The Perry wasn't really a success. In order to conserve costs, they were built without enough space aboard to take upgrades as time passed, so very quickly they became obsolete and the single screw design meant that if you had engine problems, you needed to be towed back to port.
There was actually some talk of giving FFGs a RAM. I don't think it's a bad idea necessarily and since they took the missile launcher out, the missile control room underneath the bridge is basically just unused space. Lord knows, a lot of countries have been happy to buy them and replace the old stuff with new stuff.
I think there's something to be said for the LCS being the triumph of buzzwords over good design, although there are some good things about it. The original concept (Streetfighter) was a good idea. Unfortunately, if history is any guide then almost every good idea for a ship design is unrecognizable by the time the Navy is done with it. Look at how destroyers in World War II were relentlessly designed, redesigned and modified. Sometimes I think the best way to look at a ship is exactly how the LCS is designed; a platform on which to stick modular packages of weapons and sensors.
If they put the surface warfare package aboard, LCS will have seriously big teeth with all the precision attack missiles, the gun, the 0.50cals, plus the Seahawk with Hellfires and a Firescout UAV. That's more than enough for a coastal duel with a group of missile boats.
I'm skeptical of the ASW package, because there's serious limitations on a lot of the offboard sensors they say will take the place of a hull mounted sonar. I predict that eventually they'll decide to accept a little deeper draft in favor of a hull mounted active sonar and a towed array if they can. Otherwise, it's just going to be a glorified helicopter carrier, although one can argue (not necessarily incorrectly) that the FFG7 was essentially that in an ASW role too. The truth is that ASW is hard for surface ships.
The mine warfare package will be nice too because compared to existing minehunters, the LCS will have much better self defense capability. This isn't to say that it's good enough to go without an AEGIS ship or even another LCS nearby, but I'd rather be on an LCS than an Osprey.
I'm also skeptical that speed is going to really buy them that much. The truth is that they'll probably rarely get to take advantage of it tactically and strategically they lack the endurance to make use of it. It might make a good escort for a JHSV which will be equivilently fast, but that's all I see them using it for. Warships often operate in small groups to take advantage of each other's complimentary capabilities, so you're always limited by the slowest ship in the group. That means in practice, they'll frequently not operate much faster than the AEGIS ships that they're going to need to keep nearby in order to stand a chance of surviving a cruise missile raid.
The rear boat ramp is a good idea, because it means they can maybe use them sometimes like PCs, which the Navy could DEFINITELY use some more of. Honestly, I don't know why more people interested in naval matters don't talk more about PCs. They've actually seen combat in Iraq, which one can't claim for AEGIS ships aside from shooting cruise missiles. Unfortunately, the Navy's promotion system favors CRUDES, aviation and submarine officers, so small surface combatants like PCs, amphibs and minehunters, which are probably more relevant to the present day don't get the attention they deserve.
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Originally Posted by JALU3
Why couldn't they take a success hull like the Perry, Up its armor, give it a small VLS pack (12 tubes), Sea RAM, a bofor , and give it a larger engine? Or is this asking to much of the small hull?
If the Liberty is only slightly smaller than a Perry-Long than what was the point besides the faster hull? I mean theoretically it is less capable in duration and system capability.
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