kitplane01 wrote:

A Carrier Air Wing in 1993 was
2 fighter squadrons (VF) of 10–12 F-14 Tomcats
2 strike fighter squadrons (VFA) of 12 F/A-18 Hornets
1 medium attack squadron (VA) 10 A-6E SWIP/TRAM intruders
1 tactical electronic warfare squadron (VAQ) of 4–6 EA-6Bs
1 anti-submarine squadron (VS) of 8 S-3A/B Vikings
1 helicopter anti-submarine squadron (HS) of 6 SH-3H Sea Kings
1 Detachment of ES-3A Shadow ELINT aircraft from a fleet air reconnaissance squadron (VQ)
1 detachment of C-2A Greyhound aircraft for Carrier Onboard Delivery (COD)
------
About 83 aircraft including 63 fast jets

A modern Carrier Air Wing is
4 Strike Fighter (VFA) Squadrons, with twelve F/A-18E/F Super Hornets each
1 Electronic Attack (VAQ) Squadron, made up of five EA-18G Growlers.
1 Carrier Airborne Early Warning (VAW) Squadron, with four E-2C Hawkeyes or five E-2D "Advanced" Hawkeyes
1 Helicopter Sea Combat (HSC) Squadron of eight MH-60S Seahawks
1 Helicopter Maritime Strike (HSM) Squadron of eleven MH-60R Seahawks
1 Fleet Logistics Support (VRC) Squadron Detachment of two C-2A Greyhounds;
-------------------------
About 74 aircraft including 52 fast jets

Question: Is there room on the carrier to operate another 10 fast jets? It's the same boats as 1993!

“MQ-25 is capable of significantly more than we are asking it to do at [initial operational capability]. So at IOC, it needs to be able to operate around an aircraft carrier and be able to conduct aerial refueling and that’s as far as we went,” Loiselle told USNI News in December.
“The rest of it will be spiral developed because it’s got significant additional capabilities with a mission bay… we plan to take use of in the future

889091 wrote:

So what are they using the additional space for? More fuel, ordnance and food?

STT757 wrote:

The Carrier Air Wings are in transition.

Being added now are the F-35Cs and CMV-22B.

By 2026 they will also include MQ-25A Stingray aerial refueling UAVs.

STT757 wrote:

In a combat zone like the South China Sea the Navy needs longer range reach, to keep them out of range of missile threats.

bobinthecar wrote:

The mid 80s air wing often had 87-90 aircraft. Long range PGMs, newer air frames have much better readiness rates, and the fact that F/A-18s and F35s are truly dual role means the CAW of today is in some ways far more potent and capable than that of 30 years ago. The two biggest drawbacks in my opinion of today's air wing is that even with MQ-25 there is not enough tanking capacity and there is nowhere near enough high endurance ASW capability. The development of an S-3 like air frame would very much rectify both problems.

LyleLanley wrote:

889091 wrote:

So what are they using the additional space for? More fuel, ordnance and food?

I couldn’t tell you: the only time I’ve been on one was at pier side and the hangar deck looked crowded even without aircraft embarked.

Bombs go in the magazines and fuel goes in the fuel tanks, so maybe food and gym equipment?

kitplane01 wrote:

bobinthecar wrote:

The mid 80s air wing often had 87-90 aircraft. Long range PGMs, newer air frames have much better readiness rates, and the fact that F/A-18s and F35s are truly dual role means the CAW of today is in some ways far more potent and capable than that of 30 years ago. The two biggest drawbacks in my opinion of today's air wing is that even with MQ-25 there is not enough tanking capacity and there is nowhere near enough high endurance ASW capability. The development of an S-3 like air frame would very much rectify both problems.

Sure. But a modern air wing could also have 87-90 aircraft, and each aircraft better.

I wonder what drives more of the carrier design, size of first strike or three day sortie generation?

bobinthecar wrote:

If I had to guess I would say it would grow slightly and there would be some adjustments. Later blocks of the F/A-18 are extremely advanced and vastly underrated planes. Their one and only drawback is lack of range. F-35C has the range and will probably have even more range in the future if any of the engine upgrades planned are executed. They are the A-6E of the modern wing but since the F-18 lacks range there needs to be more of them. Kind of like the air wings of the 80s and 90s. There would be squadrons of both F-14s and F/A-18s. "Heavy" and "light" fighters so to speak. Or even wings of the 60s and 70s that had squadrons of A6 and A7's as heavy and light bombers.

Anyway to get to the point, yes. They are looking to increase the number of F-35s, Growlers, and MQ-25s. In my opinion They should get rid of or reduce the number of MH-60S as they are basically SAR and logistics assets and replace them with a platform that could take the place of the S-3s in tanking and long range ASW.

See this for the current thinking within the Navy on the subject. https://news.usni.org/2022/03/24/a-gene ... ghter-gaps

bobinthecar wrote:

First Navy deployment of A-7s was late 1967 I think. But yes. A-4s for most of the 60s.

Spacepope wrote:

bobinthecar wrote:

First Navy deployment of A-7s was late 1967 I think. But yes. A-4s for most of the 60s.

I think we can all agree it all went downhill after they got rid of the A-5s and Crusaders

kitplane01 wrote:

bobinthecar wrote:

If I had to guess I would say it would grow slightly and there would be some adjustments. Later blocks of the F/A-18 are extremely advanced and vastly underrated planes. Their one and only drawback is lack of range. F-35C has the range and will probably have even more range in the future if any of the engine upgrades planned are executed. They are the A-6E of the modern wing but since the F-18 lacks range there needs to be more of them. Kind of like the air wings of the 80s and 90s. There would be squadrons of both F-14s and F/A-18s. "Heavy" and "light" fighters so to speak. Or even wings of the 60s and 70s that had squadrons of A6 and A7's as heavy and light bombers.

Anyway to get to the point, yes. They are looking to increase the number of F-35s, Growlers, and MQ-25s. In my opinion They should get rid of or reduce the number of MH-60S as they are basically SAR and logistics assets and replace them with a platform that could take the place of the S-3s in tanking and long range ASW.

See this for the current thinking within the Navy on the subject. https://news.usni.org/2022/03/24/a-gene ... ghter-gaps

The article you offered says repeatidly they want 44 strike aircraft per wing or 396 total. But they don't have enough F-18s to meet that goal, given training (263) and backup (126) requirements. I'm amazed it takes 800 aircraft to get 400 operational on the carriers. So F-35s will fill the gap, but the deployed carrier air wing will stay at 44 strike aircraft.

They tested going from 5 growlers to 7 and liked it (but money is a thing). They want to add another 5 helicopters, and 5 MQ-25s.

So the carrier air wing might add 12 aircraft, none of them strike fighters. They will increase the number of strike fighters in the navy, but not the number on board ships.

STT757 wrote:

That was a great article for this discussion, one thing they mentioned was transitioning the adversary squadrons which were planned to transition from legacy F-18s to Super Hornets. Instead, they're going to acquire F-16s and F-5s for the adversary squadrons. That allows them to fill the strike fighter gap with those Super Hornets. However, it points out that traditionally the adversary squadrons, which are Reserve units, were all comprised of a Reserve Air Wing which could deploy in combat if needed. Moving away from the F-18s to the F-16 and F-5s takes away their ability to operate in combat as part of the Carrier Air Wing. It also eliminates all those Reservists who support those aircraft who would no longer be proficient to support the fleet F-18s.

889091 wrote:

STT757 wrote:

That was a great article for this discussion, one thing they mentioned was transitioning the adversary squadrons which were planned to transition from legacy F-18s to Super Hornets. Instead, they're going to acquire F-16s and F-5s for the adversary squadrons. That allows them to fill the strike fighter gap with those Super Hornets. However, it points out that traditionally the adversary squadrons, which are Reserve units, were all comprised of a Reserve Air Wing which could deploy in combat if needed. Moving away from the F-18s to the F-16 and F-5s takes away their ability to operate in combat as part of the Carrier Air Wing. It also eliminates all those Reservists who support those aircraft who would no longer be proficient to support the fleet F-18s.

Can't the adversary squadrons continue flying the legacy F-18s, or are they so beat up that it's not worthwhile?

par13del wrote:

Is there any way to build a modern S3, new engines, new materials, same design? What was the problem if any with the original S3, and no, I am not talking about restarting the line. I have to assume that they can or do have the original drawings, biggest issue I see are the engines, as most of the combat electronics are already deployed on the P-8, just need smaller versions, I am sure the OEM can charge a ton for that making the project viable, rather than billions developing the frame.

kitplane01 wrote:

STT757 wrote:

In a combat zone like the South China Sea the Navy needs longer range reach, to keep them out of range of missile threats.

I dunno. Seems like missile range is ever-increasing, and that eventually there will be no useful station out of missile range.

par13del wrote:

Is there any way to build a modern S3, new engines, new materials, same design? What was the problem if any with the original S3, and no, I am not talking about restarting the line. I have to assume that they can or do have the original drawings, biggest issue I see are the engines, as most of the combat electronics are already deployed on the P-8, just need smaller versions, I am sure the OEM can charge a ton for that making the project viable, rather than billions developing the frame.

texl1649 wrote:

This is all an extremely high amount of cost to get a (nearly?) trillion dollar manned asset (carrier battle group), to a thousand miles from china.

The logical/non-emotional option would be to move to a more distributed/less vulnerable asset. What CVN ‘power’ needs to really be projected in the western pacific by folks like GWB/Obama/Biden/Trump (21st century US presidents)? Is any of this really going to lower the chances of armed conflict?

texl1649 wrote:

This is all an extremely high amount of cost to get a (nearly?) trillion dollar manned asset (carrier battle group), to a thousand miles from china.

The logical/non-emotional option would be to move to a more distributed/less vulnerable asset. What CVN ‘power’ needs to really be projected in the western pacific by folks like GWB/Obama/Biden/Trump (21st century US presidents)? Is any of this really going to lower the chances of armed conflict?

bobinthecar wrote:

texl1649 wrote:

This is all an extremely high amount of cost to get a (nearly?) trillion dollar manned asset (carrier battle group), to a thousand miles from china.

The logical/non-emotional option would be to move to a more distributed/less vulnerable asset. What CVN ‘power’ needs to really be projected in the western pacific by folks like GWB/Obama/Biden/Trump (21st century US presidents)? Is any of this really going to lower the chances of armed conflict?

Trillion dollar? Can I see that math?

STT757 wrote:

kitplane01 wrote:

STT757 wrote:

In a combat zone like the South China Sea the Navy needs longer range reach, to keep them out of range of missile threats.

I dunno. Seems like missile range is ever-increasing, and that eventually there will be no useful station out of missile range.

In order to be effective in the vast distances in the increasingly dangerous Western Pacific, aircraft would notionally have to operate more than 1,000 nautical miles from the carrier to keep out of range of Chinese anti-ship ballistic missiles like the DF-21 and DF-26, analyst Bryan Clark told USNI News in 2020.

The next step for the Navy is to bring an unmanned aerial refueling aircraft to operate further from the carrier to extend the range of the existing airwing. The first operational MQ-25A Stingray aerial refueling UAVs are set to deploy aboard USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN-73) by 2026, Vice Adm. Kevin Whitesell said in A

https://news.usni.org/2022/07/13/several-uavs-under-development-for-next-generation-carrier-air-wing

I'm not clear on what you're telling me???

Does the USN want to stay out of missile range: yes
Is missile range ever-increasing: yes
Is the Pacific Ocean increasing in size: No (it's actually shrinking by about 1 inch per year)

bobinthecar wrote:

I'm not clear on what you're telling me???

Does the USN want to stay out of missile range: yes
Is missile range ever-increasing: yes
Is the Pacific Ocean increasing in size: No (it's actually shrinking by about 1 inch per year)

Two mistakes a lot of people make when it comes to stuff like this is taking things in absolutes, for example, radar x detected a stealth aircraft four times out of five therefore stealth is useless, and in thinking that a task force like a carrier battle group operates alone.

Of course its good to try and stay out of range of the other guys missiles but it is also useful to operate at the extreme range of those missiles and it's even better to stay at a range such that the enemy has more ocean to search in order to find you. So yes, the Navy's goal is to stay as far away from the enemy as possible but it doesn't mean it cannot operate in range. There is no absolute here. To the second point, gone are the days when you would plan to have four CBGs fight through to the Kola Peninsula and rain havoc on the Soviet Northern fleet. That will not happen in the South China Sea with the Navy sailing off of Yulin. They don't have to. The door busting down duties will be done by stealth bombers and cruise missiles launched from subs. The carriers will be used for protection of sea lanes, and persistent presence and operations after day one.

Adding tankers to the carrier merely allows her air wing to reach further and be more persistent. IT also frees up F-18s for more important tasks. It's not about operating out of range of the enemy per se.

I don't think I was being 'absolute'.

I'm doubting the ability to stay
1) close enough so that the carrier air can reasonably get to the target
2) far enough away the land based assets have a hard time reaching out

As Chinese tech gets ever closer to our tech .. the difference between 1 and 2 vanishes.

bobinthecar wrote:

I don't think I was being 'absolute'.

I'm doubting the ability to stay
1) close enough so that the carrier air can reasonably get to the target
2) far enough away the land based assets have a hard time reaching out

As Chinese tech gets ever closer to our tech .. the difference between 1 and 2 vanishes.

To your points, you did not read what I wrote then. Other assets will kick down the door to enable that. Chinese air defenses and surveillance capability will be peeled back a layer at a time. SSGNs equip med with Tomahawks, long range bombers equipped with JASSM, Tomahawks, and PGMs, and finally F-35s on carriers will degrade China's ability to contest the South China sea. Then as was pointed out above the CBGs own missile defenses will be able to handle anything else that happens to get through.

bobinthecar wrote:

In my opinion They should get rid of or reduce the number of MH-60S as they are basically SAR and logistics assets and replace them with a platform that could take the place of the S-3s in tanking and long range ASW.

An MH-60S does much more than SAR and logistics.
https://www.navair.navy.mil/product/MH-60S-Seahawk

Can you imagine one or several Chinese aircraft carriers operating withing range of the US west coast? Even if they are supported with SSGNs? Even if they have a future chinese F-35 equivelent?

johns624 wrote:

There's a reason that the Ticos and Burkes have such a large SM and ESSM loadout and why there's always at least 2-3 of them with every CBG.

par13del wrote:

johns624 wrote:

There's a reason that the Ticos and Burkes have such a large SM and ESSM loadout and why there's always at least 2-3 of them with every CBG.

Two problems that are now becoming apparent to the everyday Joe.
1. The Tico's (cruisers) are not being replaced, the Navy and politicians along with vendors bungled that job long ago, the Burkes may have better tech but have less capacity.
2. The VLS system while wonderful and allows engagements of missile swarms, once shot it is back to port to reload, until they find a way to reload underway, the entire CBG time at sea during a conflict is determined not by the a/c on deck, missions or the munitions available, but the ability of the 2 or 3 Burkes to keep missiles in inventory.

I am certain that those programmers who started this electronic missile intercept project decades ago thought that by now one missile one kill would be standard, unfortunately.......

Two problems that are now becoming apparent to the everyday Joe.
1. The Tico's (cruisers) are not being replaced, the Navy and politicians along with vendors bungled that job long ago, the Burkes may have better tech but have less capacity.
2. The VLS system while wonderful and allows engagements of missile swarms, once shot it is back to port to reload, until they find a way to reload underway, the entire CBG time at sea during a conflict is determined not by the a/c on deck, missions or the munitions available, but the ability of the 2 or 3 Burkes to keep missiles in inventory.

I remember reading the British Navy was sailing with empty missile tubes because they didn't have enough missiles.

1) Does the USN sail with empty missile tubes?
2) Do we really have enough missiles to reload very often?

bobinthecar wrote:

The link speaks nothing of their mission or capability. Please see https://www.naval-technology.com/projects/mh_60s/ instead.It's three main capabilities are CSA. mine counter measures, and transport. At best a carrier carries 4 or 5 utility helicopters like this in the past. They are glorified deck fillers for a carrier. CSAR you need maybe 4, Same for transport since you also have HH-22s now. The CBG never performed the mine counter measures mission and it should never do so anyway.

"The MH-60S Seahawk missions are Anti-Surface Warfare, combat support, humanitarian disaster relief, Combat Search and Rescue, aero medical evacuation, SPECWAR and organic Airborne Mine Countermeasures."

studedave wrote:

With the Romeos and Sierras that all changed.
HSs (and HCs) became HSCs, and the HSLs became HSMs. More of both also stood up.
You now see them deploy together aboard a Carrier, then send birds to ships within the Battle Group.
I'd bet that they each take as many as eight birds apiece on deployment.
It's important to note- they don't all deploy to carriers.
Some just do shore based detachments overseas.
Some only go with small ships that are not part of a CBG.