Straight talk on the death missile
August 10th, 2010 | China | Posted by Phil Ewing
Don't even bother trying to defend the carrier, Fitzgerald -- even Aegis is useless against deep-seated psychologcal anxiety. // MC1 Brock Taylor / Navy
This Chinese death-ray mega-missile carrier-killer situation is boiling over — seems like everywhere you turn these days, people are announcing the end of American seapower, the new dominance of China, and generally calling: ‘Game over, man! Game over!’
Time for some real talk.
Who are the WestPac war games for?
July 22nd, 2010 | China North Korea The Pacific | Posted by Phil Ewing
MC3 Charles Oki / Navy
The carrier George Washington docked in Busan, South Korea on Wednesday for “a port visit to promote goodwill and ambassadorship to the United States’ longstanding ally,” according to the Navy. Its crew members wasted no time in paying their respects at the wreckage of the South’s patrol ship Cheonan.
Oh, and just for grins, the carrier, its air wing and its escorts will train with South Korean naval and air units in an exercise called “Invincible Spirit,” in case any regional powers are curious about the oceangoing might of the U.S. and its allies. Here’s the thing: Does North Korea really need a “demonstration” of what a carrier strike group can do?
There isn’t a military commander anywhere on this planet who isn’t familiar with the destruction the U.S. can deliver from the sea. But as we’ve written before, there’s almost nothing you can do about North Korea short of a full-scale attack, and despite what you might read in the kookosphere, that is not in the offing. Conclusion: the North gets a free seapower show off its coast, but will that actually change its behavior? Here’s a hint.
So who is “Invincible Spirit” actually for? South Korea and Japan, maybe, to demonstrate that the U.S. continues to stand by them. Regional American commanders, maybe, who have got to be frustrated by all the hardware at their fingertips that they cannot use, even in the face of a flagrant provocation. And what about China? Does GW’s mission show that the Navy isn’t yet convinced that sending carriers to WestPac makes them into “sitting docks?”
What do you think?
The cult of China’s carrier-killer
July 20th, 2010 | Blogs Carriers China | Posted by Phil Ewing
Another American "sitting dock," the Harry S. Truman, at sea. // MC2 Kilho Park / Navy
In the same way that disaster-flick auteur Roland Emmerich just cannot see enough world landmarks be destroyed, so too are there a few hard-core people out there who cannot purge their visions of an American aircraft carrier being sunk. Author Patrick Robinson vaporized his “USS Thomas Jefferson” in a nuclear strike; director Michael Bay had his Decepticons obliterate the Theodore Roosevelt; and Naval War College professor Cmdr. James Kraska blew up the George Washington with the pretend-carrier-sinker’s latest weapon of choice: China’s hyper-missile of death.
Although it’s highly classified, of course, we all know the characteristics of this super weapon by now, don’t we? It lances out of space like God’s terrible, swift sword and shatters America’s influence in the world Pacific, leaving America as geopolitically relevant as Andorra — or such are the fears. Analysts have assigned such power to China’s carrier killer, and treat its dominance as such a fait accompli, that you get stories like this:
As a portrayal of its military prowess, the United States has sent one of the bigger aircraft carriers called USS George Washington to the area. Cold War period warship could carry over 6000 crewmembers and dozens of aircrafts. These large pieces of floating metal used to be quiet effective during the Cold War era, but Short of charging their nuclear warheads at once, given today’s high-precision anti-warship cruise missiles, aircraft carriers such as the USS George Washington are considered ideal sitting docks for target practicing when they move too close to other countries’ borders.
Also, stories like this.
Well, that settles it — guess we’ll have to disband the Navy. You can’t fight fate. Just one quick question, though: How many ships has this missile actually hit?
Reporter’s Notebook: CNO @ Heritage Foundation
May 14th, 2010 | Aviation Ballistic missile defense Carriers China Environment Foreign navies leadership Maritime operations Navy Personnel The Middle East The Pacific Washington | Posted by Lance Bacon
Adm. Gary Roughead speaks at the Heritage Foundation's annual series of events aimed at highlighting key national defense and homeland security issues. (Photo by Mass Communication Specialist First Class Tiffini Jones Vanderwyst)
Date: May 13, 2010
Location: Heritage Foundation, Washington D.C.
Subj: CNO comments
In a speech and response to questions offered at the Heritage Foundation Thursday, Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Gary Roughead urged fiscal responsibility yet downplayed talk of further cuts to Navy ships and programs.
He agreed with Defense Secretary Robert Gates’ call for greater scrutiny in procurement, and said he is a “proponent” for considering revisions to decades-old laws governing personnel issues. (You can read more about that in Monday’s edition of Navy Times).
Other highlights: Read the rest of this entry »
Hot-dogging in the Chinese fleet?
April 26th, 2010 | Aviation China Maritime operations The Pacific | Posted by Phil Ewing
China's newfound naval aggressiveness is all over the news these days, although its ships train regularly with their U.S. counterparts. The Chinese destroyer Qingdao sailed with the American destroyer Chung-Hoon. // MC3 Ben Gonzales / Navy
Back in the bad old days, Soviet pilots used to tease American carrier battle groups — that’s what we called ‘em — by edging close to their airspace, flying attack-style dives toward the carrier and trying other kinds of mischief. A generation of F-14 Tomcat pilots, in fact, spent kind of a lot of time staring out their canopies at the crews aboard Russian Tu-95 bombers, sometimes waving, sometimes shaking their fists, but always curious about the guys in the other plane. Those kinds of encounters still happen every once in a while, but they’re much rarer now.
It might not stay that way if the Chinese become the new bad boys of the oceans. According to a story today out of Japan, a tense near-miss this month between a Chinese helicopter and a Japanese destroyer may have happened because the Chinese helo pilot wasn’t obeying orders to break off, and decided to put the fear into the Japanese Maritime Self Defense Force:
On the morning of April 8, the [Chinese] helicopter approached an MSDF destroyer … in the central area of the East China Sea. When the helicopter took off from a guided missile destroyer, it was about 4,000 meters away from the MSDF destroyer Suzunami. As the chopper flew closer to the Suzunami, the destroyer ordered it several times by radio not to fly any closer to the Japanese destroyers. However, the helicopter ignored the orders and continued toward the Suzunami. Ultimately the helicopter was only about 90 meters away from the Suzunami at a height of about 30 meters, lower than the destroyer’s mast.
According to another report, the crew of the Suzunami spotted Chinese air crew aboard the helo with cameras, and wondered if they weren’t filming the ship’s sensors and weapons.
We all laughed when Maverick and Goose buzzed the tower at Naval Air Station Miramar, but the idea that this Chinese pilot refused orders to break off his run doesn’t seem that funny. How soon until this happens with an American ship?