The phenomenon of armored ships
This article contains answers to the comments left by readers during the debate about the need for constructive defense in the military navy.
Here you are proving what you want, only no country in the world builds armored ships. And in the foreseeable future will not build.
“Why encourage a way of waging a war that does not give anything to a people who already have the primacy of the sea, and who, if successful, can lose this primacy”, - said Admiral Lord Jervis about the submarine designed by Robert Fulton.
The Yankees are already running to write off their 84 Aegis and lay modern “armored vehicles” in their place. The version with the “admiral conspiracy” does not claim to be the highest truth, but it is at least logical and has a real historical precedent. How cautious the British once rejected the idea of submarine warfare! What is not the answer to all skeptics - why no one is working on the security of modern ships.
The appearance of a highly protected warship will produce an effect similar to the “Dreadnought”. All NATO missile destroyers in one moment will be “second-rate” ships. All tactics and arsenals of the existing anti-ship will become outdated weapons. And if Russia had taken the lead with such a project, it would have raised the prestige of our fleet and overnight made the surface component of the Navy the strongest in the world.
However, first things first ...
The epoch of armor and a couple is long over. Whatever the fans of the battleships wrote there, the battleships are a thing of the past.
The battleship is an ugly, deep-set, thick-skinned monster. But every feat of battleships, battleships and heavy cruisers of the WWII era is an example of the highest combat stability.
Interest is not so much the battleships themselves, as their combat "scars". Type of ammunition used, location of hit, list of damage recorded.
As a rule, monstrous power munitions were used to destroy them, capable of breaking the modern ship to shreds. However, ships of past eras staunchly held a blow and only in rare cases had serious problems.
Unfortunately, the majority of readers do not pay any attention to this, starting to discuss the gauss cannons of the dreadnoughts of the future.
And here the guns? This is a constructive defense!
Whatever the fans of armor were saying, the highly protected ships stopped building right after the Second World War.
The reasons are given as examples (answers are given in brackets):
- nuclear weapons (damn two, all tests, on the contrary, showed exceptional resistance of ships to the damaging factors of nuclear weapons);
- rocket weapons (where armor-piercing shells did not cope, there is no one to frighten rockets. In overcoming armor, speed and mass do not solve anything. The main thing is mechanical strength, which missiles never had);
- development aviation (in the mid-50s. reactive attack aircraft could raise a couple of tons of bombs and fill the ship with them from bow to stern. It was impossible to prevent this: the anti-aircraft missiles were too imperfect, the air defense of the ships remained at the level of the war years).
In fact, with the end of the war, shipbuilding technologies were frozen for 10 years. When serial construction was once again improved, it turned out that in the era of rocket weapons, big ships would be useless. Rockets and electronics fit easily in a case with a displacement of less than 10 thousand tons. Further, the flywheel unwound, the designers began to facilitate the ships as much as possible. After all, in the case of the Third World War, they don’t last long enough: high-precision missiles hit the target with the first shot. And in general, ships are unlikely to fight ...
However, I had to fight. And it was a shame to lose a destroyer from one unexploded rocket. Or from a bag of a solarium with fertilizers. This is where the designers' disgrace - the superbjector for a billion dollars is completely out of order, having lost part of the crew’s 1 / 5 (undermining USS Cole)
The Eagle itself was completely broken. It hit over 50 projectiles of large and medium caliber (anyone can count the equivalent of modern missiles). However, this makes no sense. If the ship, by the will of circumstances, allows unpunished execution of itself for many hours, then no armor will help it.
Modern ammunition pierce any obstacle. The eternal dispute "shield vs sword" ended with an unconditional victory of the means of attack. Covering up armor is useless.
What brilliantly proves the continuous increase in the mass of land armored vehicles (example: “Kurganets”, 25 tons - twice as heavy as armored personnel carriers of the Soviet period).
The ship is not a tank. Despite the huge size of the citadel, it is easier to protect it than an armored vehicle.
Reserved volume tank - just a few cubic meters. meters. The ship this figure is tens of thousands of cubic meters!
That is why ships are not afraid of cumulative ammunition. In the first compartment from the side, there is no ammunition, critical systems and mechanisms. And ahead - a developed system of splinterproof bulkheads, which will absorb and stop any shard and penetrator.
The purpose of constructive protection is to distort the design of armor-piercing ammunition to such an extent that even when the defense is broken through, the remaining warhead could not cause significant damage to the ship. You can fence multi-stage warheads, install boosters and cumulative preloads, as a result, only solid scrap can fly into the depths of the hull, tearing off several distribution boards and striking sparks when meeting bulkheads.
Any ship (even a destroyer) is monstrously large compared to everything we are used to encounter in everyday life. Hit you with a crowbar, he won't notice
On the other hand, it is possible to increase the initial mass of the warhead so that the “scrap” contains at least some amount of explosives (while maintaining a high mechanical strength and filling ratio of a few%). Alas, in this case, the launch mass of the rocket will exceed all permissible limits, reducing the number of possible carriers to several pieces. And the dimensions and EPR of such a rocket will please anti-aircraft gunners.
It is much more profitable to spend reserves not on an array of ceramics and metal, but on active means of protection.
As evidenced by the cruiser "Chancellorsville", pierced drone. The Aegis system failed to intercept the BQM-74 target, which simulated a subsonic low-flying anti-ship missile, despite the absence of a warhead, the ship suffered $ 15 million in damage.
Experts will now come and explain that Aegis knew everything, and the “human factor” spoiled everything. They saw - they did not report, they reported, but not to that, they pressed, but not the wrong button ... What the hell is the difference, these are the problems of Aegis itself. The main result is a punched superstructure.
Here is another hero, the stark frigate (1987 year). We are arguing here now, and there 37 people turned into mincemeat.
Of course, it was just a frigate. If there was a Starck site, a full-fledged cruiser Chancellorsville with the Aegis system ... then it would be a 137 of the dead. Charred chest. And a bottle of rum.
Active remedies do not cope with the task.
“Sheffield”, “Stark”, Israeli “Hanit” (2006), “Chancelorsville” (2013). Every time, there is a reason why a rocket breaks through to the target.
In this case, noticing the danger even in time and knocking down a rocket, active means do not guarantee peace of mind.
On February 10, 1983, the frigate “Entrim” almost died during training firing. His six-barreled anti-aircraft gun riddled the target, which collapsed into the water 500 meters from the side. But then the laws of dramaturgy intervened. flaming debris drone ricocheted off the water and in a couple of seconds overtook the frigate. The superstructure was pierced, a fire started. Fortunately, the losses among the crew were small - only one dead.
A warship must be prepared for the fact that sooner or later he will have to be hit.
Unable to protect radar and external antenna devices.
Everything in this life would be possible.
For example, “Zamvolt” with retractable antennas. Destroy them all at once will not work: they can not be used simultaneously for reasons of electromagnetic compatibility.
Here are the stationary HEADLIGHTS mounted on the walls of the superstructure and improvised prism-like masts. To destroy all four antennas will require four times to get into the ship from different directions.
Composite radiotransparent fairings - for additional protection of the antenna web from small fragments and a blast wave. Moreover, the active phased array maintains its performance even when “knocking out” a part of its receiving and transmitting modules. And modern microcircuits (unlike gyros and fine mechanics) are extremely resistant to strong vibrations. Destroy such an antenna can only be a direct hit.
Perhaps for someone it will be a discovery, but with the loss of the radar only air defense will suffer. All other functions of the ship will remain in full. To launch “Harpoons” and “Calibrov” on targets beyond the horizon (hereinafter referred to as 20-30 km), radars are not needed. By virtue of the laws of nature, target designation is carried out only by external means (airplanes, satellites, intelligence data). While the satellite phone can be in the pocket of each officer (I exaggerate, but the essence is clear).
“Knock out” the radar, suppress the air defense system, after falling asleep the helpless ship with ordinary bombs.
Such an operation would require an air army. And while the enemies will "suppress" his air defenses, the protected ship will complete the task. And there will be a help already ...
One torpedo under the keel - and goodbye!
The number of combat-capable submarines worldwide two orders less the number of combat aircraft.
The main threat is a means of air attack.
No matter how well protected the ship is, it will require costly repairs after the battle.
It is better to immediately burn and sink, along with the crew.
Booking will affect the size of the ship.
Modern destroyers have already grown to 15 thousand tons. Against this background, a reasonable increase in constructive protection will pass almost unnoticed.
While the international treaties limiting the displacement of warships, in our time are absent.
Together with security will increase the cost!
Is it really not worth the high-tech “stuffing” of the ship? (as well as human lives)
How much will the cost of the ship increase with the addition of constructive protection? Against the background of superradars, gas turbines, reactors and combat information centers.
After all, it is known that the Orly Burke corps itself costs less than the Aegis system installed on the destroyer.
What to make armor? From titanium? Or from rhodium alloys?
Krupp armored steel with cemented top layer.
Ceramics and Kevlar are suitable for internal splinterproof bulkheads.
Those who claim that bombs easily pierce the ground and reinforced concrete do not understand the catastrophic difference between the ground and high-grade armor steel. Each of us can drive a shovel into the ground over the entire tray - but try to leave at least a scratch on the tank's “skin”! As well as driving a nail into a rail (although with a nailing gun the gun easily pushes them into the panel of houses).
How much effort - to bend a sheet of metal with a thickness of 5 inches.
Wow, 100 years ago massively built dreadnoughts with 12-inch armor, but now they can't. Despite progress in the field of metalworking and increasing productivity.
And how many countries can highly protected ships allow themselves?
Do many countries have an ocean fleet?
Just as at one time only six of the most developed countries of the world had real battleships.
What would such a ship look like?
An infinite variety of layout options, using modern technologies.
Thickness-differentiated external protection (3-5 inches). Integration of armor plates in the power body kit. “Iron-shaped” forms, reminiscent of the overseas “Zamvolt”: rational armor installation angles + a radical reduction in the upper deck area. Developed system of internal protivosklochnyh bulkheads Listed measures to protect external antenna posts.
Total displacement - about 20 thousand tons.
The composition of weapons - like the three destroyers “Burke”.
Anyone who does not believe in the possibility of building such a well-armed and protected ship in the specified dimensions - please contact the creators of “Queen Elizabeth” (the ultimate dreadnought model 1912), or, for analogue load items, TKR of “De Moine” type (1944) .
What will such a ship do?
Go safely to military conflict zones, patrol in “hot spots” (the coast of Syria, the Persian Gulf). In the event of war - to act where the ordinary ship will die almost immediately. In peacetime - to cool with your mind the lush heads of enemies. Get new allies, demonstrating the power and technical superiority of the country, under the flag of which this masterpiece walks.
Why is it still not built?
See item number XXUMX.
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