THE NEXT DREADNOUGHT REVOLUTION BY DAVID MURRIN 15TH MARCH 2021 WWW.DAVIDMURRIN.CO.UK PART 1: CURRENT DESIGN TRENDS AND LIMITATIONS THE NEXT DREADNOUGHT REVOLUTION THE NEXT DREADNOUGHT REVOLUTION HISTORY DECODED TO INFORM THE FUTURE PART 1: CURRENT DESIGN TRENDS AND LIMITATIONS BY ANALYSING PAST PATTERNS WE CAN PREDICT FORTHCOMING EVENTS AND TRENDS 1.0 TIME FOR A NEW DREADNOUGHT-TYPE INNOVATION IN WARSHIP DESIGN In a time when battleships usually took several years to build, the construction and launch in 1906 of HMS Dreadnought in less than 12 months was a demonstration of British military intention and industrial might. But most critically, her all big gun design and steam turbines made every ship built before that point obsolete. The geostrategic consequences were enormous as it gave Germany a window to attempt to challenge for control of the world’s oceans and accelerated the British-German naval arms’ race to astronomical levels. Today we are witnessing a new and fourth great industrial arms’ race, catalysed by China’s hegemonic ambitions as it seeks to outbuild America and its allies to create a blue-water navy that can dominate the world’s oceans. In this similar environment, perhaps it is time to consider the emergence of a new class of Dreadnought destroyers, which I have named Dominators, that can control large areas of ocean both below and above it. 1.1 DEDICATED MISSION DESTROYERS AND FRIGATES This ship design concept of dedicated mission escorts is favoured by all European navies and the Royal Navy is an excellent specific example of using this concept in its escort fleet. There are two sectors: the anti-submarine warfare (ASW) designs, such as the Type 23 and 26; and the anti-air warfare (AAW) destroyers, such as the Type 45. Notably, the tonnage of all these ships has been steadily increasing. The Type 26 frigate comes in at 6,900 tonnes, the Type 31 frigate at 5,700 tonnes, and the Type 45 destroyer at 8,500 tonnes. Bearing in mind the World War II cruiser HMS Belfast, with her armour, came in at 10,500 tonnes, these new classes of frigates and destroyers have been steadily getting bigger. Meanwhile, due to the high cost of these ships, the Royal Navy is still building frigates that it classifies as general-purpose. These include variants of Type 23 deployed without a towed array sonar and the new Type 31 frigates. The latter in reality are just too lightly armed to be effective in high-intensity combat. The Royal Navy has followed this design option to boost numbers as these designs are relatively cheap and in the forlorn hope that it will boost exports. But the reality is that these ships have no place in a high-intensity combat zone as they are death traps for their crews, much as the old Type 21s were in the Falklands conflict. THE NEXT DREADNOUGHT REVOLUTION HISTORY DECODED TO INFORM THE FUTURE PART 1: CURRENT DESIGN TRENDS AND LIMITATIONS BY ANALYSING PAST PATTERNS WE CAN PREDICT FORTHCOMING EVENTS AND TRENDS WWW.DAVIDMURRIN.CO.UK However, with the expectation of general-purpose frigates like the Type 31, which are the jack of all trades and masters of none, Royal Navy frigates are either specifically designed to be ASW or AAW. The Type 26 will be a purpose-built ASW platform that follows on from the once world-class Type 23 Duke-class, which are said to be so quiet that they are effectively holes in the water to enemy sonar systems. In contrast, the Type 45 is a world- class AAW destroyer with a sub-sea signature as noisy as a merchant ship (as the noise reduction technology was excluded to save costs). For these ships to survive in a high-intensity warfighting environment, they will have to operate at a minimum in pairs or be vulnerable to attack in a domain for which they are not optimised. Lose one of the pair and the loss of the other is all but inevitable. This essentially means that the two mutually dependant ships equating to some 15,400 combined tonnes are highly co-dependent. The pair cost £2 billion, compared with the £1.3-billion price tag for a US Arleigh Burke-class destroyer, which has greater combat power if less specific capability in the ASW and AAW roles. Notably, the two ships need twice the crew of a single ship. However, even when they operate together, these two Royal Navy ships – the Type 23/26 Type 45 combination – cannot make long-range surface-to-surface strikes, either against warships and land targets, and also have no counter-mine capability, which constrains their overall combat effectiveness. The Royal Navy would argue that they have been constrained by budget costs, and in turn, this has reduced procurement numbers. The perfect example is the Type 45, which was supposed to be a 12-ship class but due to cost-cutting only six were built, resulting in increased unit costs as the R&D costs were spread over so few ships. Their price tag was £1 billion each. However, imagine the potential of a true all-purpose warship that could amalgamate the full Anti Ballistic Missile Warfare (ABMW), Anti Submarine Warfare(ASW), Anti Air Warfare(AAW), Anti Submarine Warfare (SSW) and mine warfare (MW) capabilities of specialist frigates and destroyers into a single ship design. Such a new Dominator- class destroyer could operate, fight and survive independently, whilst controlling much larger areas of oceans than current ships. This could create a new concept in sea control. Notably, this could also reverse the trend that the Royal Navy has long been guilty of, which is under-arming their warships in the hope that in times of war they could increase their armament density. A concept that does not stack up in modern warfare. One remedial way of compensating for this missile shortfall is the addition to current Royal Navy ships of the BAE Systems’ adaptive deck launcher (ADL), which has four Mk 41 cells positioned on a ship’s deck in much the same way as does any other canister system, such as Harpoon. The ADL can launch all current Royal Navy and US Navy missiles via its Mk 41 cells. This means that Quad packed (four per cell) into two ADL’s each with four Mk 41 cells. The T45 could carry 32 Sea Ceptors, without the need to reduce the complement of Aster missiles. Most importantly the ADL, unlike the current vertical launch system (VLS), can be replenished at sea, potentially increasing sustained firepower in calm conditions! In addition, these bolt-on ADLs could be located on supply and amphibious ships, but then placed under the control of the escort ships, to increase the weapons-carrying load of fleets in a concept call distributed lethality. THE NEXT DREADNOUGHT REVOLUTION HISTORY DECODED TO INFORM THE FUTURE PART 1: CURRENT DESIGN TRENDS AND LIMITATIONS BY ANALYSING PAST PATTERNS WE CAN PREDICT FORTHCOMING EVENTS AND TRENDS WWW.DAVIDMURRIN.CO.UK 1.2 GENESIS: THE US, JAPANESE AND CANADIAN DEVELOPMENT OF MULTI-MISSION DESTROYERS The US Arleigh Burke-class in many ways represents a progression to just such a Dominator-class concept. With a true multi-mission capability that extends across all the maritime domains of warfare – anti-ballistic missile (ABM), ASW, AAW, anti-surface warfare (ASW) and mine warfare (MW) capabilities – these highly capable warships, with perhaps the exception of the noise quietening of the Type 23s and 26s, begin to meet the potential a new Dominator-class. However, its limitations are the 90 MKR41 missile silos that house the SM2, SM3s and SM6s for air and ballistic missile defence, combined with land and sea attack Tomahawk missiles (TLAMS) and the RUM-139 VL-ASROC missiles to attack submarine at extended ranges, meaning that these ships are vulnerable to saturation missile attacks from both sea-skimming and hypersonics from space. Additionally, the stealth qualities of these ships fall far short of that of the 15,600-tonne Zumwalt-classes. Following the American lead, the Japanese navy has been building larger designs of destroyers based on the Aegis design, the latest of which is the Maya-class coming in at 10,500 tonnes. These ships have six more Mk41 launch cells than the US equivalents and a more stealthy radar profile. Interestingly the Type 26 City Class, that for the Royal Navy comes in at 6,900 tonnes, is being adapted by the Canadian navy into highly capable multi-mission ships that are essentially destroyers. The Canadian surface combatant comes in at 7,800 tonnes and the Australian navy’s comes into the Hunter-class at 8,800 tonnes. These two larger variants will benefit from the acoustic stealth of the design, making them dangerous sub-hunters indeed, the Canadian even more so with two helicopter-towed arrayed sonars being deployed away from the ship. But these super Type 26s will also benefit from far more capable sensor packages especially on the Canadian ships, with their SP7 AESA ABM radar, Which when combined with it Mk 41 launch cells, with SM3s embarked will give it a full ABM capability. The same Mk 41 cells will give both ships the same strike capabilities as the US Arleigh Burkes whilst operating a superior three-layer air defence system with SM2s for long-range area defence, Sea Ceptors for short-range area defence and evolved sea sparrow (ESSM) for point or self-defence. Contrary to the royal navy and many other European navies, the Canadians have changed their minds from ordering a mix of three high-end and 12 general-purpose ships to 15 full-spec and identical super frigates which are in reality multi- mission destroyers.