I do hardly agree with the reason of the importance of carriers. It became obvious that a battleship that needed minimum 2 years of construction could be sunk by a handful of divebombers or torpedobombers (launched from carriers, see the sinking of the Bismarck). The carrier enabled attacks over several hundred miles, whereas the artilliery of a battleship was useful over 20 miles. What I want to say is that the importance of carriers is not a result of the sinking of battleships at Pearl Harbor, but because of their superiority and cost effectiveness against battleships. During WW2 the US naval construction policy was turned towards carriers, not towards battleships and that cannot be a result of Pearl Habor.
Well, long talking and little meaning : If BTS could reflect the later game the fact that the construction of battleships is less effective compared to carriers, that would be fine !
Pearl Harbor
Before hostilities broke out in the Pacific Theatre, there was extensive pre-war planning centered around dreadnoughts. The Royal Navy could not achieve parity with the estimated nine Japanese capital ships in Southeast Asia, since doing so would leave only a handful of ships to use against Nazi Germany. However, Prime Minister Winston Churchill was optimistic about the improving situation in the North Atlantic and Mediterranean and allocating two ships to the colony's defense was seen as a compromise. Furthermore, the US Navy would agree to send its Pacific Fleet with its eight battleships to Singapore in the event that hostilities with Japan broke out.
Initially, when the US entered the war in December 1941, they had no battleships available in the Pacific Theatre. Eight of them were sunk or crippled at Pearl Harbor and would be sent home for repairs and reconstruction; regardless they would not have been able to keep up with the carriers. As well, the new fast battleships of the North Carolina and South Dakota classes were still undergoing trials. The North Carolina and South Dakota were ready by summer of 1942 and provided
crucial anti-aircraft defense during the Eastern Solomons and Santa Cruz Islands carrier battles.
The Battle off Samar, on 25 October 1944, proved that battleships were still a lethal weapon. The American escort carriers of "Taffy 3" had a narrow escape from falling under the guns of the Japanese battleships Yamato, Kongō, Haruna and Nagato and their cruiser escort. American destroyers and aircraft attacked the battleships, enabling the American task force to disengage. Inexplicably, the Japanese fleet disengaged as well, despite being near to their intended target - the American amphibious landing forces at Leyte.
A modern fast battleship could provide a vital point defense against attackers that broke through the fighter screen. The North Carolina and South Dakota demonstrated just that in the battles of the Eastern Solomons and Santa Cruz Islands, respectively, with North Carolina downing between 7 to 14 planes while South Dakota shot down 26 to 32. The battleships' presence was crucial during these 1942 battles, as the US were still months from being able to realize their material advantage, with too few planes and ships to interdict enough of the skilled Japanese pilots.
So battleships still did have purpose in WWII as i was pointing out in the post you quoted, although i may have gone a little overboard in stating that the only reason America used carriers was because they had no available battleships
I Completely agree though, that battleships are too strong in this game, submarines should easily be able to destroy them i personally think.
Look at all the modern navies, no battleships remain in service (including in reserve) with any navy worldwide.
I still contest carriers value for money though, because heavy nuclear and conventional tipped cruise missiles were seen by the USSR as a primary weapon to destroy US carrier battle groups. Large submarines (e.g. Echo and Oscar classes) were developed to carry these weapons and shadow US battle groups at sea. Carriers are only effective against nations, which are not technolodgy on the same level as you, and countries which do not have submarines, or effective cruise missiles. How big was the soviet unions carrier force?
Tomahawk missile model has become a significant part of the US naval arsenal. It gives ships and submarines an extremely accurate, long-range, conventional land attack weapon. Each costs about $1,900,000 USD.
the Tomahawk uses inertial guidance or GPS to follow a preset course; once over land, the missile's guidance system is aided by Terrain Contour Matching (TERCOM). Terminal guidance is provided by the Digital Scene Matching Area Correlation (DSMAC) system or GPS, producing a claimed accuracy of about 10 meters.
so 1.9 million dollar missile capable of destroying billion dollar inventments
Soon Tomahawk missiles will cost as little as $600,000 in production costs for the American navy, which makes them even more dangerous, but consider the fact that Tomahawk missiles arnt really primary anti ship missiles
Anti
Ship
Missile
s
AShMs are a significant threat to modern warships and were used extensively in the 1982 Falklands War. In 1987, a US Navy guided-missile frigate, the USS Stark, was hit by an Exocet AShM fired by an Iraqi Mirage F-1. The Stark was damaged but was able to make it to a friendly port for repair. The next year, AShMs were fired by both US and Iranian forces in Operation Praying Mantis in the Persian Gulf. During this naval battle, several Iranian warships were hit by US AShMs (and by Standard SAMs doing double-duty in this role). Also, in October 1987 an American-owned tanker under the Liberian flag and a Kuwaiti tanker under the US flag, the Sea Isle City, were hit by Iranian HY-2 missiles.
In 2006, Hezbollah forces fired a Chinese C-802 AShM at the Israeli corvette INS Hanit, inflicting heavy damage and spilling a huge volume of oil into the marine environment. A second missile in this salvo sunk an Egyptian merchant ship, as well.
The counter to AShMs are Anti-missile missiles, Anti-aircraft guns, Close-in weapon systems, Deception Jammers and Decoy systems such as chaff and flares.
Passive countermeasures against AShMs include the use of stealth features in the design of modern warships to reduce their radar cross section (RCS) which reduces the ships radar signature and also measures to reduce their infra-red and acoustic signatures too. The aim of making the ships stealthly is to reduce the risk of detection and to make them harder targets for attacking AShMs. Examples include the US Arleigh Burke class destroyers and the French La Fayette class frigate.
For further reading on the possible future of AShMs look at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BrahMos
For some more information on Warships vulnerability and the fact they are really obstele in a naval battle between great powers goto
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BrahMos
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