rickusn

Amendment No. 1399 proposed by Senator Warner for Senator Dianne Feinstein, CA (Sponsor) and Senator Chuck Grassley, IA (Co-Sponsor) has been agreed to in Senate by Unanimous Consent yesterday (07/21/2005).

Text of the Amendment below :

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AMENDMENT NO. 1399

(Purpose: To provide for the transfer of the Battleship U.S.S. Iowa (BB-61))

Strike section 1021 and insert the following:

SEC. 1021. TRANSFER OF BATTLESHIPS.

(a) TRANSFER OF BATTLESHIP WISCONSIN.--The Secretary of the Navy is authorized--

(1) to strike the Battleship U.S.S. WISCONSIN (BB-64) from the Naval Vessel Register; and

(2) subject to section 7306 of title 10, United States Code, to transfer the vessel by gift or otherwise provided that the Secretary requires, as a condition of transfer, that the transferee locate the vessel in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

(b) TRANSFER OF BATTLESHIP IOWA.--The Secretary of the Navy is authorized--

(1) to strike the Battleship U.S.S. IOWA (BB-61) from the Naval Vessel Register; and

(2) subject to section 7306 of title 10, United States Code, to transfer the vessel by gift or otherwise provided that the Secretary requires, as a condition of transfer, that the transferee locate the vessel in the State of California.

(c) INAPPLICABILITY OF NOTICE AND WAIT REQUIREMENT.--Notwithstanding any provision of subsection (a) or (b), section 7306(d) of title 10, United States Code, shall not apply to the transfer authorized by subsection (a) or the transfer authorized by subsection (b).

(d) REPEAL OF SUPERSEDED REQUIREMENTS AND AUTHORITIES.--

(1) Section 1011 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1996 (Public Law 104-106; 110 Stat. 421) is repealed.

(2) Section 1011 of the Strom Thurmond National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1999 (Public Law 105-261; 112 Stat. 2118) is repealed.

TopHatter

Traitor


Well, I guess I can't really say that. They'll never be returned to action.
The carrier admirals and civilian bean counters will ensure that.

__________________
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Anon

Hey, we still have the 2.5+ a pop DD-X.

Oh wait, that'll probably never be built in numbers either.

LOL. The USN...the gang that couldn't shoot straight even if the Army held the gun for them.

I move we strike the NAVY, and give their budget directly to the USAF. Any objections?

TopHatter

Go right ahead Secretary Johnson.

I doubt you'll see a Revolt Of The Admirals this time.

More like Surrender Of The Admirals.

Anon

LOL, we could maintain the sub fleet, and disband the whole rest of the USN.

How many F-22s and B-2s do you reckon we could buy for the cost of the navy surface and air arm budget?

highsea

Two dozen B-2's and a dozen squadrons of Raptors, roughly...

__________________
My baby called me up. She said- Why don't you ever take me out? Pick me up in your brand new car....You shake the short change from the old fruit jar...

Anon

A dozen sqns, that's about what, 144 planes? I'd have thought it would be much higher. If the buy is greatly increased the unit cost would do a nose dive.

I'd have thought it would be more along the lines of 1000 more F-22s.

Probably be better off with more tankers as opposed to more B-2s. Lot more bang for the buck i'd think.

highsea

Lol, I was just making a wild guess. Figure restarting the B2 line, they will come in at ~$2Bn each for a low production number- a little under 1/2 the cost of a CVN. Take the rest of the surface ships in the CSF and trade then for a squadron of Raptors- you might get two squadrons, how much is an AB going for these days?

You can get 20 F-22's for each B2, so you can mix and match to fill in the Raptor numbers...

And we'll keep the subs, we still need them...

Anon

An Arliegh Burke is 1.1 billion dollars without weapons, helo, or fuel.

With a massively increased production run i figure each $1.1 billion Burke would get us about 20 Raptors($55 million unit cost), plus however many can get gotten for weapons/helo/fuel costs(figure a total of 150 million more per ship, or another 3 Raptors). Figure the personnel costs for 20 raptors(a bit over a sqn) to be a bit less than for an Arliegh Burke.

Forget the B-2s, just too much money to be worth it now that the factory is closed and the workers scattered to the 4 winds.

LOL.....when rick sees this thread he's gonna skitz.

highsea

Haha. Well, since we aren't getting any new B2's we can buy some of those "flying aircraft carriers".

Anon

Nah, just a spit load of new tankers.

Dreadnought

Just to break they're stones we should tell them ok since you dont want them maybe we should sell them to say ummm anyone who has the money.. like NK,Iran or Syria im sure they wouldnt hesitate to put them in service. Im sure they would be pissed..lmao fools they have no idea what it takes to protect this country or our amphibious troops anymore. Just seems like along with the greatest generation the greatest surface combatants will slowly fade into history with the pompus help of the carrier admirals who probably never served on them but im sure enjoyed the comfort they provided in bottom line protection. I just wonder how many served during the days of the battleships...probably none.
Maybe some of us are just old and our thinking is too but atleast we knew what worked. So umm what are we going to replace them with a 5" on a zodiac? no doubt.

Gun Grape

We could have made some killer razor blades though. They should never have been brought back in the 80s, a gimmick to get to the 600 ship navy. Now we can quit wasting money on upkeep.

I still say use one for a SinkEx, just to see how much was hype.



Many around here quote Bob Henneman as one of the big BB experts. Look at what he had to say about their usefulness:

http://www.bobhenneman.info/eranew.htm


"The wartime mass-production efforts of WWII killed the battleship. Tanks, trucks, jeeps, aircraft, escort vessels, Liberty ships, and even carriers were being cranked out at an astounding rate. But there is simply no way to mass-produce battleships. No matter how quickly you assemble the parts, it still takes YEARS to manufacture the heavy armor, turrets, and main guns. The manufacturing process simply cannot be rushed, and the facilities capable of this type of work are limited in capacity. The US completed a handful of battleships after the war started, but all were pre-war projects. Not one US battleship laid down or authorized after the entry into the war was finished. Those not already well advanced in construction were suspended, so that the money, manpower, and steel could go into projects with a more immediate return. The battleship died not in combat, but at the hands of bean counters.

By contrast, almost 150 carriers of all types, and over 300,000 aircraft, were churned out by the US war industry in the same time period. Battleships simply became irrelevant as they became greatly outnumbered due to economic necessity. Once the battleships became outnumbered 15 or 20 to 1 by carriers, they HAD to become a secondary feature to the world's navies. It still took dozens, or even hundreds of planes several hours to sink a battleship, but with thousands of aircraft costing less money and taking less time to build than a single battleship, the odds were always against the battleship.

The final nail in the coffin of the battleship was the elimination of the Scharnhorst, Tirpitz, Yamato, and the other Axis battleships. If battleships were designed to fight battleships, and the enemy didn't have any, why not just build more carriers and planes?

This assured that the battleship, killed by wartime economics, stayed dead after the war. It is hard to justify the expense and effort needed to build these beasts when there is no like threat.

Even today, no one argues that a battleship is not a powerful weapon. They instead argue that other, cheaper weapons can do the job instead."

Dreadnought

Well I guess I have to agree with the above stated. But again only an opinion. Myself as a person id rather still carry a 45 with the extra cost associated then carry a bb gun because it was more cost effective. Intimidating percieved threats with the largest guns afloat is worth its weight in gold. You know guys who knows we may even see the destruction or scrapping of these beautiful war machines before our time is up I think it would be ashame but thats just me. Oh and Gun it wouldnt be fair nor respectful for them to be used in Wargames to see what would happen unless ofcoarse you gonna let them defend themselves which they wont but I think they more then deserved this gesture. If anything I think the modern surface Navy would be embaressed to find it extremely hard to beat them. So if anything scrap them and use the components for one great museum forcused on Naval Power. Guns, Armor, Turrents etc would make excellent exibits. Besides it would also show the children of today what it was like back then when the world was really at war. Not like today where we must be politically correct and afford the rights of the innocent to murderous cowards.

HistoricalDavid

When the call goes out for cheap high-volume shore bombardment - such as in North Korea and China - these senators will regret their words.