US Navy's newest ship sets sail with Captain James Kirk at the bridge The US Navy's largest destroyer has finally set sail. And at its helm is Captain James Kirk. The USS Zumwalt, named after Admiral Elmo Zumwalt, has embarked on its first open ocean trials after eight years of construction. The $4bn Zumwalt is at the cutting edge of technology and will be the first of three in its class ( …
its gentle sloping sides are good for deflecting projectiles
Those must be softballs. The times of iron walls are long past gone.
Today's "projectiles" aka autonomous missiles, hypersonic or otherwise, will transform this silly radar-evading contraption into a rapidly expanding shell of debris and fleshy parts.
A couple of "terrorists" (even though they attacked a clear military target) ripped the destroyer USS Cole a new one with just a dinghy and some plastic explosives ... of course this gave the US a good occasion to demand money from any and all members of the momentary axis of evil, as the Empire is wont to do, but I digress.
This is not a battle tank. The sloping sides deflect radar beams, not projectiles. The author really ought to read up a little on the subject first.
The idea behind the flat slopes is to reflect radar beams in one or two directions, which are usually not back toward the radar dish. Anything to avoid curves that reflect widely.
I guess the hope is that incoming cruise missiles can be more easily distracted by decoys when the primary target ping is so small. I bet the ship carries a number of drone boats with outsized radar signatures, and drives them around randomly along with the ship itself when in danger. The approaching missile would have no way to know which ping is the real target.
The problem is "where's the targeting radar"? At sea level or low altitude this angled side ought to work pretty well. If the targeting radar is airborne at a good altitude to minimize the angle, it might get back a better signal.. but then there's the decoys.
Actually sloping sides increase armors effectiveness. However, I doubt the Zumwalt has any real armor. Modern warships designs are unbalanced with more offensive capability than they can absorb.
As to the Cole, her damage and near sinking shows the weakness of unbalanced designs. In boxing she would be described as having a glass jaw.
Aside from the ship sinking, the other worry about a single hit is that a hit to a magazine will effectively disarm the ship by destroying most of its missiles.
The Zumwalt design deals with this in two ways: 1) The VLS missile pods are dispersed around the perimeter of the ship next to the hull, rather than being centralized and concentrated as in other USN ships, and 2) taking a page from modern tank ammunition storage design, the hull-side armor of the VLS pods is significantly thinner than the interior-side armor; any explosion in a pod should vent most of its force and projectiles outside the ship rather than towards the inhabited interior spaces.
Not strictly true... Modern warships are thin hulled as it's better for defending against anti-ship missiles. If you have big armour belts then the missile hits it, detonates, and you have all the shock damage and spalling to deal with. The intention is that a high velocity missile will pass through the thin sides of the ship before detonating, thus punching a big hole and not doing much else.
I think the jury is out as to whether it works in practice, I guess there's not really been any empirical side by side comparison tests...
It's the age old military problem of fighting the last war though. If we were to start armouring all our ships again, you could guarantee that next time we'd be facing enemies making widespread use of anti ship missiles again.
@Dan_Wilkie I guess there's not really been any empirical side by side comparison tests...
Nothing recently, although our Royal Navy did their bit for live practice back in '82. HMS Sheffield, for example.
The point is these craft are normally a missile picket for the capital ships (aircraft carriers, amphibious assault ships etc). They're armed to down any attacker and put up a good fight, but ultimately their role is to take the missile instead of their big sister.
Given its cost co$$$$t doubt the Zumwalt is as disposable as that. Though in historical terms you are precisely correct. This race upwards in capability and cost, downwards in numbers, is gonna cost Western armies dear as second tier opponents scale up to good-enough.
Hopefully we won't get to see Chinese asymmetric developments in action (ex DF-21), because that competition will diffuse itself. But if we did, I find our platinum-plated approach worrying. Not the least because the only credible opponent motivating these systems is China which spurs more arms race.
Good for defence firm revenues tho.
"How fitting if Captain Kirk gets the command of the under construction USS Enterprise (CVN-80) in 2025."
I would guess that, if he is still serving, they will give him command (whatever his rank as the commander of a ship is always 'Captain' when in command) just so that they have a Captain Kirk in command of the Enterprise.
The gentle sloping sides are to deflect radio waves, not projectiles.
But you're post is contradiction - a big iron wall would have made the terrorist attack on Cole useless - if it had been, say, the Iowa, it wouldn't have had any real damage (but some hundreds kg of explosives are not "some plastic").
And the idea of this class of ships it's exactly to make lock-on of autonomous missiles very hard (how do you believe they are autonomous?) - while being able also to down them with new weapons. Will it be successful? I do not know - but surely improved attack weapons needs improved - and sometimes wholly new - countermeasures as well.
<snip>
"A couple of "terrorists" (even though they attacked a clear military target) ripped the destroyer USS Cole a new one with just a dinghy and some plastic explosives ... of course this gave the US a good occasion to demand money from any and all members of the momentary axis of evil, as the Empire is wont to do, but I digress."
At the time people thought it was a terrorist boat when in fact naval specialists declared it to be a Bin Liner .
"its gentle sloping sides are good for deflecting projectiles....." Take a deep breath, try and control the hate, then go back and actually read the article, it says "its gentle sloping sides are good for minimising its radar signature", nothing about deflecting projectiles.
"....The times of iron walls are long past gone...." If by "iron walls" you mean the old iron-clads then yes, if you mean the old battleships with their steel belts then that is debatable. What killed the old battleships was cost and the threat of Cold War nuke missiles - why pour so much money into a fleet of battleships when one nuke could take out an entire fleet? But in the 80s the USN used the WW2-era Iowa class battleships to shell terrorist positions around Beirut for two reasons - the ship's guns could out-range most missiles available to terrorists in Beirut, and the ship's armour could easily withstand the impact of a cruise missile hitting the side. Hilariously, the Russians spent millions of rubles developing anti-ship missiles that dive on the target just because of the old Iowas, but then the old ships were retired anyway!
"....Today's "projectiles" aka autonomous missiles, hypersonic or otherwise, will transform this silly radar-evading contraption into a rapidly expanding shell of debris and fleshy parts....." The idea of the tech is to make the ship harder to find and shoot at on the open sea, the primary tool for such being radar. You can't hit what you can't see. And then, even if you can find it, if you have radar-guided anti-ship missiles then you could still be unable to hit it anyway.
"....USS Cole...." The Cole was not attacked on the open sea but in a constricted waterway. It was also a one-off tactic as every navy in the World took note and doubled their short-range deck defences and rewrote their rules of engagement for potentially troublesome areas. The right rules of engagement and one M2 on a pintle mount would be enough to defeat a repeat of the Cole attack.
".....gave the US a good occasion to demand money from any and all members of the momentary axis of evil, as the Empire is wont to do...." Kool-aid overload detected!
A bow like hers is less prone to heavy knocking when going through waves. This allows for the vessel to move faster without taking heavy impacts which tends to break stuff.
I've seen more and more of these shape bows on ships including cargo vessels although I assume there is more to it than just fitting the bow on upside down.
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This is a perfect example of the confluence of the military-industrial complex, the good old days of war mindset, and the right wing Congress wasting billions on equipment with no practical purpose. What would we ever use it for?
As for its stealth technology, it's big enough that it's visible from space. Here is it under construction:
https://www.google.com/maps/@43.9038429,-69.8112929,234m/data=!3m1!1e3
Satellite recon is only good for stationary targets as it can only do a sweep every 8 hrs.
really? you've never heard of geostationary or geosynchronous satellites? that's two different but similar things and there are some craft that maintain their position that are not orbiting at the equator... then there's the molniya orbit where one craft is on station all the time while another is moving off and a third one is arriving to take over... the point being that you can watch a site continuously from orbit without any lapse in viewing time...
"you've never heard of geostationary or geosynchronous satellites?"
Geosynchronous satellites are 36,000 km from the earth so I don't think they do the kind of high resolution imaging we normally associate with spy satellites or even google maps. Spy satellites are in low earth orbit about a 1,000 km above the surface so imaging is much easier.
"As for its stealth technology, it's big enough that it's visible from space."
Fairly stupid statement to make, considering that MilSpec satellite cameras have been good enough for nearly 40 years to pick up a packet of cigarettes on the ground from orbit. Even the Google-purchased recon imagery used in Maps is good enough that you can pick up individual cars without any real difficulty.
"Stealth" doesn't mean invisible. It's not a cloaking device. It means it's more difficult to pick up on targetting radars because it has a small RCS for the size of it. Like the F117A and the B2.
But where am I going to get my environmental news now? I'm going to have to take out a subscription to Bunty magazine.
Actually it's almost a shame: I liked Lewis's defence writing and while I rarely agreed with Worstall (that rarest of things, a UKIP-supporting economist) in his conclusions, some of his facts made for an interesting read. Always good to see how the other half think.
In the last month. Apparently what the world needs - especially the tech world - is more lightweight analysis by left-wing or centre-left journalists, of whom there is apparently a colossal shortage. Worstall's stuff was superb, Page's defence stuff also superb, but they didn't hold the same views as the Trendy Wendies, so out they go. The Register is rapidly becoming a fucking embarrassment.
Both clearly had their biases, Worstall at times came across rabid capitalist, but at least they had some understanding about their subjects. Worstall's analysis of the rare earths trade was actually informative. I do find lately that I take one look at the main page and there are less stories that grab my attention.
Of all the things the US military needs is a stealth ship. How about invisibility cloaks for the guys on the ground? Perhaps a +15 Vorpal Blade and a +30 buckler to go with it? Truly beggars the imagination how this got past the Phase Of Ridiculous Ideas that hampers the military budget. I'm actually surprised that they didn't try to make it a combination submersible/airborne platform that can fire fucking Daisy Cutter bombs from the deck cannon while travelling at Mach 2.
> its gentle sloping sides are good for deflecting projectiles but not as good for staying upright without computer assistance.
So if the computer goes, she capsizes?! Not sure if that is a good idea.
The shape reminds me of the imperial fleet from Star Wars. If the Empire had a sea-going navy, the ships would no doubt look just like that.
And cost! The program so far is over $22 BEELION dollars, with the Zumwalt's "unit" cost nearly $4 BEELION dollars. Is this running Windows for Warships? "Captain, it's a blue screen!" "Quick, reboot the computer before we capsize!"
Never mind an iceberg, the Navy has Windows...
Interestingly, unlike most of the rest of the Navy's missile ships, the Zumwalt class will NOT be running the Aegis system (and thus will not have ABM or area air-defense capability), but will instead be running a Linux variant! Quoth the Wiki: "The Total Ship Computing Environment Infrastructure (TSCEI) is based on General Electric Fanuc Embedded Systems' PPC7A and PPC7D single-board computers[71] running LynuxWorks' LynxOS (Linux kernel)[72] RTOS.
"And cost! The program so far is over $22 BEELION dollars, with the Zumwalt's "unit" cost nearly $4 BEELION dollars."
With a lot of defense weaponry in the West it feels like we're making the same mistake as the Nazi's in World War 2, i.e. one expensive complicated Tiger versus 30-40 simple Sherman's or T34's, hope we never have to use any of it in a major war.
"...one expensive complicated Tiger versus 30-40 simple Sherman's ..."
Apart from the fact that the "Greengrocer's apostophe" is still alive and well in your post, I think you ought to read up on the actions of Michael Wittman at the battle of Villers Bocage. Using a Tiger he single-handedly destroyed 14 tanks of the 7th Armoured Division, in one go.
Shermans were known to the British crews as "Ronsons" after the lighter as they caught fire so easily. So quality can make a difference if used well.
"Apart from the fact that the "Greengrocer's apostophe"is still alive and well in your post"
What do you say to grammar Nazis?
There, their, they're!
Sorry I don't proof read every forum post to your high standards, life is too short.
Maybe you should read how notoriously unreliable the Tiger was, granted it sometimes took 4-5 Shermans to take out one Tiger, but many were abandoned by crews because of breakdowns, in Normandy some groups had almost half their Tigers out of action due to mechanical problems.
Some of this was due to poor engineering facilities and materials at the time, but it is widely recognised it was not a good mechanical design as it was too complex (Removing an engine was not a straightforward task for instance).
Keep in mind, you are always gonna find the "x enemies destroyed" anecdotes popping up. By the very nature of what catches attention and makes history. There was supposedly the KV-1 with 14 kills @ Kursk, for example, but Kursk was won by Soviet numbers, not its outliers. And numbers, and reliability, again carried the day wrt Ronson M4s vs Tigers.
Plus, IIRC Wittman fell on a nice line up of unaware enemies all in a column, wasn't a toe-to-toe slugout. Not to diss either him or the Tiger, but pls present the whole story. Respect for your counter example though.
"They got the Ronson nickname because they light up reliably at the first strike...." Well, yes and no. The British ordered almost exclusively the petrol-engined model which - in its original and unmodified form - proved vulnerable to hits on the fuel tanks setting the whole tank on fire. Later British Shermans had added applique armour over the fuel tanks and ammunition bins to help reduce the problem. But the Yanks used a lot of the diesel-powered version without the same "brewing up" problem.
The Birtish had a fixation with tanks "brewing up" due to a study done on their designs and early battles in North Africa, where the most common cause of a British tank being written-off was due to catastrophic fire in the crew compartment (very few actually exploded in best Hollywood fashion). But the cause of the frequent brewing up was traced to the bad habits of British tank crews, who packed the interiors of their tanks with personal kit such as flammable coats and oil-soaked rags, and often kept ready-to-fire ammunition stacked outside of protective containers. When their tanks were hit by AP shot, hot splinters of metal often set fire to those personal items and the fire quickly spread to the ready ammunition, and it then became a race for the crew to escape before they got burnt alive. Even the old and lighter Crusader II and III tanks suffered much less brew ups after crews started keeping the interior spaces clear and sliding doors were fitted over the ammunition racks.
The original Sherman design was very good, so good that when it made its battle debut in 1942 the Yanks made the mistake of assuming it would stay a top-line battle tank for the rest of the foreseeable War period. And for the majority of the War it was as good or better than the majority of its opponents (the most common German tank throughout the War was the up-gunned Panzer IV with the Panther and Tiger being relatively uncommon in comparison, and the Japanese tanks being little more than target practice). But in many ways it became a moot point - in the latter parts of WW2 the majority of German tanks were destroyed from the air, or broke down and were captured, or simply ran out of fuel (because air attacks destroyed their fuel supplies). And by the end of the War the Brits and Yanks both had tank designs that matched or bettered the Tiger, Panther and even Tiger II in the Pershing, Comet and Centurion.
In fairness, the 45's were £1 billion each. Which with a quick bit of conversion makes them roughly $1.5 billion each. And the Zumwalt is nigh on twice the displacement, and (whilst I'm unconvinced it's a good thing for a warship) cutting edge.
Whereas the 45's don't even work most of the time. I'd imagine after a couple of years, provided these actually stay at sea without breaking down for more than a days, you'll get more sea time per £ from a $4 billion Zumwalt than a $1 billion T45...
There was much controversy over the stability of the "tumblehome" hull form. The Wiki notes: "A return to a hull form not seen since the Russo-Japanese War in 1905, the Zumwalt-class destroyer reintroduces the tumblehome hull form." and "In April 2007, naval architect Ken Brower said, "As a ship pitches and heaves at sea, if you have tumblehome instead of flare, you have no righting energy to make the ship come back up. On the DDG 1000, with the waves coming at you from behind, when a ship pitches down, it can lose transverse stability as the stern comes out of the water – and basically roll over."
There is reason for hope -- the 1/4-scale tumblehome-hull "SeaJet" demonstrator ship did *not* roll over in tests in Lake Pend Oreille, Idaho.
I was reading about this new ship earlier, and they were comparing it to the Arleigh Burke class. Apparently the Arleigh Burke can roll over to 110 degrees and still naturally right itself, the Zumwalt is deliberately unstable and needs computer help in rough water.
The Arleigh Burke is nicer looking too, IMO. The Zumwalt is not exactly pretty, is it?
There is a building in Boston with a very large weight at the top which can be moved by hydraulic actuators to maintain stability of the building in high winds. I think this is the building that used to shed window panes as the building flexed.
I believe that some stealth aircraft are unstable without their control systems and if you lose the control system you bail out because your reflexes aren't fast enough to fly the plane.
This is not new technology.
Hits all my check boxes although I'd prefer at least twenty to forty more VLS cells since this design isn't stock Bluewater, more raider. You need deeper loadouts in a raider. The advanced guns will surely be appreciated by Marines (esp. Force Recon) or Navy SEALS in the area. Given the OTH reach, several insertions could occur in near simultaneously evolutions, with drone support.
Overpriced? With that few ships? Congress cuts and cuts the total build and WTF do you think will happen? R&D, support costs, ancillary programs are still fixed cost spread over too damn few ships. Fuck Congress.
Thirty-two of them would be everyone's worst nightmare. Good. Go Navy!
Actually bigger than many if not most WW-II cruisers. The RN County class heavy cruisers weighed in at 10,000 tonnes, rather less than the 15,000 tonnes quoted here, which is heavier than many pre-dreadnought battleships. A very far cry from the 260 tonnes of the earliest torpedo-boat destroyers. Churchill apparently once said that by forever increasing the size of destroyers, we move them from the class of the hunters to that of the hunted. He may have had a point.
For all nations, the Washington treaty cruisers were fixed at 10,000 tons.
Freed of the Treaty by the war, the US pushed cruiser weights up to 18,000 tons standard. The UK needed quantity more than "quality" so only built smaller cruisers during the war, if at all.
Theorically, the class was not related to the size, but to the mission.
Battleships were front liner, slugging each others into oblivion. If I remember well, it happened only once (the famous battle of Jutland)
Cruisers were supposed to be lone wolf hunters preying on shipping and opportunity targets, role that was superseeded by the subs
Destroyers were small-medium fleet escort ships designed to hunt and destroy those submarines.
According to the armament of the thing and the logical aim of a stealthy ship, this should be classified as a cruiser.
But it's easier for the navy to get funding to build a "small" destroyers than for "big" cruisers, so...
There were several battleship vs battleship actions after Jutland. Among them were
1 Denmark Strait, Hood and Prince of Wales vs Bismarck and Prinz Eugen
2 Pursuit of Bismarck, Bismarck vs Home Fleet
3 Naval Battle of Gualcanal, Nov 1942, Washington vs two Kongo-class (designed and one built in the UK!)
4 Suriago Strait, six American battleships plus several American cruisers (and one Australian one) vs two Japanese battleships and assorted cruisers. USS Missouri fired last main gun salvo against another battleship ever made.
If Halsey hadn't screwed up, Willis Lee and the four Iowa class battleships would have been in the San Bernadino Strait to meet Kurita and his boys, and we'd know who'd win in a fight between Yamato and Iowa class battleships. Instead, Lee and his battleships were out chasing Ozawa and Kurita hit the escort groups off Samar.
There's a lot of speculation that the Zumwalts are actually next gen battle cruisers in disguise and are earmarked to be the test bed for the Navy's railgun/ laser projects. One of the reasons the class was reduced from 32 and almost canned at one point was rumoured to be a lot of internal interference from the Carrier Jockeys.
One of the coolest things I have read about them? Apparently coz they are all electric you can switch the power between various sub systems on demand such as between the electric engines and that big ass radar array they have.
Give them energy shields and it'll be X-wing vs Tie Fighter navy stylee.
Could be a misprint for "wharffighting", something the personnel do off duty, or an indication that the ship isn't really seaworthy.
But yes, Pentagon's Redundancy Team, aka the Squad Squad, probably came up with that one. (I believe that it is commanded by Gen. Consensus.)
I'm sitting eating a sandwich on a 15 metre Fairline motor yacht while I'm reading this, just doing some work on it. Being more of a sailing man I think the Fairline is ugly but when the Zunwalt was in the ugly queue it really took the piss and all of the ugly.
In the past, naval ship's seaworthyness often saved the lives of their crews even when significantly damaged, if I sailed on this I would try to wangle a position near a life boat station.
It has got life boats somewhere......surely.
Meant to say, most ships engender a feeling of soul, this looks absolutely souless. Not designed by your usual naval architect.
Well apparently the US Navy knows nothing about building ships, so thank fsck that the combined forces of el Reg's commentards are here to school them on modern warship design!
Honestly, why did they even bother paying mere mortals to design the thing when they could have come here and discovered that their plans were all bad and wrong?
What you said.
I'm incredulous of questioning the need for a modern Navy, in this day of global trade. Sincerely, how else does stuff get reliably and continually from the manufacturers (China, et al) to the consumers (northwestern hemisphere, that is, us) ? But for modern Navies of U.S., UK, & France, how would all merchant sea lanes not be the Somali coast?
As for the futuristic design and seaworthiness, I doubt the guys and gals at naval design bureaus are stupid. As for the futuristic design and any tactical vulnerabilities, I'm sure, behind those sloped bulkheads and within those turrets are a lot of nasty and effective surprises for any adversary of any means.
"Cole", agreed, is a valid and valuable lesson. Yet, again, I doubt the design bureaus are too stupid to have learned that lesson.
As for costly financing, why else did Congress or the Navy drastically lower the class from 32 vessels to three?
Trust me, all this is true. I'm an Air Force officer, so It's very difficult for me to cough up the necessity of a modern Navy!
When I was at school in the '60s, an 'Old Boy' who'd made it big in the FO came to lecture us on Britain's strategy. He said we wouldn't need a big-ship Navy in fifty years, just fast boats to police the Mediterranean and Channel against mass population movements. Do you think they listened to their own advice? The US, on the other hand, has the Pacific.
LOL LOL and LOL, all the know-it-alls whose furthest adventure is out of their mamma's basements to get new batteries for their wireless mice. Really try reading Jane's if you "really" want to man-up on military might. "oh... it's one shot and dead"... lol good luck with that knuckledragger clownshoes.
As an ex-professional seaman,I would comment that, although the vessel may have a small radar footprint,it's visual signature is fully maximised.
Visually, it would be a very easy target to attack,it's hull is,if anything,more pronounced than the traditional architecture,as is the upperworks & any missile could hardly miss it's target.
As for handling itself in heavy weather,it looks to me as to be a sluggish vessel to manouvre & in heavy seas it's imperative to be able to have sea room in which to run before the sea.
In coming about,I can see her being affected & damaged by such heavy weather.
A vessel reacts to the environment that it's in,a traditional naval hull cuts into waves,it's bow being rakish,with little flare,this allows it to move faster,but increases stresses on the hull from more of it being out of the water once a large wave runs from the bow-midships.
This vessel will cut into a sea, but it's upperworks show too much face broad on to the sea.
It's not a 'sea-kindly' vessel,likely to be uncomfortable in any weather of consequence.
On reflection, 50% of it is 'modern', the other half looks like an 'Iron-Clad' battlewagon.
Waste of money. A new Virginia class fast attack submarine is less than 1.8 billion, and quite a bit more stealthy :). I'm a bit prejudiced as a retired submariner but really, I'd rather have 2 modern fast attack submarines and a little change in the pocket than a mission limited target floating on the surface.
Ah I see that the worst of the derp has now been removed from the article - without of course any acknowledgement that it ever existed or was ever detected. Has El'Reg been taking lessons from government PR flaks?
Get rid of amateur hour and bring back Lewis. Or stop posting articles on defence matters altogether, you're just making yourselves look silly.
(Big Brother because of retrospective history fixing)
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