Thanks for your insight about the lasers, it makes a lot more sense why they are pursing the technology if it can’t be that easily mitigated. As for the v-22 SAR capability, Bell claims that it has the capability, but I haven’t been able to find any images or video showcasing it. Drawing people while doing SAR does sound like something the v-22 would do though.

Thanks for pointing that out! I was going off of a list that had missiles compatible with all variants of the Mk 41 cells, which included the Mk 70 containerized vls cells which are large enough to use PATRIOT PAC 3 missiles and were recently tested. I've updated my post just for future reference.

I agree that a ship with a large vls battery, such as an arsenal ship, would be a much better use of us shipbuilding efforts. It seems the PLAN is interested in the development of an arsenal ship/submarine, so that will be something to look out for in the future..

Thanks! I recently have been getting more into modern naval combat, but submarine warfare has yet to scratch that itch in my brain. Maybe if trump announces some bs submarine class I’ll do another analysis post.

::: spoiler Part 2 of 2

The Trump Class

Yesterday, Trump announced the Trump Class or (BBG(X)if you follow the navy’s traditional naming convention of proposed ship projects) of guided-missile battleships. Today (or maybe possibly yesterday, I wasn’t paying attention) the navy has released some specifications. The program will replace DDG(X) program that was started in 2022 by the Biden admin which wanted it to fill the hole the canceling of the Zumwalt’s left. If they are ever built (a big if), they will likely be the centerpiece of the ‘Golden Fleet’ which I assume is a tacky version of the Greet White Fleet, which was meant to showcase US naval power in the early 1900s by circumnavigating the globe with a bunch of battleships. I thought I might go through the specs and try to see if this is purely a project to boost Trump’s ego, or an actual warship. Some people in defense spaces question whether the battleship designation is either something to boost trumps ego or an appropriate designation for such a ship. I tend to think future reef would be the best one, but considering its size compared to other surface combat ships I think battleship is an actually appropriate designation. At 35,000 tons or more, they will be 10,000 tons larger than the Kirov class battlecruisers. With a length of 840-880 feet, they would be 300 feet shorter than the Gerald R. Ford class carriers and 300 feet longer than the Ticonderoga class cruisers.

Starting with the Sea Launched Cruise Missile – Nuclear, which is a program that just started development earlier this year. They will likely use existing missile platforms like Tomahawk, which previously was capable of carrying nuclear warheads, although they were all retired. The use case scenario for these is against surface groups or large ground facilities. They would be low yield, so they likely aren’t part of the US’s second strike capabilities.

12 Cells of the Conventional Prompt Strike hypersonic missile system. This is the most interesting thing in the specs, CPS is a program to develop a “precision-guided conventional weapon strike anywhere in the world within an hour.” The US army recently entered into service the Long Range Hypersonic Weapon, or Dark Eagle if you are a 12-year old boy who thinks that sounds cool, which is a precursor to the CPS. What doesn’t make much sense is that the point of it having a similar range as an ICBM is that you don’t need to be that close to launch it, you might put it on a submarine to conceal the launch location or on land where it can be more easily protected, but you wouldn’t put it on a highly monitored and visible ship.

128 Mk 41 VLS cells. The low number of cells doesn’t make much sense, only 6 more cells (18 if you count CPS) than a Ticonderoga class at 15,000 more tons. For its size, it leaves underequipped with long range missile defense unless they plan for most of the cells to be used for anti-air missiles and for CPS to be the main offensive weapon or if they are really bought in on the rail gun and laser point defense, completely trusting those for close-in missile defense and using other ships long range air-to-surface missiles. The latter of those two options goes against most anti-missile defense doctrine, which is that you should never rely on point defense to do all the work. Based on the current renderings (although I suspect they were created using ai to some degree and are purely theoretical at this stage) the ship would have more than enough deck space for more VLS cells, though open deck space doesn’t guarantee there is enough room in the hull.

1x 32MJ Railgun with HPV. A railgun that has HPV, how futuristic! In all seriousness, it will not have Human Papillomavirus, but it might if RFK bans the HPV vaccine. HPV in this context refers to Hypervelocity Projectile, which is meant to be a guidance system for current 155mm artillery/naval guns and future railguns to be able to intercept ballistic missiles. HPV guidance is need for railguns to become useful weapons, the problem is that railgun ammunition has to be able to survive extreme pressure and tempereature that a guidance module that doesn’t immediately disintegrate is beyond current human technology. The other problem with railguns is that in their current state is barrel durability, current railguns can only fire about 400 rounds before needing to be replaced and the navy wants them to be able to last 3,000 rounds firing 6 rounds per minute. Despite the technological limitations on practical use, there are reasons to seriously consider railguns as a weapon in the future, they have a long range of up to 350km, they can’t be intercepted, ammunition is relatively cheap as it’s just a rod of metal, and a ship can carry thousands of rounds compare to a few dozen cruise missiles. Railguns are a cool sounding weapon, but I think we may have to wait until we are among the stars for their use to become practical.

2x 5” (127mm) guns that also have HPV guidance units. Not much interesting about these, the navy already seems interested in implementing HPV guidance in existing and future gun systems.

2x 300kW or 2x 600kW lasers. Now we get back to the fun stuff. Lasers are an interesting weapon systems, they have the ability to destroy incoming missiles without using any of your own. The current problem is their range, the ‘Iron Beam’ developed by the zionist entity has a reported range of up to 10km and the HELIOS system has a range of 8km which is fine against slower moving targets because it takes some time for the lasers to actually cause enough damage to destroy a projectile, but with hypersonic munitions becoming increasingly prevalent, the may be only effective against one-way-attack UAVs and other relatively slow moving targets. I don’t understand the physics involved, but from what I can gather it is extremely hard to focus enough light onto such a small point and it becomes increasingly harder at longer ranges. Another problem is that they can be rendered useless by a simple smoke-screen or even a dense fog or rain. The PLA has also worked to develop reflective coatings for their munitions that would simply reflect the beams. Overall, I really don’t see lasers such as these making there way onto ships unless these problems are solved.

4x AN/SEQ-4 ODIN. The more practical laser, already installed on 8 USN vessels, they use a dazzling laser that interrupts guidance on optically guided and infrared guided drone and missile sensors. Although it is not capable of hard kills, it is probably a better example of what laser systems are best suited for.

The rest of the weapons are 2x RIM 116, 4x 30mm point defense guns possibly a future version of the Mk44 Bushmaster II, and 2x counter UAV/USV systems which I’m assuming means some type of jamming system.

For the aircraft carried in its rear hanger they are proposing the V-22 osprey or a possible the Future Lift Vehicle which is currently in development (although it wouldn’t surprise anyone if it was canceled). The V-22 is baffling choice for an aircraft, it can’t fit the roles that shipborne helicopters are meant to fill and are well known for being maintenance nightmares and prone to crash aircraft. There’s a reason only the US and Japan operate it. Helicopters have a few main roles when launched from surface combat ships. The first and most important is for anti-submarine warfare, helicopters can launch sonobuoys which are buoys equipped with active or passive sonars which allows for detection of enemy submarines without revealing the ships position to the submarine. After a submarine is detected the helicopter or the ship can launch anti-sub torpedoes to destroy it. The V-22 does not currently have these capabilities, and a new variant would have to be developed specially for the ‘Trump Class’ ships. Other operations, such as search and rescue and infill/exfill are things that the V-22 are capable of but not optimized for. If I were a USN captain, I would much rather my ship have two SH-60s than one V-22.

Overall, I heavily doubt that an inch of a ship of this class will be built. Pretty much all of the roles it could function in could be done by smaller and cheaper vessels. Some of the technologies, lasers and railguns, may see implantation in the future, but it won’t be an oversized reef-builder. The next presidential administration will almost assuredly cancel the project or at the very least rename it if they are a democrat, or if they are a republican they will quietly reduce it to a smaller <20,000t cruiser with less lasers and more VLS cells. Some of these weapons may end up on actual warships, so their important to consider as the dying empire continues to lash out. The US will eventually need a larger class of ships, whether they are destroyers or cruisers, but they won’t be vanity battleships. I’m sure some contractors will become very wealthy as with any us military procurement project, it’ll just be more blatantly robbery this time.

Unfortunately, I don’t have the technical or scientific knowhow to provide an analysis on the different sensor systems, so if someone knows more, please feel free to provide input. I don’t usually write about stuff like this so if anything is wrong/worded badly please let me know and I’ll try to fix it.

The navy has released some specs for the proposed Trump Class guided-missile battleship. Given my many hours of experience playing Sea Power: Naval Combat in the Missile Age, I figured I would give my thoughts.

::: spoiler Part 1 of 2

Background

Since the end of the Cold War the USN has sought to develop a class of guided-missile cruisers/destroyers to replace the retired Iowa Class BBs and the aging Ticonderoga Class cruisers. The consensus was reached that the shore bombardment capabilities of the BBs could be replaced by ship/submarine launched cruise missiles and air-launched precision guided missile. The USN has proposed four different classes of ships to fulfill these requirements to various degrees, all failed. The SC-21, CG(X), DDG(X) programs were proposed, but never got pass the drawing board. The Zumwalt Class destroyers, of which only 3 of the initially planned 32 have been built at extraordinarily high costs and all have taken a decade to go from being laid down to commissioning. Because of this, the US is still building Arleigh Burke Class Destroyers first launched in 1988, which with modern refits are still capable ships, but the USN is lacking a modern hull that can go blow for blow with modern PLAN ships.

Existing and Past Large(er) Guided-Missile Ships – An Overview

Kirov Class Battle Cruiser - Built by the Soviet Union starting in 1974 and now operated by the Russian Navy, of the four built, two are still in service. The Pyotr Velikiy* (Formerly the Yuri Andropov) is the only one currently active as the Admiral Nakhimov* (Formerly the Kalinin) recently completed her refit and is undergoing new sea trials before she can be accepted back into active duty. Their main armament is the 20 P-700 Granit anti ship missile (Which will likely be replaced by the P-800 Onixs) at the time of it's introduction, the P-700 was widely regarded to be the most lethal anti-ship missile system and was given the NATO reporting name of Shipwreck. They also carry 30 S-300F and 30 S-300FM surface-to-air missiles as well as 128 shorter range 3K95 Khinzal surface-to-air missiles. With a displacement of 24,000 tons unloaded and 28,000 tons unloaded, the Kirov Class are the largest guided missile cruisers ever built and the only non-aircraft carrier combat vessle to be powered by a nuclear reactor. Despite their age they can still pose a serious threat to US carrier groups.

*They were renamed after Imperial Russian naval figures following the triumph of the forces of reaction.

Ticonderoga Class Cruisers - Built from 1980 to 1994 for the USN. Of the 27 built, 7 are still active, but all are planned to be retired by 2029, most will still be in the reserve fleet for many years to come. They have a displacement of 9,600 long tons when fully loaded. Their main armament is the 122 Mark 41 VLS cells, which can carry the SM family of surface-to-air missiles or BGM-109 Tomahawk surface-to-surface missiles. The USS Vincennes, was responsible for the intentional downing of Iran Air Flight 655, killing all 290 passengers and crew. The USS Gettysburg was responsible for shooting down an F/A-18F Super Hornet in the Red Sea during the US aggression on Ansar Allah and Yemen.

Type-055 Destroyer - Built for the People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN), the Type-055 class of destroyers are the largest guided-missile ships deployed by the PLAN. The first ship of the class, the Nanchang was first laid down in 2014 and commissioned in 2020, since then an additional seven have been commissioned and a further 4 are under construction, with a further 4 planned for a total of 16. They are designated as Renhai Class Cruisers by the USN because they are large multi-mission ships with flag facilities and to milk more money from the budget. They have a displacement of 11,000 long tons, about 4,500 tons smaller than the Zumwalt Class Destroyers, but much of the Zumwalt's tonnage goes towards useless bullshit, so it all evens out in the end. The Type-055's main armament is it's 112 GJB 5860-2006 VLS cells, which can deploy HHQ-9 long range surface-to-air missiles, YJ-18 anti-ship cruise missiles, and CJ-10 land-attack cruise missiles. They also carry 24 HHQ-10 as point defense missiles. The type-055 incorporates stealth features designed to reduce its radar cross section and the infrared signature from the smokestack. Personally, I am skeptical of how useful stealth on ship is with the proliferation of satellite reconnaissance and autonomous targeting, but I’m sure people who know more can explain its usefulness. The Zunyi in March of this year was part of a task force which conducted live fire exercises in international waters in the Tasman Sea.

Zumwalt Class Destroyer – Many are calling it the navy’s largest boondoggle; many others are calling it their largest boondoggle as of yet. The first ship of the class, the USS Zumwalt was laid down in 2011 and commissioned in 2016 but wasn’t accepted into service until 2020. The second ship, the Michael Monsoor also took 10 years to commission and the third ship, the Lyndon B. Johonson is planned to commission in 2027, after it was laid down in 2017. With a displacement of 15,500 long tons, they are the largest surface combat ships operated by the USN since the Battleship Missouri was retired in 1992. For its main armament, the Zumwalt Class features 80 MK 57 VLS cells, which has backwards compatibility with missiles designed for MK 41 VLS cells used on most other USN ships. They were equipped with the 155mm Advanced Gun System, which has a possible range of up to 150km using rocket assisted shells, the problem is that each shell cost over a million dollars and the Navy canceled procurement in 2016, so the guns are practically useless and are supposedly going to be replaced with hypersonic missile launch systems, which I assume means additional VLS cells, but I haven’t found any reliable information. The hull is designed for stealth and supposedly has a radar cross section comparable to a ‘fishing boat,’ the problem is that if I am a radar operator for the PLAN, a fishing boat moving at 30knts is rather suspicious. They are powered by 4 Rolls-Royce gas turbines capable of creating 78MW. Outfitted with an integrated power system which allows the engines to provide power to the ship’s propulsion and systems. This would potentially power a future rail gun, but I’ll get into railguns in the next section. In total the program cost over 25 billion dollars ($5 billion per ship not counting R&D costs), and delivered a total of 3 ships, with less VLS cells than a new Arleigh Burke which costs half the price.

I wish I was able to spin my school shooting suviorship into a high paying job in the Democratic Party, but I only got depression and ptsd

I don't know if anyone else here has posted about this yet, but in more 'pulling the copper wiring out of the wall' news, the Boer has decided to take down several important data from the CDC and Census websites. These include, but are not limited to, data from CDC PLACES (Population Level Analysis and Community Estimates), the Social Vulnerability Index (SVI), and the Climate and Economic Justice Screening Tool (CEJST). This data is very important for a lot of research and long term planning. I was still able to access CDC PLACES data by using a direct link to the download page, so it is not yet entirely gone. It seams from this article that CDC employees think that the data will eventually return, after it has been altered to become 'politically correct', but I think it would be best to expect them to never return. Much of the data is also still available from 3rd party data conglomeration, although at an extremely high cost for personal use.

Hezbollah Resistance fighters are currently engaged in the most fierce battles on the Lebanese-Palestinian border since the invasion began.

Israelis suffered significant losses in personnel, evac helicopters have not stopped transporting soldiers to hospitals for the past hours.

https://xcancel.com/eyesonsouth1/status/1846593645019062451?s=46

Hezbollah confirms killing 17 Israeli officers and soldiers attempting to infiltrate Lebanon in today’s confrontations

https://xcancel.com/eyesonsouth1/status/1841894586714628581?s=46

Israeli sources to Sky News Arabia: 14 Israeli occupation soldiers killed in confrontations with Hezbollah in southern Lebanon

https://xcancel.com/EyesOnSouth1/status/1841451902753526072#m

Don’t forget to fill out your apology forms folks!

Yemeni Armed Forces have reportedly struck the USS Eisenhower after firing a number of ballistic and cruise missiles at the aircraft carrier.

https://twitter.com/eyesonsouth1/status/1796492078098325995?s=46