4 ms·

Speed is counterbalanced by size. Going at 35mph is very slow when you're 300m long. You need to survive with an aircraft once to get a picture of the carrier.

Speed is counterbalanced by size. Going at 35mph is very slow when you're 300m long. You need to survive with an aircraft once to get a picture of the carrier. Then the carrier sinks. Air superiority is a numbers game. There is precisely 0% chance that you will catch it every time. With your strategy you have to win every time. The missile only has to hit once for the entire CSG to sink. You don't have to survive long enough to do anything except find the position of the carrier and send it. Once that's done, it's game over. Done. Finished.

dragontamer 5y ago
> You don't have to survive long enough to do anything except find the position of the carrier and send it. Once that's done, it's game over. Done. Finished. In 10 minutes, a carrier moving at 35 mph will have moved around 6 miles. That's a 100+ sq. mile radius. How will your missile in fact, lock onto the carrier on the approach? How does the missile know where to go? If your missile is traveling at Mach 5, what communication system are you using to track and talk with that missile? Is something in that communication chain still alive to constantly tell the missile where in fact, the carrier is? Or does the missile have such an advanced radar system that it can too, magically pick out a carrier in a 100-sq. mile radius?
- sudosysgen 5y ago
  As I said, a carrier is big. When you're making a guidance system, wether EO or Radar, you're trading off accuracy, senstivity, and range. In the case of a carrier, you need very low accuracy - in the 10 meter range instead of the centimeter range - very low sensitivity, because the target is positively huge and sticks out like a sore thumb from its surroundings, so you can get range. Besides, I think you really underestimate modern sensors. A fighter jet can detect a 1m^2 from 100km away almost omnidirectionally. That's around 10 000 sqkm, and that radar is built for very fast targets and requires very high accuracy. As for communication, you can communicate from a ground station. You don't need to tell the missile where the carrier is constantly. As we've seen before, carriers are big and sensors are advanced. Carriers also can't change course very rapidly. You just need the missile to get a 50km radius of where the carrier will be when it hits it. These missiles are very fast. From the order to launch until impact you have 12 minutes.
  - dragontamer 5y ago
    > Carriers also can't change course very rapidly. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtkpDV6Gq0c https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtkpDV6Gq0c Ummmm... yeah they can. If we're talking about 10-minutes for a hypersonic missile to arrive, that thing's bearings / velocity can be completely different by the time the missile arrives on the horizon. ------- I'm still not really convinced that you'd detect a carrier first in most open seas. Carriers would have airplanes of their own, scanning for enemies, and a number of anti-air destroyers ready to shoot down any spy plane. You call it a numbers game, but IMO, its a sensor game. Any airplane who approaches the carrier has to themselves, survive the Carrier's defense systems (including the defensive spyplanes keeping watch over the carrier group) ------- > In the case of a carrier, you need very low accuracy - in the 10 meter range instead of the centimeter range - very low sensitivity, because the target is positively huge and sticks out like a sore thumb from its surroundings, so you can get range. I'm not sure if the carrier sticks out that much in its CSG. No carrier works alone: there are a lot of other ships floating around it providing support.
    - sudosysgen 5y ago
      >Ummmm... yeah they can. If we're talking about 10-minutes for a hypersonic missile to arrive, that thing's bearings / velocity can be completely different by the time the missile arrives on the horizon. Sure, at the expense of distance travelled from last detection. > I'm still not really convinced that you'd detect a carrier first in most open seas. Carriers would have airplanes of their own, scanning for enemies, and a number of anti-air destroyers ready to shoot down any spy plane. You call it a numbers game, but IMO, its a sensor game. > Any airplane who approaches the carrier has to themselves, survive the Carrier's defense systems (including the defensive spyplanes keeping watch over the carrier group) Look at exemples of modern warfare. Air defences are made to whittle down and slow down repeated strikes by your oponents. No one has ever managed to completely prevent any intrusion at all, much less from a single carrier's airwing. >I'm not sure if the carrier sticks out that much in its CSG. No carrier works alone: there are a lot of other ships floating around it providing support. The surroundings in the context of that comment are the open ocean. Unless you mean that the sensors aren't going to be able to distinguish the carrier from other ships in the CSG.

dragontamer 5y ago

> You don't have to survive long enough to do anything except find the position of the carrier and send it. Once that's done, it's game over. Done. Finished. In 10 minutes, a carrier moving at 35 mph will have moved around 6 miles. That's a 100+ sq. mile radius. How will your missile in fact, lock onto the carrier on the approach? How does the missile know where to go? If your missile is traveling at Mach 5, what communication system are you using to track and talk with that missile? Is something in that communication chain still alive to constantly tell the missile where in fact, the carrier is? Or does the missile have such an advanced radar system that it can too, magically pick out a carrier in a 100-sq. mile radius?

sudosysgen 5y ago
As I said, a carrier is big. When you're making a guidance system, wether EO or Radar, you're trading off accuracy, senstivity, and range. In the case of a carrier, you need very low accuracy - in the 10 meter range instead of the centimeter range - very low sensitivity, because the target is positively huge and sticks out like a sore thumb from its surroundings, so you can get range. Besides, I think you really underestimate modern sensors. A fighter jet can detect a 1m^2 from 100km away almost omnidirectionally. That's around 10 000 sqkm, and that radar is built for very fast targets and requires very high accuracy. As for communication, you can communicate from a ground station. You don't need to tell the missile where the carrier is constantly. As we've seen before, carriers are big and sensors are advanced. Carriers also can't change course very rapidly. You just need the missile to get a 50km radius of where the carrier will be when it hits it. These missiles are very fast. From the order to launch until impact you have 12 minutes.
- dragontamer 5y ago
  > Carriers also can't change course very rapidly. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtkpDV6Gq0c https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtkpDV6Gq0c Ummmm... yeah they can. If we're talking about 10-minutes for a hypersonic missile to arrive, that thing's bearings / velocity can be completely different by the time the missile arrives on the horizon. ------- I'm still not really convinced that you'd detect a carrier first in most open seas. Carriers would have airplanes of their own, scanning for enemies, and a number of anti-air destroyers ready to shoot down any spy plane. You call it a numbers game, but IMO, its a sensor game. Any airplane who approaches the carrier has to themselves, survive the Carrier's defense systems (including the defensive spyplanes keeping watch over the carrier group) ------- > In the case of a carrier, you need very low accuracy - in the 10 meter range instead of the centimeter range - very low sensitivity, because the target is positively huge and sticks out like a sore thumb from its surroundings, so you can get range. I'm not sure if the carrier sticks out that much in its CSG. No carrier works alone: there are a lot of other ships floating around it providing support.
  - sudosysgen 5y ago
    >Ummmm... yeah they can. If we're talking about 10-minutes for a hypersonic missile to arrive, that thing's bearings / velocity can be completely different by the time the missile arrives on the horizon. Sure, at the expense of distance travelled from last detection. > I'm still not really convinced that you'd detect a carrier first in most open seas. Carriers would have airplanes of their own, scanning for enemies, and a number of anti-air destroyers ready to shoot down any spy plane. You call it a numbers game, but IMO, its a sensor game. > Any airplane who approaches the carrier has to themselves, survive the Carrier's defense systems (including the defensive spyplanes keeping watch over the carrier group) Look at exemples of modern warfare. Air defences are made to whittle down and slow down repeated strikes by your oponents. No one has ever managed to completely prevent any intrusion at all, much less from a single carrier's airwing. >I'm not sure if the carrier sticks out that much in its CSG. No carrier works alone: there are a lot of other ships floating around it providing support. The surroundings in the context of that comment are the open ocean. Unless you mean that the sensors aren't going to be able to distinguish the carrier from other ships in the CSG.