Logistics: Many Ships Few Missiles
Ezoic
January 10, 2025: Back in the 1990s the U.S. and Chinese navies both experimented with using TRAM, or Transportable Re-Arming Mechanism for reloading the Vertical Launch System or VLS cells that are now the standard on U.S. warships.
Back in the early 1980s American warships began using VLS cells to carry the many different types of missiles which ships used for attacking other ships, defeating air attacks, and bombarding land targets. Since 1982, nearly 12,000 VLS cells have been installed in 200 American and foreign warships. The most common VLS user is the American Burke class destroyer, with 90 VLS cells. There are currently 74 Burkes in service and by the 2030s there should be over 90 of them. At that point there will be over 8,000 VLS cells in all those Burkes.
The first ships to get VLS also received a strikedown crane so the cells could be reloaded at sea. By the 1990s new types of missiles were too heavy for the strikedown crane and it wasn't practical to install a larger and more powerful crane. Moreover, there were few opportunities for reloading the missile cells at sea anyway and the strikedown crane was omitted in new ships. This provided space for 3-6 more missile cells. Another problem was that going to a port to reload VLS cells meant a whip was unavailable for several weeks.
https://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htlog/articles/2025011005930.aspx#google_vignette&gsc.tab=0
