From ‘greyhounds of the sea’ to surface boomers?
September 18th, 2009 | Ballistic missile defense Life at Sea Morale Science and technology Ships Washington | Posted by Phil Ewing
The destroyer The Sullivans, one of three East Coast warships scheduled for the Aegis BMD upgrade, could be tasked with a BMD cruise in European waters // MC2 Daniel Barker/ Navy
The Navy’s cruisers and destroyers got a new mission this week after President Obama’s announcement about his changes to U.S. ballistic missile defense goals. Designed as multi-mission combatants with enough firepower to level a city or bring down an air force — at the same time — two or three of the Navy’s Aegis warships instead will serve as BMD barges, loaded up with SM-3 missiles and ordered to patrol the North Sea and the Mediterranean. Starting in 2011, two or three must be on station protecting Europe at any given time.
Marine Gen. James Cartwright, the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, described his vision Thursday for why the Navy should get the assignment:
A single Aegis can carry a hundred-plus or minus a few, depending on their mission configuration, of the SM-3. So this is a substantial addressal of the proliferation of the threat that we’re seeing emerge.
It would also be a substantial change for an Aegis warship’s load-out, which usually is a smorgasbord of SM-2, SM-3, Evolved Sea Sparow, anti-submarine and Tomahawk missiles. And it would be an even more substantial change for the ship’s crew, which would have a deployment more like a ballistic missile sub than a surface ship. Instead of swashbuckling high-seas adventure and visits to exotic ports, the ships will steam a box.
Or will they? Navy officials on Thursday had no details for what the new Aegis in Europe commitment will look like. Maybe a BMD cruise in the Med would be nothing but luxury — a sunshine circuit of Rivera, Italian and Greek port visits.
What do you think? You’ve got to have at least three cruisers or destroyers sailing around Europe at any one time. How would you set up the deployments?
Comments
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Mike Burleson Says:
September 18th, 2009 at 12:51 pmNow that our high end cruisers and destroyers are officially the modern day capital ships, as some of us have declared all along, can we please build some real destroyers and small escorts (corvettes and patrol ships)? We are going to need something to maintain the sea lanes if the rest of the Navy is defending space!
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