Battleship critics and proponents have argued back and forth
for decades, however, there is one overwhelming and undeniable reason why we
had battleships and why we need them today:
they’re able to fight, absorb damage, and continue to fight. The WWII history of the USS Colorado, BB-45,
amply illustrates this capability.
Following are three instances where the Colorado sustained potentially
serious damage that would have incapacitated or sunk any other type of ship.
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| USS Colorado - Note the cluster of three 5" shielded mounts on the forward superstructure. The open backs of the mounts can be clearly seen. |
Tinian
While providing gun support during the amphibious assault on
Tinian on 24-July-1944 she sustained 22 shell hits from 150 mm Japanese shore
batteries which caused 43 deaths and 198 wounded. Colorado reported one 5”/51 gun and one 5”/25
gun knocked out. Note that both guns were unarmored, open mounts. Despite the damage, Colorado continued
shelling the island and providing fire support for the ground forces until
3-Aug-1944
Does anyone think a
Burke could absorb 22x 150mm shell hits and continue its mission (or even stay
afloat)?
Mindoro
Colorado returned to the US for repairs but arrived in Leyte
to provide fire support for the assault.
On 27-Nov-1944, the battleship sustained two kamikaze hits, Colorado
reported that one did no damage but the other knocked out two 5’/51 gun mounts
and one 40 mm mount. Casualties were 19
killed and 72 wounded. Again, all three
mounts were unarmored, open mounts. Shrugging
off the damage, Colorado bombarded Mindoro from 12=17 December 1944 before
withdrawing to Manus Island for repairs.
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| USS Colorado Moments After Kamikaze Hit |
Does anyone think a
Burke could absorb two Kamikaze (each roughly equivalent to a cruise missile) hits
and continue its mission (or even stay afloat)?
Lingayen Gulf
Colorado then took part in pre-assault shelling of Lingayen
Gulf. On 9-Jan-1945, she was hit by
friendly 5” shells which hit the Sky Control (air defense station) superstructure,
resulting in 18 dead and 51 wounded. After repairs at Ulithi, Colorado joined Task
Force 54 for the pre-invasion shelling Okinawa.
Does anyone think a
Burke could absorb 5” shells and continue its mission?
In each case, Colorado was hit hard and yet was able to stay
in the fight and continue its missions.
It is also noteworthy that Colorado was able to absorb
significant damage and remain combat effective despite being an older armor
design as opposed to the newer North Carolina, South Dakota, and Iowa class
battleships. The later classes would
have been even less affected by the Colorado’s damage.
Note that in the first two incidents, all the reported
damage was inflicted on unarmored, open mount guns (depending on the time
period, the mounts may have had open-ended, lightweight, weather shields). Being an ‘old’ battleship, relegated to
secondary duty, Colorado was armed with the older style open mount guns instead
of the armored, closed 5” mounts that were standard on the newer battleships. Had Colorado had the newer, armored, closed 5”
mounts the damage would have been minimal to non-existent. The casualties were largely due to the
multitude of open mounts resulting in sailors being exposed on deck.
Discussion
Now consider what will happen when our top end surface
combatant, the Burke, gets hit in a future battle/operation.
For starters, the ship will likely sink from anything
remotely approaching the kind of damage that Colorado absorbed without missing
a beat.
Beyond that, almost any hit will result in a mission kill,
at the very least. This means thet
ship’s tasking in the operation will be missing and either that task will go
wanting – likely leading to further difficulties/losses for the overall
force/operation – or it will necessitate pulling another ship from some other
tasking to take over the mission killed task.
Of course, that leaves a gap somewhere else. And so on and so on with ripple effects
extending throughout the fleet and the theater.
If 22x 150 mm shells had mission killed the Colorado, either
vital gun support would have been reduced, leading to increased difficulty and risk
for the ground troops, or some other battleship or heavy cruiser would have had
to have been pulled off its tasking to take over for Colorado which would leave
a gap in whatever the new ship was previously doing.
Do you see the value (the force multiplication, in a very
real sense) that battleships, or any armored ship that can take a hit and keep
fighting, bring to the fleet commander?
Consider, also, the element of risk. The WWII naval commander could, for example,
task Colorado with close range bombardment without unduly worrying about some
enemy artillery hits (or 22 of them!) sinking or badly damaging the ship. In contrast, today’s commander can’t even
entertain the thought of placing a Burke within range of enemy artillery no
matter how vital the gun support might be for success of the ground operation. The battleship offers a greater range of
options because of its toughness. That
is not the case with Burkes.
What we have to recognize is that it’s not just a question
of absorbing damage and not sinking, it’s a question of continuing the
mission (staying in the fight), fully effective, not having to leave the
combat theater, and not needing another ship to be pulled off other duty to
take the original ship’s place. It’s
that secondary, ripple effect that the battleship’s armor, size, and toughness eliminates
and, in so doing, makes the battleship even more effective and valuable. Being able to continue fighting and continue
the mission is a force multiplier for the fleet.
We have no ship, today, that can sustain even a fraction of
the damage that Colorado did, let alone shrug it off and continue to
fight. This is what a ship – battleship,
in this specific example – that can absorb battle damage and keep fighting/operating
brings to the table.
We’ve lost this capability and we need to regain it.
