Sea Skimmer wrote:Chris OFarrell wrote:
Add to that the fact that the Navy does NOT have the manpower to crew the things (and the costs in time, money and manpower of massive retrofits to rebuild them with technology to reduce their crew would be staggering in of itself) then frankly, its just a waste.
Wow, so we have a manpower shortage when talk of a 25 million man army larger then US mobilized in WW2 has been going on for about forty pages?
And of those 25 million, how many of them are qualified to run and maintain an Iowa class Battleship? Let alone some of the even older things some people are proposing WW2 ended sixty years ago, the Iowas were sent to the 'boneyard' almost 20 years ago now. The expertise to rebuild them and run them is going to be VERY thin compared to rebuilding F-14's or something.
Wow, yeah, good logic. You also seem to be insisting on examining this issue from OUR standpoint, and not the standpoint of the humans in the story, which know almost nothing about hell.
I don't have a clue what you're saying there, unless your saying there MIGHT be legions of demon warships or something. The only aquatic demons we've seen are the submarine guys which a BB is going to be useless against at any rate.
The 1980s reactivation of USS Iowa, after nearly 25 years in mothballs, took less then 18 months from Congressional approval of funding and cost less then an FFG-7 frigate.
The ships were also much newer then, had been used relativly little compared to other ships in terms of time in service AND had been maintained at a much higher level of readiness unless I'm mistaken, far better then the Class-D they had been in since being retired again, which hasn't done much for their quality and durability. The USN unless I'm mistaken has also done away with almost all the tools and lines needed to build new parts for them, which probably means you would have to damn near rebuild the logistical net to keep them going.
And this is just for the Iowas, which at least were in active service and semi reserve status until recently, the idea of bringing back all the other BB's around which were NEVER modernized in the 1980's like the Iowas, is just crazy. The USN only brought the damn things back because they were a convenient harpoon and tomahawk platform.
That is not a waste for a ship that could utterly destroy an entire demon army. The main batteries could be restored to serviceability in a matter of weeks. A demon army is simply the greatest target ever for heavy gunfire.
Oh yes THATS a great idea. IF they are nice and out in the open near the cost in large ranks for you to pound to pieces. THAT is not going to happen.
Actually I never once suggest removing even one heavy gun, and automatic weapons can literally be bolted to the deck and are ready to go. It’s not like they actually designed Iowa to mount over one hundred automatic guns, and yet she carried them just fine.
Yes but you're going to have to take OFF all those older secondary guns. The old 5 inchers unless I'm mistaken are going to be of very limited utility against harpies and the missile batteries even less so. If you want to rip out the secondary guns and missiles, then built all new hoards of heavy medium and light AAA with their associated ammunition feeds, magazines and fire control, its going to be a LOT more complex then bolting Tomahawk and Harpoon launchers to the deck, unless I'm mistaken.
Something like a half billion people live within range of 16in gunfire using the WW2 era ammo, even more if production was restarted on the 35nm extended range shell that was briefly used in Vietnam. In the 1980s a 13in sabot shell was test fired as well, range over 70km, but development was not completed so I’d discount it as serious possibility for now. What’s more, since hell isn’t likely to have naval mines or much of any ability to return fire at all it’s perfectly possible to sail the battleships up major rivers to even further extend the area they can cover. This was actually done in the Korean War too with an Iowa entering the Han river to support an attack on a particularly tough hill.
Which is nice if you want to level a city, but horrible if your trying to defend a population center from a Balrdick army. THEY have ultimate strategic mobility; once they find one of the humans with the DNA to lock in on, they can spawn an army right smack back in the middle of a major city where dropping salvos of 16" gunfire isn't really the most helpful thing you can do. You're also going to have be BLOODY fast to get the ships in position to provide heavy fire if they appear a long way out and march in. I mean look at the situation in Iraq in Stewarts story; they came out and marched and over a few days, reached major towns. Unless the BB happened to be immediately in the area, there is no WAY it would have gotten on station in time to provide fire support.
And again, if the Demons are starting to play nasty and pop directly into major populated areas, ala Ireland or that US Mall, then something with a footprint measured in hundreds of meters becomes rather less useful. Even assuming it happens to be in the area.
Again, while a naval buildup may well be justified, to help the world move heavy forces around and protect supply lines against possible harpie raids, the idea that bringing back BB's for bombardment at this time is a justified expense is just foolhardy IMO.
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