All I know is we used them in the Falklands, but I am not sure if we had large enough ammo stock piled for 5 days of AA fire while the landings were taking place on the Falklands. We also used other naval guns on the frigates and destoryers to try and shot down the Argentine aircraft.
Let me mention one more time that I have a romantic attachment to BB's. Heck I can remember even war gaming them with models. And thanks for the answers regarding the armor- even though I got a couple somewhat conflicting answers, I think that in general an Iowa or equivelent would fare better than most ships if hit by any modern missiles. But what we really come down to is a modern shore bombardment platform- and while I love the idea of raining 16" shells down on an enemy- what are the possibilities of the 'right' enemy being in the 'right' position to make a huge ship like this useful? Let me put it another way- what would we be willing to eliminate in order to afford keeping an Iowa in service?
Well, first you have to get ashore. The 155 does not do much good when it is still on the LCAC. And who says anything about wanting to fight WWII? Such guns have a tactical use in a great many cases. For example, when it is not good politically, logistically, or for other reasons to put large artillery on shore in the first place. For example, in Beirut that was largely logistical (they did not want to separate out the forces to much) as well as political (they did not want to appear like an offensive force). Let's turn the clock back. Not 60 years, let's just go back 30 years. At that point the US was involved in the UN Multinational Force in Beirut, trying to end the Lebanese Civil War. And for the reasons I just described, the Marines had no heavy artillery with them on the shore (they only had their mortars). But this was not a problem. Because whenever they did need to call in for some bombardment, it was only minutes away. Imagine how helpful a BB could have been during the "Blackhawk Down" incident. Good guys trapped in buildings, bad guys assembling in pockets all over the city then advancing on them. Drop down a few 16" shells, and I am sure that many would have found more pressing engagements. Say counting the light sockets in their grandmothers house 200 miles away. And the Mighty Mo also dropped quite a few rounds during the Gulf War. As forces were entering Kuwait City, they ran into pockets of resistance that were within range of her guns. So she opened up, and the Iraqis could not pull out the white flags fast enough. The thing is, if I was "rethinking Iwo Jima", I would be demanding 20-40 of them. But obviously I am not, only a couple to provide the kind of heavy firepower that Marines have come to appreciate over the decades. The little 5" popguns that ships have now are almost worthless when it comes to assisting troops on the shore.
I'm talking about the 155mm AGS's on the Zumwalts. And why can't the Zumwalt's do the exact same job? I can definitely imagine how civilians casualties would have been even more massive given that the fighting occured entirely within a city and 16 inch shells aren't exactly what one would call "precise". A few degrees off and our casualties would have been higher too. If I was in that fight, I certainly would have rather had laser guided 155's or 203's dropping on targets instead of unguided dumb 16 inchers that could annihilate my whole platoon if one fell a few meters short. And why can't the Zumwalt's support Marines?
Honestly, I think the Iowa class ships are just to old and outdated to even consider using except in an emergency. This is why I lifted the idea of "Pocket Battleships" from the Germans. A smaller ship, based on a Cruiser. Similarly armored hull though, with no more then 1 or 2 turrets. Convert the rest of the space primarily to Tomahawk missiles. The idea is really to provide both shore bombardment, as well as a strike capability, without having to bring in either submarines, or bring in a more valuable carrier into potentially hostile waters. Battleships (as a concept, not a specific ship class itself) have long had a connection to diplomacy, and for good reason. For an example, imagine how things in Iraq might have gone if it was easily known that within 25 miles of the coast we could have called in 2 ton shells with enough high explosives to level a city block. Find a pocket of insurgents forming up in a remote area, do not bother with the air force or F-18s. DO not even bother calling up a drone. Just get some ANGLICO to watch the position, and call for a single round of 16" love. Same with the earlier example I gave of Somalia. All of the territory we were fighting in there was within range of offshore bombardment. Call in some of those, and there ain't nothing the bad guys can do about it. Or even more recently, in Libya. A lot of Kaddafi Duck's forces were within 20 miles of the coast (especially around Tripoli). Save the pilots, reduce the risk of them getting shot down. Ain't nobody shooting down a 2 ton shell. I find it amazing that most people do not seem to realize that other then in Afghanistan, most of our conflicts over the last 60 years have been fought in nations right against the ocean. Right now a lot of people are talking about North Korea and their missile launching site. A site that is less then 10 miles from the ocean. A ship with 16" guns can be sitting 15 miles off-shore (outside of North Korea's territorial waters), and still be able to drop gigantic shells on the location within 5 minutes. Think about what kind of psychological pressure that places upon anybody that is thinking of getting belligerent! Simply knowing that if they launched from there at us or an ally, their nice missile facility would be rubble before the missile even hits the ground.
The Zumwalt's? Freedom and Independence class? If you cut both those program and put the money into 2 new battleships, you would still have money left over.
Unneccessary yes, pointless no. Where as the Zumwalt and LCS's are both pointless and unneccessary. - - - Updated - - - Unneccessary yes, pointless no. Where as the Zumwalt and LCS's are both pointless and unneccessary.
The future is hypersonic missiles. These will render behemoth boats, which will be sitting ducks at sea, obsolete. The ulitimate goal is to develop stealthy missiles that would reach Mach 25. Until that actually happens, ships have their place of course as fire support platforms; 80% of the global population lives within 50 miles of a large body of water afterall...but they are slow moving sitting ducks once technology catches up with them. I don't think it's prudent to invest tax dollars in building a new one.
I would want 9 for the rate of fire. The overall effect on the enemy is different, 16 inch shell that would destroy your whole position has a greater effect then a 6.1 inch guided round which can't penetrate your position. You would end up needing to call in a Tomahawk strike. Also could they not build a 16 inch guided round? No I am talking about a redesigned Lion class, it wouldn't need to be the close to the length of the Yamato, but it wouldn't be more 55,000 tons. The crew would be about 1,200 the navy would get it's crew from where it normally gets it's crews from. If there wasn't enough room to fit the armament I want in then the ship would have to be lengthened as I said, I would want to keep all the main guns and armor, otherwise the ship would be less effective than it needs to be. I would recken the cost to be £6 billion for two ships. Fit them with PAAMS air defence system, 200 A70 launchers, room to operate and house upto 3 Merlins ASW helicopters, get 8 Tomahawk turrets from the US and fit them on to the ship, fit 4 CIWS to defend the gunnary and air defence towers, in between which would be the 4 Harpoon anti-ship missile launchers. New engines and inside of the ship redesigned to shore more armaments.
Neither are pointless. The Zumwalt is a rather expensive stealth fire support ship. The LCS's are modular ships designed to operate close in to the close or even on wide rivers providing aid to unconventional warfare missions.
I guarantee you that a pair of modern autoloading 155mm or 203mm guns can get more rounds on target in 1 minute than a 9 gun 16 inch battery. Exaclty what target is not going to be penetrated by a direct hit from a 155mm/203mm guided shell? And why would you jump to a Tomahawk? The next step would be a JDAM. What would be the point? There is a reason we don't have laser guided Daisy Cutters. The point of precision is discretion: hit just the target you intend to kill and not kill its surroundings. If you need wider spread damage with a 155/203mm, then use ICM. Those two ships would amount to nearly 10% of the Royal Navy's personnel. Considering that the RN can barely afford what it has now, how exactly are they going to afford new battleships, especially given the full size fleet carriers, AEGIS cruisers, et al that you want them to have?
If the ships were fitted with the mark 1 16 inch naval gun, they could do 12 rounds a minute with a well trained crew. Well the UK doesn't have JDAM. We would have to used naval Storm Shadow or Tomahawk. As I said before it's the effect on your enemy, they are in a bunker and you start shelling them are they going to be more worried about the 6.1 inch shell or the 16 inch one? Yes, and one of the things about 16 inch unguided shells is the enemy doesn't know where they are going to land, it could on there head or 200 metres in any direction. It also amounts to about the same population as the small town near where I live, 2,400 people isn't every many. It's about 4% of the Royal navy's total personnel. I think you mean the UK can hardly afford what it has now and it is cutting the defence budget, the Royal Navy doesn't decide how much money it gets. Right now we can't afford anything, battleships no way. What I would do however is increase UK defence spending to £150,000 billion a year. That's what this is all about what we would like to see done and if we could would we want battleships back. I want to convert the QE class carriers to STOBAR, build the naval Typhoon, leave the F-35 program and buy F-15's instead for the RAF. UK cruisers I want would have the PAAMS air defence system, not AEGIS.
Do you have a source for that? The sources I have found say the fire rate is 2 rounds a minute, not 16. JDAMs are cheap. It would be cheaper to buy some than build battleships. Any bunker burried deep enough that it won't be killed by a direct hit from a 155/203 is buried deep enough that it can't contest a landing. I'd rather kill the enemy than scare him. And where is that spending going to come from?
Wiki say they could do 1.5 rounds a minute, so 12-13 shells fired a minute. I have 9 guns you have 2, you fire 20 rounds a minute, I fire 12-13, your rounds are 6.1 inch, my rounds are 16 inch. I am putting more iron down range than you are with your 2 AGS's. Or how about the BaE railgun. Yes JDAM's are cheaper, however you need an aircraft carrier with aircraft, that costs much more than a battleship. My point still stand, are you going to be more worried about the 6.1 inch shell or the 16 shell? I would rather demoralise the enemy so they don't want to fight, than just kill them. This is if I was in control of the UK government, had a majority in parliament of 120, controlled the Lords, had the full support of my cabinet and the private sector. I would cut foreign aid by 5 billion, privatize 45% of the NHS saving £57 billion a years and getting 15 billion from private companies who bid for the 45% of the NHS every 10 years. This would bring pensions down, by 10% atleast as they move to the private sector, so that's a saving of 14 billion a year, then I would leave the EU saving another 35 billion a year, I would means test welfare, hoping to save another £15 billion. That should take care of deficit of 135 billion this year. I would move the research budget from to the private sector or defence, that's 83 billion this year, no idea how much that would save. I would put throught mass deregulation and sack of all the jobs worths from the quango's. I would increase the "living" to £8.50 an hour. I would scrap fuel duty tax and cut vat to 15%. My hope would be mass deregulation and middle class tax cuts would kick start growth. I would take on Ireland's debt from the EU at 0 interest rate, if Ireland agreed to form a economic, political and military union with the UK, really rejoin the UK, then I would change the name of the country from the UK to the British Isles. I would try and get former parts of the empire to become British overseas territories like Hong Kong, for this they would have to pay the British government 2% of their GDP a year. I would have a 10 year design and build program for the navy. I would have 3 new STOBAR QE class carriers with the Naval Typhoon, Osprey and helicopters. I would build 6 new cruisers, 12 Type 45 destroyers, 16 Type 26 frigates, 12 anti-piracy corvettes, 12 mine sweepers, 10 Astute class submarines. 2 new battleships, 3 new 60,000 amphibious assault ships, 3 new 25,000 ton helicopter carriers, 4 Albion class LPD, 4 Bay class DLS, 12 replenishment ships, 4 trident submarines, a new repair ship, new hospital ship and 10 tugs. There is more which I will tell you later.
LOL I cant get this image out of my head of a battleship hydroplaning sideways from its own salvo fire. And the barrel flex would spray shells like an unattended garden hose under pressure
Sorry, just don't really see that happening. At this time, we already have the capability of making missiles move much faster then they already do. But when you increase the speed, 2 very important things come into play. First, is the general curve that dictates that the faster a missile moves, the faster it burns fuel so the shorter the range. So either you reduce the range or you make a really massive missile. That is why the Minuteman is so much larger then the Pershing missile was. Longer range, bigger missile. Then you have the issue of tracking. A missile moving at MACH 25 has a great many problems. Even a missile moving at MACH 12 is pretty much impossible. First of all, that speed in the lower atmosphere would pretty much destroy such a missile. Heat and friction would probably tear it apart in short order. Secondly, you have just the speed of the thing. MACH 12 is over 9,000 miles per hour. Most missiles track their target either through heat, RADAR or through video. At those speeds, your missile would only have 2-3 seconds to acquire a target, determine if that is the target, then steer towards it. Can you say "absolutely impossible task"? You are confusing a great many things here. However, you are both technically correct - depending on how you do the math. The Iowa class ships had 3 turrets of 3 cannons per turret. And the correct term is really volley, not round per minute. Yes, the reload speed was 1.5 rounds per barrel per minute, or 2 rounds every 3 minutes. This turns into a theoretical rate of fire of 2 volleys of 9 rounds (18 rounds) every 3 minutes, or 6 rounds per minute if counted individually. But they were volley fired. So 1, 2 or 3 were fired at one time. So while you are technically correct, the guns were never used that way. More typical was the use of only 1 or 2 barrels at a time, in 1 or 2 turrets. After all, there was almost never really a need to send a broadside of 9 16" shells at one time anywhere. In fact, of all the photos I have ever seen of the BBs in action after WWII, they have never done "all gun broadsides" since WWII other then for training and publicity shots. This is one reason why I suggested majorly downsizing the number of turrets and guns per turret. There is simply no need for 9 large guns. But 2-4 is a reasonable number. And this allows more room for other systems, like cruise missiles and other missiles of various types (in addition to having a much smaller ship). And to answer the question as to what the 16" guns can do that the Zumwalt can't do, that should be obvious. The 155mm Howitzer has a range of just under 10 miles. The 16" guns had a range of just under 24 miles. SO to use the example I gave earlier of the North Korean missile site, the Zumwalt could be right against the shore, and still can't effectively hit the missile site (or could get parts of it). On the other hand, the BB guns could plaster the entire site, and everything else for miles around. Not to mention the difference in damage between a 15 pound bursting charge (155mm) and a 16" round, which had a bursting charge of just under 200 pounds. The comparison and scale of damage of one over the other is not even close.
Please before people say how these guns are not very accurate get some facts. These guns where designed to hit other battleships at sea at a range of over 20 miles at speeds over 25 knots. if these guns where not accurate they could not do this. http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNUS_16-50_mk7.htm as for the comment if the bunk is so deep it is not very good. I guess you forgot about command and control bunkers.
Except that each of those 155mm rounds can be laser or GPS guided meaning that they are practically guranteed to be striking on target with every shot. The same cannot be said about the 16 inchers. Which Britain is already planning on building. The 155mm is more likely to hit me. Demoralized enemies can still fight. Dead ones can't. So even you admit that your plan is impossible shor of near dictatorial power, gutting the entire British government save for the MoD, and almost definitely causing turmoil on the scale of Greece or Cyprus. BTW, how exactly would you get Hong Kong back from China?
No, I would need a massive mandate from the people of Britain, but if I put what I want to do in a manifesto I wouldn't get elected, dispite it being what needs to happen to make Britain a force in the world again. In economic, social and military terms I am more like Churchill was around WW1 than what Thatcher was like in the 80's. No I wouldn't be cutting the British state, I would be cutting British state so I could have massive tax cuts, pay off the debt and create growth. Of course the Attleeites would never go along with it, so they would need to be destroyed. It wouldn't be saving anything, the MoD doesn't collect money to spend it gets given money, I would increase the money given to the MoD. You must be joking, it wouldn't be like Greece, the UK wouldn't be getting forced to do things be outside powers any more, like Greece is by the EU. There would be civil unrest and riots for a time by the leftwingers and support the Attleeites. I would get Hong Kong back using democracy, the government of Hong Kong with UK backing would call for a referendum, then other countries would call for a Hong Kong referendum including the US. The aim in most wars isn't to kill people, but win the war. Demoralise your enemy and his will to fight. Yes but if it does hit the damage will do much less than a 16 inch shell. Yes plans to build 2 carriers, but nobody know when the F-35B will be operational. Lasser guided, but they do less damage.
And that is something I have never said. I have always been absolutely amazed at how accurate Naval gunfire was. Especially considering all the variables, not to mention the age of the systems. The BBs had a very primitive mechanical computer, but could place rounds to an accuracy of plus or minus 20 meters. Who cares? You seem to be an absolutely perfect example here of somebody who absolutely rejects any older technologies, and only cares about the newest "gee-whiz" stuff out there. Well, here are some things to consider. LASER is great, but it has one major problem. It requires some poor sap to actually be on the ground with a direct line of sight to the target. Among Marines, many consider the most dangerous job is not Recon. I knew Recon guys that would turn pale when told of what the ANGLICO guys did. And same goes with GPS. Are you aware of how accurate such rounds really are? In short, not very. The M982 is a 155mm GPS guided munition. And it has an accuracy of plus or minus 150 meters. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M982_Excalibur That's right, 150 meters. So with all of the computerization and high tech, it is not all that much more accurate then those from the BBs. Well, other then being a lot smaller. And with even less of a bursting charge. I doubt it. With an accuracy of plus or minus 150 meters, if you are in a bunker it would have to pretty much hit that bunker dead on. With the 2 ton weight of the 16" shells, even a near miss can collapse bunkers. In the Gulf War, most of the fire missions tasked to the USS Missouri and the USS Wisconsin were taking out bunker complexes. And they normally fired single salvos and took out multiple targets at the same time (yes, each gun can be independently targeted). You continue to concentrate on things like accuracy, without even realizing that the modern guns are not all that accurate either. That is something that really has not improved. After all, if that was all, why are snipers not using high powered .22 rifles? The round is small, has great flight characteristics, and can strike targets at a mile away. But no, they prefer rounds that have a shorter range, but pack a more deadly punch.
Under perfect conditions, sure. Why don't you tell the Japanese forces who were totally unphased on Iwo Jima about how accurate and devastating those shells were to their bunker complexes. Because, as we all know, it is impossible to guide laser guided weapons with DRONES, right? From your own source: "Initial combat experience with Excalibur in Iraq in the summer of 2007 was highly successful, with 92% of rounds falling within 4 metres (13 ft) of the target." Let's see a 16 inch gun match an accuracy of 4 meters with 92% of its shots.
