Is It Time for Cruise Missile Carrier Aircraft?
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By David Reimers
October 28, 2021
Is It Time for Cruise Missile Carrier Aircraft?
Today, the United States and its allies face a Chinese adversary growing in military and economic power. As China continues to produce ships, missiles, and other weapons systems at rates unseen in the West since the end of the Cold War, the U.S. Navy and U.S. Air Force are dealing with a critical weakness; the looming retirement of a large percentage of their most capable conventional missile-launching strike platforms.
Just as we need them most, the U.S. military is being forced to retire large-capacity strike platforms. The U.S. Air Force recently completed the retirement of 17 B-1B bombers, equipped with three rotary launchers, each capable of carrying eight Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile (JASSM) cruise missiles. The U.S. Navy is facing a looming crisis with the approaching retirement of 22 Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruisers (CG-47s) with 122 Vertical Launch System (VLS) cells, 28 Block 1 and 2 Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers (DDG-51s) with 96 cells, and four Ohio-class nuclear-powered guided-missile submarines (SSGN-726s) with 154 cells each. While the impact of the loss of these platforms is being mitigated to some extent by new construction of smaller and less capable Block 3 Arleigh Burke-class DDGs, Constitution-class guided-missile frigates (FFG-62s), and stretched Virginia-class nuclear-powered fast attack submarines (SSN-774s), it is nonetheless numerically profound in the near term. For the Navy, these retiring platforms represent approximately half of the VLS cells in the current fleet inventory.
https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2021/10/28/is_it_time_for_cruise_missile_carrier_aircraft_800959.html
