A need for Heavier Self-Defence capability of Aircraft Carriers?

USN Carrier Battle Groups are well protected with its own Air Wing and at least four Aegis Destroyers and/or Cruisers. Though I believe the Sea Sparrow is going to be relaced by the more capable ESSM. More than likely close in defense will stay with the CIWS or Sea Ram.

And why not… CV-61 Ranger, which is noticeably larger than CVF will be, made a port call to Vancouver in 1986, anchoring in the harbor… and did the same at Diego Garcia in 1989!

CVN-70 Carl Vinson visited DG in both 1986 & 1990 as well.

Note that the lagoon of DG is a dredged anchorage capable of hosting USN CVNs… and is the permanent mooring of the 14 ships of the USN’s Military Sealift Command’s Maritime Prepositioning Ship Squadron Two!

Add in the refueling and ship servicing facilities… and an air base with a runway long enough that it is an emergency landing site for NASA’s space shuttle, and a CVF would find DG a welcome base for supporting an extended deployment.

Vancouver was never in question. In fact, I was using it as a contrast to Port Stanley and Diego Garcia, although I was obviously mistaken with the latter!

I knew that DG had the world-class airfield facilities and the deep anchorage, I just never realized that it had the capital ship servicing facilities.

Still, it just reinforces my earlier point that the UK has the facilities to support large numbers of conventionally-powered ships halfway around the world, a capability that goes unmatched by Russia, for example.

Logan Hartke

“you’re not going to be pulling a carrier into Port Stanley or Diego Garcia anytime soon like you could Sydney or Vancouver, which was my point.”

And why not… CV-61 Ranger, which is noticeably larger than CVF will be, made a port call to Vancouver in 1986, anchoring in the harbor… and did the same at Diego Garcia in 1989!

CVN-70 Carl Vinson visited DG in both 1986 & 1990 as well.

Note that the lagoon of DG is a dredged anchorage capable of hosting USN CVNs… and is the permanent mooring of the 14 ships of the USN’s Military Sealift Command’s Maritime Prepositioning Ship Squadron Two!

Add in the refueling and ship servicing facilities… and an air base with a runway long enough that it is an emergency landing site for NASA’s space shuttle, and a CVF would find DG a welcome base for supporting an extended deployment.

Oh yes, DG is being upgraded to serve as an operating base for the USN’s SSGNs (ex-Ohio class SSBNs).

We also still have various islands scattered around the world, such as Bermuda, Ascension, the Falklands, & Diego Garcia, where we have a few people keeping an eye on the tenants to make sure they don’t make a mess of our property. 😀

I’m well aware of that, but you’re not going to be pulling a carrier into Port Stanley or Diego Garcia anytime soon like you could Sydney or Vancouver, which was my point. That’s why I stressed “major naval base”.

Thanks for the kind words again, swerve.

Logan Hartke

There is one scenario in which I can see the utility of a carrier with its own integrated air defence system. That is the case of more of an expeditionary carrier. In other words, a carrier that is expected to operate thousands of miles from the nearest major naval base. I don’t really see that situation in existence today. The are no countries that need that sort of power projection, yet lack the overseas facilities to support it. The UK is currently one of the closest, but its good relations with the Commonwealth and numerous former colonies ensure that it will always have support a long way from home. …

Logan Hartke

We also still have various islands scattered around the world, such as Bermuda, Ascension, the Falklands, & Diego Garcia, where we have a few people keeping an eye on the tenants to make sure they don’t make a mess of our property. 😀

Overall, another good post, Logan. A pleasure to read, even though I might not agree with all of it – but I have to think more on it. Ta.

There is one scenario in which I can see the utility of a carrier with its own integrated air defence system. That is the case of more of an expeditionary carrier. In other words, a carrier that is expected to operate thousands of miles from the nearest major naval base. I don’t really see that situation in existence today. The are no countries that need that sort of power projection, yet lack the overseas facilities to support it. The UK is currently one of the closest, but its good relations with the Commonwealth and numerous former colonies ensure that it will always have support a long way from home. One possibility might be the emerging Russian Navy. Always lacking the naval bases it needed to support a truly world class blue water navy, Russia (or the Soviet Union) has always had to settle for not being the blue water navy that nations such as Great Britain, the United States, and France have been able to become due to their overseas bases. A resurgent Russia is about the only nation that I can see coming anywhere close to needing and being able to actually produce and man such ships.

In a case such as that, I would actually ague (purely economically) for a CBG consisting of a couple of SSNs for ASW, a couple of CVNs with their own air defence systems, and possibly a very large nuclear-powered amphibious warfare/air defence/replenishment ship.

Basically, what I’d envision is a couple of nuclear-powered Kuznetsov-type carriers with a slightly heavier displacement (~50,000 tons) and their own air defence systems (what they have now, but moreso). The only other surface ship that would regularly accompany them more than 2,000 miles from home port would be a large Kirov/Ivan Rogov hybrid in the area of 30,000 tons. A few SSNs escorting the group at various distances, scouting ahead and around them would round out the group nicely.

The carrier should have some serious, very capable fixed-wing assets, to make up for its complete lack of surface support assets. None of this helicopter-mounted radar junk. Get a real AEW aircraft, like a modernized Yak-44 or An-71 with AESA, some navalized Flanker or eventually PAK-FA aircraft, and some ASW helicopters. Honestly, I think they should have a variant of the AEW platform to use as a fixed-wing ASW aircraft, as well – sort of a Russian S-3B Viking. Something like the following:

24 x Heavy Fighters (Su-33+)
3 x AEW Aircraft (Hawkeye-equivalent)
3 x ASW/EW Aircraft (Viking-equivalent)
4 x Multipurpose Helicopters (Ka-27/MH-60/NH90)

Obviously, the CBG would have double this since there’d be two carriers. Also, I’d have 8-12 multipurpose helicopters on the support ship.

For the support ship, I’d think it should be rather large, capable of carrying at least a fully equipped amphibious battalion with support assets, have a sizable helicopter landing deck, have the replenishment stores for the armament for itself and the two carriers, be nuclear-powered, be fairly well armored, have a good 130mm+ gun battery, possess a very large missile array of anti-ship and anti-air missiles, and a radar array more powerful than AEGIS. Again, sort of like an updated Kirov on steroids with amphibious capabilities.

Total, your CBG would have maybe 6-7 ships (2 CVNs, 1 Heavy Support Cruiser, and 3-4 SSNs). You’d have the total air complement of (using modern aircraft):

48 x Su-33s
6 x Hawkeyes
6 x Vikings
16 x Ka-27s
4 x Ka-52s

As big and expensive as these ships would be, I think that a CBG consisting of these three ships would actually be cheaper to operate and maybe even build than a comparable US CBG (for a nation without the overseas bases).

It allows you to be a better blue water navy, be more flexible, project power better, deploy and redeploy faster, stay at sea longer, and at the loss of little offensive firepower. Going all-nuclear means that you wouldn’t need an oiler, a naval base nearby, or a slow replenishment ship. This is all at the expense of survivability. Your hulls are bigger and stronger than all the little boats, but packed with more dangerous goods and there are a lot fewer hulls.

Other than such a specific scenario, though, defer to my earlier post.

Logan Hartke

Speedy,

It would be cool for aviation fans to see a naval Hawk strike fighter based on a Hawk 100/200 🙂

But such an aircraft would only be suitable in a relatively low-threat environment, I would think.

It would be better to resurrect the Sea Harrier FA2………

I agree, I think the RN CVFs should be equipped with the CTOL version of JSF, or perhaps Dassault Rafale Ms 😀

There was a thread in the main military aviation forum about navalised Typhoons.

What do you think?

How do you think Aircraft Carriers could be sensibly better armed?

Regards
Pioneer

Someone who flew once said to me “There are two types of ships…. submarines and targets !”

It’s nice to hear others are concerned by this. Since the Harrier FA2 was taken of our RN carriers, they have had no carrier borne fighter cover!

I don’t know too much about this, but I am encouraged to see that the two carrier ordered for the Royal Navy will be able to accomodate the CTOL option. This means we are not putting all our eggs in the JSF STOVL basket at this stage. I’ve often wondered why we don’t go a little lower tech, and develop a new BAe ‘Navy’ Hawk…. a sort of hybrid of the 200 and the Goshawk. Single seat, one piece canopy with no frame so the pilot can see, Goshawk airbrakes, modify the Goshawk main landing gear to allow room for a wing hardpoint. This aircraft would be able to loiter without burning the huge amounts of fuel the JSF will. Keep the JSF for strike. The Hawk is for fleet defence and limited other roles.

Do we need carrier borne AEW aircraft? Perhaps the Navy Hawk radars linked up will do, but a small AEW aircraft might help…. low-tech Shorts Skyvan with a big fuel tank and a big radar !

Cheers!

Speedy

For all practical purposes, assuming the CBG is under attack, I can see no real advantage to putting your AD systems on the carrier. If it’s trying to get all its planes in the air, then it’s not going to be able to fire off salvos of long-ranged air defence missiles. That’s sort of an either/or situation. You can get the planes off, or try to shoot down incoming missiles. The smoke and blast from missiles is likely to restrict flight operations around the immediate vicinity of the carrier or at least make it hazardous to launch and recover aircraft.

Also, many CVN-hunting techniques home in on a carrier’s radar emissions. It’s standard tactics for a CBG that’s under attack to have the CVN go dead, turning off its radar and such to make it a less inviting target. In the case of a carrier that provides its own air defence, turning its radar off isn’t an option. Well, it is, but then your missiles aren’t going to do any good.

That brings up another issue. Carriers are naturally combustible. The USN has been working since WWII to decrease that as much as possible. That’s the reason why the USN pushed for solid-fuel long-range rockets instead of liquid. There was no way liquid rocket fuel was going on their ships, especially carriers. Now, I know that modern air defence missiles are all going to have solid propellant and far less risky explosives than anything in the early days, but it’s that much less that the Navy would like to pack into their hulls.

Something else, on the issue of multiple hulls. Except for press photos, CBG escorts aren’t usually a stone’s throw away from the CVN. Putting the AD systems on multiple hulls allows you to push the AD umbrella further away from the carrier. The radar coverage, the missiles, the CIWS systems, the countermeasures, they all start further from the carrier.

Finally, if missiles and/or torpedoes start getting through, that many more hulls gives them that many additional potential targets. Sure, missiles are programmed to search for the biggest target, for example, but if it loses the biggest target, it doesn’t keep looking for it, it picks the next closest thing it can find. A CBG commander would rather it pick an escort than the CVN.

So, I see no problem with LERX’s potential setup. Heavy on the autonomous PD weapons. PD SAMs and CIWS systems, but I think that Pioneer’s idea of a VLS system is riskier than it is beneficial.

Logan Hartke

I see some of your points my friend!

Thanks
Pioneer

Well said, Logan – agree 100%.

A quite superb analogy. One that should be printed up in any principal warfare officers course notes!. Good stuff Logan

Agreed.

I’m in the “CIWS & maybe some bolt-on SR SAM” camp, & any missiles should be 1) short-range, 2) quick-reaction, 3) not dependent on the carrier illuminating targets, & 4) shouldn’t compromise the primary function.

“IIRC the original design of the USS Enterprise had a Talos launcher.”

CV-63 Kitty Hawk, CV-64 Constellation, & CV-66 America were completed with 2 twin Terrier SAM launchers (1 on each stern quarter).

CVN-65 Enterprise was also designed to carry these, but they were not fitted due to cost over-runs.

The Terrier was the USN’s “medium-range” missile of the 1960s… and the CVs carried 40 for each twin launcher… 80 total per ship.

I’m with those who see a carrier as not being used correctly or lacking adequate support vessels if it is ever in a position to need a heavy missile/gun fit. To be sure fitting CIWS (Phalanx, goalkeeper or Sea Ram etc.) is sensible and it’d be ridiculous not to have a final line of defence against missiles, and it may make sense to have a compact point defence SAM that can essentially be carried as almost bolt on units with little vessel impact (maybe a couple of ESSM units) but thats about it IMO. The rest of the ship should be optimised for operating aircraft. The ship should never get into a position where it’d ever need more as that means it has lost it’s air group, lost it’s escorts and a £2 billion carrier is trying to act as a frigate or something. If things do get hairey then a carrier gets out and goes to a safe position, not try and fight on alone.

To me, it’s like putting a VIP through special forces training and arming him with a submachine gun in order to better prepare for the possibility of an assassination attempt. It’s kind of silly. If anyone should try to take out a VIP, his best chances are to get down, get out of sight, get behind his bodyguards, and let them take the bullet if absolutely necessary, not get in a running gun battle with the enemy.

A quite superb analogy. One that should be printed up in any principal warfare officers course notes!. Good stuff Logan

I don’t know. I’m actually in favor of giving a carrier great CIWS, but putting the rest of the air defence (not including aircraft) on other hulls. That’s for a number of reasons. First of all, it keeps your ship size down. Splitting a CBG’s defences between multiple hulls is, in some cases, the only way to fit 90 aircraft on a hull that will still fit on the slipway or in a drydock.

For all practical purposes, assuming the CBG is under attack, I can see no real advantage to putting your AD systems on the carrier. If it’s trying to get all its planes in the air, then it’s not going to be able to fire off salvos of long-ranged air defence missiles. That’s sort of an either/or situation. You can get the planes off, or try to shoot down incoming missiles. The smoke and blast from missiles is likely to restrict flight operations around the immediate vicinity of the carrier or at least make it hazardous to launch and recover aircraft.

Also, many CVN-hunting techniques home in on a carrier’s radar emissions. It’s standard tactics for a CBG that’s under attack to have the CVN go dead, turning off its radar and such to make it a less inviting target. In the case of a carrier that provides its own air defence, turning its radar off isn’t an option. Well, it is, but then your missiles aren’t going to do any good.

That brings up another issue. Carriers are naturally combustible. The USN has been working since WWII to decrease that as much as possible. That’s the reason why the USN pushed for solid-fuel long-range rockets instead of liquid. There was no way liquid rocket fuel was going on their ships, especially carriers. Now, I know that modern air defence missiles are all going to have solid propellant and far less risky explosives than anything in the early days, but it’s that much less that the Navy would like to pack into their hulls.

Something else, on the issue of multiple hulls. Except for press photos, CBG escorts aren’t usually a stone’s throw away from the CVN. Putting the AD systems on multiple hulls allows you to push the AD umbrella further away from the carrier. The radar coverage, the missiles, the CIWS systems, the countermeasures, they all start further from the carrier.

Finally, if missiles and/or torpedoes start getting through, that many more hulls gives them that many additional potential targets. Sure, missiles are programmed to search for the biggest target, for example, but if it loses the biggest target, it doesn’t keep looking for it, it picks the next closest thing it can find. A CBG commander would rather it pick an escort than the CVN.

So, I see no problem with LERX’s potential setup. Heavy on the autonomous PD weapons. PD SAMs and CIWS systems, but I think that Pioneer’s idea of a VLS system is riskier than it is beneficial.

The only time that I can see it being useful is in the event that most of the escorts in a conventional CBG are eliminated, through air attack, submarines, or surface combat. Then, the carrier would still have a way to protect itself. This, however, is an incredibly unlikely scenario. First of all, if the escorts are picked off by submarines or surface craft, then I would assume that those same assets would be responsible for taking out the carrier. In that event, a VLS would be of little utility in defending against seaborne threats. In the case of air attack, I see little likelihood that air attacks would target all of your dedicated AD ships first. The carrier is going to be the main target, it’s going to be the first to go.

To me, it’s like putting a VIP through special forces training and arming him with a submachine gun in order to better prepare for the possibility of an assassination attempt. It’s kind of silly. If anyone should try to take out a VIP, his best chances are to get down, get out of sight, get behind his bodyguards, and let them take the bullet if absolutely necessary, not get in a running gun battle with the enemy. The same holds true for a carrier. Its best defence is to get the planes off and shut everything else down, making like a hole in the water. Let the bodyguards do the shooting and take the bullets.

When it comes to weaponry, a carrier should be heavy on the PD systems, aircraft, and little else.

You want a modern day Lexington, Ise, or Kiev, go for it. I’ll stick to my Yorktown, Hiryu, and Admiral Gorshkov.

Logan Hartke

IIRC the original design of the USS Enterprise had a Talos launcher. The British CVA-01 design had a sea dart launcher as did the Invincibles. Space was one of the big issues with older systems, hence it was removed from the invincibles. Recent improvements in radar minaturisation and VLS cells have changed things a bit with the best example being the CdG, a very well protected carrier. The CVN-21 will get SPY-3 and a 16 cell VLS for a total of 64 ESSM’s, a better AD setup than the new Norwegian frigates, or in fact most small frigates for that matter.

I agree.
It has often struck me as a bit odd seeing multi-billion dollar supercarriers so lightly armed.
I know they have escorts, but given the cost of the carrier, a heavier defensive fit would appear to be relatively & proportionately cost-effective. (penny wise, pound foolish)

large (western) carriers should have a combination of 3-4 multi-barrel CIWS & perhaps 4-8 PDM SAM systems like RAM, lightweight Sea Wolf, or equivalent.
Plus several 12.7mm HMGs & 4-6 20mm light cannon to engage surface targets (remember USS Cole).

If there was ever another conventional naval battle, a sizeable future enemy would definitely target CVNs/CVFs with multiple ASM/SSM/SLCMs.

Carrier defence

To a degree having a good weapons fit on a carrier is what we would all wish for but is comes down to money in the end and too much kit will conflict with the role of escorts and the ship itself. Often the RN has sent it’s CVS’s off on their own with no escort and at best you got a T23 but really they have always looked after themselves. A good short range SAM and some light guns and CIWS with the right software so they can be used in surface mode will do nicely. The RN had very limited use of the Sea Dart on the CVS and the space was better used for other things once it was removed as you rightly said the fighters onboard can do the killing at the long ranges needed with inner defence coming from escorts and the ship itself. Long range SAM’s fit on carriers is never going to happenas it is just not worth it. Look at the USN battle groups and the hardware available there. CVF may have an escort or 2 when sent off but as the RN has so few hulls, little else is going to be seen unless the UK Gov decides to reverse the decline of the fleet and gives us 50+ escorts!!!!!! Long lost dream that.

😎