US Navy to Deploy Rail Guns by 2011

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A number of DoD systems do get canceled. Example is the Paladin anti-aircraft system, the Crusader artillery system and the Commanche helicopter.

And we probably have over 300 Admirals because not that long ago we had an active 600 ship Navy.

Our Defense budget, even with the Middle East wars, is still a small fraction of the Gross Domestic Product. Something around 4% or less.

What I worry about is the $40 trillion of Federal current debt and future obligations. Hard to support a superior military if you are busted out.
 
I was reading about the DDX and its 5" gun. It shoots a 19 pound shell something like 75 miles. 19#? Heck, my johnson weighs more than that!

The DDX has so little freeboard they might as well call it a submarine.

Then I looked at the carrier USS VINSON. Nowadays, it carries 1 admiral and 6 captains (0-6) and their court followers. Talk about overloading and being top heavy, I'm surprised the VINSON hasn't turned over.

China ordered 4 KILO subs from the Russians. Can't afford to pay for them though.
 
Our Defense budget, even with the Middle East wars, is still a small fraction of the Gross Domestic Product. Something around 4% or less.
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Hmm … Can’t delete. Anyway, I’ve edited this post to correct an error. I misread the above quote as “a small fraction of the budget.â€

~G. Fink
 
GM and Ford are now spending billions of dollars in China. Every Chinaman will soon have a Taurus or Chevy.
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WT, that's wishful thinking. VW has lost their collective butt over there. Less than 1% of the PRC population can afford a car at this time, even the indigenously produced "Chery" ( a blatant ripoff of another well-known vehicle), and the PRC hierarchy is trying to rein-in their 'runaway economy' now?

It's taking too much away from the expansion of their military industial base economy. Do a Google search for Norinco/Northern Industries and Polytech product lists. They make everything from soup to nuts with cheap Wallyworld DVD players and heavy weapons in the mix. While you're there, take a look at who built up the fiber-optic network for Iraq's CNC for their antiaircraft defenses...during the embargo period from 1992 to 2003. It was so tough that we ended up hitting individual SAM sites because the CNC system was so hardened when we went back to finish the job.

Consider this: If the Loral Group hadn't exported technology to the PRC in the 90's, then the Chinese space program likely would still be at least 10, perhaps 20 years away from a successful manned launch. That same technology increased the number of long range ICBMs in their inventory from about a dozen to a hundred, by latest estimates while increasing theoretical accuracy to meters rather than miles.

Taurii and Impalas for Chinamen? Maybe, but look for them to be counterfieted and mass-produced for export to the Asian/African market, like the Honda motorcycle that they duplicated in the 70's and 80's- a part-for part copy. It's too easy to imagine that the Western plants would likely be nationalized if the mood strikes them. Besides, they have Western corporations over a barrel when it comes to contracts to 'do business' in the country. Globalization means profit for Westerners, and 'free patterns' for the PRC.

/rant off. I studied too much history and know too much for my own good. That's why I check the label for 'Made in Taiwan' instead of 'Made in China' when I must buy something made in the region.

Regards,
Rabbit.

<edited for spelling>
 
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I think WT is right, we should let our enemies start sinking our ships before we come up with a counter weapon. If you really want to save money cut out most forign aid and bring our troops home from Europe, they dont want or need us there.Just my opinion.
Mike
 
Mike - the terrorists are sinking and damaging our ships with World War II mines and suicide boats. We still don't have an effective way to defend moored ships against a dingy. Take a boat out on Sandy Hook Bay and run up to the Navy ammunition docks. Nobody will stop you.

Yet we continue to spend billions of taxpayer dollars on military boondoggles which contribute little to the defense of this country.
 
We still don't have an effective way to defend moored ships against a dingy.
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Sure we do its a pintel-mounted M2 machine gun, a box of ammo, and night vision gear for the shooter. Despite what you have been saying we have defended the fleet from at least one of these attacks in North Africa. We actually used intelligence from detainees at Guantanamo to do it. This just doesn't make the news because the networks never report when we do something right.

Now how do we defend ourselves from ICBMs launched at the West Coast from North Korea when Kim Jong-Il runs out of heating oil this winter? Ummm. Well it ain't going to be as simple as as a Ma Deuce and a Night Vision scope I can tell you that.
 
Yet we continue to spend billions of taxpayer dollars on military boondoggles which contribute little to the defense of this country.
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Like the B-1, B-2, F-117, Tomahawk, and M1 series. Everyone of these was called a boondoggle by short sighted people who thought peace was right around the corner and "we ain't going to make war no more." Everyone of these systems ended up giving us a decisive advantage when war inevitably showed up.
 
B1, F/A 22, Osprey, Harrier, Stryker, Crusader, Comanche, Seawolf, Virginia - all classic boondoggles.

Conventional naval warfare with its reliance on carrier battle groups, large surface ships, and submarines offers little combat power against terrorist groups. It makes no sense for large warships to be placed in New York Harbor to protect NYC. There will be no deep ocean, blue water battle engagements with terrorists ....... or the Chinese for that matter.

The US Coast Guard is hugely overtaxed and underfunded for its homeland security missions. I'd like to see them get a couple of billion dollars.
 
WT

Ships do wear out. Ticonderoga class cruisers first came online in the early 80s. Arleigh Burke destroyers in the early 90s. Spruance class destroyers are being slowly decommed, as they are even older than the Ticos. Oliver Hazard Perry class frigates have been around 20+ years.

Current manufacturing capability has to be kept running, or we loose it. Only one place builds subs for us now, and we are in a world of hurt if it were to close down.

One other thing. We don't base defense policy on today's threats. We try to predict future conflicts, and gear our equipment to that. Cold war based gear is on the way out, or being cut back. Commanche, Crusader, Virginia class subs, all cold war based systems. M-1 Abrams numbers are being cut, in favor of lighter, more deployable systems. F-22 is on oxygen, and should be killed, but the Air Force Fighter Mafia is selling out the service to save it.

Today's threat, of the terrorist in a rowboat, isn't 100% countered with equipment. Our passive defenses could use some work (armour at the waterline, anyone?), but we have had the firepower to counter the terrorist threat since 1918, with the adoption of the Ma Duce. However, we can't light up every boat that gets within 100 yards of our ships (In port, that is. Underway, heaven help you if you get that close). We have to find out which boat to light up, and that is the job of intel.

As we all know, intel in the Middle East has been lacking for near on 30 years, and I don't forsee it getting any better any time soon.

The threat posed to Navy surface ships is still the same, but the change is in the degree. We won't be facing a massed air attack from Backfire bombers gunning for our carriers. We will face the odd anti-ship missle fired by a few crazies, and current Russian anti-ship missles are scary, and being sold to anyone with enough cash. Just one hit from anything Russia has to offer would be fatal to anything smaller than a LHD, I imagine. CIWS can't keep up anymore.
Frankly, the line of sight kill capability with railguns is what interests me the most. If you can see it, you can kill it, out to an ungodly range.
 
The presences of advanced military equipment and weaponry has nothing to do with employing said equipment effectively. Sadaam had the best the Soviet Bloc could make and it didn't do real well against the US in Gulf I.

An effective military is composed of a lot more than hardware.

BTW, China's skimming anti ship missiles are meant to destroy US carriers and their groups.

Has anyone heard of the hyper velocity torpedo's developed by the Russians and Chinese? Last I heard the US was clueless.
 
The supercavitating torpedo is the Shkval. It can be used as either a revenge weapon (carrying a nuke back along an incoming torpedo's bearing to insure the enemy sub is taken out, notwithstanding what may happen to the Russian boat), or as an unstoppable anti-ship torpedo. Some reports have the Kursk going down during a demonstration of the Shkval, with Chinese brass observing the test. The Chinese were (are?) interested in the Oscar II class because it is designed to put carrier battle groups on the bottom.

As for the US being clueless, I believe we purchased a commercial variant of the Shkval sometime ago, and have been working on defensive strategies. Nothing has been officially released though.
 
You mean the supercavitation based torpedoes that the Kursk was allegedly going to test before it mysteriously sank?

Edit: Har, that'll teach me to hit reply and walk away from the computer for a minute.
 
There will be no deep ocean, blue water battle engagements with terrorists ....... or the Chinese for that matter.
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Do you realize why we don't have deep water battles anymore? Its because our navy is big enough and bad enough that nobody wants to try it. Its deterrence plain and simple. If you honestly think the Chinese would be keeping to their own coasts without an ocean full of US carriers between them and what they want, you have another thing coming. They can't oppose us conventially so they are forced to resort to unconventional means which are less effective.

All that is neglecting the ability the US Navy has to project power via airstrikes and missiles far onto dry land. Those tomahawks came from where? Cruisers and destroyers and submarines? Oh right. Those airstrikes come from where? Oh aircraft flying from US carriers or US bombers flown from missourri via "boondoggle" programs you mentioned earlier.
 
For what it is worth...

First, when we speak of "the Chinese", you must be careful to seperate the PRC\PLA from the average citzen. In fact, there are so many who advocate change but live in fear daily for it. It's very easy to find yourself in a forced labor camp there still, no matter how much all you see of the new freedoms from their economic change might show.

Anyway - without ranting on this - the PRC party\PLA(most I hope) would never want to engage in a navy\air military conflict outside of their borders. They surely are under equipped against the US from what I understand. However, the costs in lives to each side would be huge - and the US would never be able to engage on their turf (look at our trouble right now in Iraq). My fear is how far the hawks in China would be if things get more heated in Taiwan if we the US wish to engage. I believe the PRC wish to change Taiwan from the inside. They are already immensily powerful politically in Taiwan and have been buying power there. As long as it keeps profitting them though, I believe they would like things as they are. Money talks. Heck the PLA run businesses...
 
One thing you lose when you get away from chemical propelled guns is that waste byproduct known as heat. Right now the ROF and the accuracy of naval guns is limited primarily by heat concerns. The developmental rail guns will likely mitigate ROF and accuracy losses from heat, as well as throw projectiles a goodly distance further and with better trajectories if it lives up to its billing.
 
Good responses, guys.

What I worry about is somebody running a suicide boat up against the Staten Island ferry, drowning 2000 passengers. Or maybe somebody hits a LNG tanker in the Houston Ship Channel. Or God forbid, an IED alongside a schoolbus in Billings, MT or Lenexa, KS.

If we don't beat these b*stard terrorists soon, we won't have to concern ourselves with the Chinese. Heck, our own fleets won't have a port to come home to.
 
read a couple responses about the F22, my bro was on the program until he recently retired. This plane is frigging awesome guys. And it is moving forward. You wouldn't believe some of the stuff it is capable of. Not that I would know a bunch mind ya. It ain't a boondoggle IMHO.
 
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