"Hewitt interviews top Congressman on Navy future" Topic

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Interesting stuff on aircraft carriers

Surprise, they want more money. There is only so much money and cutting Fed payroll or taking money from other pots will go over like a lead balloon, those dems he mentions will change their vote when primary opponents bring up how they cut into a social program. Lots of pie-in-the-sky "oh trust us, we'll fix it THIS time" talk. Call me a skeptic.

Well. we do need more ships.

Why do you need more ships?

Not too long ago we didn't because we had a 1000 ship navy with all our allies always where. Oh wait Australia just said those subs they buy from the US, don't pencil those in to defend Taiwan.

Andy, do you recall what happened when the Royal Navy decommissioned their last aircraft carrier?

They got a war in the Falklands.

IMO these two guys are too political about the naval balance of power and the Navy in this bro fest interview.

What an apparent waste of a trip for Rep Calvert. No mention of the four new US bases on the north Philippine coast within easy reach of the South China Sea and Taiwan. In China's backyard. Does he get what all those weapons going into Taiwan mean? High tech controlled detonation sea mine program now going in on the invasion routes? No understanding of the restoration of the Pacific trade agreement that also restored our military connections with Australia and Japan on defending the region? The joint exercises? Beefing up our other Pacific bases? Sounds like he went to the beach in Tahiti instead! Oh and this quote "Submarines go underwater. You can hide them."

The Navy is being forced to retain the most defective ships in American naval history, the LCS class, by a Florida Congressman and his friends for one reason. Money and jobs for his district. Same in Wisconsin, where somebody else is bringing home the pork to build a revised version of this major failure. All done with lobbyists and self interested Congressmen. Just one of many examples in this pork fest.

Numbers of ships…really? It will take China many years to equal the number of carrier battle groups we have. Or anyone else. Britain has one.

Not to mention – how are they getting their invasion force to Taiwan? Because right now they do not have nearly enough of the ships needed to do this complex operation and no experience.

Never mind the quality, experience, tradition, the Chinese are still well behind us in numbers that matter. They will put to sea their first real full size carrier for trials this year. So what if they have built more frigates than the US because they are easier to build? And what about tech experience in air ops? Pilots? Once they get their daily political training done, how fast will they reach the level of US pilots? Does anyone realize how hard this is to do and how good we are?

The new Enterprise is due around 2026-28 or so. Pride of the fleet, a massive symbol of naval strength. High tech missile defenses. Massive mobile offense striking power. We can defend these ships. Perhaps we prefer not to explain how we do this to the Chinese.

We are turning out the next generations of subs. Faster, quieter, versatile. Already discussed here.

Its not the numbers of ships. But we need to fix the procurement process. The Navy asked the LCS class to do too many things. It had major manufacturing defects. Nearly useless. Get the lobbying and congressional greed under control. Not happening right now, maybe. But new laws and protocols are needed.

Want to know how to really get a ton of money for more ships, Rep Calvert? Reform how defense spending works in Congress and with contractors. And stop the traditional waste by the military itself. Remember the $10,000 USD toilet seat? Congress has zero cred on defense spending priorities. Time to get to work for all of us.

Well, they discussed some of that, Tort, especially procurement. And the discussion of the survivability of carriers was interesting; IS the Navy now thinking that they are useful everywhere except near China?

Plus, that bit about destroying a carrier = 5000 kia = full-out war was VERY interesting in terms of what we are thinking about what the Chinese are thinking.

Remember this is radio, and relatively brief.

We would have long since discovered how vulnerable carriers remain if we had fought a Naval war since WWII. Hypersonic weapons just add to the challenge, but the fundamental problem is swarm attacks of any kind.The surface ships have to dedicate so many of their VLS cells to carrier defense, that we limit the real long range strike capacity for cruiser and destroyer Tomahawks. What we don't need are more huge targets with short range strike capabilities, i.e. birdfarms. What we need are more SSGNs, more SSNs, more destroyers, the ability to engage targets over the horizon with air defenses, the ability to reload VLS at sea, and a mother-ton more of Tomahawks, Standard missiles,Torpedos, and mines.

Sinking a carrier will either make us go home or transform a regional war into one viewed as must won at all costs. Remember the Alamo, Maine, Pearl Harbor, 911, etc.

I do get excited about naval matters…. maybe I was too harsh, but I would still ask Rep Calvert to try not to help us so much until he figures out where all the current money goes. Any member of Congress who wants to retain the LCS program or tell the navy which ships to build or how many is suspect, IMO.

The survivability of carriers has been an issue since their inception. There are more threats, but also more ways to protect them than ever. There is just too much classified info about this right now to reach a conclusion about how risky China operations might be. Surrounded by strong bases and with the right tech, I suspect they are a serious worry for the Chinese. In a war, there will be risks for everyone.

China is certainly in a hurry to build their own carrier groups, why do this if there are so vulnerable? But the idea that the Pacific is weak is mostly politics. There is a lot going on there.

Reopening the base on Tinian, where the A bombs took off from, is part of a designed dispersal plan for better defense. People are serving in more remote locations, with more weapons, in greater numbers than at any time since WW2. The Pacific shift was already starting when Putin pulled the trigger on Ukraine, but it did not really let up. Much of the hubbub about changing the Marines' mission involved retooling them for fast deployment Pacific fighting, I think.

We are flying over Chinese warships on a regular basis, just short of confrontation. Japan is getting ready to launch a major military expansion. The joint exercises really bug Xi. Australia will be able to put nuke subs in play.

Of course, in the end, we hope these are cards to play in reaching an agreement and not a prelude to a shooting war. I suspect it would be horribly costly for the US and China would come even worse. We are better than they are and have far more combat experience. They have virtually none. Xi understands the concept of a fleet in-being, I think, especially after watching Putin throw his cards away.

And then there are nukes. But these 2-bit dictators are still smart enough not to destroy for generations the territories they want to grab. We hope…

Lost Pict these are great points and part of the answer. What happens when China puts a huge bunch of drones in the air? We don't know what we don't know.

But the carriers also bring a psychological factor into play. Four or five battle groups appearing off your coast while you are running a massive complex amphibious operation that you have never done before has gotta be a thrill. Now it is China who has to assign its resources and set priorities to meet threats to their own naval and shore forces. The bird farms are still relevant, and we are doing the other stuff you mentioned, sea mines for example.

Carriers will maybe go the way of the battleship later in the century. But they remain a scary weapon for now. As I said, we don't know what we don't know.

Yes, good points, thanks both.

As to procurement, sure, but it has long been understood that any advanced weapons system will have parts manufactured in 218 Congressional districts and 26 states.

That is no doubt more costly, but otoh there may be advantages, both economically and in terms of vulnerability of targets, in having a dispersed manufacturing of weapons.

In any case it is a political necessity.

I work on weapons development for the Navy. Stuff costs a lot, in part due to most systems never being fielded (dying in the Valley of Death between R&D abd acquisition). It's worse when the platforms for the weapons are axed. A good example was the Advanced Gun System (AGS), a long-range 155mm guided round for the DDG-1000 destroyers. The gun worked and the round worked, but when the ship buy was slashed to 3 hulls the per round cost soared by 10x because you still have to absorb R&D and production set-up costs. The round was cancelled and we have three state of the art ships that have cool guns without ammo. These ships will now get the Conventional Prompt Strike (CPS), but this is a very differet mission than the requirements that drove the design.

I have worked on most of the ships and weapons regularly discussed in these forums, Ford class carriers, LCS, F-35,F-18, and most Navy conventional missile / gun systems. Making the technology work is hard, doing it with the lowest bidder is hard, and having Congress involved is hard. But despite, we have a damn fine Navy that will sink any adversary. I am proud to have served and still believe we build the finest Naval equipment in the world.

Lost Pict, first much thanks for your service. And then thank for your expertise and info. The Zumwalts are certainly amazing ships, very cool tech in so many areas. The tumblehome hull shape reminded me of the French Victorian era pre dreadnoughts, but it is a stable design,part of the stealth profile, I presume. With so many features it seemed like the overall role was less well defined than the Arleigh Burkes. A complex ship, just became too expensive. The AGS was to have a high rate of fire and the ship was to carry several hundred rounds, could have made quite an impression!

And I especially agree with your last statement. It does not get said nearly enough with all the complaining we do. The finest navy in the world by a long shot. Again, thank you.