You're right that it's a concern, but I find it hard to believe that this hasn't already been considered. Presumably one of the most central operations at the beginning of such a war would be to neutralize such missiles in the enemy country.

You'd also have to actually hit the damn boat, which I would assume would be a pretty hard task for a ballistic missile going five times the speed of sound, or whatever. Surely the military would see the launch, and try to get the ship out of the way?

It seems to me that this is a far bigger risk to, say, Guam or Okinawa than a carrier group at sea. You're right to say that navies can't operate with impunity, but it's a bit much to say that they're obsolete in a war with the three revisionist powers (China, Russia, Iran).

You really are that stupid, Fasces349.

It's quite likely that a nuclear war would start out limited, but once one side starts to lose too badly they'd go for broke. Here's a hypothetical. China plans on invading Taiwan. To ensure success they launch huge conventional attacks on American and allied bases in Japan, South Korea, and the Pacific. To make sure they get carrier groups at sea in the Pacific or Indian or wherever they happen to be floating at the time, they launch nuclear strikes in those areas. Now, it's quite likely that the United States will respond with a nuclear attack (whether tactical or all-out), but if there's still a significant conventional force left they could make use of that to punish China, or it's possible they could even surrender.

So there. There's a scenario where a limited nuclear war would be possible and make the targeting of aircraft carriers a good policy. I find it quite unlikely that this WOULDN'T quickly escalate into a nuclear holocaust (see where I said we be gone before we missed the carriers), but it's possible that China's crazy plan would work here. Nuclear states come up with plans on how to use their weapons without immediately leading to the extinguishment of humanity, it's just that in practical terms things probably won't work out that way. That doesn't make the decision to target carriers foolish, though.

I mean, what do you expect? That the opposing navies just steam out to sea to meet each other? you might as well have armies wearing colorful uniforms line up in a field and march at one another.

exactly, given how quickly nuclear wars happen, it would escalate into a full war very quickly...
and it failed to answer my question, I asked give an example of a situation that would be a limited nuclear war, that was a full scale war, or at least becomes one.

I wasn't expected navies to steam out to sea to meet each other, I was suggestion conventional weapons like fighters and bombers...

That question as phrased makes no sense. My hypothetical does answer your previous one, since it lays out the scenario for a possible limited nuclear war. The United States could cut its losses and not respond. It could still have conventional forces and decided to limit itself to them.

At any rate, the whole point of this was to show the efficacy of targeting carriers with nuclear weapons. That seems pretty clear.

no its not clear, if it was Germans would have been using V2 rockets on carriers in world war 2...

Except V2 rockets didn't have any kind of precision guidance. They were aimed at London and suchlike because they could only reliably HIT something the size of a friggin' city.

A wave-skimming nuclear armed cruise missile could do some serious damage to a carrier group. Particularly if it was programmed to dive into the water prior to it detonating. A subsurface explosion is a lot more dangerous to a ship than an airburst... or in some cases, even a direct hit.

Its kind of like swatting a bug with an axe, but its definitely possible.

Seriously?

For one Germany didn't have the bomb...

Maybe you don't understand how wide the radius of destruction is on a nuclear explosion. It's certainly faster than the carrier can move in the time it takes between launch and detonation. By nuking the ships at sea they are gone without risk to your own navy (at least from the opponent's navy).

Seriously, what's hard to understand about this? This is definitely the policy on nuclear armed submarines, where they would lob missiles and boil the seas if they knew where the subs were during the conflict. It stands to reason that if you were in a war where nuclear weapons could be used one of your targets would be the enemy's navy, since you could gain a serious upper hand without risking your forces. I really don't know why you don't understand this.

But what should I expect from a boy who lives in Canada and has all the benefits which come from living in a liberal democracy, and yet decides he's going to be a fascist?

It's also not as if Germany was dealing with enemy carriers as a serious element of force projection by the time they got the V2 operational. But really, let's be honest here. We may as well talk about the relevance of the War of Jenkins' Ear as WWII when considering past wars' applicability to current and future naval conflict. Precision-guided munitions will have at least as big an impact as the switch from sail to steam did on what navies can accomplish.

but the fact is if there were a possibility of nukes being used on such small targets then why bother with carriers at all? Most of the modern super power military's have agreed that the best ship for naval warfare is the carrier, hence why so many (the ones that can afford to) are building it...

Why were so many battleships built? Most were sink by subs or planes. And carriers are good for projecting power.

The us stopped building big battleships after midway, when the carriers strength was proven superior to that of a battleship...

@ largeham and Fasces

Fasces is right; they quit building them after Midway, but they kept using them until recently. Battleships are very good at pounding the hell out of anything within 24 miles of blue water, which is actually quite a bit of land.

America actually has a law on the books that says that all Iowa-class batteships that become museums must not be modified in any way that would negatively affect their military utility. The US Navy still maintains a stockpile of 16-inch shells and barrels, just in case we need to shell the hell out of any bad guys on a beach.

The fact is largeham, your not paid hundreds of thousands of dollars a year to decide what ships are the most effective in modern naval warfare, and the ones that did build carriers. So either they'r retarded (which I doubt) or there is some merit in carriers other then being a decoy for nukes.

Nukes are cheaper to build and maintain then carriers so if that was the case they wouldn't be being built

No one is going to nuke a carrier, especially an American carrier. No one wants to be the one to start a nuclear war. WWIII won't go nuclear until the very end. When American Marines are about to kick in the door to the Forbidden City, China will loose all of its missiles, and the war will end two hours later.

Thats what I said... (allthough not the Marines invading China, just the war will end a few hours after the first nuke is fired)

The only catch is if one country occupies another's launch control facilities. If you take the other guy's launch facilities, all you have to worry about is missile boats.

Don't forget the nuclear trains and trucks. The US developed a couple of roaming units to prevent just that problem. One was truck based and the other rail based.

and subs...

Fasces-

You argue as if institutional folly and bias is largely unknown. Carriers are marvelous weapons from a legislative body's point of view, with lots of expensive contracts going into their construction and maintenance that can be spread amongst many different districts. Carriers are also marvelous weapons from a naval aviator's point of view, because if it isn't, then the aviator's career has been about as useful as that of a buggy whip salesman. And naval aviation has been the royal road to flag rank since the Pacific War.

@ Fasces

I said subs.

@ Draugnar

America's nuclear trucks and trains are no longer in service. However, we do have 14 Ohio-class missile subs in service as insurance.

Regardless, capturing Minot Air Force Base would be no easy task.

A cursory look at our recent history would tend to imply strongly that America is by a wide margin the most likely invader rather than invadee in any conflict between nuclear powers.

@gunfighter: my apoligizes, missed that part
@Khan: whats your point?

People who are highly paid to make decisions don't necesaarily make good decisions just because they're highly paid.

but the reason why they are highly paid is because they have made good decisions in the past

Or because they're good at bureaucratic infighting, or they've attached themselves like lampreys to the right mentor, or...

@ Bob

Things could turn around very quickly. All it takes is an unforeseeable cataclysmic event, like a deathly plague that wipes out 95% of the population (and 95% of the military too) or a complete economic collapse.

@Gunfighter - I should have been more clear. If we developed them, so did the other nuclear superpowers like the old USSR. So I have no doubt China has something of a similar nature.

It does amuse me how much the military is a sacred cow for some people.

There are some very fine individuals in the military. I've worked with some of them. There are also a lot of petty time servers both in uniform and in the overall military-industrial complex. You have never seen mismanagement until you have visited a naval shipyard.

Just because somebody has a bit of braid on their sleeve or happens to be called "Congressman" doesn't automatically mean they're competent. I've worked with relatively high ranking officers who were dangerously incompetent.

Fasces seems to worship at the altar of Authority. But in many professional cultures, the best way to join Authority is to emulate the thinking of those that are already in Authority. This doesn't breed good critical thinking skills, but passive acceptance of things "everybody knows".

This is not always true, but I found out the hard way personally that its best to make your own judgements on the competency of the authority. This does not mean be grossly insubordinate, but to back up people in authority's work and not accept it as good just because they are Authority.

"Fasces seems to worship at the altar of Authority." Well he is a fascist...