US Navy News and updates

John Fedup said:
The two RR MT-30 gas turbines in the DDG-1000 have the power requirements needed for the future rail gun and laser weapons. Could the Burkes realistically be upgraded with the sufficient power needed for these future weapons while still maintaining hotel and propulsion loads? Also, the HVP tech velocity pales in comparison with the railgun.
Click to expand...

AFAIK lasers and railguns weren't a consideration when DDG-1000 was being conceived. The focus was on AGS. If HVP had been foreseen at the time then IMO justifying the expense of a new class of DDG to fire PGMs from ship cannon would have been problematic.
 
Ranger25 said:
The San Antonio Class LDP was initially designed with Tac length VLS (2x8). They were cancelled from the program and they inly carry ESSM for self defense. With a renewed emphasis on offensive Marine operations they are revisiting the concept.

More below

https://news.usni.org/2016/10/13/vertical-launch-system-san-antonio-amphibs
Click to expand...

Makes sense and I have wondered why they haven't done this with LPDs previously. The issue is probably the lack of a suitable missile for the kind of support the USMC are after, i.e. a VLS ATAMS or GMLRS., even land attack Standard, what's the ballistic range of an ESSM or ESSM BLOCK II, a stripped down land attack missile using the basic body/airframe could be interesting?

Such a large ship should have little difficulty incorporating an upgraded combat system and something like CEAFAR, while the eventual LPD(R) would be the logical platform to deploy 155mm and even ABM. CEC would be a no brainer for even a basic Mk-41 outfit.
 
SSM attacks on USS Mason

There have now been three separate attacks reported against USS Mason where shore based SSM's have been fired at the ship from Yemen.

In each case none of the missiles have struck and the ship has been described as having deployed "countermeasures". I'm guessing that could be electronic jamming or chaff as the phrase seems to imply that no SAM's were fired at the incoming missiles.

Does anyone have a theory as to why the ship would use passive measures against an SSM attack rather than deploying those in conjunction with engaging them with SAM's?
 
spsun100001 said:
There have now been three separate attacks reported against USS Mason where shore based SSM's have been fired at the ship from Yemen.

In each case none of the missiles have struck and the ship has been described as having deployed "countermeasures". I'm guessing that could be electronic jamming or chaff as the phrase seems to imply that no SAM's were fired at the incoming missiles.

Does anyone have a theory as to why the ship would use passive measures against an SSM attack rather than deploying those in conjunction with engaging them with SAM's?
Click to expand...

The reference to "countermeasures" doesn't necessarily mean soft-kill only from what I can tell. For example 2 x SM2 and 1 x ESSM were reportedly fired in one of the earlier incidents:

https://news.usni.org/2016/10/11/us...s-to-defend-from-yemen-cruise-missiles-attack

It would certainly be interesting to know the specifics of each episode. One would hope that more primitive subsonic SSMs like these should be easy pickings for late model SM2s or ESSM (once properly cued) given that they've been designed with more difficult supersonic targets (Sunburn, Yakhont etc) in mind.
 
spsun100001 said:
There have now been three separate attacks reported against USS Mason where shore based SSM's have been fired at the ship from Yemen.

In each case none of the missiles have struck and the ship has been described as having deployed "countermeasures". I'm guessing that could be electronic jamming or chaff as the phrase seems to imply that no SAM's were fired at the incoming missiles.

Does anyone have a theory as to why the ship would use passive measures against an SSM attack rather than deploying those in conjunction with engaging them with SAM's?
Click to expand...

Because deploying a Nulka or EWSP to defend against a radar guided missile is infinitely cheaper than using a hardkill option and if they are able to successfully decoy the incoming threat every time, all the better.

'Confusion to our enemies' and all that...
 
ADMk2 said:
Because deploying a Nulka or EWSP to defend against a radar guided missile is infinitely cheaper than using a hardkill option and if they are able to successfully decoy the incoming threat every time, all the better.

'Confusion to our enemies' and all that...
Click to expand...

Good point. From what I can tell these don't seem to be particularly sophisticated SSMs (Silkworm/C802?) so softkill methods may well be doing the job..?
 
ADMk2 said:
Because deploying a Nulka or EWSP to defend against a radar guided missile is infinitely cheaper than using a hardkill option and if they are able to successfully decoy the incoming threat every time, all the better.

'Confusion to our enemies' and all that...
Click to expand...
Agreed, I doubt the USN will release exactly how they deterred the missile. Most likely first asset used was SEWIP.

USN Ship Protection: From “Slick 32s” to SEWIP

The Mason, DDG-87, is a IIA Burke so it appears to have the EA version of SEWIP
 
Recently the the senior naval leadership (read Admirals) decided to strip sailors of their job descriptions in their rank titles creating a furore on the lower deck who are dead against it. The lower deck want their job titles back which is fair enough because it is tradition and it defines who you are on a ship and within the navy. The reasons given by the senior naval leadership are that it will encourage cross trade training, help sailors with promotion within the navy and employment outside of the navy. These seem somewhat spurious reasons and appear to be change for the sake of change at the expense of tradition.

Navy launches far-reaching ratings overhaul despite sailor backlash

The end of ratings: What's next in the Navy's radical enlisted shake-up
 
ngatimozart said:
Recently the the senior naval leadership (read Admirals) decided to strip sailors of their job descriptions in their rank titles creating a furore on the lower deck who are dead against it. The lower deck want their job titles back which is fair enough because it is tradition and it defines who you are on a ship and within the navy. The reasons given by the senior naval leadership are that it will encourage cross trade training, help sailors with promotion within the navy and employment outside of the navy. These seem somewhat spurious reasons and appear to be change for the sake of change at the expense of tradition.

Navy launches far-reaching ratings overhaul despite sailor backlash

The end of ratings: What's next in the Navy's radical enlisted shake-up
Click to expand...

It's worse than just admirals here; it's specifically senior civilian leadership (the Secretary), as well as senior enlisted leadership (the Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy, even more specifically, the one who retired a couple months ago). Everyone gets a turn on this Sit-n-Spin, and there's more than enough failure to go aronud.

The logic and justification varies, as well, from SECNAV's "We started this process to remove the word "man" from our titles and reduce gender differences in the Navy" to what seemed to be MCPON's "This will allow more career flexibility
and a make it easier for people to transition into the civilian world." Which, let's talk about that, because item a) I don't care about, we're not here to make you happy by switching jobs a bunch of time, we're here to build experienced technicians and professionals, and item b) no it doesn't, it merely creates a different term people have to put on resumes when transitioning. It's not like we used VMET numbers or anything else for these numbers, we just made up a bunch of new numbers.

This is what happens when your leadership only seeks to see how much radical change they can impose without caring about costs.
 
PetranPireotis said:
I will make the question again , because since week 43 there is again the rumour.. 1 or 2 Burkes will come to HelNavy in 2019 and 2020 respectively... 2 units from DDG84 to DDG96 :argue
Click to expand...

There are ongoing talk's though to my knowledge no exact hulls have been narrowed down. That being said I don't see it being likely that the US would give up any of the DDG84 through to DDG96 in the 2019 - 2020 time period. At that point they will be less then 20 years old giving another good decade of use to the USN.

The USN currently doesnt have the required number of surface combatants (I believe it was around the 90 mark give or take needed) so they would be unlikely to give away valuable asset's at that age.

More likely the USN will be looking to hand over if any at all a pair of the Flight I Burkes, ideally the earliest ones.

That all be said, These talks have been going on for a decade and still don't seem to be any closer so at this point it isn't even really worth discussing. Request for a pair of Burkes sent in 2005, Almost 2017 now.

Regards, VN.
 
Ranger25 said:
Forbes will get the role as SECNAV.
Changes coming to the USN fleet
Click to expand...

"In eight years, the Chinese will have north of 80 submarines in the Asian-Pacific area, and we will have in the low 30s," Forbes said. "That's not the world that we necessarily want to be in." Forbes quoted in the Navy Times 2/5/15

He has in the past Forbes has called for a more active posture in the SCS. I do not think the trump Administration will withdraw or pivot away from the Western Pacific as some media have speculated.

Forbes has also supported the ongoing funding of the LCS when heading the House Armed Services Seapower and Projection Forces Subcommittee. However, I wonder if the frigate mafia within the USN will have another go at cutting the LCS back to 32 and bringing back a medium surface combatant between the LSC and the Burkes. He also notes a glaring amphibious shortage in the fleet to support the USMC.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top