Where will the money come from...

Steven- Carrier aircraft are more mobile than land-based aircraft? BRBR

Nope but the place they land sure is...

I think ya need to spend some time in a USN airwing and a USAF ariwing...like I
have and the 'answers' such seem easy.
P. C. Chisholm
CDR, USN(ret.)
Old Phart Phormer Phantom, Turkey, Viper, Scooter and Combat Buckeye Phlyer

"Giz" wrote in message
...

It takes a B-2 a loooonng time to fly from the US to a target in the
Middle East. Not exactly an on demand platform.


How does the speed of a B-2 compare to that of an aircraft carrier?



To fly that same aircraft from somewhere
near the fight requires host country approval.


Why is that a problem?



Remember how difficult it was for the Air Force to get in the fight
against Libya?


Eldorado Canyon? I recall the F-111s had to take a lengthier route than
desired and that carrier aviation alone wasn't up to the task. Is that not
correct?



Just think, that was with
host country approval. CV aviation will always have that advantage over
shore based. 4.5 acres of sovereign territory that can go to the fight.


4.5 acres that can go to the fight at a rather slow speed, joining the
land-based aviation already involved.

"Giz" wrote in message
...

Where is Edwards AFB?


California.



Where is the USS John C. Stennis?


Beats the hell outta me.



Where will both be 6 months from now?


Same answers.

I don't see what your questions have to do with the relative mobility of
carrier aircraft versus land-based aircraft.



Aircraft that you cannot use for political reasons are worse than useless.
They have cost you, but are not returning on the investment.


So we purchase carrier aircraft for political purposes and land-based
aircraft for combat purposes?



You honestly can't see the advantage of a CVBG off a hostile coast over a
wing of B-2's in middle America?


No, why don't you explain it to me?



Open your eyes. Even the Air Force doesn't try to make the
argument you are. They did before, but have come to their senses. CV
aviation will not replace shore based aviation, but it will not succumb to
it either.


The argument I'm making? I thought I was just asking a few questions.

"Pechs1" wrote in message
...

Nope but the place they land sure is...


So what?



I think ya need to spend some time in a USN airwing and a USAF
ariwing...like I
have and the 'answers' such seem easy.


Well, then, perhaps you could answer some of the question I've asked in this
discussion. Nobody else seems able to.

...."reusable hypersonic cruise vehicle (HCV) ... capable of
taking off from a conventional military runway and striking
targets 9,000 nautical miles distant in less than two
hours"....


And how long can this "HCV" loiter in the target area while
the White House makes it's go-to-war decision? Those
"ancient" aircraft carriers have been continuously
on-station all day, every day at multiple hot spots all over
the world for over HALF A CENTURY [almost half a million
hours at EACH hot spot]!

No, this latest engineering solution-in-search-of-a-problem
does not preclude the continuing need for aircraft carriers
and what only they can do!!! Incidentally such HCV concepts
have been repeatedly considered over many decades. About
every twenty years we revisit these old "new ideas".

By the way, just calculate the pay load fraction needed for
fuel to move that 12,000 pound HCV hypersonically over 9,000
miles.

"Get it right or just forget it!"

WDA

end


"s.p.i." wrote in message
om...
To pay for the envisioned force structure below? Well the
seemingly
inviolate 12 carrier hull money is most likely one place.
With what
is being proposed why would you need 12 carriers anyway?
Maybe its time to begin to transform Naval Aviation away
from being so
completely centered around a weapons system that hasn't
fundamentally
changed in 60 years-the Aircraft Carrier-before it becomes
completely
irrelevant...

Julian Borger in Washington
Tuesday July 1, 2003
The Guardian

The Pentagon is planning a new generation of weapons,
including huge
hypersonic drones and bombs dropped from space, that will
allow the US
to strike its enemies at lightning speed from its own
territory.
Over the next 25 years, the new technology would free the
US from
dependence on forward bases and the cooperation of
regional allies,
part of the drive towards self-suffi ciency spurred by the
difficulties of gaining international cooperation for the
invasion of
Iraq.

The new weapons are being developed under a programme
codenamed Falcon
(Force Application and Launch from the Continental US).

A US defence website has invited bids from contractors to
develop the
technology and the current edition of Jane's Defence
Weekly reports
that the first flight tests are scheduled to take place
within three
years.

According to the website run by the Defence Advanced
Research Projects
Agency (Darpa) the programme is aimed at fulfilling "the
government's
vision of an ultimate prompt global reach capability
(circa 2025 and
beyond)".

The Falcon technology would "free the US military from
reliance on
forward basing to enable it to react promptly and
decisively to
destabilising or threatening actions by hostile countries
and
terrorist organisations", according to the Darpa
invitation for bids.
The ultimate goal would be a "reusable hypersonic cruise
vehicle (HCV)
... capable of taking off from a conventional military
runway and
striking targets 9,000 nautical miles distant in less than
two hours".

The unmanned HCV would carry a payload of up to 12,000 lbs
and could
ultimately fly at speeds of up to 10 times the speed of
sound,
according to Daniel Goure, a military analyst at the
Lexington
Institute in Washington.

Propelling a warhead of that size at those speeds poses
serious
technological challenges and Darpa estimates it will take
more than 20
years to develop.

Over the next seven years, meanwhile, the US air force and
Darpa will
develop a cheaper "global reach" weapons system relying on
expendable
rocket boosters, known as small launch vehicles (SLV) that
would take
a warhead into space and drop it over its target.

In US defence jargon, the warhead is known as a Com mon
Aero Vehicle
(Cav), an unpowered bomb which would be guided on to its
target as it
plummeted to earth at high and accelerating velocity.

The Cav could carry 1,000 lbs of explosives but at those
speeds
explosives may not be necessary. A simple titanium rod
would be able
to penetrate 70 feet of solid rock and the shock wave
would have
enormous destructive force. It could be used against
deeply buried
bunkers, the sort of target the air force is looking for
new ways to
attack.

Jane's Defence Weekly reported that the first Cav flight
demonstration
is provisionally scheduled by mid-2006, and the first SLV
flight
exercise would take place the next year. A test of the two
systems
combined would be carried out by late 2007.

A prototype demonstrating HCV technology would be tested
in 2009.

SLV rockets will also give the air force a cheap and
flexible means to
launch military satellites at short notice, within weeks,
days or even
hours of a crisis developing.

The SLV-Cav combination, according to the Darpa document,
"will
provide a near-term (approximately 2010) operational
capability for
prompt global strike from Consus (the continental US)
while also
enabling future development of a reusable HCV for the
far-term
(approximately 2025)". The range of this weapon is
unclear.

This is what I wrote in April and so far I'm half right...
"And I'll bet a paycheck the Air Force will argue just
that Real Soon
Now. Also the Space folks will likely chime in about the
operational
usefulness of the Common Aero Vehicle as well.

I wouldn't be surprised if there were only a six carrier
force by
2015."

How much of the Earth's surface is out of range of land-based aviation?
How
much of the Earth's surface is out of range of carrier aviation?

Irrelevant. Land-based aviation requires runways. We operate from many of
them at the pleasure of a host nation. What that nation gives, so can it
take away.

R / John

roncachamp- How does the speed of a B-2 compare to that of an aircraft
carrier? BRBR

If the CV is already there,,,lots faster.

To fly that same aircraft from somewhere
near the fight requires host country approval.


Why is that a problem? BRBR

Cuz some countires will say no(?)....

Eldorado Canyon? I recall the F-111s had to take a lengthier route than
desired and that carrier aviation alone wasn't up to the task. Is that not
correct? BRBR

Nope not correct...and we(CVs) werre on station for many moths after the USAF
went home,,,flying 10 miles north of the 'line of death'...no USAF units were
invloved....

4.5 acres that can go to the fight at a rather slow speed, joining the
land-based aviation already involved. BRBR

See above and there were NO USAF landbased assets involved in this or many oher
exercises...

P. C. Chisholm
CDR, USN(ret.)
Old Phart Phormer Phantom, Turkey, Viper, Scooter and Combat Buckeye Phlyer

roncachamp- Where is Edwards AFB?

California.



Where is the USS John C. Stennis?


Beats the hell outta me.



Where will both be 6 months from now?
BRBR


bing bing, we have a winner...and he doesn't even know it....


I don't see what your questions have to do with the relative mobility of
carrier aircraft versus land-based aircraft. BRBR


ummmmm vulnerability??
Predictabiulity?
Ability to make a US 'statement'?

I know having a bunch of SAC weenies dressing up nice with their scarfs and new
leather jackets and all and standing next to their B-2s makes my eyes water but
the people in Liberia don't really GAS...

P. C. Chisholm
CDR, USN(ret.)
Old Phart Phormer Phantom, Turkey, Viper, Scooter and Combat Buckeye Phlyer

roncachamp- Sea lines of communication and supply cannot be maintained
without carrier
aviation? Other countries without carriers seem to manage. BRBR

ya mean third or fourth world nations who's economy is a fraction of
California's??

See confliuct, worlkd war, etc...If it weren't for the 'sea lines of
communication', the UK would be speaking German.

Well, if the response requires carrier aviation, then we'd have to call the
US Navy. But why would any response necessarily require carrier aviation?
BRBR

Ya deploy a USAF TacAir wing? And put a load of Army guys on ships?
Nope-you
are going to call Naval Aviation with their ugly, ****ed off little
sister, the
USMC onboard Anphibs.


Please explain why. BRBR

Faster, more versatile, more effective, cheaper...

How would a TacAir wing be any more anything, please explain..Your
clue-lessness is fast approaching 'troll' status...
P. C. Chisholm
CDR, USN(ret.)
Old Phart Phormer Phantom, Turkey, Viper, Scooter and Combat Buckeye Phlyer

roncachamp- How much of the Earth's surface is out of range of land-based
aviation? How
much of the Earth's surface is out of range of carrier aviation? BRBR


Lots...center of Russia, lots of China...you aren't going to just wander around
in their airspace w/o their permision. BUT how many seaports can be threatened
by a CV that is already w/i 1000 NM of the country?? Compared to being
theatened by land based aviation of the US...

Has a runway ever been sunk? I seem to recall a few carriers have, that
would seem to indicate a 1000 ft runway that moves at 25 knots is indeed
more vulnerable than a 10,000 ft one that does not. BRBR


you are out to lunch...I seem to think of a runway and some aircraft in Hawaii
that were put out of action by some CVA based aircraft...I think they were
Japanese..


P. C. Chisholm
CDR, USN(ret.)
Old Phart Phormer Phantom, Turkey, Viper, Scooter and Combat Buckeye Phlyer