Shipbucket

However, they also make fine targets, large ones at that. Yes, smaller carriers make equally opportune targets, yet they are not as costly to lose as a nuclear carrier and it's 5000 men.

Furthermore, why replace when you can renovate, for instance, USS Kitty Hawk and USS Constellation could be improved and prove suitable for further service, yet instead they sit as storage.

Because hulls get worn out over time and it's more cost-effective to build new ones.

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USN components, camouflage colors, & reference links (World War II only)

1) One big carrier is easier to defend than several smaller ones.
2) The knock-on effect of loosing a modern carrier would be the same no matter how big or small
3) It's cheaper to operate one big carrier rather than two small
3) One big carrier gives you more capabilities than two small ones
Because they're worn out and because there's no more room for upgrades.
And like I said earlier, if you want to be able to build carriers in the future you'll need to keep the workers and their skills in use.

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“Close” only counts with horseshoes, hand grenades, and tactical nuclear weapons.
That which does not kill me has made a grave tactical error

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Source Materiel is always welcome.

There's a reason why she ended her service being called USS Shitty Hawk.

I remember on another forum a USN sailor talked about an incident where a cat cable came undone and delegged a whole line of yellowshirts. He said the carrier's age was definitely a factor.

The fact of the matter is is that carriers just wear out. Even not counting age the complexity of older carriers takes a lot of money, while newer carriers are designed to be more maintenance-friendly. And those two you named specifically aren't nuke boats, which is why nobody much hesitated to retire them.

The same problem we had with the Oslo class Frigate. Speed was first turned down because the engines were worn out. then came the problems with guns. Finally the guns were so worn out that they almost fell apart after every firing exercise (one of the reason they replaced the aft 76mm twin with a 40mm so that 76mm gun can be used as a replacement for the other 76mm when that one is rebuild.). then came the development / technology ...

Each smaller carrier will require almost as many rank-and-file to operate as one large one.
They will be far less effective at flight ops- they are slower to launch strikes, slower on turnaround and unable to both launch and recover at the same time.
In short- it will be MORE EXPENSIVE to operate several smaller carriers than it is to operate one larger one... not to mention the increased expense of providing more escorts.

And, as has been pointed out- you can't renovate forever. Most of our carriers are >25 years old; that's old, even for a ship.

We have already unnecessarily weakened ourselves by accepting the myth of 'smaller numbers, greater technology.' Reducing numbers or capabilities of what we have now would be disastrous.

Regarding battleships and 20" guns:

This may be an old mare's tale but I've heard 14" guns are ideal for fire support because they're big but not too big.

quality show tbh

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I actually had an idea for this.....
Lets say you take a Yamato-Class Battleship, or any Battleship in it's "Class" (Similar weight, displacement, speed, etc.) and Took off it's Main and secondary cannons, then replaced that weight with VLS Cells with cruise missiles, enough to fill it's displacement. that would be a lot of firepower. If you subtract the Yamato's Main and secondary armaments, that would free up about 465.9 tonnes of it's total displacement. Now then, if each BrahMos Missile Weights about .3 tonnes, that's a lot, around 1,553 in total I think.
I know I didn't account for the weight of the cells needed to launch them, so that may subtract the total amount of missiles.

What are your guy's thoughts on this?

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