Hacker News Reader

Comment by latch | Hacker News Reader

except they are extremely expensive and hard to defend. They are great for projecting power against countries that can't defend against them, but extremely ineffective against a remotely comparable force. They are an obvious high priority.

Ever see Independence Day or, more recently, Battle LA? Didn't you find it stupid that once the command ship are destroyed, the enemy essentially dies? This is what aircraft carriers represent.

Take the $23 billion dollars it takes to build the first Gerald R. Ford Carrier and invest that into various decentralized, independent, small technologies, and your army is considerably better for it when it comes to any serious threat.

It's like our military planners never read Ender's Game.

View on HN

There are 190-odd countries in the world. The US Navy's aircraft carriers are extremely effective against at least 185 of 'em.

All the countries with a "remotely comparable force" also have nuclear weapons, so if the US ever winds up in a full-on shooting war with one of them then it's all over for both sides anyway.

No aircraft carrier has actually been sunk since World War 2. So they can't be that vulnerable.

1000 anti-ship missiles cost far less than an aircraft carrier with crew and aircraft aboard. There are a number of non-nuclear powers with the ability to launch 1000 anti-ship missiles against an American task force.

How would you launch a thousand anti-ship missiles? And how would you get that launch platform within range of a US aircraft carrier?

Bear in mind that anything capable of launching a thouand anti-ship missiles will be one of the things the USAF will destroy within the first few hours of the war.

> How would you launch a thousand anti-ship missiles?

With a hundred small boats

> And how would you get that launch platform within range of a US aircraft carrier?

With civilians on board

> Bear in mind that anything capable of launching a thouand anti-ship missiles will be one of the things the USAF will destroy within the first few hours of the war.

Yep, nothing better to start a war on the right foot than civilian massacre.

No aircraft carrier has actually been sunk since World War 2. So they can't be that vulnerable.

Isn't that like saying Hoover Dam has never been destroyed, so it can't be that vulnerable?

I'm not sure that there have been serious attempts to destroy either (is my point).

Hmm, but a carrier can do a lot of different stuff. It's about nuance. Sometimes you just want to float there quietly on the horizon looking like 90,000 tonnes of badassery while the diplomats do their thing. Didn't Sun Tzu say something about avoiding the need to actually fight whenever possible?

Take the $23 billion dollars it takes to build the first Gerald R. Ford Carrier and invest that into various decentralized, independent, small technologies

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stealth_ship

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Type_212_submarine

A fleet of Sea Shadow type vessels and Air Independent Propulsion submarines combined with a good land-based air force would make life very difficult for carrier battle groups.

This isn't the scale I'm talking about. You don't need a fleet of $500 million USD submarines.

11 US aircraft carriers? 11 missiles. $100+Billion vs $15 Million. 30000 soldiers vs 0.

During the cold war this is the strategy that Russia took - let the US build expensive ships, they build [relatively] cheap missiles. The Chinese are doing the same with the Dong Feng missiles.

Yes, but if China also built the fleet, then it would be in a position to project power farther from its shores. If all you wanted to do is keep the carrier group away from your own shore, then capable missiles would suffice.

China is doing it's best at ramping up their fleet. It is just that they focus on making better ships instead of making many ships, at the moment.

One missile won't get through. You don't encounter a carrier by itself--it has a combat air patrol, one or two Aegis cruisers, and two or three Aegis destroyers. Each Aegis system can track 100 targets at a time and launch countermeasures.

However, missiles do scale well. Even 1000 missiles will cost much less than the carrier and will almost certainly take it down.

A single supersonic or soon-to-exist (india is mass-producing) hypersonic missile might get through. But yes, even if 1 doesn't, 100 easily will.

Carriers of today hold 90 aircraft, 2 RAMs, 3 Phalanxs and 2 Sea Sparrow launchers (specs from Wikipedia page on George H.W. Bush aircraft carrier). I'm pretty sure with all this they can defend themselves pretty well.

China, Russia India and France have stockpile of supersonic cruise missiles. India is mass producing hypersonic cruise missiles, while Russia and the US are prototyping.

In comparison, most of the cruise missiles we hear about (Tomahawk for example) are subsonic (though the US does have a few old supersonic ones).

The effectiveness of missile defense systems isn't 100%. It's hard to shoot something travelling at 3600mph. It takes a lot of power, a lot of accuracy, generates a ton of heat, and a requires dash (or two) of lady luck. The defensive system can be overwhelmed for a fraction of the price.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com