Navy changing LCS into frigate

The Navy is planning on making so many changes to the LCS ships that they're turning them into a new class of Frigate. The new ships will be more heavily armored, and initially will have an unspecified missile added, to be followed by a second type being developed.

It's about time that they do something to fix the LCS. This will be good for the Navy, and will add a new class of ship they'll need.

m.warhistoryonline.com...

whitefleet.net...

news.usni.org...

a reply to: Zaphod58

i personally think the LCS was a waste. they should have immediately invested in the DDG platform rather than delay the development for the new DDGs.
imagine a hybrid LCS and a DDG platform... basically a LCS sitting on a Zumwalt would have been unrivaled and more cost effective than supporting development for 3 new ship classes in a single decade.

its good to have a slush fund at your disposal i guess.
hopefully Trump will rectify this .
sailors especially on small boys can attest to the living condition, and how the arleigh burke class is almost not up for the task anymore.

a reply to: Zaphod58

The idea of a close in, ship to shore combat craft was always somewhat of a strange duck.

With the advent of the electromagnetic rail gun, the preference will surely become that stand off distance from target is maximised, and close in engagement becomes basically an irrelevance. When you can hit any target from a dingy to a destroyer at a distance of over one hundred kilometers, the ability to get close to shore becomes absolutely void.

a reply to: TrueBrit

Perhaps the concept that China could at some point send hordes across the Pacific to attack mainland America is a good reason to have coastal protection beyond the gun emplacements of old and even modern mobile missile units. Mobility is the key issue to land/sea/space warfare these days. A coastal defense force of properly armed ships is one of the last-gap measures to insure protection.

One important lesson from the Korean war has not been forgotten even if it is rarely discussed when war with China is the topic. In Korea, the US lost the war because the Chinese military thinks nothing of human lives, merely the objective.
In Korea, seas of lightly-armed bodies rushed forward to simply overwhelm the firepower of the allies. As the Chinese attacked and those in the fore were cut down, their bodies stacked to become an advancing wall of protection for the next wave to come over the top. The US had no strategy except to threaten nuclear war.

At the present time in short order, China could amass a flotilla of commercial ships used as troop ships to inundate the entire west coast of America with a solid mass of millions of men on the ground if they were to get a footing.

You couldn't have enough missiles, torpedoes or strike aircraft to destroy a widely dispersed force launching from the coasts of China. The decisive battles would be fought here, near their intended destinations.

Unless they do some radical re-design, a turd is still a turd, no matter what you re-name it.

a reply to: Aliensun

Would they hell.

You could absolutely see a force like that wiped out on the sea, and of course the US military has enough resources to make that work. If they can drone their own proxy agents in the Middle East, they can sink a few million men into shark infested water by torpedoing their boats! Hell, they could sink every one of those boats before they even got close enough to deploy rib boats from! They could pummel those boats from a distance of over a hundred miles if they wanted, with simple kinetic impact rounds at that!

a reply to: JIMC5499

It sounds like it's going to get a pretty extensive redesign. It'll have to if they want to armor her and add the weapons they're talking about.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: JIMC5499

It sounds like it's going to get a pretty extensive redesign. It'll have to if they want to armor her and add the weapons they're talking about.

Maybe this is why we need to make ships modular like legos so we can mix and match things on a universal ship body.

a reply to: TrueBrit

Obviously, you have no conceptual powers to see thousands and thousands of ships blanketing the ocean on the way to the US mainland. View the advancing ships I speak of as similar to the sacrificial human waves they committed in attack Korea. As I stated, there would not be enough delivery of ordnance from rail guns, lasers, missiles, torpedoes, bombs or aircraft to stop a massive, non-formation armada of commercial and military ships.

Of course, this situation that I suggest avoids the mentioning of the likelihood of a nuclear exchange between nations that would have resulted before the invasion attempt. Nothing would be working like clockwork after that, except those many, assorted ships plodding along with millions of Chinese troops armed with little more than rifles. End of story.

originally posted by: Aliensun
a reply to: TrueBrit

Obviously, you have no conceptual powers to see thousands and thousands of ships blanketing the ocean on the way to the US mainland. View the advancing ships I speak of as similar to the sacrificial human waves they committed in attack Korea. As I stated, there would not be enough delivery of ordnance from rail guns, lasers, missiles, torpedoes, bombs or aircraft to stop a massive, non-formation armada of commercial and military ships.

Of course, this situation that I suggest avoids the mentioning of the likelihood of a nuclear exchange between nations that would have resulted before the invasion attempt. Nothing would be working like clockwork after that, except those many, assorted ships plodding along with millions of Chinese troops armed with little more than rifles. End of story.

I take it you have not seen a FUAB or MOAB dropped in surface detonation mode. One MOAB dropped on a tank brigade in iraq wiped it out. Tha amount of ships needed to pull off your scenario would never make it to the US because we have plenty of those weapons and tac nukes if need be on cruise missiles.

ANd you underestimate the US military at your own peril. They are hardened to survive a strike long enough to return the favor and some with submarines.

originally posted by: Aliensun
a reply to: TrueBrit

Perhaps the concept that China could at some point send hordes across the Pacific to attack mainland America is a good reason to have coastal protection beyond the gun emplacements of old and even modern mobile missile units. Mobility is the key issue to land/sea/space warfare these days. A coastal defense force of properly armed ships is one of the last-gap measures to insure protection.

One important lesson from the Korean war has not been forgotten even if it is rarely discussed when war with China is the topic. In Korea, the US lost the war because the Chinese military thinks nothing of human lives, merely the objective.
In Korea, seas of lightly-armed bodies rushed forward to simply overwhelm the firepower of the allies. As the Chinese attacked and those in the fore were cut down, their bodies stacked to become an advancing wall of protection for the next wave to come over the top. The US had no strategy except to threaten nuclear war.

At the present time in short order, China could amass a flotilla of commercial ships used as troop ships to inundate the entire west coast of America with a solid mass of millions of men on the ground if they were to get a footing.

You couldn't have enough missiles, torpedoes or strike aircraft to destroy a widely dispersed force launching from the coasts of China. The decisive battles would be fought here, near their intended destinations.

You seem to forget what happens when they get on Shore here there's plenty of people with arms they would never make it.

And there's no way a sea of a thousand Chinese ships could even get past Hawaii let alone to the West Coast

The concept of the LCS wasn't to bad, as long as you have sufficient numbers to allow you to cover all the roles required. It's all well and good saying we don't need the hull numbers because each hull can do 3 jobs only but they could only ever do 1 at a time and were compromised because of it. It essentially became no different to a Coast Guard cutter and less capable than most of the corvettes in use while being vastly more expensive and leaving the USN with a class type gap and a huge whole between the LCS and the DDG.

Even with the redesign I can't help but think it's going to be a hugely compromised ship.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: JIMC5499

It sounds like it's going to get a pretty extensive redesign. It'll have to if they want to armor her and add the weapons they're talking about.

This is the part where the feature creep gnomes come out at night and turn it into something useless that ends up dropped after eating a billion dollars of tax money.

Therefore, I'm all for it. Sign me up to add on the AESA surface missile tracker lateral line sensors. I also want first dibs on the sneaky wave personal communicators shaped like the ship's logo that act like STTNG communicator badges.

a reply to: Bedlam

I do love when the gnomes come out to play. Maybe, and I can't believe I am saying this with a straight face, the LCS will actually become semi capable after all.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: Bedlam

I do love when the gnomes come out to play. Maybe, and I can't believe I am saying this with a straight face, the LCS will actually become semi capable after all.

More likely some admiral will try to make a lasting legacy for himself by adding tank treads or the like, to give it a land attack capability.

The good thing about dead duck megabuck projects is that once you're sure it's spiraling, you propose add-on crap and include big penalties for cancellation, then stall like a boss until the thing gets #canned. Tada!

a reply to: Bedlam

Most likely, but hey, there's always a first time for everything.

A good read, and It's Absolutely True:

The Pentagon Wars

a reply to: Bedlam

Yeah that was a really good read.

In my opinion the lcs was invented so that the navy can continue senslessly promoting officers to admirals and such.

Used to be an admiral commanded a 100 ships or so. Now just for the sake of it they have so many that they often command 2 or 3 ships. Seems stupid. Its a ring knocker thing i guess and above my comprehension.

originally posted by: Aliensun


At the present time in short order, China could amass a flotilla of commercial ships used as troop ships to inundate the entire west coast of America with a solid mass of millions of men on the ground if they were to get a footing.

You couldn't have enough missiles, torpedoes or strike aircraft to destroy a widely dispersed force launching from the coasts of China. The decisive battles would be fought here, near their intended destinations.

Sure you could. Unarmed commercial ships taking a week from there to here? Load up the bombers with SDB's. One B-2 could take 200 bombs per mission.

Can even P-8's drop SDB's?