BAE Systems - Queen Elizabeth Class Aircraft Carrier Simulation

[Catfish]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXyPLZGp41A

A friend was already aboard, he just said it was 'gigantic', almost as big as a US flattop, and appx. three times the size of the Ark Royal /Invincible /Illoustrious. Most impressive must have been the now full size beds, who seem to be able to transfer from a bed to a sofa in a storm, so in that case some prefer to sleep on the ground ..
But he likes the ship very much :)

[kraznyi_oktjabr]

Axial deck carrier. Me no like! :down:

Now if F-35B fails to deliver in affordable price Royal Navy will have heavy weight white elephant. Also when it comes time to retire F-35B (which most likely happens before carrier itself) only option will be another VTOL jet. Ofcourse assuming that Royal Navy is not willing to spend few hundred million pounds to refit it as angled deck ship... :nope:

[Oberon]

Nah, we'll probably just field the carrier without any aircraft, it's practically what we're doing now. :O:

Yeah, I think most of us in the UK would prefer a CATOBAR carrier and a different model of the F-35 (preferably one that didn't cost so much and break so often) or a navalised Typhoon to pad out the golden birds.
But there you go, that's the MOD for you, making procurement mysteries since 1940.

ARRSE put it best:

The British Military has a habit of procuring and adopting, usually at great expense to the taxpayer, many things that either:


Aren't needed
Don't work
Are obsolete before they're introduced (or even designed in some cases)
Are rubbish
Work eventually but cost the GDP of a mid-sized African country to fix
Are not squaddy proof
Are more expensive and worse than civilian equivalents that can be bought off-the-shelf

Or avoid all of the above, and so are cancelled just before going into service.
We're not alone in this; but at least American Military procurement mysteries don't completely stuff the Defence budget for everything else. Examples include:


SA-80
Nimrod AWACS - so embarrassingly rubbish that it is featured as a case study in MK2
TSR-2
BOWMAN
Eurofighter Typhoon
Enfield No.2 Revolver
Combat 95
Chaingun
Clansman - although to be fair, when it was introduced in the early '80s was pretty good. The problem is that it is still in service some 25 years later.
SA-80 bayonet
Boots, Cardboard (several patterns)
Straps, utility
.303" ammunition
Future Lynx
L81A2 Cadet Target Rifle
Churchill Tank - obsolete the day it was designed ... did make a valiant return as the basis of Hobarts AVRE Funnies

Near-misses that were almost foisted on the army include:


Pattern 13 Rifle
EM-2 Rifle (was supposed to work OK but it's still a bullpup)
Burton magazine (ok, so this was a very long time ago)
.402 Enfield-Martini ammunition

The opposite of the above are British Military Procurement Successes - these are very rare! When they do happen, generally something else gets in the way of effectiveness, such as mucking up the issue process or even getting rid of such items well before their time. Foreign Military Procurement Successes do happen occasionally, though.

[Skybird]

That is political boasting at best. Militarily against an enemy of same technical eye level such big ships do not make sense anymore.

The future is either submarines, or a huge fleet of much smaller vessels that have a very small quantity of flyables aboard, like helicopters aboard frigates today.

If you have just one or two capital ships, taking them out is easy for a submarine, and then the fleet is done. Having a much greater quantity of smaller ships that can add their individual resources for one greater swarm of aircraft, adds to redundancy of the whole fleet in case two or three ships get shot out of it. For that, aircraft with true VTOL capability of course are a must.

These superheavy platforms are for wars against minor, militarily inferior forces only: Asymmetrical wars. Terrorism. And that puts it somewhat ad absurdum, I think. And submarines are not the only threat to capital ships, but drones as well. Drone fleets are cheaper, and allow greater quantities.

Attacking the enemy's electronic infrastructure by virusses, and in general cyberwarfare not even mentioned. Carriers like these must not be touched by bombs are missiles. Getting into their electronics and their supportinmg electronics networks is a substantial alternative. I assume that is what the Chinese are primarily focussing on.

Has nobody learned the lessons from the early episodes of the new Battlestar Galactica series...? :O:

[kraznyi_oktjabr]

That is political boasting at best. Militarily against an enemy of same technical eye level such big ships do not make sense anymore.

The future is either submarines, or a huge fleet of much smaller vessels that have a very small quantity of flyables aboard, like helicopters aboard frigates today.

If you have just one or two capital ships, taking them out is easy for a submarine, and then the fleet is done. Having a much greater quantity of smaller ships that can add their individual resources for one greater swarm of aircraft, adds to redundancy of the whole fleet in case two or three ships get shot out of it. For that, aircraft with true VTOL capability of course are a must.

These superheavy platforms are for wars against minor, militarily inferior forces only: Asymmetrical wars. Terrorism. And that puts it somewhat ad absurdum, I think. And submarines are not the only threat to capital ships, but drones as well. Drone fleets are cheaper, and allow greater quantities.Read this: http://www.navweaps.com/index_tech/tech-031.htm
That hymn of carrier's obsolescence has been sung most part of its existence. ASCM (and before tham nukes) were supposed to make carriers part of history but they still need knowledge of where that carrier is. So far I haven't heard of such game changer that I would dismiss carrier as obsolete.

However carrier is not usefull if it doesn't have capable air wing. Handful of strike fighters (F-35B) and ASW helos (Merlin/Wildcat) is not enough. Current plans has no AWACS, no fixed wing ASW (better range and speed than helos), no EW, no tanker (buddy tanking is nice substitute) nor COD. So with its current air wing UK's carrier is of limited utility.

BTW how many of wars lately has been between peer powers?

Attacking the enemy's electronic infrastructure by virusses, and in general cyberwarfare not even mentioned. Carriers like these must not be touched by bombs are missiles. Getting into their electronics and their supportinmg electronics networks is a substantial alternative. I assume that is what the Chinese are primarily focussing on.

Has nobody learned the lessons from the early episodes of the new Battlestar Galactica series...? :O:This is where I partially agree with you. However all that fits nicely together with drones too... :)

[Wolferz]

Needs an environmental mod.:rock:

[Skybird]

Read this: http://www.navweaps.com/index_tech/tech-031.htm
That hymn of carrier's obsolescence has been sung most part of its existence. ASCM (and before tham nukes) were supposed to make carriers part of history but they still need knowledge of where that carrier is. So far I haven't heard of such game changer that I would dismiss carrier as obsolete.

I'd rather have 10 frigate-sized vessels with each having 2 Harriers or F-35 aboard (if that thing ever gets reliable), than one carrier with 20 VTOLs aboard.

Sinking one ship either means the loss of 2 planes, or the loss of 20 planes and all aircover for the entire flotilla. It was Gorshkov making popular the idea that any war at sea in modern times will be ultrashort and ultra-hefty due to the overkill capacity of warheads and limited ammounts of ammo available at sea. So, redundancy is all. Against an equal enemy you need to expect loosing ships - but the Brits almost lost the Falkland war and their carrier if the Argentinian engineer would not have misconnected the torpedo wires. And that was a 206-class. - What do you think a carrier groups chances is against a modern Kilo, 212, Gotland?

Also, missile attacks, flooding the defences with more missiles than Aegis can pick out of the air, or the fleet can rearm in SM1s without going back to harbour.

Carriers are loud, noisy, fat targets. Not for the Taliban. But for any nation having access to modern technology, like Europeans, Russians, Chinese, Brazil, India. Use those in service until they have reached the end of their useful lifetime.l But do not build new ones. They now are what battleships were at the beginning of WWII. At least against enemies fighting on same technical eye level.

U32 has reached Florida some days ago. Those excercises with the US navy over the summer without doubt will prove my point. And if I were an enemy admiral needing to value the loss of a 212 against the enemy loosing one carrier plus one or two capital escorts or supply ships, I knew what my decision would be. Logics of war.

Next, submarines are excellent intel gathering and spec ops platforms. The smaller the boat, the closer to the landmass it can move. Invisibly.

Then there is the option to turn huge boats into SSGN cruise missile platforms, like the USN did with some Ohio boats. Again, with the platform remaining invisible.

But my preferred choice would be fewer capital ships of decisive importance, but a much bigger fleet size in general and the smaller ships all being equipped with 1-4 VTOLs. Small ships, but many of them, and all having a small air capacity that could be combined, where needed. Maybe still carriers as well: but much smaller ones: less expensive, but having more of them.

In war, I believe in numerical advantage. Technology can compensate numerical inferiority only to a certain degree - and not beyond. True in the air. True on land. True on the high seas. Rumsfeld and the US army learned that the hard way in Iraq.

You need sufficient numbers.

And I have not even started to discuss finances. Last time I checked, Britain's finances still were a mess.

And what finally should be considered: is the massively shrunken Royal Navy even capable to protect with its few platforms any high value assets at sea? By numerical size, the British navy is only a shadow of its former self. Already during the Falkland war they had problems to collect the number of ships needed and the logistical transport capacity needed.

Maybe the first sealord privately would be quite happy if there were no carriers at all that he had to worry about - worrying additionally to the already stressed resources of the Navy?!

[TLAM Strike]

Attacking the enemy's electronic infrastructure ... I assume that is what the Chinese are primarily focussing on.

Right... the Chinese are not focusing on conventional warfare anymore...

http://img687.imageshack.us/img687/8536/chineseaircraftcarrierl.jpg
http://img33.imageshack.us/img33/7720/j31621x414.jpg
http://img836.imageshack.us/img836/1979/j20fifthgenerationfight.jpg
http://img171.imageshack.us/img171/1281/armedchinesez10attackhe.jpg
http://img197.imageshack.us/img197/686/type99mbtpla1s.jpg
http://img825.imageshack.us/img825/8486/zbd05ifv2.jpg
http://img708.imageshack.us/img708/3091/5image05.jpg
http://img805.imageshack.us/img805/3631/df31aicbmtel20091s.jpg


Yea I really see this stuff as useful in low intensity cyber-warfare... :hmmm:

[Oberon]

Yea I really see this stuff as useful in low intensity cyber-warfare... :hmmm:

To be fair, they got the designs for most of that stuff through low intensity cyber-warfare...and wikipedia.

[Raptor1]

To be fair, they got the designs for most of that stuff through low intensity cyber-warfare...and wikipedia.

And from 25-year old DOS games, judging by the camouflage pattern on that ZBD-04. :O:

[Oberon]

And from 25-year old DOS games, judging by the camouflage pattern on that ZBD-04. :O:

Special low resolution camouflage texture.

http://img823.imageshack.us/img823/2770/vivad.jpg

[kraznyi_oktjabr]

I'd rather have 10 frigate-sized vessels with each having 2 Harriers or F-35 aboard (if that thing ever gets reliable), than one carrier with 20 VTOLs aboard.I wouldn't. It would be logistical nightmare. Such arrangement would either require each ship to carry same maintenance personnel as carrier would or constant airlifting of technical specialists from one ship to another. Also such smaller hull (even all ships combined) can't hold equal stores and fuel bunkerage as single larger ship would. There is reason why modern aircraft carriers are so huge.

Sinking one ship either means the loss of 2 planes, or the loss of 20 planes and all aircover for the entire flotilla. It was Gorshkov making popular the idea that any war at sea in modern times will be ultrashort and ultra-hefty due to the overkill capacity of warheads and limited ammounts of ammo available at sea.Assuming that enemy finds its target. Didn't you read article? Its much easier to turn on your radar and tell enemy who and where you are than find enemy.
So, redundancy is all. Against an equal enemy you need to expect loosing ships - but the Brits almost lost the Falkland war and their carrier if the Argentinian engineer would not have misconnected the torpedo wires. And that was a 206-class. - What do you think a carrier groups chances is against a modern Kilo, 212, Gotland?In my opinion you are over estimating submarines capabilities and utility - especially conventionally powered one.

Also, missile attacks, flooding the defences with more missiles than Aegis can pick out of the air, or the fleet can rearm in SM1s without going back to harbour.Again assuming that enemy knows where the group is. Also you seem to think that only way to prevent hit is to destroy missile.

Carriers are loud, noisy, fat targets. Not for the Taliban. But for any nation having access to modern technology, like Europeans, Russians, Chinese, Brazil, India. Use those in service until they have reached the end of their useful lifetime.l But do not build new ones. They now are what battleships were at the beginning of WWII. At least against enemies fighting on same technical eye level.Maybe its noisy but is it noisy enough to give it away half an ocean away? Remember that there is limited amount of submarines too and also that CSG is usually escorted by its own submarines.

U32 has reached Florida some days ago. Those excercises with the US navy over the summer without doubt will prove my point. And if I were an enemy admiral needing to value the loss of a 212 against the enemy loosing one carrier plus one or two capital escorts or supply ships, I knew what my decision would be. Logics of war.Exercises restrict greatly where carrier can move and give submarine an edge. Unless CSG commander has unimpended freedom of movement I would take "results" with bulk carrier of salt.

<snip, reply is becoming ridiculously long...>I agree that numbers are important but I see numerical factor more important in escort vessels than major capital ships such as carriers. Otherwise I think we have to agree to disagree.

[geetrue]

The end of the end is in sight ... surely this will be the end of modern warfare

as soon as they get it to work that is, but this they will do and then it will be the end.

http://www.dodlive.mil/files/2010/05/100520-F-9999B-111.jpg

http://fly.historicwings.com/2012/07/news-flash-hypersonic-flight-into-space/



Published July 16, 2012
News Flash: The USAF and NASA have announced an air-launched, hypersonic research aircraft capable of flying from the lower atmosphere into space (achieving altitudes above 100 kilometers) and returning for a landing on a normal runway. The aircraft is air-launched and utilizes rockets to accelerate to atmospheric speeds of over 3,500 mph (and as high as Mach 6.7).



Air Force's WaveRider hits 3,500 mph in test

http://www.kansas.com/2010/05/27/1332054/air-forces-waverider-hits-3500.html

Read more here: http://www.kansas.com/2010/05/27/1332054/air-forces-waverider-hits-3500.html#storylink=cpy


Since the 1960s, the Air Force has been flirting with hypersonic technology, which can propel vehicles at a velocity that cannot be achieved from traditional turbine-powered jet engines.

But the technology has been exceedingly difficult to perfect. Previous attempts produced very limited results including flights that lasted only a few seconds, said Peter Wilson, senior defense analyst with Rand Corp.

With the technology, the military could strike anywhere on the planet within an hour or less, said John Pike, director of Globalsecurity.org, a website for military policy research.

"The WaveRider represents a major change that could have big implications on today's weapon systems," he said. "It can travel great distances at remarkable speeds, showing potential for a long-range cruise missile."


Read more here: http://www.kansas.com/2010/05/27/1332054/air-forces-waverider-hits-3500.html#storylink=cpy

[Skybird]

the Chinese are not focusing on conventional warfare anymore...

That is not what I have said.

[Jimbuna]

A fat lot of use that submarine was for protection purposes, sailing on the surface.

[Red October1984]

Special low resolution camouflage texture.

http://img823.imageshack.us/img823/2770/vivad.jpg

:har: :har:

That was hilarious. I love that picture. :rotfl2:

[Skybird]

I wouldn't. It would be logistical nightmare. Such arrangement would either require each ship to carry same maintenance personnel as carrier would or constant airlifting of technical specialists from one ship to another. Also such smaller hull (even all ships combined) can't hold equal stores and fuel bunkerage as single larger ship would. There is reason why modern aircraft carriers are so huge.
Most frigate-or-bigger class military ships have 1 or 2 helicopters these days. Make it the size of cruisers, and change doctrine. Or smaller, much smaller carriers like the Marine's helicopter carriers. Smaller ships certainly would need to limit regular flight operations, if they are on their own. Point is a loss of one or two does not knock you out, and you have always the option to assemble lets say 20 of them in one action group and have them coordinating their air operations - like a temporarily assembled huge carrier.

Maybe its noisy but is it noisy enough to give it away half an ocean away? Remember that there is limited amount of submarines too and also that CSG is usually escorted by its own submarines.
A modern tech enemy should be able to read the noise of a carrier from impressive ranges, absolutely. The Brits boasted with that their new submarine class can hear "in Plymouth when a ship leaves harbour in New York". That may be exaggerated or not, and may refer to most optimal sea conditions or not. However, there are others tools as well. Especially satellites. And finally, one truith remains true: a submarine must meet that carrier just once.

To take out the air operation capacity of a big carrier with my fleet design - same air potency distributed amongst many smaller ships - would need many many opportunities and consume more time, increasing the risk to the sub significantly, too.


Exercises restrict greatly where carrier can move and give submarine an edge. Unless CSG commander has unimpended freedom of movement I would take "results" with bulk carrier of salt.
Such limits are imposed on the uboat, too, even more likely since the US Navy wants to demonstrate that it can deal with such threats - it does not like headlines saying that carrier groups cannot counter modern submarine threats. There was this famous naval excercise where they simulated an attack on Iran and got the US fleet totally destroyed, then repeating the excercise with changed rules so that the Iranians could not win anymore. The Navy got its great show, the victory was perfect, and everybody was happy.

US carriers btw got also "ambushed" by NATO submarines outside exercises, while both groups/units were in transit. One such incident included I think a Swedish boat, the other I have on mind was about a German boat.

From the moment on a carrier group is detected by a potent enemy nation, it turns from being a hunter into being the hunted.

[Jimbuna]

In 1981, The NATO exercise Ocean Venture ended with much embarrassment for the U.S. Navy, and more specifically, its enormously expensive aircraft carrier battle groups. During the exercise, a Canadian submarine slipped quietly through the aircraft carrier U.S.S. America’s destroyer screen, and conducted a devastating simulated torpedo attack on the ship. The submarine was never detected, and the exercise umpire, a U.S. Navy officer, pronounced the carrier “dead.”



In 1989, naval analyst Norman Polmar wrote in Naval Forces that during NATO’s exercise Northern Star, “…the Dutch submarine “Zwaardvis” was the only orange (enemy) submarine to successfully stalk and sink a blue (allied) aircraft carrier…”



On September 24 2003, the Australian newspaper The Age disclosed that Australia’s Collins class diesel submarines had taught the U.S. Navy a few lessons during multinational exercises. By the end of the exercises, Australian submarines had destroyed two U.S. Navy nuclear attack submarines and an aircraft carrier.



in 1998, U.S. News and World Report noted “In two recent exercises with Latin American navies, a Chilean sub managed to evade its U.S. counterparts and ‘sink’ a U.S. ship.” To be more specific, during RIMPAC 1996, the Chilean submarine Simpson was responsible for sinking the carrier U.S.S. Independence (this event was mentioned in the 1997 Discovery Channel TV documentary “Fleet Command.”)


http://www.cuttingedge.org/news_updates/nz1839.htm

[Platapus]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXyPLZGp41A



That is some awesome animation :up:

[Twin Screws]

A fat lot of use that submarine was for protection purposes, sailing on the surface.

Very true, subs are at their best when submerged, as the captain & crew of the Belgrano found out. :up:

[Jimbuna]

Very true, subs are at their best when submerged, as the captain & crew of the Belgrano found out. :up:

Ouch! but true.

[Skybird]

Very true, subs are at their best when submerged, as the captain & crew of the Belgrano found out. :up:
And the British found out that truth, too, almost, when the Argentinian 209 only by mishandling torpedo wiring failed to sink the British carrier and flagship. The British admiral admitted later that if those fishes would have hit, with aircover then gone the British armada would have been forced to give up and retreat, leaving victory to Argentinia.

You see, submarines work for both sides. Britain was a lucky winner.

In Argentinia they talk until today of the unlucky engineer "who lost the war for Argentinia" when connecting those two wires the wrong way around.

[Jimbuna]

"leaving victory to Argentina" :har:

Do not miscalculate the threat the British troops made and ensured on land :nope:

[Skybird]

I think you have asked me before on that, Jim, two or three years ago. Or was it Oberon?

I am not concluding there. I just quote what the British admiral commanding the whole armada said, years later. He said if the 209 would have succeeded in sinking the carrier, the armada would have needed to withdraw and stop operations inside the warzone and inside the Argentinian airforce'S range, due to lacking air coverage. The Argentinian air force was everything but a clawless eagle - it struck repeatedly and the pilots showed in combat engagements both skill and courage and determination to which British commanders payed their respect after the war.

That would have meant: no more Vulcan raids. No transport flights. No paratroopers. No replenishments. No tran psort ships. No sea-based logistics.

So again (and back then I also gave you - or Oberon - a link ), I remember for sure the original statements: I am just repeating what the admiral commanding the British fleet has said himself. If you have any issue over what he said after the war, you need to discuss that with him. ;)

You won that war over to loose ends of wire that got mistaken when getting connected. Lucky victory. But then, to varying degree war always is about luck as well. We can only try to reduce its role. But we cannot eliminate it from the formula completely.

[Twin Screws]

You see, submarines work for both sides. Britain was a lucky winner.


No, it's just that British subs work, German subs don't.
As anyone who plays SH3 knows, German torpedoes were prone to mishaps. :03:

"The Type 209 is a class of diesel-electric attack submarine developed exclusively for export by Howaldtswerke-Deutsche Werft of Germany."

I always thought German engineering was among the best, perhaps I'm wrong. :hmmm:

[Skybird]

209 is the export version of the 206.

The Argentinian boat was okay, and got not struck at by the British as far as I recall (they could not find it, the 206/209 were amongst the most silent subs in their time and still are quite silent by today's standards - so they say at least). The torpedo problem was handling failure by inexperienced crew man. Due to attaching the wrong wire to the wrong contact, the eels' navigation system got messed up and they could not be steered after getting fired, or did not arm themselves once leaving safety distance. Almost half of the British fleet or so was bound by frantically trying to find the sub, since it posed a tremendous threat. They never ever even snapped up a sign of it. The boat safely returned unpressed to its home harbour.

If you still think that Germans and subs do not match, then try to find a 212. No sound, no thermal wake, no magnetic sensor vulnerability (so they say...). Good luck, enjoy yourself. :D

The last serving 206s were decommissioned from German navy service only two years ago, I think, either 2010 or 2011. That gave them a service time of over 40 years. A small handful of them still do service in a few foreign navies to which they got sold, at least some of the midlife-updated boats.