USA's "Project Cancelled"

[NOMISYRRUC]

All the post war destroyer escorts in favour of more proper destroyers. That is:

• 17 additional Shermans instead of the Dealey and Claud Jones classes.
• 65 ASW versions of the Adams class instead of the Bronstein, Garcia, Brooke classes.
• 51 additional Spruance class instead of the Perry class.

 

[Hammerbolt]

All the post war destroyer escorts in favour of more proper destroyers. That is:

• 17 additional Shermans instead of the Dealey and Claud Jones classes.
• 65 ASW versions of the Adams class instead of the Bronstein, Garcia, Brooke classes.
• 55 additional Spruance class instead of the Perry class.

2) all of these carried a helicopter; the Adams would have to be redesigned.
3) the point of the Perry was to have a ship that was much cheaper to build and operate than the Spruance.

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

2) all of these carried a helicopter; the Adams would have to be redesigned.
3) the point of the Perry was to have a ship that was much cheaper to build and operate than the Spruance.

I know.

 

[ShySusan]

All the post war destroyer escorts in favour of more proper destroyers. That is:

• 17 additional Shermans instead of the Dealey and Claud Jones classes.
• 65 ASW versions of the Adams class instead of the Bronstein, Garcia, Brooke classes.
• 55 additional Spruance class instead of the Perry class.

Except you won't get anywhere near that number of destroyers built. You'll get maybe half the number of destroyers as you did the frigates. That's going to leave you critically short of hulls.

 

[RanulfC]

The problem with the B-70 wasn't technical, it was tactical. The day of the high altitude bomber was well and trully over.

Technical, tactical and operational actually.

1) As a SAC only asset it was going to be expensive, the B-58 had already proven this.

2) "Dash to the Border" (even assuming stand-off weapons) wasn't the primary assumed flight operation by the time the XB-70s were being built and stooging around outside the borders at subsonic speeds on airborne alert, (which was) was going to require vastly increased tanker support and expanded maintenance and operations costs. It would have had to sit on base-alert which while its speed would seem to be an advantage from that perspective must take into account it has further to go in the first place. Operationally and mission wise the ICBM beats out the B-70 on every aspect. (And before someone brings up the ability to re-target or recall a bomber, re-targeting in the era of ICBMs was unlikely and as it wasn't going to launch UNLESS an attack was confirmed {to expensive to launch on alert and loiter unlike the B-52} that also wasn't an operational or tactical consideration)

3) The XB-70 was specifically designed for high-speed at high-altitude and bringing it down to subsonic speeds and low altitude for penetration was going to greatly effect its range. Worse it's not designed to deploy weapons at those speeds and altitudes and yes, very much unlike the B-52 (which of course WAS designed for such operations) that's going to make a very big difference in its capability if has to do so.

4) Not going to Vietnam, the B-70 would have had little capability to carry conventional munitions, (like the B-58 it was not a design goal) but worse yet it probably couldn't accurately hit a target with conventional weapons anyway. It was literally designed to plant mushrooms folk, nuclear weapons means you only have to get 'close enough' after all

5) Speaking of stand-off weapons, Skybolt was essentially an attempt by the Air Force to pry some of the funding and priority from the Navy's Polaris program with an 'airborne' ICBM system. Skybolt and the B-52 at least made some sense, Skybolt and the B-70 did not. Skybolt was to be kept on airborne alert and here again you run into the issue with the B-70 being a terrible platform for airborne alert.

It's been argued that the B-70 would have been the ultimate manned, nuclear armed , free-fall weapon, delivery system and that's probably true but those 'commas' are there for a reason At the time it was conceived and designed those were the requirements and constraints but as each of those is replaced, (manned and free-fall with automated stand off weapons, nuclear with conventional, etc) there's less and less justification for the expense, complexity and operational costs of the B-70. Would it have been 'cool' to have? Heck ya! But unfortunately the 'rule-of-cool' is less often capable of reaching reality than one could wish

B-58 could have lifted Skybolts, and B-70 could have air-dropped Minuteman...

In the first case, well, yes but the question is to what purpose as it could ONLY carry one and only then in place of the fuel it needs to get anywhere significant, let alone back again so... Why?

In the second case, eh, no it couldn't Keep in mind they actually studied carrying the upper-two stages of the Minuteman as an ASAT or Short-Notice Recon Satellite LV on the B-58:

STUDY SUMMARY- Project "Town Hall" B-58 Hustler/Minuteman Missile ASAT/Spy Satellite

Here's an interesting report I grabbed from the net, detailing plans to air-launch a modified Minuteman Missile from beneath a B-58 Hustler supersonic bomber, equipped with either a photoreconnaissance satellite payload (with film reentry bucket) or an antisatellite weapon system to shoot down...

www.rocketryforum.com

http://www.up-ship.com/apr/extras/townhall.htm

But there was little chance the B-70 could be modded enough to carry and/or launch such a system. (Carrying the missile externally, on the back of the B-70 was the most practical way to CARRY such a weapon but launching would have been highly risky. A LOT worse than the M-21/D-21 combination)

Randy

 

[Jim Smitty]

Honestly I view the XB-70 as a good technology demonstration, but the cost to field it would ate up the majority of the USAF budget. Never mind the fact SAMs would been hell to deal with.

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

Except you won't get anywhere near that number of destroyers built. You'll get maybe half the number of destroyers as you did the frigates. That's going to leave you critically short of hulls.

It won't be about half. It will be a lot more than that because economies of scale will reduce the unit cost.

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

Britain's project cancellations and failures are pretty widely known, but thinking back from the end of the Cold War to quite recently the US has had a litany of serious project cancellations, or others that saw production but had them cut short for various reasons.

For the Army I'm thinking the RAH66 helicopter, the M8 AGS, the Crusader SP howitzer. The Navy the A12 attack aircraft, Seawolf subs (3 built), Zumwalt destroyers (3 built), every attempt at a long range gun/guided shell. For the Marines the various advanced AAAT7 replacements. For the USAF the F22 cut short at 173 built, B2 cut short at 21 built.

I'm sure there are others I don't know about.

Which of these projects are most likely to be successful, which should have been aborted or replaced with something else early on, which should have never have started in the first place?

May I have some clarification?

Re the projects that had their production cut short for various reasons. The most important reason was usually the cost. Are we allowed to spend the extra money required to build them in greater numbers?

 

[ShySusan]

It won't be about half. It will be a lot more than that because economies of scale will reduce the unit cost.

Not by that much. And economies of scale won't drive down life cycle costs, which are easily the more expensive part of owning a warship. The higher life cycle costs will necessitate fewer hulls being purchased as they simply cost more to operate. More fuel, more weapons, more crew, more provisions, more maintenence. Honestly, giving them 50% of the canceled frigates might be generous.

 

[Riain]

May I have some clarification?

Re the projects that had their production cut short for various reasons. The most important reason was usually the cost. Are we allowed to spend the extra money required to build them in greater numbers?

The US military budget is massive and therefore highly complex, so to say the B2 was cut short because of cost is both right and wrong. The USAF budget was vast enough to find say $2 billion to build another 3 B2s, but this will have to come at the expense of something else and there is no shortage of boondoggle something elses in the USAF budget. The F22 was cut short I think partly to find money for some stuff that was just around the corner, maybe F35 developments that never happened or happened in later financial years and that money could have bought more F22s instead. Perhaps the Zumwalt is the best example; the Guided Shells and SPY4 VSR were bridges too far that made the Zumwalts too expensive to develop and shit once they got into service, if they had been fitted with stealthy 5" guns and used the SPY2 VSR linked to the SPY3 the development costs would plummet, be successful and provide a ship worth building in numbers rather than reverting back to the maxed-out Arleigh Burke Flight 3.

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

Not by that much. And economies of scale won't drive down life cycle costs, which are easily the more expensive part of owning a warship. The higher life cycle costs will necessitate fewer hulls being purchased as they simply cost more to operate. More fuel, more weapons, more crew, more provisions, more maintenance.

Re the larger crews. Some figures from Jane's Fighting Ships 1986-87

I was suggesting 65 ASW versions of the Adams class destroyer instead of the SCB.199 destroyer escorts.

384 Charles F. Adams (DDG)​

​

Total crew of 65 Adams class destroyers = 24,960​

​

305 Bronstein class (2 built)​

328 Glover class (1 built)​

321 Garcia class (10 built)​

332 Brooke class (6 built)​

329 Knox class (46 built)​

​

Total crew of the 65 SCB.199 = 21,274​

Therefore, the OTL crew of the 65 SCB.199 DEs was 85% of the crew of 65 Adams class DDGS.

However, the ASW version of the Adams may have a smaller crew because the Tatar SAM system and its associated electronics have been replaced by facilities for one DASH or LAMPS I. None of the below had a helicopter, but they might be more accurate comparisons.

337 Forrest Sherman (Decataur & Paul Jones DDG)​

304 Forrest Sherman (ASW modernisation)​

292 Forrest Sherman (unmodified)​

​

Total crew of 65 Forrest Sherman DDG = 21,905​

Total crew of 65 Forrest Sherman ASW = 19,760​

Total crew of 65 Forrest Sherman (built) = 18,980​

Therefore, the OTL crew of the 65 SCB.199 DEs was 97% of 65 Sherman DDGs, 108% of 65 ASW Shermans and 112% of 65 unmodified Shermans in 1986.

I also suggested 51 additional Spruances instead of the Perry class.

324 Spruance class - total 16,524​

200 Perry class - total 10,200​

​

Therefore, the OTL crew of the 51 Perry class frigates was 62% of the crew of 51 Spruance class destroyers.

The difference between the Sherman class destroyers (292) and the Delay (165) and Claude Jones (171) is the biggest. 17 Shermans have a crew of 4,694 and the destroyer escorts had a crew of 2,829. That means that the crew of 13 Delays and 4 Jones class is 60% the size of the crew of 17 Shermans.

Honestly, giving them 50% of the cancelled frigates might be generous.

Strictly speaking the frigates weren't cancelled because they would not have been ordered in the first place.

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

This is another change that requires the spending of more money.

IOTL the plan was for 45 SSBN in 5 squadrons of 9 boats with 6 submarine tenders to support them (one per squadron plus a spare to cover refits). However, 4 Lafayette class and the Simon Lake class depot ship that were planned for FY 1965 weren't ordered.

That left a force of 41 first-generation SSBNs organised into 4 squadrons of 10 with 5 submarine tenders to support them. As far as I know the four squadrons were:

SUBRON 14 - Holy Loch, Scotland​

SUBRON 15 - Apra Harbour, Guam (disbanded in September 1981)​

SUBRON 16 - Rota, Spain (moved to Kings Bay, Georgia in the late 1970s).​

SUBRON 18 - Charleston, South Carolina​

Does anyone know where the fifth SSBN squadron would have been based had it been formed? And I don't mean SUBRON 17 was formed at Bangor, Washington in January 1981 for the Pacific Fleet's Trident submarines.

 

[Simon]

It won't be about half. It will be a lot more than that because economies of scale will reduce the unit cost.

Eh, I think you might be overestimating what you would save via learning curve. Yes the cost reduces every time but IIRC for military shipbuilding it only gets to 90% on the fourth ship or so and eventually you reach an absolute minimum. Looking through the classes of ships you mentioned until the Oliver Hazard Perry-class it seems like a lot of them were constructed by smaller shipyards which built only two or three, which means you'll likely get little to no real reduction in price if you change classes and concentrating orders in a smaller number raises the question of whether you could swing it politically if a lot of local contracts are lost compare to our timeline.