Show the flag, rattle sabers, anti-piracy, interdiction, board & search, coastal security, escorting, training ground for sharp young officers and enlisted...all in the company of the Big Boys or in back water areas of lower intensity. If you can build 3 OPV's for the cost of 1 FFG you have upped your numbers. Think of them a niche ships.
Honestly, we found in WW2 that a .50 does a pretty good job in that regard, and a modern 25mm Bushmaster is even better. PT boats did a real number on Japanese powered barges in the Slot in the Solomons with their .50 MGs and 20 or 40mm cannon, NOT with their torpedoes. Most of the destruction of the Japanese convoy of destroyer transports in the Bismark Sea was due to .50 MGs from the aircraft involved.
I would probably recommend a 3"/76mm or 5" gun instead of a 57mm, simply because it has a longer range than a 57mm AND increases the flexibility of the hull by allowing it a battery big enough to provide short fire support even though a Ma Deuce would be adequate for most LIC patrol missions.
We need to be able to kill something for less than $six digits. If you want missiles for everything, devise cheaper missiles. A Shahed runs $20-50K. An FPV starts at $500. A RHIB starts at under $2K. Give me a thousand dollar missile and we'll talk. Cheaper will also imply smaller and the capacity for more of them.
Hmmm.....as Nichevo notes, look at the logistics issues imposed by cost. The Zumwalt-class destroyers carry no rounds for their 5" guns because those guided rounds cost $800K-$1million each. We currently lack the capacity to manufacture guided rockets/missiles/etc. at the rate they are being used in a HIC in Ukraine.
NGS is essential for an opposed entry, at least until the Marines can get their own guns established on-shore. Missiles are to expensive to provide the volume of fire needed - not just precision fires, but suppression fires, obscuring smoke, etc. I think a guided missile would be an overly expensive way to deploy smoke for obscurement, don't you think? Aircraft are also expensive and can't stay on station as long as a ship. Gun support combined with forward deployed ANGLICOs is the best solution to providing such fires during an opposed entry.
You can see the case for NGS in the Normandy landings. Carpet bombing from the air and saturation rocket attacks from LSM(R)s did little to suppress the shore defenses - it took direct gunfire support from destroyers moving close enough to shore to literally scrape the bottom of their hulls on shingle to get an angle to take out German nests and bunkers. Until that direct fire support was provided, the 1st and 29th ID were pinned at the seawall.
Of course, a 5" gun is probably the MINIMUM size required. Historically and up until the retirement of the Iowa class-battleships in the early 1990s, that role was traditionally designated for cruisers and battleships with 6-16" guns. The Des Moines-class heavy cruisers with batteries of autoloading, rapid fire 8" guns were probably the optimum. USS Newport News was VERY effective in this role on three floats of Vietnam, including destruction of shore batteries on the North Vietnamese coast, support of the 3 MARDIV in 67-8 (where it provided continuous 24/7 fire support along the DMZ for multiple weeks at a time), and the bombardment of Haiphong Harbor in Linebacker II. Unfortunately, the hull-form of the Des Moines class was not amenable due to deck space to upgrades for Harpoon, Tomahawk, CIWS, or new radars. As a result, the Iowa-class platforms were refit and reactivated to fill the role instead.
The Cyclone-class coastal patrol vessels provided harbor security and support for naval special warfare units in the Persian Gulf. OPVs could fill the naval fire support role destroyers were used for in Vietnam.
They DO have combat capability. It is a different capability than required in a high intensity conflict, but a very real capability for LIC. For example, an OPV can serve well in anti-piracy operations at a lower cost than using a major surface combatant in the role. The US is unusual in larger navies in NOT having ships dedicated to this sort of role - countries like France and Spain, for example, have avisos dedicated to the role. Prior to World War II, the US Navy DID invest in craft like this - gunboats, armed yachts, etc. - for use in missions like patrolling the waters of the Philippines to prevent piracy, supporting Marine forces in the Banana Wars, etc. No admiral of the period would have assumed that a ship designed for major conflict (like a battleship or cruiser) would have been appropriate for those missions.
You are as I see it making the assumption that the only combat worth noting is high intensity conflict. That ignores the reality that most of the actual combat Naval Surface Warfare has engaged in since the Second World War has been low intensity conflict. Operation Preying Mantis is the closest to an actual high intensity naval battle we have engaged in since 1945. All other actions involving major surface combatants have been air missions from carrier battle groups against land targets or gunfire support against the same. Anti-piracy engagements and interdiction of sea-based logistics support for enemy combatants constitute most of the actual ship-to-ship engagements in the period. You didn't need Harpoon ASMs or 8" guns to engage pirate small craft or North Vietnamese sampans smuggling munitions to the VC - but a smaller, agile combatant with a 3"-5" gun, some machine guns, a helicopter, and a RHIB for a boarding party can do the mission very well.
Thanks, Sal for a great 2023. Looking forward to your 2024.
Re: Constellation Mk 41 VLS - Does anyone here know if the limitation mentioned is based on total weapon weight or weapon length? Two totally different problems.
Tactical length is shorter and srike length longer. All initial missiles for FFG happen to be tactical length and here has been a noticeable lack of clarity around whether the cells in the selected design are tactical or strike length. Their price per launcher in the budget is less than the cost per launcher on a Burke so I am inclined to think we are getting tactical length. Our launchers are much heavier than similar European Aster launchers plus our design seems to have shaved some hull depth exactly where the VLS is placed. I think this is why Congress said add Tomahawk and SM-6. My cheap easy solution to that would be delete NSM and clear that deck to fit as many mk 70 container launchers as possible or ADL strike length launchers.
Thanks for clearing up my memory. Too many years since I was at a drawing board. Does each ADL mount hold 4 canisters or 8? I’ve seen drawings that show both, and the only photos are side views that don’t clear that up. I believe the Conny now has 16 NSMs, so matching that number in ADL canisters corresponds to a lot of topside weight (birds and housing). The Burkes are general purpose destroyers, whereas it’s common for navies to make frigates more specialized. Were I in charge, I would tell Congress that the Navy can provide some of the class as AAW specialized and some as SUW specialized. Granted, that is a more nuanced answer than “Yes, sir. Three bags full, sir,” but I think we have people smart enough to properly brief congressional staff members.
FFG-62 is more than capable of performing the sort of escort missions now occurring in the Red Sea. 32 VLS; some with SM-2, some with quad-packed ESSM, Sea RAM, and a 57mm gun, all directed by a Spy 6 variant. This is a very capable ship and adding more stuff only slows down acquisition and raises costs. We can debate the idea of an OPC of course, but the Navy needs 20 FFG-62's as designed now, and can wait until the next flight (you are a fan of flights yes?) for more capability.
Laz - for the love of Pete will you please read my posts before commenting? I've been asking you to do this for over a decade. Do you not see the Flight II commentary? FFS dude, really.
You did say a Flight 2 but it was murky in the text as to where that would start. If after the first 20 planned ships than ok. I still disagree that FFG-62 is not capable of the sort of escort missions currently underway in the Red Sea. :-)
I agree that is an FFG-62 shortcoming, but with that as a threat is any low-end surface combatant viable? Houthi ballistic missiles so far seem poorly aimed.
They are still refining their tactics and probably the weapons. It is very probably going to get more effective and also more common. 500 kilos hitting at Mach 3+ is going to seriously tear up a DD/FG when it explodes deep inside the hull, so stopping that is critical.
They are the ‘third rate’ vessels of the Napoleonic navy in modern form – intended to fly a flag, do the 99% of maritime work that doesn’t involve fighting in a war and doing it cheaply and efficiently.
A 74-gun ship was a third-rate and was indeed a line-of-battle ship, indeed a workhorse, but not a flitter. The smallest rated ship that a post-captain would command was a sixth-rate, of 22 to 28 guns (on the high end, the fictional Captain Aubrey's HMS Surprise was a 28-gun frigate), and these were what the author of the passage above truly meant, the scouts, signalers, look-into-port-and-see-what's-whatters.
Unrated vessels, exactly. Even a frigate was not intended or expected to operate in the line of battle, but would be used for auxiliary purposes like signaling, observation, and actions intended to bring about the battle. Might do things like rescue survivors from sunken ships. But if they don't fire on the Santísima Trinidad, the Spanish four-decker won't fire on them.
Brigs and sloops don't even really belong at sea under those conditions. Not really speed or endurance or seaworthiness enough. They're the ones who go up river deltas looking for slavers or who carry the mail or sound enemy harbors. Inshore work. The littorals. What LCS was supposed to be, I guess (ha).
They need to stop saying no to cargo ships, packed with VLS, and make it work. They need to figure out UNREP for VLS on current surface combatants. They also need to figure out something worthwhile that fits 10 times as many into a VLS cell for 1/10 the price. It's a little ridiculous to expend a Standard missile on something smaller than itself.
Basically they need to do all the things they're going to do in an actual war, before the war starts.
Exactly. So who "certifies" that the area of operation is "sanitized" (based on that old Probability of Detection of 50%!) before sending in the Fig? Of course, maybe the NavSeanics are planning an FFG flight for ASW with no air defense capability. Ya know, to improve "stability".
The one main selling point for the FFG62 using the Italian design was to leverage PROVEN technology and capabilities. Sea keeping and sensor placement was a known. Now the navy has removed the sonar dome, which removes the capability of conducting ASW when the sea state is too developed for tail deployment. The reasoning is to “increase stability”, yet the navy increased the hull length on the FFG -62 to increase “future growth”, and also increased the gross tonnage of the vessel. A frigate must be capable of ASW in any sea state. This is a poor trade off in economy. I submit the ASW mission is the most critical of any this class will perform, yet we literally cut the balls off it.
Maybe, but subs are still out there, and the USN has degraded its ASW capabilities over the decades: not enough SSN's, retiring OHP Class, retiring S-3 Viking, trading more numerous P-3's for fewer P-8's. How many hours per month does a Burke crew spend conducting ASW drills, do you think?
They have a dedicated east coast DDG ASW squadron which to me shows they need some more specialization in combatants. We are taking the path of highest cost for least resistance.
But less AAW capability than LCS and no embarked helo in an OPV, so not really suited to USN strategy or operations. An OPV would not be useful in any kind of AAW/missile threat environment.
You are as wrong about OPV as you were about LCS. I would also offer to you that you should research what the Royal Navy has been using the River Class for. Look at the Rivers at the low end and the Italian Thaon di Revel-class OPV at the high end of what we're talking about.
I have noted my shortfalls in LCS thinking: https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/2023/december/confessions-former-lcs-champion The current USN is not the RN. We have a different mission set and have no Commonwealth/former colonial possessions to patrol where the threat is low. The Caribbean might be such a place, but unlike the UK the US has a capable Coast Guard for those missions.
The USCG shouldn't be doing overseas constabulary missions, despite any advantage conveyed by Title 14 of the U.S. Code. America's coasts need to be guarded by subject matter experts who aren't spread thin around the world.
We have the Navy & Marine Corps for overseas nautical tomfoolery (and there are always a handful of Coast Guard LEDETS available to embark on a grey hull, if absolutely necessary for searches/seizures/law enforcement).
" we ..." have no Commonwealth/former colonial possessions to patrol where the threat is low."
But we sure seem to interject our ships and people into sh!thole countries where bad things are happening, and voluntarily serving as the world's police force (gratis, no less) even when we are $31 trillion in debt, cannot meet recruiting goals, and suffer from an atrophied fleet and national leadership searching unsuccessfully for a clue about anything.
I disagree. And in any event, building a dozen OPVs to soak up low end tasks in peacetime would be more than worth the effort. We shouldn’t be limiting our navy’s options in peacetime (the natural state it is in about 98% of the time) because of a missile/wartime bogeyman. We’re losing the influence game because we don’t have enough ships to cover our commitments, and many of those commitments don’t need a CRUDES, but they do need a ship that works.
The challenge is that such OPV's, while useful in Phase 0 ops have little utility in a shooting conflict. If you made them big enough to have a rotary wing capability and a SeaRAM or two then maybe, but then you have another LCS.
Every ship can't sink the Yamato or destroy Beijing. Nobody expected HMS Pickle to "have utility in a shooting conflict." 10 guns was more than it needed to carry home the news of Nelson's victory at Trafalgar.
Look at a Houthi scale threat. They haven't got DF-21s. They have windup toys and we're shooting them down with million dollar missiles (and that's at the low end).
Even if we don't care what things cost, we've got to be able to have fewer of such systems than we would have of less capable systems that are good enough for smaller threats.
Missiles? VLS a bunch of Stingers and some Hellfire/Brimstones or TOWs in a box somewhere, or NASAMS, or Spike, or APKWS/LCGIR.
You want rotorcraft, sure thing, get a six pack of drones. Some kind of gun and a few MGs. Reuse that new Patriot radar maybe, the LTAMDS. ($150M. No. Sea Giraffe or such will do at $25M. What's cheaper than Sea Giraffe?)
If we're going to have 600 ships, we can't have all 600 be ABs, Ticos, Columbias and Fords. You can't sail an Arleigh Burke up the Susquehanna River to Wilkes-Barre anyway.
Thought 1: OPV’s post World War II were the province of the Coast Guard. The Navy used to have a number for the Yangtze Patrol as well as other peace maintenance roles, but the sheer number of DE and DD hulls available after World War II ended that as a part of our force structure. Maybe we need to reconsider that.
Thought 2: FFG armament needs to have robust local air defense. In this case, a sizable number of ESSM and SM ready VLS cells. We also need to look at EW as part of the ship’s weapons systems. How good are soft kill systems agains low cost UAS?
I look at AAW capability in an FFG like in WWII they looked at torpedo armament. John C. Butler Class DE had a single triple torpedo launcher. Her contemporary Fletcher Class DD had twin quint-launchers for a total of 10. Sammy B made her three count.
I like to think of Bagley and Gridley with their 16. Post war I also like to think of Brooke's 16 SM-1 and 16 ASROC as being a 32 tactical length VLS ship with one helo and 1 Mk 54.
In the modern sense I think Korea's FFX Batch I Incheons are closest in spirit to Bagley and Gridley. Tiny and vicious.
ESSM is still a $million-plus. Something must be done. How many FPV drones can you fit in one Mk. 41 VLS cell? No, I don't mean Coyote at $100K+. These people apparently have or will have tens of thousands of rounds to send at us. Silver bullets would be tough enough to afford, platinum impossible.
I think you are onto something here. Until they have SEWIP Blk III they have a missing link in their defense. They could short cut this with the anti UAS system on the FRCs in Bahrain. They also need to get serious about their only planning M2s for point defense. They need at least 2 Mk 38 mod 4 or some XM914 RWS.
We need to play to the level of our competition. Meaning we need to bring simple solutions to their low budget weapons. Hard and soft. We could go back to the ships defense like the WW2 independence class carriers. Those babies were armed to the teeth with every foot of the cat walks manned with a gun.
Seems to this bubblehead/sandcrab that what the OPV mission calls for is what the LCS was actually capable (if we could have fixed all the engineering and design problems created by bloat and beltway bandits) I'm no more a fan of the little crappy ships than you are, but damn if it doesn't feel like you're advocating for building something like them.
agreed, with exceptions. The concept of multiple plug and play modules was pie in the sky shit. Even vessels with as much design and configuration control as the Trident Submarine have enough variance, that you would not be able to pull a section from one and "plug it in" to another. Non structural design is +/- .50 inches, structural is +/- .25, PER ITEM. Those variances add up fast. Ships, even little ones, are not pickup trucks, you can't just swap the doors and the bed between like years as if they were made of legos. That was the big piece that the dreamers behind LCS never grasped.
I thought the manning concept was workable, but it demanded an aviation-like approach. Meaning a more robust training pipeline because you don't have the manpower for OJT, and getting the shoreside maintenance unit stood up before deployment.
If you want Buck Rogers, you have to spend the Bucks.
Take a look at the introduction of the MQ-4 to the Fleet. The first three airframes went to Pax River as test assets. The next few went to VUP-19 for training. THEN operational units got them. (Yes, I know about the early deployments...and we had back-pocket plans for Combat Test as well)
Had LCS actually operated as the SSBN's do with detailed crew turnover guidance then the multiple crew concept would have been fine and actually contributed to less wear/tear on the ships. Sadly the surface navy keeps punting on this concept without really giving it an honest try.
speaking as someone who has DONE that, there are some serious problems with it, that are in the "fight club" arena. (you know, the first rule of fight club is we don't talk about fight club?) We never discuss the issues with Blue/Gold crewing on SSBN/SSGNs because if we don't bring them up they really don't exist.
Primarily it comes down to lack of ownership. The standing joke in the SSBN fleet for the last 50 years at least, is that there are three crews on a boomer. The Blue crew, the Gold crew, and the "Other crew," and those guys on the "other crew" are a bunch of complete fuckups that break everything on board.
I would expect that the modules and mounting HW would be made in a factory with more typical automotive tolerance, and then the mounting hardware would be installed in the ship. There would be a minimum scale needed for this, no idea what that would be. It certainly would be more then a few.
Interesting. I've never seen that criticism of the modular concept, but it makes some sense. I always pictured the modules as primarily shipping containers that stack or fit where needed, but that was an incomplete view.
Agree. LCS tried to do too many new things in one package and failed as a result. I agree too despite what I said in the past that LCS has not proved capable of being a modern frigate with reasonable air and missile defense.
The speed requirement dictated the choice of hulls and power plant.
They did not think of range as they thought LCS would be zipping back and forth between the littoral and nearby friendly bases, swapping modules and crew.
They got so much wrong....
A much better job could be done with a relatively simple, robust and reliable ship.
What message does the visit by the HMS Trent really send?
America and Britain may see the ship as a commitment against a tin horn dictator - as Ronald Reagan used to say.
Other countries - with long and resentful memories - may see the visit as the latest version of American gunboat diplomacy and British colonialism. No easy answer.
My fear is that we may end up in the worst possible situation. We imply a commitment and then fail to back it up when push comes to shove. I hope the CIA and MI6 have thought this out carefully.
Strait of Hormuz calls for Burkes, rather than OPVs. Then again, look at all the work the Coast Guard is doing over there, so most of the time, it needs plenty of OPVs, too.
If I recall correctly the USCG physically shipped a handful of patrol boats over there, where they're permanently home ported as part of PATFORSWA. Those PBs didn't sail there, nor transit the Straight of Hormuz. They were literally cargo.
I'll play devil's advocate here -- is the 5" the right choice? If we're looking at large swarms of "flying lawnmower" drones, the 57mm might not be such a bad option -- large enough for a proximity fuze, high firing rate, and better rounds/ton than a 5" or even a 76mm.
With the risk of opponents running VLSs dry with swarms of flying lawnmowers, I can see a case for a gun optimized towards that class of target over "stopping power". The idea would be to save the VLS and CIWS for deadlier threats.
Still points in one direction. We need hemispheric protection. Microwave weapons can also do a shot gun, but we need cheap munitions that can fire and forget in any direction at any time. Or many, mounts WWII style except with guided and air burst. 30mm XM914 with 2 stingers on the mount or I'd say, adapt the mount for 2 APKWS to make the shots fired cheaper, yet still effective for the threat. Ditch the M2. (heresy, I know)
Evidently the 35mm is current minimum caliber for AHEAD type smart fuzing, which is evidently what's needed for single/short bursts instead of Phalanx style "walls of lead." Maybe 57mm or 76mm is a sweeter spot. Is that also more proper Boghammar medicine?
And there's always room for Jell-O//a couple of M2s stuck on somewhere.
Please explain to this old Gun Boss what you are saying when you refer to "canister shot". I know what canister is both historically and in the Field Artillery arena, but haven't the slightest idea what you are talking about.
Sorry, I should have said Mark 172 instead of “canister”. It’s the closest thing we have I think since AAVT common went away? I’m not a gunners mate or a gun boss. I’m a sub hunter. So forgive me for misspeaking.
I'm assuming you mean proximity fusing (aka VT)? It's great (ask any WWII IJN pilot), but against flying lawnmower swarms, I'm not sure how the extra "stopping power" of the 5" balances against the faster firing rate and larger ammo capacity of the 76mm or 57mm, both of which can support VT fused projectiles now. Unless the swarm is flying *very* close formation, the extra oomph of the 5" might go to waste in this scenario.
IIRC, after WWII, the 40mm Bofors was superceded by the 3" autloader (before they were all replaced by SAMs) because the increasing speed and size of attack aircraft required hitting harder and further out. Now, with the flying lawnmowers, we're facing almost the opposite problem: huge numbers of small, cheap drones that are *just* big enough that they can't be ignored, but swarm in numbers too large to handle with SM/RAM/ESSM.
If I put on my "red team" hat, my notional strategy would be to run USN missiles and CIWS out with mass flying lawnmowers, with a followup of ASBMs and/or higher-tier AShMs.
I think we need something with more range. With large swarms, it's going to be critical to start killing them as far out as possible -- waiting until they're within CIWS range probably means being unable to switch targets fast enough to kill them all before the leakers start hitting.
well, remember that these are not rapid movers, we're talking helo speed or slower, most are in the <150 KT range. Still, I take your point... And the trouble is that spending missiles or even something in the 20-40MM range against $500 drones is a losing proposition.
Maybe a combination set of systems? 4-6 of these hypothetical 5.56 radar controled chain guns, and a few banks of manpads in ganged formation. Better yet, something with a proximity detonation frag warhead, that will kill many in the cloud simultaneously.
What we need is a something that can take care of these drones at 20km. 20km so they can defend a convoy, not just themselves. What gun system 57, 76 or 5" can defend against air targets at 20km?
If I had a home swarm of small drones… I’d grab a shot gun with bird shot #7 before I’d grab one of my AR’s or AK. That’s why a mass of steel is needed
The choice of 57mm is a poor choice. The 76mm OM and modern ammo options would make a serious increase in FFG-62 combat effectiveness. I hope that FFG-72 (or whatever the hull number is for the first FFG Upgrade) includes the 76mm mount.
Let's see..... big hull, lightly loaded to keep draft shallow, relatively light armaments, probably a helicopter, and good for disaster assistance; an American "Floreal" class.
57mm, 2 SeaRAM or SeaRAM and Phalanx, MGs, ability to accept NSM launchers; hanger for SeaHawk, but Flight deck to handle larger helicopter; full EW; "overpowered" radar and sonar, with comms to share all info to other units; RHIBs for inspection and coastal work; multiple operating theaters, with at least one medical AND dental team on board; bunks for crew and at least one platoon of Marines; "excess" water desalination and electrical power capacity; and at least 10,000 NM range....
The "flying lawnmower" problem sounds like a good use for a laser countermeasure, such as the Israelis are developing. Shooting costly munitions at flying lawnmowers is expensive and logistics-intensive for re-supply.
I agree, although I'm not sure the lasers are there yet. The examples I've seen so far seem to need non-trivial dwell time on target to burn a drone -- I have concerns about their ability to deal with large swarms of flying lawnmowers *fast* enough.
Also, while DEWs don't use "ammunition", one thing I'm curious about is how heavy the fuel cost is to use one -- all that wattage has to come from somewhere. Although UNREPping fuel is a lot easier than reloading a VLS, so....
Another item I'm curious about is duty cycle limits -- high-energy lasers generate a LOT of waste heat. When I worked on 4kw industrial lasers about two decades ago, each one required the same cooling as an indoor skating rink. Efficiencies have improved since then, but a military-grade "reach out and touch someone" laser is going to need much more power, with commensurately greater heat rejection issues.
William: Wow! That's a lot of cooling for a laser. Considering how far LED lighting has come, with greatly improved output and heat management in smaller and smaller packages, military-grade laser weapons should become a reality.
Oh, they *are* a reality -- ironically, most of them (that I'm aware of) are basically industrial lasers "bundled" to get military grade output (which, IIRC, is ~100kW, though obviously that's dependent on how much "stopping power" the beam requires).
I should also mention that the final output optics of these lasers generally need a sacrificial "cover glass", which needs to be VERY clear. A spot of dust, or weld slag, or (I assume) salt encrustation, will create a "hot spot" that burns the glass, making the opaque spot grow, which makes it absorb more heat faster, which makes the spot grow faster... and very shortly your beam output is down to a few % of what it's supposed to be, b/c you're just heating the glass.
The alternative, though, is to leave your final *focusing* optic exposed, which is a major repair item. So regular cleaning/replacement of the cover glass is a serious regular maintenance item.
"Seaman Snuffy! Take this here sponge 'n squeegee, and have that HELIOS lens clean before I finish my coffee. What's that? What?! No, leave the needle gun here!"
A little plumbing creativity would go a long way, given that any hull sporting a directed energy weapon is floating on the surface of Earth's largest heat sink. Run some intake and exhaust piping through a pump and a beefy heat exchanger, and you've got a capability almost as good as a nuclear power plant.
Probably -- if there's one thing the Navy should know how to do, it's move heat (although most sweating sailors would probably disagree :P ) . But they should be able to borrow some expertise from the nukes.
It needs *massive* cooling, though, because very small amounts of thermal expansion in the various parts of the laser will cause beam coherence issues very quickly. So it's not just cooling to avoid overheating, it's cooling to keep the entire beam path at a *stable* temperature regardless of ambient conditions, or whether the 100kW output laser is generating ~5x-10x that in waste heat while firing.
Had a great conversation with a guy this weekend who is actually in the laser field. We are right at the edge of being there. Inside 5-yrs, even moreso. All we need at this point is more.
I'm not sure of the power scaling rate, but I think the current 50-60KW power output with HELIOS and DE M-SHORAD is high enough to be useful against certain threats. If they get 500-600KW in 5 years, well that is a lot more useful against a lot larger range of threats. Except in bad weather...
After my conversation this weekend, I am leaning towards a more optimistic view. Not a pure problem solver, but an exceptionally valuable additional system to throw in the mix.
Enough oomph to quickly fry commercial-sized drones like quadcopters, right?
Did you and your source discuss the power generation capacity required for a FFG/OPV to keep its laser system firing at drone swarms or multiple inbound missiles? It would be just so typical for our acquisitions guys to have the lasers and the generators available, but to somehow not be able to get them both onto a ship at the same time.
"“The Navy has been working to develop cost estimates for procurement of future laser weapon systems in order to support Navy programmatic considerations,” but “There are no previous programs of record for shipboard laser weapon systems in the Department of Defense from which to draw historical comparisons, particularly in the area of logistics and life-cycle cost.”
In other words, the Navy can’t acquire ship lasers because it has never acquired large numbers of them before, and therefore doesn’t know how much it might cost. "
Will someone please resurrect ADMs Red Raborn and Arleigh Burke.
"The Admiral (Burke) then decreed that we would proceed, with top priority, and wrote a memorandum saying that I (Raborn) was to have absolute top priority on anything I wanted to do, and everyone in the Navy would be responsive to my requests. If anyone in the Navy felt they couldn’t be, they were to come instantly to him with me and he would take it on himself to say no if he thought it was proper. Obviously this was a ‘magic’ piece of paper, which I carried in my shirt pocket for months — and only had to use twice, apologtically. The thing that shook them up most of all was that no one had anything to say about the program except me. No one in the Navy could tell me ‘what’ or ‘how’ to do this."
An EW guy, I am not expert in propulsion But naval literature generally says that variable pitch propellers offer improved performance and quieting across a wider range of speeds than do fixed pitch propellers. Otherwise, why was the more complex concept adopted? Can you explain why getting rid of variable pitch is a good idea please?
One more likely reason, they got rid of the bow mounted sonar so they will only have the two towed array systems. They don’t need to mitigate the hull noise now as the array sensors will be far enough away for self noise delousing. The change likely was predicated on cavitation effects on the towed array.
The fixed props and shaft mounted electric motors with rafted gensets are all noise mitigation for this platform. The sonar deletion is entirely for great lakes and seaway travel.
Then that is a poor trade off In economic terms. Can’t build them and get them out to the fleet with a sonar dome / bow bulb. So we will just remove them entirely. Clown shoes.
FFG and Zumwalt have fixed pitch as electric power combined with makes it quieter. CPP is great with gas turbine as you can go in reverse without reversing your engine.
Having helped win the first anti-missile campaign in history, I remain a big believer in the "heavy" gun for air defense as well as anti-surface fire power. A true destroyer should have TWO five inch guns - as my class had - so they cover 360 degrees of bearing. I also specified the CWIS - but our improved 1945 "layered defense" system was considered adequate - so the "war emergency" (for Vietnam) 20 mm took 11 years to field. The mounting was in fact designed for a 30 mm gun - because theory said 20 mm lacked the knock down power required. That was later confirmed by tests in the Reagan era. The 30 mm gun (GAU-8) WAS developed - for the A-10. But although some allies field a comparable 30 mm weapon, WE NEVER adopted what was supposed, in the design phase to be the "long term, future version." I not only want 30mm CWIS, I want either 2 or 4 of them per DDG - to provide 360 degree defense - to limit the risk of saturation or attack from a bearing one gun cannot cope with.
As a frigate Sailor (always deployed in Knox classes) I love the FFG 62 and would ask to be assigned to one if I was a brand new again to the Navy. It’s a fantastic experience as a Sailor. I wish they would have left the sonar suite alone. Hopefully they will revisit this in the successor class.
Knox class, huh? And you survived the evil fossil fuel driven steam plant? How non-transformational. A full step above slave powered oars and a half step beyond sails. ;<)
Yes. Too many to count for short cruises as we were bounced from deck to deck to provide air detachment with our little Sea Sprite. All Knox decks for me. We always had water though. I had squadron mates who cruised as air detachment on OHP and SPRUANCE to hear their tales of luxury… I still wouldn’t have traded a single place with any of them. Especially the poor bastards who had to ride Belknap Class cruisers. !
I'm just shaking my head here...because it's been a well-known fact for 40 years or so that ship steel is cheap. A modern warship, much like a modern combat aircraft, is a truck for sensors and weapons. And it is those sensors and weapons, plus the software that knits them together, that drives the cost.
Taking a foreign hull, modifying it, and then substituting American sensors and weapons doesn't save a damned dime. The Constellation program will probably work - it will deliver ships that have actual fighting power - but I remain convinced it will not be cost-effective. Half the fighting power of a Burke, for three-quarters of the price. We would probably have done better to gone with a new-build Perry hull with updated sensors and weapons.
Now, as for an OPC...frankly, THAT is what LCS should have been. Not the mismash of "good ideas", nouveau jeune ecole fantasies, and out-of-control desirements we got. A simple hull, about 30 kts, 5 inch gun on the front end, helo and pad aft, and a SeaRAM amidships. If I'm going to FIGHT in the littorals, the smart move is to do it with airpower. But aircraft can't do stop-and-search missions, don't provide gunfire support, and don't have the presence of a gray hull with an American flag. Had we gone down that route, the program would have been a smashing success.
If LCS had a working propulsion plant it would still be around.
The real issue on the odds is the combining gear with splitters. Rube Goldberg’s idea of a Main Propulsion train, if you ask me. Going electric would have been the best way to make that work.
I understand the rationale but what do these Navy OPCs do in wartime?
I can't see the Navy investing in ships (again) that have no combat capability.
Show the flag, rattle sabers, anti-piracy, interdiction, board & search, coastal security, escorting, training ground for sharp young officers and enlisted...all in the company of the Big Boys or in back water areas of lower intensity. If you can build 3 OPV's for the cost of 1 FFG you have upped your numbers. Think of them a niche ships.
I understand but those are mostly peacetime missions. If a conflict turns hot, they will become targets and have to run.
Ideally, a ship could perform the missions you outlined but would also have some utility in a hot environment.
57mm would be nice for hulling fishing/Maritime Militia ships.
As would many guided munitions we can now easily deck mount with no greater complexity than a larger crew served weapon.
57 mm shells are much more affordable than guided munitions when dealing with small scale operations.
Honestly, we found in WW2 that a .50 does a pretty good job in that regard, and a modern 25mm Bushmaster is even better. PT boats did a real number on Japanese powered barges in the Slot in the Solomons with their .50 MGs and 20 or 40mm cannon, NOT with their torpedoes. Most of the destruction of the Japanese convoy of destroyer transports in the Bismark Sea was due to .50 MGs from the aircraft involved.
I would probably recommend a 3"/76mm or 5" gun instead of a 57mm, simply because it has a longer range than a 57mm AND increases the flexibility of the hull by allowing it a battery big enough to provide short fire support even though a Ma Deuce would be adequate for most LIC patrol missions.
I'd rather we look at what the guns can do at sea and less for NGFS at this point. Get serious about guided rockets for that.
We need to be able to kill something for less than $six digits. If you want missiles for everything, devise cheaper missiles. A Shahed runs $20-50K. An FPV starts at $500. A RHIB starts at under $2K. Give me a thousand dollar missile and we'll talk. Cheaper will also imply smaller and the capacity for more of them.
Hmmm.....as Nichevo notes, look at the logistics issues imposed by cost. The Zumwalt-class destroyers carry no rounds for their 5" guns because those guided rounds cost $800K-$1million each. We currently lack the capacity to manufacture guided rockets/missiles/etc. at the rate they are being used in a HIC in Ukraine.
NGS is essential for an opposed entry, at least until the Marines can get their own guns established on-shore. Missiles are to expensive to provide the volume of fire needed - not just precision fires, but suppression fires, obscuring smoke, etc. I think a guided missile would be an overly expensive way to deploy smoke for obscurement, don't you think? Aircraft are also expensive and can't stay on station as long as a ship. Gun support combined with forward deployed ANGLICOs is the best solution to providing such fires during an opposed entry.
You can see the case for NGS in the Normandy landings. Carpet bombing from the air and saturation rocket attacks from LSM(R)s did little to suppress the shore defenses - it took direct gunfire support from destroyers moving close enough to shore to literally scrape the bottom of their hulls on shingle to get an angle to take out German nests and bunkers. Until that direct fire support was provided, the 1st and 29th ID were pinned at the seawall.
Of course, a 5" gun is probably the MINIMUM size required. Historically and up until the retirement of the Iowa class-battleships in the early 1990s, that role was traditionally designated for cruisers and battleships with 6-16" guns. The Des Moines-class heavy cruisers with batteries of autoloading, rapid fire 8" guns were probably the optimum. USS Newport News was VERY effective in this role on three floats of Vietnam, including destruction of shore batteries on the North Vietnamese coast, support of the 3 MARDIV in 67-8 (where it provided continuous 24/7 fire support along the DMZ for multiple weeks at a time), and the bombardment of Haiphong Harbor in Linebacker II. Unfortunately, the hull-form of the Des Moines class was not amenable due to deck space to upgrades for Harpoon, Tomahawk, CIWS, or new radars. As a result, the Iowa-class platforms were refit and reactivated to fill the role instead.
You still need to carry out that mission in a HIC, and a LIC environment is almost a constant reality where a HIC is a rare occurrence.
The Cyclone-class coastal patrol vessels provided harbor security and support for naval special warfare units in the Persian Gulf. OPVs could fill the naval fire support role destroyers were used for in Vietnam.
They DO have combat capability. It is a different capability than required in a high intensity conflict, but a very real capability for LIC. For example, an OPV can serve well in anti-piracy operations at a lower cost than using a major surface combatant in the role. The US is unusual in larger navies in NOT having ships dedicated to this sort of role - countries like France and Spain, for example, have avisos dedicated to the role. Prior to World War II, the US Navy DID invest in craft like this - gunboats, armed yachts, etc. - for use in missions like patrolling the waters of the Philippines to prevent piracy, supporting Marine forces in the Banana Wars, etc. No admiral of the period would have assumed that a ship designed for major conflict (like a battleship or cruiser) would have been appropriate for those missions.
You are as I see it making the assumption that the only combat worth noting is high intensity conflict. That ignores the reality that most of the actual combat Naval Surface Warfare has engaged in since the Second World War has been low intensity conflict. Operation Preying Mantis is the closest to an actual high intensity naval battle we have engaged in since 1945. All other actions involving major surface combatants have been air missions from carrier battle groups against land targets or gunfire support against the same. Anti-piracy engagements and interdiction of sea-based logistics support for enemy combatants constitute most of the actual ship-to-ship engagements in the period. You didn't need Harpoon ASMs or 8" guns to engage pirate small craft or North Vietnamese sampans smuggling munitions to the VC - but a smaller, agile combatant with a 3"-5" gun, some machine guns, a helicopter, and a RHIB for a boarding party can do the mission very well.
Thanks, Sal for a great 2023. Looking forward to your 2024.
Re: Constellation Mk 41 VLS - Does anyone here know if the limitation mentioned is based on total weapon weight or weapon length? Two totally different problems.
As designed, FFG-62 does not support SM-6 or Tomahawk, but does have SM-2, ESSM and separate launchers for Naval Strike Missile.
Thanks. My memory is that those fit into what we called the “strike length” Mk 41, a shorter version of the system.
Tactical length is shorter and srike length longer. All initial missiles for FFG happen to be tactical length and here has been a noticeable lack of clarity around whether the cells in the selected design are tactical or strike length. Their price per launcher in the budget is less than the cost per launcher on a Burke so I am inclined to think we are getting tactical length. Our launchers are much heavier than similar European Aster launchers plus our design seems to have shaved some hull depth exactly where the VLS is placed. I think this is why Congress said add Tomahawk and SM-6. My cheap easy solution to that would be delete NSM and clear that deck to fit as many mk 70 container launchers as possible or ADL strike length launchers.
Thanks for clearing up my memory. Too many years since I was at a drawing board. Does each ADL mount hold 4 canisters or 8? I’ve seen drawings that show both, and the only photos are side views that don’t clear that up. I believe the Conny now has 16 NSMs, so matching that number in ADL canisters corresponds to a lot of topside weight (birds and housing). The Burkes are general purpose destroyers, whereas it’s common for navies to make frigates more specialized. Were I in charge, I would tell Congress that the Navy can provide some of the class as AAW specialized and some as SUW specialized. Granted, that is a more nuanced answer than “Yes, sir. Three bags full, sir,” but I think we have people smart enough to properly brief congressional staff members.
We haven' seen the final product yet, but ADL appears to be 4 cells.
We are no longer building SM-2.
And there's another production line we'd better get up. Unless we make a 2nd for SM-6.
As per the last budget, we're building SM-6 now as that is the SM-2 replacement.
At 115 per year. Going to 250/year in 2028. How many do we expend each year in training?
https://comptroller.defense.gov/Portals/45/Documents/defbudget/FY2024/MYP_Exhibits/SM6_NAVY_MYP_1-4.pdf
https://www.rtx.com/raytheon/what-we-do/sea/sm-2-missile Raytheon is still building them and the USN is committed to the weapon through 2035, so acquisition can continue.
Laz, please in the name of all things Salamander, read what I write. "As per the last budget..."
I sincerely hope that whoever is responsible for that decision is no longer associated with the Navy in any capacity whatsoever.
They likely now serve on a BOD for Raytheon, or LM….
Is that due to Fire Control?
https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2Fdefencereview.gr%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2FMK41VLSECP7-1024x512.jpg&f=1&nofb=1&ipt=0950116d4f354c1e19624936da838ca8cec12f37ca43649b3e5b127a170afe7e&ipo=images
FFG-62 is more than capable of performing the sort of escort missions now occurring in the Red Sea. 32 VLS; some with SM-2, some with quad-packed ESSM, Sea RAM, and a 57mm gun, all directed by a Spy 6 variant. This is a very capable ship and adding more stuff only slows down acquisition and raises costs. We can debate the idea of an OPC of course, but the Navy needs 20 FFG-62's as designed now, and can wait until the next flight (you are a fan of flights yes?) for more capability.
Laz - for the love of Pete will you please read my posts before commenting? I've been asking you to do this for over a decade. Do you not see the Flight II commentary? FFS dude, really.
You did say a Flight 2 but it was murky in the text as to where that would start. If after the first 20 planned ships than ok. I still disagree that FFG-62 is not capable of the sort of escort missions currently underway in the Red Sea. :-)
Yeah 24 SM-2, 32 ESSM, and 21 RAM wih Mk 110 ready to go is good enough so long as some of tha can now handle the ballistic missile threat.
I agree that is an FFG-62 shortcoming, but with that as a threat is any low-end surface combatant viable? Houthi ballistic missiles so far seem poorly aimed.
How viable will be the threat 30-40b years down he road for he same ship still out there trying to survive?
They are still refining their tactics and probably the weapons. It is very probably going to get more effective and also more common. 500 kilos hitting at Mach 3+ is going to seriously tear up a DD/FG when it explodes deep inside the hull, so stopping that is critical.
They are the ‘third rate’ vessels of the Napoleonic navy in modern form – intended to fly a flag, do the 99% of maritime work that doesn’t involve fighting in a war and doing it cheaply and efficiently.
https://www.rmg.co.uk/stories/topics/rated-navy-ships-17th-19th-centuries
A 74-gun ship was a third-rate and was indeed a line-of-battle ship, indeed a workhorse, but not a flitter. The smallest rated ship that a post-captain would command was a sixth-rate, of 22 to 28 guns (on the high end, the fictional Captain Aubrey's HMS Surprise was a 28-gun frigate), and these were what the author of the passage above truly meant, the scouts, signalers, look-into-port-and-see-what's-whatters.
/Pedant off
Beat me to it. I would say these ships are more like the Sloops and Brigs of Nelson's time.
Unrated vessels, exactly. Even a frigate was not intended or expected to operate in the line of battle, but would be used for auxiliary purposes like signaling, observation, and actions intended to bring about the battle. Might do things like rescue survivors from sunken ships. But if they don't fire on the Santísima Trinidad, the Spanish four-decker won't fire on them.
Brigs and sloops don't even really belong at sea under those conditions. Not really speed or endurance or seaworthiness enough. They're the ones who go up river deltas looking for slavers or who carry the mail or sound enemy harbors. Inshore work. The littorals. What LCS was supposed to be, I guess (ha).
They need to stop saying no to cargo ships, packed with VLS, and make it work. They need to figure out UNREP for VLS on current surface combatants. They also need to figure out something worthwhile that fits 10 times as many into a VLS cell for 1/10 the price. It's a little ridiculous to expend a Standard missile on something smaller than itself.
Basically they need to do all the things they're going to do in an actual war, before the war starts.
Much in agreement!!
And Nelson said, should he die, they would find inscribed on his heart “want of frigates.” Some things never change.
Where the hell is the sonar dome????
Exactly. So who "certifies" that the area of operation is "sanitized" (based on that old Probability of Detection of 50%!) before sending in the Fig? Of course, maybe the NavSeanics are planning an FFG flight for ASW with no air defense capability. Ya know, to improve "stability".
The one main selling point for the FFG62 using the Italian design was to leverage PROVEN technology and capabilities. Sea keeping and sensor placement was a known. Now the navy has removed the sonar dome, which removes the capability of conducting ASW when the sea state is too developed for tail deployment. The reasoning is to “increase stability”, yet the navy increased the hull length on the FFG -62 to increase “future growth”, and also increased the gross tonnage of the vessel. A frigate must be capable of ASW in any sea state. This is a poor trade off in economy. I submit the ASW mission is the most critical of any this class will perform, yet we literally cut the balls off it.
TBF, more probable someone yeets a missile at you than has a sub deployed. Or sends a drone off a merchant ship.
True. But being a sponge is what the mission was to be and is to be for any escort. Operating out at the 1st CZ is crucial.
Maybe, but subs are still out there, and the USN has degraded its ASW capabilities over the decades: not enough SSN's, retiring OHP Class, retiring S-3 Viking, trading more numerous P-3's for fewer P-8's. How many hours per month does a Burke crew spend conducting ASW drills, do you think?
They have a dedicated east coast DDG ASW squadron which to me shows they need some more specialization in combatants. We are taking the path of highest cost for least resistance.
Don't forget that almost nothing in the propulsion is the same as a Fremm either.
Perhaps we learned from the past about using Italian power plants..
Still our gas turbine, but yeah, avoid Italian diesel gensets.
It is in the "cost savings" part of the ledger.
I don’t like it. They could have fully funded it and we wouldn’t need to cost savings the design. IMO
Couldn’t agree more. The River class are doing amazing work for the RN in Asia, incredibly well received.
But less AAW capability than LCS and no embarked helo in an OPV, so not really suited to USN strategy or operations. An OPV would not be useful in any kind of AAW/missile threat environment.
You are as wrong about OPV as you were about LCS. I would also offer to you that you should research what the Royal Navy has been using the River Class for. Look at the Rivers at the low end and the Italian Thaon di Revel-class OPV at the high end of what we're talking about.
I have noted my shortfalls in LCS thinking: https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/2023/december/confessions-former-lcs-champion The current USN is not the RN. We have a different mission set and have no Commonwealth/former colonial possessions to patrol where the threat is low. The Caribbean might be such a place, but unlike the UK the US has a capable Coast Guard for those missions.
I'd be more inclined to agree if the USCG were manned and equipped for that overseas constabulary mission.
You could make the same comment for the USN. They aren’t exactly turning people away at the recruiters either.
The USCG shouldn't be doing overseas constabulary missions, despite any advantage conveyed by Title 14 of the U.S. Code. America's coasts need to be guarded by subject matter experts who aren't spread thin around the world.
We have the Navy & Marine Corps for overseas nautical tomfoolery (and there are always a handful of Coast Guard LEDETS available to embark on a grey hull, if absolutely necessary for searches/seizures/law enforcement).
The problem is neither the Navy nor the Coast Guard is manned for it.
The Coast Guard is more suitably equipped but is too small.
Um, the first three letters of that acronym might indicate that they have other business.
" we ..." have no Commonwealth/former colonial possessions to patrol where the threat is low."
But we sure seem to interject our ships and people into sh!thole countries where bad things are happening, and voluntarily serving as the world's police force (gratis, no less) even when we are $31 trillion in debt, cannot meet recruiting goals, and suffer from an atrophied fleet and national leadership searching unsuccessfully for a clue about anything.
I disagree. And in any event, building a dozen OPVs to soak up low end tasks in peacetime would be more than worth the effort. We shouldn’t be limiting our navy’s options in peacetime (the natural state it is in about 98% of the time) because of a missile/wartime bogeyman. We’re losing the influence game because we don’t have enough ships to cover our commitments, and many of those commitments don’t need a CRUDES, but they do need a ship that works.
The challenge is that such OPV's, while useful in Phase 0 ops have little utility in a shooting conflict. If you made them big enough to have a rotary wing capability and a SeaRAM or two then maybe, but then you have another LCS.
Well, Nimitz had a bunch of them: PCs.
Every ship can't sink the Yamato or destroy Beijing. Nobody expected HMS Pickle to "have utility in a shooting conflict." 10 guns was more than it needed to carry home the news of Nelson's victory at Trafalgar.
Look at a Houthi scale threat. They haven't got DF-21s. They have windup toys and we're shooting them down with million dollar missiles (and that's at the low end).
Even if we don't care what things cost, we've got to be able to have fewer of such systems than we would have of less capable systems that are good enough for smaller threats.
Missiles? VLS a bunch of Stingers and some Hellfire/Brimstones or TOWs in a box somewhere, or NASAMS, or Spike, or APKWS/LCGIR.
You want rotorcraft, sure thing, get a six pack of drones. Some kind of gun and a few MGs. Reuse that new Patriot radar maybe, the LTAMDS. ($150M. No. Sea Giraffe or such will do at $25M. What's cheaper than Sea Giraffe?)
If we're going to have 600 ships, we can't have all 600 be ABs, Ticos, Columbias and Fords. You can't sail an Arleigh Burke up the Susquehanna River to Wilkes-Barre anyway.
Wish I could like this twice
Thought 1: OPV’s post World War II were the province of the Coast Guard. The Navy used to have a number for the Yangtze Patrol as well as other peace maintenance roles, but the sheer number of DE and DD hulls available after World War II ended that as a part of our force structure. Maybe we need to reconsider that.
Thought 2: FFG armament needs to have robust local air defense. In this case, a sizable number of ESSM and SM ready VLS cells. We also need to look at EW as part of the ship’s weapons systems. How good are soft kill systems agains low cost UAS?
I look at AAW capability in an FFG like in WWII they looked at torpedo armament. John C. Butler Class DE had a single triple torpedo launcher. Her contemporary Fletcher Class DD had twin quint-launchers for a total of 10. Sammy B made her three count.
I like to think of Bagley and Gridley with their 16. Post war I also like to think of Brooke's 16 SM-1 and 16 ASROC as being a 32 tactical length VLS ship with one helo and 1 Mk 54.
In the modern sense I think Korea's FFX Batch I Incheons are closest in spirit to Bagley and Gridley. Tiny and vicious.
Something like eight tactical length VLS holding 32 ESSM seems appropriate for the type of ship we are talking about.
Same kit as the larger, more capable ships, just less of it.
ESSM is still a $million-plus. Something must be done. How many FPV drones can you fit in one Mk. 41 VLS cell? No, I don't mean Coyote at $100K+. These people apparently have or will have tens of thousands of rounds to send at us. Silver bullets would be tough enough to afford, platinum impossible.
I think you are onto something here. Until they have SEWIP Blk III they have a missing link in their defense. They could short cut this with the anti UAS system on the FRCs in Bahrain. They also need to get serious about their only planning M2s for point defense. They need at least 2 Mk 38 mod 4 or some XM914 RWS.
We need to play to the level of our competition. Meaning we need to bring simple solutions to their low budget weapons. Hard and soft. We could go back to the ships defense like the WW2 independence class carriers. Those babies were armed to the teeth with every foot of the cat walks manned with a gun.
Seems to this bubblehead/sandcrab that what the OPV mission calls for is what the LCS was actually capable (if we could have fixed all the engineering and design problems created by bloat and beltway bandits) I'm no more a fan of the little crappy ships than you are, but damn if it doesn't feel like you're advocating for building something like them.
The CONCEPT of LCS was excellent; the DESIGN and EXECUTION, not so much.
agreed, with exceptions. The concept of multiple plug and play modules was pie in the sky shit. Even vessels with as much design and configuration control as the Trident Submarine have enough variance, that you would not be able to pull a section from one and "plug it in" to another. Non structural design is +/- .50 inches, structural is +/- .25, PER ITEM. Those variances add up fast. Ships, even little ones, are not pickup trucks, you can't just swap the doors and the bed between like years as if they were made of legos. That was the big piece that the dreamers behind LCS never grasped.
StanFlex is a thing; but the Navy thought it could do it "betterer".
Also, the manning concept was, as my British friends might say, a pile of pants and bag of a55.
I thought the manning concept was workable, but it demanded an aviation-like approach. Meaning a more robust training pipeline because you don't have the manpower for OJT, and getting the shoreside maintenance unit stood up before deployment.
"Robust training pipeline"? So not replacing A-schools with a app on a PED? Sounds expensive.
If you want Buck Rogers, you have to spend the Bucks.
Take a look at the introduction of the MQ-4 to the Fleet. The first three airframes went to Pax River as test assets. The next few went to VUP-19 for training. THEN operational units got them. (Yes, I know about the early deployments...and we had back-pocket plans for Combat Test as well)
Had LCS actually operated as the SSBN's do with detailed crew turnover guidance then the multiple crew concept would have been fine and actually contributed to less wear/tear on the ships. Sadly the surface navy keeps punting on this concept without really giving it an honest try.
speaking as someone who has DONE that, there are some serious problems with it, that are in the "fight club" arena. (you know, the first rule of fight club is we don't talk about fight club?) We never discuss the issues with Blue/Gold crewing on SSBN/SSGNs because if we don't bring them up they really don't exist.
Primarily it comes down to lack of ownership. The standing joke in the SSBN fleet for the last 50 years at least, is that there are three crews on a boomer. The Blue crew, the Gold crew, and the "Other crew," and those guys on the "other crew" are a bunch of complete fuckups that break everything on board.
I would expect that the modules and mounting HW would be made in a factory with more typical automotive tolerance, and then the mounting hardware would be installed in the ship. There would be a minimum scale needed for this, no idea what that would be. It certainly would be more then a few.
Interesting. I've never seen that criticism of the modular concept, but it makes some sense. I always pictured the modules as primarily shipping containers that stack or fit where needed, but that was an incomplete view.
Agree. LCS tried to do too many new things in one package and failed as a result. I agree too despite what I said in the past that LCS has not proved capable of being a modern frigate with reasonable air and missile defense.
The speed requirement dictated the choice of hulls and power plant.
They did not think of range as they thought LCS would be zipping back and forth between the littoral and nearby friendly bases, swapping modules and crew.
They got so much wrong....
A much better job could be done with a relatively simple, robust and reliable ship.
What message does the visit by the HMS Trent really send?
America and Britain may see the ship as a commitment against a tin horn dictator - as Ronald Reagan used to say.
Other countries - with long and resentful memories - may see the visit as the latest version of American gunboat diplomacy and British colonialism. No easy answer.
My fear is that we may end up in the worst possible situation. We imply a commitment and then fail to back it up when push comes to shove. I hope the CIA and MI6 have thought this out carefully.
The proportionality of the vessel to a developing navy is what Sal is intimating at. It has a place.
WRT "I hope the CIA and MI6 have thought this out carefully" one could say I am not as confident as I was 30 years ago
The Strait of Hormuz calls for more 5" guns and less missiles.
Strait of Hormuz calls for Burkes, rather than OPVs. Then again, look at all the work the Coast Guard is doing over there, so most of the time, it needs plenty of OPVs, too.
If I recall correctly the USCG physically shipped a handful of patrol boats over there, where they're permanently home ported as part of PATFORSWA. Those PBs didn't sail there, nor transit the Straight of Hormuz. They were literally cargo.
That is correct. See this article: https://www.mycg.uscg.mil/News/Article/3321377/the-long-blue-line-20-years-oif-patforswalargest-uscg-unit-outside-us-territory/
Pretty sure the FRCs made it there on their own. https://www.dcms.uscg.mil/Our-Organization/Assistant-Commandant-for-Acquisitions-CG-9/Newsroom/Latest-Acquisition-News/Article/2892791/coast-guard-accepts-47th-fast-response-cutter/
Thanks!
I'll play devil's advocate here -- is the 5" the right choice? If we're looking at large swarms of "flying lawnmower" drones, the 57mm might not be such a bad option -- large enough for a proximity fuze, high firing rate, and better rounds/ton than a 5" or even a 76mm.
With the risk of opponents running VLSs dry with swarms of flying lawnmowers, I can see a case for a gun optimized towards that class of target over "stopping power". The idea would be to save the VLS and CIWS for deadlier threats.
5 inch with canister shot. Quite effective.
Still points in one direction. We need hemispheric protection. Microwave weapons can also do a shot gun, but we need cheap munitions that can fire and forget in any direction at any time. Or many, mounts WWII style except with guided and air burst. 30mm XM914 with 2 stingers on the mount or I'd say, adapt the mount for 2 APKWS to make the shots fired cheaper, yet still effective for the threat. Ditch the M2. (heresy, I know)
One thing I'd like to see considered is taking an LCS-odd and strap 4 57mm mounts onto the helo deck. Turn it into a dedicated close-in AAW escort.
Not structurally possible. Under the helo deck is a massive open area for boat operations. Putting RAM launchers or NSM boxes would be more feasible.
Evidently the 35mm is current minimum caliber for AHEAD type smart fuzing, which is evidently what's needed for single/short bursts instead of Phalanx style "walls of lead." Maybe 57mm or 76mm is a sweeter spot. Is that also more proper Boghammar medicine?
And there's always room for Jell-O//a couple of M2s stuck on somewhere.
Please explain to this old Gun Boss what you are saying when you refer to "canister shot". I know what canister is both historically and in the Field Artillery arena, but haven't the slightest idea what you are talking about.
Sorry, I should have said Mark 172 instead of “canister”. It’s the closest thing we have I think since AAVT common went away? I’m not a gunners mate or a gun boss. I’m a sub hunter. So forgive me for misspeaking.
Mark 172 HE-ICM (Cargo Round)
http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNUS_5-62_mk45.php#Notes_on_Mark_172_HE-ICM_Cargo_Round
I'm assuming you mean proximity fusing (aka VT)? It's great (ask any WWII IJN pilot), but against flying lawnmower swarms, I'm not sure how the extra "stopping power" of the 5" balances against the faster firing rate and larger ammo capacity of the 76mm or 57mm, both of which can support VT fused projectiles now. Unless the swarm is flying *very* close formation, the extra oomph of the 5" might go to waste in this scenario.
IIRC, after WWII, the 40mm Bofors was superceded by the 3" autloader (before they were all replaced by SAMs) because the increasing speed and size of attack aircraft required hitting harder and further out. Now, with the flying lawnmowers, we're facing almost the opposite problem: huge numbers of small, cheap drones that are *just* big enough that they can't be ignored, but swarm in numbers too large to handle with SM/RAM/ESSM.
If I put on my "red team" hat, my notional strategy would be to run USN missiles and CIWS out with mass flying lawnmowers, with a followup of ASBMs and/or higher-tier AShMs.
Or we could literally build a small charge like the Abrams uses made up of canister…. It could be done cheap.
Yes VT = proximity. Not hard to calculate considering flying lawnmowers move at a predictable speed.
what we need for flying lawnmowers is a radar guided 5.56 chaingun. Smaller than the bushmaster even.
Too small.
it's a glorified version of what you can buy on the internet. a 5.56 will take one out, if you can hit it.
I think we need something with more range. With large swarms, it's going to be critical to start killing them as far out as possible -- waiting until they're within CIWS range probably means being unable to switch targets fast enough to kill them all before the leakers start hitting.
well, remember that these are not rapid movers, we're talking helo speed or slower, most are in the <150 KT range. Still, I take your point... And the trouble is that spending missiles or even something in the 20-40MM range against $500 drones is a losing proposition.
Maybe a combination set of systems? 4-6 of these hypothetical 5.56 radar controled chain guns, and a few banks of manpads in ganged formation. Better yet, something with a proximity detonation frag warhead, that will kill many in the cloud simultaneously.
Agreed. We need a swatter to deal with flies.
What we need is a something that can take care of these drones at 20km. 20km so they can defend a convoy, not just themselves. What gun system 57, 76 or 5" can defend against air targets at 20km?
If I had a home swarm of small drones… I’d grab a shot gun with bird shot #7 before I’d grab one of my AR’s or AK. That’s why a mass of steel is needed
and that's why I said "chain gun"
We need drones o hunt drones and maybe even do so with guided munitions.
eventually this will be part of the answer
The choice of 57mm is a poor choice. The 76mm OM and modern ammo options would make a serious increase in FFG-62 combat effectiveness. I hope that FFG-72 (or whatever the hull number is for the first FFG Upgrade) includes the 76mm mount.
Let's see..... big hull, lightly loaded to keep draft shallow, relatively light armaments, probably a helicopter, and good for disaster assistance; an American "Floreal" class.
57mm, 2 SeaRAM or SeaRAM and Phalanx, MGs, ability to accept NSM launchers; hanger for SeaHawk, but Flight deck to handle larger helicopter; full EW; "overpowered" radar and sonar, with comms to share all info to other units; RHIBs for inspection and coastal work; multiple operating theaters, with at least one medical AND dental team on board; bunks for crew and at least one platoon of Marines; "excess" water desalination and electrical power capacity; and at least 10,000 NM range....
The "flying lawnmower" problem sounds like a good use for a laser countermeasure, such as the Israelis are developing. Shooting costly munitions at flying lawnmowers is expensive and logistics-intensive for re-supply.
Yes. We are working on this too. Lasers are the future and they always will be.
I agree, although I'm not sure the lasers are there yet. The examples I've seen so far seem to need non-trivial dwell time on target to burn a drone -- I have concerns about their ability to deal with large swarms of flying lawnmowers *fast* enough.
Also, while DEWs don't use "ammunition", one thing I'm curious about is how heavy the fuel cost is to use one -- all that wattage has to come from somewhere. Although UNREPping fuel is a lot easier than reloading a VLS, so....
Another item I'm curious about is duty cycle limits -- high-energy lasers generate a LOT of waste heat. When I worked on 4kw industrial lasers about two decades ago, each one required the same cooling as an indoor skating rink. Efficiencies have improved since then, but a military-grade "reach out and touch someone" laser is going to need much more power, with commensurately greater heat rejection issues.
William: Wow! That's a lot of cooling for a laser. Considering how far LED lighting has come, with greatly improved output and heat management in smaller and smaller packages, military-grade laser weapons should become a reality.
Oh, they *are* a reality -- ironically, most of them (that I'm aware of) are basically industrial lasers "bundled" to get military grade output (which, IIRC, is ~100kW, though obviously that's dependent on how much "stopping power" the beam requires).
I should also mention that the final output optics of these lasers generally need a sacrificial "cover glass", which needs to be VERY clear. A spot of dust, or weld slag, or (I assume) salt encrustation, will create a "hot spot" that burns the glass, making the opaque spot grow, which makes it absorb more heat faster, which makes the spot grow faster... and very shortly your beam output is down to a few % of what it's supposed to be, b/c you're just heating the glass.
The alternative, though, is to leave your final *focusing* optic exposed, which is a major repair item. So regular cleaning/replacement of the cover glass is a serious regular maintenance item.
"Seaman Snuffy! Take this here sponge 'n squeegee, and have that HELIOS lens clean before I finish my coffee. What's that? What?! No, leave the needle gun here!"
A little plumbing creativity would go a long way, given that any hull sporting a directed energy weapon is floating on the surface of Earth's largest heat sink. Run some intake and exhaust piping through a pump and a beefy heat exchanger, and you've got a capability almost as good as a nuclear power plant.
Probably -- if there's one thing the Navy should know how to do, it's move heat (although most sweating sailors would probably disagree :P ) . But they should be able to borrow some expertise from the nukes.
It needs *massive* cooling, though, because very small amounts of thermal expansion in the various parts of the laser will cause beam coherence issues very quickly. So it's not just cooling to avoid overheating, it's cooling to keep the entire beam path at a *stable* temperature regardless of ambient conditions, or whether the 100kW output laser is generating ~5x-10x that in waste heat while firing.
Damn, I love the Front Porch. I learn so much here! 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻
easier than reloading a VLS
FIX THIS. NO QUESTIONS.
HELIOS. It's already in the deploy-it-and-try-it-out phase.
Had a great conversation with a guy this weekend who is actually in the laser field. We are right at the edge of being there. Inside 5-yrs, even moreso. All we need at this point is more.
I'm not sure of the power scaling rate, but I think the current 50-60KW power output with HELIOS and DE M-SHORAD is high enough to be useful against certain threats. If they get 500-600KW in 5 years, well that is a lot more useful against a lot larger range of threats. Except in bad weather...
After my conversation this weekend, I am leaning towards a more optimistic view. Not a pure problem solver, but an exceptionally valuable additional system to throw in the mix.
Enough oomph to quickly fry commercial-sized drones like quadcopters, right?
Did you and your source discuss the power generation capacity required for a FFG/OPV to keep its laser system firing at drone swarms or multiple inbound missiles? It would be just so typical for our acquisitions guys to have the lasers and the generators available, but to somehow not be able to get them both onto a ship at the same time.
Here today an article saying we don't know how much they cost, but it ain't cheap. https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2024/01/why-navy-isnt-shooting-down-houthi-drones-lasers-yet/393067/
From your linked article.
"“The Navy has been working to develop cost estimates for procurement of future laser weapon systems in order to support Navy programmatic considerations,” but “There are no previous programs of record for shipboard laser weapon systems in the Department of Defense from which to draw historical comparisons, particularly in the area of logistics and life-cycle cost.”
In other words, the Navy can’t acquire ship lasers because it has never acquired large numbers of them before, and therefore doesn’t know how much it might cost. "
Will someone please resurrect ADMs Red Raborn and Arleigh Burke.
https://archive.navalsubleague.org/1990/polaris-and-red-raborn
"The Admiral (Burke) then decreed that we would proceed, with top priority, and wrote a memorandum saying that I (Raborn) was to have absolute top priority on anything I wanted to do, and everyone in the Navy would be responsive to my requests. If anyone in the Navy felt they couldn’t be, they were to come instantly to him with me and he would take it on himself to say no if he thought it was proper. Obviously this was a ‘magic’ piece of paper, which I carried in my shirt pocket for months — and only had to use twice, apologtically. The thing that shook them up most of all was that no one had anything to say about the program except me. No one in the Navy could tell me ‘what’ or ‘how’ to do this."
No historical comparison to draw on. Pfft!
An EW guy, I am not expert in propulsion But naval literature generally says that variable pitch propellers offer improved performance and quieting across a wider range of speeds than do fixed pitch propellers. Otherwise, why was the more complex concept adopted? Can you explain why getting rid of variable pitch is a good idea please?
Cost savings and maintenance. Less engineer work and manpower.
One more likely reason, they got rid of the bow mounted sonar so they will only have the two towed array systems. They don’t need to mitigate the hull noise now as the array sensors will be far enough away for self noise delousing. The change likely was predicated on cavitation effects on the towed array.
A ship with a big bow dome won't fit in the Welland locks...
The fixed props and shaft mounted electric motors with rafted gensets are all noise mitigation for this platform. The sonar deletion is entirely for great lakes and seaway travel.
Then that is a poor trade off In economic terms. Can’t build them and get them out to the fleet with a sonar dome / bow bulb. So we will just remove them entirely. Clown shoes.
FFG and Zumwalt have fixed pitch as electric power combined with makes it quieter. CPP is great with gas turbine as you can go in reverse without reversing your engine.
Having helped win the first anti-missile campaign in history, I remain a big believer in the "heavy" gun for air defense as well as anti-surface fire power. A true destroyer should have TWO five inch guns - as my class had - so they cover 360 degrees of bearing. I also specified the CWIS - but our improved 1945 "layered defense" system was considered adequate - so the "war emergency" (for Vietnam) 20 mm took 11 years to field. The mounting was in fact designed for a 30 mm gun - because theory said 20 mm lacked the knock down power required. That was later confirmed by tests in the Reagan era. The 30 mm gun (GAU-8) WAS developed - for the A-10. But although some allies field a comparable 30 mm weapon, WE NEVER adopted what was supposed, in the design phase to be the "long term, future version." I not only want 30mm CWIS, I want either 2 or 4 of them per DDG - to provide 360 degree defense - to limit the risk of saturation or attack from a bearing one gun cannot cope with.
As a frigate Sailor (always deployed in Knox classes) I love the FFG 62 and would ask to be assigned to one if I was a brand new again to the Navy. It’s a fantastic experience as a Sailor. I wish they would have left the sonar suite alone. Hopefully they will revisit this in the successor class.
Knox class, huh? And you survived the evil fossil fuel driven steam plant? How non-transformational. A full step above slave powered oars and a half step beyond sails. ;<)
Yes. Too many to count for short cruises as we were bounced from deck to deck to provide air detachment with our little Sea Sprite. All Knox decks for me. We always had water though. I had squadron mates who cruised as air detachment on OHP and SPRUANCE to hear their tales of luxury… I still wouldn’t have traded a single place with any of them. Especially the poor bastards who had to ride Belknap Class cruisers. !
I'm just shaking my head here...because it's been a well-known fact for 40 years or so that ship steel is cheap. A modern warship, much like a modern combat aircraft, is a truck for sensors and weapons. And it is those sensors and weapons, plus the software that knits them together, that drives the cost.
Taking a foreign hull, modifying it, and then substituting American sensors and weapons doesn't save a damned dime. The Constellation program will probably work - it will deliver ships that have actual fighting power - but I remain convinced it will not be cost-effective. Half the fighting power of a Burke, for three-quarters of the price. We would probably have done better to gone with a new-build Perry hull with updated sensors and weapons.
Now, as for an OPC...frankly, THAT is what LCS should have been. Not the mismash of "good ideas", nouveau jeune ecole fantasies, and out-of-control desirements we got. A simple hull, about 30 kts, 5 inch gun on the front end, helo and pad aft, and a SeaRAM amidships. If I'm going to FIGHT in the littorals, the smart move is to do it with airpower. But aircraft can't do stop-and-search missions, don't provide gunfire support, and don't have the presence of a gray hull with an American flag. Had we gone down that route, the program would have been a smashing success.
If the LCS had a 5 inch and any sonar capability they likely would have still been around.
If LCS had a working propulsion plant it would still be around.
The real issue on the odds is the combining gear with splitters. Rube Goldberg’s idea of a Main Propulsion train, if you ask me. Going electric would have been the best way to make that work.
Hmm wasn’t their power plant Italian? The gearboxes something?
IIRC, the shipbuilder went to a 'cheaper but just as good' gearbox from a different vendor after the first ship or two. Well, it was cheaper...
I’m not sure. I never went down there, but I know the water jets are Rolls-Royce.
Italian gensets on LCS-1. The rest is Rolls Royce, Colt Peilstick, and Renk (German?)
Steel made by the lowest bidder makes me nervous especially coming from a guy whose handle is a battleship that was hit hard at Jutland.
An honest tribute to brave men who took fast ships in harm's way.
Beatty and Jelicoe are heroes of mine.