Naval Pictures VI: A New Enterprise

[Wrangler]

With fears of the hypersonic missiles...

Ships like the USS Ronald Reagon, maybe on the cutting block as being too vulnerable and expensive to expose to combat anymore.
Since there no defense against this new class of missile.

[MoneyLovinOgre4Hire]

Are hypersonic anti-ship missiles a real thing yet, or just one of those "everybody is working on it and they're totally 5-10 years from completion, I swear" things?

[Colt Ward]

MLO4H, I think its the latter . . . and I also wonder about it being like the Super Cav torpedo . . . really slick, gives the target no time to react . . . but the weapon itself has no terminal guidance b/c by its nature it cannot react in time.

[Kidd]

Are hypersonic anti-ship missiles a real thing yet, or just one of those "everybody is working on it and they're totally 5-10 years from completion, I swear" things?

All sides have supposedly successful experimental versions of the things

It's claimed that the Khinzal missile is basically IOC, the Chinese a couple years behind, and the US Navy a couple years behind them

[Fat Guy]

Everyone is also working on laser based missile defense, which will bag hypersonic targets.

[Colt Ward]

The other thing is that carriers are more & more a tool for asymmetrical warfare rather than a straight conventional battle unit- in fact the USFG gets more use out of them in such a manner than the 'conventional' use.

[ANS Kamas P81]

Good thing for those hypersonic missiles that carriers don't have launchers of their own and roll with escorts loaded with missiles capable of mach 3.5, am I right?  All alone like a big giant target, just screaming to be shot, that's the way to use a modern CVN!

[worktroll]

Apropos of nothing, a great article on LA Googie architecture: https://la.curbed.com/2017/9/29/16384732/googie-southern-california-architecture

"During the high point of the Downes Age, they put Ming the Merciless in charge of designing California gas stations. Favoring the architecture of his native Mongo, he cruised up and down the coast erecting raygun emplacements in white stucco. "

- The Gernsback Continuum, by William Gibson

[Kidd]

Good thing for those hypersonic missiles that carriers don't have launchers of their own and roll with escorts loaded with missiles capable of mach 3.5, am I right?  All alone like a big giant target, just screaming to be shot, that's the way to use a modern CVN!

Well, Lockmart is working on a hypersonic interceptor (Arrow), but until then, the response seems to be to attack the launch platform, hide, or deploy lots of ECM and hope for the best.

[HobbesHurlbut]

Doesn't hypersonic missiles have certain weaknesses like manuevering during the hypersonic flight is being severely limited or take too much room to do?

[snewsom2997]

The problem with Ground/Ship based Anti Missile systems and Hypersonic missiles is the time you have to shoot the target down. Most Anti Ship or Cruise Missile types are going to be skimming waves/hugging the earth, and you can only see out 15 miles or so, so unless they invent a laser that can curve through the air, they are not going to have very much time to acquire and engage the target. A carrier Battle Group is going to do that with concentric rings of defense. Aegis type Cruisers and Destroyers, 10-20 miles out, but those are not infinite either and suffer the same LOS problems. With hard ammo you just need to hit the thing, with a laser you are going to have to hold it a while, and at Mach 8 and the curvature of the earth, that while isn't going to be very long at all.

[kato]

Doesn't hypersonic missiles have certain weaknesses like manuevering during the hypersonic flight is being severely limited or take too much room to do?

The reverse. Hypersonic glide vehicles (HGV - that's what's everyone developing) have vastly improved maneuvering over the default reentry systems of their carrier vehicles - many ballistic vehicles have flight paths that mimic similar maneuvering, but due to momentum and lack of control structures are heavily restricted in their horizontal movement and offer zero retargeting/reattack capability.

The main downside is that due to materials science restrictions sensors on the HGV are pretty much a moot thing. Hence why it's always assumed that such a vehicle would carry a nuclear warhead - due to lack of precision. There are some concepts that may alleviate this problem (Germany trying active cooling of the outside of the reentry hull of its HGV, some others trying semi-shielded "aft" comm links to conveniently placed satellites), but they're far from being implemented in a way that one could consider terminal homing on such a HGV.

There are no low-altitude "seaskimming" HGVs. That's a misconception that stems from the moniker "anti-ship missile". HGVs reenter the atmosphere at Mach 10-12, go into a horizontal glide phase at high altitude at this speed while attempting to get their bearing (literally), and would then attack in a rather direct pattern, possibly with an internal booster as well.

There are very limited numbers of weaponized hypersonic missiles under development that are not HGVs. The Indian Brahmos II and the Chinese Lingyun-1 pretty much; for Russia the 3M22 Zircon is claimed to be in IOC - development started in the 90s; 3M22 is the only one among these with an anti-ship focus.

[glitterboy2098]

given that most anti-ship missiles currently are sub-sonic (thus the focus on seaskimming as a way to avoid detection and anti-missile defenses) anything that is able to move faster than sound is scary to a navy. that multiple countries are sinking a lot of money into developing missiles that can move mach 5+ (reducing detection and defense time to virtually nil even though the missiles are basically sub-orbital at that point) is terrifying. whether any of them actually work out is yet to be seen.

[ANS Kamas P81]

Yeah, the thing about hypersonics is atmospheric density.  There's a great reason the SR-71 flew at 90,000 feet+, the air's thin enough that Mach 3.5 was only heating the skin to 450^oF or so.  If you tried to do that at low altitude, you'd incinerate your missile like a meteor.  Hell, some modern combat aircraft still can't break supersonic at sea level, despite being happily able to up at altitude.  Once that hypersonic projectile descends to low altitude on its way to a target, it's going to slow down.

You're basically dealing with a ballistic missile, coming from rather high altitude, with both a radar signature and one hell of a heat signature.  That's going to be plenty of warning to deal with things, and start lobbing missiles back at it - like I said, even your short-range Sea Sparrows from a RAM launcher accelerate to Mach 3.5, so dealing with incoming isn't impossible.  A little more difficult, sure, and they can be fired from further back and have longer ranges to engage targets within, but unless they're shooting gigawatt laser beams from 100,000 feet they're not unstoppable.

[kato]

There's a great reason the SR-71 flew at 90,000 feet+, the air's thin enough that Mach 3.5 was only heating the skin to 450^oF or so.  If you tried to do that at low altitude, you'd incinerate your missile like a meteor.

SHEFEX II, a German hypersonic glider, descended from 920,000 ft apogee to 50,000 ft in a low-angle (35°) reentry into the atmosphere while shedding speed from Mach 11.5 down to Mach 5.9 in 2010. It reached 1500°F on its leading edge at Mach 11 at 100,000 ft as its top temperature, considerably before the maximum dynamic pressure point at 66,000 ft. It was previously ground-tested up to around 3000°F and carried an internal sensor suite with over 80 temperature sensors previously flown for the same kinda analysis on a ballistic reentry cone launched on a SLBM from a Russian submarine.

[Fat Guy]

Artist’s rendering of Raytheon Advanced Missile Systems’ winged Tactical Boost Glide hypersonic weapon concept:

[Wrangler]

HMS Egret,  she was armed sloop in the British Navy. Launched in 1938, armed eight 4inch guns and machine guns.



What unique about her is that she is the first warship to be sunk by guided weapon.  She was part of a 40th Support Group in 1943, with her sistership and some frigates.  She was being used for surveillance mission watching for German bombers.  However, sadly she herself of victim and her entire crew of one these bombers, using a radio controlled Henschel Hs 293 glide bomb.

[Nightlord01]

HMS Egret,  she was armed sloop in the British Navy. Launched in 1938, armed eight 4inch guns and machine guns.



What unique about her unique, is she is the first warship to be sunk by guided weapon.  She was part of a 40th Support Group in 1943, with her sistership and some frigates.  She was being used for surveillance mission watching for German bombers.  However, sadly she herself of victim and her entire crew of one these bombers, using a radio controlled Henschel Hs 293 glide bomb.

Very British in design, the cutaway from one deck down to a two deck quarterdeck is a hallmark of the Brits.

Pity she doesn't have the high cable deck.

[Kidd]

CG of British Tribal-class destroyer, my favourite WW2 destroyer class in terms of looks and everything

Large size image here: https://cdna.artstation.com/p/assets/images/images/010/389/908/large/barbu-gabriel-tribal-3.jpg

Very British in design, the cutaway from one deck down to a two deck quarterdeck is a hallmark of the Brits.

Pity she doesn't have the high cable deck.

Yes, the cutaway is so very iconic. I don't know what it's for but it somehow looks dashing.

[Wrangler]

I'm more surprised that designation 1,200 ton Sloop was still being used and Frigate.  Prior to World War II, before US's designations changed everything to Escort Destroyer (formerly known as a Frigate).  HMS Egret was one of two ship ships.  Aside from being i guess a patrol ship and a surveillance ship, i had no clue what a sloop built in the 1930s should could be possibly doing.

Nowadays, River Class Patrol Ships are mainstain of the Royal Navy's patrol missions.  Which are essentially being used to keep the shipyards busy as there struggling keep their doors open from what I've read.

Such as this ship, HMS Forth (P222),  she a 2,000 ton Patrol ship belong to the Batch II group of the River Class.


In comparisoning it to the older and lighter Sloop, i find HMS Egret bit more warship than Forth is. With newer ship with it's single 30mm cannon, and assorted machine guns and mini-gun verse HMS Egret's eight 4 inch naval guns and machine guns she was armed with it. 

[Kidd]

Electronics and helipad and MUCH better accommodation takes up space and mass - and don't knock the "accommodation" bit

I mean, you read about some of the WW2 small ships, you kinda wonder if it's the Second World War or War of the Second Coalition, conditions are that bad...!

[Wrangler]

Electronics and helipad and MUCH better accommodation takes up space and mass - and don't knock the "accommodation" bit

I mean, you read about some of the WW2 small ships, you kinda wonder if it's the Second World War or War of the Second Coalition, conditions are that bad...!

I know, i just think today's ships are bit under armed.  I realize commerce and travel on the water ways are less so than they were half a century ago. 

[kato]

I know, i just think today's ships are bit under armed.

Italy is currently replacing its Minerva class patrol corvettes with Paolo Thaon di Revel class offshore patrol vessels.

The "light" version of these ships displaces 4,880 tons and is armed with:
- 1x 127mm/64 Vulcano (75 nm range, terminally guided)
- 1x 76mm/62 Strales (120 rpm, terminally guided)
- 2x 25mm Oerlikon KBA in RWS mounts
- 2x LRAD
- up to two helicopters

It's also fitted for but not with:
- 16 VLS tubes for Aster 15/30 SAM and SCALP Naval cruise missiles
- 8 Otomat Mk2 Block IV AShM (200+ nm range, land attack capable)
- 2 triple 324mm ASW torpedo tubes

Currently 10 on contract including options; at least three planned to be built to "Full" version, i.e. with FFBNW systems. First unit was launched in June this year, three others are laid down.

[Wrangler]

LOL, at latest the Italians know how to arm their patrol ships. I hate seeing term Corvette be made so generic as Offshore Patrol Ship.  Sounds like their using a cabin cruiser with machine gun or something.

[kato]

The differentiation is that in Europe there is no Coastguard in the overwhelming majority of countries. Offshore Patrol Vessels fill the coastguard role - they're not per se primary military vessels. Countries with coastguards actually procure identical vessels for their coastguards (Germany buying Lürssen OPV80s for their national police for coastguard duty, which e.g. Colombia uses as OPVs in the Navy...).

Italy did cut the second planned batch of Paolo Thaon di Revel "OPVs" *, intended to replace its current OPVs - the first batch replaces vessels of war (8 corvettes and 4 light frigates) and hence also the above armament options. Instead of a second batch the current plan is to procure "corvettes" as OPV replacement, jointly with France. 3,000-3,300 ton ships with light armament (probably a medium and two light guns and a self-defense SAM VLS that will probably end up as an 8-cell VLS for Aster 15) called "European Patrol Corvettes".

* the actual designation in Italian is "multipurpose offshore patroller".

[Kidd]

Kato,
Why did the Italians require SAMs and SSMs on those few ships? Where are they expected to deploy?

[kato]

Gulf of Sirte, Horn of Africa... plenty of places with possibly unfriendly air assets and unfriendly missiles. And places where you may get into a situation where you adhoc may be required to drop a 200 kg warhead 150 miles inshore in some situations.

For the PPA "multipurpose offshore patrollers" the three "Full" ships will realistically be gap fillers to fill the escorts for the three Italian carrier and ampibious groups as there aren't enough FREMM frigates.

[chanman]

I'm more surprised that designation 1,200 ton Sloop was still being used and Frigate.  Prior to World War II, before US's designations changed everything to Escort Destroyer (formerly known as a Frigate).  HMS Egret was one of two ship ships.  Aside from being i guess a patrol ship and a surveillance ship, i had no clue what a sloop built in the 1930s should could be possibly doing.

Nowadays, River Class Patrol Ships are mainstain of the Royal Navy's patrol missions.  Which are essentially being used to keep the shipyards busy as there struggling keep their doors open from what I've read.

Such as this ship, HMS Forth (P222),  she a 2,000 ton Patrol ship belong to the Batch II group of the River Class.


In comparisoning it to the older and lighter Sloop, i find HMS Egret bit more warship than Forth is. With newer ship with it's single 30mm cannon, and assorted machine guns and mini-gun verse HMS Egret's eight 4 inch naval guns and machine guns she was armed with it.

British WW2 frigates were basically sloops built to commercial standards (like corvettes). I guess the sloop classification got dropped post-war, but they were in use in the inter-war period

[Dragon Cat]

HMS Talent and HMS Diamond

[Wrangler]

Does anyone know why darling class destroyer seem to be I don't know under arm for what they are. It's supposed to be like the large combatant of the British Navy and yet it only has limited amount of weapons in comparison to say an Aegis Destroyer. I know there's economic difference between the two countries that employ different weapon systems but still it seems a bit under-armed.