Aircraft carriers are America’s first line of defense, as well as the vital instrument used by Washington to protect allies and project influence across the globe. As Rep. Randy Forbes, (R-Virginia) notes, “When a crisis arises and American lives and interests are at risk, the first question decision makers ask is, ‘Where are the carriers?’ Our Navy’s aircraft carriers provide 4.5 acres of sovereign American territory and a mobile base of operations that reduces the need to deploy U.S. boots on the ground. When ISIS blitzed through the Middle East last year, the strike fighters aboard the carrier George H.W. Bush were the only U.S. aircraft in position and ready to halt their advance. It took 54 days for the United States to negotiate deals with allies in the region that allowed us to employ aircraft based on their territory. In the months since, the carriers Carl Vinson and Theodore Roosevelt have rotated through the region, providing a constant American military presence, supporting ongoing operations against ISIS, and deterring aggression by Iran. In other theaters, meanwhile, the presence of American carriers has deterred aggression, protected the free flow of goods, people, and information, and enabled the United States to extend a helping hand when natural disasters strike.
However, while threats across the planet multiply, the number of these vessels continues to be below what is clearly necessary. Rear Admiral Thomas Moore once said, “We’re an 11-carrier Navy in a 15-carrier world.” Federal statutes require a minimum of eleven carriers.
Unfortunately, the U.S. now has only a 10-carrier navy (An 11th, the new U.S.S. Gerald Ford, is not yet operational, and may not be fully ready for duty until 2021) and the world has become even more dangerous, as both China and Russia have expanded their sea power while America’s continues to contract. In 2015, Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus warned that a “Carrier force structure below 11 would inject significant risk in the Fleet’s ability to comply with the Defense Strategic Guidance.” The human element cannot be overlooked in all this. In an attempt to make up the difference, carrier deployments have increased in length from 5.5 months on average in 2008 to 9.5 months. That’s difficult for both sailors and their families. Further, it puts a great deal of stress on the ships themselves, delaying homeport maintenance.
As noted in Breaking defense, “The Navy’s in a carrier crunch. US commanders around the world keep asking for carriers to cover trouble spots from Syria, Iran, and Afghanistan to the Western Pacific and the South China Sea, but the Navy doesn’t have enough to go around.” President Obama sought to cut the carrier fleet to 10 in his 2015 budget. From the 1980s to 2002, the Navy went down from 14 carriers in the fleet to 12, of which at least two and more often three were deployed around the world at any given time. (The average wavered between 2.5 and 2.75). Since 2003, however, the Navy has shrunk from 12 carriers to 10.
There have some who have argued that aircraft carriers are increasingly vulnerable to enemy missile attack, and there is some element of truth to that. In war, there will be casualties. That may sound harsh, but it reflects reality. However, that is not a reason to lose the vital advantage that carriers provide.
Only One pill per viagra on line day. It is the first ED treatment introduced in 1998. cialis online The sound waves travel into the muscle and produce gentle raindogscine.com order viagra heat. At the point when cialis pill from india men are not able to handle playing second place for awhile. 6. Further, dramatic improvements in U.S. defensive technology have taken place. Rear Admiral Edward Masso discusses the vulnerability issue: “The U.S. Navy is greatly endangered by the global proliferation of anti-ship ballistic and cruise missiles. Some analysts, like Dennis Gormley, Andrew Erickson, and Jingdong Yuan at the National Defense University, say U.S. aircraft carriers in the western Pacific are sitting ducks for communist China’s missiles, especially their CM-400AKG Mach 5.5 Wrecker cruise missile and their DF-21 ballistic missile, dubbed ‘the carrier killer.’ They are wrong. Simply put, the ongoing improvement of missile defense systems on U.S. Navy warships is keeping pace with the development of new Chinese missiles and with others that are appearing in North Korea, Iran, and Russia. Innovative U.S. shipborne defenses with the capability to detect, track, destroy or deflect such advanced missiles are now being deployed, as they must be, if our warships and the world’s commercial vessels are to have access to the Persian Gulf, South China Sea, Sea of Japan, and the Eastern Mediterranean. The capabilities of China’s Wrecker and DF-21 missiles, for example, are far from being ignored… the navy [has] carried out sea trials of a new countermeasure to anti-ship missiles called Pandarra Fog. Slated to be deployed as part of a warship’s defensive armament, the Pandarra Fog system creates radar-absorbing carbon-fiber clouds that prevent a missile’s seeker from finding its target. It is a simple but effective means of blinding the radar target acquisition system of anti-ship supersonic cruise missiles and ballistic missiles like the Wrecker and the DF-21.”
While budgetary concerns limit the possibility of a return to a 15-carrier navy, there has been discussion about supplementing an 11-carrier force with a number of smaller carriers.
Tyler Rogoway, in a foxtrotalpha article, makes the case for this concept. “The Navy is experiencing serious operational shortfalls due to running its fleet of ten aircraft carriers hard in recent years, which is one short of the mandated 11. As such, it is time for the U.S. to build smaller aircraft carriers in greater numbers than what today’s one-size-fits-all super carrier strategy permits.”
Rogoway points out that two smaller carriers could be purchased for the price of one larger one. The loss, he argues, in the capability of a larger version would be made up by other advantages. It would give the Navy additional flexibility in deployment. “By building smaller carriers, and more of them, Navy commanders will be able to better pair their available resources with the mission at hand. For instance, you do not need a super carrier for simply creating a strong presence in a region, or to support low-intensity warfare operations, or to train aircrews, or to execute good-will tours. In fact, smaller carriers would provide everything a super carrier could, although at diminished sortie rates. For missions where a super carrier’s capability is needed, and if none are available, two smaller carriers can be deployed in one’s place.”
The Russian and Chinese navies, which have trained together during the past several years, are rapidly enhancing their strength, now exceeding the U.S. in numbers of submarines and very soon in overall fleet size. Expect questions about U.S. carriers to be a hot issue in 2017.