Modern Carrier Battle Group..Strategies and Tactics

[ZTZ99]

Re: The End of the Carrier Age?

I think submarines that can deploy UCAVs are what will truly make carriers obsolete. We're talking decades here, but it's only a matter of time before UCAVs can do pretty much everything a carrier's manned jets can do. Cruise missiles can be deployed from submarines, so UAVs shouldn't be much of a problem. The advantages in terms of survivability are enormous. Have you all seen that fake video of a submarine firing an F-15 out of the water? Well, I think one day something like that may very well become a reality.

It's not easy to sink a carrier from the air. Right now maybe only the US can do that. Maybe not even. An entire naval wing's F-18's can launch 192 Harpoons at the same time, and that's assuming all 48 F-18's are in the air at the same time and all 48 tasked with strike missions, which doesn't happen in real life. The escorts could maybe contribute a dozen or two more. Realistically a US carrier group can maybe muster 100 or so Harpoons simultaneously. Not nearly enough IMO to overwhelm a putative PLAN CVBG. You would probably need a few dozen missiles landing on target and exploding as planned just to sink the carrier itself, to speak nothing of the ones that had to be sacrificed for the rest to get past the escort air defense screen.

A naval UCAV would probably not be able to carry as much as an F-18 as long a distance, meaning you could probably only load 2 Harpoons at a time. Or if the UCAV itself is the weapon (like the Harpy), only one warhead at a time. The number of subs launching swarm attacks on a carrier would have to be prohibitively enormous. Even a ship the size of a carrier used to launch UCAV swarms will not likely be able to mount enough numbers, unless it can store, maintain and launch several hundred of them simultaneously.

I think the key to a carrier's obselecence is an ultra quiet submarine launching Shkval-type supercavitating torpedoes equipped with terminal guidance systems. A single submarine launching a one-shot brace of 4 to 6 of these missiles could sink a carrier in under a minute from launch. This type of weapon is currently being researched and is within reach for several of the world's navies.

An alternative would be hypersonic antiship missiles which current air defense technology is probably incapable of intercepting. The rumored Chinese anti-ship ballistic missile IMO is much ado about nothing, especially when several USN ships are being or have been equipped with the SM-3, which can be deployed in far larger numbers than the 2nd Artillery can deploy ASBM's.

 

[Finn McCool]

Re: The End of the Carrier Age?

It's not easy to sink a carrier from the air. Right now maybe only the US can do that. Maybe not even. An entire naval wing's F-18's can launch 192 Harpoons at the same time, and that's assuming all 48 F-18's are in the air at the same time and all 48 tasked with strike missions, which doesn't happen in real life. The escorts could maybe contribute a dozen or two more. Realistically a US carrier group can maybe muster 100 or so Harpoons simultaneously. Not nearly enough IMO to overwhelm a putative PLAN CVBG. You would probably need a few dozen missiles landing on target and exploding as planned just to sink the carrier itself, to speak nothing of the ones that had to be sacrificed for the rest to get past the escort air defense screen.

A naval UCAV would probably not be able to carry as much as an F-18 as long a distance, meaning you could probably only load 2 Harpoons at a time. Or if the UCAV itself is the weapon (like the Harpy), only one warhead at a time. The number of subs launching swarm attacks on a carrier would have to be prohibitively enormous. Even a ship the size of a carrier used to launch UCAV swarms will not likely be able to mount enough numbers, unless it can store, maintain and launch several hundred of them simultaneously.

I think the key to a carrier's obselecence is an ultra quiet submarine launching Shkval-type supercavitating torpedoes equipped with terminal guidance systems. A single submarine launching a one-shot brace of 4 to 6 of these missiles could sink a carrier in under a minute from launch. This type of weapon is currently being researched and is within reach for several of the world's navies.

An alternative would be hypersonic antiship missiles which current air defense technology is probably incapable of intercepting. The rumored Chinese anti-ship ballistic missile IMO is much ado about nothing, especially when several USN ships are being or have been equipped with the SM-3, which can be deployed in far larger numbers than the 2nd Artillery can deploy ASBM's.

We can speculate quite a bit about how carriers will be destroyed in the future. But what I was getting at with UCAV launching subs is How do you have a platform that can project power like a carrier but still be survivable? Submarines are one way.

 

[zraver]

Re: The End of the Carrier Age?

We can speculate quite a bit about how carriers will be destroyed in the future. But what I was getting at with UCAV launching subs is How do you have a platform that can project power like a carrier but still be survivable? Submarines are one way.

1. carrier subs, even using ucavs will be large which will limit there inshore use as much as a carrier.

2. Nuclear powered carriers offer the promise of laser based point or even fleet defense capabilities. Several rapid firing lasers with a decent range and enough power could push up the numbers required to swamp a carrier groups defenses past the point of most nations to achieve especially when combined with Aegis type systems. This while the threat to carriers is evolving, so to are the defenses.

3. Carriers will remain critical to support the operations of marines/naval infantry operations far from home in a power projection role. With navies lacking big gun ships for NFS missions. The choice is really expensive shipboard missiles that will rapidly eat into a fleets stock and that are hard to tailor and slow to arrive. Or aircraft loitering near the battle space armed with smaller shorter ranged mission specific missiles and bombs that are also cheaper.

4. You can't jam a human pilot. The threat exists that a UCAV could be hacked and hijacked.

5. Without the ability to pack up and move a least a brigade of troops, drop them on to a hostile coast and support them your not really a major power. being a global power requires the ability to do this globally. Although we don't see this capability used very often, we do see it used. Falklands, Grenada, Panama, Korea are examples.

6. A sub carrier just ins't that impressive on port calls and good will visits. A big towering air craft carrier is thanks to the reputation the class of ships has earned. They stiffen allies and make enemies tremble.

 

[Finn McCool]

Re: The End of the Carrier Age?

1. carrier subs, even using ucavs will be large which will limit there inshore use as much as a carrier.

2. Nuclear powered carriers offer the promise of laser based point or even fleet defense capabilities. Several rapid firing lasers with a decent range and enough power could push up the numbers required to swamp a carrier groups defenses past the point of most nations to achieve especially when combined with Aegis type systems. This while the threat to carriers is evolving, so to are the defenses.

3. Carriers will remain critical to support the operations of marines/naval infantry operations far from home in a power projection role. With navies lacking big gun ships for NFS missions. The choice is really expensive shipboard missiles that will rapidly eat into a fleets stock and that are hard to tailor and slow to arrive. Or aircraft loitering near the battle space armed with smaller shorter ranged mission specific missiles and bombs that are also cheaper.

4. You can't jam a human pilot. The threat exists that a UCAV could be hacked and hijacked.

5. Without the ability to pack up and move a least a brigade of troops, drop them on to a hostile coast and support them your not really a major power. being a global power requires the ability to do this globally. Although we don't see this capability used very often, we do see it used. Falklands, Grenada, Panama, Korea are examples.

6. A sub carrier just ins't that impressive on port calls and good will visits. A big towering air craft carrier is thanks to the reputation the class of ships has earned. They stiffen allies and make enemies tremble.

Well there's always problems with every weapon system, nothing is invincible, everything has its upsides and downsides, I'm just saying in a world where missile technology is going to get a lot more dangerous, there's still going to be a need for air power projection close to the enemy's shores, and one way to do that is, when we consider them current trends in aviation technology, with UCAV armed subs.

 

[SLIRBM]

Re: The End of the Carrier Age?

hahaha end of CSG ？are you kidding？

 

[rhino123]

Re: The End of the Carrier Age?

hahaha end of CSG ？are you kidding？

You know... everyone here is giving constructive opinions to this thread... except for you. It is really tiring to see new poster like yourself coming into our forum and start making a joke out of everyone.

 

[bd popeye]

Re: The End of the Carrier Age?

You know... everyone here is giving constructive opinions to this thread... except for you. It is really tiring to see new poster like yourself coming into our forum and start making a joke out of everyone.

Mods note >>>Rhino is correct. SLIRBM please read the forum rules before you post again.

FORUM RULES: Things to Remember Before Posting, important, please read!

bd popeye super moderator and Grand Pubah

 

[montyp165]

Re: The End of the Carrier Age?

For surface ships, weapons such as railguns could revitalize gun-style armaments, but that also entails greater development of electrical generation systems for ships.

 

[jantxv]

Re: The End of the Carrier Age?

Arguments in favor of traditional carrier obsolescence are indeed premature given the demonstrated advances in directed energy weapons. It is easy to imagine directed energy weapons overwhelming merely hypersonic mass based weapons given the speed and range advantages of light. Nuclear reactors usually found on most American carriers are an ideal sourcing for meeting the power requirements of these new weapons.

Nations that wish to enter into the fray of credible power projection would be well represented by a traditional carrier type platform that has been proven not only in past and current conflicts, but is adaptable to meet the sea change of a near future bristling with directed energy weapons.

It would seem these facts demonstrate clearly the reasoning behind China's full support of an advanced world class carrier program. The continuing advancement of directed energy weapons should breath new life into arguments favoring nuclear carriers for the Chinese Navy.

 

[Finn McCool]

Re: The End of the Carrier Age?

Arguments in favor of traditional carrier obsolescence are indeed premature given the demonstrated advances in directed energy weapons. It is easy to imagine directed energy weapons overwhelming merely hypersonic mass based weapons given the speed and range advantages of light.

Finally someone realizes. I've been saying for a while that it's a matter of simple physics; it's a lot easier to hit a fast moving object with a beam of light/particles than it is to hit with a missile. We're not quite there yet but it's easy to see that the technology will get there fairly soon.