Will battleships ever be brought back?
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Will battleships ever be brought back?
Steam isn’t dead, but it is a technology of the past—just like 16-inch guns. Built to duel Japan in World War II, in fact, battleships were recommissioned for the Korean War, the Vietnam War, and the Cold War. …
Are battleships still relevant?
Even in spite of their huge firepower and protection, battleships were increasingly vulnerable to much smaller and relatively inexpensive weapons: initially the torpedo and the naval mine, and later aircraft and the guided missile. Many World War II-era battleships remain in use today as museum ships.
Can battleships be modernized?
The battleships were modernized to include cruise missiles, ship-killing missiles and Phalanx point-defense guns. The resulting ship, a “battlecarrier,” was merely one of many schemes over the span of 30 years to modernize the most powerful American battleships ever built.
Does the US Navy still build cruisers?
The U.S. fleet has 22 Ticonderoga-class cruisers. The 9,800-ton Ticos aren’t the biggest surface combatants in the fleet—that honorific belongs to the three 15,900-ton Zumwalt-class destroyers. The current Flight IIA Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, each displacing around 9,500 tons, boast 96 cells apiece.
Are we building a new aircraft carrier?
It is currently under construction at Newport News Shipbuilding in Virginia and will be commissioned in 2020.
Are the old battleships of the US Navy coming back?
Long gone are the days where the United States Navy roamed the seas with heavily-armed battleships as its primary capital ships. Not everyone who talks naval warfare entirely agrees with mothballing the biggest guns of the American Navy, but there’s a reason the old battleships are gone – and a reason they’re never coming back.
By the 20th Century, naval powers were churning out ships with speed, firepower, and armor in a race to be able to sink the other side’s seafaring battleships. Once the two sides saw each other, it was on.
What will the future of battleships look like?
While the effective range of antiship missiles will only continue to grow, a long-distance striking capability will still be useful against other targets, including island garrisons, air bases and enemy ships. Fourth, the battleships will be purely offensive weapons designed to attack targets on land and at sea.
What happened to the battleships of World War II?
The chief surface ships of the U.S. Navy (USN) today displace less than a quarter that of the battleships of World War II. Post-WWII ships also, broadly speaking, discarded the idea of armor as a means of ensuring survivability. There remains considerable debate as to how traditional battleship belt (side) armor could resist cruise missiles.