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> Not sure where you got that idea. Like battleships, they are a big dumb target. The same way carriers and their aircraft made battleships obsolete modern ant

> Not sure where you got that idea. Like battleships, they are a big dumb target. The same way carriers and their aircraft made battleships obsolete modern anti-ship missiles have made carriers obsolete in a theoretical war between superpowers. Countries still covet them as a status symbol (or a way to spend taxpayer money), but I think that is about it. > And it would take more than one hit to sink a carrier. These are 100k+ ton ships, and the important bits are armored. That's why the Russian idea is to just bombard them with missiles until enough they poke enough holes in them to sink or disable them. It seems like a reasonable strategy to me.

gozur88 10y ago
>Like battleships, they are a big dumb target. The same way carriers and their aircraft made battleships obsolete modern anti-ship missiles have made carriers obsolete in a theoretical war between superpowers. Yeah, except that's not actually true unless the war goes nuclear. Carriers are very well defended from air attack. The entire battle group is there to defend the carrier, which means aircraft-launched AA missiles, hundreds of SM-2s, plus point defense. Plus ECM and EM-type weapons. And that's assuming US forces aren't able to destroy any launch platforms, which is probably not a good assumption at this point. It's much harder to pull of a surprise attack than it used to be. >That's why the Russian idea is to just bombard them with missiles until enough they poke enough holes in them to sink or disable them. It seems like a reasonable strategy to me. Yeah, that's pretty much the strategy everyone's been using since they switched from boarding actions to guns in the 1500s. The Russians can't actually mount that kind of attack any more without telegraphing it in a big way, since it would take nearly every remaining conventional bomber and naval asset in the Russian military to ensure success. Nobody else is capable at all unless the scenario posits a US carrier in shallow water off the coast of Shanghai. I'm not saying carriers are invulnerable. They're not. People make mistakes, and sometimes they're fatal. There are always variables that are impossible to evaluate without knowing the absolute latest top secret stuff. But a carrier group in the open ocean is a tough nut to crack, especially from the air, and attackers make mistakes too. It's far from obsolete.
- jabl 10y ago
  > But a carrier group in the open ocean is a tough nut to crack Well, that hints at the point, doesn't it? No, Russia or China, or whoever the US Navy Brass dreams about re-fighting the battle of Leyte gulf with again, isn't going to try to hit a US carrier group in the middle of the South Pacific. They are probably perfectly happy with preventing said carrier group from parking outside Archangelsk, the Baltic Sea, the South China sea or wherever it is that they want to flex their military muscle..
  - gozur88 10y ago
    Well, here's the thing. A carrier group can attack from blue water. You can play around with scenarios, but the US navy is not going to give adversaries an easy victory by coming too close to land.
    - jabl 10y ago
      Sure. But if the carrier group is "projecting power" in the middle of the ocean, who cares? Get close enough to shore so it can project its power over some militarily interesting area, and it starts to get in range of all kinds of scary weaponry. Assuming a technologically advanced adversary, and not a bunch of goons with Ak-47's and RPG's, of course. So in the end I guess the question is whether a carrier group is a cost-effective power projection tool in the age of supersonic (or even ballistic, if we choose to believe those Chinese things are real) anti-ship missiles, submarines and whatnot. Or are they just like battleships in WWII?
      - gozur88 10y ago
        >Sure. But if the carrier group is "projecting power" in the middle of the ocean, who cares? A CBG can hit hardened targets from a thousand miles away.

gozur88 10y ago

>Like battleships, they are a big dumb target. The same way carriers and their aircraft made battleships obsolete modern anti-ship missiles have made carriers obsolete in a theoretical war between superpowers. Yeah, except that's not actually true unless the war goes nuclear. Carriers are very well defended from air attack. The entire battle group is there to defend the carrier, which means aircraft-launched AA missiles, hundreds of SM-2s, plus point defense. Plus ECM and EM-type weapons. And that's assuming US forces aren't able to destroy any launch platforms, which is probably not a good assumption at this point. It's much harder to pull of a surprise attack than it used to be. >That's why the Russian idea is to just bombard them with missiles until enough they poke enough holes in them to sink or disable them. It seems like a reasonable strategy to me. Yeah, that's pretty much the strategy everyone's been using since they switched from boarding actions to guns in the 1500s. The Russians can't actually mount that kind of attack any more without telegraphing it in a big way, since it would take nearly every remaining conventional bomber and naval asset in the Russian military to ensure success. Nobody else is capable at all unless the scenario posits a US carrier in shallow water off the coast of Shanghai. I'm not saying carriers are invulnerable. They're not. People make mistakes, and sometimes they're fatal. There are always variables that are impossible to evaluate without knowing the absolute latest top secret stuff. But a carrier group in the open ocean is a tough nut to crack, especially from the air, and attackers make mistakes too. It's far from obsolete.

jabl 10y ago
> But a carrier group in the open ocean is a tough nut to crack Well, that hints at the point, doesn't it? No, Russia or China, or whoever the US Navy Brass dreams about re-fighting the battle of Leyte gulf with again, isn't going to try to hit a US carrier group in the middle of the South Pacific. They are probably perfectly happy with preventing said carrier group from parking outside Archangelsk, the Baltic Sea, the South China sea or wherever it is that they want to flex their military muscle..
- gozur88 10y ago
  Well, here's the thing. A carrier group can attack from blue water. You can play around with scenarios, but the US navy is not going to give adversaries an easy victory by coming too close to land.
  - jabl 10y ago
    Sure. But if the carrier group is "projecting power" in the middle of the ocean, who cares? Get close enough to shore so it can project its power over some militarily interesting area, and it starts to get in range of all kinds of scary weaponry. Assuming a technologically advanced adversary, and not a bunch of goons with Ak-47's and RPG's, of course. So in the end I guess the question is whether a carrier group is a cost-effective power projection tool in the age of supersonic (or even ballistic, if we choose to believe those Chinese things are real) anti-ship missiles, submarines and whatnot. Or are they just like battleships in WWII?
    - gozur88 10y ago
      >Sure. But if the carrier group is "projecting power" in the middle of the ocean, who cares? A CBG can hit hardened targets from a thousand miles away.