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Would you be able to share some light on what a cruiser is (that's how this ship is classified on wikipedia) vs another kind of ship. I am comparing to the brit

by cm2187 5y ago

Would you be able to share some light on what a cruiser is (that's how this ship is classified on wikipedia) vs another kind of ship. I am comparing to the british navy which doesn't seem to have anything above destroyer (outside of aircraft carriers). In these days and age where all war ships seem to be essentially floating missile launch platforms, what is the difference?

AnimalMuppet 5y ago
Some are bigger than others, which means that they can launch more missiles (and maybe also longer range missiles). They may also have more powerful radars, and have a more central role in coordinating the fleet as a whole. Also, they have more people, so it's a bigger deal if they get sunk.
brimble 5y ago
Ship class designations are weird. Russia keeps a ship or two designated as "battlecruisers" (in the WWII era, that would have meant a lightly-armored, probably fast, very large ship with battleship-class guns) that would just be called cruisers in most other navies, now. I've seen British ships with tonnage that would put them nearly up to a WWII-era heavy cruiser (step under a battlecruiser, the smallest thing generally regarded as a "capital ship" in that era) called a destroyer (formerly that would have been a much smaller size of ship), these days. From their design, the ship class in question seem to be some kind of largish general-purpose missile cruisers with substantial armament and decent anti-air/anti-missile defenses, but not intended to survive sustained fighting (their weapon placement suggests that—all those missile tubes on the deck can't possibly be safe, but it might let them cram more weapons on there cheaply) [VERY LATE EDIT] The TL;DR here is that "cruiser" and "destroyer" and all that are nearly meaningless without context of who's doing the labeling, and when. [ANOTHER LATE EDIT] I overstated the degree to which the Kirov class' designation is misleading: its displacement is roughly in the range of WWII-era battlecruisers (~1/2 the displacement of an Iowa class battleship—armor is really, really heavy). It lacks battleship-class guns, but so does everything else these days and it'd be kinda silly if it had them.
- NikolaNovak 5y ago
  >>I overstated the degree to which the Kirov class' designation is misleading I could not figure it out easily - looks like Moskva was NOT a Kirov class, but a class down?
  - brimble 5y ago
    Correct. Toward the end of the age of big ship's guns it'd have been designated a heavy cruiser, probably. But, other countries operate ships they designate destroyers at roughly the same displacement, these days. Role of the ship, and just preference of the country deciding what they'll call them, is a bigger factor than size.
- speeder 5y ago
  The battlecruisers are actual battlecruisers including having a lot of deck guns. They are nowhere near Ukraine though. Seemly their job is patrol seas where US warships might attack Russia. Also I`ve read the reason Iowa Battleship in USA is not fully decomissined is just in case they need it to take out the two Russian battlecruisers... not likely to be nededed but "just in case"
  - ceejayoz 5y ago
    No, the Kirovs don't have much in the way of guns. The main armament is 20 P-700 missiles. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirov-class_battlecruiser https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirov-class_battlecruiser Lots of big missiles; the only real naval gun is a twin 130mm. (That's about the size of an Arleigh Burke destroyer's gun. The Iowa's 15" guns are 406mm.) If you're in gun range of a Kirov, something has gone badly wrong for the Kirov.
  - nradov 5y ago
    All US Navy battleships were completely decommissioned years ago. There is no possible way to reactivate any of them.
    - irrational 5y ago
ajross 5y ago
In modern usage it's mostly just about size. Naval non-carrier surface combat vessels have a bunch of roles and weapon systems, but tend to be generalists and not specialists. So everything has cruise missiles and SAMs and radars and antisubmarine helicopters, etc... If it's big it's a "cruiser" and if it's small it's a "frigate" and everything else is a "destroyer". And there's a bunch of overlap and ambiguity. These ships are big-ish soviet-era vessels designed primarily (as I understand it) for anti-ship cruise missile focus, but they fill all roles.
simonh 5y ago
Originally cruisers were pretty much the largest ships in a fleet, capable of independent long range cruising missions. Battleship was a broader term. The development of HMS Dreadnought heralded a revolution in big gun capital ship design and modern battleships were sometimes referred to as Dreadnought class battleships, though for a long time that’s been the only kind. Particularly large or capable cruisers are sometimes called battle cruisers. This ship doesn’t have big guns because it’s a missile ship so it can’t be a battleship, but it is a capital ship, which makes it a cruiser. As all programmers know, naming things is hard.
- jltsiren 5y ago
  "Cruiser" is an old term, and it originally referred to the mission rather than to the ship. Cruisers were usually smaller ships such as frigates or sloops, because bigger ships were too expensive to use in that role. Battleships were the last descendants of the ship of line, which basically meant a ship big enough and heavily armed enough to not be a weak link in the line of battle.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - simonh 5y ago
    > it originally referred to the mission rather than to the ship That’s basically what I said.
dragontamer 5y ago
I'm no Navy expert. But, here's my understanding of today's Navies. * Corvette/Frigates -- Smaller ships with smaller munitions. They're just missile platforms. Anything smaller than a Corvette basically is ignored for most discussions. Frigates are slightly larger than Corvette. * Destroyers -- Bigger than Frigates. Not only do Destroyers have significant missile capacities (like Corvette / Frigates), Destroyers are big enough for major sensor suites. SONAR, RADAR, etc. etc. Maybe enough for a CWIS (aim-bot with a gatling gun, designed to automatically shoot down enemy missiles as they approach). * Cruisers -- Bigger than Destroyers. More missiles, more sensors. While a Destroyer might have 1x CWIS and 1x RADAR, you might be seeing 2x or 3x CWIS or RADARS on the larger Cruiser class. > In these days and age where all war ships seem to be essentially floating missile launch platforms, what is the difference? Defense. You need a lot of power to run those RADAR systems, which are constantly scanning the skies for enemy missiles. Corvette/Frigates are too small to have a CWIS / anti-missile defense system, so they need to hang around larger ships (like Destroyers or Cruisers) for defense. Multiple Destroyers could be stationed next to each other to increase their defenses. But if two Destroyers were just going to sail together (for better RADAR coverage and/or defenses), its a better idea to just make a slightly bigger ship, but with twice the RADAR / twice the defense of a singular Destroyer.
- KptMarchewa 5y ago
  >Corsair Corvette.
  - dragontamer 5y ago
    Woops, there goes my Starcraft part of my brain corrupting my military part of my brain. Thanks for the correction, I just edited it in.
    - KptMarchewa 5y ago
      At least carriers are obvious :)
- andbberger 5y ago
greenyoda 5y ago
According to Wikipedia: "Modern cruisers are generally the largest ships in a fleet after aircraft carriers and amphibious assault ships."[1] So it looks like they're larger than destroyers but have a similar function. A discussion of current U.S. and Russian cruiser capabilities can be found here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cruiser#Current_cruisers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cruiser#Current_cruisers Moskva is a Slava-class cruiser: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slava-class_cruiser https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slava-class_cruiser [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cruiser https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cruiser
- dragonwriter 5y ago
  > So it looks like they're larger than destroyers but have a similar function. The Ticonderoga class cruisers are basically the same size as the Arleigh Burke destroyers (smaller than the Flight III, larger than earlier ones) and much smaller than the Zumwalt-class destroyers. There's a degree of what amounts to fashion in the naming, and “cruiser“ is out of fashion for newer ships.
nradov 5y ago
The distinctions between surface warship classes are somewhat arbitrary. Some modern frigates and destroyers are larger than WW2 cruisers. Originally cruisers were lightly armored vessels intended for long range, high speed commerce raiding to disrupt enemy logistics. They weren't intended to stand in the line of battle and slug it out with heavily armored battleships. But now modern cruisers carry large numbers of missiles for attacking other ships, or striking surface targets, or defending an aircraft carrier from air and missile attacks. So the key distinction that characterizes a cruiser is basically just "more missiles". The US Navy is gradually decommissioning their cruisers and can't afford to build new ones.
- sgt101 5y ago
  Well, can't afford while keeping 9 super carriers and 30 odd virginia class. It should be noted that the current generation of super subs can fire cruise missiles at shore targets as well as old cruisers could. Add in the shift in drone technology and the argument for big, non carrier surface combatants looks poor.
  - dragonwriter 5y ago
    > Add in the shift in drone technology and the argument for big, non carrier surface combatants looks poor. The newer American destroyers are bigger than the last cruisers we built, so phasing out of cruisers isn't about not having big, non-carrier surface combatants.
    - sgt101 5y ago
      The Zumwalts are cancelled now. The calculus seems to be that if you are building a modern capital ship then it's either an aircraft platform, an assault ship or it needs to be able to go underwater - because it will cost just as much. There is a sharp division between naval assets to be used in war, and everything else.
      - dragonwriter 5y ago
nickff 5y ago
Most of the other replies here say it’s all about size, and size does matter, but it’s not the whole story. Generally, cruisers are designed with capabilities that allow them to operate anywhere on the ocean on their own, or as the lead vessels in small groups of ships (along with frigates and destroyers). Destroyers are usually smaller and have a more limited set of capabilities, and are intended to operate as ocean-going support ships in a combat group. Frigates are usually even smaller, with similar set of capabilities to a destroyer, but more limited equipment and intended to operate relatively close to their home ports. Every navy has different sizes for each, with the USA having some of the largest ships of each designation. You should also keep in mind that each type of ship has gotten progressively larger over time; as of WWII, destroyers were roughly 2000 tons, and cruisers were about 8000 tons.
- dragonwriter 5y ago
  > Most of the other replies here say it’s all about size, and size does matter, but it’s not the whole story. Originally the distinctions were (mostly) of purpose, but after WWI a series of treaties (mostly the Washington Naval Treaty and the First and Second London Naval Treaties) set out size, equipment, and numerical limits for various categories, so a whole lot of the interwar design and classification was based on gaming treaty limits, and the resulting naming patterns had a lasting influence that gradually faded.
sgt101 5y ago
Ha, no one is right. The key distinction is what name when applied to the hoped for platform will win funding from the national tax authority - what ever that is. In the UK talk of cruisers is a no-no, the last "through deck cruisers" were actually aircraft carriers, and no one is falling for that again. Thus the Type 45's are definitely destroyers despite displacing 9400 tonnes. In other lands the Ticonderoga's are cruisers, even though they displace 9600 tonnes, the Arleigh Burke are destroyers at 9300 tonnes, but the Zumwalt's come in at 14000 tonnes as destroyers as well! Note, there will only ever be three Zumwalt's.

by cm2187 5y ago

AnimalMuppet 5y ago

Some are bigger than others, which means that they can launch more missiles (and maybe also longer range missiles). They may also have more powerful radars, and have a more central role in coordinating the fleet as a whole. Also, they have more people, so it's a bigger deal if they get sunk.

brimble 5y ago

Ship class designations are weird. Russia keeps a ship or two designated as "battlecruisers" (in the WWII era, that would have meant a lightly-armored, probably fast, very large ship with battleship-class guns) that would just be called cruisers in most other navies, now. I've seen British ships with tonnage that would put them nearly up to a WWII-era heavy cruiser (step under a battlecruiser, the smallest thing generally regarded as a "capital ship" in that era) called a destroyer (formerly that would have been a much smaller size of ship), these days. From their design, the ship class in question seem to be some kind of largish general-purpose missile cruisers with substantial armament and decent anti-air/anti-missile defenses, but not intended to survive sustained fighting (their weapon placement suggests that—all those missile tubes on the deck can't possibly be safe, but it might let them cram more weapons on there cheaply) [VERY LATE EDIT] The TL;DR here is that "cruiser" and "destroyer" and all that are nearly meaningless without context of who's doing the labeling, and when. [ANOTHER LATE EDIT] I overstated the degree to which the Kirov class' designation is misleading: its displacement is roughly in the range of WWII-era battlecruisers (~1/2 the displacement of an Iowa class battleship—armor is really, really heavy). It lacks battleship-class guns, but so does everything else these days and it'd be kinda silly if it had them.

NikolaNovak 5y ago
>>I overstated the degree to which the Kirov class' designation is misleading I could not figure it out easily - looks like Moskva was NOT a Kirov class, but a class down?
- brimble 5y ago
  Correct. Toward the end of the age of big ship's guns it'd have been designated a heavy cruiser, probably. But, other countries operate ships they designate destroyers at roughly the same displacement, these days. Role of the ship, and just preference of the country deciding what they'll call them, is a bigger factor than size.
speeder 5y ago
The battlecruisers are actual battlecruisers including having a lot of deck guns. They are nowhere near Ukraine though. Seemly their job is patrol seas where US warships might attack Russia. Also I`ve read the reason Iowa Battleship in USA is not fully decomissined is just in case they need it to take out the two Russian battlecruisers... not likely to be nededed but "just in case"
- ceejayoz 5y ago
  No, the Kirovs don't have much in the way of guns. The main armament is 20 P-700 missiles. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirov-class_battlecruiser https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirov-class_battlecruiser Lots of big missiles; the only real naval gun is a twin 130mm. (That's about the size of an Arleigh Burke destroyer's gun. The Iowa's 15" guns are 406mm.) If you're in gun range of a Kirov, something has gone badly wrong for the Kirov.
- nradov 5y ago
  All US Navy battleships were completely decommissioned years ago. There is no possible way to reactivate any of them.
  - irrational 5y ago

ajross 5y ago

In modern usage it's mostly just about size. Naval non-carrier surface combat vessels have a bunch of roles and weapon systems, but tend to be generalists and not specialists. So everything has cruise missiles and SAMs and radars and antisubmarine helicopters, etc... If it's big it's a "cruiser" and if it's small it's a "frigate" and everything else is a "destroyer". And there's a bunch of overlap and ambiguity. These ships are big-ish soviet-era vessels designed primarily (as I understand it) for anti-ship cruise missile focus, but they fill all roles.

simonh 5y ago

Originally cruisers were pretty much the largest ships in a fleet, capable of independent long range cruising missions. Battleship was a broader term. The development of HMS Dreadnought heralded a revolution in big gun capital ship design and modern battleships were sometimes referred to as Dreadnought class battleships, though for a long time that’s been the only kind. Particularly large or capable cruisers are sometimes called battle cruisers. This ship doesn’t have big guns because it’s a missile ship so it can’t be a battleship, but it is a capital ship, which makes it a cruiser. As all programmers know, naming things is hard.

jltsiren 5y ago
"Cruiser" is an old term, and it originally referred to the mission rather than to the ship. Cruisers were usually smaller ships such as frigates or sloops, because bigger ships were too expensive to use in that role. Battleships were the last descendants of the ship of line, which basically meant a ship big enough and heavily armed enough to not be a weak link in the line of battle.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- simonh 5y ago
  > it originally referred to the mission rather than to the ship That’s basically what I said.

dragontamer 5y ago

I'm no Navy expert. But, here's my understanding of today's Navies. * Corvette/Frigates -- Smaller ships with smaller munitions. They're just missile platforms. Anything smaller than a Corvette basically is ignored for most discussions. Frigates are slightly larger than Corvette. * Destroyers -- Bigger than Frigates. Not only do Destroyers have significant missile capacities (like Corvette / Frigates), Destroyers are big enough for major sensor suites. SONAR, RADAR, etc. etc. Maybe enough for a CWIS (aim-bot with a gatling gun, designed to automatically shoot down enemy missiles as they approach). * Cruisers -- Bigger than Destroyers. More missiles, more sensors. While a Destroyer might have 1x CWIS and 1x RADAR, you might be seeing 2x or 3x CWIS or RADARS on the larger Cruiser class. > In these days and age where all war ships seem to be essentially floating missile launch platforms, what is the difference? Defense. You need a lot of power to run those RADAR systems, which are constantly scanning the skies for enemy missiles. Corvette/Frigates are too small to have a CWIS / anti-missile defense system, so they need to hang around larger ships (like Destroyers or Cruisers) for defense. Multiple Destroyers could be stationed next to each other to increase their defenses. But if two Destroyers were just going to sail together (for better RADAR coverage and/or defenses), its a better idea to just make a slightly bigger ship, but with twice the RADAR / twice the defense of a singular Destroyer.

KptMarchewa 5y ago
>Corsair Corvette.
- dragontamer 5y ago
  Woops, there goes my Starcraft part of my brain corrupting my military part of my brain. Thanks for the correction, I just edited it in.
  - KptMarchewa 5y ago
    At least carriers are obvious :)
andbberger 5y ago

greenyoda 5y ago

According to Wikipedia: "Modern cruisers are generally the largest ships in a fleet after aircraft carriers and amphibious assault ships."[1] So it looks like they're larger than destroyers but have a similar function. A discussion of current U.S. and Russian cruiser capabilities can be found here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cruiser#Current_cruisers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cruiser#Current_cruisers Moskva is a Slava-class cruiser: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slava-class_cruiser https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slava-class_cruiser [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cruiser https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cruiser

dragonwriter 5y ago
> So it looks like they're larger than destroyers but have a similar function. The Ticonderoga class cruisers are basically the same size as the Arleigh Burke destroyers (smaller than the Flight III, larger than earlier ones) and much smaller than the Zumwalt-class destroyers. There's a degree of what amounts to fashion in the naming, and “cruiser“ is out of fashion for newer ships.

nradov 5y ago

The distinctions between surface warship classes are somewhat arbitrary. Some modern frigates and destroyers are larger than WW2 cruisers. Originally cruisers were lightly armored vessels intended for long range, high speed commerce raiding to disrupt enemy logistics. They weren't intended to stand in the line of battle and slug it out with heavily armored battleships. But now modern cruisers carry large numbers of missiles for attacking other ships, or striking surface targets, or defending an aircraft carrier from air and missile attacks. So the key distinction that characterizes a cruiser is basically just "more missiles". The US Navy is gradually decommissioning their cruisers and can't afford to build new ones.

sgt101 5y ago
Well, can't afford while keeping 9 super carriers and 30 odd virginia class. It should be noted that the current generation of super subs can fire cruise missiles at shore targets as well as old cruisers could. Add in the shift in drone technology and the argument for big, non carrier surface combatants looks poor.
- dragonwriter 5y ago
  > Add in the shift in drone technology and the argument for big, non carrier surface combatants looks poor. The newer American destroyers are bigger than the last cruisers we built, so phasing out of cruisers isn't about not having big, non-carrier surface combatants.
  - sgt101 5y ago
    The Zumwalts are cancelled now. The calculus seems to be that if you are building a modern capital ship then it's either an aircraft platform, an assault ship or it needs to be able to go underwater - because it will cost just as much. There is a sharp division between naval assets to be used in war, and everything else.
    - dragonwriter 5y ago

nickff 5y ago

Most of the other replies here say it’s all about size, and size does matter, but it’s not the whole story. Generally, cruisers are designed with capabilities that allow them to operate anywhere on the ocean on their own, or as the lead vessels in small groups of ships (along with frigates and destroyers). Destroyers are usually smaller and have a more limited set of capabilities, and are intended to operate as ocean-going support ships in a combat group. Frigates are usually even smaller, with similar set of capabilities to a destroyer, but more limited equipment and intended to operate relatively close to their home ports. Every navy has different sizes for each, with the USA having some of the largest ships of each designation. You should also keep in mind that each type of ship has gotten progressively larger over time; as of WWII, destroyers were roughly 2000 tons, and cruisers were about 8000 tons.

dragonwriter 5y ago
> Most of the other replies here say it’s all about size, and size does matter, but it’s not the whole story. Originally the distinctions were (mostly) of purpose, but after WWI a series of treaties (mostly the Washington Naval Treaty and the First and Second London Naval Treaties) set out size, equipment, and numerical limits for various categories, so a whole lot of the interwar design and classification was based on gaming treaty limits, and the resulting naming patterns had a lasting influence that gradually faded.

sgt101 5y ago

Ha, no one is right. The key distinction is what name when applied to the hoped for platform will win funding from the national tax authority - what ever that is. In the UK talk of cruisers is a no-no, the last "through deck cruisers" were actually aircraft carriers, and no one is falling for that again. Thus the Type 45's are definitely destroyers despite displacing 9400 tonnes. In other lands the Ticonderoga's are cruisers, even though they displace 9600 tonnes, the Arleigh Burke are destroyers at 9300 tonnes, but the Zumwalt's come in at 14000 tonnes as destroyers as well! Note, there will only ever be three Zumwalt's.