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32-574: Anti-surface warfare can be divided into four categories based on the platform from which weapons are launched : Anti-ship missiles include the Harpoon , RBS-15 , P-500 Bazalt , Penguin and Exocet . Following the results of the Battle of Taranto and the Battle of Midway during World War II , the primary combatant ship type was the fleet aircraft carrier . After World War II, the ASuW concept primarily involved

64-447: A carrier battle group , but the term has become generic to both land-based and naval flight operations. Capping operations differ from fighter escorts in that the CAP force is not tied to the group it is protecting, is not limited in altitudes and speeds it flies, and has tactical flexibility to engage a threat. Fighter escorts typically stay with the asset they are supporting and at the speed of

96-426: A bomber force, but their comparatively low range and loiter time made it impossible to keep a constant combat air patrol over hundreds of miles of ocean. The range of anti-ship missiles also typically put bombers out of range of fighters launching once a raid was detected, nullifying a major part of the fleet's anti-air defences. The ability to bring real time intelligence from long range radars and satellite imaging to

128-499: A coordinated attack which leads to defensive fire being wasted on the same targets. Networking also brings information from airborne radar, giving vastly longer range than any ship board radar could achieve due to the radar horizon. Additionally modern communication and intelligence tools make carrier fleets harder to attack than in previous decades. The challenge for a carrier in the 1970s was in effectively using its air arm against incoming bombers. Fighters could cause huge casualties in

160-443: A few hits to make an attack successful. The major change is that attackers now need to invest more resources into each attack. Larger formations of aircraft are needed to successfully saturate defences, but if this can be achieved then the aircraft will cause very significant damage. Even a single missile may be able to penetrate defences and sink a ship and even the most successful defence systems cannot guarantee an interception, simply

192-481: A higher likelihood of one. Most naval vessels today are equipped with long range anti-surface missiles such as Harpoon and Exocet which are capable of crippling or destroying enemy ships with a single hit. These can be fired from vertical launch systems or from stand alone launch tubes and are designed to attack other warships. Smaller ships such as the US Navy's littoral combat ship make use of smaller missiles, such as

224-458: A massive siege tower which mounted catapults, could also be considered a weapons platform. The next attempt to mount weapons on platforms was made at sea, with catapults and eventually cannon mounted on their final form as ships of the line before the advent of ironclad warships mounting turrets. On land, the attempt to mount weapons on mobile platforms in the modern period was first made with railway guns . These, as forms of artillery , were

256-496: A medium-sized power could significantly damage a modern frigate, with the attack of a single plane on a single ship capable of inflicting heavy damage, let alone the scenario of a multi-ship flight. The same advantages that made planes so successful against surface ships in World War II are largely still existent. Aircraft can attack in large numbers with little warning and can carry multiple weapons that are each capable of disabling

288-399: A part of many ships' weaponry. Weapons such as the 5-inch Mark 45 gun remain in service to provide artillery support against land targets but also with a function against surface ships. Missiles are typically a better weapon in terms of their destructive potential but cannon shells are much harder (if not impossible) to intercept with anti-missile defence systems and likely will not be seen on

320-487: A saturation attack, 'soft kill' countermeasures are complemented by the invention of the point-defence close-in weapon system (CIWS), usually a rapid-fire autocannon sometimes paired with a missile system as a last line of defence. Finally the arrival of networked fleet level defence direction using many radars and many launch platforms together to intercept a cloud of missiles allows for better use of defence resources. Previously each ship would have to act individually against

352-465: A ship's potential firepower many times over. While an Arleigh Burke -class destroyer typically carries eight Harpoons ready to fire, it carries forty or more Standard missiles in its vertical launch cells. This also presents a Standard armed ship with the potential to attack a long range target without necessarily trying to sink it, something very valuable against non-military targets. While naval guns have largely been supplanted by missiles, guns remain

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384-450: A ship. While warships are able to carry powerful defensive technologies the need to destroy every incoming missile leaves them at a disadvantage. Missiles and supersonic aircraft are very difficult targets to hit and even the most advanced systems cannot provide certainty of interception. During the Cold War the gulf was at its most pronounced, with saturation missile attacks a major concern but

416-477: Is a type of flying mission for fighter aircraft . A combat air patrol is an aircraft patrol provided over an objective area, over the force protected, over the critical area of a combat zone, or over an air defense area, for the purpose of intercepting and destroying hostile aircraft before they reach their target. Combat air patrols apply to both overland and overwater operations, protecting other aircraft, fixed and mobile sites on land, or ships at sea. Known by

448-508: The AGM-114 Hellfire , in the surface-to-surface role that are less suited to attack warships but are still dangerous against fast attack craft or smugglers and pirates as well as land targets. A surface ship has several key disadvantages as a ship-to-ship missile platform compared to other combatants. Being close to the surface substantially reduces radar range due to the radar horizon which makes it harder to find targets and decreases

480-696: The Yom Kippur War saw Israeli missile boats sink an equal number of Syrian boats by using electronic counter measures and chaff to successfully avoid missile fire, but modern missiles typically have additional guidance systems that make such defences much less effective. In a modern conflict anti-surface missiles would more likely be used against merchant shipping or auxiliary ships and only against similarly armed vessels when no other weapons are available. The arrival of networked weapon systems do potentially offer surface-to-surface missiles way to launch, using radar data from an aircraft or UAV to target missiles over

512-688: The weapon system . In more general use, a weapons platform could be structured around a gun , such as a gun turret on a ship , or bracing on an aircraft . For example, a jet aircraft is a weapons platform for missiles , bombs or autocannons , and the resultant weapon system is the fighter jet ; a motorboat can serve as a weapons platform for automatic weapons , torpedoes and flamethrowers , resulting in weapon systems such as gunboats and fast attack crafts . Land vehicles, either wheeled , tracked or mixed , are also considered weapons platforms for grenade launchers , machine guns , recoilless guns and some missile launchers , which transform

544-484: The Atlantic," but by the late 1980s, many advanced designs were approaching sound-output equivalent to a body of water the size of the sub. P-3 Orions or other ASW maritime patrol planes could deploy magnetic anomaly detectors or disposable sonobuoys , against which the concept of a submarine firing a SAM was generally considered a poor trade-off (the revelation of the submarine's location was not generally considered worth

576-536: The Soviet Union expanded its submarine fleet, which in the event of hostilities may have been sufficient to deny the supply of material to the theatre. As military strategists often design counter-strategies to meet the capabilities of the rival force, the West then responded with the construction of SOSUS lines to track Soviet submarines. From the air, Soviet naval aviation had ASuW capabilities. The Tupolev Tu-16 Badger G

608-511: The acronym CAP, it typically entails fighters flying a tactical pattern around or screening a defended target, while looking for incoming attackers. Effective CAP patterns may include aircraft positioned at both high and low altitudes, in order to shorten response times when an attack is detected. Modern CAPs are either GCI or AWACS -controlled to provide maximum early warning for defensive reaction. The first CAPs were characteristic of aircraft carrier operations, where CAPs were flown to protect

640-490: The defender's radar, providing a potential advantage for a surprise attacker. Equally, guns do not require a radar lock to fire, giving them utility against stealth vessels or those too small to be detected. Undersea versus fleet action is commonly described as a "cat-and-mouse" game, where submarines seek to escape detection long enough to engage in a punishing strike against the much more valuable aircraft carrier fleet groups. Early Soviet submarine designs could be heard "across

672-448: The fleet better allows fighters to be used against attackers in the air. These improvements do not make a fleet impervious to missile attack but do increase a fleet's ability to defend itself and the number of attackers needed to saturate defences. Attackers retain the advantage because a fleet is still relatively static and needs to be successful against every incoming missile to avoid significant losses while attackers only need to achieve

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704-495: The gulf has closed a little in recent time. The advent of phased array radar on ships allow them to track and target a far larger number of targets at one time, increasing the number of missiles needed to saturate defences. The arrival of vertical launching systems allow for dozens of SAMs to be launched almost simultaneously from each ship, a substantial advance over older missile launchers that could only fire one or two missiles before reloading. Should salvoes of SAMs fail to destroy

736-506: The horizon and engage ships without exposing the launcher to retaliation although such systems are yet to be deployed. One recent advance in surface to surface weaponry is the modification of RIM-66 Standard anti-air missiles to attack surface targets. Although not as powerful as a dedicated anti-ship missile they are extremely fast and agile and better able to penetrate anti-missile defences. Additionally as many more surface-to-air missiles are typically carried on every vessel this increases

768-516: The last vestiges of development of the super-weapon thinking before the advent of the tanks that changed the use of weapons platforms in warfare, although the largest railway guns were still used during the Second World War on the Eastern Front . This military -related article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Combat air patrol Combat air patrol (CAP)

800-404: The maximum range that a missile could be usefully launched at. Also, launching from low altitude costs more fuel than air launch, further decreasing a missile's potential range. However ships can carry far more missiles than any other platform and are thus able to attack more targets or continue an engagement for longer than other platforms. While ships do retain a robust anti-ship missile armament

832-611: The multiple carrier battle groups fielded by the United States Navy , against which the Soviet Union designed specialized strategies that did not equate to a 1:1 match of designs. Broadly speaking, military planners in the US after World War II envisioned that a Warsaw Pact invasion of Western Europe would require a massive convoy effort to Europe to supply allied forces in theatre. Against this necessity of logistical and combat support,

864-515: The possible hit on a single plane). However, the concept of the submarine firing on the plane has been revived with Germany's Type 209 diesel submarines. Submarines seeking to engage in ASuW can also be targeted by other submarines, resulting in wholly undersea combat. Shore-based assets may have provided the decisive edge in surface warriors, with constraints imposed by range of such assets. Furthermore, satellites controlled from ground stations could provide information on enemy fleet movements. In

896-444: The post-Cold War era, UAVs and asymmetric threats such as the suicide boat are adding additional complexity to the ASuW discipline. Weapons platform A weapons platform is generally any structure , vehicle or mechanism on which a weapon can be installed (via various mounting mechanisms ) for optimal stability and performance. The mounted weapons, the platform and all other associated supporting equipments together form

928-448: The ubiquity of such missiles makes an engagement with anti-ship missiles between surface ships fairly unlikely because for one ship to launch its missiles it would have to bring itself within range of the enemy's missiles. Even with surprise the flight time of such missiles is long enough for an enemy to return fire before being hit, making such an engagement extremely dangerous without some additional advantage. The Battle of Latakia during

960-562: The vehicles into weapon systems such as armored cars (such as the Humvee ), IFVs and technicals ( improvised from civilian pickup trucks ). In addition, artificial satellites have been proposed as potential space weapon platforms. These satellites could carry an arsenal of weapons, such as to threaten other countries with the possibility of an orbital nuclear strike (see Rods from God ). The earliest weapons platforms were chariots , followed by war wagons . The ancient Greek Helepolis ,

992-542: Was armed with anti-ship missiles, followed by the Tupolev Tu-22M Backfire supersonic maritime strike bomber. Even the prop-driven Tu-142 , primarily designed for anti-submarine warfare (ASW), could and was armed with anti-ship missiles. Following the end of the Cold War , ASuW still involves asymmetries, which may for now be more pronounced. After the development of reliable, long-range, guided missiles, air ASuW

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1024-566: Was imagined to consist of a mass attack by high-speed jet aircraft launching a sufficient number of missiles to overwhelm the air defences of a fleet. Some commentators believed that this capability was consistently underestimated. Exocet anti-ship missile strikes against the Royal Navy during the Falklands War even resulted in the adoption of 'Exocet' as a slang term for a 'sharp, devastating and surprising attack.' The USS Stark incident showed

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