Naval Tactics question

I have been wondering, with so many of the modern western navies gearing themselves towards littoral warfare and short-range action based around small coastal craft. Would it be reasonable to assume that if a naval power instead opted for a modern version of the "Grand Fleet" with large, powerful capital ships equiped with advanced, long-range sensors and powerful, long-range weaponry, the navies of other naval powers would be simply outclassed.

Nuclear Powered Aircraft Carrier. lol Problem solved.

You will never see a Battleship, or any other ship like that again. With the new antiship missiles, and combat power capable of deploying on a USN CVN they would be a fairly easy target. During WWII, and up until the First Gulf War the Battleship had a roll to play in combat operations, but the weapons just got too powerful for their armor, and their survivability dropped way down. Most nations are going to an LCS format because they don't have the capability or budget for a Navy that can project power like the USN or RN, or another large navy can.

Just exactly what "navies" are you referring to? I need some specific instances in order to accurately answer your question.

Originally posted by Mabus the Forsaken
I have been wondering, with so many of the modern western navies gearing themselves towards littoral warfare and short-range action based around small coastal craft.

It's the only way the average country can enable itself to defend it's shores, trade routes and fishing waters. Anything else gets simply far more expensive and most countries have no interest in projecting power at the expensve it would entail.

Would it be reasonable to assume that if a naval power instead opted for a modern version of the "Grand Fleet" with large, powerful capital ships equiped with advanced, long-range sensors and powerful, long-range weaponry, the navies of other naval powers would be simply outclassed.

Ships sink but they can not in turn sink the continents from wich planes and surface to surface missiles will come.... If that does not answer your questions do clarify!

Stellar

[edit on 1-12-2005 by StellarX]

Other than ships that need to be large (aircraft carriers) there is actually no need for the olsd style "Ships of the Line". A couple of modern missile boats used correctly would eat a WWII cruiser's lunch. The prime reason for the size of earlier ships was to have enough mass to withstand the forces generated by the firing of the large guns they carried. I saw the New Jersey shoot a couple of times from a helicopter and the whole ship moved sideways in the water. These days with modern missiles and high velocity cannons there is no need for huge ships. Now the need is speed and agility.

Aircraft Carriers - especially the US ones are useless for this.

Don't take this as an insult to US aircraft carriers though.

Most aircraft carriers aren't besigned to be big battleships with big guns and huge radars and all that, they're desgined to carry as many planes as they can.

Therefore it's not the job of an aircraft carrier to have the biggest guns, as they usually travel with frigs and cruisers.

Today it's a case of "a little bit of everything". You get some frigates, some cruisers, an aircraft carrier and some subs and you'll have a very powerful combo.

Littoral combat is a buzz word at the moment but the ideas are nothing new. At the highest levels there are two major threads in modern naval planning. the 1st is responce to known and percieved threats, the 2nd is flexability in order to handle the unknown. Each navy decides what assets they require to conduct these two tasks. To take an example, say Holland, They have very little known threats (especially now the cold war is over), nobody is about to invade, so they are unlkely to be fighting a major war of survival soon. This means that part of the navy is not a major consideration. What they no need is flexability in their navy for such things as fisheries protection and disaster relief. This has lead them to go for a larger number of smaller, more cost effective vessels compared to some other countries. They have no need for an aircraft carrier. etc. Their force is mostly what is now known as a littoral combat force. (they still maintain a few blue water vessels to act as flagships).

On the other hand if you one of the big 4 navies (eg. USA, UK Russia and France). There leading roles in the world mean they have more known and pecieved threats to their interests. This means they have larger blue water navies with more ship types including carriers, amphibious assualt, long range subs etc and are able to defend against those known and percieved threats (i.e they have real offensive power projection). They have till now had large number of large ocean going vessels as that was what was needed ( during the cold war). Since about 1990 the large navies have been reorganising themselves to meet the changing world. A major percieved threat has gone, and new ones have emerged. This move towards littoral combat is the repose to this. No major navy will be giving up their blue water capability completly but it is being restructured to fit the new threats. Frigate and destroyer numbers are being reduced and smaller faster combat vessels are being developed. These are better able to work close inshore and respond flexably to quickly devoping threats.

They have a very hard job, the last to gulf wars have shown that working close in is an extreamly hostile envornment. (most ships lost in gw 1 and 2 were fast attack craft sunk by helicopter fired missiles, all iraqi tho!) . The major navies have neglected this area of naval skills during the cold war and are now rapidly building back and updating the skills set needed for these vessels.