Future russian aircraft carriers. #2

Not that i wish to enter this measuring contest of the experts, but... A3 Skywarrior is one of the best navalised aircraft ever used and it was... not big... it was... huge. And it filled like 5 different roles though service. If you have adequate carrier, size doesnt count all that much. We could argue that F-14 was too big for carriers, yet it was magnificent bird that did hell of a job, imo far better platfrom that F-18SH will ever be.

Hell guys Su-34 has roots in naval use.

GunshipDemocracy wrote:

Militarov wrote:

Isos wrote:

Actually India did commit 120 million into PAK-FA project. Far from 5 billion that is expected for joint development, but..still, there was some Indian money in it.

Serioulsky ? And they complain about it not going fast ...

Well we can imagine their reactions if they gave the 5 billion ...

Well we do not know what they agreed behind the door to be honest. Tho Indians are famous for being drama queens when its about military procurements.

Drama queens? you know Bollywood and so,  yet they are the biggest Russia's weapon importer. Isnt it?

Yeah they are, but they are worlds biggest weapon importers in general together with Saudi Arabia. They import equally high amounts of weapons from France, UK..US... P8s, Apaches, Scorpens, C-17s... Rafales...

But they are by far biggest drama queens in the field. Their howtizer procurement is legendary.. you know that most of people on this forum were not even born when India started howtizer replacement programme ?

Tsavo Lion wrote:

Although LHDs r not the same as LHAs, & Russia may combine some elements of both- a "super LHD" but w/o dock, making it more like LHA; and they can still build bigger LHDs inspired by Mistal- if they didn't believe in it, why order 2 of them in France & plan to build to at home? ...

Copying America-class approach is definitely right way to go.

Been saying that for a while and now with STOVL confirmed to be in development it is most likely course.

Actually India did commit 120 million into PAK-FA project. Far from 5 billion that is expected for joint development, but..still, there was some Indian money in it.

India is contributing to the development of FFGA, they have not spent a cent on the PAK FA which is a Russian fighter programme... just the same as the Su-30MKI was a joint development between India and Russia, but India spent nothing to develop the Su-30 which the aircraft is based upon.

Well how about another alterative what if Russia were to make a heavy missile carrier that could carry hypersonic missiles with a range greater than 3000 km as well as the S-500,many Pantsir-Ms,some mid range,AA anti sub missiles and launch long range tiltrotor recon drones.

Such a vessel could perform land attack,anti sub warfare,anti surface duties,missiles defence and area air denial therefor it would be an effective ship for both defence and power projection.

The easiest way to explain it would be to say that the Russian Army is going to operate in future without the Russian Air Force and will only operate helicopters for the air role because land bases are now too vulnerable and airfields big enough for fighters to operate from are far too expensive and vulnerable.

Fixed wing aircraft offer a fast responsive way for looking and reaching targets other options lack performance in... a target appears over Soviet territory moving towards a Soviet test area and secret military base... with SAMs you either choose to ignore it or shoot it down... now whether that is KAL007 or Mathias Rust I would say big deal but for the military they actually want to know what they are shooting down, so having interceptors able to fly up and investigate during times of peace and times of war can be very very useful.

The facts are that air power is expensive and the navy wont have a lot of money, but I think helicopter carriers are a useless waste of money if you are going to be using them for all sorts of other things like mini carriers and crap like that.

The Russian Navy decided it wanted landing vessels... presumably from experience in Georgia and a realisation that in the far east they would have had serious problems doing what they did without proper naval support like real landing ships.

I think they also thought such vessels will be useful in the far north as well as they expand operations in the arctic.

The fact of the matter however is that the usefulness of such vessels as actual aircraft carriers is seriously limited and a decent carrier with catapults vastly improves the potential of even a medium sized vessel.

They don't want or need a super carrier, by the time anything they want gets built they will have hypersonic anti ship and land attack missiles so carrier based land attack is rather pointless except against the most primitive enemy.

What they need is carrier based AWACS and a decent fighter component to help protect against enemy missiles that will be hypersonic soon enough and a cat takeoff light 5th gen fighter would be vastly more useful than a VTOL or STOVL fighter and having a decent AWACS aircraft operating with it will expand its performance dramatically.

Once it is built a medium carrier with nuke propulsion wont cost that much more to operate than a small carrier with STOVL aircraft, but it will be orders of magnitude more effective.

Half its aircraft could be unmanned and just act as eyes and ears or just carry lots of missiles to be used against swarm attacks or high speed attacks... another case where a bigger carrier with more drones is better.

Hey buddy guess what F-35's are operational sure in small numbers bu countries like Norway, Isreal etc are operating them.

So you are saying IF Russia can get 20 countries together to invest in their new STOVL but have no input into its design and no access to any of its secret technologies and if they can get those 20 countries to all buy some that it might not turn into a disaster of an expensive piece of crap?

OK.

But can you list all these countries that will buy a 5th gen STOVL fighter from Russia in the next 20 years and include how many they will buy?

The main fault with the F-35 is that it is trying to be a STOVL aircraft AND an F-16 replacement... if they had eliminated the requirement for the STOVL component and just had land based and cat takeoff naval versions it would have been much cheaper and much better designed... and would still have been expensive.

Been saying that for a while and now with STOVL confirmed to be in development it is most likely course.

STOVL what though? They could be emergency jammer platforms that launch during an attack and lure active homing and passive homing missiles away from the ship...

BTW they are also developing EM catapults and a naval version of the PAK FA...

Copying America-class approach is definitely right way to go.

No, it isn't because Russias needs for carrier based aircraft are totally different.

They need aircraft to defend surface ships from attack... not to strike baby milk factories in Iraq.

The Russian Navy needs enhanced power projection capabilities. Limiting Russias military to self defence will ultimatley result In Russia being just a no go zone for other countries with no real influence an no allies.

Russian missile development is going very well however Russia has no ship other than the Admiral Nakimov that has both the endurance required for long range operations and the ability to launch these missiles and even then it can only eliminate a maximum of 80 targets before having to return to port.

The Lider class can only carry 64 cruise missiles making its power projection limited aswell and I have doubts Russia will operate enough Lider class destroyers to provide reliable support in a Syria style war.

The Shtorm class is the logical solution to the Russian Navys lack of power projection abilities and it would still be able to effectively combat nato and provied air support to its fleet.

GarryB wrote:

Copying America-class approach is definitely right way to go.

No, it isn't because Russias needs for carrier based aircraft are totally different.

They need aircraft to defend surface ships from attack... not to strike baby milk factories in Iraq.

Bombing baby milk factories is pretty much only role carriers have left these days. They won't be protecting anything in this day and age. WW2 is over. Even Cold War is (not that they would have been of much use then as well)

The-thing-next-door wrote:
.........
The Shtorm class is the logical solution to the Russian Navys lack of power projection abilities and it would still be able to effectively combat nato and provied air support to its fleet.

Again, missiles and submarines. That is how it's done now. At least against enemy that has enough money to afford Navy.

Power projection is for mountain tribes and, like Garry mentioned, baby milk factories (I don't see why they should be off limits, precedent has been set). It can easily be done with small carriers.

And if they even wanted status symbol like Shtorm-class you need to keep in mind that they are having massive problems with construction of small stuff like frigates.

So first things first, other stuff later and stupid useless crap like supercarriers much much later or better yet never.

Waste not, want not.

No it is not.

Point in case, if you operate SSBNs, a major requirement is to grant them the highest grade of security you can attain.

A medium sized carrier, with AWACS and long endurance fighters, create by itself a security bubble hundreds of km large in radius.

Within that security bubble, your own ASW assets, both airborne and naval, can operate to search and chase enemy's SSNs with decent aecurity, while both enemy's airborne and surface ASW assets are negated the freedom to chase your SSBNs within that security bubble.

It means you can deploy thr full range of ASW assets against enemy's SSNs, while the enemy is left only with SSNs to chase your SSBNs and it can not even provide them a safe environment.

Other main role of a aircraft carrier is to force the opponent to disperse its own resources.

A true classic case, because India has aircraft carriers, Pakistan struggle to maintain a credible defensive screen all along its coast, spending resources badly needed on its eastern frontier.

The same could be applied, to name two examples, in the artic region and in the northern scandinavian coast.

Having the ability to deploy there a real aircraft carrier, force the opponent to make provisions to counter it even without the carrier really moving there.

And while any airfield are fixed targets easily engaged with any long range weapon system an opponent has in its inventory, an aircraft carrier is a full fledged airbase able to move wherever deemed useful, forcing first and foremost to create defenses wherever it could operste against you, then forcing to create a credible searching and tracking system, and last reducing your attack's means to those able to engage mobile targets only.

It is funny advocading the end of the carriers' era, right when quite everyone is trying hard to field new and more powerful carriers.

The british stepped up from the Invincible class to the Queen Elizabeth class (70.000 tons at full load), the indians are building a new and larger aircraft carrier right after having induced in service Vikramaditya, the italians built the Cavour (27.000 tons at full load) to replace Garibaldi (13.000 tons only), the french are always looking a way to build a second carrier past the Charles de Gaulle, the chinese are building right now their second aircraft carrier, and perhaps their third aircraft carrier too.

The USA have not even the slighest idea to get rid of their CVNs, notwithsranding the fact they operate the largest, bigger and most capable LHD/LHA fleet in the world.

So, who is believing in the real world that the carriers will have no future?

I can not find any country at all.

PapaDragon wrote:

GarryB wrote:

Copying America-class approach is definitely right way to go.

No, it isn't because Russias needs for carrier based aircraft are totally different.

They need aircraft to defend surface ships from attack... not to strike baby milk factories in Iraq.

Bombing baby milk factories is pretty much only role carriers have left these days. They won't be protecting anything in this day and age. WW2 is over. Even Cold War is (not that they would have been of much use then as well)

The-thing-next-door wrote:
.........
The Shtorm class is the logical solution to the Russian Navys lack of power projection abilities and it would still be able to effectively combat nato and provied air support to its fleet.

Again, missiles and submarines. That is how it's done now. At least against enemy that has enough money to afford Navy.

Power projection is for mountain tribes and, like Garry mentioned, baby milk factories (I don't see why they should be off limits, precedent has been set). It can easily be done with small carriers.

And if they even wanted status symbol like Shtorm-class you need to keep in mind that they are having massive problems with construction of small stuff like frigates.

So first things first, other stuff later and stupid useless crap like supercarriers much much later or better yet never.

Waste not, want not.

If missiles are what the Russian navy wants why the bloody hell would they waste enough money to build atleast 5 Shtorms on LHDs with VTOL?

If missiles are what the navy wants then they don't want VTOL.

One possible alternitive to the Shtorm would be a heavy nuclear powered missile cruiser with the ability to carry more than 100 long range cruise missiles but ofcourse you would disagree because vessels capable of commanding and supporting other vessels are a bad Idea and would comprimise the entire Russian navy.

For the last time VTOL as of now is over expensive and under performing.

I find i must ask you what ordinance would this hypothetical Russian VTOL fighter carry? Will it be able to perform anti ship,anti air and land attack missions with greater performance than the SU-57?

Or will it be capable of faster than light travel and be able to operate as a medium bomber,long range interceptor,infantry transport,gunship,fighter,and be armed with a super deathray just incase you need to melt a small country that desides to side with the enemy?

Ultimateley if it is not more effective than the Shtorm class then it does not justify the cost of its development and the option to have a few Shtoms and some navalised SU-57s is both more effective and cheaper therefore LHDs with VTOL aircraft are not worth thier cost.

GunshipDemocracy wrote:

eehnie wrote:

eehnie wrote:

GunshipDemocracy wrote:

eehnie wrote:
says enough about your economic skills.

If the people is not accepting your arguments is because they are very weak.

PAK-FA was developed by ~$20blns ,  of which India paid like half.  BTW remind me what is with your budgeting or project management skills? you never managed neither budget nor project. Then please dont talk about something you have little idea of

And your experiencie? My experience is enough to see this in your numbers:

https://www.gao.gov/new.items/d02298.pdf

$21.0 Billion = Development costs F-22

GunshipDemocracy wrote:PAK-FA was developed by ~$20blns ,  of which India paid like half.

http://www.jsf.mil/news/docs/20160324_Fact-Sheet.pdf

$55.1 Billion = Development costs F-35 (only Research, Development, Test and Evaluation costs, nothing of procurement, nothing of military construction)

GunshipDemocracy wrote:Fighters - say 10-12blns to develop.  Where UAE also is interested in export. Russian part5-6 bllions.

https://fas.org/sgp/crs/weapons/RS20643.pdf

$04.7 Billion = Development cost G Ford Aircraft Carriers
$12.9 Billion = Cost per unit (CV-78 G Ford Aircraft Carrier)
$11.4 Billion = Cost per unit (CV-79 JF Kennedy Aircraft Carrier)
$13.0 Billion = Cost per unit (CV-80 Enterprise Aircraft Carrier)
$13.0 Billion = My estimation of the Cost per unit (CV-81 ????? Aircraft Carrier)
$55.0 Billion = Total cost of development of the G Ford Aircraft Carriers plus construction of the 4 aircraft carriers

GunshipDemocracy wrote:Shtorm? 1x14 blns+ 1 bln for catapult

Awesomely in your projections for the main fighter and the heavy aircraft carrier the costs would be in tie with the costs for the US, while the costs for the "VTOL" aircraft are for Russia 1/5 of the costs of the US (discount of the 80%, nothing less), that goes to 1/10 (discount of the 90%) thanks to the United Arab Emirates.

Are you kidding us? Do you want really to sustain these numbers?

Why this discount of the 80% GunshipDemocracy, while the rest remain like in the US?

apart that Russia doesn't need any Nimitz kinda carrier with current doctrine anyway , tell me what fighter you want to see on deck? PAK FA? or MiG-41? no other will be enough viable option in 2030s.  And you did compare surface needed to store PAK FA and  F-35 right? so which is smaller? 
Hint: why F-22 was never navalized?

Really, not answering the question. Finding some scape ways.

Well at this point is quite clear your numbers have not a fair basis. There is nothing real that allows to defend a discount of the 80% in the development of a "VTOL" fighter while you are defending similar costs than in the US for main fighters and aircraft carriers.

Under a fair analysis is quite clear that the development of aircrafts is more expensive than the development of aircraft carriers. Here is where Russia will find the biggest savings of money. Not only in the development of multiple aircrafts, also in the development of a minimum number of variants.

Around the 2030s Russia will be developing also a successor for the Su-34. Obviously the option of maximum interest for aircraft carriers is the Su-57. If possible, even the main variant of the Su-57, to avoid development costs of variants and of other aircrafts. And also to avoid a reduced specific fleet.

Withe the development of a naval variant of the Su-57 there is a clear correlation. To begin we know that the Su-57 needs only around 330m for landing, while the initial variant of the Su-27/30/33/35 needs around 450m. It means that proportionally, the potential effort in a naval variant to allow the Su-57 to operate from aircraft carriers is fairly lower than the effort to create the Su-33 from the Su-27, and as consequence the cost will be fairly lower.

Also, there is a clear correlation between the cost in the development of a naval variant of the Su-57 and the size of the future Russian aircraft carrier. In a big aircraft carrier the cost of a naval variant can begin by 0, if the main variant of the Su-57 can operate comfortably in the aircraft carrier. And reducing the size of the aircraft carrier, the cost of a naval variant of the Su-57 begins to increase likely exponentially, until to reach a reduction of the size of the aircraft carrier, that allows not the use of a naval variant of the Su-57.

In a fair projection of costs of the different projects for Russia, the "discounts" comparing to the costs in the US should be approximately the same in the three cases, maybe bigger in the case of the F-35 because of the development of 3 variants, but not with the difference you said. To be fair, if your projection in the case of the "VTOL" fighter is a cost 80% lower than in the US, the projection in the case of the main aircraft and the aircraft carrier needs to be of a cost 70% lower than in the US at worst. This means:

For the US:
https://www.gao.gov/new.items/d02298.pdf
$21.0 Billion = Development costs F-22
http://www.jsf.mil/news/docs/20160324_Fact-Sheet.pdf
$55.1 Billion = Development costs F-35 (only Research, Development, Test and Evaluation costs, nothing of procurement, nothing of military construction)
https://fas.org/sgp/crs/weapons/RS20643.pdf
$04.7 Billion = Development cost G Ford Aircraft Carriers
$12.9 Billion = Cost per unit (CV-78 G Ford Aircraft Carrier)

For Russia (70% lower in the main fighter and aircraft carriers, 80% lower in "VTOL" fighter):
- without link to official data still
$6.30 Billion = Development costs Su-57 (PAK-FA) (to be confirmed)
- without link to official data still
$11.02 Billion = Development costs "VTOL" Fighter (only Research, Development, Test and Evaluation costs, nothing of procurement, nothing of military construction)
- without link to official data still
$1.41 Billion = Development cost Project 23000 Aircraft Carrier
$3.87 Billion = Cost per unit of the first unit of the Project 23000

It would be necessary to check the costs of development of the Su-57 to fix the real proportions (not easy for me with the budget documents in Russian), but still, it is fair to say that the cost of development and construction of the first aircraft carrier of the Project 23000 would be less than a half of the cost of the development of a new "VTOL" fighter.

And returning to the Russian doctrine, the Project 23000 is a fairly good weapon in order to reach non-nuclear deterrence, unlike other options that we see exposed here. As Multirole Aircraft Carrier, the Project 23000 is also a fairly good weapon to work on sea denial, and also to work in the long range missile strategy. Fairly and significantly better than every other option of aircraft/helicopter carrier exposed here.

The decission about the construction of the first unit of the Project 23000 is not a question of optimism, is a question of priorities.

The-thing-next-door wrote:.....
If missiles are what the Russian navy wants why the bloody hell would they waste enough money to build atleast 5 Shtorms on LHDs with VTOL?......

5 Shtorms = 1 VTOL/LHD?

Now you have gone full eehenie. Never go full eehenie.

The-thing-next-door wrote:....
I find i must ask you what ordinance would this hypothetical Russian VTOL fighter carry?.....

More than enough to fulfill it's core purpose: bombing mountain tribes, baby milk factories and flying Russian flag atop sufficiently large, fully erect geopolitical dick.

Peŕrier wrote:....
The USA have not even the slighest idea to get rid of their CVNs.....

Of course they don't just like powers of old had no idea how to get rid of their battleships until they started getting sunk en-masse by cheap aircraft back in WW2.

It's called fighting yesterday's war. Nothing new or unusual.

Now replace battleships with CVN's and aircraft with missiles and you should get up-to-date picture.

As it seems, India, UK, France, China, Italy, to some extent even Brazil have no idea how to get rid of their aircraft carrierrs too, up to the point of being building new ones even right now.

Maybe they are all wrong.

PapaDragon wrote:Of course they don't just like powers of old had no idea how to get rid of their battleships until they started getting sunk en-masse by cheap aircraft back in WW2.

It's called fighting yesterday's war. Nothing new or unusual.

Now replace battleships with CVN's and aircraft with missiles and you should get up-to-date picture.

100% agree. Hypersonic weapons will sound the final death-knell of huge flat-tops wallowing around on the high seas. IMHO, the practical defense of 100k ton behemoths from swarms of M5-M8 missiles (or M15 HGVs) will prove to be an impossibility, and the USN brass are in total self-denial mode as they can't imagine having to give up their big toys. Huge CVNs will remain useful against 2nd & 3rd tier regional powers who lack self-defense abilities, but against peer adversaries? No, such vessels will simply become liabilities due to factors such as their great expense, their huge complement of 5K personnel per hull, and the catastrophic impact on morale in the event of their loss.

Big_Gazza wrote:

PapaDragon wrote:Of course they don't just like powers of old had no idea how to get rid of their battleships until they started getting sunk en-masse by cheap aircraft back in WW2.

It's called fighting yesterday's war. Nothing new or unusual.

Now replace battleships with CVN's and aircraft with missiles and you should get up-to-date picture.

100% agree.  Hypersonic weapons will sound the final death-knell of huge flat-tops wallowing around on the high seas.  IMHO, the practical defense of 100k ton behemoths from swarms of M5-M8 missiles (or M15 HGVs) will prove to be an impossibility, and the USN brass are in total self-denial mode as they can't imagine having to give up their big toys.  Huge CVNs will remain useful against 2nd & 3rd tier regional powers who lack self-defense abilities, but against peer adversaries?  No, such vessels will simply become liabilities due to factors such as their great expense, their huge complement of 5K personnel per hull, and the catastrophic impact on morale in the event of their loss.

Even against Oniks and Kh-32 salvos they are not safe... If they develop and anti-ship iskander with longer range then they are dead ships. But russia needs more awacs and Il-38 aircrafts to detect them.

Isos wrote:Even against Oniks and Kh-32 salvos they are not safe... If they develop and anti-ship iskander with longer range then they are dead ships. But russia needs more awacs and Il-38 aircrafts to detect them.

Agreed, but its hypersonics that will finally force a grudging acceptance of this fact among the Carrier-philes.

Regarding surveillance, I think that space-based assets will be the primary means (with aircraft & drones being a backup), and that both Russia and (especially) China should develop light naval recon/ELINT and data relay satellites that can be deployed as a rapid response surveillance net in times of tension, and maintain an inventory of such ready-to-launch birds. Standardized satellites in sealed containers and mounted to solid-propellant launchers on mobile TELs. If enemy naval forces can be spotted and tracked in real time, and the surveillance maintained in event of a hostile action, I believe that massed hypersonic/supersonic missiles salvos launched from both shore-based and aircraft launcher will render obsolete the concept of massed naval fleets.

Big_Gazza wrote:

Isos wrote:Even against Oniks and Kh-32 salvos they are not safe... If they develop and anti-ship iskander with longer range then they are dead ships. But russia needs more awacs and Il-38 aircrafts to detect them.

Agreed, but its hypersonics that will finally force a grudging acceptance of this fact among the Carrier-philes.  

Regarding surveillance, I think that space-based assets will be the primary means (with aircraft & drones being a backup), and that both Russia and (especially) China should develop light naval recon/ELINT and data relay satellites that can be deployed as a rapid response surveillance net in times of tension, and maintain an inventory of such ready-to-launch birds.  Standardized satellites in sealed containers and mounted to solid-propellant launchers on mobile TELs.  If enemy naval forces can be spotted and tracked in real time, and the surveillance maintained in event of a hostile action, I believe that massed hypersonic/supersonic missiles salvos launched from both shore-based and aircraft launcher will render obsolete the concept of massed naval fleets.  

Air defence system will be able to destroy satellite and you can be sure that even now russia usa and china have weapons against them. Modern radars on awacs can detect naval battle groups from far away. I would put my money on them. Satellites are good for peace time to have a look on the enemy.

You still need ships to protect your shores and your civilian ships against other subs and ships or pirates. So you will need some fighters with them in order to not be affected by the radar horizon of your naval radar so carriers are not so bad.

US tactics of sending them near shores will be obsolete but in the open ocean it allows you to send your fighters attack oposing forces while being out of range.

That's why most of poeple think a medium carrier is good enough for russia to protect a naval group. Russia will never use a carrier like usa to bomb a country 10 000km away.

Big_Gazza wrote:

Isos wrote:Even against Oniks and Kh-32 salvos they are not safe... If they develop and anti-ship iskander with longer range then they are dead ships. But russia needs more awacs and Il-38 aircrafts to detect them.

Agreed, but its hypersonics that will finally force a grudging acceptance of this fact among the Carrier-philes.  

Regarding surveillance, I think that space-based assets will be the primary means (with aircraft & drones being a backup), and that both Russia and (especially) China should develop light naval recon/ELINT and data relay satellites that can be deployed as a rapid response surveillance net in times of tension, and maintain an inventory of such ready-to-launch birds.  Standardized satellites in sealed containers and mounted to solid-propellant launchers on mobile TELs.  If enemy naval forces can be spotted and tracked in real time, and the surveillance maintained in event of a hostile action, I believe that massed hypersonic/supersonic missiles salvos launched from both shore-based and aircraft launcher will render obsolete the concept of massed naval fleets.  

Until now, i.e. with present technological level, it doesn't work that way.

Surveillance satellites are huge, heavy and needs days of tests after reaching their intended orbit before becoming operational.

In the 90ies the USA tried the concept of small, low orbit surveillance satellites.

The idea was to replace the classical satellites with a huge constellation of relatively cheap and small low orbit ones.

The whole concept proved to be a failure because the low orbit dictated very quick orbits, denying any chance to observe a target long enough to positively identifying and classifying it.

Even the idea to pass targets between several satellites following the same orbit proved too hard and prone to failures.

So there is no cheap and rapidly deployable alternative, when a major war will start, the satellites already operational and those already in orbit and tested but kept in reserve, will be the only satellites anyone would have a chance to use.

It seems to be more promising the idea of swarms of little UAV deployed to cover very large areas, but the idea itself implies the use of relatively small ones, operating not that far away from their base.

Again, the concept requires them to be ship based, and to deploy them in numbers you will need either a large number of ships in a single area, or some specialized ship.

Whatever people could think, carrier era is not ending nor is even nearing its end.

Carrier are and will remain the most powerful and flexible weapon system at sea, no supersonic or hypersonic or even ballistic missile will ever change this fact.

Whatever missile will be deployed, a carrier will be able to launch a similar missile against enemy's launching positions through its aircrafts, remaining out of range.

There is simply nothing in the world that could make obsolete the aircraft carrier, the same way nothing could make obsolete at land an airbase with its aircrafts.

Nothing in the space, nothing in the air, nothing at sea, nothing under the sea.

Whatever the new threads, they will just force carriers to deploy new countermeasures, but the carriers will stay the best weapon at sea.

Just like at land, where whatever the counteraviation and surface to air weapons that could be developed won't change the reign of the aircraft, and the related airbases.

Isos wrote:Air defence system will be able to destroy satellite and you can be sure that even now russia usa and china have weapons against them. Modern radars on awacs can detect naval battle groups from far away. I would put my money on them. Satellites are good for peace time to have a look on the enemy.

You still need ships to protect your shores and your civilian ships against other subs and ships or pirates. So you will need some fighters with them in order to not be affected by the radar horizon of your naval radar so carriers are not so bad.

US tactics of sending them near shores will be obsolete but in the open ocean it allows you to send your fighters  attack oposing forces while being out of range.

That's why most of poeple think a medium carrier is good enough for russia to protect a naval group. Russia will never use a carrier like usa to bomb a country 10 000km away.

Prior to any attack by naval forces, the enemy needs to mobilise and gather his forces. That's when you signal your resolve and enhance your surveillance capabilities with additional satellites.  We are watching...  We know were your ships are...  AWACS can detect surface forces, but they are vulnerable to carrier-based air superiority, and they lack the wide-scale continuous coverage that orbital assets can potentially provide.

Shooting down satellites is an act of war, and could trigger an immediate response. Lets face it, if the USN were to assemble several CBGs off the Chinese coast in times of tension and then proceed to shoot down Chinese surveillance birds, I'd expect the CCP leadership to know what comes next.  Russia would be no different.

US CVNs are not a significant threat if they are outside of the effective range of carrier-based aviation.  The point to having anti-surface IRBMs and hypersonic/supersonic AShMs is to raise the threat environment such that the USN is not prepared to risk its hugely expensive flat-tops close to Chinese/Russian waters.  The USN can always use cruise missiles, which have long range, but numbers are limited and an inability to effectively use aviation strike forces robs the USN of much of its offensive punch.

BTW Russian carriers fulfill a very different role to USN CVNs.  Old Kiev-class were intended to assist in the defenses of SSBN bastions, with heavy AShMs for killing surface units attempting to penetrate defended waters, and helos for performing ASW defense against SSNs attempting to interdict the boomers.  Kuznetsov was intended for similar role, but with enhanced air-superiority to guard against USN carrier aviation.  These roles are still valid, especially when supported by land/air-based missile barrages of the sort we are discussing.  

Peŕrier wrote:Until now, i.e. with present technological level, it doesn't work that way.

Surveillance satellites are huge, heavy and needs days of tests after reaching their intended orbit before becoming operational.

In the 90ies the USA tried the concept of small, low orbit surveillance satellites.

The idea was to replace the classical satellites with a huge constellation of relatively cheap and small low orbit ones.

The whole concept proved to be a failure because the low orbit dictated very quick orbits, denying any chance to observe a target long enough to positively identifying and classifying it.

Even the idea to pass targets between several satellites following the same orbit proved too hard and prone to failures.

So there is no cheap and rapidly deployable alternative, when a major war will start, the satellites already operational and those already in orbit and tested but kept in reserve, will be the only satellites anyone would have a chance to use

Technology moves on (eg sensors, electronics, communications, networking tech), and what was not feasible in the 90s can become feasible in the future.  Heavy recon/ELINT sats in high orbit and a constellation of replaceable signals-intel birds in low orbits makes eminent sense.   In any case, surveillance systems will utilise multiple techniques and technologies, and I don't accept that large naval forces can assemble to attack continental landmasses with carrier-based aviation and not be subject to effective surveillance...

Peŕrier wrote:It seems to be more promising the idea of swarms of little UAV deployed to cover very large areas, but the idea itself implies the use of relatively small ones, operating not that far away from their base.

Again, the concept requires them to be ship based, and to deploy them in numbers you will need either a large number of ships in a single area, or some specialized ship.

No-one denies UAVs can be very useful for area surveillance, but they have the same limitations as any manned aircraft and are vulnerable to interdiction or jamming/EW.

Peŕrier wrote:Carrier are and will remain the most powerful and flexible weapon system at sea, no supersonic or hypersonic or even ballistic missile will ever change this fact.

Whatever missile will be deployed, a carrier will be able to launch a similar missile against enemy's launching positions through its aircrafts, remaining out of range.

That is simply an assertion based on personal viewpoint.  Commonsense makes it abundantly clear that it is easier to attack a 100k ton vessel sitting in the open sea than it will be to defend it. It is FAR easier to develop a weapon that can attack a large ship than it is develop a countermeasure system that can detect, track and reliably intercept an incoming small, fast and maneuverable missile, especially in waves/swarms.

Additionally, why do you think that a carrier can attack an enemy launch position with it aircraft and remain out of range???  eg DF-41s are certainly out of range of carrier aviation, and the TELs can't be tracked in real-time so tomahawks are not an answer...  or Chinese AShM launched by J-20 naval attack fighters will have broadly equal overall range to CVN strike planes.  The idea that a CBG can simply sit in open sea and prevent their opponent from launching missiles is nonsensical.

Peŕrier wrote:There is simply nothing in the world that could make obsolete the aircraft carrier, the same way nothing could make obsolete at land an airbase with its aircrafts.

Nothing in the space, nothing in the air, nothing at sea, nothing under the sea.

Whatever the new threads, they will just force carriers to deploy new countermeasures, but the carriers will stay the best weapon at sea.

..except that carriers can be damaged so they cannot launch or recover aircraft, and they can be SUNK.  Airbases are distributed facilities and are much less fragile, they can be repaired, and holes in airstrips can be filled in.

Countermeasures?  Such as lasers or railguns?     yeah sure, just keep clinging onto that life-preserver and dream your little dreams of exceptional invulnerability....

Well, USA is not going at war with russia or china anyway. Their carriers are here to destroy and control weeker countries and control the pacific and they did the job. They have 0 interest attacking russian or chinese mainland.

The most probable scenario is that china build its blue force and tries to get more islands so usa could send its navy for a just a limited naval war. Far from its bases chinese navy has 0 chance against us navy. Even with their carriers and j 15 which is not mature at all compared to f 18 and f 35.

PapaDragon wrote:

Peŕrier wrote:....
The USA have not even the slighest idea to get rid of their CVNs.....

Of course they don't just like powers of old had no idea how to get rid of their battleships until they started getting sunk en-masse by cheap aircraft back in WW2.

It's called fighting yesterday's war. Nothing new or unusual.

Now replace battleships with CVN's and aircraft with missiles and you should get up-to-date picture.

Wow you sound just like those people that repeatedly insist the the tank is obsolete and have been insisting since the bloody 1960s yet tanks are still used designed and produced.

Not to mention how Khrushchev even supported development of tank alternatives but to no avail and like I said tanks are still here.

One thing to also note just because the Russian navy can deal with carriers relatively easily does not mean they are obsolete as Russia usually makes the best missiles on the planet while nato countries would have a very hard time trying to put a scratch on a Shtorms paint job as they do not even have any air launched anti ship missiles with a range greater than the 600 km range of the S-500 that the Lider class will carry nor do they have any hypersonic missiles.

The-thing-next-door wrote:........

One thing to also note just because the Russian navy can deal with carriers relatively easily does not mean they are obsolete as Russia usually makes the best missiles on the planet while nato countries would have a very hard time trying to put a scratch on a Shtorms paint job as they do not even have any air launched anti ship missiles with a range greater than the 600 km range of the S-500 that the Lider class will carry nor do they have any hypersonic missiles.

Just because Russia managed to crack hypersonic missiles first does not mean that USA and others will be standing still.

Developing and building Russian CVN would take decades, more than enough time for USA to catch up hypersonic development several times over. You think they will be standing still? They are working on it already, hell they started working on it before Russia did.

Back in '45 USA thought that they will have nuclear monopoly for decades at least. They realized they were fooling themselves once USSR dropped first nuclear weapon of their own not too long after.

For Russia to think that they will have hypersonic advantage forever would be equally naive.

Hypersonic missile are hypersonic at high altitude. Detecting them will be easy.

Interception is always improved just compare s 300p and s 400.

New methodes can be made like a thousands of small drones flying around the ship so it will make a bubble and exploding when a mossiles is near them.

And also you can put alll the air defence system from a cruiser on a carrier. Why would it then be obsolate while the cruiser or the frigate isn't while it has also fighter on it ?

Satellites are highly sensitive Items, up to now there is little chance somebody would risk one with a hurried up launch.

Actually, It is not feasible to launch a satellite without weeks long arrangenents.

That means that barring a very long escalation, there is little to no hope at all to expand your constellation in time of crysis.

Small, low orbit satellites could work in the future, but the existence of High altitude, long Endurance UAVs makes their developement even more dubious.

Even being "small" and "cheap", such satellites will cost a little fortune each, and shooting them down is becoming year by year more trivial, while replacing just one of them would require days or weeks.

This is why UAVs are being considerered: replacing a shot down one requires hours, if not even less.

And you have the ability to change the payload quite easily, while any satellite will have the same payload along the whole of its lifespan.