Solly Fleet Advancements

People, this isn't another case of the Royal British Navy and the U.S. Navy being forced to build corvettes and DDEs as stopgap, cheaper, barely adequate vessels in the face of the submarine threat. The corvettes were the absolute minimum which could possibly have done the job. They were designed on the basis of a deep sea trawler hull because they could be built in small, scattered civilian yards to civilian standards, and they were actually outclassed as combat vessels by the submarines they were hunting. It was their ability to suppress the slow and largely blind (when submerged), air-breathing submarine by forcing it to remain submerged that made them effective, not their speed or weapons fit, and that sort of suppression isn't going to be a factor in the Honorverse.

The destroyer escorts, on the other hand, weren't all that much cheaper than the standard prewar fleet DD, and they didn't save very much on building times. True, they were cheaper than the later Sumner/Gearing-class ships evolved from the Fletcher-class, but not by as much as most people seem to think. I don't have the cost figures on the Sumner/Gearings, but the Fletchers [authorized 1939; built 1942-44] cost roughly $6,000,000 each under wartime building conditions, which was almost exactly the same cost as the ultimate DDE design. They weren't that much smaller than the fleet DDs, either. Although the Gearing class [1944] displaced 2,203 tons in light condition, while the Brenan-class DDE [1944] displaced 1,023 tons (about a 50% tonnage reduction over the DD), the pre-war Bagley-class DD [1937] displaced only 1,400 tons. It was primarily the numbers being built simultaneously (i.e., the sheer scale of the building program) and the decision to adopt alternative, cheaper power plants (also not a factor ' or an option ' in the Honorverse), not their smaller size, less complex hull, or dirt-cheap price tag which made the DDEs available in such quantities.

For that matter, if you look at the debate over the DDE's construction, you'll find that Admiral Robinson, the Chief of BuShips in 1941, argued strongly in favor of building large numbers of a 1,500-ton standard DD (with beefed up AA in place of torpedo tubes but an otherwise standard armament) instead of the DDE. He based his argument on a BuShips analysis which showed that the low-end capability DDE would cost about $6,900,000 per unit whereas a 1,620-ton DD would have cost only $8,000,000, or only about 16% more than the proposed DDE. In fact, the simpler DDE finally adopted cost about $6,000,000 (same as the Fletcher), around 60% of the 1,620-tonners (Gleaves-class) designed in 1938 and actually completed in 1941-43, which came in around $10,000,000 (more than the later, wartime Fletcher-class), but Robinson was talking about a smaller, cheaper DD, as well. He wanted to go back to the Bagely as the basis for a design which would be simpler than the Fletcher but much more capable than the DE and argued that the real bottleneck (for DDs or DDEs) was going to be yard capacity, not cost, and that by the time the yard capacity was built up to projected levels, it would be able to build the DDs in the numbers actually needed… which he believed would be substantially lower than the numbers of DDEs being projected.

In fact, he was quite right… not that it did him much good. His proposals were overruled primarily by FDR, who didn't trust the admirals not to press for 'gold-plated heads' rather than building austere, readily produced designs. He pressed for enormous DDE (and CVE) programs, which required the construction of three completely new yards dedicated to DDE production (exactly as Robinson had predicted) and found themselves in competition for strategic materials and priorities which were in very short demand. They didn't really hit their stride until very late in 1942… and by mid-1943 there were enormous cancellations of orders because the Navy was finding itself glutted with huge numbers of ships of very limited utility (again, as Robinson had predicted) and there were other and more pressing needs (like landing craft) in direct competition with the DDE program. The greatest single reason that the DDEs were no longer needed was that the escort carrier had proved decisive in breaking the back of the German submarine arm, and even scores of CVEs were cancelled, as well.

Despite the massive cancellations, so many had already been built that the USN ended up with hundreds of only marginally useful vessels post-war, which created its own problem in that with so many hulls, obsolescent and tactically limited or not, it was extremely difficult to get Congressional authorization to build the newer, more effective vessels which were actually needed. If Robinson's advice had been taken, almost the same numbers of units would have been produced, to nearly the same timetable, and they would have been 50% faster, with a greater operating radius and enough reserve buoyancy to accept a far larger increase in both equipment and manpower post-war.

Alizon wrote:Just to be clear, I wasn't arguing for frigates as an anti-missile platform. I was arguing that the SLN has a need for small combatants for missions not involving direct combat with GA forces and it has the need for a lot of them.

And just for the record, I actually think the entire fleet capable DD with all of the last technology is the answer to this is pretty narrow. I also think the construction time analysis is narrow as well. I believe it stems from a comparison of what the construction time and cost would be for a Frigate designed to the same standard to the same standards and leading edge technologies as a Destroyer designed for the same work.

On the other hand, if you built a small combatant using a hybrid of commercial and military technology, designed it to deal with pirates and frontier threats outside of the combat zones where something less than the very best design will do just fine, I think you could drastically reduce costs and construction times.

The best real world examples of this can be found in the massive building during world war II of the Destroyer Escort and Frigate designs of the US and Royal Navies. When compared to Fleet Destroyers designed for screening duties and fleet deployments which could be expected to face front line units of the opposing battle fleets, these vessels were both slow and badly underarmed. Their design often was based at least partially on commercial construction techniques and "off the shelf" parts and which could be built not only in the sophisticated military shipyards but by more humble establishments.

None of these DE's were capable or designed for frontline action with the fleet, but they could be built in vast numbers at a reduced price and they could free other front line combat vessels from secondary duties and allow them to be deployed elsewhere.

Now, I don't know what the optimum size for such a series of vessels would be, but they would probably be no bigger than a small destroyer because what would determine their size is their function. What size do I need to support adequate capabilities for the mission meshed with the need to build them as quickly as possible.

I don't see that the result of this calculation is going to result in anything other than a small combatant much larger than a small destroyer.

SWM wrote:

Alizon wrote:Just to be clear, I wasn't arguing for frigates as an anti-missile platform. I was arguing that the SLN has a need for small combatants for missions not involving direct combat with GA forces and it has the need for a lot of them.

And just for the record, I actually think the entire fleet capable DD with all of the last technology is the answer to this is pretty narrow. I also think the construction time analysis is narrow as well. I believe it stems from a comparison of what the construction time and cost would be for a Frigate designed to the same standard to the same standards and leading edge technologies as a Destroyer designed for the same work.

On the other hand, if you built a small combatant using a hybrid of commercial and military technology, designed it to deal with pirates and frontier threats outside of the combat zones where something less than the very best design will do just fine, I think you could drastically reduce costs and construction times.

The best real world examples of this can be found in the massive building during world war II of the Destroyer Escort and Frigate designs of the US and Royal Navies. When compared to Fleet Destroyers designed for screening duties and fleet deployments which could be expected to face front line units of the opposing battle fleets, these vessels were both slow and badly underarmed. Their design often was based at least partially on commercial construction techniques and "off the shelf" parts and which could be built not only in the sophisticated military shipyards but by more humble establishments.

None of these DE's were capable or designed for frontline action with the fleet, but they could be built in vast numbers at a reduced price and they could free other front line combat vessels from secondary duties and allow them to be deployed elsewhere.

Now, I don't know what the optimum size for such a series of vessels would be, but they would probably be no bigger than a small destroyer because what would determine their size is their function. What size do I need to support adequate capabilities for the mission meshed with the need to build them as quickly as possible.

I don't see that the result of this calculation is going to result in anything other than a small combatant much larger than a small destroyer.

If that's what you want to promote frigates for, forget it. Potato posted the relevant infodump from David Weber. And don't bother arguing that David was only talking about Manticore and Haven--his arguments apply just as well to the Solarian League. Frigates simply cannot carry out the kinds of missions you are talking about. They don't have enough missile capacity, endurance, or general capability. David has stated it quite clearly--frigates are not useful in those missions.

In addition, I still say that Solarian League already has enough small ships to handle those missions, as long as they aren't trying to use them in offensive operations against the Grand Alliance (and the text has already told us they aren't).

Alizon wrote:As such I don't accept as proof positive that the infodump is even reasonably describing the information much less that it represents compelling evidence.

Cauldron of Ghosts
Chapter Eleven
wrote:Frigates were simply too small and fragile to have any significant role in modern naval combat. The roles the frigate had once filled were now filled by destroyers in any navy which aspired to be anything more than a system-defense force, and even destroyers were experiencing a steady upward creep in size and tonnage. There was still a role for small warships—indeed, a larger one than they had played in the better part of a century—but that role was played by LACs, not frigates,...

Alizon wrote:
Well apparently I wasn't clear enough. It is not my intention to argue specifically for "frigates". What I am saying is that the SLN has a need for large numbers of small combatants which are NOT top of the line large fleet destroyers.
.....Snip......
What it seems like to me is that the vast majority of these vessels are going to be heading off to either attack commerce or operating with Battle fleet as the SLN gears up to attempt to take on the GA. So what you seem to be left with is probably a sprinkling of light units left over that neither Frontier Fleet nor Battle Fleet feel are capable enough for front line action trying to keep order throughout the length and breadth of the entire League and it's frontier.

You are going to need something to supplement those skeleton forces left behind. Where are you going to get them from?

Whitecold wrote:Knowing that the poor dead horse is about to be flogged even more, what kind of frontier threats are you imagining?
Number one source of potential enemies would be rouge FF units, or FF ships that have been captured/sold and ended up in the wrong hands. Even Silesian pirates got their hands on warships, forcing the RMN to switch from FGs to DDs and CLs quite some time ago. With the SL in the process of breaking up, ships getting 'lost' only gets easier.
So if your rear areas should be secure, you need a real warship to do so.
Also if you have time to build new ships, build combat capable ones, and use the ones they replace as rear area guard.