The United States cannot even produce the fifteen and sixteen-inch shells that the battleships of old used to attack. And that capacity is not coming back anytime soon
  • ProfessorAdonisCnut [he/him]English
    33•2 months ago

    This is kind of a nothing article. Like, obviously battleships built in the 40s would be pretty worthless in a peer/near-peer war even if they were in perfect working order. Even at the end of WW2 the utility of battleships was limited, and now missiles out-range their guns by 2 orders of magnitude.

    Even the US knows it though, they’re all retired museum ships now. They were kept around as long as they were because some politicians had the same fixation on needing them for shore bombardment as they have for keeping low-speed flying bathtubs around for close air support.

    • dinklesplein [any, he/him]English
      25•2 months ago

      telling a naval officer from the 30s we have 100000 ton nuclear powered capital ships and turning away blinking the tears off when they ask how big the main guns are

  • Dr_Gabriel_Aby [none/use name]English
    30•2 months ago

    I’m half kidding, but since the Spanish American war, Americas entire reasoning for having boats in the water is to have our nation get attacked. We live two oceans away from danger.

    It was such a norm in the 20th century, that Bin Laden thought attacking the boat in 2000 was gonna kickstart the Afghan war.

  • D61 [any]English
    24•2 months ago

    These things haven’t been useful outside of floating museums and reenactments since before I was born.

    • ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆OPEnglish
      23•2 months ago

      Hey now, they were great for bombing the shit out of small countries that had no serious militaries. You just park one of these bad boys next a country like Iraq and then do a genocide with impunity.

        • WashedAnus [he/him]English
          11•2 months ago

          It was recommissioned for to bombard Iraq, and they still blew up a gun turret by being idiots and pinned it on a dead guy for allegedly being gay.

          • dinklesplein [any, he/him]English
            10•2 months ago

            the worst part is they could easily have just said it’s been a while since we last operated a battleship and the people who knew are gone so there’s a learning curve, and that would have been a plenty acceptable excuse.

            • footfaults [none/use name]English
              1•2 months ago

              They increased the powder and also had issues with the powder increasing in pressure as it aged. They pinned it in a gay guy because surely the manufacturer or command that directed them to change the loading couldn’t be at fault

    • Owl [he/him]English
      21•2 months ago

      shoeless jackanapes in the third world.

      I hope you trip over your own teeth, you racist piece of shit.