No More U.S. Battleships?

Herman Hum

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No More U.S. Battleships?
"For the first time since the 1890s, the U.S. Navy soon could be without a battleship," Defense News says.

The Senate, in its version of the fiscal 2006 defense authorization bill, authorizes the Navy to dispose of the battleship Wisconsin and transfer it to the state of Virginia.

And a provision in the House version of the defense bill would transfer the battleship Iowa to the Port of Stockton, Calif.

Only two battleships remain in Navy custody: the Wisconsin, berthed at Nauticus maritime center in downtown Norfolk, Va., and the Iowa, moored in a mothball fleet at Suisun Bay, Calif. Per an agreement dating from the 1990s between the Navy and the Senate, the ships have been kept because their 16-inch guns can provide fire support for Marines on shore. The agreement mandates the Navy to keep the ships until an equal or greater fire support capability is operational.

But the Extended-Range Guided Munition (ERGM) intended to provide that new capability remains mired in developmental problems, and it’s not clear when — or even if — that weapon ever will be fielded.

Two other ships in the four-ship Iowa class, the Missouri and New Jersey are now museum ships in Hawaii and New Jersey, respectively.
 

Secret Agent

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Save the battlewagons
Oliver North (archive)


April 15, 2005


"There is no weapon system in the world that comes even close to the visible symbol of enormous power represented by the battleship." -- Retired Gen. P.X. Kelly, USMC

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Those words of the former Marine commandant resonate with me. In 1969, gunfire from the battleship USS New Jersey (BB-62) saved my rifle platoon in Vietnam. During her six months in-theater, the USS New Jersey's 16-inch guns were credited with saving more than 1,000 Marines' lives. The North Vietnamese so feared the ship that they cited her as a roadblock to the Paris peace talks. Our leaders, as they did so often in that war, made the wrong choice and sent her home. Now, 36 years later, Washington is poised to make another battleship blunder.

After the USS Iowa (BB-61) and USS Wisconsin, (BB-64) were taken out of active service in 1992, Congress passed Public Law 104-106, a 1996 measure requiring that our last two battleships be kept ready for reactivation. But today's Navy brass wants Congress to repeal the law, strike the ships from Naval Vessel Register -- the official list of available ships -- and donate them to museums.

The Navy, focusing on a new "strategic vision" called "sea basing," claims that the battleships' proven firepower is no longer necessary for Naval Surface Fire Support (NSFS) -- the kind of mission that saved my Marines three decades ago. Adm. Vernon Clark, the chief of naval operations, says that "Marines will be supported by combat air." That's great -- except when bad weather keeps the planes on deck instead of overhead. It also ignores the full range of support that is economically available from well-protected, highly mobile, gun and missile-firing battleships. This is not your grandfather's battlewagon.

In 1983, the USS New Jersey was the best support available to the Marines after their barracks were bombed in Beirut. During the "tanker war," in the mid-1980s, every time the USS Iowa steamed into the Persian Gulf, the Iranians ceased hostile action.

During Desert Storm, cruise missiles launched from both the USS Missouri (BB-63) and the USS Wisconsin attacked scores of targets deep inside Iraq; and an entire Iraqi Naval Infantry unit surrendered to one of the USS Wisconsin's unmanned aerial vehicles. Unlike any other naval vessel, battleships combine survivability, speed and immediate, heavy firepower.

The Navy claims that the "firepower problem" -- Marines call it "steel on target" -- will be solved by new, 5-inch Extended Range Guided Munitions (ERGM). Under development at great cost since 1996, the Government Accountability Office said in 2004 that the ERGM program is rife with cost overruns and that "its problems have led to test failures and delays."

In truth, the ERGM should have been scrubbed in March 2000, when the Marines told Congress that neither ERGM nor any other 5-inch round would meet Marines' lethality requirements. Worse still, a May 2001 internal Navy report admitted that ERGM won't meet Marines' volume of fire requirements, either. Both needs can easily be met by existing 16-inch guns on the battleships.

Navy planners insist that a new DD(X)-class of ships -- also still in development -- will surpass battleships' NSFS capabilities. But on April 1, 2003, Marine Commandant Gen. Michael Hagee testified that our nation's expeditionary forces "will remain at considerable risk" for want of NSFS until the DD(X) joins the fleet "in significant numbers." Since then, the Navy has reduced the DD(X) buy from 24 ships to five. This leaves Marines high and dry unless Iowa and Wisconsin are available for rapid reactivation.

Even if the Navy ordered more of the DD(X) class -- at $2 billion to $3.5 billion each -- these small, thin-skinned vessels are highly vulnerable to "sea skimmer" missiles. And a terrorist action, like the 2000 attack on the USS Cole -- which crippled the destroyer and killed 17 -- would do similar damage to a DD(X).

Naval officers admit that heavily armored battleships are practically impervious to such strikes, but claim that what the DD(X) lacks in armor it will make up in stealth and speed. To embattled Marines that just means their nearest naval gunfire support will be far out at sea and traveling at high speed -- neither of which contribute to accurate "steel on target" for troops fighting ashore.

Our Navy currently has no capability for providing the lethal, high-volume firepower that would be required if -- God forbid -- we should have to land Marines on the coasts of Iran or North Korea, or in defense of Taiwan. When the Marines assaulted Um Qasr at the start of Operation Iraqi Freedom in March 2003, they had to rely on naval gunfire from an Australian frigate. The Navy's answer is to wait six years for the costly, unproven ERGM system and a half-dozen or fewer, yet-to-be-built DD(X) ships. But America's enemies may not wait that long. And America's taxpayers may not want to pay the price -- in blood or treasure. The DD(X)-ERGM experiments are estimated to cost between $12 billion and $16 billion.

It would take less than two years to reactivate the Iowa and Wisconsin. The battleships are 10 percent faster than the still-conceptual DD(X). They each bring to bear 12 5-inch and nine 16-inch guns -- capable, with new munitions, of firing accurately to nearly 100 miles. The two battleships can also carry nearly twice as many cruise missiles as all the DD(X) hulls combined. All that firepower is available for $2 billion -- the cost of one DD(X).

Sometimes, as I tell my grandchildren, older is better. In the case of the two battlewagons, older is not only superior, it's also a lot less expensive.


Oliver North is a nationally syndicated columnist and the founder and honorary chairman of Freedom Alliance.
http://www.townhall.com/columnists/ollienorth/on20050415.shtml
 
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Seldom do I agree with Col. North. This is one time he is absolutely right.

Newer isn't better, only newer. With the quality of construction of the Iowa class BBs, and modern technology, these ships can be lethal for another couple of generations.
 

The Doctor

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The foundries necessary to build ships and guns like that no longer exist. The Navy needs to keep one (preferably both) of these ships in reserve until a weapons system is deployed with as good or better fire support capability.
 

CV32

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The Iowa's were awesome fire support assets, no doubt. But with the length of time they have been laid up, and with more systemic maintenance problems like that experienced with the carrier Kennedy, I can't help but think that the opportunity to keep the battleships alive has passed. What is their present condition generally, or that of the powder bags for those 16 inch guns ?
 
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CV32 said:
The Iowa's were awesome fire support assets, no doubt. But with the length of time they have been laid up, and with more systemic maintenance problems like that experienced with the carrier Kennedy, I can't help but think that the opportunity to keep the battleships alive has passed. What is their present condition generally, or that of the powder bags for those 16 inch guns ?
As stated in the article, it would take about two years to geta dormany BB up to snuff.

The components of each round would be the issue. As Doc said, the foundaries no longer exist that could manufacture more ammo for the 16 inch guns. Between the rounds, the powder bags, and everything else needed to fire one of those flying trucks a lot needs to be considered. I would assume that it would still be cheaper to ramp up manufacture of those elements, than to build new ships with similar firepower.
 

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Doctor Sinister said:
How would one of these things stand up to a modern sea-skimming missile?

Just curious...

Dr. S.
Are you kidding? These things were designed to withstand hits by Japan's Yamoto battleships, which, IIRC, had 20 inch guns. A modern ASM would only make a dent! Not even you could destroy it! :devil:
 

The Doctor

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Doctor Sinister said:
How would one of these things stand up to a modern sea-skimming missile?

Just curious...

Dr. S.
If they were to operate in an area of severe SSM threat, they would carry enough extra paint to repair any damage that the missiles could cause.
 

Herman Hum

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Secret Agent said:
Are you kidding? These things were designed to withstand hits by Japan's Yamoto battleships, which, IIRC, had 20 inch guns.
Wasn't something similar said about the near-invincibility of the Bismarck?
 

The Doctor

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The Japanese Battleships Musashi and Yamato are the closest analogies to Iowa Class BB's. Both ships were operating with little or no air cover and sustained massive damage prior to sinking.

On 24 October 1944, while en route to the prospective battle area off the Leyte landing beaches, Musashi and her consorts were attacked by hundreds of U.S. Navy carrier aircraft. In this Battle of the Sibuyan Sea, she was hit by some nineteen torpedoes and seventeen bombs. Though her heavy protection withstood this massive damage to a degree probably unsurpassed by any other contemporary warship, Musashi capsized and sank about four hours after she received her last hit.
http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/sh-fornv/japan/japsh-m/musashi.htm



The carrier planes began their attacks in the early afternoon, scoring immediate bomb and torpedo hits on Yamato and sinking Yahagi and a destroyer. Three other destroyers were sunk over the next hour, as the Japanese continued to steam southwards. In all, Yamato was struck by some ten torpedoes, mainly on the port side, and several bombs. At about 1420 on the afternoon of 7 April, less than two hours after she was first hit, the great battleship capsized to port, exploded and sank, leaving behind a towering "mushroom" cloud. Fewer than 300 men of Yamato's crew were rescued. Nearly 2500 of her men were lost, plus over a thousand more from Yahagi and the escorting destroyers. U.S. losses totalled ten aircraft and twelve aircrewmen.
http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/sh-fornv/japan/japsh-xz/yamato-n.htm

 

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...Yawn...One Oscar/Victor/Akula....4 SET-45 torpedos...shaken not stirred...big hole(s) in bottome of battleship, followed by wake homing torpedo (no rudders, no screws...) equals one dead BB. And it ain't the shells or powder bags that would be the problem...it's the boilers and the main battery mechanisms. You'd have to find enough boiler techs...er, ain't none of them left, they call them "machinist mates" to main the boilers (and this is an arcane art, believe me). Then you'd have to dredge up enough qualified gunners mates to not only operate the guns, but to lay them in, and work the ammunition hoists (more complicated machinery).

Sorry, but if you want to really mess up someones shoreline, get a nice big ship with a big flat deck, put a couple of hundred mortars aboard, and fire away. And with that many, accuracy would not be a large issue :p . Seriously, you could put gunfire support weapons on just about anything, and just get it to the beach. You don't have to have a billion dollar ship to get them there, just something that will power itself to the beach, has acceptable communications available, and room for ammunition. All the rest, is gingerbread.

Boats
 

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Boats said:
...Yawn...One Oscar/Victor/Akula....4 SET-45 torpedos...shaken not stirred...big hole(s) in bottome of battleship, followed by wake homing torpedo (no rudders, no screws...) equals one dead BB.
What's a SET-45 ? Never heard of it. Oh, and you might want to use the wake homer first, before the ship stops dead in the water from the four torpedo hits. No propulsion, no wake. ;)

Sorry, but if you want to really mess up someones shoreline, get a nice big ship with a big flat deck, put a couple of hundred mortars aboard, and fire away. And with that many, accuracy would not be a large issue :p .
Hmmm, range and terminal effect might be. Don't know any mortars that can send a shell out to 20 nm, or penetrate 30 feet of concrete.
 

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Picky, picky, picky...I figured that the weapons exploding under the hull would cause severe damage, but might not sink it. Wake homers would certainly open up the stern tubes, and rudder posts, and cause the stern to settle quite a bit, not to mention the horrendous damage done to all the compartments the shafts pass through, not to exclude flooding.

As for the mortars, you should read more about WW2...battleship fire did little if any real damage to fortifications, unless there was a very lucky direct frontal strike. When attacking fortifications like bunkers, you want plunging fires...much like is delivered by mortars. My point, was that if NGFS is needed, you don't need a battleship. You only need a platform that will mount the weapons, feed them, and guide them. The other ships of the battle group will protect this ship...and no I don't think we need to go to the extravagance of the Arsenal ship.

Boats
 

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1) WW2 battleships were designed to withstand side impacts by relatively primitive torpedoes. They have no design provision whatsoever (armor belt, multi-hull spacing, shock protection, you name it) for underkeel detonations. What this means is that any modern torpedo or mine is going to cause a world of mayhem to them. A heavy anti-surface torpedo (like one of those 650mm Russian mothers with their 1-ton warheads, or a couple of Western 533's) would have no problem breaking a battleship's back and sending it to the bottom faster than you can say "design obsolesence".

2) The oft-bragged-about "superthick armor belt" actually covers a relatively small portion of the ship, IIRC the bridge, flag and CIC sections. Most of the rest of the ship has the typical WW2 ship armor and substantial portions of the board are _wood_ (unless that has been renovated and I didn't hear about it). Guess what happens to the super-armored section's bouyancy when the rest of the ship gets more holes than a Swiss cheese...

3) Modern anti-surface weapons are far more lethal than anything the Japanese could throw at the Iowas in WW2. To quote Paul J. Adam, an SS-N-22 impacts with ten times the kinetic energy and twenty times the explosive load of a typical 16-inch shell (and let's not even go to the real beasts like SS-N-12/19 or AS-4/6). Think what these numbers mean for a second. And even if we're talking about light & slow sea-skimmers like the Exocet or Harpoon, there's still the matter of most of the ship (sans super-armored island) being vulnerable to them. Hell, even plain 5-inch munitions these days have far better accuracy and penetration thn they used to.

4) The main guns of the Iowa have a 150x500m dispersion pattern, according to the field manual. Want to be the marine that fights on the front with such an inaccurate weapon supporting you? Not me, thanks. If I'm about to die, at least let it be from an enemy round. I'd much rather have overhead CAS-air & helos plinking enemy positions.

Their rate of fire is also lackluster. Quoting PJA again:

"[As the enemy, which ship would I rather have firing at me?] The battleship. Thirty seconds between salvoes while firing for effect? I can cover two hundred yards a minute on foot under battleship fire even if they're properly registered. (Up, run for twenty seconds, down, wait for the next salvo, up, run...). OTOH, even a single 5" mount lands a shell on my position every three seconds. Just raising my head becomes dangerous.
Rate of fire is _much_ more important than shell size for most applications."

Also there's the subject of limited range. The 16'' guns have a maximum range of ~23nm (and an effective range shorter than that). IIRC current USN doctrine is that NGFS platforms should stand at least 25nm off-shore, at which distance the Iowas can't even hit the shoreline. Modern gun & ammo systems like 5-inch RAPs (and soon ERGM and possibly naval ATACMS) are more appropriate.

5) 1500-man crew (just count the salaries...). 60-year-old machinery and equipment. Design & construction techniques long surpassed. Drydock queens easily surpassing supercarriers in maintenance requirements (without any of their benefits).


"Facts, those stubborn things"
 
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CV32

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I don't think there is any doubt that torpedoes are the way to kill a battleship. In fact, they're a great way to kill just about anything that floats, aren't they. I don't know of any warship that likes torpedoes; sure, some are better protected than others, but there's a reason why they called the Soviet/Russian 650mm heavyweight torpedo a "carrier killer". On the other hand, sending a battleship into the littoral where there is any serious risk of enemy submarines would be kinda risky, don't ya think ? :laugh: :whist:
 

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CV32 said:
I don't think there is any doubt that torpedoes are the way to kill a battleship. In fact, they're a great way to kill just about anything that floats, aren't they. I don't know of any warship that likes torpedoes; sure, some are better protected than others, but there's a reason why they called the Soviet/Russian 650mm heavyweight torpedo a "carrier killer". On the other hand, sending a battleship into the littoral where there is any serious risk of enemy submarines would be kinda risky, don't ya think ? :laugh: :whist:
Thus putting the oft quoted argument to rest, that it looks really scary to a nations military to see that big grey battleship sitting offshore...right up until an SSK puts a spread into it, or it runs into a minefield....

Boats
 
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