On Fri, 12 Sep 2003 22:50:38 +0100, "Paul J. Adam"
wrote:

In message , Scott Ferrin
writes
Same here. Back when I was first getting interested in ships. . .well
compared to a Kara the Belknap class looked pretty sorry.

Yeah, but I know which I want to be on when the shooting starts.


Also you have to remember this is before they got Phalanx and Harpoon.
1 5" gun, an ASROC box, a twin arm launcher and two dinky sets of
torpedo tubes don't seem too impressive when you compare them to two
twin SA-N-3s, two twin SA-N-4s, eight LARGE ASW missiles, ten 21"
torpedo tubes, four CIWS, ASW rockets, and a helicopter. Gordon
could probably shed some light on the subject. (I know he didn't seem
to have a very high opinion of "Trashkent" (Kara class) )




One reason the USSR put so many weapons on its ships... was that it
improved the chances that _something_ would work when the war broke out.
The closer you got, the less appealing those USSR ships looked.

A colleague remembers how badly the Kuznetsov _stank_ while passing
downwind of her. Ships whose weapon mounts are fouled by lines of drying
fish, are not likely to generate great combat power.