navydavesof wrote:
Busto963 wrote:
Commercial industry adopted articulated boom cranes with active heave compensation long ago to deal with heavy, dynamic loads at sea and do them with safety. The U.S. Navy needs 120-150 ton cranes of that design as a minimum if it wants the capability to transport and support small craft in littoral and amphibious operations.
So, would you want this be included into a new LSD, one that replaces the current capabilities being lost by decommissioning ships and includes the heavy lift capability?
Absolutely.
The fleet is short of lift capacity, and that is based upon 2003, pre-Iraq war requirements. Since then, the Army and USMC have gone from HMMWV to MRAPs, and heavy trucks like HEMETT, LAVs, etc. have all been up armored, meaning that the actual sea lift capacity shortfall is actually far worse. Everyone assumes that all these heavy vehicles like MRAPS will all go back into storage. This is silly, IEDS are not going away, and will be a threat even in “peace keeping” missions. Ergo, our actual requirement is to carry vehicles that are often tons heavier than the unarmed base version, and our sea lift requirements are based upon unrealistic data. We are faced with the untenable options of deploying with less cargo (fewer vehicles, less ammunition/food/parts), or deploying with vehicles with less armor protection than we have established for current operations. This is totally unacceptable. I also find it ridiculous that current ships cannot pick up a combat loaded M-1 tank for transhipment from a MSC or commercial hull.
This shortfall will have to be made up using contracted merchant hulls, or MSC ships. Merchant hulls are generally reliant on container terminal cranes for offloading. Many MPS ships do not have cranes either (they also are not combat loaded, but that is another problem). In any event, when the shooting starts, you cannot have too many cranes to offload cargo.
Cranes also give the fleet an integral ability to re-arm to refit independent of ports.
Finally, large cranes let you transform a cargo ship into a tender for minesweeping, VBSS operations, antipiracy, support Special Operations, and of course, carry cargo and landing craft for amphibious operations. Think of a carrier, or amphib group that can bring Mobile Inshore Undersea Warfare Unit (MIUWU), or a fully equipped Sea Bee battalion + landing craft with it.
Look at what SOCOM is doing with the USS Ponce, and think how much more effective she would be if she could actually carry, deploy, repair, and recover an entire Special Boat Unit (with MK Vs or larger craft), or mine sweepers.
navydavesof wrote:
Perhaps even put a gun like the AGS(L) up front so it can provide calls for fire instead of pulling in another ship? Keep in mind a naval gun like that does not consume very much internal space. Only abotu 15' would have to be added to the ship's length to provide an internal magazine with about 500 rounds of conventional ammunition.
The German replinishment ship Berlin is very interesting!
A 5” or 155mm gun might be quite useful, but I would install it with a mind to ASUW, not NGFS. The ship is after all primarily an oiler/ammunition ship, with dry and refrigerated stores capability. The only reason she should be within gun-howitzer range of shore is to transfer her cargo to troops ashore.
My thoughts are they should be armed with one or two 76mm or 57mm guns, a pair of SeaRAM, and a pair of Mk 38 25mm, or 35mm GDM008 millennium guns.
Now, you could take a “small” (10-25,000 ton) commercial hull that costs roughly $50-60 million, and turn it into a fire support ship. Commercial cargo hulls are getting faster, and commercial building standards often exceed those of their military cousins, so you are not automatically getting a cheaply built ship. If you can mount several large pedestal cranes on the hull, you can probably install gun mounts. Run with that one!
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