NS Military Realism Consultancy Thread Mk X Purps Safe Space

[Austria-Bohemia-Hungary]

Obviously the solution is to bulge the Nimitzes a la CV-3.

[Gallia-]

Obviously the solution is to bulge the Nimitzes a la CV-3.

hot? owo

[Scandinavian Nations]

i for one can't wait to have my eyeballs replaced by huge camera lenses that

stream 3D porn.
Really, that's what everyone will get them for. No exceptions.

Is there any point in time when it could be considered the time battleship be pcame obsolete because of the rise of the carrier?
I want to set a RP in the 1920s and 30s and wanted to know how far back I have to go where I don't have to worry about aircraft carriers ruining my sexy battleship and battlecruiser squadrons.

HMS Dreadnought entered service in 1906. That was the first ship that we would easily recognize as a "battleship", with all-steam propulsion (no sails), turret-mounted big guns, some centerline turrets.

She carried anti-aircraft guns for self-defense.

[Laywenrania]

Is there any point in time when it could be considered the time battleship be pcame obsolete because of the rise of the carrier?
I want to set a RP in the 1920s and 30s and wanted to know how far back I have to go where I don't have to worry about aircraft carriers ruining my sexy battleship and battlecruiser squadrons.

HMS Dreadnought entered service in 1906. That was the first ship that we would easily recognize as a "battleship", with all-steam propulsion (no sails), turret-mounted big guns, some centerline turrets.

She carried anti-aircraft guns for self-defense.

she's the first "all-big gun-battleship" with turbines. The other features were already carried by earlier ships.

To the original question one could argue that around 1921 and later, the battleship can be considered as obsolete, as the naval testing of aircraft against battleships showed the vulnerability of the big ships and they were often more a fleet-in-beeing threat, with the mainwork done by the far cheaper cruisers and destroyers (which never got the fame they deserved, contrary to the battleship), which were to a certain degree "expendable", compared to the wasteful resources spent on battleships.

[Laritaia]

so drunj carrier remains drunj

https://www.onr.navy.mil/en/Media-Cente ... ion-CVN-78

They went with HSLA 115, which shaved 100-200 tons from the topside (the specific estimate was 175 tons) mass and reduced the list. I'm not sure if there are other, cumulative changes that total to a complete list elimination, though. It's probably still slightly drunj, but you already snickered about that a while ago TBF.

wasn't one of their suggested fixes to literally fill a compartment on the other side with lead

now that i think about it, that will be the reason why the aft Sea Sparrow sponson is so massive now

to compensate for the remaining 200 tons

[Scandinavian Nations]

she's the first "all-big gun-battleship" with turbines. The other features were already carried by earlier ships.

Inconsistently. Some had multiple-gun mounts (forgot that one), some were all big gun, some weren't. If we go earlier, we get much less consistent designs.

Anyway, the point is that even at the inception of 20th century battleship designs, they already worried about torpedo boats, destroyers, submarines and aircraft; there was no real golden age for steel battleships to have the seas all to themselves.

To the original question one could argue that around 1921 and later, the battleship can be considered as obsolete, as the naval testing of aircraft against battleships showed the vulnerability of the big ships ...

The dreadnought battleship was vulnerable and clearly headed towards obsolescence already when it was invented.
Torpedoes, which negate armor, were already common. Submarines, which ultimately replaced battleships as the primary fleet vs fleet weapon, were being mass-produced. Military aircraft were arriving, bombers had been foreseen a few years back, it was a matter of time.

But new technology takes time to develop, get deployed, and get mass-produced in numbers required to actually render old technology ineffective. There's no one point in that time where something clicked and battleships became useless. Rather, it was a gradual process of weapons that rendered the dreadnought obsolete becoming increasingly capable and increasingly common between 1905 and 1945.
As of 1915, with Jutland having proven torpedoes to be the number one threat and with bombers under development, one could argue that any new battleship construction was inertia. Still they kept playing some role.

[The Soodean Imperium]

she's the first "all-big gun-battleship" with turbines. The other features were already carried by earlier ships.

Inconsistently. Some had multiple-gun mounts (forgot that one), some were all big gun, some weren't. If we go earlier, we get much less consistent designs.

?????

Twin-gun mounts were more or less standard on "true" pre-Dreadnought battleships, and were nearly always in the 12-inch range. Nearly always centerline, as well, often with one turret forward and one aft. You're confusing Pre-Dreadnoughts specifically with the less consistent designs of the mid-to-late 19th century, e.g. floating batteries, central battery ships, and ironclads. By the late 1890s there was already a clear convergence around the configuration shared by Fuji, Brennus, Petropavlovsk, and Maine (BB-10), with the main differences relating to the arrangement of the secondary, tertiary, and quaternary batteries.

None of these Pre-Dreadnoughts were "all big gun" though, this was HMS Dreadnought's most significant improvement over her predecessors, the result of years of advocacy by Sir "Jacky" Fisher. HMS Dreadnought actually eliminated the secondary battery entirely, jumping directly from 12-inch to 3-inch (QF) guns, while nearly all dreadnoughts that followed her revived the 4-to-6-inch secondary battery.

As built, she also lacked anti-aircraft guns entirely. During WWI she was refitted with two (2) anti-air guns, first 6pdrs and later 20-cwt guns. This was pretty typical of battleship and cruiser air defense up until the 1930s.

All-steam propulsion on battleships was standard even earlier; by the late 19th century, sails were still present on some light cruisers to help with fuel efficiency on long patrols of the colonial coasts, but it's patently false that Dreadnought was the first battleship (Pre-Dreadnought or otherwise) with no sails. HMS Dreadnought's propulsion innovation was the use of turbines rather than multiple-expansion engines hooked up to the boilers. Even then, Germany's early "Dreadnoughts" still used multiple-expansion engines, so it's somewhat debatable whether turbines were a necessary feature of the Dreadnought category.

Anyway, the point is that even at the inception of 20th century battleship designs, they already worried about torpedo boats, destroyers, submarines and aircraft; there was no real golden age for steel battleships to have the seas all to themselves.

Has there ever been any age where any warship (or plane, or vehicle) faced no threats altogether? Did MCLOS ATGMs render tanks obsolete?

To the original question one could argue that around 1921 and later, the battleship can be considered as obsolete, as the naval testing of aircraft against battleships showed the vulnerability of the big ships ...

The dreadnought battleship was vulnerable and clearly headed towards obsolescence already when it was invented.
Torpedoes, which negate armor, were already common. Submarines, which ultimately replaced battleships as the primary fleet vs fleet weapon, were being mass-produced. Military aircraft were arriving, bombers had been foreseen a few years back, it was a matter of time.

The "death" of battleships was only indirectly a result of the appearance of aircraft carriers.

Ceteris paribus, the same vulnerabilities you've identified apply equally well to carriers. They are not immune to bombs, they are not immune to torpedoes, and they were not appreciably faster. Arguably they were more vulnerable, as the aircraft carriers of WWII tended to incorporate fewer protection measures and fewer high-caliber anti-air guns than contemporary battleships, and AFAIK generally took fewer hits to sink. And yet carriers (and cruisers, and destroyers) never became obsolete because a few well-placed torpedoes could sink them.

Battleships' problem is that they were designed around large surface engagements, of the kind seen at Jutland and Tsushima, where ships of both fleets would engage each other in a line of battle or something resembling it. And in World War II, these engagements proved relatively uncommon. Carriers, by contrast, could continue to launch aircraft and engage the enemy while remaining hundreds of kilometers away, to the point that battles where opposing warships never came within visual range became a standard occurrence in the Pacific. In a war fought along these lines, in which the enemy refused to commit to a surface engagement but continued to send air attacks, there was not much for a battleship to do. Carriers, by contrast, were still vulnerable to air attacks, but they actually possessed the ability to fight back.

[Neo-Pontic Empire]

Obviously the solution is to bulge the Nimitzes a la CV-3.

hot? owo

Thicc carriers

[Theodosiya]

Would twinning .50, 30mm or 57mm a good idea in ship, or vehicle, for .50?

[Laritaia]

Would twinning .50, 30mm or 57mm a good idea in ship, or vehicle, for .50?

what do you mean by this?

do you mean a 30mm with a coaxial .50?

[Theodosiya]

No, as in twin .50 cal or twin .30 cal in gun mount and twin 57mm in turret.

Coax .50 are silly.

[Laritaia]

No, as in twin .50 cal or twin .30 cal in gun mount and twin 57mm in turret.

Coax .50 are silly.

well twin .50s and .30s are common irl on ships and there is a twin 57mm AA gun

so yes

[Austria-Bohemia-Hungary]

HMG calibres are basically worthless for shipboard air defence purposes from 1939 onwards, you might find a use for the 57 mm's until like the 60's-70's when Styxes starts getting proliferated throughout the planet.
What vehicles are we talking about? SPAAG's or secondaries on an AFV?

[Theodosiya]

So, say, a frigate, with 2x2 30mm manually operated gun, Goalkeeper, 4x2 .50, 2x1 AGL and 76mm SR is possible/realistic? (Not including the missiles)

HMG calibres are basically worthless for shipboard air defence purposes from 1939 onwards, you might find a use for the 57 mm's until like the 60's-70's when Styxes starts getting proliferated throughout the planet.
What vehicles are we talking about? SPAAG's or secondaries on an AFV?

Shipborne. I'll use twin 35 or 40mm as SPAAG, and MG3 for coax. The 57mm is for corvs/OPV.

[Austria-Bohemia-Hungary]

You can suppress pirates with just two HMG mounts. If you intend to shoot at aircraft in a post-war environment a couple of Bofors m/1948's is much, much better.

[Theodosiya]

It's modern day. I'm not gonna use them for AA, unless in emergency. And for AA, there are Mistrals, Aster, Goalkeeper and MICA.

[Versail]

What exactly do the civilians employed by militaries do?

[NeuPolska]

What exactly do the civilians employed by militaries do?

Photography, public affairs, possibly some aspects of logistics, probably domestic truck/transport drivers, working in an office, etc.

[Kouralia]

What exactly do the civilians employed by militaries do?

Admin work, catering, service work (cleaning etc.). Things that don't require military training, committing to a life of service/an inability to back out of contracts and resign easily, and things that don't require so much security clearance.

Anything actually important will be done by soldiers, politicians, or civil servants in the relevant cabinet department.

[The Soodean Imperium]

Time for Soode to ask another lengthy question about conscription?

A few months ago, during my region's re-scaling of the map and other adjustments, my population ended up more than doubling, while my border length didn't increase proportionally as much. Which means that I now need only about 0.6-0.7% of my population in active service to meet my defense needs, as opposed to around 1.1-1.2% before. Which, in turn, means that my previous policy of two years' military service for all males is no longer necessary and needs to be revised.

An all-volunteer military would be easily doable at 0.6% in active service, and it would mesh well with the Menghean military's IC policy of moving toward a relatively more skilled and technologically advanced fighting force. Lower turnover rates would mean a greater accumulation of experience for radar operators, tank commanders, and the like, and reduce the need to train a massive batch of fresh recruits every year.

On the other hand, though, lower turnover rates would also drain my pool of reservists, as under conscription I could place all ex-conscripts in the mobilization reserves for the first four years and more than double the number of active divisions by calling them up. Given that Menghe faces a parity opponent on one border and is locked in rivalry with the region's main interventionist power, I see this as a fairly important capability.

I've also grown somewhat attached to the social effects of universal conscription, which would include instilling nationalism, unifying regional and ethnic identities, and making service a core part of citizenship, things that the Menghean regime would ICly find very attractive.

The opposite approach, I suppose, would be to shorten the mandatory service term to 12 months (18 including training and reserve familiarization); this would allow me to keep the social effects and the reserve pool, but it would intensify the problems with high turnover and low experience.

A possible promising middle-route approach, and this is just me speculating, would be to keep 2-year conscription but select only the most qualified or most fit ~50% of recruits, and accept volunteers or returning servicemen for more skill-demanding positions. As I see it now, this seems to be the best balance, in that it keeps turnover at an acceptable rate but also leaves a decently large pool of mobilization reserves. It should still keep the citizen-soldier identity, since anyone can be called up in theory, and at any rate those who are selected out still get indoctrination from !Komsomol membership.

In fact, I'm so attached to it that I'm probably suffering from confirmation bias, so I've come here to have someone hopefully point out any flaws with this and give input on my other options.


FakeEdit: laziest solution would be to keep universal 2-year conscription and just add another ~2 million active soldiers to the military but I'm not ~NS~ enough for that

[Neo-Pontic Empire]

On the other hand, though, lower turnover rates would also drain my pool of reservists, as under conscription I could place all ex-conscripts in the mobilization reserves for the first four years and more than double the number of active divisions by calling them up. Given that Menghe faces a parity opponent on one border and is locked in rivalry with the region's main interventionist power, I see this as a fairly important capability.

I've also grown somewhat attached to the social effects of universal conscription, which would include instilling nationalism, unifying regional and ethnic identities, and making service a core part of citizenship, things that the Menghean regime would ICly find very attractive.

Seems like the only real downside is fewer reservists which could be fixed by having a national militia. Essentially give each man a rifle, make him go to training for a few weeks every year, and if war breaks out he is supposed to head to a mustering ground to join with a unit and head off to war. Would be a bit more complex with jobs more specialized than infantry (eg. armour and aviation) but these could be supplemented by retired soldiers and specially trained and educated individuals (eg. pilots can join the air corps reserves and just have to have at least X flying hours per year, doctors are drafted into the reserve medical corps).

[The Soodean Imperium]

On the other hand, though, lower turnover rates would also drain my pool of reservists, as under conscription I could place all ex-conscripts in the mobilization reserves for the first four years and more than double the number of active divisions by calling them up. Given that Menghe faces a parity opponent on one border and is locked in rivalry with the region's main interventionist power, I see this as a fairly important capability.

I've also grown somewhat attached to the social effects of universal conscription, which would include instilling nationalism, unifying regional and ethnic identities, and making service a core part of citizenship, things that the Menghean regime would ICly find very attractive.

Seems like the only real downside is fewer reservists which could be fixed by having a national militia. Essentially give each man a rifle, make him go to training for a few weeks every year, and if war breaks out he is supposed to head to a mustering ground to join with a unit and head off to war. Would be a bit more complex with jobs more specialized than infantry (eg. armour and aviation) but these could be supplemented by retired soldiers and specially trained and educated individuals (eg. pilots can join the air corps reserves and just have to have at least X flying hours per year, doctors are drafted into the reserve medical corps).

I have considered relying on Youth Vanguard members aged 18-28, who already conduct ideological lessons and could easily be repurposed into a paramilitary training organization.

My concern though is that an ex-conscript who served as a tank gunner for two years, and then left the military for three years with annual refresher training, is going to be a much better tank gunner than a new recruit who got to play with a rifle or a gunsight for a few weeks each year over the course of five years. I could be completely wrong about this though.

Under the universal-conscription system, Menghe's reserves were "layered" - for the first four years after leaving the military, an ex-soldier is part of the Mobilization Reserve, and for the next eight years, part of the Emergency Reserve or Homeland Defense Troops or whatever I decide to call it. Mobilization Reserve units are relatively fresher out of active service, train a few weeks out of every year in their assigned units, and can be assembled into fully mechanized formations with last-generation (1990s) equipment.

Assuming my reasoning in the second paragraph is correct, and it might not be, this means that the Army can more than double its number of operational divisions in the course of a week by calling up mobilization reserves alone, and this new force will still be of better quality than one assembled from a national militia. Given Menghe's strategic situation, this strikes me as a very important capability, and I'm not sure a national militia would be just as good.

[Neo-Pontic Empire]

My concern though is that an ex-conscript who served as a tank gunner for two years, and then left the military for three years with annual refresher training, is going to be a much better tank gunner than a new recruit who got to play with a rifle or a gunsight for a few weeks each year over the course of five years. I could be completely wrong about this though.

True. Perhaps to rectify that offer pay bonuses for people who enter more specialized fields in exchange for greater pay. In other words when you turn 18 or graduate secondary school you must report to the reserve corps for training. You can elect to do an unskilled task (eg. cook, truck driver, infantryman) in which case your pay is less (or none if you consider it a civic duty) than if you decide to enter a specialized field (medicine, armour, artillery, officer corps) in which case you may need to have specialized training and education already or plan to have it in the future. You stick around training for longer and you get paid more than people who just spend a weekend learning not to shoot themselves in the foot. Plus retired military personnel can join it the reserves in their field for some extra post retirement money. So for example the members of specific groups in the reserves might have to undergo the following
*Infantrymen: Week long course after turning 18 so you don't hurt yourself, head to muster once a year for PT, and basic drill and unit training
*Doctors: 18 year olds can sign up to be doctors, they get a first aid course and basic rifle training after getting their doctorate they are reserve doctors (not sure what you would need to just be a battlefield medic)
*Tank Crewmen: 18 year olds sign up for a longer course where they learn the basics of each job in a tank and are assigned one specialized job (eg. gunner) that they focus on. During yearly training they have to stay a bit longer than infantrymen
*Officers: Primarily retired soldiers, officers, and NCOs, anyone who didn't have officer training gets it during their orientation
Veterans can take any role they are trained with, so a retired infantryman can join the infantry reserves, a retired tanker can join the armoured reserves. The idea is that by mixing veterans with untrained conscripts they cumulative experience might be similar to fully trained conscripts.

Of course your reserves still can't match conscripts most likely but they are easier to raise and can be more numerous as commitments can last for longer than 2 years without interfering much in one's personal life. So explaining further. Lets say your military with conscription is 2 million personnel (I forgot your numbers if you gave them), with a national militia your standing army might number 1 million but your militia might number 8 million plus as one could be forced to stay in the militia for 4, 8, 10 years or hell even until they turn 40 or 50.

[Scandinavian Nations]

All-steam propulsion on battleships was standard even earlier; by the late 19th century, sails were still present on some light cruisers to help with fuel efficiency on long patrols of the colonial coasts, but it's patently false that Dreadnought was the first battleship (Pre-Dreadnought or otherwise) with no sails.

No one asserted that it was. Dreadnought was the first ship that combined every defining feature of a 20th century battleship, not just some of them.

Has there ever been any age where any warship (or plane, or vehicle) faced no threats altogether?

No credible threats other than broadly similar warships? Yes - most of the ironclads age and before.

Galleys, ships of the line and ironclads got their moments in the sun. Steel battleships never did. They came straight into an environment designed to kill them asymmetrically.

Ceteris paribus, the same vulnerabilities you've identified apply equally well to carriers. They are not immune to bombs, they are not immune to torpedoes, and they were not appreciably faster.

They don't care.

Battleships were defined by their armor, which protected them from being disabled by anything except another battleship. This prompted a positive feedback loop, a battleship arms race, which resulted in dreadnoughts. Same positive feedback loop that produced the Tiger and the Abrams; a weapon being built specifically around defeating the same weapon.

When bombs and torpedoes arrived, armor no longer mattered. It became all about how much ordnance you could bring in a single strike and how far out you could deliver it. Aircraft won that contest, missiles finished the job.

Battleships' problem is that they were designed around large surface engagements, of the kind seen at Jutland and Tsushima, where ships of both fleets would engage each other in a line of battle or something resembling it.

Jutland was a torpedo soup that finally confirmed that battleships were heading towards obsoletion. Anyone building them after Jutland was just following their own inertia.

[The Soodean Imperium]

All-steam propulsion on battleships was standard even earlier; by the late 19th century, sails were still present on some light cruisers to help with fuel efficiency on long patrols of the colonial coasts, but it's patently false that Dreadnought was the first battleship (Pre-Dreadnought or otherwise) with no sails.

No one asserted that it was.

You did:

HMS Dreadnought entered service in 1906. That was the first ship that we would easily recognize as a "battleship", with all-steam propulsion (no sails), turret-mounted big guns, some centerline turrets.

She carried anti-aircraft guns for self-defense.

With the exception of "entered service in 1906," every single one of these claims is patently false. The Pre-dreadnoughts of the late 1890s, at the very least, had all-steam propulsion, turret-mounted big guns, and two twin centerline turrets. They were also fairly easy to recognize as battleships, though this claim is a subjective one, so I'm sure you'll use some weasel wording like "I've never looked at pre-dreadnoughts before so I didn't know that's what a battleship looks like."

The one truly new and revolutionary feature HMS Dreadnought brought to the table was an all-big-gun armament, foregoing 4-to-6-inch guns entirely in favor of five twin 12-inch turrets. As well as turbine propulsion, though again, it's debatable whether this was a necessary feature of subsequent "dreadnought battleships." Incidentally, the all-big-gun arrangement is also the one feature you dismissed as unoriginal in your subsequent post.

Dreadnought was the first ship that combined every defining feature of a 20th century battleship, not just some of them.

Except, notably, for the entire secondary battery. And the use of superfiring mounts, anti-air guns, and non-ram bows, but those aren't really fair points.

Has there ever been any age where any warship (or plane, or vehicle) faced no threats altogether?

No credible threats other than broadly similar warships? Yes - most of the ironclads age and before.

Galleys, ships of the line and ironclads got their moments in the sun. Steel battleships never did. They came straight into an environment designed to kill them asymmetrically.

If any weapon came into an environment designed to kill them asymmetrically, surely it was carriers. The IJN achieved a watershed victory in carrier-based attacks, but they also lost their entire carrier fleet before the war was up. And not just to other aircraft carriers. Eight were lost to US submarines. The UK lost five of its carriers to submarines, and the US lost three, four including Yorktown. And yet this did not render carriers "obsolete," because they still had useful offensive capabilities.

Unless you're trying to argue that carriers never enjoyed a "moment in the sun" either, and that this should be limited only to weapons that were truly invulnerable?

Ceteris paribus, the same vulnerabilities you've identified apply equally well to carriers. They are not immune to bombs, they are not immune to torpedoes, and they were not appreciably faster.

They don't care.

Battleships were defined by their armor, which protected them from being disabled by anything except another battleship. This prompted a positive feedback loop, a battleship arms race, which resulted in dreadnoughts. Same positive feedback loop that produced the Tiger and the Abrams; a weapon being built specifically around defeating the same weapon.

When bombs and torpedoes arrived, armor no longer mattered. It became all about how much ordnance you could bring in a single strike and how far out you could deliver it. Aircraft won that contest, missiles finished the job.

Yes, that was the exact point I made. Congratulations on abandoning your old argument, and repeating mine in a different way?

The point is that "obsolescence" is not purely a matter of vulnerability, because if any platform serves a useful role, attempts will be made to reduce those vulnerabilities. Thus, in the interwar era, all major powers applied anti-torpedo bulges to their battleships and incorporated improved torpedo protection into newly built ones. Deck armor increased dramatically as well, a response not only to aircraft bombs but also to plunging fire at growing ranges. Destroyers (originally TBDs) were designed to fend off torpedo boats, and they later received dual-purpose guns to fend off attack aircraft. None of these were perfect solutions, but all were deemed adequate, because all major powers of the interwar era, correctly or incorrectly, judged that surface engagements would remain a major part of naval warfare, and that battleships would be a core part of them.

Battleships' problem was that they had nothing to contribute to an engagement fought at well beyond visual range, and experience in World War II indicated that this would be the norm in the future. Carriers excelled at engagements beyond visual range, and so they were retained, despite being at least as vulnerable to attack aircraft, mines, submarines, nuclear weapons, and the occasional unexpected surface combatant.