9 ms·

This question gets asked on Quora over and over and over and over and over again. The article makes three main points, that carriers are expensive, vulnerable a

This question gets asked on Quora over and over and over and over and over again. The article makes three main points, that carriers are expensive, vulnerable and useless. All three points are wrong. Sure, $6 billion looks like a lot of money. But it's a drop in the bucket compared to the rest of the Carrier Battle Group. You need a lot of ships to properly protect a carrier. Sure, in a conflict with a major international power, our carriers won't stick around. But first, 48 hours is a long time in the context of modern conventional warfare. Guerrilla warfare lasts as long as the people involved want it to last, conventional wars are decided in time periods measured in hours. So a carrier battle group isn't particularly vulnerable. Sure, new tech like ASBMs will force us to change tactics, but we're developing new tech too. Also, nobody is predicting another war with a major international power. The game changer isn't carriers and hasn't been for decades. The game changer is nuclear weapons. If Russia or China decides to target our carriers, the response will have nuclear components. Nuclear weapons are the only things keeping our carriers afloat anyway, if they didn't exist, we'd have scrapped them a long time ago. So, 48 hours. During this time, each carrier, with it's compliment of an entire fighter-bomber wing, has destroyed much more than its share of enemy military targets. Also, the battle groups don't have to actually see battle in order to be useful. A carrier is essentially a floating air base that we can put pretty much anywhere we want, giving us the global strike capabilities that make it so, if we have to threaten a petty tyrant with utter destruction, he doesn't just laugh us out of the room.

bayesian_horse 10y ago
It's increasingly likely that Russia or China may fight a war with the US outside their traditional borders. For example in the South China Sea. It would be conceivable that a conflict there would stay "sub-nuclear", as neither nation's home territory is threatened.
- akshatpradhan 10y ago
  Or research money will be poured into an Iron Dome[1] for Carriers. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_Dome https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_Dome
  - bitL 10y ago
    Supercavitating torpedos won't be affected.
  - ckozlowski 10y ago
    In this case, it's the BMD component of the Aegis system. SM-6 is specifically designed for this mission.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
nxzero 10y ago
Classical war is dead. All conflicts long-term going forward will be won with economic resilience; meaning even if attacked, invaded, controlled, etc. - long-term the attacking force's culture will succumb to economic attrition. Future of war is economic.
- dragonwriter 10y ago
  Economics and logistics (the latter being the ability to project the former where and when you need it) have always been dominant factors in war.
- lmkg 10y ago
  War has always been economic. The ability to win wars is not the ability to inflict losses, but the ability to sustain losses--both economically, and politically. You might make an argument that for a brief period around modern times, wars were lethal enough that this was not the case. But even during this time period, the ability to inflict damage was largely an economic factor.
- sitkack 10y ago
  We made Vietnam pay back all the bombs we dropped on it.
mcv 10y ago
> Sure, $6 billion looks like a lot of money. But it's a drop in the bucket compared to the rest of the Carrier Battle Group. You need a lot of ships to properly protect a carrier That doesn't make the carrier less expensive, it makes it more expensive. > If Russia or China decides to target our carriers, the response will have nuclear components. Are you suggesting that the US will initiate nuclear war?
- rihegher 10y ago
  >Are you suggesting that the US will initiate nuclear war? Well, the US is the only nation that has initiated the use of nuclear weapons for warfare so far.
  - njknsdf 10y ago
    Against a defenseless country looking to surrender that couldn't retaliate. Will be a bit different if it initiates nuclear war against Russia or China.
- scott_s 10y ago
  Regarding your first point, that exact sentiment was addressed in the article under the heading "The future is drones and submarines" (whose thesis is obvious). Selected quoting from there: The supercarrier requires an exponential and compounding set of very expensive investments. The total acquisition cost of a carrier strike group exceeds $25 billion, an air wing another $10 billion and the annual operating costs of perhaps $1 billion. ... "Yet, a cruise missile fired from a wide range of lower signature ships costs less than a third of each bomb delivered by a fighter from the deck of a carrier. Nor do these platforms require a carrier’s defensive shield — and they can launch from beyond the range of carrier-based aircraft. ... A similar shift is occurring now and will displace the modern equivalent of the dashing cavalry officer — the fighter pilot. The knight class never passes willingly — as they take justifiable pride in their acumen and truly believe in their mission. However, the carrier and its air wing cannot be allowed to drive strategy or procurement. As an outsider, it's hard for me to fully assess these arguments (including from the paragraphs I elided). But they sound rather convincing.
bjourne 10y ago
> Guerrilla warfare lasts as long as the people involved want it to last, conventional wars are decided in time periods measured in hours. How do you know that? The only conventional war I know of that was decided in hours was the Six-day war and that was because Israel inflicted a surprise attack on Egypt. Not saying you are wrong, just curious why you think so since the US hasn't been facing an equal adversary in war since WWII.
- vinceguidry 10y ago
  The difference between conventional war and unconventional war is the overall objective. Conventional war is the destruction of another state's ability to wage war. Once that has been accomplished, if war continues, it's unconventional, because it has to be waged by non-state actors. States hold war materiel and personnel on military bases, these weapons have long supply chains and generally cannot be hidden. Once you've blown these things up, then the state cannot make war any longer. With aircraft, missiles, satellites, AWACS, advanced intelligence capabilities, the expected speed of conflicts has gone from days to hours in the last few decades. The US enjoys complete dominance over the rest of the world's militaries. There is no state, no imaginable alliance of states that could withstand a full-scale US military attack. We'd destroy their air forces, naval forces, and any ground forces they could muster within hours. So long as we refuse to fight an unconventional war, then our troops could just go home. It's because our leaders get cocky and idealistic that we get dragged into ongoing guerrilla conflicts.
rdiddly 10y ago
> If Russia or China decides to target our carriers, the response will have nuclear components. So if a nuclear superpower effortlessly takes out a US carrier using a few Kalibr missiles, we will nuke them and be utterly destroyed, thereby proving the carrier was not vulnerable? By that definition ("I'll nuke you if you touch it") a block of cheddar cheese is invulnerable.
- michaelcampbell 10y ago
  Not around me it isn't.
coldtea 10y ago
>Sure, $6 billion looks like a lot of money. But it's a drop in the bucket compared to the rest of the Carrier Battle Group. You need a lot of ships to properly protect a carrier. How is that an argument in favor of a carrier not being expensive? If anything, it implies the actual total cost of a carrier is even more than its own cost.
- dragontamer 10y ago
  Except Carriers have been used in the Afghanistan and Iraq. While also being used in China to hamper Chinese aggression. It seems like the ships are getting good use in the current climate. Carriers are the best choice of weapon in an asymmetrical war against terrorists. Terrorists can't target a Carrier Group, but Carrier Groups can bomb them all day, every day nearly perpetually.
  - coldtea 10y ago
    >While also being used in China to hamper Chinese aggression. Where Chinese aggression = China trying to police its own area? Maybe some Chinese carriers should have helped tamper US aggression all those years in Banana Republics, Mexico, Panama, South America, etc...
    - dragontamer 10y ago
      Chinese aggression like stationing their ships in the Philippines and Japan. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scarborough_Shoal#Claims_by_China_and_Taiwan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scarborough_Shoal#Claims_by_Ch... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_China_Sea_EEZ_disputes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_China_Sea_EEZ_disputes
      - coldtea 10y ago
        >Chinese aggression like stationing their ships in the Philippines and Japan The same Philipines the US occupied and used as a colony (and neo-colony) and the same Japan where the US nuked civilians and had the country under supervision (it's army) etc. post-war? Not to mention this is not actually "stationing their ships in the Philippines and Japan" (which the US does all the time, literally, in their harbors), but having disputes over some sea territory.
at-fates-hands 10y ago
>Sure, $6 billion looks like a lot of money. But it's a drop in the bucket compared to the rest of the Carrier Battle Group. You need a lot of ships to properly protect a carrier. You also need a lot of ships to protect all the countries that cry about their neighbors invading them, human rights atrocities and other "emergencies" that take our military all over the world to protect other countries that are fully capable of doing it themselves, but prefer to put our military in harm's way instead.
ryan_j_naughton 10y ago
If ASBMs become available to smaller countries, as they inevitably are, then they will use them against the US to defend themselves. They US won't be able to respond with nuclear weapons in that case as that would be an insane escalation, and thus their ASBMs would be an effective deterrent against our carriers getting close enough for the fighters to be useful.
- vinceguidry 10y ago
  No, it would just push the battle groups further out to sea, naval ships aren't sitting ducks against ASBMs, they do have defenses such as CIWS. If they keep far enough away then they won't be terribly vulnerable. Also, the US doesn't just have nuclear weapons to retaliate with. We're perfectly capable of devastating these smaller countries without them.
varunom 10y ago
>> Also, nobody is predicting another war with a major international power. I think [0] would show some other reality. 0: http://johnpilger.com/articles/a-world-war-has-begun-break-the-silence- http://johnpilger.com/articles/a-world-war-has-begun-break-t...
Tloewald 10y ago
Pointing out that the actual cost of a carrier is far higher than $6B (true) is not a point in your favor. The opportunity cost needs to be considered — what could you do with your, um, entire naval budget if you weren't obsessed with building carrier battle groups? 48h hasn't proven to be a long time in any modern war. In fact the evidence is that modern wars are more protracted than 19th and mid-20th century because, owing to the realities of the modern military (it tends to be heavy on capital equipment and low on manpower) you can't really win a war any more, instead you just blow up expensive stuff and then snipe at each other. Sure, the Taliban refuses to surrender but China, Russia, or North Korea would be easier, right? Any plausible war will probably involve a period of escalation and a long aftermath. Which 48h do you get? A confrontation off Taiwan or the Spratleys could easily ignite with a US carrier blowing up after being hit by a torpedo or swarm of inexpensive cruise missiles. The way US politics works we'd have lost before the war even started. And finally, what do our carrier planes blow up while the carrier remains afloat? No-one except us has much that's worthy of their attention.
- dragontamer 10y ago
  On the contrary. The USA only has ten carriers deployed right now. The "Carrier Strike Group" is simply all of the other ships (destroyers, cruisers, etc. etc.) that follow the carrier around. The Strike Groups will remain without a Carrier. They basically are the US Navy, aside from the subs we have hidden around the world. Furthermore, all of the other ships are completely useless in Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan. You can't hit ISIS with a Destroyer. You hit them with Airplanes, carried over by Carriers. The firepower of a single US Carrier is bigger than the vast majority of land-bases in the world. A US Carrier can also move however. Its probably one of the most potent weapons of the US. Basically, we have ten moving naval bases, that can be stationed anywhere in the ocean. Each one can go toe-to-toe with the vast, vast majority of land-bases in a particular region and win. Or we can build another few $500 Million to $5 Billion bases in Afghanistan that we later abandon when we change administrations (Bush had different plans than Obama). The Carriers are a far better use of money than building actual bases. Despite their high costs.
  - dragonwriter 10y ago
fit2rule 10y ago
Sorry, but I don't agree with your contention that the author is wrong. Nothing you've said supports that idea. You have, however, contributed a 4th good reason to get rid of aircraft carriers: >If Russia or China decides to target our carriers, the response will have nuclear components. .. that their early and costly destruction in a conflict may well be the tinder for nuclear escalation. Well, lets get rid of them.

bayesian_horse 10y ago

It's increasingly likely that Russia or China may fight a war with the US outside their traditional borders. For example in the South China Sea. It would be conceivable that a conflict there would stay "sub-nuclear", as neither nation's home territory is threatened.

akshatpradhan 10y ago
Or research money will be poured into an Iron Dome[1] for Carriers. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_Dome https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_Dome
- bitL 10y ago
  Supercavitating torpedos won't be affected.
- ckozlowski 10y ago
  In this case, it's the BMD component of the Aegis system. SM-6 is specifically designed for this mission.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]

nxzero 10y ago

Classical war is dead. All conflicts long-term going forward will be won with economic resilience; meaning even if attacked, invaded, controlled, etc. - long-term the attacking force's culture will succumb to economic attrition. Future of war is economic.

dragonwriter 10y ago
Economics and logistics (the latter being the ability to project the former where and when you need it) have always been dominant factors in war.
lmkg 10y ago
War has always been economic. The ability to win wars is not the ability to inflict losses, but the ability to sustain losses--both economically, and politically. You might make an argument that for a brief period around modern times, wars were lethal enough that this was not the case. But even during this time period, the ability to inflict damage was largely an economic factor.
sitkack 10y ago
We made Vietnam pay back all the bombs we dropped on it.

mcv 10y ago

> Sure, $6 billion looks like a lot of money. But it's a drop in the bucket compared to the rest of the Carrier Battle Group. You need a lot of ships to properly protect a carrier That doesn't make the carrier less expensive, it makes it more expensive. > If Russia or China decides to target our carriers, the response will have nuclear components. Are you suggesting that the US will initiate nuclear war?

rihegher 10y ago
>Are you suggesting that the US will initiate nuclear war? Well, the US is the only nation that has initiated the use of nuclear weapons for warfare so far.
- njknsdf 10y ago
  Against a defenseless country looking to surrender that couldn't retaliate. Will be a bit different if it initiates nuclear war against Russia or China.
scott_s 10y ago
Regarding your first point, that exact sentiment was addressed in the article under the heading "The future is drones and submarines" (whose thesis is obvious). Selected quoting from there: The supercarrier requires an exponential and compounding set of very expensive investments. The total acquisition cost of a carrier strike group exceeds $25 billion, an air wing another $10 billion and the annual operating costs of perhaps $1 billion. ... "Yet, a cruise missile fired from a wide range of lower signature ships costs less than a third of each bomb delivered by a fighter from the deck of a carrier. Nor do these platforms require a carrier’s defensive shield — and they can launch from beyond the range of carrier-based aircraft. ... A similar shift is occurring now and will displace the modern equivalent of the dashing cavalry officer — the fighter pilot. The knight class never passes willingly — as they take justifiable pride in their acumen and truly believe in their mission. However, the carrier and its air wing cannot be allowed to drive strategy or procurement. As an outsider, it's hard for me to fully assess these arguments (including from the paragraphs I elided). But they sound rather convincing.

bjourne 10y ago

> Guerrilla warfare lasts as long as the people involved want it to last, conventional wars are decided in time periods measured in hours. How do you know that? The only conventional war I know of that was decided in hours was the Six-day war and that was because Israel inflicted a surprise attack on Egypt. Not saying you are wrong, just curious why you think so since the US hasn't been facing an equal adversary in war since WWII.

vinceguidry 10y ago
The difference between conventional war and unconventional war is the overall objective. Conventional war is the destruction of another state's ability to wage war. Once that has been accomplished, if war continues, it's unconventional, because it has to be waged by non-state actors. States hold war materiel and personnel on military bases, these weapons have long supply chains and generally cannot be hidden. Once you've blown these things up, then the state cannot make war any longer. With aircraft, missiles, satellites, AWACS, advanced intelligence capabilities, the expected speed of conflicts has gone from days to hours in the last few decades. The US enjoys complete dominance over the rest of the world's militaries. There is no state, no imaginable alliance of states that could withstand a full-scale US military attack. We'd destroy their air forces, naval forces, and any ground forces they could muster within hours. So long as we refuse to fight an unconventional war, then our troops could just go home. It's because our leaders get cocky and idealistic that we get dragged into ongoing guerrilla conflicts.

rdiddly 10y ago

> If Russia or China decides to target our carriers, the response will have nuclear components. So if a nuclear superpower effortlessly takes out a US carrier using a few Kalibr missiles, we will nuke them and be utterly destroyed, thereby proving the carrier was not vulnerable? By that definition ("I'll nuke you if you touch it") a block of cheddar cheese is invulnerable.

michaelcampbell 10y ago
Not around me it isn't.

coldtea 10y ago

>Sure, $6 billion looks like a lot of money. But it's a drop in the bucket compared to the rest of the Carrier Battle Group. You need a lot of ships to properly protect a carrier. How is that an argument in favor of a carrier not being expensive? If anything, it implies the actual total cost of a carrier is even more than its own cost.

dragontamer 10y ago
Except Carriers have been used in the Afghanistan and Iraq. While also being used in China to hamper Chinese aggression. It seems like the ships are getting good use in the current climate. Carriers are the best choice of weapon in an asymmetrical war against terrorists. Terrorists can't target a Carrier Group, but Carrier Groups can bomb them all day, every day nearly perpetually.
- coldtea 10y ago
  >While also being used in China to hamper Chinese aggression. Where Chinese aggression = China trying to police its own area? Maybe some Chinese carriers should have helped tamper US aggression all those years in Banana Republics, Mexico, Panama, South America, etc...
  - dragontamer 10y ago
    Chinese aggression like stationing their ships in the Philippines and Japan. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scarborough_Shoal#Claims_by_China_and_Taiwan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scarborough_Shoal#Claims_by_Ch... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_China_Sea_EEZ_disputes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_China_Sea_EEZ_disputes
    - coldtea 10y ago
      >Chinese aggression like stationing their ships in the Philippines and Japan The same Philipines the US occupied and used as a colony (and neo-colony) and the same Japan where the US nuked civilians and had the country under supervision (it's army) etc. post-war? Not to mention this is not actually "stationing their ships in the Philippines and Japan" (which the US does all the time, literally, in their harbors), but having disputes over some sea territory.

at-fates-hands 10y ago

>Sure, $6 billion looks like a lot of money. But it's a drop in the bucket compared to the rest of the Carrier Battle Group. You need a lot of ships to properly protect a carrier. You also need a lot of ships to protect all the countries that cry about their neighbors invading them, human rights atrocities and other "emergencies" that take our military all over the world to protect other countries that are fully capable of doing it themselves, but prefer to put our military in harm's way instead.

ryan_j_naughton 10y ago

If ASBMs become available to smaller countries, as they inevitably are, then they will use them against the US to defend themselves. They US won't be able to respond with nuclear weapons in that case as that would be an insane escalation, and thus their ASBMs would be an effective deterrent against our carriers getting close enough for the fighters to be useful.

vinceguidry 10y ago
No, it would just push the battle groups further out to sea, naval ships aren't sitting ducks against ASBMs, they do have defenses such as CIWS. If they keep far enough away then they won't be terribly vulnerable. Also, the US doesn't just have nuclear weapons to retaliate with. We're perfectly capable of devastating these smaller countries without them.

varunom 10y ago

>> Also, nobody is predicting another war with a major international power. I think [0] would show some other reality. 0: http://johnpilger.com/articles/a-world-war-has-begun-break-the-silence- http://johnpilger.com/articles/a-world-war-has-begun-break-t...

Tloewald 10y ago

Pointing out that the actual cost of a carrier is far higher than $6B (true) is not a point in your favor. The opportunity cost needs to be considered — what could you do with your, um, entire naval budget if you weren't obsessed with building carrier battle groups? 48h hasn't proven to be a long time in any modern war. In fact the evidence is that modern wars are more protracted than 19th and mid-20th century because, owing to the realities of the modern military (it tends to be heavy on capital equipment and low on manpower) you can't really win a war any more, instead you just blow up expensive stuff and then snipe at each other. Sure, the Taliban refuses to surrender but China, Russia, or North Korea would be easier, right? Any plausible war will probably involve a period of escalation and a long aftermath. Which 48h do you get? A confrontation off Taiwan or the Spratleys could easily ignite with a US carrier blowing up after being hit by a torpedo or swarm of inexpensive cruise missiles. The way US politics works we'd have lost before the war even started. And finally, what do our carrier planes blow up while the carrier remains afloat? No-one except us has much that's worthy of their attention.

dragontamer 10y ago
On the contrary. The USA only has ten carriers deployed right now. The "Carrier Strike Group" is simply all of the other ships (destroyers, cruisers, etc. etc.) that follow the carrier around. The Strike Groups will remain without a Carrier. They basically are the US Navy, aside from the subs we have hidden around the world. Furthermore, all of the other ships are completely useless in Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan. You can't hit ISIS with a Destroyer. You hit them with Airplanes, carried over by Carriers. The firepower of a single US Carrier is bigger than the vast majority of land-bases in the world. A US Carrier can also move however. Its probably one of the most potent weapons of the US. Basically, we have ten moving naval bases, that can be stationed anywhere in the ocean. Each one can go toe-to-toe with the vast, vast majority of land-bases in a particular region and win. Or we can build another few $500 Million to $5 Billion bases in Afghanistan that we later abandon when we change administrations (Bush had different plans than Obama). The Carriers are a far better use of money than building actual bases. Despite their high costs.
- dragonwriter 10y ago

fit2rule 10y ago

Sorry, but I don't agree with your contention that the author is wrong. Nothing you've said supports that idea. You have, however, contributed a 4th good reason to get rid of aircraft carriers: >If Russia or China decides to target our carriers, the response will have nuclear components. .. that their early and costly destruction in a conflict may well be the tinder for nuclear escalation. Well, lets get rid of them.