Re:The Nation Needs a Shipbuilding Revolution
by briandear on Tuesday February 04, 2025 @06:04AM
(#42930882)
Naval vessels aren’t outdated tech. It allows longer term force projection you can’t get without ground-based. I can stick a destroyer off the coast and leave it there as long as I want. It’s a lot harder to build an airbase. Submarines can stay on station almost indefinitely.
Transporting tanks, artillery, vehicles, is difficult by air when done at scale. Air extraction of a SEAL team is done by helicopters. And those helicopters need to land somewhere. They need fuel and crews and supplies. Forward deployed ground bases are logistically more difficult than having a carrier group off the coast.
As a missile platform, there are certainly alternatives such as the 747 or even space based weaponry, but naval vessels are more than simply weapons platforms.
Also air-based missile platforms depend on a guarantee of air superiority —- it would be naïve to suggest that the U.S. would have that air superiority in all theaters of battle.
Transporting tanks, artillery, vehicles, is difficult by air when done at scale. Air extraction of a SEAL team is done by helicopters. And those helicopters need to land somewhere. They need fuel and crews and supplies. Forward deployed ground bases are logistically more difficult than having a carrier group off the coast.
As a missile platform, there are certainly alternatives such as the 747 or even space based weaponry, but naval vessels are more than simply weapons platforms.
Also air-based missile platforms depend on a guarantee of air superiority —- it would be naïve to suggest that the U.S. would have that air superiority in all theaters of battle.