The electromagnetic catapults and weapons elevators for Ford class carriers have historically been a headache, but changing now would create immense challenges.
  • givesomefucks@lemmy.worldEnglish
    3·
    15 days ago

    would involve an extremely costly and time-consuming redesign that would further delay new carriers entering service.

    The entire reason for “American superiority” is that a single aircraft carrier would be the world’s 7th largest air force if it was it’s own country…

    And we can park multiple anywhere on like a weeks notice.

    We waste a shit ton of money on the military, but this costs even more money, and hampers the most important part of our military.

      • givesomefucks@lemmy.worldEnglish
        1·
        15 days ago

        Always.

        But delaying carrier production is a huge thing, especially for a worse/older system. Like, on an unending list of ways that trump has helped Putin and our other actual enemies, I’ll be absolutely shocked if anything passes this at the top of the list.

        Our aircraft carriers are the reason the rest of the world puts up with our shit

        The “carrot” was foreign aid, the “stick” is being able to drop an Air Force 100 miles away from almost any country that is larger than that countries air force…

        And we don’t have to just bring one.

        These ships allow us homecourt advantage anywhere on the globe, and it’s going to be significantly weakened for a very long time, even longer if we try to undo Trump’s fuckups with retrofits that stick them in shipyard for a substantial time.

        It’s about a decade start to finish, so about a decade after he leaves office to fix it moving forward. And they last forever.

        The Nimitz is our oldest. Started in the 60s, seaworthy in the 70s, and still kicking 50 years later.

        This is a much bigger deal than what people are normally freaking out about.