U.S. Navy Needs to Build Back its Sea Mine Capability

[rangerrebew]

U.S. Navy Needs to Build Back its Sea Mine Capability
PUBLISHED NOVEMBER 8, 2023
@ 4:39 PM

By Steven Wills
The United States and other nations dependent on maritime trade for prosperity often forget about the power of the sea mine to inflict significant strategic and operational level of war effects on opponents. While the U.S. Navy has occasionally built back its mine clearance forces since the end of World War II, its mining capability and that of the wider joint force has been rarely used since 1945.

In fact, the nation’s mine infrastructure is facing a historic nearly-40 plus year period of neglect and under-investment since the end of the Cold War. This decay also includes industrial capacity, explosives, training, infrastructure, ships and personnel..

Just a handful of facilities, including those run by Boeing and General Dynamics in the U.S., produce mines. Like other neglected elements of U.S. munitions production, these facilities produce few dozen mines per year, a completely insufficient number for large-scale mining in the Indo-Pacific and other regions.

https://defenseopinion.com/u-s-navy-needs-to-build-back-its-sea-mine-capability/475/

[rangerrebew]

But that won't provide the necessary "war equity" that wokeness requires.

[DefiantMassRINO]

In the 1980s, in the Persian Gulf, Iran deployed North Korean sea mines against Iraq (and probably American) naval forces.  Guided missile frigate, USS Samuel B. Roberts (FFG-58), struck one in 1998.

The World War I Era technology mines were so old, they became new again.  The US navy had to get re-acquainted with mine sweeping on the fly.

The true value of sea mines is that they cause enemy delay and enemy expenditure of resources.  They can be one more cut to bleed the enemy of time, materiel, and personnel in a war of attrition.