How much can you do with the LCS?

[Mgellis]

Just for fun...

The two LCS platforms get slammed on because they don't have much in the way of teeth. Personally, I'm beginning to think the real problem is they gave these ships the wrong names. No one gets mad at the Wasp-class for not being a "combat" ship. They should have called them something like the LOS, "Littoral Operations Ship." These things aren't supposed to engage an enemy directly...their weapons are for self-defense, like those found on an aircraft carrier. If they need to kill something, they send a drone or a helicopter or a boat full of SEALS. They're not supposed to be warships, they're spy ships, anti-piracy ships, minehunters, omg-there's-a-volcano-send-help-good-thing-you-have-a-modular-hospital-you-can-plug-in ships, etc.

So...since it looks like we will end up with anywhere from 24 to 32 of these things, we might as well get some use out of them in Command.

What additional roles can you envision for the two LCS classes?

Obviously, these things could be used to hunt submarines (presumably from a safe distance since they don't have their own torpedoes, only those on their helicopters--I guess you find the sub, launch the chopper, and then head in the opposite directly as quickly as you can) and mines. They could also be used as platforms for launching small and targeted raids (two MH-60s with Hellfires...that could ruin a terrorist's day...).

But what other jobs could the LCS do in Command? Spy ship? Anti-crime/anti-piracy? Hospital ship? The mission bays have 6,000 square feet and 15,000 square feet (LCS-1 and LCS-2 classes, respectively). That's about the same as four or ten medium-sized (1,500-square foot) houses...you could fit dozens of cargo containers in spaces like that. That's a lot of room, and room designed to be have different mission modules built for it and swapped in and out as needed.

So...what could you do if you had that kind of mission space?

[dcpollay]

Just for fun...I'm going to slam them some more. [:)] I don't think they're getting slammed because they are named incorrectly. Rather, they are being slammed because they are largely incapable of carrying out their promised missions. They are indeed combat ships. They are intended to go in harm's way, and engage hostile subs, patrol boats, pirates, mines, and I'm sure I missed a few others.

But, they have construction problems, structural problems, technical problems, weapon problems, cost problems, and I'm sure I missed a few. My understanding is that the ships will be past a significant portion of their service life before some of the mission modules are ready to use.

They were sold to Congress as being "all things to all people," and although the process is not yet done, they are winding up being "no things to most people." Changing the name is just slapping lipstick on a pig.

As for additional roles, in Command they can be very flexible, since most of the problems I talked about above are disregarded. In real life, they might make nice pierside training ships.

OK, go ahead and flame away. [:)]

[orca]

Agree completely with your comments. It's not designed as an offefencive combat ship.

Was able to tour USS independence during a public viewing this week. The missin bay is huge. The ships should be very flexible. The modularity will allow them to more easily be upgraded when new weapons are developed.

[jtoatoktoe]

Well they're suppose to be replacements for Frigates.....the Perry Class had SM-1 and Harpoon before the launchers were taken out. So they maintain their other weapons a cannon, torpedo tubes and a Helo's.
a LCS relies on "modules" which don't seem that impressive. A Anti Submarine Module is probably the only real module for warfare it would pack that's comparable. The Anti ship is suppose to be the Griffin....yeah ok as for anti air its point defense.

They would of been better using the Freedom Class and putting a small VLS system so it could at least carry most modern U.S. Navy weapons. Should also ditch the Independence model though I can see it being more stealthy from a front search.

For the entire fleet i'm also not a fan of them replacing Phalanx with SeaRAM. Yeah its got better range but i'd feel better with hundreds of bullets over 11 missiles in a SeaRam system. As its basically using the same radar system. I'd like to see a combo system.

[Mgellis]

(Definitely do not want to use LCS in combat roles if you can help it unless you can give them more weapons...I tried a sample "sandbox" scenario with a "swarm" attack by putting an LCS against 10 7-meter RHIBs armed with machine guns...it did not go well. Generally, the LCS could sink five to seven of the RHIBs, but was then out of ammo. At that point, it was either overwhelmed by the other boats or could survive only by running away. A Burke, on the other hand, had little trouble dispatching all ten attackers.)

[Elouda]

One of the things I'm looking at for a future scenario is potential loadouts for these ships;

One of the things I'm considering is the feasibility of installing an 8 cell VLS system for a total of 32 ESSM, and a pair of twin or quad ASM canisters, in exchange for the modular packages. This would make the somewhat useful as light combatants and escorts. Optionally they could retain the ASW gear and still try to squeeze in the VLS for a more capable escort role.

Need to take a look at whats actually possible in terms of space and weight.

As for SeaRAM - while I initially though the same way, at least in command SeaRAM is incredibly good - I just wish it wasnt a choice of either/or, but you could have both in some Kashtan like configuration (I'd probably go for 2x11 launchers and a single 20mm in the middle).

[IWS]

The LCS is not intended to be a frigate, and adding and integrating VLS, harpoon, torpedos, etc would increase the cost. A lot.

As an example, upgrading the weapons on the Australian Adelaide class frigates (ex Perrys) to include VLS and other improvements cost over US $320m per ship (AU dollar = .9 US dollars at current exchange rates).

From the Wikipedia article on the Adelaide class. The project covered 4 ships:
"In the mid-1990s, the Australian government commenced SEA 1390, also known as the FFG Upgrade Project.[8] Originally costing A$1 billion, which has expanded to A$1.46 billion, the project includes improvements to the combat and fire control system, the sonar suite, and the air defence missiles."


Here's a recent white paper by the Undersecretary of the Navy discussing the LCS history and rationale.

http://www.aviationweek.com/Portals/AWe ... 0paper.PDF

[mikmykWS]

Agreed. LCS-1 Freedom visited Boston in 2008 and took a tour. Was pretty clear the ship was more about hauling stuff than a pure warship.

I have them pegged as really the ultimate scouts.

Mark what happens if you host UAV's or helo's and engage that swarm at night?

Mike

[Mgellis]

A related issue is what can be fit into its weapon stations. An LCS has four that could be modified. You could replace the 57-mm. gun and the Sea Ram missiles--they're not modular, so it would be a major job, but they could be replaced with something else. Could the Sea RAM be replaced with a 30-mm. cannon and leave the two weapon pods for other things?

I've been trying to figure out how big the weapon modules are...the one technical paper I could find...

http://www.dtic.mil/ndia/2006garm/tuesday/canaday.pdf

...looks like you have room for four small missile canisters (not sure how many missiles each one carried...could you get four Hellfires in each one? That would give you sixteen in each station or 32 total for the whole ship).

What else could you put in those weapon pod stations?

Last idea for now...a "low tech" solution...what about putting 81-mm. mortars in the two weapon pods? Mortars don't have much range, but they are versatile and you can carry a lot of ammunition for them.

[Mgellis]

ORIGINAL: Colonel Mustard

Just for fun...I'm going to slam them some more. [:)] I don't think they're getting slammed because they are named incorrectly. Rather, they are being slammed because they are largely incapable of carrying out their promised missions. They are indeed combat ships. They are intended to go in harm's way, and engage hostile subs, patrol boats, pirates, mines, and I'm sure I missed a few others.

But, they have construction problems, structural problems, technical problems, weapon problems, cost problems, and I'm sure I missed a few. My understanding is that the ships will be past a significant portion of their service life before some of the mission modules are ready to use.

They were sold to Congress as being "all things to all people," and although the process is not yet done, they are winding up being "no things to most people." Changing the name is just slapping lipstick on a pig.

As for additional roles, in Command they can be very flexible, since most of the problems I talked about above are disregarded. In real life, they might make nice pierside training ships.

OK, go ahead and flame away. [:)]

No flames. I agree there are some SERIOUS problems with the whole program. But I think one of those problems was that they raised the wrong expectations. The problem isn't that calling it a littoral operations ship would be putting lipstick on a pig; the problem is that we already put lipstick on the pig by calling it a littoral combat ship. If we had just called it a pig to begin with--i.e., said something like "Look, this is not a destroyer; it's a ship designed to handle all the grunt work like mine sweeping and hunting pirates that navies still have to do"--I think there would have been a lot less controversy about it.

There is nothing wrong with a pig if what you want is bacon.

Aside from that, I'm just trying to be practical. It looks like we're going to end up with between 24 and 32 of these ships. They're not useless. They're just not destroyers. But they are fast. And they have a pretty good range. They have that nice 57-mm. gun, which can handle small threats fairly well I imagine as long as there's only one or two of them coming after you at a time. They've got a big hanger. They've got lots of room for extra equipment.

Since we're going to be stuck with a couple of dozen of them for a while, we might as well figure out what we can use them for.

[Mgellis]

ORIGINAL: mikmyk

Mark what happens if you host UAV's or helo's and engage that swarm at night?

If you are ready for the swarm and can get even one helicopter with Hellfire missiles in the air before too many of them get too close, things look very different. The helicopter can zap four or five of the small boats and the LCS can handle the rest. (If you have armed MQ-8 drones, too, that's even better.)

It also does not hurt that the LCS can move quickly enough that even speedboats have trouble catching it. I was letting the swarm come to the LCS in the tests and then defending without attempting to get away...if the LCS was moving, evading and/or hunting as opportunity allowed, that by itself becomes a powerful weapon for dealing with small, lightly armed threats.

[Mgellis]

One question...and I really don't know the answer to this one...can power (like, a lot of power) be run from the big reconfigurable space in an LCS to the weapon station pods? If so, maybe those 30 mm. guns could be swapped out for COIL lasers? I'll bet the module bay is big enough for the power source, but can you get the power to the turrets? If so...well, a pair of those lasers would make an LCS a lot more impressive, I think.

[IWS]

ORIGINAL: Mgellis

ORIGINAL: mikmyk

Mark what happens if you host UAV's or helo's and engage that swarm at night?

If you are ready for the swarm and can get even one helicopter with Hellfire missiles in the air before too many of them get too close, things look very different. The helicopter can zap four or five of the small boats and the LCS can handle the rest. (If you have armed MQ-8 drones, too, that's even better.)

It also does not hurt that the LCS can move quickly enough that even speedboats have trouble catching it. I was letting the swarm come to the LCS in the tests and then defending without attempting to get away...if the LCS was moving, evading and/or hunting as opportunity allowed, that by itself becomes a powerful weapon for dealing with small, lightly armed threats.

After I read your post, ran a similar sandbox against 15 armed RHBs out of curiosity.

The LCS ran away. With a 10 knot speed advantage it broke contact pretty quickly, then dodged to one side.

Once the LCS broke contact, the swarm had no way of knowing where it was. They chased the stale datum and the LCS just sat back and watched them charge off in the wrong direction.

An MQ-8 kept track of the swarm, and a couple of MH-60 missions resulted in 9 kills 3 damaged using hellfires.
I let the LCS kill the last 3 functioning boats in the interest of crew morale...

With enough hellfires and room to run, seems like the LCS can take on lots of small boats with no worries.
Fast attack craft would be a whole different ballgame, though.

[jdkbph]

ORIGINAL: Mgellis

There is nothing wrong with a pig if what you want is bacon.

All well and good... and probably accurate as far it goes... until you look at the (actual) price tag.

We're paying Knox/Perry replacement dollars and getting... what? I wouldn't be surprised if, privately at least, most surface "TF" level commanders see them as a liability if placed in their formation. And I'm not at all sure a surface support TG commander would be comforted by their presence as an escort.

JD

[IWS]

ORIGINAL: Mgellis

A related issue is what can be fit into its weapon stations. An LCS has four that could be modified. You could replace the 57-mm. gun and the Sea Ram missiles--they're not modular, so it would be a major job, but they could be replaced with something else. Could the Sea RAM be replaced with a 30-mm. cannon and leave the two weapon pods for other things?

I've been trying to figure out how big the weapon modules are...the one technical paper I could find...

http://www.dtic.mil/ndia/2006garm/tuesday/canaday.pdf

...looks like you have room for four small missile canisters (not sure how many missiles each one carried...could you get four Hellfires in each one? That would give you sixteen in each station or 32 total for the whole ship).

What else could you put in those weapon pod stations?

Last idea for now...a "low tech" solution...what about putting 81-mm. mortars in the two weapon pods? Mortars don't have much range, but they are versatile and you can carry a lot of ammunition for them.

I've read the two modular weapons stations are big enough for the Mk 48 vls, which is 8 tubes (4 ESSM per tube).

Also take a look at the Danish "Stanflex" module system and the ships that use them in Wikipedia or elsewhere.
Good stuff.

[IWS]

ORIGINAL: jdkbph

ORIGINAL: Mgellis

There is nothing wrong with a pig if what you want is bacon.

All well and good... and probably accurate as far it goes... until you look at the (actual) price tag.

We're paying Knox/Perry replacement dollars and getting... what? I wouldn't be surprised if, privately at least, most surface "TF" level commanders see them as a liability if placed in their formation. And I'm not at all sure a surface support TG commander would be comforted by their presence as an escort.

JD

They're not supposed to be escorts or frigates.
They are expensive, but otherwise fit the missions they're intended for pretty well.

About 60% will be fitted for minesweeping.
Expensive for minesweepers, but they can self-deploy across oceans, move quickly once in-theater, and will be more capable than what we have now (using ROVs, USVs, helicopters).

The "surface warfare" fit will be deployed for low threat missions. The Navy has specifically mentioned Africa and South America as being a good fit. This is a smart economy of force decision-- Using an LCS to chase pirates or show the flag frees up a Burke that would otherwise be stuck doing that.

The ASW fit is actually pretty capable. They'll have the same towed array Burkes use, and a British active/passive variable depth sonar to make up for the lack of a hull-mounted one. There are also plans to fit the USVs with lightweight versions of the dipping sonars our helos use. And again, for every LCS that's hunting subs in brown water a Burke can be doing something else instead.

[jdkbph]

Well if that's true, and they could be armed with 32 ESSM's and 8 LRASMs, a potential adversary might start to take them seriously.

JD

[dcpollay]

ORIGINAL: Mgellis



No flames. I agree there are some SERIOUS problems with the whole program. But I think one of those problems was that they raised the wrong expectations. The problem isn't that calling it a littoral operations ship would be putting lipstick on a pig; the problem is that we already put lipstick on the pig by calling it a littoral combat ship. If we had just called it a pig to begin with--i.e., said something like "Look, this is not a destroyer; it's a ship designed to handle all the grunt work like mine sweeping and hunting pirates that navies still have to do"--I think there would have been a lot less controversy about it.

There is nothing wrong with a pig if what you want is bacon.

Aside from that, I'm just trying to be practical. It looks like we're going to end up with between 24 and 32 of these ships. They're not useless. They're just not destroyers. But they are fast. And they have a pretty good range. They have that nice 57-mm. gun, which can handle small threats fairly well I imagine as long as there's only one or two of them coming after you at a time. They've got a big hanger. They've got lots of room for extra equipment.

Since we're going to be stuck with a couple of dozen of them for a while, we might as well figure out what we can use them for.

I agree that the expectations are wrong; but I don't think the expectations were created by the name. They were created by the design concept that envisioned a single ship type carrying out a wide variety of very different missions. The modular concept tries to overcome what historically has been a trade-off between proficiency in different mission areas. Trying that, the designers came up with a very complex product. I've always been wary of complexity; too many working parts causes breakdowns in equipment, communications, or any other aspect of the task, and is generally expensive to boot.

For my money, if you want to hunt pirates, that's the job of a frigate such as the Perry. Not overwhelming power, but enough to handle that job, and cheap enough to have in numbers. And when the pirates show up, the crew isn't out training to sweep mines or do something else.

As you said, we're getting a couple dozen of them anyway. Only time will tell....

[jdkbph]

ORIGINAL: IWS

They're not supposed to be escorts or frigates.

I know. I'm just saying they're priced as if they were. Half a billion should buy more than just a fancy new MCM.

JD

[Rudd]

The ships were predicted to fall short in manning. And the Navy has deployed the ships with berthing modules in the mission bays in order to carry the crew required for operations. However the ships are designed with sufficient headroom to change from 2-high bunking to 3-high bunking, which would allow crew sizes of 100 if needed

from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Littoral_combat_ship

Doesn't sound like they can maintain a 24/7 crew without using the berthing modules in the mission bays.