64 modules planned so far, 55 ships planned so far. 1.16 modules per ship.
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What about a fire support module for shore bombardment? Lastly, the modules make it far easier to modernize the ships since the modules are not an integral part of the ship.
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Sorry Scooter but your mother ship would be an unnecessary waste of resources. Like Jonesy says, if you need s ship with a different module you just send one in.
And the LCS gets another mission… surprisingly linked to those ARGS!!
USMC Commandant Suggests LCS Fire Support
A persistent capability gap in U.S. naval surface fire support (NSFS) could well be filled by the new Littoral Combat Ship (LCS), according to Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James Conway.
Conway said his Navy counterpart, Adm. Gary Roughead, has agreed to expand the concept of using the LCS as a firing platform for what Conway called a “box of rockets.”
The services are still examining storage and elevator capacity aboard LCS, and Conway said “we don’t have [the] box we need.”
NSFS is the ship-to-shore artillery element of the fires triad used to suppress and break apart enemy forces under an amphibious assault. Marine and the Navy leaders looked to reinvigorate the Corps’ classic, forcible beach-entry role after years of in-land counter-insurgency fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. But as adversary defenses become more sophisticated, and reach farther from shore, the challenge for U.S. forces remains to outfit ships with systems offering enough firepower and range.
The truncation of the DDG-1000 and cancellation last year of Raytheon’s Extended Range Guided Munition (ERGM) put a dent in the Corps’ requirement for NSFS (Aerospace DAILY, Dec. 19, 2006). In the near-term, Conway said, the Marine Corps has not found a volume of firepower that can successfully fill the NSFS gap. Using the LCS “may fix the problem for the long-term,” he added.
http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/generic/story_channel.jsp?channel=defense&id=news/LCS051509.xml&headline=USMC%20Commandant%20Suggests%20LCS%20Fire%20Support
And more modules appear… along with the need to move seamlessly from ASW (to clear the area for the ARG), to MW (to clear the invasion beach/approaches), to NSFS (to support the actual landing), back to ASW (to keep the ARG safe during the rest of the op). Not to mention the ASuW to keep the “pesky gnats” away from the big gray floating things and the beachhead?
Now how many LCS are needed in you-all’s claimed “1 ship, 1 module, never to be changed” scheme?
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