A need for battleships?

Very controversial, but there is a rising discussion of bringing to the United States Navy modern gunnery systems.

The reason is battle field experience in The Russian Ukrainian war.

With small, cheap subsonic drones killing tanks, aircraft and even individual soldiers on the battle field, the idea of using modern high tech (and very expensive) missiles to destroy card board drones that (depending on type, model and arms) often cost far less than $20,000 per unit USD.

Lots of discussions, but one area of that topic was the case for WW2 battleships armed with radar controlled 5inch 38 cal. Dual purpose guns, 40 mm intermediate anti aircraft guns, and 20 mm single and dual anti aircraft guns would be better suited (and cheaper to operate and use) to dealing with cheap, sub sonic drones.

In the modern U.S. navy, the number and type of guns any given ship carries has been reduced. Thus, the ships currently active in the Fleet are singularly unable to face the threat of Ukraine style small cheap drones.

At best, the could launch a missile ,all of which are expensive and for a ship at sea, difficult to replace short of returning to base.

Depending on the particular class of ship, you might have one or two five inch gun mounts. Individually, each such gun should be able to target and destroy a single drone for approximately $500 per shell, but rate of fire and ships total ammunition store of such shells are a finite limit to how many drones could be destroyed.

A swarm attack, of enough drones, would saturate the gun defenses of any single ship.

Thus, discussion of what type and mixture of gun defenses should the modern ships of the navy have, to protect themselves from enemies armed with a Ukrainian style cheap drones.

The discussions continue, but the bottom line is, is it time again for layered air defense, intended for a subsonic drone threat?

Now, because of the jokers out there who suggest that hyperspeed munitions are more dangerous, compare the cost structures:

Often hyperspeed missiles are horrifically expensive, and able to be defeated by current technology missiles and close in weapons systems . And often using munitions or missiles that are far cheaper than the hyperspeed missiles cost.

What is needed, is a way to deal with the cheap drone threat.

Look at what happened to the Russian Black Sea fleet.

By Jeff Anderson (Jga) on Sunday, January 19, 2025 - 04:12 pm: Edit

I just had an image pop into my head; a potential point defense system for counter drone work. I imagined a unit based on a miniaturized Phalanx, but built around a 5.56 mm minigun. I'm thinking it could even be a discrete unit, just something that can be wheeled out on deck and plugged in to the ship's weapons control systems.

It'd no doubt be worthless against hypersonic missiles, but against drones or close-in against suicide speedboats, I think it might have potential

By MarkSHoyle (Bolo) on Sunday, January 19, 2025 - 04:13 pm: Edit

Makes you wonder, what an Iowa would look like,
armed like an Atlanta Class CLAA......
How many 5" could you install, rather than a 16"...

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Sunday, January 19, 2025 - 04:46 pm: Edit

AA Defensive

Wouldn't a 16" Flechette Shell - be ideal?

The kill area must be what - 60 Foot in Diameter and mission kill perhpas 100 foot in Diameter?


I would have thought 20 mm and below probably doesn't have enough explosive/fragmentation and so direct hit or close to direct hit (10 foot proximity??) is then needed.

CIWS might be ideal for point defence - but if it's that close, the explosion might still do damage to the target - so not ideal.

A small drone might not have much radar detection also - so the old 'fire and barrier defence' might come back into it?

Alot of 5" Guns might be better for that.

(So combination of visial, IR and Radar is needed).

Which perhaps leeds onto - could a Sound Detector actually be better than Radar or IR?

You can hide radar and IR signatures to various degress - I haven't heard of anything to 'stop' sound?

As SVC said though - if someone fires 500 $300 dollar drones at you, how long would it take to bankrupt a SAM defending force?

By Jeff Anderson (Jga) on Sunday, January 19, 2025 - 09:14 pm: Edit

A swarm with enough drones to saturate might be dense enough for multiple kills with a single round. Saab has developed proximity shells for their 57 mm gun that, according to the (Saab) promotional videos might be just the ticket for dense parts of swarms.

Those that get through get hit by microwave lasers (or the .223 miniguns I blathered about at 4:12 this afternoon?)

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Sunday, January 19, 2025 - 09:32 pm: Edit

Several medial sites (including Rueters) have posted stories in the last five days announcing that Subic bay naval base, Luzon, Philippines, has been reopened.

U.s. dept of defense announced the intention to reopen 4 bases in the Philippines in April, 2023.

This seems to be related to preparations in the event China were to move aggressively in the South China Sea or even invade Taiwan.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Monday, January 20, 2025 - 01:04 am: Edit

Paul Howard, A 16" flechette would be a fired from gun that, because of its mass, would be very slow to to train on target. Making corrections to keep the aim on small fast moving targets would be hard.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Monday, January 20, 2025 - 01:45 am: Edit

Swarms is an idea for nightmares; cheap and too numerous to defend against with conventional defences. In reality all capabilities you add (starting with a small warhead!) also increase weight, which means either shorter range and speed, or getting a bigger engine, more fuel, bigger body etc. Increasing cost and reducing numbers.
If you want something to fire at a warship of the coast of Yemen and ensure it actually can hit and do damage, you may add capabilities until you realise the cheap drone from Ali Express have become a Harpoon missile. Then you have no cheap swarm any longer. The Soviet navy had this idea of saturation attacks of naval targets. It was quite expensive with bombers carrying anti-ship missiles the size of small fighter jets (those missiles communicated with each other to assign targets IIRC). I haven't heard of any other swarm system IRL.

By Mike Grafton (Mike_Grafton) on Monday, January 20, 2025 - 08:26 am: Edit

CIWS and it various competitors would be fine. I have been caught out in the open during IF attacks at night and the visuals are impressive.

By MarkSHoyle (Bolo) on Monday, January 20, 2025 - 08:37 am: Edit

Even in the mid-40s, 40mm & 5" rds had a proximity fuse attached, as mentioned, don't know what the detection ability would be against a drone....

How many drones would it take to even scratch something similarly armored as an Iowa....

Also, you could equipment the ship with multiple groups of drones, which had a net (similar to the old cargo nets they used to board landing craft) attached that paralleled the ship....

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Monday, January 20, 2025 - 09:27 am: Edit

The Russians have been fitting their tanks with a “cage” structure, varies from repair depot to repair depot. Some of the early versions were little more than poultry mesh small gauge wire, to later types that were metal and wood frames.

The idea appears to be stopping grenades dropped from drones far enough away from the tanks armor to prevent serious damage to the vehicle.

More recently, the Russians have been making the “cage” heavier and with thicker metal plates, thick enough to cause armor piercing shells and RPGs to also detonate far enough away from the tank hull to again, prevent damage to the actual hull of the tank.

Same general idea as fitting torpedo blisters to the hull of navy ships for protection from torpedos. I.e. the torpedo detonation would damage the blister, but leave the original hull of the ship undamaged.

If any one is curious about torpedo blisters, check out the you tube videos of the recent dry docking of the USS Texas battleship. Some excellent video of the removal, refurbishing and replacement of torpedo blisters.

By MarkSHoyle (Bolo) on Monday, January 20, 2025 - 10:38 am: Edit

Are the French still using Fountain Sprays as a missile defense (ECM I guess)....
Imagine you would need a larger drone to get past the water, then again, you could board larger damage control parties, fire hoses should also be effective against some drones.....

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Monday, January 20, 2025 - 11:25 am: Edit

Modern American Warships are fitted with high capacity water pumps to wash down the ship after biologic chemical or nuclear attack.

There are pictures posted on the web on numerous sites, including the USNI proceedings.

Is that what you were thinking?

By MarkSHoyle (Bolo) on Monday, January 20, 2025 - 12:27 pm: Edit

Damage control has used high pressure for nearly 100 years...
At one point several decades ago, the French and probably others had something that created a screen of water, noted to disrupt radar missile guidance..
No doubt linked into the damage control system...

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, January 20, 2025 - 01:10 pm: Edit

Note to self: be careful what you wish for.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Monday, January 20, 2025 - 01:34 pm: Edit

(Hmmm…. Looking over the most recent posts…)

Nah! Not in a million years and Petricks Immortal Soul in a bottle on the desk!

A return to Star Fleet Battles of advanced technology size class 2 hulls?

Never again will I go to bed after drinking high cafinated energy drinks.

By Jeff Anderson (Jga) on Monday, January 20, 2025 - 03:10 pm: Edit

Yet another brash, dumb Civvie comment...

I don't know about water sprays helping to hide from RADAR; if it blocks the RADAR signals, it also returns them, which defeats the purpose of trying to hide behind it.

On the other hand, the curtain of water will definitely block the IR signature.

As an underinformed civilian, I don't know. Do anti-ship missiles actually use passive IR seekers?

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Monday, January 20, 2025 - 04:43 pm: Edit

Jeff Andersson, yes they do. Passive guidance help them avoid detection.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Monday, January 20, 2025 - 10:16 pm: Edit

The major advantage of the “Ukrainian drone revolution “ was the cost reduction in combat drones. Cardboard Drones make for great, cheap expendable drones.

Cardboard drones trying to fly through the veritable deluge of water that a nimitz class Aircraft carrier can generate will likely find that:
A. Water saturated card board loses structural integrity very quickly.
B. The current generation of cardboard drones use a combination of GPS and video imagery to navigate. The mass of water that such a drone would have to pass through would, again, very likely blind the video imagery, and given that a Nimitz carrier does not operate In a stationary position, will limit the effectiveness of GPS guidance.
C. A modern Carrier Battle Group is exceptionally prepared for electronic warfare both counter measures as well as counter countermeasures. A cheap card board drone, not so much.

By Mike Grafton (Mike_Grafton) on Tuesday, January 21, 2025 - 08:44 am: Edit

Water mist might also mess with laser targeting.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Tuesday, January 21, 2025 - 09:19 am: Edit

Playing devils advocate....

.... what is the smallest Drone you could build which has

1) GPS (to navigate to a pre-set point)
2) Range of say 50-75 Km's*
3) Carries a 1 Kg plastic explosive warhead**
4) Sensor (could a Video camera feed an oboard AI system so it tries to crash into the target??)****.

3D Print the bulk of the craft (land based drones might be able to use cardboard - but the moisture over sea is perhaps not ideal) - what 'metal' is needed (Battery???, Motor and in AI/Computer sytem?).

With so little Metal - would Radar pick it up?
if it had a 2m* wing/prop span - in a naturally light 'colour' - how far out would it be visible?

* - I am guessing there is a 'sweet spot' so that it hold enough batterty power to fly at say 100 kmh's an hour and has a range of 75 km's?

** - How much Plasic Explosive (with a Shaped Charge to Direct the bulk of the explosion) would be needed to blow a hole in a ship side and do internal damage??

I did think about making it operator guided - but that means it needs to transit and receive data - so more thinks to detect.

The AI system could be include a auto turn off function for the explosive - so once the Drone is returning to bases (hence it needs GPS or some form of navigation system), after say 3 hours of flight, it can safely land and be re-used.


**** - Could the targeting system hit things like the Radar Dome or other Fire Controlers - and basdcially blind the ship so large drones/missiles could then target it? (Many years ago, played a NATO Wargame - the US had a Battleship in the force and the rules bascially allowed the ship to remain intact - but all it's electronic stuff was destroyed.... and so resulted in blind firing of it's guns).

By Jeff Anderson (Jga) on Tuesday, January 21, 2025 - 11:40 am: Edit

Raven?

A couple thoughts about the one kilogram warhead.

While it can't do a "Hard Kill" (i.e.: sinking a ship), I'd imagine there's all sorts of things a hand grenade sized warhead can do that will cause untold havoc aboard a ship.

I've read about how the warheads on "Anti-Radiation Missiles" (such as HARM or STARM) are fragmentation warheads. Admittedly, these are in the five kilogram range, so what you're talking about is smaller, but if it's in closer proximity (I have on a DVD, a pilot making a snarky comments about how missiles aren't called "Hittles"), it can easily do just as much.

With EVERYONE using drones nowadays, open deck areas may have lithium battery storage racks, or possibly aviation fuel systems. How much havoc can a fire started by a thermite or magnesium warhead trigger there?

You also brought up EFPs. Called shots (as opposed to the DAC? ) against specific systems? May sound outrageous, but the thought of drones being the threat they are probably would have sounded outrageous back some thirty to forty years ago, when they were first developed.

(Then again, before World War I, what were "The Experts" saying about those flying toys, Airplanes? )

By MarkSHoyle (Bolo) on Tuesday, January 21, 2025 - 12:45 pm: Edit

I can just imagine the USN fielding the largest Skeet Shooting team on earth.....

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Tuesday, January 21, 2025 - 01:04 pm: Edit

Add EMP hardening to the requirements. Ships all ready have that so could easily employ EW weapons for defense that fry the electronics of small consumer type drones.
As I said; you can have drones that are simple, cheap and numerous, or expensive, capable and few.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Tuesday, January 21, 2025 - 01:21 pm: Edit

Attrition: Running Out of Older Soldiers
January 20, 2025: With the war in Ukraine now three years old, Russia is running out of soldiers. To deal with this problem Russia increased the maximum age of involuntarily called-up soldiers to fifty. Russia sill offers thousands of dollars to men who will join but the heavy casualties have left few younger men to tempt with the cash bonuses offered to those who will join. By 2024 Russia allows men as old as 70 to enlist and receive the cash payments. Many of these men were grandfathers and admitted they did it to provide for their orphaned grandchildren. The fathers had died in the war and many grandfathers lacked the income to help the widows take care of the grandchildren. Three years of war in Ukraine have brought tragedies like this to the Russian people. The government still hasn’t got enough soldiers and it would be humiliating to hire more North Korea mercenaries to fill the manpower gap.
Officers believe that the older soldiers provide stability to the younger troops. Some of the older men fought in Afghanistan during the 1980s and have combat experience to pass on. While not as physically capable as the young men, the old soldiers calmed the younger soldiers with assurances that they would all get through the next battle. A growing number of older soldiers don’t make it through the next battle. They may be wiser but are not quick enough to get out of the way of enemy fire or explosions from artillery or mortar shells.
Meanwhile, back in Russia military age men continue to leave the country rather than risk being mobilized into the army. There are a growing number of rumors that the government will use another forced mobilization of soldiers to fight. These men will still get the cash bonuses but many will not live to send the money. Their widows or parents will get the money as a bitter inheritance for their loss.
Russia long ago declared casualty data top secret, but the number of casualties becomes known because people talk about it and the rumors imply larger losses than actually occurred. The deaths of fifty year-old men is particularly prone to nostalgic exaggeration.
Previously the government had emptied the jails and prison camps of criminals who were enticed by cash payments or simply forced to join the military and die in Ukraine. Putting these men into uniform did not change their criminal nature and as soldiers they were often as much a danger to Russian soldiers and civilians as they were to the enemy. By 2024 Russia had run out of criminals and switched to older men, who never got to enjoy life in a Russia where there was less crime.
FYEO