http://gizmodo.com/388227/uss-independence...ngly-affordable

"Last month, the US Navy and General Dynamics took the lid off the new U.S.S Independence littoral combat ship (LCS). This beast will sail close to the shore and throw everything imaginable at an enemy—from armored vehicles and helicopters to shells, torpedoes and missiles. Plus, it can hustle at a rumored 60 knots. Basically, that means the enemy will have a difficult time escaping the wrath of this mighty vessel no matter where they are."

now thats highly interesting.

makes one suspect that corps, while fielding less men then nations, will make up for it with more high tech weapon systems.

still, they will probably be into the high them hard and hit them fast style of war. blitzkrieg taken to the nth degree and then some.
so if they cant break the back of the enemy in one swift move, or at least produce so much shock and awe that the enemy folds from sheer shock, they will probably loose as they cant maintain a war of attrition.

still, i guess that so far they have gotten away with it as the fighting strength of the big nations have gotten a beating from the increased hostility of the wilderness, new powerful nations based around magic rather then tech and industry, and had their industrial capacities reduced by the corps going "non-national".

right now usa have the final say as to who general dynamic or lockheed martin can do business with. but what if that ceased to happen? what could that do to the power balance? makes me think of ww1 where all sides fielded maxim machineguns made on license in the respective nations.

i really do suspect that globalization of the economies of the world will have a interesting effect on wars. especially if the corps can fight of any attempt at emergency nationalization of their production facilities. hmm, i wonder what kinds of national debts the orbital holds...

It sounds like an assault carrier- usually named after battles they are usually with names like Iwo Jima and Guadelcanal. The most recent one is the USS New York actually made with steel from ground zero.

I'm gonna really question a 60 knot speed. MAYBE smaller boats can get that but not something that can carry aircraft. The mass needed for even a harrier flight deck is too much for that and 60 knots is unbelievably fast. 30-40 knots is considered really booking in ships. In WW2 Battleships could only do around 25 knots and even the american fast carriers, SOTA in design because they stripped off the battle plates of the british ships and replaced it with teak, could only do 30-35 knots.

Something tells me the USS New York is going to be up front and person in any conflict during her lifetime with that kind of history behind her.

Hats off to the men and women that will serve her, may she do her country proud!

the speed claims could have somthing to do with this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trimaran

As one who witnessed a Nuclear Powered Super Carrier outrun it escorts including mine, a 4 gas turbine powered destroyer.

My destroyer in Emergency Battle Override has performed at ~40+ knots in seas of 3 to 4 feet swells and it was not a hull like this one has. Was interesting watching the Russian Naval unit compete with us in the Dakota Dash of long ago.

My big question is how they will "hide" the roostertail of the wake water moving at those speeds. The Pegasus class hydrofoils were capable of speeds near those but the roostertail was a very large RADAR target. Even my destroyer put up a wall of water at her fantail when letting down her hair so to speak. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif)

Today's Nuclear Powered Supercarriers are capable of speeds greater than my destroyer could do, and when the SC let it all out, all speed measuring devices/equipment on all ships around the SC were disabled. SC speeds are still classified even today.

But since the Naval High Command does not learn from the past, they will go exclusively with these, and the SC will fade away, until it hits the fan again, and the USN finds these pocket carriers lack what it takes.

WMS

I was just gonna post about this
reminds me of some of the SR boats

That's way awesome. They just turned off the sensors, huh? That kinda makes you wonder what other statistics are still classified. Can't see them ever ditching super carriers, though. These don't look like they have the same kind of sea legs that the big boys have. I like the idea of close-in assault carriers, particularly if they're cheap, but it dosen't seem like they would have the same capacity for time-at-sea.

and the same level of presence...

if one want to show one is paying attention, one send a carrier group. if one dont want to show it, one send a sub.

As someone with a massive hard-on for the naval hardware I apologize ahead of time if I drag this into minutiaeville.

The Independence and other LCS's (I think there are still two competing designs) aren't really pocket carriers so much as utility ships. They combine the speed of a destroyer (or better if the speed reports are to be believed. 60+ knots is "Ridiculous Speed" for most naval engagements) with interchangeable mission oriented modules.
I read a riveting description of how three LCS’s operating in concert could tackle a low intensity conflict like terrorists trying to disrupt shipping by launching suicide attacks in the Persian Gulf. One ship had a SEAL team module (living quarters, armory, equipment), the other had a bevy of drones (a couple of remote RHIB boats, UAVs, and a fancy submarine drone), and the last one had a bunch of missile tubes stuffed into its mission module. They used the RHIBs to interdict bombers enroute to their targets, UAV’s to backtrack to their point of origin, SEAL’s to actually secure the target, and missiles to provide them with close support and swat down follow on attacks (using the UAVs to extend sensor network far outside of the ships organic capabilities). Throw in a DDX for some railgun finger of god goodness and you have quiet a handy unit.
Basically the LCS is all about flexibility and the ability to scale force. It falls in the spectrum of vessels between the stealth of a sub and the Righteous Fist of Inevitable Vengeance that is a carrier battle group. Unlike a carrier, or for that matter an amphibious assault ship, it has the speed and armament to mix it up in a stand up naval fight. You don’t need a squadron of destroyers and cruisers to protect it, nor do you need a sub tasked to shadow it (although that might not be a bad idea).

But the LCS isn’t an assault carrier; we have LHA, LHD’s for that role. The LCS only caries a couple of helos whereas a true amphibious assault ship carries a reinforced helicopter squadron, a handful of V/STOL aircraft, and an entire expeditionary unit of Marines with 30 days of logistical support.

The Austin and it's sister ships (including the New York) are actually LPD's, a class I'm intimately familiar with and love as my first duty station was aboard the Dubuque, a LPD of the previous generation. As much as I love them they are primarily taxi cabs for Marines. Totally awesome taxi cabs that can carry upwards of 600 Marines, armor, a couple of helos, and put everything shore in a LCAC or a couple of LCU’s, but taxis nonetheless. The Austin class is larger, faster, stealthier, and has a myriad of awesome upgrades over the older LPD's (which got built during and slightly after Vietnam). Plus it has bunks that you can sit up in, that’s almost worth the price of admission right there.

I do disagree with my esteemed colleague WMS though. I don't think naval planners are being dismissive about super carriers. Super carriers of various designs are considered the linchpin for "Sea Basing" which is the pre-positioning large forces in international waters so we don’t have to worry about some dumb Marine in Okinawa jeopardizing our strategic footing in a hemisphere. LCS ships are designed to work in conjunction with these Sea Bases, pushing sensors, spec ops, and other elements closer to shore and therefore closer to the enemy. We need a ship that’s more than a one trick pony and that can get in and out fast, disgorging all manner of interesting death. Or hell, humanitarian aid. Pull all the war modules out, throw in a surgical suite, a refrigerated cargo container full of vaccines, pack the holds full of rebuilding material, and you’ve got a 60 knot gift basket that can park itself at unprepared piers.

*shivers* Mmm… Navy shit… Mmm…

And yeah, carriers can book. So can destroyers and frigates but I’m fairly certain the fastest ship in our inventory is the carrier. Something about having four nuke power plants and screws the size of small houses. I had a sub guy claim that subs are actually the fastest ships out there, which makes a bit of sense as they’re essentially large nuke powered torpedoes. But I tell you what, when I get to the Lincoln in Seattle I’ll let you guys knows what it’s like. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

Did anyone else catch that report a couple of months ago about a Chinese sub "accidentally" sneaking into a US carrier battle group?

Yeah, that scared the hell out of me. We've got the tech to detect them, which means that somebody is getting complacent with procedure.

So complacent that it snuck past an entire carrier battle group? Or perhaps they Chinese have just gotten very very good at making quiet diesel electric subs.

I was of the understanding that Chinese sub squadrons, while the most advanced part of their navy, were still a good pace behind us in terms of both stealth and detection technology. I know they have a lot of money coming in, but I find it hard to believe that they've gone from Soviet surplus to U.S.-equivalent technology in.. ten years? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/question.gif)

I suppose the only question I have is this: Do you think they'll take credit, or would they require cash for one o' these babies? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif)

Who knows? They do have nuclear power, it wouldn't be too far-fetched to imagine they'd managed to get it into a sub. Or hell, just made some crazy stealthy breakthrough for their subs. Ten years is a long time in tech terms.

Nuclear reactors aren't the whole key to the stealth equation. You need fairly sophisticated cavitation technology to break up your bubbles and keep your screw quiet. It's a lot more then just shoving some control rods in the ol' core. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif)

The modified type 39/Song class subs are probably pretty good (the early production type 39s had some sort of problem). Similar to the Russian Kilo, but probably with better passive sonar.

could be the picked up a trick or two from what the swedish navy have available:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gotland_class_submarine

Oh it's not that they can't put a nuke in a sub, it's just that it's cheaper and easier to make them using tech that's been around for a hundred years. Furthermore, and this is the dirty little secret of the US sub program, diesel/electric subs can actually be quieter than a nuke sub (everything else being equal, like screw cavitation and all that). A nuke generates power by creating high pressure steam and that is a fairly loud process. Diesel subs rely on batteries when running under the waves and as such only have to silence their propulsion and screws.

The obvious advantage of nuclear power is that it allows a sub to run virtually forever without surfacing a necessary attribute for a "boomer", a nuclear detterent sub. However, for something like an attack sub which is significantly smaller and designed primarily to kill entire fleets without being detected, you can't carry all that many supplies to being with so the advantages of a nuclear power plant are reduced somewhat. A friend of mine on an attack sub related that there's so little space they actually stack supplies in the passageways and lay planks over the top so you can walk over them. They also had to hot rack which is the fairly disturbing practice of forcing two people to share one bunk (thankfully not at the same time).

The link that hobgoblin put up pretty much sums it up. Modern desiel electric subs are extremely difficult to detect, I have no doubt that the Chinese are busily building subs like this.

We thought that about Russian aviation during the cold war, and then they rolled out the SU-27 and quietly reminded us not to underrate the efficiency of highly motivated engineers (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

The main disadvantage of diesel/electric subs is their lack of medium/high speed underwater endurance. You can't go for very long at 10+ knots like a nuke sub can, so your ability to actually chase/intercept a surface fleet is fairly limited. In barrier patrol and constricted waters, they can be right bastards.

except if you look at the gotland class i linked to, its supposedly faster submerged (20 knots) then surfaced (11 knots)...

and its supposed to manage 2 weeks submerged...

The other issue is wether or not their tactics call for open water intercepts or waiting for a battle group to settle into an area of operation. Carriers might be able to put the hammer down and all but fly, but when they're actually launching and recovering aircraft they go a great deal slower (though far from slow, they keep their speed up and face into the wind to make take offs easier).

All subs are faster submerged, since submerged subs don't generate wake drag. Modern diesel/electric subs can manage 20 or 25 knots while submerged, but they can't do it for any length of time (a few hours at most). The endurance envelope submerged will look something like 200-500 miles at 2-5 knots (around 7-10 days of total submerged time), but maybe only 50-150 miles at 10 knots, and maybe only 20-50 miles at 20 knots.

Nuke subs can go 20+ knots submerged basically forever.

can they do that without any kind of cavitation risk?

The max 'quiet' speed of the western attack subs is somewhere around 20 knots. If they want to put the hammer down, then can go 30+ knots, but it makes plenty of noise.

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Note that the ~20 knot max quiet speed is still pretty loud. Nuke subs still use the ~5 knot creep, just like diesel boats do.
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