Posted on Apr 30, 2017
Why the Navy Needs a New Destroyer -- The Motley Fool
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Destroyers are well tested and are proven to be able to survive in a hostile environment. LCS's are unproven and don't work. Cool toys that can't leave the pier or shoot guns, are the same as having a Ferrari in your driveway with no engine!
What the Navy really needs is a cruiser replacement. The average age is over 30 years. We need them to perform command and control in any larger combat scenarios.
FWIW, I served as a combat watch officer and engineer on destroyers, cruisers and frigates. I also helped train the first LCS crews.
On a side note, when I was working a joint job in Tampa, I always thought the Navy could take a lesson from the other services who look at needs/mission first, then develop tools to meet that. It seems like (admittedly form the deckplate level, the one using it) the Navy looks for cool toys and then figures out how to shoehorn it in to existing architecture.
What the Navy really needs is a cruiser replacement. The average age is over 30 years. We need them to perform command and control in any larger combat scenarios.
FWIW, I served as a combat watch officer and engineer on destroyers, cruisers and frigates. I also helped train the first LCS crews.
On a side note, when I was working a joint job in Tampa, I always thought the Navy could take a lesson from the other services who look at needs/mission first, then develop tools to meet that. It seems like (admittedly form the deckplate level, the one using it) the Navy looks for cool toys and then figures out how to shoehorn it in to existing architecture.
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The Navy definitely needs the Arleigh Burke class as it has the capacity and the capabilities to cover Anti-Air Warfare, Anti-Surface Warfare and Anti-Submarine warfare. They are the defense ship for carrier and expeditionary strike groups, they can independently sail for other operations, and they really perform as the workhorse of the fleet. The Navy should continue to buy these destroyers to keep a single platform model for cost savings due to the vast majority of parts being similar in nature. The Navy should retire all of the cruisers as this point as they are getting past their useful life expectancy and will only increasing cost more to maintain and sail. The Navy should also cancel the LCS program entirely as it is too expensive for the capabilities it provides. Instead the Navy should look to purchase at 200'-250' 1000 ton corvette sized ship with a hangar for one UAV for a fifth to a seventh of the price of the LCS. Same capabilities but at a reduced cost. The navy could easily then purchase 100 or more of the smaller ships and forward deploy them to both hot spots and other regional areas of interest. This would play much much better into the Navy's doctrine of distributed lethality. Plus you would increase the number of defensive missile and sensors available to the strike group commanders and fleet commanders as each of the ships would as sensor data to the Navy's network of sensors.
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Funny how I used to call the littoral combat ship I used to add that identifier Charlie in front of it as a joke back in 2003 when I heard first heard the term and now that I look at it the name is deserving Charlie littoral combat ship which is a piece of junk. Just think how much money could have been spent on Arleigh Burke Destroyers instead just like how much money could have been spent on the A10 or other systems that are wasting it on the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter that still is too fat and to unarmored to be either a fighter plane or close air support. Just think the F-35 has two trigger pulls while the A-10 Warthog has about trigger pulls for Close air Support. The F-35 three brought down by a 7.62 millimeter bullet while the A-10 Warthog can resist 23 millimeter Soviet anti- aircraft gun ordinance and still fly with two out of three systems compromised. The F-35 kinda reminds me that the beginning scene of the movie Air America worth a Vietcong farmer shoots a rifle at a C-123 cargo plane and he gets a lucky shot and he hits the engine and then it crashes and explodes on landing.
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