Military Ships (was Your Typical Beneteau!)
 

cavelamb wrote:
It is true that armor would keep bullets out, but an Exocette with go
through that like so much cardboard.

"Like cardboard" ??!?
Big big difference between battleships & destroyers.

The USS Pennsylvania (less well armored than the Iowa class) was the
main target of the Bikini A-bomb tests. In the second blast, the bomb
went off too low, about 500' directly above the ship.

Did it sink?
"10 February 1948 photo of the Pennsylvania (BB-38) being scuttled off
Kwajalein after being subjected to both "Crossroads" atomic blasts.
She was towed to Kwajalein after the explosions and studied there. Too
"hot" to handle, she was simply towed to sea and scuttled at the
conclusion of the radiation studies."
http://www.navsource.org/archives/01/38e.htm




On Aug 19, 3:41*pm, Bruce in alaska wrote:
Battleships are dodo's of the Navy

That was the current strategic thinking in 1940... you certainly are
up-to-date


... You need Air and
Undersea Superiority around the ships to keep them safe

In most cases, yes. Especially when fighting a main-force Navy... but
you overlook a key fact, we have air superiority. In spades.

1 carrier overmatches all but about 5 air forces in the world, 2
carriers overmatch all but 2. Until the U.S. Navy stops being the U.S.
Navy (which could happen if certain political illogic prevails), the
Iowa class can steam anywhere we send them.



.....*with
Battleships you need to be within 20 miles of the Target,

Umm, no.
Actually the improve 16/45 ammo can go about 60 miles (published data,
which means it can probably go about 100).
Still not equal to the carriers 400+nm, BUT bullets are a lot cheaper
and they are great for use in "asymmetrical warfare."

If you want to convince people to not fight, drive a battleship up
close to their shore where they can get a look. They are brutal in
appearance, intimidating & lethal. And if they decide they don't care
if you shoot at them, a batteship broadside can make a 1000 yard
diameter crater, as the PLO found out in 1983.


.... and one
Harpoon Missile can ruin your whole week.

Wrong.

.... one Nuke Sub, blew the Argentine
Cruiser away, with one torpedo.


Wrong again, and (to repeat) a cruiser... especially a really old (pre-
WW2) poorly-maintained one manned by a crew with but a passing
familiarity with modern DC practice.... is not a battleship.

I don't mean to crank on you so much, but I do want to emphasize that
getting good strategic results requires knowing & using the facts.

The biggest problem we have with using the Iowa-class battleships to
impement naval strategy is that they are manpower-intensive.

Regards- Doug King

Military Ships (was Your Typical Beneteau!)
 

"it's me" wrote in message
...

The reason why the battleships are history is that they are out of gun
barrels. They had a huge stockpile of 16/45 gun tubes left over from
WW2 but nobody can make them any more.


"Dennis Pogson" wrote:
We could then bring back the Fairey Swordfish and the Japanese Zero, just
to
see if they can still sink these monstrosities.


Sure.... they might be slow enough that an F-18 couldn't touch
'em..... OTOH the AMRAAMs can be configured to home on engine noise so
they probably couldn't get within sight much less close enough to
strike.... hey let's bring back the Sopwith Camel too!

No boat that sails well is ever fully obsolete, gaff-riggers still
work. A battleship is an awesome naval platform and the USN is smart
to keep this option on the table.

Fresh Breezes- Doug King

And they make superb targets for Exocets!

Military Ships (was Your Typical Beneteau!)
 

On Wed, 19 Aug 2009 18:27:35 -0700 (PDT), "it's me"
wrote:i

Actually the improve 16/45 ammo

What are you talking about. Iowas have 16/50 guns, for one thing.
Ammo is not designated that way.

Casady

Military Ships (was Your Typical Beneteau!)
 

On Wed, 19 Aug 2009 18:27:35 -0700 (PDT), "it's me"
wrote:

if you shoot at them, a batteship broadside can make a 1000 yard
diameter crater, as the PLO found out in 1983.

Only with nuclear ammo. It takes megatons to make a hole that big.

Casady

Military Ships (was Your Typical Beneteau!)
 

On Thu, 20 Aug 2009 06:43:51 +0100, "Duncan Heenan"
wrote:




"it's me" wrote in message
...

The reason why the battleships are history is that they are out of gun
barrels. They had a huge stockpile of 16/45 gun tubes left over from
WW2 but nobody can make them any more.


"Dennis Pogson" wrote:
We could then bring back the Fairey Swordfish and the Japanese Zero, just
to
see if they can still sink these monstrosities.


Sure.... they might be slow enough that an F-18 couldn't touch
'em..... OTOH the AMRAAMs can be configured to home on engine noise so
they probably couldn't get within sight much less close enough to
strike.... hey let's bring back the Sopwith Camel too!

No boat that sails well is ever fully obsolete, gaff-riggers still
work. A battleship is an awesome naval platform and the USN is smart
to keep this option on the table.

Fresh Breezes- Doug King

And they make superb targets for Exocets!

An Exocet will try to hit just above the water line, midships, where
they would remove some paint from the 12 inch belt armor.

Casady

Military Ships (was Your Typical Beneteau!)
 

Richard Casady wrote:
What are you talking about. Iowas have 16/50 guns, for one thing.


You're right, my bad. The North Carolina & earier classes had the 16"
45 caliber ('caliber' in this case referring to the barrel length, not
the diameter). The Iowas have 16" 50 caliber.


On Aug 20, 8:54*am, (Richard Casady)
wrote:
On Wed, 19 Aug 2009 18:27:35 -0700 (PDT), "it's me"

wrote:
if you shoot at them, a batteship broadside can make a 1000 yard
diameter crater, as the PLO found out in 1983.

Only with nuclear ammo. It takes megatons to make a hole that big.


Want to bet?

Also, want to guess how many different types of 16" shells have be

Military Ships (was Your Typical Beneteau!)
 

On 18-Aug-2009, Vic Smith wrote:

Hi Joe,

It is true that armor would keep bullets out, but an Exocette with go
through that like so much cardboard.

The ships taken out by Excepts weren't battleships. Destroyers are
unarmored and often have aluminum superstructures.
But I agree that *all* surface ships are vulnerable during all out war
with a major power in this air/electronics age.

This is closest to being correct. The Exocets will not penetrate an Iowa
class battleship according to several people that were on them.
I am not saying that they can not be sunk by missiles, I just said that
the
antiship missiles wont do it. They are designed to take out the newer
less
armored ships.
Now could a major power quickly repurpose a missile to kill a battleship?
Might take a few hours but necessity is the mother of invention.

Hey, how come your spell-checker changed my Exocet but left yours
alone? (-:
I spent 3 1/2 years on a can and always felt like a sitting duck.
Most of that time was in a boiler room 12 feet below the waterline.
Battleships had exterior tankage and other means to thwart torpedoes.
I had maybe half an inch of steel. More than once I would look at the
hull and wonder if a Russian torpedo could punch through and land in
my lap before it exploded. Not that I worried about it, but the
thought did come now and then.
Luckily, at that age I was usually just thinking about pussy.

--Vic

First let me say thank you for serving!
Being born in 59 I missed that obligation. My cousin (4 years older) served
on the New Jersey from the time Reagan took it out of mothballs until it
went back in. He is the source of most of my information on battleships. I
chose to go to collage, he went in the navy. He has a pension from the navy
and is about 5 years from retiring from 3M with another pension. Meanwhile I
am looking for a job, AGAIN.
I have come to hate aviation. When the economy takes a downturn aviation
does a nosedive.

As to my spell-checker changing your Exocet but leaving mine alone is
simple. I hit the wrong button. :)

Military Ships (was Your Typical Beneteau!)
 

On 20-Aug-2009, (Richard Casady) wrote:

An Exocet will try to hit just above the water line, midships, where
they would remove some paint from the 12 inch belt armor.

Casady

I am sorry Casady, I have to disagree with you here.
I feal sure that the Exocet would remove ALL the paint from the 12 inch belt
armor.

:)

Military Ships
 

"Steve Firth" wrote in message
...
Gordon wrote:

Then you start over doing the same thing only using willie peter (white
phosphorus) and you burn up what you flattened.

Ah yes, dropping white phosphorous onto unarmed women and children,
something to be proud of.

That's like people worrying about laser dot sighting damaging eyesight. No
worries about the copper jacketed lead slug that follows the little red dot.

Military Ships (was Your Typical Beneteau!)
 

"cavelamb" wrote in message
m...
Andy Champ wrote:
it's me wrote:

"Dennis Pogson" wrote:
We could then bring back the Fairey Swordfish and the Japanese Zero,
just to
see if they can still sink these monstrosities.

Dennis, you do know the RN historic flight has two flying Swordfish don't
you? (and there are others)

Sure.... they might be slow enough that an F-18 couldn't touch
'em.....

I wouldn't like to be in the Swordfish. Drop to maybe 300kts and use the
Gatling. No problem. I'll be surprised if there aren't any ship-mounted
cannon that would work nicely.

OTOH the AMRAAMs can be configured to home on engine noise so
they probably couldn't get within sight much less close enough to
strike....

Really? Those things do Mach 4 don't they - following sound is a neat
trick when you're inside a shock wave system. But the Swordfish is metal
framed, and should show up nicely on radar.


hey let's bring back the Sopwith Camel too!

Now as a wood-and-fabric aircraft that might be hard to track on Radar...
snip

Andy

There is usually enough metal in a wood and fabric airplane to show up
on radar.

But the low speed may be below the radar speed gate.
In which case...

Phalanx......