Bye Bye USS Forrestal

[klagldsf]

They aren't even technically supercarriers, depending on what your definition is.

[Charybdis]

You're right, I'll just stick with super expensive!

[Tagger 1-1]

Fuck whatever a "budget" or "mission requirement" means my nation deserves supercarriers because coastline and tacticool

- every post complaining about why their country needs supercarriers, summed down to its true points

You, sir, are clearly not a knowledgeable fellow when it comes to budgeting and naval mission requirements. A nation like Canada requires the ability to project power far from her many thousands of miles of coastline, simply due to the fact that it must be able to stop a potential Russian or Chinese invasion before it reaches its shores. This can only be properly done with an aircraft carrier. Unless of course you would like to suggest that we get started with battleships (a stupid and silly sentiment often expressed by many of this forum's rank amateurs, yourself included).

I am quite entertained by your attempts to sound like an internet tough guy. Clearly you need to work on the impression, because it all feels so very rote.

There are two very fundamental differences between the type of fixed-wing carriers Canada used to operate, and the type of carriers the USN operates now (i.e., "supercarriers," which is why I used that word, very specifically). And those differences boil down to "cost" and "manpower." According to Wikipedia and some quick math, a single Nimitz is worth a whole damn quarter of Canada's. Entire. Military. Budget. And that's before you factor in manpower. Enterprise costs around half a billion dollars just to decommission.

Numbers and proof, please. Otherwise you are just pissing into the wind with assumptions and false platitudes.

A supercarrier is not under the mission requirements of the Canadian Navy. Supercarriers are not used to patrol coastline. Supercarriers are used to conduct offensive strikes against enemy assets. This is their primary mission.

Again, see my comments above (if you are actually capable of reading...) :S

S/F Tagger sends

[Rodondo]

1. Since when has Canada, since Korea, needed to project power that far? Last time I checked they were on a weaker footage than South Korea and Australia.

2. Canadas military budget for this year is C$20.1 Billion (Source:Canadian Treasury), a Nimitz costs anywhere from 4.5-6.2 Billion from what I could find online and in text. Klagldsf is spot on in what he said. This isn't just talking about US carriers either, I bet it would be nigh impossible to get a carrier for Canada, new or brought up to modern standards without spending more than 1-2 Billion, which is big money out of 20 Billion.

3. Russia is not capable of invading a state as vast and far as Canada, Kazakhstan or another neighboring state maybe. China would look south to South Asia and Australia if it would go on the imperialist footing. Our region supplies it's need for resources and it's not over a massive ocean. Canada is Possibly one if the safest nations on Earth due to the proximity to the US and any invading force, even by sea, would have to essentially go through the US.

4. Whilst Canada has experience, may I point out what is probably known to most, it stopped operating carriers in the early seventies, that's 40 years of change and I doubt there would be anyone not behind a desk in the RCN who served on a carrier. At that point the Bonaventure was operating Helis mainly. I can think of three nations that would be better tasked into taking up carriers again (Argentina, Australia and Spain) seeing that they had a more recent experience (1950's-1985/1997, 1948-1983, 1967-2012? Respectively) with carrier operations and actual carrier based jets. Personally, I think Australia is best suited out of the four (including Canada) with higher budget, recent need- Persian Gulf/Afghanistan 2001-present and the fact the Canberras would have been much more capable with a few F35 lightnings onboard. But we dont need a carrier, just smarter thinking and a few more small surface combatants

[acelanceloet]

if power projection is important for the canadian navy, why don't they have tomahawks in service? if you would need long range strike capacity (such as an carrier offers) but cannot afford it, the first, much cheaper, buy would be cruise missiles. but they have no in service, and barely any VLS cells that are capable of firing them (the Tribals could fire them I think, but at the cost of SM-2MR missiles)

I see no reason why canada would be invaded by any force. can you explain that to me?
I join Rodondo that the chinese and russia have no reasons to attack canada. so why would you defend against that very unlikely happening? I mean, it is just as likely that the US takes over canada as that russia would do it, as far as I can see.

large coastlines and the thread of an invading force is best dealed with with minefields, fast attack crafts and coastal missile batteries, supported by some surface combatants. the Scandinavian countries during the cold war are an good example of this. if you have the budget and still fear attack, and if there is an large gap of ocean between you and your attackers, then it might be an good idea to look at AEGIS ships too...... but those, too, have never been build and IIRC considered by canada.

the canadian navy has about 8,500 sailors. you would need 4,378 of these to crew an forrestal. more then half your navy would be on board that carrier, making you unable to do escort for the carrier or patrol tasks for your long coastline, because most of the other half of your navy would be shore support for your carrier.

Tagger 1-1, I have read your comments but I have not yet seen any good reason why it is so important for Canada to have an supercarrier. please explain further, as I can not find your point.

[Shipright]

Canada does need to patrol is coastlines. It's inaccessible, remote, mostly uninhibited coastlines. May I introduce you too this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_CP-140_Aurora

The Aurora was acquired in the early 1980s to replace the CP-107 Argus and to further support Canada's anti-submarine warfare mission obligations under NATO for the northwest Atlantic sector.[7] Short deployments to Alaska (Adak), Hawaii (Kaneohe Bay), Iceland (Keflavik), the UK (St Mawgan and Kinloss), and Norway (Andoya) were the norm. However, since the end of the Cold War, they had been used primarily in coastal surveillance and sovereignty patrols by providing an all-weather mission surveillance platform. Increasingly as the CP-140 moves into the 21st century it is employed for domestic and international surveillance by CANCOM for security, counter-terrorism and smuggling, as well as to monitor foreign fishing fleets off Canada's coasts. CP-140s have also been deployed on operations such as Operation Assistance and Operation Apollo.

[shippy2013]

@ tagged 1 - 1. I believe the best and probably only affordable option if Canada and indeed Brazil, Spain and Austrailia needed to go back to operating any form of carrier is a ship based on Italy's Cavour.

A small STOVL/LPH carrier operating either second hand UK or USM Harriers or new F35B.

[klagldsf]

Numbers and proof, please. Otherwise you are just pissing into the wind with assumptions and false platitudes.

Source for how a Nimitz costs about 8.5 billion USD

Source for Canadian military budget being 22 billion CDN in 2011

Also thanks for proving that you don't know what the word "platitude" means.

[TimothyC]

@ tagged 1 - 1. I believe the best and probably only affordable option if Canada and indeed Brazil, Spain and Austrailia needed to go back to operating any form of carrier is a ship based on Italy's Cavour.

A small STOVL/LPH carrier operating either second hand UK or USM Harriers or new F35B.

Just to be clear, Brazil ended up doing a very extensive refit to ex-Foch, and she's likely to stick around for quite some time. The Brazilians never fully left the fixed wing game on carriers, and I don't see them doing so any time soon.
As for Australia and Spain - That's what they are doing (only with the Spanish design, not the Italian one).

[Rodondo]

Brazil is also looking, vaguely at a new French designed Conventional Carrier, an export version probably of a companion of the Charles De Gaul. This is might occur into physical reality 2020-2030