The CoA

To some this might have meaning. I have always had a very strong romance with America's Battleships. So the other day I am going into the east bay area, and as I am crossing the big bridge, I look out at the mothball fleet sitting off grizzly island. So I am eyeballing this one on the end....it has a sloped prow....thats weird, only heavy cruisers and Battleships have that shape on their hull...

So I decided to exit and drive to the "dont drive here or we will shoot you" sign. There before my eyes was the Battleship Iowa. Such a sexy thing. I wanted to get closer.

I know carrier doctrine has completely replaced them even as flagships, but they are just so kewl.

I had always thought that it would have been great for an Iowa class Battleship to duke it out with the Yamato. We might very well have lost, but still........

This is much better than the shot I got on my I phone, lol

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Iowa-26-03-2006.jpg

I've always had a special place in my heart for those big battle-wagons as well.

16" guns vs 18.1" guns. They definitely had the advantage there, but I think the Iowa class had a big advantage in fire control.

Being from South Dakota, my favorite has always been BB-57. Would have been nice to see her when she was still afloat.

During the 1st gulf war, I was able to board and tour the Wisconsin. While the watch officer was showing me around, the ship went to Battlestations and GQ. It was all I could do to get OFF the ship before they pulled out of Bahrain Harbor and started firing about 13 Tomahawk Cruise missles. It was one of the best days of my life!

The Navy is considering developement of a Battleship that is unarmed with external guns, but is loaded to the hilt with nothing but S2S, S2A, S2L missles. There is much argument whether they would be called battleships, or a new yet unused name such as heavy missle cruiser. In this day and age its all about power projection.

Like Bir, I have a soft spot for Battleship X. I have heard she was the most decorated Battleship of WWII. I remember once hearing a rumor that the Japanese were supposed to have signed their surrender on the South Dakota however the President was from Missouri so....Ah, that doesn't matter. All battleships are pretty darn cool in my book!

Of course this post got me reading and I discovered that the Alabama is a museum ship in Mobile. Not the South Dakota, but I think I may someday have to make a trip to Mobile.

The Iowa was going to be a gift to San Franscico, with SF having a huge "fleet" history. Sadly because of their offense at current homosexual policies, and their disapproval of the war in Iraq, they declined. Vallejo gets the prize however, so Iowa will be housed as a Military museum. The Department of the Navy however is not comfortable with their loss of shore bombardment capability. Thus, the Wisconsin, New Jersy, Iowa and the Mo, will be kept in a battle ready state. They have remanufactured new shells and powder. The source of the explosion on the Iowa turned out to Not be a crazed homosexual sailor who was disgruntled, but the fact that power manufactured in the late 40's degrades and creates an ether by product that can spontaneously explode. Its sort of odd to me that smart people in the Navy wouldnt know that Nitrocellulose based powders degrade with time, but go figure. When I was talking to some guys on the Wisconsin, I noticed active duty Master chiefs that looked like they where in their 60's. They where. It seems that the list of people that are GMG (gunners mates) for 16 inch guns is a small list. They let these guys come in from fleet reserve.

Had a chance as a scout to stay overnight on the Alabama. Very cool stuff. :) (Pretty sure it was overnight...I know we were there when other tourists weren't...I seem to be getting old.)

I took my scouts on the Carl Vinson. We call them "tiger cruises"

Oh man.. I am right with you guys on this one. When "Battleship X" was completed, it was under a complete security lockdown. The US wanted no information about it to leak to the Japanese. Her name did not appear anywhere on board. Diaries were banned, and personal belongings did not carry her name. She is credited with shooting down 32 planes and sinking 3 cruisers in the battle of Guadalcanal, and served as Admiral Halsey's Flagship.

There is just something cool about a gun that will hurl an armor-piercing shell the mass of a Volkswagen (actually, 1 and a third Volkswagens) 21 miles. And she had 9 of those bad boys!

I am also rather amused that the 4 ships of the South Dakota class are the BB57 South Dakota, BB58 Indiana, BB59 Massachusetts and BB60 in light of my recent migration.

I was very excited when I heard they were recommissioning the battleships and fitting them for modern warfare (adding missile launchers and advanced aegis air defense systems. The only pang was that the South Dakota would not be among those recommissioned. Originally, it was planned to bring BB57 up the Missouri to become a museum in South Dakota. But they were unable to navigate her that far up the river. So in 1962 she was sold for scrap and scuttled... umm.. I think in Delaware.

On the Yamato thing... I did once play a naval war game pitting the South Dakota against the Yamato (I think the system was called Naval Wars). I had bad luck in the opening salvo. A critical failure resulted in my radar and fire control systems getting knocked offline for several minutes. With manual fire, I was unable to hit the Yamato, and was forced to retire from the engagement after firing just a few shots. On paper it looked like it would have been a tough fight. We never did go back and try it again.

The images area is good.

http://www.battleshipyamato.info/