
 Wulfmar wrote:
Carrier seemed pretty viable last time I was there.

Additional: Just spotted a comment: The Phalanx is used to shoot down anti-ship missiles - think of it like a huge chain gun. They're not shooting missiles down with other missiles, only a wall of bullets.


No, that's what the RIM RAMis for


I saw no RIM RAM aboard her, are you talking about different carriers to the one at Rosyth?


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 23:14:11


Post by: Co'tor Shas


 Wulfmar wrote:
 Co'tor Shas wrote:
 Wulfmar wrote:
Carrier seemed pretty viable last time I was there.

Additional: Just spotted a comment: The Phalanx is used to shoot down anti-ship missiles - think of it like a huge chain gun. They're not shooting missiles down with other missiles, only a wall of bullets.


No, that's what the RIM RAMis for


I saw no RIM RAM aboard her, are you talking about different carriers to the one at Rosyth?

Yeah, I was more referring to the Izumo, and I think the Gerald Ford and Nimitz have them as well I'm not sure). At the very least we euqip our screening ships with them
Spoiler:


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 23:19:24


Post by: Wulfmar


Looks like the child of a Phalanx / Goalkeeper and an Ork buggy rocket launcha! I approve muchly


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/28 23:20:05


Post by: Co'tor Shas


The SeaRAM is a cool little system, yeah.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/29 00:16:47


Post by: Hordini


When we're talking about aircraft carriers, are we including helicopter carriers and amphibious assault LHD/LHA type ships as well? Or just the super carriers?


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/29 03:34:27


Post by: Co'tor Shas


I mean the question sort of covers all carriers, if a super-carrier is still viable, so will light carriers, ect.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/29 04:00:42


Post by: sebster


 jhe90 wrote:
Yes, for one you also have to be very carful on political agreements, gotta watch it incase they rescind permission and that can feth up a enitre wartime strategy, there vulnerable to regional political issues.

Far easier to have a carrier that's 100& under own control and able to do as it pleases.
UK needs one as we have intrests in places we may not have political situations to get basing agreements.


And even if you can get a basing agreement, it is still far from ideal. You might get a country in the region to base your planes, and you might be able to quickly bring that location up to the specs needed for your operation, but what do you have to give up when your regional partner knows that you absolutely need their base to have any air cover at all for your operation? And are you willing to take the risk that if your ally pulls the plug during the operation you will be left with no air cover at all?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
The US military has bases on nearly every continent. I often wonder why they bother with aircraft carriers.


Because being on the same continent is okay for peacetime logistics operations, but flying round the clock wartime sorties out of a base on the other side of the continent is a nightmare. Aircraft will be spending far longer going to and from the combat zone than they spend actually in the zone.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 Kilkrazy wrote:
To put it simply, manned aircraft are still one of the best, cheapest and most flexible ways of delivering a wide variety firepower on to targets. They have the principle disadvantage of needing a substantial fixed ground base from which to operate. The aircraft carrier removes this disadvantage.


Yeah, I tried to say something similar to what you're saying above earlier in the thread, and I think I didn't quite get the point right. But as you say above, planes are a dominant weapon of war, and aircraft carriers are a tool that gives those planes far more flexible uses.

I guess what I've been trying to get at is the idea from the opening post that aircraft carriers might be obsolete because they can be sunk. But having a vulnerability doesn't make a platform obsolete. A platform becomes obselete when something else becomes better at performing that units battlefield role. Right now nothing else can command an area of the sea like a carrier group, and so they remain a critical weapon of war for any nation that can afford the price tag.

As a comparison, as war technology progressed battleships became vulnerable to mines and torpedoes, but they remained the primary means of dominating the seas because nothing else could do that job. Nobody thought for one second about replacing their battleships with mine layers and torpedo boats, because they might be able of sometimes killing the much pricier battleships, but they could never dominate the sea. And so battleships were only finally replaced when carriers showed they were better at commanding an area of ocean.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/29 07:03:37


Post by: Jadenim


Sebster, I agree, but mention should be made of the sideways twist of the submarine. It can't command a large sea area in the same way as a carrier or battleship, but it can deny it to the enemy, very effectively.

I know battleship owning countries were getting very worried about submarine capabilities in the 1920's and 30's, but this was then superseded by the carrier (which is also a pretty good anti-submarine platform too). I do wonder how things would have played out if the carrier hadn't developed at the same time. Germany very nearly took us out of the war in 1943 due to sustained submarine operations, despite never having fully committed to the concept (Hitler was obsessed with matching the Royal Navy, rather than beating it). If they'd thrown more time and resources into the submarine fleet there could have been a very different result...


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/29 11:51:22


Post by: Darkjim


Russia says new UK aircraft carrier 'a convenient target'

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-40442058

A lot of yah boo sucks between the various high-rankers, interesting though.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/29 13:11:39


Post by: Ketara


 sebster wrote:

As a comparison, as war technology progressed battleships became vulnerable to mines and torpedoes, but they remained the primary means of dominating the seas because nothing else could do that job. Nobody thought for one second about replacing their battleships with mine layers and torpedo boats, because they might be able of sometimes killing the much pricier battleships, but they could never dominate the sea.


Not even remotely true. The Jeune Ecole was a very respectable field of naval theory in its day, and persisted for a solid forty odd years. What's more, it was completely realistic at several points. You just have to take into account the progression of naval munitions technology within that period.

When the torpedo boats first starting emerging in the 1870's, the main guns of an ironclad fired so slowly that a flotilla of cheaper torpedo craft had an excellent chance of getting in close even with how inaccurate Whitehead torpedoes were at that point. At that stage the British fleet was still muzzle-loading.The appearance of the torpedo boat and its effectiveness (as seen during the trials of HMS Vesuvius and HMS Lightning) resulted in the British rapidly ordering over a hundred torpedo boats themselves from Thornycroft. What's more, they had a desperate scrap with the War Office (who still controlled their ordnance) to procure some form of machine gun to combat the torpedo boat. They ended up cramming 1-inch Nordenfelt guns on every large warship that could carry them as fast as Temple & Co. & Enfield could manufacture them.

Then when the torpedo boats started being built of thicker plates (too thick for the 1-inch to penetrate), getting larger, and acquiring greater sea-going capabilities in the 1880's, the Admiralty had another crisis on their hands. They played around with new shell firing quick-firing guns (the earlier Nordenfelt fired a solid slug), torpedo gunboats, and so on, but it took them several years to develop countermeasures.

After that, you have the destroyer, which actually began life as a large torpedo boat in its own right (it was called a torpedo boat destroyer partially because it was designed to kill other torpedo boats, and partially because it functioned as a large one itself with multiple torpedo tubes).

This is without even getting into submarines and the resulting abandonment of close blockade as a strategy or German minelaying development and theory in that period. So yeah, torpedo boats/subs were often proffered as a replacement for the battleship, and it was actually carried out in a number of instances. I believe one French Minister of the Marine actually scrapped/halted all battleship construction at one point in their favour, whilst the British delayed their own construction programs at least once because they were scared they were building obsolete vessels.

tl;dr, large sea going torpedo vessels regularly posed a strategic threat to battleships, several groups thought one should replace the other, and it was a fluid ongoing battle to keep the larger vessels capable of countering the smaller ones all the way up to 1914.


For the truly nerdy, there is a book which actually theorises that Jacky Fisher of the Admiralty was planning on using torpedo craft to mount a 'flotilla defence' of the UK prior to WW1 (see 'Sir John Fisher's Naval Revolution' by Nicholas Lambert). It is however, highly suspect (I've personally found the bloke twisting sources to imply they say things they don't).


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/29 13:13:36


Post by: Wulfmar


 Darkjim wrote:
Russia says new UK aircraft carrier 'a convenient target'

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-40442058

A lot of yah boo sucks between the various high-rankers, interesting though.


Aye there's a lot of sabre-rattling coming from high-rankers who suffer from helioproctosis. Fact of the matter is both Russia and the UK have aging technology coming to the end of it's life all at the same time, that neither is capable of replacing in one go.

Old wolves barking while their teeth fall out.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/29 13:28:46


Post by: Do_I_Not_Like_That


 Darkjim wrote:
Russia says new UK aircraft carrier 'a convenient target'

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-40442058

A lot of yah boo sucks between the various high-rankers, interesting though.


Yeah, Joe Commie up to his old tricks again. Putin's losing sleep over this new carrier


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/29 13:53:11


Post by: Darkjim


Possibly the Russians could easily sink both our carriers if they put their minds to it, given the air power difference, but again, if Russia is sinking British carriers then there's probably quite a lot else going on of greater import anyway.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/29 14:48:28


Post by: jim30


Of course to sink a carrier, you have to find her, sustain that position and have good enough missiles with accurate enough targeting that can fire, punch through a world class hard and soft kill set of defences and not be distracted by decoys etc, and then hit the target.

Its not as easy as pressing a 'fire' button! :-)


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/29 14:54:08


Post by: Co'tor Shas


I mean it was made in Britain, how world-class could it be?


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/29 15:04:08


Post by: Henry


 Ketara wrote:
...everything said by Ketara on torpedo boats

When things get ugly around here and I wonder why do I bother, I'm reminded that this is why I keep coming back to Dakka OT.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/29 15:10:29


Post by: Skinnereal


 Co'tor Shas wrote:
I mean it was made in Britain, how world-class could it be?



That depends how big the world is this week.
So far, it's Russia and USA that get included, and maybe Argentina.
Who else has navies to compare against?
Who is listed as a reason for having the thing built in the first place? North Korea?


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/29 15:23:37


Post by: Co'tor Shas


France of course, 30 Years War: Nuclear Boogaloo!


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/29 18:23:22


Post by: AlmightyWalrus


 Co'tor Shas wrote:
France of course, 30 Years War: Nuclear Boogaloo!


That'd be the 100 years' war, the 30 years' war was HRE and friends vs. HRE and friends.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/29 18:39:19


Post by: Kilkrazy


Japan and France also have pretty decent navies. They are both close allies, of course.

If the UK has to fight a war against anyone who would be a serious threat, it is most likely to be the Russians or Chinese, and we would be fighting as part of a Western Alliance.

A more relevant question is whether we need more small ships like frigate for patrol and anti-piracy operations.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/29 18:50:08


Post by: Co'tor Shas


From my knowledge the rankings generaly go

1. USN by a landslide

2. People's Liberation Navy (china)

3. JMSDF (japan)

4. Russian Navy

5. Royal Navy

6. French Navy

And then it's something like India, Korea, Italy/Germany



Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/29 20:27:11


Post by: avantgarde


That's kinda loose ranking since power fluctuates based on projection capabilities.

The Chinese operate a large fleet of diesel subs but their boats are going to perform significantly different in a naval battle in the SCS vs in Guam vs off the US West Coast vs in the Mediterranean.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 00:05:01


Post by: Co'tor Shas


The US navy is the only navy with any real push beyond their boarders, so it's generally assumed that most people are compared to their local area.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 02:01:03


Post by: sebster


 Jadenim wrote:
Sebster, I agree, but mention should be made of the sideways twist of the submarine. It can't command a large sea area in the same way as a carrier or battleship, but it can deny it to the enemy, very effectively.

I know battleship owning countries were getting very worried about submarine capabilities in the 1920's and 30's, but this was then superseded by the carrier (which is also a pretty good anti-submarine platform too). I do wonder how things would have played out if the carrier hadn't developed at the same time. Germany very nearly took us out of the war in 1943 due to sustained submarine operations, despite never having fully committed to the concept (Hitler was obsessed with matching the Royal Navy, rather than beating it). If they'd thrown more time and resources into the submarine fleet there could have been a very different result...


Those are fair points and I agree. But I will add a couple of additional points. The first is that while subs represented a potent counter to battleships, no-one was giving up on battleships at that point and that's really the issue I was getting at. Denying an area of sea is a potent advantage in war, but its not the exact same thing as being able to command an area. To manage an amphibious landing, for instance, you need a dominating presence in surface ships.

The other point is that while the German blockade was extremely effective in 1943, by the end of 1944 being assigned to a sub crew was close to a death trap. Potentially in 1945 the advantage might have swung back to subs if new German tech had been rolled out in force, but the end of the war interfered with that. It was a tech battle where slight edges were the difference between extreme effectiveness and high vulnerability.

 Ketara wrote:
Not even remotely true. The Jeune Ecole was a very respectable field of naval theory in its day, and persisted for a solid forty odd years. What's more, it was completely realistic at several points. You just have to take into account the progression of naval munitions technology within that period.


Actually my statement was absolutely and completely true. Read it again. You bolded it, so here it is again;
"Nobody thought for one second about replacing their battleships with mine layers and torpedo boats"

Jeune Ecole did have a focus on a variety of counter measures to the battleship, but at no point did anyone suggest just making a navy out of specific anti-battleship counter measures. A large part of the theory was about envisioning new kinds of surface ships, smaller and lighter but maintaining high firepower, that would ultimately replace battleships in the role of controlling areas of sea. And I know that you know that, which means you completely misread the sentence you directly responded to, and completely misread my entire comment as well.

Any way I'll repeat my main point here once again. The existence of a counter measure in and of itself does not render a war platform obsolete. They will force counter measures and doctrinal changes, but as long as nothing else can perform that platform's role any better then it will remain an important military unit.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 02:30:39


Post by: Co'tor Shas


After all, tanks and helicopters have yet to replace infantry.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 03:05:38


Post by: whembly


 Co'tor Shas wrote:
After all, tanks and helicopters have yet to replace infantry.

Well... once we get massive Mechas:
Spoiler:


Helicopters and tanks are fethed.

But until then...


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 12:20:47


Post by: Ketara


 sebster wrote:

Actually my statement was absolutely and completely true. Read it again. You bolded it, so here it is again;
"Nobody thought for one second about replacing their battleships with mine layers and torpedo boats"

Jeune Ecole did have a focus on a variety of counter measures to the battleship, but at no point did anyone suggest just making a navy out of specific anti-battleship counter measures.

Precisely....and neither did I? In the same regard absolutely nobody had a fleet entirely made of battleships, nobody proposed a navy entirely of torpedo boats.

But that isn't what you said now, is it? That's either a complete strawman or misunderstanding (of you or me, I'm not entirely sure).

You said nobody thought about 'replacing' battleships with torpedo boats. Replacing, that is to say, substituting. Inserting another ship type in the place of. The logical assumption (given the context) is that you are talking about the strategic and battlefield roles of the battleship. In other words, you are saying (to very clearly lay out what I am understanding your original statement as) 'No naval authorities in any country ever considered replacing, in part or in full, their battleships with torpedo boats with the intent of the torpedo boats undertaking the same strategic and tactical role'.

To which I say, untrue. That was very much the entire point of the Jeune Ecole. I wasn't planning on throwing references around particularly (this is a webforum instead of an online journal, after all), but if you'd like to consult Theodore Ropp's work on Theophile Aube, the French Minister of Marine, you will find proof to the contrary. The torpedo boat was not seen purely as a 'battleship counter'. That's merely one facet of the Jeune Ecole.

One has to consider precisely what it was a battleship actually did. It killed ships of any size/class (which the torpedo boat could do), it could function autonomously overseas to project power (which the torpedo boats of the 80's could actually do if accompanied by a 'mother' ship), it could destroy commerce (which was one of the primary functions of the French torpedo boats). The last is coastal bombardment. The French made very specific moves towards trying to enable torpedo boats to do this, one called the Gabriel Charmes was outfitted with a 5.5 inch cannon. The intent was that torpedo boats would be able to undertake 'command of the sea' in the Mahanian sense, which was very much the strategic province of the battleship.

When Aube came to power in '86, he stopped construction work on four battleships. In their place, he tried to order six large and ten small cruisers (for overseas work), twenty large torpedo boats designed to hunt other torpedo boats, fifty bateaux-canon (the torpedo boats equipped with guns), a hundred regular torpedo boats, and three 'mother ships' for the torpedo boats. He also began to trial melinite shell, explicitly to permit the bateaux-canon to perform coastal bombardment, and restarted experimentation on submarines (see the work of Gustave Zede). All this with the intent that they would 'replace' the battleship.

What happened? It failed. Aube wasn't in power long enough, the trials didn't go well enough, and a number of key supporters like Charmes died in the period. But that's only the most extreme example of the Jeune Ecole, and frankly? The query wasn't whether or not someone succeeded in replacing the battleship with the torpedo boat. Success is immaterial.

The assertion you made was whether or not somebody 'thought for one second' about doing it. To which the answer is very clearly that not only did they consider it, they made attempts to do it.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 12:32:44


Post by: ingtaer


Tangential relevant to the conversation and in keeping with my love of obscure history, I present to you New Zealand's greatest ever warships; the Defender Class torpedo spar boat.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defender-class_torpedo_boat

This fantastic warship was designed to ram the enemy with a torpedo attached to its prow. I cant imagine why the design never saw combat...


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 12:37:25


Post by: jhe90


ingtaer wrote:
Tangential relevant to the conversation and in keeping with my love of obscure history, I present to you New Zealand's greatest ever warships; the Defender Class torpedo spar boat.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defender-class_torpedo_boat

This fantastic warship was designed to ram the enemy with a torpedo attached to its prow. I cant imagine why the design never saw combat...


just got to get it past the escorts, the potential light flanking cruiser sqaudrens and then past the targets secondary armament of lighter rapid fire guns.
and then... then hit with the torpedo.

but iys on your ship you just blew up...

yep. war winning that


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 12:46:25


Post by: Ketara


Spar torpedoes sound daft, but somebody managed to blow up a sloop with one in the US Civil war. You have to remember that when they were first mooted (prior to the propelled Whitehead) guns fired exceptionally slowly, quite inaccurately, and with short range. If you could chuck half a dozen smaller faster boats with spar torpedoes at a battleship, you stood a chance at getting right up next to it.

In which case, the spar torpedo would be lowered to a point under the waterline from a distance, where the force of explosion would find it easier to find a path through the hull of the ship then the water behind your (now rapidly disappearing) small boat.

It sounds crazy in theory, but did make a kind of sense. There were a lot of torpedo variations back then, from the Brennan to Newport's.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 12:50:23


Post by: jhe90


True but older warships often still had manned deck guns, or those built into belt armour. still could take a few down.


(later those guns got swapped for pure armour in turret mounts above the armour belt)



Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 13:02:12


Post by: Frazzled


 Ketara wrote:
Spar torpedoes sound daft, but somebody managed to blow up a sloop with one in the US Civil war. You have to remember that when they were first mooted (prior to the propelled Whitehead) guns fired exceptionally slowly, quite inaccurately, and with short range. If you could chuck half a dozen smaller faster boats with spar torpedoes at a battleship, you stood a chance at getting right up next to it.

In which case, the spar torpedo would be lowered to a point under the waterline from a distance, where the force of explosion would find it easier to find a path through the hull of the ship then the water behind your (now rapidly disappearing) small boat.

It sounds crazy in theory, but did make a kind of sense. There were a lot of torpedo variations back then, from the Brennan to Newport's.


Damn the torpedoes! Full speed ahead!


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 13:09:25


Post by: ingtaer


 Ketara wrote:
Spar torpedoes sound daft, but somebody managed to blow up a sloop with one in the US Civil war. You have to remember that when they were first mooted (prior to the propelled Whitehead) guns fired exceptionally slowly, quite inaccurately, and with short range. If you could chuck half a dozen smaller faster boats with spar torpedoes at a battleship, you stood a chance at getting right up next to it.

In which case, the spar torpedo would be lowered to a point under the waterline from a distance, where the force of explosion would find it easier to find a path through the hull of the ship then the water behind your (now rapidly disappearing) small boat.

It sounds crazy in theory, but did make a kind of sense. There were a lot of torpedo variations back then, from the Brennan to Newport's.


Whilst what you say is true, consider the context. NZ was defended by four of these (one at each major port each hundreds of miles from another) and very few coastal guns. That's it. Against any navy that was capable of invading (these boats were built as consequence of the so-called 'Russian Scare' whose warships were equipped with 10-inch guns) these would do nothing. So it was indeed an entire National Defence plan built around torpedo boats, whose plan is somehow steaming into enemy fire, alone, to ram an enemy ship to blow it up. With nothing to defend against any other ships that the enemy might have brought along. That takes a special kind of mind to plan, somehow get approved, paid for and deployed. They were also called the Torpedo Branch of the Armed Constabulary which belongs in a Monty Python sketch.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 13:21:46


Post by: Ketara


Oh, I'm not saying that those particular torpedo boats were going to defend a whole country. I'm not even saying these specific boats were a good idea when they were built.

I was just pointing more to how the concept of a spar torpedo generally wasn't entirely crazy when it was first devised twenty years beforehand.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 13:29:21


Post by: Easy E


The battle of Lissa mucked about with things when the Austro-Hungarians navy managed to ram an Italian fleet to death in the Med. That made naval planners very confused on how to proceed, and things like steam rams and spar torpedoes stayed in vogue even after they were no longer a good idea.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 16:23:43


Post by: A Town Called Malus


 Darkjim wrote:
Russia says new UK aircraft carrier 'a convenient target'

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-40442058

A lot of yah boo sucks between the various high-rankers, interesting though.


They're just grumpy that the French wouldn't give them their carriers after what happened in Ukraine.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 16:28:25


Post by: Lone Cat


 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
Our brand new, shiny aircraft carrier (£6 billion to build) sets sail for sea trials.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-40402153

But to get straight to the point, as a keen student of military history, I've been watching youtube videos on anti-ship missiles, and they scare the gak out of me

So are aircraft carriers turning into floating bullseyes, or will they endure for a few more years?

I don't want to see my hard earned tax money end up on the bottom of the ocean.



Especially the Chinese anti-naval missiles fired from a mobile platform outranges carriers...
Is this also marks the viable return of Battleships with UAV tech and cruise misssile battery


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 16:29:01


Post by: A Town Called Malus


 whembly wrote:
 Co'tor Shas wrote:
After all, tanks and helicopters have yet to replace infantry.

Well... once we get massive Mechas:
Spoiler:


Helicopters and tanks are fethed.

But until then...
Spoiler:


Eh... huge vertical profile makes them easier to spot than a tank and they have less manoeuvrability than a helicopter. The complexity of their propulsion systems and the suspension that would need to be built in also limits the weight you can use for armour and weapons systems so they'll probably end up being easier to kill than their equivalent spend in tanks and copters.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 16:30:11


Post by: djones520


 A Town Called Malus wrote:
 whembly wrote:
 Co'tor Shas wrote:
After all, tanks and helicopters have yet to replace infantry.

Well... once we get massive Mechas:
Spoiler:


Helicopters and tanks are fethed.

But until then...
Spoiler:


Eh... huge vertical profile makes them easier to spot than a tank and they have less manoeuvrability than a helicopter. The complexity of their propulsion systems and the suspension that would need to be built in also limits the weight you can use for armour so they'll probably end up being easier to kill than their equivalent spend in tanks and copters.


You would need Japanese Mecha that can launch 5000 missiles per volley. Then conventional warfare will change.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 16:42:31


Post by: A Town Called Malus


 djones520 wrote:
 A Town Called Malus wrote:
 whembly wrote:
 Co'tor Shas wrote:
After all, tanks and helicopters have yet to replace infantry.

Well... once we get massive Mechas:
Spoiler:


Helicopters and tanks are fethed.

But until then...
Spoiler:


Eh... huge vertical profile makes them easier to spot than a tank and they have less manoeuvrability than a helicopter. The complexity of their propulsion systems and the suspension that would need to be built in also limits the weight you can use for armour so they'll probably end up being easier to kill than their equivalent spend in tanks and copters.


You would need Japanese Mecha that can launch 5000 missiles per volley. Then conventional warfare will change.


But at that point why not just build 500 helicopters or tanks armed with 10 missiles each? You don't lose the whole payload if one copter goes down and can spread the launch sites of the missiles around to make it more difficult for anti-missile systems to track and counter your strike without wasting the missile fuel dispersing from their initial launch site to achieve a spread and variety of attack angles.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 16:54:34


Post by: feeder


 A Town Called Malus wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
 A Town Called Malus wrote:
 whembly wrote:
 Co'tor Shas wrote:
After all, tanks and helicopters have yet to replace infantry.

Well... once we get massive Mechas:
Spoiler:


Helicopters and tanks are fethed.

But until then...
Spoiler:


Eh... huge vertical profile makes them easier to spot than a tank and they have less manoeuvrability than a helicopter. The complexity of their propulsion systems and the suspension that would need to be built in also limits the weight you can use for armour so they'll probably end up being easier to kill than their equivalent spend in tanks and copters.


You would need Japanese Mecha that can launch 5000 missiles per volley. Then conventional warfare will change.


But at that point why not just build 500 helicopters or tanks armed with 10 missiles each? You don't lose the whole payload if one copter goes down and can spread the launch sites of the missiles around to make it more difficult for anti-missile systems to track and counter your strike without wasting the missile fuel dispersing from their initial launch site to achieve a spread and variety of attack angles.


Pretty sure the sci-fi Rule of Cool applies to real life conflict, too.

If the Japan/Russia or Japan/China or Japan/NK tensions go hot and the JSDF unveils her Gundam Battalion, the enemy will be too busy trying to get selfies with the mechas to fight effectively.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 18:09:29


Post by: KTG17


 Frazzled wrote:
Carriers are fine against the People's Republic of Slabovia, but they have not been tested against a first rate power since their inception.


Coral Sea? Midway? Are you familiar with the Pacific War during World War 2?

That aside, the modern aircraft carrier will be around for a long, long time. Aircraft carriers are not a super weapon system that sails around on its own. Its part of a system. It has supporting ships and subs that sail around it everywhere it goes, and on a network using the state of the satellite and communications technology. Its also a moving target. And while subs seem pretty scary, remember that most torpedoes have a range of 10 miles, so in the vast expanse of the ocean a sub has to get nearly within point blank range, while avoiding the carrier's accompanying subs, as well as being tracked in the air by the new P-8A Poseidon. Google it. It finds, tracks, and can sink subs from 30,000 feet.

Now that's not to say sub's are obsolete either, they too, like the carrier, are part of a system. A system no one has like the US.

Every now and then I see an argument over who's got the best fighter or tank etc, and the reality is none of them will decide a battle in a void. Its a combination of weapons and tactics that wins, and I just don't see anyone with the capability the US has developed and continues to developed. I don't care if its in the North Sea, Persian Gulf, or South China Sea, the US is going to dominate because of the system, not any particular weapon.

I would say the far-ish future of carriers will involve mostly cheaper ones loaded with drones, supplementing long range manned aircraft based in the US are far away bases. But they will still be around.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 18:20:40


Post by: Frazzled


KTG17 wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
Carriers are fine against the People's Republic of Slabovia, but they have not been tested against a first rate power since their inception.


Coral Sea? Midway? Are you familiar with the Pacific War during World War 2?
.


To be clear I meant post WWII.

I wonder how they would fair against an attack by stealth aircraft.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 18:22:42


Post by: djones520


 Frazzled wrote:
KTG17 wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
Carriers are fine against the People's Republic of Slabovia, but they have not been tested against a first rate power since their inception.


Coral Sea? Midway? Are you familiar with the Pacific War during World War 2?
.


To be clear I meant post WWII.

I wonder how they would fair against an attack by stealth aircraft.


So... since they're inception, just 20 years later.

What 1st Rate powers have fought a war since then though? We haven't had a US Army M1A2 throw down with a Russian T-90 yet, so I guess those are obsolete as well? I mean we both possess anti-tank missiles that can kill each others tanks, so there is no sense in the hundreds of millions we spend on them, right?


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 18:27:20


Post by: Frazzled


Tanks have been in combat on multiple occasions. As time as moved on their role has changed and they have become more vulnerable to attack, especially air attack.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 18:31:12


Post by: djones520


 Frazzled wrote:
Tanks have been in combat on multiple occasions. As time as moved on their role has changed and they have become more vulnerable to attack, especially air attack.


Not since the early Israeli wars have we seen a conflict of a modern tank against a modern tank.

As has been pointed out numerous times in here, just because technology exists that can destroy a military target, does not make that target obsolete. An aircraft carrier, and it's attached battle group provides many, many, tangibles to the JFC (Joint Force Commander). Until technology proceeds to the point where a Carrier Battle Group can be neutralized with it being incapable of providing any military value of import, they will be useful.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 18:35:25


Post by: Frazzled


 djones520 wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
Tanks have been in combat on multiple occasions. As time as moved on their role has changed and they have become more vulnerable to attack, especially air attack.


Not since the early Israeli wars have we seen a conflict of a modern tank against a modern tank.

As has been pointed out numerous times in here, just because technology exists that can destroy a military target, does not make that target obsolete. An aircraft carrier, and it's attached battle group provides many, many, tangibles to the JFC (Joint Force Commander). Until technology proceeds to the point where a Carrier Battle Group can be neutralized with it being incapable of providing any military value of import, they will be useful.


Only if they don't exceed the cost.

Again, they've not actually fought anyone in multiple decades. How a carrier group would stand up to a concentrated pounding by say one or two hundred Chinese antiship missiles remains to be seen.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 18:36:40


Post by: jhe90


 djones520 wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
Tanks have been in combat on multiple occasions. As time as moved on their role has changed and they have become more vulnerable to attack, especially air attack.


Not since the early Israeli wars have we seen a conflict of a modern tank against a modern tank.

As has been pointed out numerous times in here, just because technology exists that can destroy a military target, does not make that target obsolete. An aircraft carrier, and it's attached battle group provides many, many, tangibles to the JFC (Joint Force Commander). Until technology proceeds to the point where a Carrier Battle Group can be neutralized with it being incapable of providing any military value of import, they will be useful.


The thing is a carrier battle group is yes it can be attacked. But its defences are immense. And it can unload a hell ton of fire power on anyone inside maybe 1000 miles.
Its also in a short time of being sited, mobile and moving at flank, classified, but over 30 knots!
If you add a growing circle from first detect to hunt. It wodens to hundreds of square miles, to thousands, quickly.

Plus as said, its formidable AA defences and outer cap patrols keep anyone outside a good 100mile envelope..

If they where obsolete why would US build more. China want them, be in demand second line for sale and UK spend billions on em.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 18:38:06


Post by: KTG17


 djones520 wrote:
Not since the early Israeli wars have we seen a conflict of a modern tank against a modern tank.


Desert Storm.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 18:42:43


Post by: djones520


 Frazzled wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
Tanks have been in combat on multiple occasions. As time as moved on their role has changed and they have become more vulnerable to attack, especially air attack.


Not since the early Israeli wars have we seen a conflict of a modern tank against a modern tank.

As has been pointed out numerous times in here, just because technology exists that can destroy a military target, does not make that target obsolete. An aircraft carrier, and it's attached battle group provides many, many, tangibles to the JFC (Joint Force Commander). Until technology proceeds to the point where a Carrier Battle Group can be neutralized with it being incapable of providing any military value of import, they will be useful.


Only if they don't exceed the cost.

Again, they've not actually fought anyone in multiple decades. How a carrier group would stand up to a concentrated pounding by say one or two hundred Chinese antiship missiles remains to be seen.


Considering the vast majority of those Anti-ship missiles that the Chinese have, has an operational range of 50ish kilometers, good luck getting them to the Carrier, that has a defense net of as pointed out, up to a thousand miles.

In true warfare, casualties are going to happen. You civvies have kind of forgotten that. If the Chinese expend their entire anti-ship missile capability to take down a single carrier, well that's a price we'll likely pay. When the other 7 or so we've got are then able to operate with impunity, it's a trade we won.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
KTG17 wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
Not since the early Israeli wars have we seen a conflict of a modern tank against a modern tank.


Desert Storm.


No, not even close. The Iraqi's most modern battle tank in Desert Storm was 20 years old at that point, or using 20 year old technology, in the case of the Lion of Babylon tanks. The Soviets/Russians had already been replacing their T-72's with the T-80 five years prior to Desert Storm. In contrast, the M1 Abrams was state of the art at the time.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 18:47:53


Post by: KTG17


Unless you assets around the world or alliances to help defend, I don't think having a carrier is worth it. In most cases, its simply prestige. The UK and France do have overseas territories to defend (as small as they might be) so its reasonable to have them. Russia does not, so its a bit of a waste for them to have any, and the same goes for China. China only wants them for prestigious reasons. They have seen the US sail around the South China Sea and it represents the US's global reach. China doesn't have overseas territories beyond the South China Sea, which can be covered by aircraft from the mainland. They see the influence the US has pulling one up, and would like the same effect sailing around the South and East China Sea.

But having them is one thing. Using them is another. I don't believe for a minute that China's military strength will ever be measured by their carriers. They will be paper tigers because China hasn't developed a matured system to use them. The US has been at it for 80 years. China would have to actually engage in some wars to properly learn how to use their weapons, and they will lose the first big one they fight.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 18:48:03


Post by: Frazzled


Why do you think it would be a single carrier?


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 18:49:08


Post by: djones520


KTG17 wrote:
Unless you assets around the world or alliances to help defend, I don't think having a carrier is worth it. In most cases, its simply prestige. The UK and France do have overseas territories to defend (as small as they might be) so its reasonable to have them. Russia does not, so its a bit of a waste for them to have any, and the same goes for China. China only wants them for prestigious reasons. They have seen the US sail around the South China Sea and it represents the US's global reach. China doesn't have overseas territories beyond the South China Sea, which can be covered by aircraft from the mainland. They see the influence the US has pulling one up, and would like the same effect sailing around the South and East China Sea.

But having them is one thing. Using them is another. I don't believe for a minute that China's military strength will ever be measured by their carriers. They will be paper tigers because China hasn't developed a matured system to use them. The US has been at it for 80 years. China would have to actually engage in some wars to properly learn how to use their weapons, and they will lose the first big one they fight.


China wants them for force projection reasons. They are trying to expand their economic base to the ocean, and they need a navy to defend it. If you want a true blue water navy, you need carriers. It's that simple.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 18:51:40


Post by: KTG17


 djones520 wrote:
KTG17 wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
Not since the early Israeli wars have we seen a conflict of a modern tank against a modern tank.


Desert Storm.


No, not even close. The Iraqi's most modern battle tank in Desert Storm was 20 years old at that point, or using 20 year old technology, in the case of the Lion of Babylon tanks. The Soviets/Russians had already been replacing their T-72's with the T-80 five years prior to Desert Storm. In contrast, the M1 Abrams was state of the art at the time.


What are you talking about? The Adrams entered service in 1980. Does that mean in 2017 the Abrams is obsolete and junk today? Of course not, its still an ass-kicking tank. Just because one had more capabilities than the other doesn't mean they weren't modern.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 djones520 wrote:
China wants them for force projection reasons. They are trying to expand their economic base to the ocean, and they need a navy to defend it. If you want a true blue water navy, you need carriers. It's that simple.


No I know they would like them for force projection, but to where? If its beyond the South China Sea, then fine, but I dont think that is their goal. And if its just within the China Seas, then land based aircraft can cover that.

In their case its prestige.

If they had assets in the South Pacific, or Indian Oceans, then sure. But they don't.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 18:57:07


Post by: djones520


KTG17 wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
KTG17 wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
Not since the early Israeli wars have we seen a conflict of a modern tank against a modern tank.


Desert Storm.


No, not even close. The Iraqi's most modern battle tank in Desert Storm was 20 years old at that point, or using 20 year old technology, in the case of the Lion of Babylon tanks. The Soviets/Russians had already been replacing their T-72's with the T-80 five years prior to Desert Storm. In contrast, the M1 Abrams was state of the art at the time.


What are you talking about? The Adrams entered service in 1980. Does that mean in 2017 the Abrams is obsolete and junk today? Of course not, its still an ass-kicking tank. Just because one had more capabilities than the other doesn't mean they weren't modern.


The Abrams has constantly been updated throughout its life. The M1A2 variant that we operate now is worlds beyond the M1A1 that we used in 1991 (the oldest variant at the time was 4 years old). The best tank the Iraqi's had was 1971 technology, the worst was late 40's, where the US and its allies were using 1986+ technology.

The only instance of a modern tank shooting at a modern tank in Desert Storm were the few unfortunate friendly fire incidents we had.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 18:58:12


Post by: KTG17


Check out this map:



The South and East China Seas are not very big. That whole area can be covered by land-based aircraft.

If you want to move beyond that, for force projection, fine, but to go where? If you have no territories beyond that area, what is the point? If you suspect they will TAKE territory thru hostile means, fine, but I highly doubt that will go over well.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 djones520 wrote:
The only instance of a modern tank shooting at a modern tank in Desert Storm were the few unfortunate friendly fire incidents we had.


I guess we differ on the meaning of modern. If the oldest Abrams in Desert Storm was 16 years older than the newest Iraqi tank is considered modern vs ancient, then yes, you would be correct. However, I honestly think you are stretching it.

And the M1 alone didn't win the war. It was the system. The US would have won if they were using the T-72s and the the Iraqis the Abrams.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 19:04:30


Post by: Agiel


To expand on what jhe90 has said just because a carrier can be sunk (of course it can, but I'll go more into that in a bit), it absolutely doesn't mean that it's easy, even with all the new-fangled anti-ship missiles out there. The AAW capabilities of the Type 45 destroyer are similarly tough nuts to crack as the various Aegis-equipped vessels like the Ticonderoga class CGs and variations of the Arleigh Burke DDGs:




As well with anti-ship missile bombers, we should note that back in the 70s even with the introduction of the Tu-22M Backfire and the AS-4 Kitchen anti-ship missile Soviet Naval Aviation was not sanguine about its chances of attenuating the US carrier threat in the event of open war; a mass raid against a carrier battle group was expected to have a 50% attrition rate, independent of whether or not it scored any hits on a carrier (see page 18: https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/b2ec1735-8652-40b0-ae04-a9e30a5597cd/Kamikazes--The-Soviet-Legacy.aspx).






Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 19:08:04


Post by: djones520


700 miles to the Spratly islands from the southern most Chinese airfield. That's the one way distance that an SU-27 can fly while carrying an operational load. That means it has zero loiter time.

China has a very small fleet of aerial refuelers, so you cannot rely on that for your ability to control the skies in a contested zone.

Their primary aircraft, the J-10, can't even fly half that range on an operational payload. So no, the Chinese cannot effectively provide air support with ground based aircraft to the South China Sea.



Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 19:08:46


Post by: jhe90


Agiel wrote:
To expand on what jhe90 has said just because a carrier can be sunk (of course it can, but I'll go more into that in a bit), it absolutely doesn't mean that it's easy, even with all the new-fangled anti-ship missiles out there. The AAW capabilities of the Type 45 destroyer are similarly tough nuts to crack as the various Aegis-equipped vessels like the Ticonderoga class CGs and variations of the Arleigh Burke DDGs:




As well with anti-ship missile bombers, we should note that back in the 70s even with the introduction of the Tu-22M Backfire and the AS-4 Kitchen anti-ship missile Soviet Naval Aviation was not sanguine about its chances of attenuating the US carrier threat in the event of open war; a mass raid against a carrier battle group was expected to have a 50% attrition rate, independent of whether or not it scored any hits on a carrier (see page 18: https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/b2ec1735-8652-40b0-ae04-a9e30a5597cd/Kamikazes--The-Soviet-Legacy.aspx).






Yeah a type 45 has heavy AA abaility,
they state something like tracking mach 2 tennis balls, tracking, engaging, some 48 targets in under 20 seconds of being sighted on radars with Various AA and anti ship missiles.

and thats the specs they reveal...


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 19:09:21


Post by: Agiel


@KTG17

It should also be noted that the terrain can also significantly complicate targeting of carriers; NATO war plans for the North Atlantic included sending carriers into bastions on the Finnmark coast where the clutter would confuse maritime search radars and the active radar seekers of anti-ship missiles.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 19:16:29


Post by: avantgarde


Since y'all are talking about projected PLAN development and the new Type 055 rolled out of docks on Wed.:

http://plarealtalk.com/2016/05/31/chinese-navy-2020-projecting-the-surface-combatant-fleet/


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 19:21:08


Post by: jhe90


 avantgarde wrote:
Since y'all are talking about projected PLAN development and the new Type 055 rolled out of docks on Wed.:

http://plarealtalk.com/2016/05/31/chinese-navy-2020-projecting-the-surface-combatant-fleet/


while they may be effective there names are rather dull
number classes, least name tham after cool people or stuff.

like ... CLass Destroyer.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 19:48:17


Post by: Frazzled


 djones520 wrote:
700 miles to the Spratly islands from the southern most Chinese airfield. That's the one way distance that an SU-27 can fly while carrying an operational load. That means it has zero loiter time.

China has a very small fleet of aerial refuelers, so you cannot rely on that for your ability to control the skies in a contested zone.

Their primary aircraft, the J-10, can't even fly half that range on an operational payload. So no, the Chinese cannot effectively provide air support with ground based aircraft to the South China Sea.



Thats what those artificial islands are for.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 19:59:54


Post by: whembly


 Frazzled wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
700 miles to the Spratly islands from the southern most Chinese airfield. That's the one way distance that an SU-27 can fly while carrying an operational load. That means it has zero loiter time.

China has a very small fleet of aerial refuelers, so you cannot rely on that for your ability to control the skies in a contested zone.

Their primary aircraft, the J-10, can't even fly half that range on an operational payload. So no, the Chinese cannot effectively provide air support with ground based aircraft to the South China Sea.



Thats what those artificial islands are for.


Yeah... but can you sink an artificial island?


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 20:01:31


Post by: MDSW


 djones520 wrote:
Yeah, Aircraft Carriers are still the king of the sea, and are going to be for a long time yet.

Here is a somewhat basic look at why killing an aircraft carrier is a pretty daunting task.

http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/five-reasons-us-aircraft-carriers-are-nearly-impossible-sink-17318


Great article. However, in mentioning the electronic tie-in of all the defense systems, etc., I can only think what would happen to all of the active and passive defense systems if a sizeable EMP device was employed close to the carrier? Would it effectively make it dead in the water and vulnerable or is everything shielded to avoid this type of attack?


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 20:07:20


Post by: whembly


 MDSW wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
Yeah, Aircraft Carriers are still the king of the sea, and are going to be for a long time yet.

Here is a somewhat basic look at why killing an aircraft carrier is a pretty daunting task.

http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/five-reasons-us-aircraft-carriers-are-nearly-impossible-sink-17318


Great article. However, in mentioning the electronic tie-in of all the defense systems, etc., I can only think what would happen to all of the active and passive defense systems if a sizeable EMP device was employed close to the carrier? Would it effectively make it dead in the water and vulnerable or is everything shielded to avoid this type of attack?


Most are hardened against EMP.

Not sure what the means exactly... but the military has multi-decades to figure out how to prevent EMPs from knocking out their critical systems.

On non-Military equipment/infrastructure... we're boned.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 20:26:34


Post by: Frazzled


 whembly wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
700 miles to the Spratly islands from the southern most Chinese airfield. That's the one way distance that an SU-27 can fly while carrying an operational load. That means it has zero loiter time.

China has a very small fleet of aerial refuelers, so you cannot rely on that for your ability to control the skies in a contested zone.

Their primary aircraft, the J-10, can't even fly half that range on an operational payload. So no, the Chinese cannot effectively provide air support with ground based aircraft to the South China Sea.



Thats what those artificial islands are for.


Yeah... but can you sink an artificial island?


I have been reliably informed you can with a large enough armored formation. Now we just need some floating tanks.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 MDSW wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
Yeah, Aircraft Carriers are still the king of the sea, and are going to be for a long time yet.

Here is a somewhat basic look at why killing an aircraft carrier is a pretty daunting task.

http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/five-reasons-us-aircraft-carriers-are-nearly-impossible-sink-17318


Great article. However, in mentioning the electronic tie-in of all the defense systems, etc., I can only think what would happen to all of the active and passive defense systems if a sizeable EMP device was employed close to the carrier? Would it effectively make it dead in the water and vulnerable or is everything shielded to avoid this type of attack?


or computer viruses kick in. Damn Cylons!


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 20:29:52


Post by: Jefffar


You can render any ground based airfield inoperable with the right type of munitions. Given that these islands are not going to have easy access to the heavy equipment required to make repairs to an airfield, they are actually more vulnerable to being taken out than either mainland airbases (which can be repaired) or carriers (which are hard to find).

Also, China is doing a lot of power projection into the Indian Ocean and has plenty of client states in Africa and the middle East. Their carrier ambitions may be more about supremacy over India than about challenging America.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 20:33:02


Post by: feeder


China has plenty of overseas corporate assets that they want major force projection to supplement, just like the US.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 20:34:47


Post by: whembly


 Frazzled wrote:
 whembly wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
700 miles to the Spratly islands from the southern most Chinese airfield. That's the one way distance that an SU-27 can fly while carrying an operational load. That means it has zero loiter time.

China has a very small fleet of aerial refuelers, so you cannot rely on that for your ability to control the skies in a contested zone.

Their primary aircraft, the J-10, can't even fly half that range on an operational payload. So no, the Chinese cannot effectively provide air support with ground based aircraft to the South China Sea.



Thats what those artificial islands are for.


Yeah... but can you sink an artificial island?


I have been reliably informed you can with a large enough armored formation. Now we just need some floating tanks.

They're mothballed at the moment... the Iowa-class battleships.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 20:35:05


Post by: Frazzled


I think we're glossing over this Cylon / China alliance thing..


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 20:41:20


Post by: jhe90


 whembly wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 whembly wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
700 miles to the Spratly islands from the southern most Chinese airfield. That's the one way distance that an SU-27 can fly while carrying an operational load. That means it has zero loiter time.

China has a very small fleet of aerial refuelers, so you cannot rely on that for your ability to control the skies in a contested zone.

Their primary aircraft, the J-10, can't even fly half that range on an operational payload. So no, the Chinese cannot effectively provide air support with ground based aircraft to the South China Sea.



Thats what those artificial islands are for.


Yeah... but can you sink an artificial island?


I have been reliably informed you can with a large enough armored formation. Now we just need some floating tanks.

They're mothballed at the moment... the Iowa-class battleships.


If there good ernough to pound Japanese, Koreans, Vietnamese, Iraqis, and others. They equal opportunity 16 inch delivery platforms.
They will sink a island some 20 tons of HE a minute sustained fire, 100 foot crators able to punch holes in some 21 foot of concrete.

Also those old analogue... Ships. That's a massive fariday cage with muli hundred compartments and multiple auxiliary systems...
Should work in a EMP...


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 21:15:16


Post by: Co'tor Shas


 djones520 wrote:
KTG17 wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
KTG17 wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
Not since the early Israeli wars have we seen a conflict of a modern tank against a modern tank.


Desert Storm.


No, not even close. The Iraqi's most modern battle tank in Desert Storm was 20 years old at that point, or using 20 year old technology, in the case of the Lion of Babylon tanks. The Soviets/Russians had already been replacing their T-72's with the T-80 five years prior to Desert Storm. In contrast, the M1 Abrams was state of the art at the time.


What are you talking about? The Adrams entered service in 1980. Does that mean in 2017 the Abrams is obsolete and junk today? Of course not, its still an ass-kicking tank. Just because one had more capabilities than the other doesn't mean they weren't modern.


The Abrams has constantly been updated throughout its life. The M1A2 variant that we operate now is worlds beyond the M1A1 that we used in 1991 (the oldest variant at the time was 4 years old). The best tank the Iraqi's had was 1971 technology, the worst was late 40's, where the US and its allies were using 1986+ technology.

The only instance of a modern tank shooting at a modern tank in Desert Storm were the few unfortunate friendly fire incidents we had.


It would be a bit like saying that the M16A4 is outdated because the M16 debuted in the 60's. Just because it hasn't been replaced with an entirely new system doesn't mean it isn't up to date. Hell, even the M4's from the 90's are getting replaced by the M4A1.

The M1A2, while not necessarily the most advanced tank in the world (some of the, albeit untested in battle, Korean or Japanese tanks might hold that honor , the Type 10 is a particularity cool bit of tech, and the Leopard 2 always exists), is a thoroughly modern tank.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 jhe90 wrote:
 whembly wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 whembly wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
700 miles to the Spratly islands from the southern most Chinese airfield. That's the one way distance that an SU-27 can fly while carrying an operational load. That means it has zero loiter time.

China has a very small fleet of aerial refuelers, so you cannot rely on that for your ability to control the skies in a contested zone.

Their primary aircraft, the J-10, can't even fly half that range on an operational payload. So no, the Chinese cannot effectively provide air support with ground based aircraft to the South China Sea.



Thats what those artificial islands are for.


Yeah... but can you sink an artificial island?


I have been reliably informed you can with a large enough armored formation. Now we just need some floating tanks.

They're mothballed at the moment... the Iowa-class battleships.


If there good ernough to pound Japanese, Koreans, Vietnamese, Iraqis, and others. They equal opportunity 16 inch delivery platforms.
They will sink a island some 20 tons of HE a minute sustained fire, 100 foot crators able to punch holes in some 21 foot of concrete.

Also those old analogue... Ships. That's a massive fariday cage with muli hundred compartments and multiple auxiliary systems...
Should work in a EMP...


Go bit or go home, bring out those old Montana-class designs.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 21:23:40


Post by: jhe90


 Co'tor Shas wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
KTG17 wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
KTG17 wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
Not since the early Israeli wars have we seen a conflict of a modern tank against a modern tank.


Desert Storm.


No, not even close. The Iraqi's most modern battle tank in Desert Storm was 20 years old at that point, or using 20 year old technology, in the case of the Lion of Babylon tanks. The Soviets/Russians had already been replacing their T-72's with the T-80 five years prior to Desert Storm. In contrast, the M1 Abrams was state of the art at the time.


What are you talking about? The Adrams entered service in 1980. Does that mean in 2017 the Abrams is obsolete and junk today? Of course not, its still an ass-kicking tank. Just because one had more capabilities than the other doesn't mean they weren't modern.


The Abrams has constantly been updated throughout its life. The M1A2 variant that we operate now is worlds beyond the M1A1 that we used in 1991 (the oldest variant at the time was 4 years old). The best tank the Iraqi's had was 1971 technology, the worst was late 40's, where the US and its allies were using 1986+ technology.

The only instance of a modern tank shooting at a modern tank in Desert Storm were the few unfortunate friendly fire incidents we had.


It would be a bit like saying that the M16A4 is outdated because the M16 debuted in the 60's. Just because it hasn't been replaced with an entirely new system doesn't mean it isn't up to date. Hell, even the M4's from the 90's are getting replaced by the M4A1.

The M1A2, while not necessarily the most advanced tank in the world (some of the, albeit untested in battle, Korean or Japanese tanks might hold that honor , the Type 10 is a particularity cool bit of tech, and the Leopard 2 always exists), is a thoroughly modern tank.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 jhe90 wrote:
 whembly wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 whembly wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 djones520 wrote:
700 miles to the Spratly islands from the southern most Chinese airfield. That's the one way distance that an SU-27 can fly while carrying an operational load. That means it has zero loiter time.

China has a very small fleet of aerial refuelers, so you cannot rely on that for your ability to control the skies in a contested zone.

Their primary aircraft, the J-10, can't even fly half that range on an operational payload. So no, the Chinese cannot effectively provide air support with ground based aircraft to the South China Sea.



Thats what those artificial islands are for.


Yeah... but can you sink an artificial island?


I have been reliably informed you can with a large enough armored formation. Now we just need some floating tanks.

They're mothballed at the moment... the Iowa-class battleships.


If there good ernough to pound Japanese, Koreans, Vietnamese, Iraqis, and others. They equal opportunity 16 inch delivery platforms.
They will sink a island some 20 tons of HE a minute sustained fire, 100 foot crators able to punch holes in some 21 foot of concrete.

Also those old analogue... Ships. That's a massive fariday cage with muli hundred compartments and multiple auxiliary systems...
Should work in a EMP...


Go bit or go home, bring out those old Montana-class designs.


Lol. Well they sure boost US steel Industry!
But they are basically a larger, slightly slower heavy Iowa class, better armour, 3 extra guns. There not too different
Iowas ain't shabby!

And the US tank might not be mosts high tech but its combat tested. Its kinks are ironed out and been put through conditions only real combat operations can truely test of it and lessons learned.

Its passed pretty well, tech is proven, crew training is solid, tactics solid.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 21:43:33


Post by: Co'tor Shas


Pretty much, yeah, but I hold a special place in my heart for any tank that can go 70kph backwards.






Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 21:44:40


Post by: Do_I_Not_Like_That


Some very good points here, but looking to the future, what about things like advanced underwater drones? Or Modern day Kamikazes? Or surface swarm tactics?

Yeah, I appreciate that carriers have all sorts of defence systems, but sheer weight of numbers might overwhelm a carrier.

I still think the very careful use of one, and only one, nuclear warhead could also be a major weapon. Like I said earlier, if for example, the US lost a carrier fleet to one nuke, they're unlikely to hit the red button in return, and would probably chalk the lose up to 'acceptable losses.'

For example, during the Cold War, NATO had the plan to use the Rhine as a defence line and tactical nuke anything across the Rhine.

The Russians knew this, wargamed for it, factored it into their invasion plans, but NATO using small nukes on the battlefield was never a red line for the Russians to launch their nukes against Washington.

China might be tempted to gamble in a similar situation. Cities getting wiped out is one thing, but a US fleet getting sunk in the middle of the Pacific is another thing entirely.




Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 21:44:54


Post by: Jadenim


Aside from the obvious prestige reasons, I think the main aim of the Chinese carrier development is to counter the US carrier fleet; if they can project an air power bubble 500-1000 miles off their coast they have effectively neutralised the US ability to strike at them (short of lobbing ballistic missiles around and I don't think anyone wants that!)


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 21:55:26


Post by: Do_I_Not_Like_That


 Jadenim wrote:
Aside from the obvious prestige reasons, I think the main aim of the Chinese carrier development is to counter the US carrier fleet; if they can project an air power bubble 500-1000 miles off their coast they have effectively neutralised the US ability to strike at them (short of lobbing ballistic missiles around and I don't think anyone wants that!)


I read somewhere that China is going for the land empire - Eurasia, as opposed to the maritime empire.

Matitime Empires are a new thing, the British Empire being the most famous example.

China is well aware that it is 'encircled' by US allies, with Taiwan being the most obvious example. For sure, they need a decent sized fleet for power projection, but I suspect that the land empire strategy is their overall goal. Look at the inroads being made in Africa as an example.

Aircraft carriers are important to China IMO, but not as important as they are to the US which has it's own geographical problems to overcome i.e distance across the Pacific.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/06/30 21:55:51


Post by: jhe90


 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
Some very good points here, but looking to the future, what about things like advanced underwater drones? Or Modern day Kamikazes? Or surface swarm tactics?

Yeah, I appreciate that carriers have all sorts of defence systems, but sheer weight of numbers might overwhelm a carrier.

I still think the very careful use of one, and only one, nuclear warhead could also be a major weapon. Like I said earlier, if for example, the US lost a carrier fleet to one nuke, they're unlikely to hit the red button in return, and would probably chalk the lose up to 'acceptable losses.'

For example, during the Cold War, NATO had the plan to use the Rhine as a defence line and tactical nuke anything across the Rhine.

The Russians knew this, wargamed for it, factored it into their invasion plans, but NATO using small nukes on the battlefield was never a red line for the Russians to launch their nukes against Washington.

China might be tempted to gamble in a similar situation. Cities getting wiped out is one thing, but a US fleet getting sunk in the middle of the Pacific is another thing entirely.




But then again drones could also be defensive with own command ships. A drone carrier that acts as another layer in the defensive position.
Ie could operate a picket line of drones, and also say launch high speed drones to sacrifice to take torps or missiles for the fleet. Also maybe guided depth charge etc to counter subs.

The carrier is force projection.
The drone ship can attack but also defensive layers.



Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/01 06:25:01


Post by: Spetulhu


 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
China is well aware that it is 'encircled' by US allies, with Taiwan being the most obvious example. For sure, they need a decent sized fleet for power projection, but I suspect that the land empire strategy is their overall goal. Look at the inroads being made in Africa as an example.


Carriers would be convenient if they want to quickly help some African puppet state without having men and planes stationed in the country. It's exactly what the US often does with it's carrier groups, after all. And keeping India in check is also a good motivation, seeing as they sit smack dab in the middle of the best route for shipping stuff to and from Africa.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/01 07:31:57


Post by: Kilkrazy


The Athenian Empire, established about 500BC, was a maritime empire.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/01 16:35:05


Post by: Grey Templar


 Kilkrazy wrote:
The Athenian Empire, established about 500BC, was a maritime empire.


Depends on what you put the threshold at for "Empire".

Even at it's height, the Delian league was pitifully tiny. Hardly really deserving of the term "Empire". It also didn't even last 80 years. And about 1/3 of that time was the war that ended the league.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/01 17:14:02


Post by: Jefffar


Phoenician Empire was also maritime. The Romans had to fight several wars with them and their colonies for control of the Mediterranean.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/01 17:17:37


Post by: Grey Templar


Indeed. They actually went all around the Mediterranean, and potentially even further if some fairly obscure evidence is to be believed. They may have even landed in Brazil.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/01 17:21:33


Post by: Agiel


I think we'd also be remiss to not mention that the US is fielding as well as developing equally terrifying anti-ship missiles from the Norwegian-made NSM (tested on deck mountings on the LCS):




As well as the Lockheed Martin AGM-158C LRASM launched from B-1B Lancers and carrier strike fighters (surface-launched version has since been shelved, probably in favour of the NSM replacing the Harpoons mounts on the stern of ships):




Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/01 18:41:19


Post by: Frazzled


 Grey Templar wrote:
Indeed. They actually went all around the Mediterranean, and potentially even further if some fairly obscure evidence is to be believed. They may have even landed in Brazil.


And the Romans utterly utterly slaughtered them.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/01 18:43:02


Post by: A Town Called Malus


 Frazzled wrote:
 Grey Templar wrote:
Indeed. They actually went all around the Mediterranean, and potentially even further if some fairly obscure evidence is to be believed. They may have even landed in Brazil.


And the Romans utterly utterly slaughtered them.


Only after the Romans learned how to make boats from the Carthaginians.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/01 18:43:44


Post by: Kilkrazy


And the Roman Empire was a land empire that fell.

Because all things fall.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/01 19:49:24


Post by: Grey Templar


 Frazzled wrote:
 Grey Templar wrote:
Indeed. They actually went all around the Mediterranean, and potentially even further if some fairly obscure evidence is to be believed. They may have even landed in Brazil.


And the Romans utterly utterly slaughtered them.


Indeed. Because of size and organization. The Pheonicians were also primarily traders. Rome was a military giant. Even if they werent great sailors, you'll still steamroll anybody smaller than you if you put effort in.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/01 20:18:24


Post by: jhe90


 Grey Templar wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 Grey Templar wrote:
Indeed. They actually went all around the Mediterranean, and potentially even further if some fairly obscure evidence is to be believed. They may have even landed in Brazil.


And the Romans utterly utterly slaughtered them.


Indeed. Because of size and organization. The Pheonicians were also primarily traders. Rome was a military giant. Even if they werent great sailors, you'll still steamroll anybody smaller than you if you put effort in.


Rome was logistics.
They could bring alot more to bear than there rivals for a time.
And they took naval warfare. Then turned into into a land formation fight and ranged weaponry.

Rome was not a naval power. They did not trust the sea.
But they could still sail if required.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/02 08:34:40


Post by: Spetulhu


 jhe90 wrote:
Rome was logistics. They could bring alot more to bear than there rivals for a time.


That goes for their land battles too. Rome had incredible reserves of manpower and enough industry to equip new legions quickly. None of their rivals could do something like that, though some could raise huge armies. The Phoenicians largely relied on mercenaries as I recall, something that works as long as you pay and are victorious - once you start losing many old mercs will look for a way out and any new units will be worse equipped, worse led, worse trained and so on.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/02 08:53:03


Post by: jhe90


Spetulhu wrote:
 jhe90 wrote:
Rome was logistics. They could bring alot more to bear than there rivals for a time.


That goes for their land battles too. Rome had incredible reserves of manpower and enough industry to equip new legions quickly. None of their rivals could do something like that, though some could raise huge armies. The Phoenicians largely relied on mercenaries as I recall, something that works as long as you pay and are victorious - once you start losing many old mercs will look for a way out and any new units will be worse equipped, worse led, worse trained and so on.


Also displine and cross unit training.
Two legions could integrate battle plans and tactics quickly, fight ad one unit with similar training and general strategy with strict command chains and organization. Multi legion battles where regular.

A force of various mercs, not so much, all independent, trained differently or experiences in different battles.
Doffrwnt story. And not same ability to adapt command structure as well less structured.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/02 11:13:31


Post by: Kilkrazy


The discussion of the strengths of Republican Rome are interesting but rather a big tangent from the viability of the fleet carrier in the 21st century.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/02 12:16:48


Post by: Jefffar


Then let's loop them back.

One of the other things that keeps the Carrier relevant is its political value. A carrier (and accompanying assets) represents a certain easily quantifiable level of national interest and intent. A government committing a carrier o a theatre sends a clear message that they are very interested in the outcome of a situation and are willing to take steps to ensure a favourable outcome.

This is one of the things that makes America a true super power. Not just one, but sometimes two or three of their massive supercarriers, with their escorts, accompanied by Marines can find their way to any coastline in the world in a manner of days after the outbreak of a crisis.

Its much like how Rome used to demonstrate its interest in affairs by the presence of one or more legions nearby.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/02 16:02:30


Post by: sebster


 Ketara wrote:
Precisely....and neither did I? In the same regard absolutely nobody had a fleet entirely made of battleships, nobody proposed a navy entirely of torpedo boats.

But that isn't what you said now, is it? That's either a complete strawman or misunderstanding (of you or me, I'm not entirely sure).

You said nobody thought about 'replacing' battleships with torpedo boats. Replacing, that is to say, substituting. Inserting another ship type in the place of. The logical assumption (given the context) is that you are talking about the strategic and battlefield roles of the battleship. In other words, you are saying (to very clearly lay out what I am understanding your original statement as) 'No naval authorities in any country ever considered replacing, in part or in full, their battleships with torpedo boats with the intent of the torpedo boats undertaking the same strategic and tactical role'.


You misunderstood me, as i never said there was no notion of replacing battleships in part. That reading of my statement makes little to no sense in the context of the rest of my point.

However, I didn't know Jeune Ecole reached the extent of envisioning a fleet design that would dominate the seas without battleships. I only knew it in the context of specific counters to battleships. So I stand corrected on that point, cheers.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
KTG17 wrote:
No I know they would like them for force projection, but to where? If its beyond the South China Sea, then fine, but I dont think that is their goal. And if its just within the China Seas, then land based aircraft can cover that.

In their case its prestige.


The Chinese have spent a substantial pile of cash in primary industries in Africa, and securing sea lanes to bring resources back to China. Ever wonder why the Chinese took a sudden interest in resolving the Sri Lankan crisis, and accepted humiliating India and harming that relationship? Because they wanted to take a lead position in Sir Lankan politics, because of Sri Lanka's critical location in the trade route from Africa to China.

China is now a modern economy, which means to fuel their economy they need resource flows from outside their borders. It is then natural to want force project capability to protect those assets. It is not merely prestige. And nor do Chinese carriers have to be competitive with US carriers to be a valuable asset. Not every military operation is about butting heads with the US. It isn't always about the US, you know.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/02 18:50:50


Post by: Frazzled


 Kilkrazy wrote:
And the Roman Empire was a land empire that fell.

Because all things fall.


Not the Spanish Inquisition.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/02 21:20:27


Post by: jhe90


 sebster wrote:
 Ketara wrote:
Precisely....and neither did I? In the same regard absolutely nobody had a fleet entirely made of battleships, nobody proposed a navy entirely of torpedo boats.

But that isn't what you said now, is it? That's either a complete strawman or misunderstanding (of you or me, I'm not entirely sure).

You said nobody thought about 'replacing' battleships with torpedo boats. Replacing, that is to say, substituting. Inserting another ship type in the place of. The logical assumption (given the context) is that you are talking about the strategic and battlefield roles of the battleship. In other words, you are saying (to very clearly lay out what I am understanding your original statement as) 'No naval authorities in any country ever considered replacing, in part or in full, their battleships with torpedo boats with the intent of the torpedo boats undertaking the same strategic and tactical role'.


You misunderstood me, as i never said there was no notion of replacing battleships in part. That reading of my statement makes little to no sense in the context of the rest of my point.

However, I didn't know Jeune Ecole reached the extent of envisioning a fleet design that would dominate the seas without battleships. I only knew it in the context of specific counters to battleships. So I stand corrected on that point, cheers.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
KTG17 wrote:
No I know they would like them for force projection, but to where? If its beyond the South China Sea, then fine, but I dont think that is their goal. And if its just within the China Seas, then land based aircraft can cover that.

In their case its prestige.


The Chinese have spent a substantial pile of cash in primary industries in Africa, and securing sea lanes to bring resources back to China. Ever wonder why the Chinese took a sudden interest in resolving the Sri Lankan crisis, and accepted humiliating India and harming that relationship? Because they wanted to take a lead position in Sir Lankan politics, because of Sri Lanka's critical location in the trade route from Africa to China.

China is now a modern economy, which means to fuel their economy they need resource flows from outside their borders. It is then natural to want force project capability to protect those assets. It is not merely prestige. And nor do Chinese carriers have to be competitive with US carriers to be a valuable asset. Not every military operation is about butting heads with the US. It isn't always about the US, you know.


Yes older carrier. Not a super carrier but its enough to intimidate some African nations and keep those trade routes opn, safe and hold people to there promises in a particularly unstable and changeable part of the world

Its got enough leverage for those needs.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 02:29:18


Post by: Agiel


I should also like to point out that for all the people who've claimed that carriers are too big a target, absolutely none of them have come up with a viable alternative that provides similar capabilities for the cost. Just about every other type of combination of vessel (Soviet-style KUG or American SAG centered around a battlewagon) is either as vulnerable to the very same anti-ship missiles (actually, even more so) or are unable to turn out a similar kind of sustained firepower (much has been made of the converted Ohio SSGNs or those Kalibr-firing corvettes, but unlike carrier aviation they have to return to ports to reload their offensive payloads). Carrier aviation also has the benefit of providing long-range over-the-horizon detection capability for defensive and offensive capabilities (providing guidance data to AAW interceptors like the AIM-120D AMRAAM and SM-6 against sea-skimming anti-ship missiles flying below the horizon is a capability of the E-2D Super Hawkeye) and striking at targets well beyond the ranges of other surface vessels.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 14:51:37


Post by: BaconCatBug


They have been obsolete since the first ICBMs existed. All they exist for now is so the US and China can have dick-waving contests.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 14:57:57


Post by: Co'tor Shas


 BaconCatBug wrote:
They have been obsolete since the first ICBMs existed. All they exist for now is so the US and China can have dick-waving contests.

I mean that completely ignores reality. And also that there are more than two countries in the world.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 15:18:36


Post by: Frazzled


 Co'tor Shas wrote:
 BaconCatBug wrote:
They have been obsolete since the first ICBMs existed. All they exist for now is so the US and China can have dick-waving contests.

I mean that completely ignores reality. And also that there are more than two countries in the world.


Indeed there are six.

Texas.
Greater Texas (aka the US)
Norte Texas (Canada)
Mexico (central and south America)
Australia
Not Texas (everywhere else).


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 15:53:24


Post by: Kilkrazy


 Frazzled wrote:
 Kilkrazy wrote:
And the Roman Empire was a land empire that fell.

Because all things fall.


Not the Spanish Inquisition.


They fell unexpectedly.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 16:02:49


Post by: Do_I_Not_Like_That


As Britain has proved, having one of the world's best aircraft carriers counts for nothing if you don't have any warplanes to put on it!

What a shambles


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 16:03:24


Post by: Frazzled


 Kilkrazy wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 Kilkrazy wrote:
And the Roman Empire was a land empire that fell.

Because all things fall.


Not the Spanish Inquisition.


They fell unexpectedly.



Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 16:16:41


Post by: sebster


 BaconCatBug wrote:
They have been obsolete since the first ICBMs existed. All they exist for now is so the US and China can have dick-waving contests.


And here we are returning to the crude notion that war is just about hard counters. A can kill B, therefore B is totally worthless and militaries should just be loads and loads of A. Except the real world doesn't work that way.

Just go back and read the thread. There's some really good stuff in there. You will learn things. You will leave the thread with an opinion that is vastly better informed than what you just posted. That can only be a good thing. Please do it.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 16:20:40


Post by: Frazzled


 sebster wrote:
 BaconCatBug wrote:
They have been obsolete since the first ICBMs existed. All they exist for now is so the US and China can have dick-waving contests.


And here we are returning to the crude notion that war is just about hard counters. A can kill B, therefore B is totally worthless and militaries should just be loads and loads of A. Except the real world doesn't work that way.

Just go back and read the thread. There's some really good stuff in there. You will learn things. You will leave the thread with an opinion that is vastly better informed than what you just posted. That can only be a good thing. Please do it.


In his defense, if major powers are going at it, such that carrier groups are being attacked, nukes are definitely, if not likely, going to eventually be used. Major powers haven't fought a duirect war in decades with a fear that would occur being a major driver to it not happening. Nuclear deterrance indeed worked.

If nuclear deterrance hasn't worked in the scenario, then odds are death from above is only a matter of time, and major sea battles would be one reason for it.

on the positive, in a short period of time I'd proffer fleet groups would have the capacity to actually defend themselves from old style missiles. THAAD's been deployed and hell I worked on THAAD so thats er...decades technology.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 16:22:17


Post by: Do_I_Not_Like_That


Slightly OT, but still relevant as it concerns naval warfare, but this youtube video, by a former British Admiral, on the subject of naval warfare of the future, is quite interesting if you have 90 minutes to spare

It's one of my favourites. The intro finishes at 5 minutes 22 secs






Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 16:24:25


Post by: Grey Templar


 Frazzled wrote:
 sebster wrote:
 BaconCatBug wrote:
They have been obsolete since the first ICBMs existed. All they exist for now is so the US and China can have dick-waving contests.


And here we are returning to the crude notion that war is just about hard counters. A can kill B, therefore B is totally worthless and militaries should just be loads and loads of A. Except the real world doesn't work that way.

Just go back and read the thread. There's some really good stuff in there. You will learn things. You will leave the thread with an opinion that is vastly better informed than what you just posted. That can only be a good thing. Please do it.


In his defense, if major powers are going at it, such that carrier groups are being attacked, nukes are definitely, if not likely, going to eventually be used. Major powers haven't fought a duirect war in decades with a fear that would occur being a major driver to it not happening. Nuclear deterrance indeed worked.

If nuclear deterrance hasn't worked in the scenario, then odds are death from above is only a matter of time, and major sea battles would be one reason for it.

on the positive, in a short period of time I'd proffer fleet groups would have the capacity to actually defend themselves from old style missiles. THAAD's been deployed and hell I worked on THAAD so thats er...decades technology.


I have thought that it is possible for 2 nuclear armed countries to have an open war without the use of nukes. Neither is willing to escalate the combat beyond conventional warfare because that would mean total annihilation for both. The stalemate would only be broken if one side was losing the war badly(IE: a direct invasion of the other's homeland with defeat imminent)


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 16:25:28


Post by: Do_I_Not_Like_That


 Frazzled wrote:
 sebster wrote:
 BaconCatBug wrote:
They have been obsolete since the first ICBMs existed. All they exist for now is so the US and China can have dick-waving contests.


And here we are returning to the crude notion that war is just about hard counters. A can kill B, therefore B is totally worthless and militaries should just be loads and loads of A. Except the real world doesn't work that way.

Just go back and read the thread. There's some really good stuff in there. You will learn things. You will leave the thread with an opinion that is vastly better informed than what you just posted. That can only be a good thing. Please do it.


In his defense, if major powers are going at it, such that carrier groups are being attacked, nukes are definitely, if not likely, going to eventually be used. Major powers haven't fought a duirect war in decades with a fear that would occur being a major driver to it not happening. Nuclear deterrance indeed worked.

If nuclear deterrance hasn't worked in the scenario, then odds are death from above is only a matter of time, and major sea battles would be one reason for it.

on the positive, in a short period of time I'd proffer fleet groups would have the capacity to actually defend themselves from old style missiles. THAAD's been deployed and hell I worked on THAAD so thats er...decades technology.


As I've said before to everybody, nobody, and I mean nobody will nuke a city in a time of war. That's an end of the world scenario that no nations wants to enact.

But if a US carrier fleet is in the middle of the Pacific? Dropping one nuke on them could be a tempting move. America would obviously be mad as hell, but that could be chalked up as a military loss, and not a civilian catastrophe.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 16:33:41


Post by: Grey Templar


 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 sebster wrote:
 BaconCatBug wrote:
They have been obsolete since the first ICBMs existed. All they exist for now is so the US and China can have dick-waving contests.


And here we are returning to the crude notion that war is just about hard counters. A can kill B, therefore B is totally worthless and militaries should just be loads and loads of A. Except the real world doesn't work that way.

Just go back and read the thread. There's some really good stuff in there. You will learn things. You will leave the thread with an opinion that is vastly better informed than what you just posted. That can only be a good thing. Please do it.


In his defense, if major powers are going at it, such that carrier groups are being attacked, nukes are definitely, if not likely, going to eventually be used. Major powers haven't fought a duirect war in decades with a fear that would occur being a major driver to it not happening. Nuclear deterrance indeed worked.

If nuclear deterrance hasn't worked in the scenario, then odds are death from above is only a matter of time, and major sea battles would be one reason for it.

on the positive, in a short period of time I'd proffer fleet groups would have the capacity to actually defend themselves from old style missiles. THAAD's been deployed and hell I worked on THAAD so thats er...decades technology.


As I've said before to everybody, nobody, and I mean nobody will nuke a city in a time of war. That's an end of the world scenario that no nations wants to enact.

But if a US carrier fleet is in the middle of the Pacific? Dropping one nuke on them could be a tempting move. America would obviously be mad as hell, but that could be chalked up as a military loss, and not a civilian catastrophe.


I am sure that if a nuke ever gets launched at any American military asset, no matter what it is or who is in charge of the codes, that you'd see plenty of our own nukes go flying in retaliation.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 16:38:21


Post by: Co'tor Shas


It's very possible two neculear powers to fight in open war and not use nukes. If India and Pakistan can mange to not nuke each other, than so can China and the US.

I'd be far more worried about DPRK launching one, or one of Russia's shoddily kept warheads being stolen my terrorists.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 16:40:23


Post by: Do_I_Not_Like_That


But it would be a proportionate response in my opinion.

No nation on Earth could stand back and do nothing if one of its cities got turned to ash, but losing military assets is different to civilian assets, because people know the risks if you join the military. It's a different mindset. During the Cold War, if the KGB killed a CIA agent, then the normal response was to kill a KGB agent in return. Both sides understood the 'rules.'

So, in this hypothetical situation, America loses a carrier fleet in the middle of nowhere, and the proportional response would be to nuke a Chinese military asset/base/airfield in retaliation, but NEVER a civilian target.



Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 16:43:48


Post by: Grey Templar


 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
But it would be a proportionate response in my opinion.

No nation on Earth could stand back and do nothing if one of its cities got turned to ash, but losing military assets is different to civilian assets, because people know the risks if you join the military. It's a different mindset. During the Cold War, if the KGB killed a CIA agent, then the normal response was to kill a KGB agent in return. Both sides understood the 'rules.'

So, in this hypothetical situation, America loses a carrier fleet in the middle of nowhere, and the proportional response would be to nuke a Chinese military asset/base/airfield in retaliation, but NEVER a civilian target.



Given how densely populated China is, it would be pretty impossible to nuke a Chinese base without also catching a lot of people in the crossfire. Nor would the chinese know that we are "only nuking a base". Any use of a nuke aggressively would result in open season.

You can't really compare using 1 nuke vs a specific military target with the Tit-for-tat with spies. Those Spies weren't getting slapped with nukes. Being a spy is also illegal, nobody is surprised if a spy gets killed because that's been the rules forever. Spies can be killed on sight.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 17:43:33


Post by: A Town Called Malus


 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 sebster wrote:
 BaconCatBug wrote:
They have been obsolete since the first ICBMs existed. All they exist for now is so the US and China can have dick-waving contests.


And here we are returning to the crude notion that war is just about hard counters. A can kill B, therefore B is totally worthless and militaries should just be loads and loads of A. Except the real world doesn't work that way.

Just go back and read the thread. There's some really good stuff in there. You will learn things. You will leave the thread with an opinion that is vastly better informed than what you just posted. That can only be a good thing. Please do it.


In his defense, if major powers are going at it, such that carrier groups are being attacked, nukes are definitely, if not likely, going to eventually be used. Major powers haven't fought a duirect war in decades with a fear that would occur being a major driver to it not happening. Nuclear deterrance indeed worked.

If nuclear deterrance hasn't worked in the scenario, then odds are death from above is only a matter of time, and major sea battles would be one reason for it.

on the positive, in a short period of time I'd proffer fleet groups would have the capacity to actually defend themselves from old style missiles. THAAD's been deployed and hell I worked on THAAD so thats er...decades technology.


As I've said before to everybody, nobody, and I mean nobody will nuke a city in a time of war. That's an end of the world scenario that no nations wants to enact.

But if a US carrier fleet is in the middle of the Pacific? Dropping one nuke on them could be a tempting move. America would obviously be mad as hell, but that could be chalked up as a military loss, and not a civilian catastrophe.


But any nukes used in such a manner would not be ICBMs. The nature of ICBMs means that you have no idea what the target is when it is launched. From the point of view of the US, a launch of an ICBM from China aimed at a carrier fleet in the pacific would be identical to an ICBM launched at the US mainland until they had enough of a trajectory to extrapolate from. And waiting for such data as to do that cuts into your response time.

So without using ICBMs, what else does china have? It could drop an atomic bomb, but such a bomber could be intercepted. It could launch smaller missiles, assuming the carrier fleet is in range and such deployment vehicles haven't been destroyed.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 18:05:49


Post by: Mr. Burning


A Speedboat full of explosives holing a carrier...Or a silkworm...Or Excoet...WHY CANT WE DEFEND OUR SHIPS....WE ARE WEAK.....WE DEMAND ANSWERS!!!!!

Hell. You have your nukes and I'l accept the ability to drop 'mine' type objects along major sea lanes and at the mouths of home ports where Carriers are berthed.

Watch the collective outrage as carrier commanders refuse to put to sea until the 'mines' are all gone. Watch as politicians are hounded out of office.

Nukes are irrelevant.









Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 20:03:33


Post by: djones520


A speedboat full of explosives couldn't even sink a destroyer. How is it going to do that to a carrier?


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 20:06:33


Post by: jhe90


 djones520 wrote:
A speedboat full of explosives couldn't even sink a destroyer. How is it going to do that to a carrier?


not sink... but you can force someone into dry dock for a few weeks or months to repair the damage.
its good as out of action.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 21:07:43


Post by: Ketara


It's almost as if things like guns, radar, and the common Mk I eyeball don't exist for some people.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 21:18:32


Post by: jhe90


 Ketara wrote:
It's almost as if things like guns, radar, and the common Mk I eyeball don't exist for some people.


Aye. The defences are dense.
However, you do not need to sink a ship, just damage the ship enough it needs to dock, knock out a key weapon system or such like radar, ernough damage to make it mission killed but not sunk and need to withdraw.

Even if its short term, that combat ship is not on patrol. Its in harbour under repairs.



Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 21:30:06


Post by: Ketara


I'm going to put this bluntly, do you think this hasn't occurred to the people who man warships? They have people on watch 24/7 in appropriate routines with appropriate defences for this sort of thing whilst in port, and whilst sailing.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/03 21:44:39


Post by: jhe90


 Ketara wrote:
I'm going to put this bluntly, do you think this hasn't occurred to the people who man warships? They have people on watch 24/7 in appropriate routines with appropriate defences for this sort of thing whilst in port, and whilst sailing.


USS Cole shows what can happen. Rare but risk enough to not dismiss it so off hand.
It only takes one single opportunity, one single gap in the net for the enemy to maybe penetrate.

Compliancy I what hurts you far more than many things.





Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/04 02:19:33


Post by: sebster


 Frazzled wrote:
In his defense, if major powers are going at it, such that carrier groups are being attacked, nukes are definitely, if not likely, going to eventually be used. Major powers haven't fought a duirect war in decades with a fear that would occur being a major driver to it not happening. Nuclear deterrance indeed worked.

If nuclear deterrance hasn't worked in the scenario, then odds are death from above is only a matter of time, and major sea battles would be one reason for it.

on the positive, in a short period of time I'd proffer fleet groups would have the capacity to actually defend themselves from old style missiles. THAAD's been deployed and hell I worked on THAAD so thats er...decades technology.


Two things - first is that 'in a battle between major powers the carrier groups will get nuked' doesn't mean, as BaconCatBug claimed, that carriers are therefore useless. Because there's lots of engagements that aren't fought against other major powers.
Since WWII the US has deployed aircraft carriers in wars in lots of wars to support US military objectives and never had them nuked. Clearly there's plenty of scope for carriers to support national objectives in conflicts short of nuclear war.

The second issue is that even in a conflict against a major nuclear power there is no certainty of nukes being used to take out carriers. Losing control of a sea lane due to the superiority of an enemy carrier group doesn't automatically mean nuclear retaliation and risking escalation towards total nuclear annihilation. That's a big risk, of course, but there's nothing certain about it.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
As I've said before to everybody, nobody, and I mean nobody will nuke a city in a time of war. That's an end of the world scenario that no nations wants to enact.

But if a US carrier fleet is in the middle of the Pacific? Dropping one nuke on them could be a tempting move. America would obviously be mad as hell, but that could be chalked up as a military loss, and not a civilian catastrophe.


It might be chalked up as a military loss. It also might not be. The side launching the nuke wouldn't be certain, the US probably wouldn't know right up until it happens to the carrier group how it will really respond. The US might decide it is better to accept the loss than give a nuclear retaliation of their own, but they might also feel backed in to a corner where nuclear retaliation is needed. That's the issue with use of nukes. Each step might escalate to the next, depending on whether countries feel they can back down or not.

So it's wrong to say that it will never happen, just as it's wrong to say it is certain to happen in some circumstances. We just don't know.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 jhe90 wrote:
USS Cole shows what can happen. Rare but risk enough to not dismiss it so off hand.
It only takes one single opportunity, one single gap in the net for the enemy to maybe penetrate.

Compliancy I what hurts you far more than many things.


Isolated terror attacks in times of relative peace are not effective wartime strategies. You can get lucky once and take a destroyer out of the fight for a while. Doing something similar to a carrier requires luck and planning a whole order of magnitude greater. And then to neutralise the US fleet you need to do that to seven carrier groups. And of course in wartime security is going to be much higher.

I'm not saying sabotage isn't a good weapon of war, it is. But it's more a useful side element, than a direct counter.

Let me put it this way, if you're about to go to war with a carrier equipped enemy, and your glorious leader says not to worry about the air dominance their carrier groups will give them because he has some sabotage operations planned, then start planning how you're gonna get you and your family the feth out of the country.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/04 14:08:25


Post by: A Town Called Malus


 sebster wrote:

Let me put it this way, if you're about to go to war with a carrier equipped enemy, and your glorious leader says not to worry about the air dominance their carrier groups will give them because he has some sabotage operations planned, then start planning how you're gonna get you and your family the feth out of the country.


Well, unless said plan is along the lines of the St. Nazaire raid. You don't need to target the ship directly with the sabotage in order for the sabotage to take a ship out of the war, after all. If you can damage the ports near the combat zone it requires to refuel, rearm and make repairs then you can turn what would be a minor repair job completed in a matter of days into a days long sail to the next closest port which can handle a ship your size plus repair time and then days sail back.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/04 14:34:45


Post by: trexmeyer


Has this been mentioned?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Challenge_2002

Red received an ultimatum from Blue, essentially a surrender document, demanding a response within 24 hours. Thus warned of Blue's approach, Red used a fleet of small boats to determine the position of Blue's fleet by the second day of the exercise. In a preemptive strike, Red launched a massive salvo of cruise missiles that overwhelmed the Blue forces' electronic sensors and destroyed sixteen warships. This included one aircraft carrier, ten cruisers and five of six amphibious ships. An equivalent success in a real conflict would have resulted in the deaths of over 20,000 service personnel.


Everything can be destroyed.


Still, the carrier's use as a mobile airbase gives it a degree of force projection never before seen. I don't see them losing much viability in a conventional war.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/04 18:23:10


Post by: Mr. Burning


 Ketara wrote:
It's almost as if things like guns, radar, and the common Mk I eyeball don't exist for some people.



Now I'll admit that a speedboat isn't much of a threat in the realm of layered defences.

More likely a missile would get through and cause some damage. At this point Politicians see an exponentially greater threat to their position. I don't think many of our MP's would understand combat operations in the light of the Daily Fail or Guardian claiming lack of defence expenditure is harming our troops and demanding action.

The BBC just ran an article asking if we can ever really minimize civilian casualties through use of drone strikes and military operations. Our Carriers will be great for force projection and acting as force multipliers, but in what situation? Afghanistan? Iraq? Syria? Yemen, Sudan (Humanitarian flag waving aside).

I fully support our efforts to create a carrier force, but you cant help feeling that HMS Queen Liz will have many many successful drug interdiction mission under her belt, by the time she is out of service.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/05 02:36:12


Post by: sebster


 A Town Called Malus wrote:
Well, unless said plan is along the lines of the St. Nazaire raid. You don't need to target the ship directly with the sabotage in order for the sabotage to take a ship out of the war, after all. If you can damage the ports near the combat zone it requires to refuel, rearm and make repairs then you can turn what would be a minor repair job completed in a matter of days into a days long sail to the next closest port which can handle a ship your size plus repair time and then days sail back.


St Nazaire was an effective means of sabotaging a port, and denying it to the enemy had strategic consequences. Actions like that are an effective tool of war, then as well as now. But to return to my point, that kind of operation is situational and inherently supportive of traditional war, it can't be used to make any conventional weapon of war entirely obselete. That doesn't change whether you're sabotaging the ship or it's supporting infrastructure.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/05 12:12:41


Post by: Peregrine


 A Town Called Malus wrote:
Well, unless said plan is along the lines of the St. Nazaire raid. You don't need to target the ship directly with the sabotage in order for the sabotage to take a ship out of the war, after all. If you can damage the ports near the combat zone it requires to refuel, rearm and make repairs then you can turn what would be a minor repair job completed in a matter of days into a days long sail to the next closest port which can handle a ship your size plus repair time and then days sail back.


Now you're talking about a ridiculously complicated plan where you have to hit the carriers AND simultaneously knock out all nearby repair options, where any one of these attacks is an act of war that will immediately put all other targets on alert. That's the kind of insanity that only works in fiction. If you really want to mission kill a carrier for cheap you throw a swarm of anti-ship missiles at it and saturate its defenses, and hope that the missiles that get through can put it out of the fight long enough to accomplish your strategic objectives.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/05 12:48:00


Post by: A Town Called Malus


 Peregrine wrote:
 A Town Called Malus wrote:
Well, unless said plan is along the lines of the St. Nazaire raid. You don't need to target the ship directly with the sabotage in order for the sabotage to take a ship out of the war, after all. If you can damage the ports near the combat zone it requires to refuel, rearm and make repairs then you can turn what would be a minor repair job completed in a matter of days into a days long sail to the next closest port which can handle a ship your size plus repair time and then days sail back.


Now you're talking about a ridiculously complicated plan where you have to hit the carriers AND simultaneously knock out all nearby repair options, where any one of these attacks is an act of war that will immediately put all other targets on alert. That's the kind of insanity that only works in fiction. If you really want to mission kill a carrier for cheap you throw a swarm of anti-ship missiles at it and saturate its defenses, and hope that the missiles that get through can put it out of the fight long enough to accomplish your strategic objectives.


You don't actually need to hit the ship to prevent it from being able to operate in the area of operations you want to deny it. The Tirpitz never got into the Atlantic, not because it was damaged alongside the Nazaire raid, but because the Nazaire raid made reaching a dock to carry out repairs from the Atlantic extremely risky, requiring either going through the English Channel or the GIUK gap, both of which were heavily defended by the Royal Navy.

Denying an enemy the possibility of safe repair can be just as effective at removing a ship from a warzone as actually damaging that ship.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/05 15:24:54


Post by: MDSW


 Frazzled wrote:
 Co'tor Shas wrote:
 BaconCatBug wrote:
They have been obsolete since the first ICBMs existed. All they exist for now is so the US and China can have dick-waving contests.

I mean that completely ignores reality. And also that there are more than two countries in the world.


Indeed there are six.

Texas.
Greater Texas (aka the US)
Norte Texas (Canada)
Mexico (central and south America)
Australia
Not Texas (everywhere else).


OMG, that literally made me LOL at work!!! I, too, am a Texan, so appreciate this in all its glorious Texas pride!!


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/05 16:01:19


Post by: jhe90


 MDSW wrote:
 Frazzled wrote:
 Co'tor Shas wrote:
 BaconCatBug wrote:
They have been obsolete since the first ICBMs existed. All they exist for now is so the US and China can have dick-waving contests.

I mean that completely ignores reality. And also that there are more than two countries in the world.


Indeed there are six.

Texas.
Greater Texas (aka the US)
Norte Texas (Canada)
Mexico (central and south America)
Australia
Not Texas (everywhere else).


OMG, that literally made me LOL at work!!! I, too, am a Texan, so appreciate this in all its glorious Texas pride!!
\

Australia.. i believe your spell check should say Catchan...


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/05 20:47:22


Post by: Easy E


 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
But it would be a proportionate response in my opinion.

No nation on Earth could stand back and do nothing if one of its cities got turned to ash, but losing military assets is different to civilian assets, because people know the risks if you join the military. It's a different mindset. During the Cold War, if the KGB killed a CIA agent, then the normal response was to kill a KGB agent in return. Both sides understood the 'rules.'

So, in this hypothetical situation, America loses a carrier fleet in the middle of nowhere, and the proportional response would be to nuke a Chinese military asset/base/airfield in retaliation, but NEVER a civilian target.



We would have to Nuke Taiwan to prove we were serious.



Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/05 22:13:44


Post by: Do_I_Not_Like_That


 Easy E wrote:
 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
But it would be a proportionate response in my opinion.

No nation on Earth could stand back and do nothing if one of its cities got turned to ash, but losing military assets is different to civilian assets, because people know the risks if you join the military. It's a different mindset. During the Cold War, if the KGB killed a CIA agent, then the normal response was to kill a KGB agent in return. Both sides understood the 'rules.'

So, in this hypothetical situation, America loses a carrier fleet in the middle of nowhere, and the proportional response would be to nuke a Chinese military asset/base/airfield in retaliation, but NEVER a civilian target.



We would have to Nuke Taiwan to prove we were serious.



Taiwan's on our side. Then again, given some of the gak electronic stuff I've bought over the years that was made in Taiwan, I sometimes wonder


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/06 02:59:11


Post by: sebster


 A Town Called Malus wrote:
You don't actually need to hit the ship to prevent it from being able to operate in the area of operations you want to deny it. The Tirpitz never got into the Atlantic, not because it was damaged alongside the Nazaire raid, but because the Nazaire raid made reaching a dock to carry out repairs from the Atlantic extremely risky, requiring either going through the English Channel or the GIUK gap, both of which were heavily defended by the Royal Navy.

Denying an enemy the possibility of safe repair can be just as effective at removing a ship from a warzone as actually damaging that ship.


Yes, but as I already said it doesn't matter that you switched the target from the carrier to its supporting infrastructure, you still have the issue of sabotage being isolated, attacks of opportunity with little ability to scale up to an overall war effort. I mean, even with the example St Nazaire the value of the operation was dependent on Royal Navy control of the Channel, showing the raid by itself wasn't sufficient.

So yes, sabotage can be valuable, and yes, that sabotage can be delivered against supporting infrastructure as well as the carriers themselves. But no, the threat of that sabotage by itself does not render any weapon of war obselete, particularly not carriers.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/06 13:42:31


Post by: Easy E


 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
 Easy E wrote:
 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
But it would be a proportionate response in my opinion.

No nation on Earth could stand back and do nothing if one of its cities got turned to ash, but losing military assets is different to civilian assets, because people know the risks if you join the military. It's a different mindset. During the Cold War, if the KGB killed a CIA agent, then the normal response was to kill a KGB agent in return. Both sides understood the 'rules.'

So, in this hypothetical situation, America loses a carrier fleet in the middle of nowhere, and the proportional response would be to nuke a Chinese military asset/base/airfield in retaliation, but NEVER a civilian target.



We would have to Nuke Taiwan to prove we were serious.



Taiwan's on our side. Then again, given some of the gak electronic stuff I've bought over the years that was made in Taiwan, I sometimes wonder


That's the beauty of it....Taiwan is on our side , but it is one of China's main objectives to recalim. Go ahead and reclaim this radioactive island of death now!

Clearly, I am in no mental state to control policy.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/06 13:55:09


Post by: Frazzled


 Easy E wrote:
 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
 Easy E wrote:
 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
But it would be a proportionate response in my opinion.

No nation on Earth could stand back and do nothing if one of its cities got turned to ash, but losing military assets is different to civilian assets, because people know the risks if you join the military. It's a different mindset. During the Cold War, if the KGB killed a CIA agent, then the normal response was to kill a KGB agent in return. Both sides understood the 'rules.'

So, in this hypothetical situation, America loses a carrier fleet in the middle of nowhere, and the proportional response would be to nuke a Chinese military asset/base/airfield in retaliation, but NEVER a civilian target.



We would have to Nuke Taiwan to prove we were serious.



Taiwan's on our side. Then again, given some of the gak electronic stuff I've bought over the years that was made in Taiwan, I sometimes wonder


That's the beauty of it....Taiwan is on our side , but it is one of China's main objectives to recalim. Go ahead and reclaim this radioactive island of death now!

Clearly, I am in no mental state to control policy.


"Such Iron! We never knew the Federation was capable."
-Some Ferengi.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/07 04:03:08


Post by: squidhills


 Easy E wrote:


That's the beauty of it....Taiwan is on our side , but it is one of China's main objectives to recalim. Go ahead and reclaim this radioactive island of death now!

Clearly, I am in no mental state to control policy.


Now, now... don't sell yourself short. Scorched Earth tactics can be quite useful in some circumstances.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/10 09:25:48


Post by: Seaward


Non-CATOBAR carriers have been obsolete for some time.

CATOBAR carriers are not going to be obsolete anytime soon.

The Navy is aware of the existence of anti-ship missiles.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/10 21:18:36


Post by: djones520


Seaward wrote:
Non-CATOBAR carriers have been obsolete for some time.

CATOBAR carriers are not going to be obsolete anytime soon.

The Navy is aware of the existence of anti-ship missiles.


What? Are you serious? The utmost experts in the world in Naval Warfare have an opinion that differs from some arm chair Admiral whose never been on a ship before?


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/10 21:38:33


Post by: JohnHwangDD


 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
what defence is there against those super-fast anti-ship missiles of death?


None. That's the point.

If you have spent huge amounts of blood and money into a carrier, you should keep a very wide berth of Americans, Chinese and Russian forces and bases. Just stay out of their de facto territorial waters, simple as that.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 Ketara wrote:
It's almost as if things like guns, radar, and the common Mk I eyeball don't exist for some people.


Tell that to the crew of the USS Fitzgerald...

Huge crew on that "nimble" destroyer, and they couldn't even avoid a floating skyscraper with fixed speed and heading.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/11 02:06:55


Post by: sebster


 JohnHwangDD wrote:
 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
what defence is there against those super-fast anti-ship missiles of death?


None. That's the point.


Dude, we've just 7 pages of people describing in reasonable detail the capabilities and limitations of the anti-missile defences on warships. Popping in after all that to say 'none' is just not useful.

Tell that to the crew of the USS Fitzgerald...

Huge crew on that "nimble" destroyer, and they couldn't even avoid a floating skyscraper with fixed speed and heading.


The presence of peace time accidents involving ship on ship collisions mean absolutely nothing in terms of war time vessels being able to identify and destroy an explosive packed ship attempting to ram them.

That's like referencing the Goldsboro incident to claim nukes are inherently uncontrollable, and therefore can't be used for any tactical or strategic purpose at all.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Seaward wrote:
Non-CATOBAR carriers have been obsolete for some time.

CATOBAR carriers are not going to be obsolete anytime soon.

The Navy is aware of the existence of anti-ship missiles.


Is the advantage of CATOBAR that it can launch fighters that don't have to be explicitly designed to have the high thrust for short take off? Which I guess hurts the aircraft design in other ways? Payload, range etc?

What planes are the Royal Navy going to launch of this new carrier?


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/11 04:38:34


Post by: Seaward


 sebster wrote:

Is the advantage of CATOBAR that it can launch fighters that don't have to be explicitly designed to have the high thrust for short take off? Which I guess hurts the aircraft design in other ways? Payload, range etc?


Yeah, that's one of the many advantages. If you're not using a CATOBAR carrier, whatever you're flying off of it is going to be, at best, a far more grave compromise than if you were. The F-35B's combat radius, for example, is a little north of 400 nmi, while the F-35C's is somewhere around 700. The C can also carry a heavier payload.

Another big advantage is sortie generation rate. The Nimitz class can launch three aircraft simultaneously, with a fourth immediately after, and then reload all the catapults with more birds and do it again in a relatively short amount of time. Since they don't use the entire flight deck for launching, the way a non-CATOBAR carrier does, it's also a lot easier to have aircraft staged and ready to launch. If we ever found ourselves in a World War II-style carrier duel again, we would have a massive advantage in being able to launch our entire air wings long before the Russians or Chinese or other ramp users could.


What planes are the Royal Navy going to launch of this new carrier?


F-35Bs, the STOVL/non-CATOBAR variant that our Marines will be using on amphib carriers.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/11 04:50:45


Post by: Gulgog TufToof


OP: John Michael Greer's book "Twilight's Last Gleaming" deals with the topic of cruise missile attacks on carriers specifically.

Edit: Also deals w/ the topic of nukes, China, Russia, aaaand Texas.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/11 07:03:26


Post by: sebster


Seaward wrote:
Yeah, that's one of the many advantages. If you're not using a CATOBAR carrier, whatever you're flying off of it is going to be, at best, a far more grave compromise than if you were. The F-35B's combat radius, for example, is a little north of 400 nmi, while the F-35C's is somewhere around 700. The C can also carry a heavier payload.

Another big advantage is sortie generation rate. The Nimitz class can launch three aircraft simultaneously, with a fourth immediately after, and then reload all the catapults with more birds and do it again in a relatively short amount of time. Since they don't use the entire flight deck for launching, the way a non-CATOBAR carrier does, it's also a lot easier to have aircraft staged and ready to launch. If we ever found ourselves in a World War II-style carrier duel again, we would have a massive advantage in being able to launch our entire air wings long before the Russians or Chinese or other ramp users could.


Ah, that makes sense. You've mentioned a few times about ramp launches being much worse and I wondered why, and now I know. Thanks.

F-35Bs, the STOVL/non-CATOBAR variant that our Marines will be using on amphib carriers.


Interesting. This prompted me to look up if the F-35B can launch off the Canberra class amphibious carriers. Apparently it can, but we're still dicking around deciding if we actually want to put them on our amphibious carriers. Like all countries that aren't the US, we only get new toys every couple of years or there abouts. So if we get the amphibious carriers one year, we have wait a while before we get the fifth gen planes to fly from it.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/11 07:15:21


Post by: jhe90


The 35B however can be operated off out carrier, our assult ships and even a solid land base..

We do not have luxury totally dedicated systems and designs.
Plus our carriers are some 30k tons lighter than US. Which could be a reason why also.


Aircraft carriers in the 21st century: still viable or obsolete?  @ 2017/07/12 08:24:14


Post by: Jadenim


The QE carriers are certainly big enough to operate as CATOBAR, if suitably fitted out, it was part of the original design considerations; they have a planned service life of 50-years and there is no guarantee that STOVL aircraft will be available beyond the F-35B (and even that wasn't guaranteed to be around when they started the project).

I'm sure I'd read that STOVL can have equal, if not greater, sortie generation, as you don't have to reset catapults, etc. You can pretty much taxi off the lift and straight into a take-off roll. However the combination of shorter range and lower payload certainly reduces the punch that a number of aircraft can deliver; an equal number of conventional carrier sorties could hit a single target with more ordnance or control a larger area.