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Long-Range Projectiles For Navy's Newest Ship Too Expensive To Shoot (arstechnica.com)
An anonymous reader writes: The USS Zumwalt (DDG-1000) is the U.S. Navy's latest warship, commissioned just last month -- and it comes with the biggest guns the Navy has deployed since the twilight of the battleships. But it turns out the Zumwalt's guns won't be getting much of a workout any time soon, aside from acceptance testing. That's because the special projectiles they were intended to fire are so expensive that the Navy has canceled its order. As [Ars] described [Zumwalt's Advanced Gun System (AGS)] in a story two years ago: "The automated AGS can fire 10 rocket-assisted, precision-guided projectiles per minute at targets over 100 miles away. Those projectiles use GPS and inertial guidance to improve the gun's accuracy to a 50 meter (164 feet) circle of probable error -- meaning that half of its GPS-guided shells will fall within that distance from the target." The projectile responsible for that accuracy -- something far too complex to just be called a "shell" or "bullet" -- is the Long Range Land-Attack Projectile (LRLAP). Each projectile has precision guidance provided by internal global positioning and inertial sensors, and bursts of LRLAPs could in theory be fired over a minute following different ballistic trajectories that cause them to land all at the same time. Lockheed Martin won the competition to produce the LRLAPs, and the company described their capabilities thusly: "155mm LRLAP provides single strike lethality against a wide range of targets, with three times the lethality of traditional 5-inch naval ballistic rounds -- and because it is guided, fewer rounds can produce similar or more lethal effects at less cost. LRLAP has the capability to guide multiple rounds launched from the same gun to strike single or multiple targets simultaneously, maximizing lethal effects." The "less cost" part, however, turned out to be a pipe dream. With the reduction of the Zumwalt class to a total of three ships, the corresponding reduction in requirements for LRLAP production raised the production costs just as the price of the ships they would be deployed to soared. Defense News reports that the Navy is canceling production of the LRLAP because of an $800,000-per-shot price tag -- more than 10 times the original projected cost.
The U.S. Defense budget is about $600 Billion per year now, the Federal Budget is about $4 trillion. So that's about 15%. So 85% of the budget is going for Grandma, her meds, her opiate addicted great-grand kids and their parents, etc. The military also spins off a lot of technology, networks for instance.
This isn't the 60's anymore, grow up.
I'd say this all is classic over-engineering. As with the F35 JSF, Airbus A400M and Jaeger90 ... errrm, sorry, "Eurofighter". These projects have been running over time and budget for *decades* (you may guess when the Jaeger90 was supposed to enter service ...) and are just about outdated by drones and new types of asymmetric warfare when they'll finally will be finished.
Meanwhile the russians are gradually updating their Mig29s and Sukolevs with junkyard scraps or something and can actually fly. Like, they have pilots trained on them that can strap in and take off in 3.5 Minutes flat.
If I were king of the US i'd cancel these projects inmediately and do a maintainable iteration of existing aircraft.
Upgrade/iterate the F15, F16 and A10, get some new upgraded missiles and stuff and built 700 of each and get some pilots to learn to fly them.
This new warship is also not much more than some PR move/dick measuring contest of the US Navy vis-a-vis the other forces.
Insanely expensive and not really of any pivotal value in a conflict I would guess. Not much different than in WW1.
New-toy-cash would be way better invested in stealth drones or something.
My 2 cents.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
We have other 155mm artillery, such as the M284 (commonly mounted on a M109 Paladin chassis). Current versions of the Paladin have capabilities eerily similar to the desired capabilities of the Zumwalt's guns.
So, how exactly did these geniuses develop what appears to be the same gun, with the same capabilities, but somehow make it incompatibly different?
See that "Preview" button?
"Clearly the reason recent conflicts have required coalitions is so each government's incompetence can be cancelled out."
I know you're (half) joking but there's some (half) truth to this. The reason it was such a problem when the UK first refused to join strikes in Syria, and such a big deal when we eventually did join is because of the UK's Brimstone missile, it provides a capability that the US just doesn't have - it's accuracy against moving targets, and ability to cancel very last minute if there's a risk of civilian casualties is immensly important when striking inner city areas such as those ISIS hides in, but it also has millimetre wave and laser guidance options making it incredibly flexible in terms of hitting the target. There was some buzz about buying Brimstone in the US, but instead they chose to reinvent the wheel and just try and upgrade the hellfire themselves to do the exact same thing - launch from fast jets, with dual mode seekers, because military industrial complex money wasting.
As an aside the F-117 was cancelled in 2008, but there have been numerous videos of them flying since despite supposedly being mothballed, including earlier this year - one theory is that it's because the F-22 doesn't do laser guidance and so can't hit moving targets on the ground, therefore the F-117 remains the USAF's only option for doing this, hence why they're keeping them airworthy and flying and the crews trained and active just in case. The F-35 can do this (which is why when people say the F-35 can't dogfight they're missing the point, it's not meant to, it's a strike fighter, dog fighting is what the F-22 is for, which is why the F-22 can't hit moving ground targets - there's no jack of all trades aircraft that can do everything perfectly).
Regarding the carriers, Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm fast jet pilots were transitioned to the RAF, but are seconded to fly with countries like France and the US to practice carrier efforts - there are currently RAF (former fleet air arm) pilots flying French Rafales with the French Navy and American F/A-18s and Harriers with the US Navy and Marines.
France does a decent job of maintaining full spectrum capabilities making it much more independent than the UK and US but the cost is that it means some of those capabilities are now incredibly dated - it's hard for one single country to afford everything. The US can afford to do it, but due to overly inflated project costs through corruption and backhanders it just runs out of money even though it shouldn't.
It's not just the West though - Russia's joint project with India, the PAK-FA, their 5th generation attempt at creating a competitor for the F-22 is also in the shit, with Russia now dropping it's order of them to a mere 12 aircraft so probably only ever between 3 and 9 combat ready at best (you don't have all your aircraft flying at once, some are always used as reserves, some will be trainers etc.). China's having a good go but whilst many of it's designs are based on stolen US designs (there's a reason some of it's aircraft have striking similarities, they don't appear to have ever managed to steal a comprehensive design, so what you get is something where half of the plane looks like a cutting edge Western equivalent design, and the rest of it looks straight out of the 60s. See this image for example highlighting the front of the aircraft having a similar profile to the F-35, but the engines demonstrating the stealth profile of a gigantic flying turd (and likely the avionics of a Commodore 64).
So you're actually not far wrong, countries genuinely are working together to fill gaps, and it genuinely is because of terrible decision making based on corrupt procurement processes - there's really no question that the Brimstone was far and away the most sensible purchase option for the US, it would've saved millions and does everything they want. Similarly selling the Royal Navy's entire 72 Harrier fleet to the US for less than the price of 2 F-35s only to then pay the US to let our pilots keep
Only 50 Meters accuracy for this expensive crap?
Since cheap drones could send guided missiles through a tiny the bathroom window of a bunker 10 years ago, this seems a bit poor.