What if: US navy builds the Arsenal Ship

[lordroel]

What if: US navy builds the Arsenal Ship

While aircraft carriers will continue to serve a pivotal role in the era of increasingly advanced, long-range integrated anti-access/area denial (A2/AD), heavily armed arsenal ships have been floated as complementary platforms that can enhance the lethality of contemporary navies – supporting destroyers, cruisers, frigates and aircraft carriers and amphibious power projection operations.

Prior to the successful raids against the Italian naval base at Taranto and US naval base at Pearl Harbour, the battleship and its quicker brother, the battlecruiser, were the undisputed king of the seas. Heavily armoured and armed, they came to represent not only the prestige of the nation, but also served to highlight the intention and power projection capability of great powers.

Image I, 1995 depiction of an arsenal ship



However, as is inevitable, the passage of time and rapid evolution of technology rapidly diminished the power and relevance of the battleship – the Pacific theatre and to a lesser extent the Battle for the Atlantic gave rise to the aircraft carrier and its revolutionary carrier air wing and the power projection capabilities afforded to aircraft carriers and their supporting task groups.

By the end of the Second World War, the battleship had seemingly reached the pinnacle of its design, armour, speed and offensive capability – culminating in a series of designs built by Germany, Japan, the UK and the US. It seemed as if the era of the battleship was at an end – while the Soviet Union and its successor, Russia, operate the nuclear powered Kirov Class, only the US would retain the battleship comparable in the now famous Iowa Class.

As carrier-based combat aircraft and their weapons systems and long-range precision munitions became ever more advanced throughout the Cold War, even the US phased the venerable battleship out of service – replaced by advanced guided missile cruisers, destroyers and frigates powered by increasingly advanced radars like the SPY-1 system and supporting Aegis combat system, and armed with a suite of advanced gun and missile systems.

Image II



The US Navy envisioned that the ship would have a large capacity of different missiles, including Tomahawk and Standard, and space for future extended range gun systems. The ship could also have a sea-based version of the Army Tactical Missile System. This ship could greatly increase capabilities in littoral operations to conduct long-range strike missions, provide fire support for ground forces, defend against theater ballistic missiles, and maintain air superiority.

The Arsenal Ship has the potential to provide substantial fire support to a variety of missions in regional conflicts without the logistics burden of transporting both delivery systems and ammunition to the shore and forward areas. The Arsenal Ship is expected to carry a large number of VLS cells but without the sophisticated command and control and radar equipment found on Aegis-equipped ships.

The number of VLS cells being bandied about was 500 per ship, with 4 or 5 ships contemplated.

Image III

[James G]

I used an arsenal ship - in Royal Navy hands - in one of my short pieces. I remember in the novel Invasion - China invades the US - they were part of eth story.
Arsenal ships are the future, IMHO. Naval aircraft, manned or unmanned, will always be exposed to defences. They take up too much room too.

[lordroel]

Jul 7, 2020 17:48:34 GMT James G said:

I used an arsenal ship - in Royal Navy hands - in one of my short pieces. I remember in the novel Invasion - China invades the US - they were part of eth story.
Arsenal ships are the future, IMHO. Naval aircraft, manned or unmanned, will always be exposed to defences. They take up too much room too.

Would it be like this: Arsenal Ships for the Royal Navy where the author mentions: 

A cargo ship with some low observable features then we can probably look at a vessel cost of £100 million. The vessel should be armed with a mixture of VLS 41 strike launchers and A70 Sylvia Launchers. This will allow us to incorporate both Tomahawk Block 4 and Naval SCALP or Storm shadow. We will also be able to incorporate any future US or European weapons such as Loitering munitions. Total missile load would likely cost £500 million. That would give us a cost of £600 million around half the cost of a Type 45 or Astute SSN. One vessel would have the cruise missile fire power of 5 US Carrier Battle Groups.

Two vessels could be built. The Vessels would deploy with the Royal Navy's Amphibious Taskforce. This would give us additional strike capacity away from the carriers.

But that is the Royal Navy, if you check this page by FAS: Arsenal Ship

Arsenal ship was a joint Navy / DARPA program to acquire a moderate cost, high firepower demonstrator ship with low manning as soon as possible. The Arsenal Ship was planned to restore the naval support of the land battle, the modern day equivalent of the firepower that battleships provided during World War II and in Korea. The plan was to produce the demonstrator ship for initial operational capability (IOC) by the year 2000. Based on successful demonstration, a total force of four to six Arsenal ships would be funded. The goal was to develop an Arsenal Ship (AS) functional design by the end of FY97. This timeline from concept design (FY96) through fabrication (FY00) represented half the development time of previous naval vessels of this complexity. The Arsenal Ship would contains four times the VLS cells found on a CG-52 class ship, have a fixed unit sailaway price of $450 million, and a life-cycle cost 50% less than that of a naval combatant.

But in early 1997 the House National Security Committee concluded that the Arsenal Ship and the SC-21 were two separate major warship development programs, and that the cost of carrying out two such programs would be unaffordable, while the requirement for both had been validated by the Secretary of Defense. On 24 October 1997 the House-Senate conference committee on the FY1998 Defense Authorization Bill on refused additional funding for the Arsenal Ship. With only $35 million appropriated, the Navy needed an additional $115 million to sustain the program. That day the Secretary of the Navy announced that the program would not be pursued. Some of the design work has been incorporated into the SC-21 and DD-21 program. On 01 December 1997 the National Defense Panel report criticized the cancellation of the Arsenal Ship, noting that the ship could have reduced the need for aircraft carriers.

The Arsenal Ship was developed initially as a demonstration program to provide a large increase in the amount of ordnance available to ground- and sea-based forces in a conflict, particularly during the early days. The Navy envisioned that the ship would have a large capacity of different missiles, including Tomahawk and Standard, and space for future extended range gun systems. The ship could also have a sea-based version of the Army Tactical Missile System. This ship could greatly increase capabilities in littoral operations to conduct long-range strike missions, provide fire support for ground forces, defend against theater ballistic missiles, and maintain air superiority.

The Arsenal Ship has the potential to provide substantial fire support to a variety of missions in regional conflicts without the logistics burden of transporting both delivery systems and ammunition to the shore and forward areas. The Arsenal Ship is expected to carry a large number of VLS cells but without the sophisticated command and control and radar equipment found on Aegis-equipped ships.

The ships would be theater assets that will operate under the authority of the joint Commanders-In-Chief (CINCs) and receive their targeting along with command and decision information from other assets. This ship will rely on other military assets, including surface combatants, to provide the targeting information and connectivity necessary to launch its weapons. The Arsenal Ship would server as the magazine for a distributed sensor network. A unique aspect to the Arsenal Ship is that all the command and decision functions would be made off board.

Thus, the Arsenal Ship will not be fitted with long range surveillance or fire control sensors, but will be remotely controlled via robust data links. The data links will be secure, redundant and anti-jam in order to provide high reliability in the connectivity of the Arsenal Ships in high jamming operational scenarios. The overall program is an attempt to leverage the significant joint investment in Link 16 and CEC. Early in arsenal ship's life this control will be exercised through an Aegis platform. As the theater connectivity matures, the Arsenal Ship would accommodate a more robust set of controls from a wide variety of sources that would include JSTARS aircraft, AWACS or an E-2 with Cooperative Engagement Capability (CEC) and, a soldier or a Marine on the ground or a command post ashore. This concept allows for remote missile selection, on-board missile initialization and remote launch orders, and provides remote "missile away" messages to the control platform.

The ship would have the equivalent ordnance about 500 vertically launched weapons from a wide variety of the military's inventory of about four or five Aegis cruisers and destroyers. Employing the Cooperative Engagement Capability (CEC)  remote magazine launch concept, the arsenal ship would provide additional magazine capacity for Theater Ballistic Missile Defense (TBMD) and Air Supremacy missiles.

The Navy envisioned the ship to have a small crew (possibly less than 50 members) and be highly survivable. Associated with minimizing ship costs and manning is the planned reliance on passive survivability, so that it would be very difficult for the Arsenal Ship to be hit by modern weapons. This may be achieved by a combination of reducing the signatures of the ship and the tactical use of countermeasures. If the ship is hit by a missile or a torpedo, the design would insure that the magazines are not violated. Finally, the hull would be sized and designed such that, even if the ship encounters a large torpedo or mine, the ship won't sink.

The Navy planned to maintain the Arsenal Ship forward deployed in major overseas regions for extended periods by rotating the ship s crew and returning the ship only for major maintenance and overhauls. This plan would allow the Navy to use fewer Arsenal Ships to maintain overseas presence than if the ships were deployed routinely from the United States and permit their early availability in a conflict. Additionally, if the Arsenal Ship concept proves successful and within its cost projections (around $500 million for construction of each ship), DOD and the Navy may be able to retire or forego purchases of some assets, such as aircraft carriers, surface combatants, ground-based launchers, or combat aircraft.

The Arsenal Ship Program's acquisition approach represented a major departure from the way Navy ships have been acquired in the past. The program turned the systems development process over to industry at its earliest stage and challenges industry to develop and design the optimum mix of performance capabilities which can be accommodated within production and life-cycle affordability constraints. In an effort to optimize streamlined technical and business approaches, the program used DARPA's Section 845 authority to conduct prototype development and acquisition experiments outside normal constraints of the Federal Acquisition Regulations.

Experience during the Arsenal Ship Project showed that to achieve a design balanced between cost and performance, a significant amount of interchange was required among subject experts, analysts, and the technical personnel developing the system and functional designs. Additionally, subject experts from outside of the team were used to assure critical performance requirements were understood and satisfied. However, because of the limitations on access applied during the Arsenal Ship Project, achieving the design balance became quite difficult.

In July 1996, DARPA awarded each of five industry teams $1 million Phase I agreements under full and open competition. Since that time, the five teams performed various trade-off studies and developed their initial Arsenal Ship design concepts based upon the governments Ship Capabilities Document and the Concept of Operations. The Phase I Arsenal Ship Concept Designs, in conjunction with the three successful offeror's Phase II proposals, formed the basis for the Phase II selection and were deemed as providing the best value to the government.

In early 1996 the program was redesignated the Maritime Fire Support Demonstrator (MFSD). The new effort broadened the scope to insert technologies into the demonstrator in preparation for risk reduction for SC-21. The MFSD was to be an at-sea technology testbed for the SC-21, the next-generation CVX aircraft carrier, and other future ships.

In Phase II, which lasted one year, three industry teams continued to develop their concept designs into functional designs consisting of an integrated engineering and cost baseline for the Arsenal Ship Program. On 10 January 1997 DARPA selected three industry teams for Phase II of the Arsenal Ship Program. The three selected industry teams were each awarded $15 million modifications to their existing Phase I Arsenal Ship agreements. The three Phase II industry teams were:

General Dynamics, Marine/Bath Iron Works, Bath, Maine, Team Leader, with:

- General Dynamics, Marine/Electric Boat, Groton, Conn.; Raytheon Electronic Systems, Lexington, Mass.; and Science Applications International Corp., McLean, Va.

- Lockheed Martin, Government Electronic Systems, Morrestown, N.J., Team Leader, with: Litton Industries/Ingalls Shipbuilding, Pascagoula, Miss.; and Newport News Shipbuilding, Newport News, Va.

- Northrop Grumman Corporation, Sykesville, Md., Team Leader, with: National Steel and Shipbuilding Co., San Diego, Calif.; Vitro Corp., Rockville, Md.; Solipsys, Columbia, Md.; and Band Lavis & Associates, Inc., Severna Park, Md.

After Phase II, DARPA planned to select one industry team to enter into Phase III, with the Navy to award an MFSD design and construction contract to one of the three Arsenal Ship teams in January 1998. During that phase, the industry team chosen would complete its detail design and construct an Arsenal Ship Demonstrator, as well as provide an irrevocable offer to construct five additional Arsenal Ships and convert the Arsenal Ship Demonstrator into a fully operational asset in the production phase (Phase V). Phase IV consists of performance testing and a fleet evaluation. The value of the research and development portion (Phases I-IV) of the program was approximately $520 million.

Specific objectives to be demonstrated included the ability to perform the operational mission for 90 days; architecture, communications, and datalink functions capable of satisfying the AS concept of operations; and the capability for remote launch of strike, area air warfare, and fire support weapons. The planned test program will include a salvo launch of up to three Tomahawk missiles in 3 minutes; a single SM2 launch using the AS as a remote magazine for a cooperative engagement capability ship, a single Tomahawk launch using the AS as a remote magazine for air-directed and shore-based targeting, and a single weapon launch from a VLS cell in support of a naval surface fire control mission digital call for fire.

You can also get a lot of information about a Arsenal Ship.

[sandyman]

James do you have a link to the novel please

[lordroel]

Jul 8, 2020 12:32:10 GMT sandyman said:

James do you have a link to the novel please

Invasion (Harry novel)

[1bigrich]

It could be argued the USN has a smaller version of the Arsenal Ship. The four Ohio class conversions to SSGNs have 154 Tomahawk missiles. Florida has fired her cruise missiles in combat, against Libya.

Regards,

[lordroel]

Jul 13, 2020 0:17:40 GMT 1bigrich said:

It could be argued the USN has a smaller version of the Arsenal Ship. The four Ohio class conversions to SSGNs have 154 Tomahawk missiles. Florida has fired her cruise missiles in combat, against Libya.

Regards,

But what if instead of those 4 Ohio SSGNs there are 4 as planned Arsenal Ships each carying a payload of 500 vertically launched weapons.

[simon darkshade]

It would be a tremendous waste of money and duplication of capabilities.

The USN does not lack for VLS cells - with a current nominal surface fleet of 22 Ticos and 67 Burkes and a submarine fleet of 4 Ohios and 47 attack boats (648), there is a total of 10,070 full length cells in service. They cannot keep all of those filled with SAMs and TLAMs at the moment.

All up, the USN have fired 301 in the past decade, 856 between 2000 and 2010 and 1036 in the 1990s. In the absence of a definitive need and a definitive threat, there is nothing that is gained by procuring 4 arsenal ships that doesn't already come along with far more multi-dimensional and useful ships that are already required. There was a rush once upon a time to get Tomahawk shooter into the fleet, but that was in the early 1980s, providing much of the impetus for the battleship reactivations of the Reagan years; that fell away once the Spruances were converted.

Whilst the USN hasn't lost a modern warship for quite some time, excluding dockside fires, the loss of an arsenal ship would represent too substantial a loss in capabilities to justify using it in the manner it was best suited to.

All up, it is a 1980s proposal to an issue that was already going away back then.

[stevep]

Jul 13, 2020 4:35:36 GMT simon darkshade said:

It would be a tremendous waste of money and duplication of capabilities.

The USN does not lack for VLS cells - with a current nominal surface fleet of 22 Ticos and 67 Burkes and a submarine fleet of 4 Ohios and 47 attack boats (648), there is a total of 10,070 full length cells in service. They cannot keep all of those filled with SAMs and TLAMs at the moment.

All up, the USN have fired 301 in the past decade, 856 between 2000 and 2010 and 1036 in the 1990s. In the absence of a definitive need and a definitive threat, there is nothing that is gained by procuring 4 arsenal ships that doesn't already come along with far more multi-dimensional and useful ships that are already required. There was a rush once upon a time to get Tomahawk shooter into the fleet, but that was in the early 1980s, providing much of the impetus for the battleship reactivations of the Reagan years; that fell away once the Spruances were converted.

Whilst the USN hasn't lost a modern warship for quite some time, excluding dockside fires, the loss of an arsenal ship would represent too substantial a loss in capabilities to justify using it in the manner it was best suited to.

All up, it is a 1980s proposal to an issue that was already going away back then.

  simon darkshade,

  Some good points raised there.  I've thought of it as a cheaper alternative to a CVN albeit lacking some of the capacities but it would seem to make little sense if not replacing at least some of the CVNs.

  Steve

[1bigrich]

Jul 13, 2020 12:15:44 GMT stevep said:

Jul 13, 2020 4:35:36 GMT simon darkshade said:

  Some good points raised there.  I've thought of it as a cheaper alternative to a CVN albeit lacking some of the capacities but it would seem to make little sense if not replacing at least some of the CVNs.

  Steve

There is no doubt if the USN spend 13,000,000,000 dollars on a nuclear powered surface combatant, displacing over 100,000 tons, it would be powerful.  But would it be practical?   Could it do jobs no other surface combatant could do?   I think we'd all agree, the answer is no.

Now arsenal ship won't cost that much, and will be conventionally powered, but the same questions need to be asked:   Would it be practical, and would it do jobs no other surface combatant could do?

As Simon mentioned, the USN can't keep the VLS tubes in the fleet full now.

Regards,

[lordroel]

Jul 13, 2020 12:37:15 GMT 1bigrich said:

Jul 13, 2020 12:15:44 GMT stevep said:

  Some good points raised there.  I've thought of it as a cheaper alternative to a CVN albeit lacking some of the capacities but it would seem to make little sense if not replacing at least some of the CVNs.

  Steve

There is no doubt if the USN spend 13,000,000,000 dollars on a nuclear powered surface combatant, displacing over 100,000 tons, it would be powerful.  But would it be practical?   Could it do jobs no other surface combatant could do?   I think we'd all agree, the answer is no.

Now arsenal ship won't cost that much, and will be conventionally powered, but the same questions need to be asked:   Would it be practical, and would it do jobs no other surface combatant could do?

As Simon mentioned, the USN can't keep the VLS tubes in the fleet full now.

Regards,

It can carry cruise missiles, surface to air missiles and anti ship missiles, having 1 Arsenal Ship with escort and depending on what mission is (anti air, anti surface ore anti ship) makes it a very dangerous opponent i would subsume.

[jedicommisar]

Jul 7, 2020 17:07:42 GMT lordroel said:

Jul 7, 2020 17:07:42 GMT lordroel said:

Image I, 1995 depiction of an arsenal ship

This is the first image that I've seen of the Arsenal Ship concept that I actually like, probably because it reminds me of something that would be in a Gerry Anderson production

[simon darkshade]

Ships have certainly moved away from aesthetically pleasing designs over the last several decades, but even being not-unpleasant on the eye doesn't make up for the various downsides and opportunity costs. The arsenal ship does not provide a capability that isn't already in the fleet.

[stevep]

Feb 4, 2021 12:14:38 GMT simon darkshade said:

Ships have certainly moved away from aesthetically pleasing designs over the last several decades, but even being not-unpleasant on the eye doesn't make up for the various downsides and opportunity costs. The arsenal ship does not provide a capability that isn't already in the fleet.

  Yes but does it provide a capacity at a markedly lower cost?  I know I'm taking a different stance than I had above but wondering if it would make a good '2nd class capital ship' at a much lower price to supplement such ships or for less powerful nations possibly replace large CVs altogether.  Yes they need a lot of missiles but buying in bulk would reduce the cost per missile greatly and if their replacing very costly a/c, pilots and support services for those then you could have an efficient unit for a much lower cost.  Especially since one of the other big cost savings for many planned arsenal ships is that they can be operated with pretty small crews, definitely less than a large carrier.  For the US for instance I think they operate is it 12 large CVN currently.  What if you replaced 3 of them, when their retired, with say 9-12 arsenal ships?  You could probably save a lot of money on both construction and operating costs.  This would give 1-2 such ships supporting a CVN based force or possibly operating without them in lower intensity situations.

  There is a lot of concern that the USN has a huge investment in its CVNs but also that their increasingly vulnerable.  You often see in future conflict scenarios quite a number of those being targeted and often either sunk or disabled by an opponent's 1st strike which while the USN's sub forces would be largely unaffected would considerable reduce the capacity of its surface fleet.  Would it be better having arsenal ships in support for such a scenario.

[oscssw]

Jul 13, 2020 4:35:36 GMT simon darkshade said:

It would be a tremendous waste of money and duplication of capabilities.

The USN does not lack for VLS cells - with a current nominal surface fleet of 22 Ticos and 67 Burkes and a submarine fleet of 4 Ohios and 47 attack boats (648), there is a total of 10,070 full length cells in service. They cannot keep all of those filled with SAMs and TLAMs at the moment.

All up, the USN have fired 301 in the past decade, 856 between 2000 and 2010 and 1036 in the 1990s. In the absence of a definitive need and a definitive threat, there is nothing that is gained by procuring 4 arsenal ships that doesn't already come along with far more multi-dimensional and useful ships that are already required. There was a rush once upon a time to get Tomahawk shooter into the fleet, but that was in the early 1980s, providing much of the impetus for the battleship reactivations of the Reagan years; that fell away once the Spruances were converted.

Whilst the USN hasn't lost a modern warship for quite some time, excluding dockside fires, the loss of an arsenal ship would represent too substantial a loss in capabilities to justify using it in the manner it was best suited to.

All up, it is a 1980s proposal to an issue that was already going away back then.

Completely agree.  It was a bad idea at the time, for the reasons you describe and makes even less sense today.