Aegis Cruiser Sunk as Target
 

This seems stupid and wasteful to me:
USS Valley Forge Sunk off Hawaii
The four Aegis cruisers decommisioned in the last few years, largely because they have Mk.26 Missile launchers and not VLS, still have plenty of life left in them and are some of the worlds most fearsome surface combatants. If the US doesn't want them, they would make a great flagship for a smaller allied Navy, not to mention their value as reserve assets for the USN. What a waste.:nope:
This sort of thing has been happening alot more of late, and it is getting really disturbing.:huh:

I think it would be better to see them as a museum w/o all the AEGIS stuff on them. That way, the groups who take a ship under their umbrella don't have to spend so much on makin' them look pretty. :up:

LOL, we need more corals nowadays! :D

Each year america's buget keeps getting smaller and smaller so far alot of 688's have been decomissioned early simply because the navy cant afford to refuel them.

What kind of trash talk is this? Can you provide a link or source to prove your assertions?

It seems silly to use a Tico for very, very expensive target practice. The Valley Forge was still a very capable ship with a very specific and relevant mission.

Sure CNN CNBC ABC most news networks that have reported on the issue not only that FAS.org bellona has had a report out.

and all the subs that have already been de commed from service quote" USS Portsmouth SSN 707 was taken out of service earlier this month as she was due for refueling but the current cost doesnt warrent her to have her core re fueled"

Not to menion the USS Honalulu SSN 718 USS Cincinati USS birmingham the list goes on for the 688

Due to the expence of refueling the USN seeing them as not cost effective to maintain them, 10 virginias are on order to replace the remaining 42 los angeles class, most of the 688's that have been decomissioned are only 18 to 22 years old thier lives were designed for at least 25 to 30 years so this is early retirment

Ticos run on gas turbines.

He's working on the Subs Being Decomissioned Due to Lack of Fuel tangent.

Anyway, you are right. For example, they could lease them to South Korea, who are about building their KDX-III destroyers, so they are already "security-cleared" for Aegis. The ship will be a massive increase in capability (and thus complexity) over their KDX-II counterparts. While Valley Forge's Aegis is an earlier Baseline, it would surely be valuable as a interim training vessel to help the South Korens bridge the gap.

Guys, i think its a total waste, and yes the budget for the military is lowering. The US hasnt had any major naval combat since WWII. We dont have the need for 10 fast attack carriers anymore, or many battleships. For this reason they have cut the navys budget.

Now personally, Thought i hope this never happers, with the huge cutback on the budget, we have less personell, less ships, basically less fighting power. If we are in need of another carrier or submarine, we wont have many and our forces will be spread all to crap. Though we dont have the numbers, but better trained men and women, we still need reinforcments to back up the people on the front lines.

Though the 688Is are getting old, they can still be used.Training purposes is what comes to mind first, and it would be better on the ship instead of sitting at the dock, or like above with the Aegis and sink them like the Russians did with so many of their subs.

Basically we dont need as many ships as we did in WWII, but we still need enough ocean power to stop a threat to the country.

The USN buget has gone down by 25% over the last 15 years which means theres just enough to support what they got now and only just, so to save some money they git rid of the less capible units and bring in the more capible units ie the virginia's however i doubt the virginias will ever match the numbers of the 688 theres simply no need for a 65 strong fast attack fleet any more.

Right now america has only 45 at the most attack submarines russia has 48 both diesel and nuclear she too is down sizing to around 30.

Why do you need 65 attack submarines when the wars of today are fought by aircraft and men on the ground it seems a big waste of money to keep all thess obsolete submarines in service to provide cover, the SSN744's are fully capible of carrier battle group cover single handedly so are the seawolfs it makes more sence to reduce the fleet and concentrate on the area that does need the attention which is the newer carriers and destroyers and aircraft not to mention auxilaries mine warfare ships and patrol craft these are the ships that will be most needed in the future.

If iran mines the straight of hormuz its not going to be a submarine thats going to clear a path it will be the smaller mine warfare vessels however most of americas mine warfare vessels are nearing 20 or have gone over 20 years old they are pretty out of date they are in need of replacing.

Britiain maintains 22 mine warfare vessels that also double up as coastal patrol craft why because they can see that mine warfare is a very nessasery ship to have in a navy every one else has seemed to shun them even russia china france germany america and a fair few others.

So what do you do with the older less capible units you get rid then make way for the new but at the moment its 4x688's for 1x SSN744

The tico being sunk in question is not as capible as the newer tico's also these ticos are older than the modern ones port royal is what 10 years old i dont see america wanting to replace them for atleast another 30 years the carriers are to last 52 years the ohios 42 years each so they are building less units but they are making them last and they also build "future safe" vessles so in the future they can be changed to what the navy needs.

personaly i find that the units that waste the most money at the moment are

The origional 688's
The perry class FFG they need replacing by more capible modern ships
All the mine hunter force its not as capible as it should be it could be better
Auxilaries definatly need replacing most are 1970's 80's vintage
The spruance DD's are wasting money they have 31 Burkes and more building

This thread is about the sinking of the USS Valley Forge (CG 50) on 2 November. The decomissioning and handling of SSNs is a completely seperate matter, largely due to the fact that handling radioactive material is a lengthy and expensive process. As such, the two items cannot be adequately compared.

If the USN inserted a plug and gave them a VLS bank they would be upto date modern CG's simply because they dont have VLS they are seen as a burden and its too expencive to convert the now ageing hulls as the life they have left is short so whats the point of keeping an obsolete unit in service if you can do little with it? its a bit like the perrys

That would probably be less expensive than cleaning up a decommissioned SSN.