
USS Carl Vinson has first UAV command center install aboard an aircraft carrier - protomyth
http://www.navy.mil/submit/display.asp?story_id=94306
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nostrademons
This reminds me a lot of the development of aircraft carriers during WW1 and
the interwar period.

At first, all aircraft carriers were converted
tankers/freighters/cruisers/etc, and aircraft were only used for scouting
(much like drones here will be used as tankers). Then came the converted
battlecruisers - the capital ships of the day, much like the USS Carl Vinson
is now. Even then, people didn't trust carrier-based air power: Lexington and
Saratoga had a full suite of 8-inch guns, in case they ended up in a surface
engagement. It was only in the run up to war in the late-30s that major
parties started commissioning purpose-built aircraft carriers, and then only
in small numbers.

I predict that in the next major conflict, aircraft carriers will be utterly
useless, most of our big flat-tops will be sunk in the first couple months,
and the bulk of combat will fall to a large fleet of inexpensive drones. And
then the AI controlling them will gain sentience and we'll be forced to send
one of these drones back in time to save John Connor so that he can become the
leader of the Resistance as they take over humanity...

~~~
ChuckMcM
I'm not sure I want to be there if they carriers have been sunk :-).

That said, Carrier survivability is a pretty big deal in naval doctrine,
between the ring of cruisers and destroyers in a typical battle group
providing ship missile defense to ABM defense from the Aegis class cruisers,
and subs and aircraft providing ASW defense. It is going to be pretty hard to
get close enough to a carrier to sink it in a 'hot war' situation. And while I
could see one or two getting taken out while the country was still at Defcon 3
or 4, once one got hit that would all change.

I got to tour the Carl Vinson when it was in Oakland, its a pretty amazing
ship. The MQ-XX program is one where ships like the Carl Vinson can add
additional air patrol and farther over the horizon engagements. That would
seem to extend the depth of the defense.

~~~
nostrademons
The way to kill a carrier strike group today is to make them run out of
bullets.

An Arleigh-burke class destroyer carries 96 missiles, a Ticonderoga carries
122. Assuming you've got 2 squadrons of F-18s overhead, that's 2 * 12 * 6 =
144 additional missiles. Additionally, you've got Phalanxes etc. for close in
warfare, capable of engaging another couple dozen targets. The CSG as a whole
can engage (rough order of magnitude) 1000 simultaneous targets.

What happens if you send in 10,000 flying bombs simultaneously?

Each of these would be exceptionally simple: a couple thousand pounds of TNT
or other explosive, a basic aluminum airframe, control servos, a lot of fuel
(enough for a couple thousand mile range), a small jet or even turboprop
engine, a microchip, and a communications uplink. You could probably build
this for about $10K with COTS hardware. $10K * 10K missiles = $100M, to sink a
carrier group that cost tens of billions and carries 7500 lives.

In a one-to-one contest with modern U.S. weaponry, every single one of these
devices would lose. The point is to force that 1:1 tradeoff, because you have
more than an order of magnitude more weaponry.

All of U.S. military doctrine is based on the assumption that manpower is the
limiting resource. You can't currently launch a 10,000-plane aerial attack on
a CSG, because most nations aren't willing to sacrifice 10,000 pilots in a
suicide mission, and even if they were, you can't coordinate 10,000 people in
any meaningful way, nor do you have the airfield or aircraft capacity for it.
You _can_ coordinate 10,000 microchips in a meaningful way, and these drones
can be a lot smaller and launch off of carriers that are themselves drones (or
freighters, or fishing boats, or airliners, or other craft that look a lot
like civilian vessels) and hence expendable.

~~~
toomuchtodo
> The way to kill a carrier strike group today is to make them run out of
> bullets.

Nuclear powered vessel (all latest carriers?) + lazed weapon = you'll never
run out of ammo.

[http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/video/2014/dec/10/us-
navy...](http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/video/2014/dec/10/us-navy-laser-
weapon-video)

"The US navy demonstrated its new 30-kilowatt laser weapon system in the
Persian Gulf, near Iranian waters. The device, which is 30 million times more
powerful than a laser pointer, is capable of targeting mounted weapons systems
on fast-moving boats, and destroying drones in mid-flight. According to the
navy, a much more powerful 150 kilowatt system is currently in development"

This was two years ago.

~~~
stcredzero
Railguns with inert slugs. The things will have a 200+ mile range and you can
store and reload without having to worry about explosive propellant. Lots more
bang for the buck. Lots more ammo storable onboard.

~~~
ChuckMcM
These are the real game changers for destroyers and cruisers. The combination,
lasers and rail guns, is probably going to be the standard of what you have to
deal with in 15 - 20 years.

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vlehto
Being UAV has relatively little to do with anything. Background: Typical 4th
generation fighter is about 20 tons. 5 tons fuel, 3 tons engines, 30%
structures = 6 tons. 2 tons payload. ~400kg internal cannon with rounds and
mount. Ton of avionics and flares and such. Ton of radar+flir+optics etc.
100kg pilot with ~100 kg life support and ~100kg seat. ~some stuff for
balance. Removing the pilot completely gets you 300kg more fuel. Which gives
you ~7% more range.

Change the requirements? No need for 9g load limit, 5G will suffice. And the
engine could be medium bypass because you don't really want to go supersonic.
-> 2 tons more fuel while fuel consumption is halved. -> 300% more range. And
we didn't even touch power/weight ratios.

They cut down carrier air wings in the 90's because Soviet Union collapsed.
Viking had to go the Prowler was phased out. Viking had range og ~5000km
Prowler had ~3000km. The current best is super Hornet with about ~2000km and
F35 will not change that. Now that China is ramping up, you need replacement.
One of the most important things done by previous slow and clumsy planes was
the refueling. Because it could extend the ranges of other planes.

Ranges matter. The pacific is ~10 000km across.

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djsumdog
What a waste. Does the US really need to dump more money into air craft
carriers? The US carrier fleet is already 10 times larger than any other
country in the world.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aircraft_carriers_by_c...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aircraft_carriers_by_country)

"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies
in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who
are cold and are not clothed." -Dwight D. Eisenhower

~~~
JoeAltmaier
We feed and clothe ourselves pretty well now. So does most of the world.
There's a name for arguments containing irrelevant comparisons - what is it? I
don't recall.

~~~
djsumdog
What planet do you fucking live on?! 1% of Americas have been through the
prison system, the homeless population in my city is worse than Sydney's was
in 2012, the US keeps most of the middle east perpetually in war to support
the western standard of living and the majority of the people on the planet
don't have clean water to drink. It's becoming more and more difficult for
American kids to go to University while programs in European countries are
either affordable or free.

Poke your head out of your bubble for like a minute!

~~~
JoeAltmaier
...says the young guy who doesn't remember how the world was 50 years ago.

------
niels_olson
I submit most people here miss the larger point of aircraft carriers: you can
park 4 acres of sovereign US territory 2 miles from most countries. We have
more night-qualified fighter pilots on one ship than almost every other
country has period. Stats like this go on for days. We invite flag officers
from other militaries, including China and Russia, to come inspect our units.
They go home and recommend peace at all costs.

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forgotAgain
Why does the command center have to be on the ship? It seems equivalent to me
as to saying the routing function for a delivery service has to be in the
vehicle depot.

It would seem a better idea to have ten automated UAV launch/recovery depot
type ships, controlled by a central command then a single ultra expensive
asset/target.

~~~
jauer
Latency & self-sufficiency.

The initial use seems to be as tankers for crewed aircraft. Local control
means no satellite round trip delay and perhaps the ability to conduct
refueling operations if satellites are broken.

------
actionwords
having completely autonomous navigation, and vehicle maintenance, and flights,
aboard an ACC would make them EXTREMELY more compact and efficient.

------
reustle
Offtopic: Man, these military websites are embarrassingly old looking. Where
is 18F when you need 'em? :-)

[https://foia.navy.mil/foia/webbas02.nsf/(vwwebpage)/home.htm...](https://foia.navy.mil/foia/webbas02.nsf/\(vwwebpage\)/home.htm?opendocument)

~~~
toomuchtodo
Why don't you ask them how to help fix it?

[https://twitter.com/18F](https://twitter.com/18F)

[https://chat.18f.gov/](https://chat.18f.gov/)

~~~
0xffff2
Better yet, why don't you not? Surely there are much more important problems
with the government's computer systems than that some websites "look old".

~~~
pavel_lishin
But shitty websites are still a problem. Not everyone can work on the most
important problem at the same time.

~~~
knieveltech
Craigslist finds your argument unpersuasive.

