Naval Version of MLRS

[TheBlurryOne]

Is that kind of heavy naval fire support needed anymore? i think, i may be very wrong here but in the early days of the Iraq invasion that Australian ships were of the few that were trained to support ground forces? Is there any room for conventional naval bombardment in a world brimming with missiles and stealth long range bombers?

 

[rip]

Is that kind of heavy naval fire support needed anymore? i think, i may be very wrong here but in the early days of the Iraq invasion that Australian ships were of the few that were trained to support ground forces? Is there any room for conventional naval bombardment in a world brimming with missiles and stealth long range bombers?

I see the same pattern over and over in military history. Because a new and better form of war fighting is developed, it is falsely assumed that the old types simply disappear. Everyone wants to jump on the next best thing and not be left behind, so important things and lessons hard learned are then forgotten. If fact what happens is this, the old types of warfare are just useful for fewer things. I know that the very idea of having so much added complication to each new stage of the game and so many different special skills required, is mind boggling but you need what you need. You just need it less often.

For instance, how many times has Sniper skills and tactics been abandon by the US Army and Marines and then have to be reinvented all over again? At least three times that I know of. And there are literally dozens of other examples of, tactics, doctrines, and weapons that have come and gone and come back again. The same basic problems in warfare NEVER CHANGE only the current methods of solving them. Like the startling necessity (sometimes call suicide missions) of assaulting a heavily fortified position with too few troops and with too few heavy weapons, where you cannot count upon the factor of surprise to make the difference. They are only suicide mission’s for one reason and for one reason only because they were not envisioned within the doctrine, tactics, and hence were pressed without suitable weapon’s development to accomplish the objective. Old ideas become new and new become old by implementing those same basic ideas in different ways. Life goes on or it doesn’t.

The supper weapon augment does not hold water in a sustained combat environment because of cost of the weapons and the length of time needed to produce them in mass quanities which at this point no manufacture in the world has the ability to do.

 

[Todjaeger]

The supper weapon augment does not hold water in a sustained combat environment because of cost of the weapons and the length of time needed to produce them in mass quanities which at this point no manufacture in the world has the ability to do.

The per round cost of a GPS/INS-guided 500 lb JDAM is ~US$35,000 while
the cost of a M31A GPS/INS-guided rocket is ~US$137,000. As such, the cost per weapon is not favourable for precision rockets over bombs. Plus the JDAM has a larger explosive warhead. When comparing 'dumb' bombs, rockets and artillery (naval or land-based) shells, the cost per round to provide a given amount of explosives is still to in favour of rockets.

-Cheers

 

[My2Cents]

The per round cost of a GPS/INS-guided 500 lb JDAM is ~US$35,000 while the cost of a M31A GPS/INS-guided rocket is ~US$137,000. As such, the cost per weapon is not favourable for precision rockets over bombs. Plus the JDAM has a larger explosive warhead. When comparing 'dumb' bombs, rockets and artillery (naval or land-based) shells, the cost per round to provide a given amount of explosives is still to in favour of rockets.

The value of any munition is is zero if you cannot deliver it to the target in a timely fashion. Getting a JDAM delivered to support a ground unit under fire within 5 minutes requires an aircraft equipped with one already on station, a forward controller from the appropriate service on hand to direct it, and at least 2 different services and a minimum of 4 levels of command to sign off on the weapon release.

Fire support from land based M31A guided missiles is easier to get, you do not have to cross service lines, need less than half the approvals, and person authorized to guide it in is much more likely to be available. That is why troops on the ground prefer GPS guided rockets and shells over aircraft, when available. Fire support from ship based MLRS systems may not much more available than from aircraft, but could still also be available for smaller actions where a supporting aircraft carrier would not be available. Aircraft still have longer range.

There is also the question of collateral damage. A 500 lb JDAM has much greater potential in this area than the 200 lb M31A, making it even harder to get the weapon released even if available.

 

[Todjaeger]

The value of any munition is is zero if you cannot deliver it to the target in a timely fashion. Getting a JDAM delivered to support a ground unit under fire within 5 minutes requires an aircraft equipped with one already on station, a forward controller from the appropriate service on hand to direct it, and at least 2 different services and a minimum of 4 levels of command to sign off on the weapon release.

Fire support from land based M31A guided missiles is easier to get, you do not have to cross service lines, need less than half the approvals, and person authorized to guide it in is much more likely to be available. That is why troops on the ground prefer GPS guided rockets and shells over aircraft, when available. Fire support from ship based MLRS systems may not much more available than from aircraft, but could still also be available for smaller actions where a supporting aircraft carrier would not be available. Aircraft still have longer range.

There is also the question of collateral damage. A 500 lb JDAM has much greater potential in this area than the 200 lb M31A, making it even harder to get the weapon released even if available.

The arguments that have been getting put forward here though, are whether or not there could/should be a rocket launcher system aboard warships, to provide a bombardment capability, particularly for amphibious landings.

A MRLS does a very good job supporting engaged ground units, it compliments tube artillery in that fashion by performing the same function in a slightly different manner.

What I was attempting to illustrate, is that for a precision bombardment prior to the actual landing, especially of hardened targets where collateral damage is not a significant concern, aircraft PGMs are a much better weapon. The aircraft can get a view of the target area, which would be needed to fire precision munitions for accuracy's sake whether they were JDAMs or rockets, aircraft also have larger ordnances available than a rocket system does.

Ground-based mobile rocket artillery has its place on the battlefied, it just does not seem appropriate aboard a warship. Now, if there were to be suggestions made to construct some form of floating artillery barge, which had rocket launchers on it, that might be different. Such a system, if the intent was to be able to move the rocket launchers around over water, then anchor the barge in a littoral or riverine area to provide fire support, could be viable.

That sort of design and method of operations would be different than aboard a warship, since the barge would not be expected to respond or be involved in incidents on the open ocean, since it would be operating strictly in confined waterways. Also, it would not be operating without naval support from other vessels, and/or the area would have already been sanitized.

-Cheers

 

[Awang se]

Doesn't have to be a barge. A specialized MLRS ship can work. Doesn't have to be helpless too. The onboard rocket launcher can fire various type of round, guided or unguided, land target or sea target, direct or indirect. Now if you ask me about putting an MLRS onboard LHD, i'll say it's unfeasible. But if it's a specialized MLRS ship, that's another story. The only question whether there's country out there with the will and the capital to build such a highly specialized ship.

 

[My2Cents]

What I was attempting to illustrate, is that for a precision bombardment prior to the actual landing, especially of hardened targets where collateral damage is not a significant concern, aircraft PGMs are a much better weapon. The aircraft can get a view of the target area, which would be needed to fire precision munitions for accuracy's sake whether they were JDAMs or rockets, aircraft also have larger ordnances available than a rocket system does.

Aircraft have poorly performance at spotting competently camouflaged targets and identifying decoys. This has been demonstrated repeatedly in Afghanistan, Iraq, Bosnia, and Georgia, with as few as 2% of the available targets being successfully detected and destroyed by aircraft alone. You need observers on the ground and that means minimum safe distance becomes critical. For attacks on defensive bunkers using ground spotters the SDB is a better choice than the JDAM, but it is even more expensive than the M31A.

And yes, aircraft are better because they can use larger ordinance, when it is required, and have longer range. But they cannot find bunkers on their own. And they require a dedicated launch platform in a naval environment, which may not be available, particularly for small operations.

The arguments that have been getting put forward here though, are whether or not there could/should be a rocket launcher system aboard warships, to provide a bombardment capability, particularly for amphibious landings.

A MRLS does a very good job supporting engaged ground units, it compliments tube artillery in that fashion by performing the same function in a slightly different manner.

The MLRS is a flexible weapon system due to the way the munitions are handled. For example it has been demonstrated as a launcher for the SLAMRAAM system, so it should be capable of handling the ESSM. And there is no reason an imaging seeker could not be easily developed for long range ship-to-ship use. But the ammunition is bulkier than for a VLS system, so there is no way MLRS system can have a small footprint.

The solution might be to develop a MLRS variant that can be used in quad packs that can fit in Mk-41 cells. Otherwise modular systems could be installed suitable vessels or specialized ships created by modifying existing designs, probably by replacing the helicopter hanger(s).

Ground-based mobile rocket artillery has its place on the battlefied, it just does not seem appropriate aboard a warship. Now, if there were to be suggestions made to construct some form of floating artillery barge, which had rocket launchers on it, that might be different. Such a system, if the intent was to be able to move the rocket launchers around over water, then anchor the barge in a littoral or riverine area to provide fire support, could be viable.

That sort of design and method of operations would be different than aboard a warship, since the barge would not be expected to respond or be involved in incidents on the open ocean, since it would be operating strictly in confined waterways. Also, it would not be operating without naval support from other vessels, and/or the area would have already been sanitized.

A barge certainly would have advantages in a littoral environment as a floating fire base, but there is no good way to get it there. So you find a local barge and lash a HIMARS on it, which is probably still unworkable to support a landing if any kind of surprise is required. In confined waterways less so, mainly because the ammunition is vulnerable to small arms fire, you would need some kind of armored sidewalls, probably for the offshore work as well. Forget about tactical maneuvering and it is just too slow.

 

[Todjaeger]

Doesn't have to be a barge. A specialized MLRS ship can work. Doesn't have to be helpless too. The onboard rocket launcher can fire various type of round, guided or unguided, land target or sea target, direct or indirect. Now if you ask me about putting an MLRS onboard LHD, i'll say it's unfeasible. But if it's a specialized MLRS ship, that's another story. The only question whether there's country out there with the will and the capital to build such a highly specialized ship.

The way I interpreted the question as originally worded, was why a rocket launcher system was not fitted to most naval vessels to support amphibious landings. The question then seemed to morph into whether or not a 'simple' conversion could be done to adapt a MRLS to be used from a vessel, to fufill a potential hole in capabilities with respect to opposed landings against hardened targets.

Could such specialized vessel and weapon system be developed? Of course. Given how a battlespace is now handled, the US (the only country likely to develop such a specialized bombardment system) has other capabilities available to reduce the effectiveness of a hardened defence in an opposed landing.

The scenario also overlooks the circumstances and historical backdrop of the prior hardened defences employed during opposed landings, and the changes in capabilities between then and now.

-Cheers

 

[AegisFC]

The USN looked at a naval MLRS but decided it wasn't worth it. Your best bet for information about the proposed system and ships designed for it would be Norman Friedmans "U.S. Amphibious Ships and Craft: An Illustrated Design History ".

 

[rip]

The USN looked at a naval MLRS but decided it wasn't worth it. Your best bet for information about the proposed system and ships designed for it would be Norman Friedmans "U.S. Amphibious Ships and Craft: An Illustrated Design History ".

I would like to comment that the use of MLRS in the shore bombardment roil as I proposed it, as just a simple self-propelled barge mated with the land designed MLRS has been highly misrepresented here on this thread.

Here is the problem; a capacity that is seldom needed and has not been needed for some time, is now missing from our naval forces. The cost of modern warships, which do all the things that modern warships are expected to do most of the time, are now so expensive that there is not enough money to acquire enough of them for the major common naval requirements that exist every day and everywhere, much less is there to buy new expensive specialized hulls for missions that are seldom seen but nevertheless cannot be said to have gone away forever.

The only reason that the proposal of taking a system like MLRS and marring it with a water born platform of any kind is that we cannot afford a special build hull to accomplish that mission. Putting something like MLRS on a standard size ocean going barge with as little modification as possible does not create a warship of any kind but just a specialized gun platform for a specific but difficult mission. The barrages are cheap and do not require any new technology, maybe some modification about stabilization, ether in the barge or the rocket launcher maybe.

The original idea for this is not mine. I read about a proposal that could put together several different kinds of specialized barges, mix and match them, and deploy them by ocean going tugboats 25 years ago (THe barge ship) in an article in The Institute of Naval Proceedings, and I thought it was sound idea then and is even a better idea now with our now much smaller fleet.

 

[wormhole]

The Navy has only so much money and already have other means to deliver precision firepower so they probably think this need is already being met with the assets at hand. Now maybe some other country without the same capabilities of the USN could consider something like a navalized MLRS worth the effort.

 

[Anas Ali]

i think its not a problem the Egyptian nave did it prior the 73 war they mounted bm-11 on ships [Mod edit: One-liners or content fee posts (spam like posts), like this, are a violation of forum rules, and posting a string of one-liners to just post a link in another thread will not be tolerated.

There is no need to rush in and try to increase post count, at the cost of your personal credibility to other members of the forum. Make good use of the 3-day ban, to read the forum, to get a sense of level of maturity of other members. To aid new members, the Mod Team has prepared a thread called "Air Power 101 for New Members" (in particular, the discussion on counter-sea operations), and it will you get up to speed on some concepts required for a serious discussion.

Even the Mod Team's warning to you is longer and contains more information that the one-liners you have posted.]

 

[Matty922117]

Not huge advantages, but not a bad idea.

Can someone tell me the possibility of adapting the MLRS and its subsystems like ATACMS to a naval version? Not nessesarily a VLS But just a upgrade of the system itself and why it wouldnt be possible for it to use it for Naval firesupport or why it hasn't? I've asked the question before but it hasnt ever really been answered.

Most US battleships are using VLS for launching Tomahawk cruise missiles, I don't think there would be a use for MLRS in naval warfare, Tomahawks have greater range and (if I'm not mistaken) larger warheads. The only use I really see MLRS having in naval warfare is the capability of launching faster warheads than the Tomahawk, infact lately cruise missiles have been easy tragets for anti-cruise surface-to-air missile technology. I like the idea of MLRS in naval warfare, the speed will give a great advantage.

 

[kato]

A Tomahawk costs about thirty times as much as a guided rocket for MLRS, hence why there is interest in the first place. That, and a MLRS module would be relatively easily reloadable at sea from the ship's magazines or supply units.
For the other reasons read page one of this thread.

 

[StobieWan]

Did anyone come up with a way to handle the pallets the missiles come on? They'd have to be cycled back into the magazine or stored some other place - that takes up some room. Agreed that MLRS can drop a large weight of fire onto target but we're already seeing a situation where they're only firing the guided rounds for fear of collateral damage. I'm wondering if that space might be better used by something more flexible is all.

 

[My2Cents]

Did anyone come up with a way to handle the pallets the missiles come on? They'd have to be cycled back into the magazine or stored some other place - that takes up some room. Agreed that MLRS can drop a large weight of fire onto target but we're already seeing a situation where they're only firing the guided rounds for fear of collateral damage. I'm wondering if that space might be better used by something more flexible is all.

Well, I can envision a way to feed a MLRS, but it requires 2 hatches, 2 elevators, and a big chunk of deck space for a horizontal feed mechanism, as well as the below deck ammunition storage. You are right about the need to cycle the pallets back into the magazine, which will double the size of the loading mechanism.

I suspect it would be more cost effective to design a bombardment rocket derived from the ESSM or SM-2 so you could launch it from the VLS.

 

[kato]

Technically you only need a hatch giving access to a below-deck pod storage in front of the launch assembly. At least if you keep the integral loading boom assembly of the land version. An elevator would probably be helpful though.

Getting the pallets from that below-deck area in and out of magazines would then be a separate thing. That access hatch could also serve as a genera strikedown access though, so it's not necessarily wasted extra space.

 

[StobieWan]

From a materials handling point of view, I'm sure it'd be possible to come up with a transport mechanism that can bring up a loaded pallet then stow an expended one, but I wonder what kind of magazine arrangements you'd need ?

 

[kato]

Wouldn't be that much different from stowing anti-ship missiles, both dimensions- and dangerwise. Okay, there aren't that many frontline ships stowing extra ammunition of these proportions like that, but you can easily copy such e.g. from missile FAC tenders.

 

[CB90]

Wouldn't be that much different from stowing anti-ship missiles, both dimensions- and dangerwise. Okay, there aren't that many frontline ships stowing extra ammunition of these proportions like that, but you can easily copy such e.g. from missile FAC tenders.

"Cool" idea, but this is a rather costly way to perform a niche capability with limited utility.

For starters, the range of ATACMS is extremely limited compared to TLAM.