Why Battleships?

In a past post (see, "Why Not Battleships?") we reviewed the arguments against a modern battleship and were unable to find a compelling reason not to build them.  However, that does not necessarily mean that there are any compelling reasons to build them.  Let’s see if there are.  Here are some of the arguments for a battleship.

Presence – One of the Navy’s major justifications for its very existence is presence/deterrence.  Personally, I find that rationale to be completely unfounded and historically dubious but that’s a separate topic.  The Navy feels presence is a major justification and nothing says presence like a battleship.  Even critics would have to agree with this – they may not agree that it’s worth it but they can’t deny the sheer imposing presence of a battleship.  There is no better naval presence or deterrence than a battleship.

So, presence would seem to be a valid reason to build battleships.

Firepower – As we noted in the previous post, a battleship has more firepower, more sustained firepower, and more responsive firepower than a carrier – and the battleship’s firepower can’t be jammed, decoyed, shot down, or have a pilot captured.

Within its inherent range limitation, the firepower of the battleship, therefore, offers a viable alternative to a carrier group which frees up the carrier for its primary mission of air superiority and escort of Tomahawk shooters.

A battleship utterly dominates anything it can reach.

So, firepower would seem to be a valid reason to build battleships.

Flexibility – As noted in the preceding discussion of firepower, a battleship offers the ability to conduct significant strikes without requiring a carrier.  This flexibility would be operationally advantageous given the limited number of carriers in the fleet.

Further, the ability of a battleship to operate as the centerpiece of a powerful surface group gives the navy the flexibility to operate more surface groups than just the few carrier groups that are currently possible.

So, flexibility would seem to be a valid reason to build battleships.

Amphibious Assault – We’ve noted that the Navy/Marine amphibious assault doctrine completely negates any possibility of gun support.  Given the Marine’s already light combat structure, the absence of naval gun support effectively renders the entire concept of amphibious assault null and void.  The existence of battleship gun support completely changes that picture and makes amphibious assault conceptually possible again.  The ability to stand relatively near shore and provide gun support with near-immunity to land based rockets, artillery, and anti-ship missiles (via the small size of mobile anti-ship missiles and the presence of the Aegis umbrella) is a huge advantage in an assault.  

So, amphibious assault would seem to be a valid reason to build battleships.

Pressure – The Navy’s distributed lethality concept is predicated on the ability to apply much greater operational and tactical pressure on the enemy by forcing them to account for more threats.  Again, ComNavOps believes this is bilgewater but the Navy believes it.  That being the case, a battleship, alone (stupid) or in a group, would be the epitome of creating additional pressure on the enemy’s operational and tactical situation.  Unlike, say, an LCS with a few anti-ship missiles (if that comes to be), a battleship would be a major threat to both the enemy’s surface and land assets.  The enemy would have to devote significant resources to defending against a battleship group.

So, pressure would seem to be a valid reason to build battleships.

Range – The Iowa class battleships had a range of 15,000 nm at 15 kts, according to Wiki.  Short of nuclear propulsion, this is about as good as it gets.  This type of range is particularly applicable to the Pacific/China theatre and stands out in stark contrast to the LCS which has proven to be a disaster in its deployments to the Pacific.  Given the Navy’s limited bases and limited at-sea replenishment and refueling ships, a powerful ship with great range is mandatory.

So, range would seem to be a valid reason to build battleships.

We noted no compelling reasons not to build modern battleships and now we note several reasons to build them.  Operational and tactical flexibility combined with immense firepower are the main reasons for building modern battleships.  The increase in lethality and options that a battleship provides would be a tremendous advantage for any fleet.  The logic seems clear – battleships are a good idea and a modern battleship is long overdue.

Offensive Aegis

As ComNavOps was reviewing some general naval history and pondering the Navy’s current force structure he couldn’t help but be reminded that the strength and backbone of the fleet (well, the surface fleet, anyway) is Aegis.  Any surface combatant that doesn’t start with the letters CVN (carrier) is an Aegis ship, either a Burke or a Tico.  I’m reminded that Aegis is a strictly defensive system.  True, that's not exactly headline news but thinking a bit further I realized that the entire might of the fleet was designed as a defensive force.  Now, by good fortune, VLS and Tomahawk have allowed the Aegis ships to project a bit of offensive firepower, as well, but it remains a fact that the Navy hasn't commissioned a purpose-built offensive platform since [not sure?].  If you care to look at it this way, the surface Navy consists of defensive Aegis platforms and carriers.

Still not earthshaking revelations.  Where's this going?  Well, it occurs to me that the Navy needs an offensive equivalent to Aegis.  I'm not just talking about a better anti-ship cruise missile than Harpoon or a bigger gun but a complete game-changing offensive system. 

Such a system should have several hundred mile to 1000+ mile weapons range.  The weapons should be stealthy, supersonic, and pack a punch with a range of weapons varying from one-hit, one-kill on the largest ships to Hellfire size weapons for small targets.

The most important aspect of a game-changing offensive system, though, would have to lie in the sensor and fire control systems (SFC).  A system should have the ability to detect and classify targets at several hundred to thousand mile ranges.  The fire control should be capable of not just guiding the weapons but assigning individual targets once in the target area. 

The problem, of course, is that current technology can't provide that kind of performance from the weapons launching platform.  So, what about launching the sensor/fire control system along with (or ahead of) the weapons?  The Soviets were working towards this but I don't know how far along they got.  Basically, large missiles whose payload is sensors and fire control rather than a warhead.  Several of these would form a line-of-sight SFC network for the accompanying missiles.  By definition, this would involve a significant degree of autonomy.  Basically, waves of missiles capable of reasoned search, target classification, and intelligent weapons allocation.

I could imagine waves of SFC missiles with accompanying anti-ship missiles sweeping the East/South China Seas.  Maybe we have a use for the Mk57 launch cells?

To an extent, UAVs could do this except that no UAV has anywhere near the speed, range, and payload to be effective.

Going further, launching platforms, meaning the ships themselves, that can detect and target at the required distances would be nice.  From what I can gather, the old Spruance Outboard system was attempting to do exactly that by collating passive sensor information from multiple sensors on multiple platforms – and not just sea based, either.  Land and air based sensors can contribute just as readily as ships.  The concept is that each individual sensor’s information is woefully insufficient by itself for targeting but that the combination of information from the multitude of sensors can be assembled into a targeting quality picture.  Think of it as triangulation on a vast scale.  If that could be refined, that might provide the hugely over-the-horizon detection that's needed.  If you think about it, it’s not all that different in concept from the Co-operative Engagement Capability (CEC) that’s currently used for defensive anti-air warfare.

Well, enough rambling.  I don't know the specifics but I just know that we need an offensive system equivalent to what Aegis gave us defensively.

What do you think?  Anything to this or does ComNavOps need to up the dosages of his medications?

SSGN - The Navy's Best Strike Platform

I’d like to talk about what I feel is the Navy’s best platform, the guided missile submarine (SSGN).  Their existence is not a secret by any means and yet relatively few people are aware of them or have a good feel for their capabilities.



SSGN - 154 Strike Missiles



There are four SSGNs and they were converted from Ohio class ballistic missile subs.  These are pure Tomahawk land attack missile platforms.  Of the original 24 Trident missile tubes on the Ohio, 22 were converted to hold 7 Tomahawk cruise missiles each, giving a strike capacity of 154 missiles.  The remaining two tubes were converted to swimmer lockout chambers for special ops.



Think about what these SSGNs provide.  A massive land attack capability is contained in a single ship which is the hardest platform to find in the world.  When we discuss ways to overcome the Anti-Access/Area Denial (A2/AD) threat this has got to be the main answer.  An SSGN can penetrate the A2/AD zone with relative ease and deliver an entire surface group’s worth of cruise missiles with near impunity. 

The only drawback is that the Navy has only four of these subs.  While that is plenty during peacetime, the Navy will certainly wish for more if war with China occurs.



VPM with Seven Missiles



The other problem is that the SSGNs are scheduled to be retired starting in about ten years and the Navy has indicated that they will not produce a direct replacement.  The currently discussed solution is the addition of a Virginia Payload Module (VPM) to stretched versions of the Virginia class.  Four modules would be added to each Virginia.  Each module holds 7 missiles which would add 28 missiles to the 12 already present in Virginias for a total of 40 missiles per sub.  Thus, four of the stretched Virginias would provide the same strike capacity as a single SSGN.  The Navy estimates that the conversion would add about 20% ($400M) to the cost of a Virginia.  Bear in mind that Navy cost estimates are notoriously underestimated. 



On the plus side, distributing the strike capacity among four subs instead of one spreads the risk and decreases the impact of losing a single platform.  On the minus side, having to send four subs to do the job of one makes for a crowded launch area and increases the risk of detection.  Whether it’s better to have four strike platforms versus a single one depends on a detailed understanding of submarine operations that I just don’t have.  The Navy built the current SSGNs as a single platform because that’s what they had to work with.  They’re looking at building multiple, smaller platforms now because, again, that’s what they have to work with, at least until the next generation Ohio replacement, the SSBN(X), becomes available. 

The SSGNs are our single most potent and effective strike platform.  While the cost of providing replacements in the form of stretched Virginias is high, this is one area where the cost is fully justified.