Question about naval warships

Destroyers ('Cans') are small fast targets, and very dangerous. There's great satisfaction in "getting" one, but only the best skippers and crews should try it. However, they're smaller, and tend to blow up, so, often as not, they won't be there for the following torpedoes to hit. Admirals ( theirs and ours) don't care about 'Cans", so no points. But bragging rights, with other Submariners, can mean a few free beers.

   In the mid sixties, there was all kinds of different ASW technology, and a need to coordinate it. Part of the job of the first ship I served in, was to develope that coordination. Sonobouys, dipping sonar, MAD, VDS, and an assortment of ASW weapons,ASROC, torpedoes, hegehogs, existed, but there was no rhyme,or reason to the deployment of these. By the time we were done, we had found the combinations that worked best, and the procedures to employ them.......vunerability became part of the submariner's lexicon, and submarines were no longer exempt from the term "target".  Oh, before those familiar with "war games" start, yes, at first there were restrictions put on the subs. We were "testing theories". When we started testing "practices", the restrictions were lifted...there were quite a few surprises, on both sides!

   A "destroyerman" first, and despite two cruisers, a tender, and a communication command ship, a "destroyerman" last.

Pete

P.S. Destroyermen got a few free beers too!  

Originally, the word cruiser does not really refer to any particular type of ship.   Instead it refers to any warship that is sent on a cruise - an independent, detached patrolling mission away from the main battlefleet.
   
The word Frigates did, however,  refer to a very specific type of warship - a 3 masted ship with one single covered gun deck, equipped with more than 24 long guns, and square rigged on all 3 masts.

It so happens that frigates usually constituted the bulk of the warships sent to act as cruisers.   So during  the age of sails,  cruisers and frigates often refers to the same ship.   A frigate sent on an indenpendent cruise is a cruiser.   Of course a brig or a ship of the line sent on an independent cruising mission would be a cruiser also.   But more often than not cruisers were frigates.

When age of sails ended, and the age of steam began, the long established convention for what qualifies as a frigate became obsolete.   No more gun decks, no more 3 square rigged masts, no more 24 long broadside guns.   So the term frigate fell out of favor.   The term cruiser, devoid of technical sailing baggage, now come into vogue to describe a particular type of steam powered warship - a fairly large warship capable of operating independently for long period, far away from bases.   A type of warship intermediate between great big mighty battleships and small fry coastal combatants like torpedo boats.

During WWII it became clear that any warship operating independently for prolonged periods is a dead duck.    Warships don't operate independently in high threat, air dominated environments and live.    Thus the name cruiser , implying a ship capable of operating independently, became somewhat dubious.    If a cruiser is called cruiser because it undertakes indepnedent cruises, then one might as well call it a sinker.    So major navies began to rethink the name cruiser.  Afterall, a ship would hardly cruise when it is expected to be always firmly tethered to the battlefleet or carrier task force.   

By this time, the term frigate has been out of use for so long that its sailing ship connotations have been forgotten.    So some cleaver chap decided to resurrect the name Frigate for any largeish warship designed to screen carrier task forces.  This meaning of Frigate has no relationship with frigate in the sense of USS Constitution.     Hence almost all major US surface warships built for screening carrier forces between 1960 and 1975 were called "frigates".    Russians didn't even bother to resurrect an old name.   Every large Russian warship built between 1960 and 1975 were "Large anti-submarine ships".

After 1975, major navies again rethought, and decided that lumping so many diverse warships into a single amorphous Frigate catagory is silly.   Why classify at all if everything falls into one classification.   So from then on, what used to be frigates were reclassified into 2 new classes.   Bigger ones were now cruisers again, apparently the meaning of cruising has been forgotten.   Smaller ones were destroyers now.    You can dice this way or that.  But there is no clear distinction between cruiser and destroyer now.   Cruisers are bigger destroyers.   In fact, destroyers of some country are bigger than the cruisers of other countries.   Japanese destroyer Kongo is a case and point.  She is much larger than the largest US cruiser.
 
 
 

 Cruising mission is when any vessel is sent on independent, detached offensive or defensive duties.     It so happens that the

Sorry Mike... I didn't read your very good post until after I did mine..

Time to go deep................

Well at the risk of taking return fire from all the "Skimmers" on this board the definition of Crusier is the same as all the Skimmer Craft...... "TARGET"... A little bigger and slower than some but still a TARGET.. LOL

The US Navy's nuclear powered cruisers, CGN's, were originally classified as "destroyer leaders", DLGNs, what kind of role were they to play except of course, their surface to air mission for carrier battle group protection? I mean, how were they going to lead destroyers? I am aware that there were conventionally powered DLGs also, but there were at least comparably powered destroyers there for them to  "lead".

An interesting footnote to the whole battlecruiser story is the Kirov-class.  While still lacking armor, it had a suite of long, intermediate and short range missiles that made the four ships in the class very powerful and deadly adversaries, had they ever seen action.   Also possessing a reasonable number of guns for close-in protection against smaller targets, the addition of nuclear power brought the original purpose of cruisers as long-range skirmishers around full-circle.

I always thought them to be very advanced and innovative, but now they rot in port with the rest of the Russian fleet. 

Battlecruisers at one time were a viable option...and that time was before the advent of radar controlled gunnery and fast battleships.

It was logical in the day when battleships could only muster 20-25 knots, to have a ship capable of doing 30. The sacrifice came with armor, as battlecruisers (like cruisers) were designed to outrun anything they couldn't outfight, and outfight anything they couldn't outrun. In essence, a poor-man's battleship, a rich man's cruiser. Battlecruisers were typically armed with 10, 11, or 12inch guns, and in some cases, 13.5" (Lion, Tiger) and 15" (Repulse, Renown, and Hood) whilst a heavy cruiser (in most instances) was 8inch, and light cruisers 6inch.

When you look at the number of battleships built from 1914 onward, compared to the number of cruisers, the chances of a battlecruiser running into a battleship were far less (where the battleship would hold the advantage) than a battlecruiser running into a heavy or light cruiser (where it would have the advantage).

The demise of the battlecruiser started at Jutland, not because they didn't serve a purpose, but because of a design flaw in the British ships that led to the loss of three ships. This led the Germans to believe that they had superior battlecruisers, and that the design was still a viable platform. This eventually lead to the "pocket battleships" of WW2, as well as the Scharnhorst and Gniesenau. Were they undergunned battleships, overgunned cruisers, or battlecruisers in the true sense? Either way, Jutland caused the British to rethink their position on the class, and by that time, Jackie Fisher, the major proponent of battlecruisers, was out of the picture.

The US was late in developing battlecruisers, and the London Treaty converted Lexington and Saratoga from battlecruisers into carriers. The Alaska class was designed and built specifically to counter the pocket battleship, but itself was rendered obsolete by naval air power and of course, the fast battleship. Of course, the pocket battleship concept itself was marred by the loss of the Graf Spee, who ran into 3 Royal Navy cruisers.

I think the window of opportunity for the battlecruiser opened and closed quickly. It involved a new doctrine in naval warfare that many were reluctant to adopt, the "run and gun" method versus the stand-off slugfest of previous eras. I think it also fell victim to its own design philosphy - since the entire concept of the battlecruiser was incorporated into the battleship - the fast battleship.

Jeff

The name basically says it - big enough to operate on independent cruises - showing the flag etc, and cheap enough to be built in greater numbers than battleships.

A type which has, more or less, survived, unlike the misconceived battle-cruisers.

Present day US Navy cruisers (Ticonderoga class) are built on Spruance class destroyer hulls. The main difference between them are the Aegis radar system and the large missile load of the Ticonderogas, giving them the longer range and hitting power of the traditional cruiser.

Mike does make a good point ... you don't see so many cruisers any more because they are very vulnerable to a variety of attackers, like subs, aircraft and, years back, bigger guns.

The traditional mission for crusiers were to serve as long-range scouts for battle fleets and as commerce raiders and special tactics in battle fleet operations.  An example would be way they were used by the Germans at Jutland to delay the British main fleet while the German High Seas Fleet turned away, back again and away again.  Emden was a successful commerce raider in WWI, but by WWII the Scharnhorst found it harder to get away and hide becasue of radar and aircraft.

Cruisers can be likened to horse Cavalry ... lightweight and fast, but with less heavy firepower and protection.  They had to be used boldly, yet wisely and ultimately fell to the sword of technology and the evolution of war.  Like the battleship, they could not be built to withstand extensive air attacks and, like the battleship ... many of them succumbed to torpedoes from anything that could launch them.

Today's cruisers would never stray far from the fleet in a war.  Their purpose today is to guard the carriers.  There is a new generation of missiles, though, that have so much standoff range that something very much like the cruiser may come back, although it may have a new name, like Arsenal Ship or something.

Thanks for the info! 

StarTux wrote:

What about a Frigate?

Frigate is a sailing navy carryover and the role changed in the steelnavy era.

Destroyers actually came about to deal with Torpedo Boats (or so my reading/research told me, but it made sense) that threatened the dominance of the Royal Navy. You see Torpedo boats are cheap and could "swarm" a larger vessel and torpedo the heck out of it. So the RN made a new class, called the Torpedo Boat Destroyer. The mission has evolved, yet the name Destroyer persists.

Originally you have it correct, TBD's were to defend against torpedo boats. With the advent of offensive submarine operations the role evolved into ASW. Then WWII came along and air threat was added, destroyers then became the first line of the air defense screen as well as the first line of torpedo boat and submarine screen. By the end of WWII there were specialized DDR radar pickets.

Cruisers/Heavy cruisers were obviously more abundant than your main capital ships, such as BB-55 etc. Tehy'd either be part of the main battle group, providing escort and addtional firepower, ot the cruisers would act more independently. Check to see what occured during the cahse and destruction of Bismarck.

Very close. The original concept of cruisers was a class of vessels that could operate independantly of battle groups for scouting and commerce raiding. They were meant to outrun what they couldn't outfight and outgun what they couldn't outrun.

From wikipedia; a frigate is a warship intended to protect other warships and merchant marine ships and as anti-submarine warfare (ASW) combatants for amphibious expeditionary forces, underway replenishment groups, and merchant convoys.

LPT319 wrote:

DrewH is right is most aspects. I have always thought destroyers were more ASW focused, and had to operate as apart of a larger TF  whereas cruisers could operate independently and were more anti-air/anti-surface focused. Wikipedia states; A cruiser (From Dutch Kruiser, "something that crosses") is a large warship capable of engaging multiple targets simultaneously. Historically they were generally considered the smallest ships capable of independent operations — destroyers usually requiring outside support such as tenders — but in modern parlance this difference has disappeared. In modern warfare the cruiser has virtually disappeared, supplanted in all roles by the destroyer. Info about Destroyer listed here; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Destroyer   Seems the missile age has really blurred the lines. Notice the DDG-51 and CG47 class (from CG52 on) each have realtively the same capabilities.

What about a Frigate?

Destroyers actually came about to deal with Torpedo Boats (or so my reading/research told me, but it made sense) that threatened the dominance of the Royal Navy. You see Torpedo boats are cheap and could "swarm" a larger vessel and torpedo the heck out of it. So the RN made a new class, called the Torpedo Boat Destroyer. The mission has evolved, yet the name Destroyer persists.

Cruisers/Heavy cruisers were obviously more abundant than your main capital ships, such as BB-55 etc. Tehy'd either be part of the main battle group, providing escort and addtional firepower, ot the cruisers would act more independently. Check to see what occured during the cahse and destruction of Bismarck.

Hope that helps, I am by no means an expert.

Matt

DrewH is right is most aspects. I have always thought destroyers were more ASW focused, and had to operate as apart of a larger TF  whereas cruisers could operate independently and were more anti-air/anti-surface focused. Wikipedia states;

A cruiser (From Dutch Kruiser, "something that crosses") is a large warship capable of engaging multiple targets simultaneously. Historically they were generally considered the smallest ships capable of independent operations — destroyers usually requiring outside support such as tenders — but in modern parlance this difference has disappeared. In modern warfare the cruiser has virtually disappeared, supplanted in all roles by the destroyer.

Info about Destroyer listed here; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Destroyer

 

Seems the missile age has really blurred the lines. Notice the DDG-51 and CG47 class (from CG52 on) each have realtively the same capabilities.

Ok, I'm a pilot so bear with me. The destroyer is to take the hits for the carriers and battleships, The cruiser and heavy cruiser were to attack other naval vessels that would attack the carriers and battleships. I'm probably wrong, but that is how it was explained to me. No, wait, they were the target after the carrier was sunk!