Captions will look like this

The Ford is the most advanced aircraft carrier the US has ever built. The total cost is more than 30% higher than initial estimates. More costs are expected. The Navy accepted the Ford without some of its newest technologies operating, and the ship won't be ready for battle until 2022.

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aircraft carriers
The US Navy has 11 nuclear-powered aircraft carriers operating all over the world.US Navy
  • China has developed advanced anti-ship weapons that have renewed debate about the future of aircraft carriers.

  • US officials say carriers are well defended and won't be easy to attack.

  • Capt. Paul Campagna said that anyone who thinks that we are fragile little teacups is grossly mistaken.

The first aircraft carrier of the US Navy entered service in 1922. Some are wondering if carriers can survive in the future.

Russia and China have developed increasingly sophisticated anti-ship weapons that have raised new doubts about those ships.

The captains of two of the carriers argue that the US Navy's 11 flattops would be hard to stop.

Capt. Paul Campagna said that questions about whether carriers are "obsolete" have come up before, including when Congress was debating whether to build the first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier.

USS Dwight D. Eisenhower
The USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN 69) underway in the North Arabian Sea, April 20, 2013.US Navy

The aircraft carrier has shown itself to be enduring. Campagna said at the Sea Air Space conference in National Harbor, Maryland that the carrier is not on an island.

It deploys with the air wing. It deploys with the strike group. It deploys with a defense that goes from the bottom of the ocean to space, and anyone who thinks that we are fragile little teacups out there is grossly mistaken.

China's military modernization, which has produced a variety of long-range weapons and more capable aircraft, ships, and submarines to launch them, has driven the doubts about the carrier's future.

China has anti-ship missiles that are designed for naval targets and are sometimes called carrier killers.

China military missile DF-21
A military vehicle carries DF-21D missile past an image of the Great Wall of China, in Beijing, September 3, 2015.GREG BAKER/AFP via Getty Images

The DF-21D and the DF-26 were introduced in the 2000s. They have been seen as a threat to US ships.

China has built targets that look like US aircraft carriers and destroyers, and officials have advocated using those missiles against the real thing.

In August 2020, the Chinese military fired a pair of missiles into the South China Sea in a demonstration of its ability to deny access to the sea, where Beijing has made sweeping but widely rejected territorial claims.

In an interview that December, Adm. Philip Davidson said that the missiles were fired at a moving target and that the US knew for years that China was pursuing that capability.

In written testimony to the Senate armed services committee in March 2021, Davidson said that the DF-21 is capable of attacking aircraft carriers in the Western Pacific.

aircraft carriers
USS Ronald Reagan, USS Theodore Roosevelt, and USS Nimitz in the western Pacific, November 12, 2017.Reuters

The use of missiles in a large-scale exercise was meant to show the Chinese military's focus on countering any potential third-party intervention during a regional crisis.

When fired from new warships, submarines, and long-range bombers, China's air and sea-launched anti-ship cruise missiles can reach deep into the Pacific.

China and Russia are both developing hypersonic weapons that could use their speed and maneuverability to evade missile defenses and strike a carrier thousands of miles from shore.

The Chinese are pouring a lot of money in the ability to rim their coast in the South China Sea with anti-ship-missile capability. The South China Sea, the East China Sea, and all of those areas are being used for destabilizing purposes, according to the director of naval intelligence.

'We're ready to go'

USS Gerald R. Ford
Newport News Shipbuilding begins flooding Dry Dock 12 to float the aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford.US Navy

Current and former US Navy officials acknowledge that carriers are not invulnerable, but they stress that the ships are well defended and resilient and need to accept some risk to be effective.

With our ability to man repair lockers throughout the ship, which are basically fire stations inside the ship, and our ability to seal it up and absorb any kind of impact with 1,000 feet, we have a lot of advantages. We are ready to go. Campagna said we are lethal.

The Navy conducted shock trials on its newest carrier, the Gerald R. Ford, in the summer of 2021.

The first carrier to go through shock trials was Ford. The trials did not show a direct hit, but Navy officials said Ford only needed a fraction of the repairs.

A Chinese commentator said in August that the trials were a demonstration of super resilience against conventional anti-ship weapons.

Navy aircraft carrier Gerald Ford during shock trials
USS Gerald R. Ford during shock trials in the Atlantic Ocean, June 18, 2021.MCS Seaman Jackson Adkins/US Navy

The aircraft carrier in the US is well built and will continue to operate, Campagna said.

The ships of the carrier strike group have anti-ballistic-missile systems. The Missile Defense Agency is looking at sea-borne defenses.

Missiles, radar-guided cannons, decoys and electronic jamming are some of the measures the carrier has. Anti-submarine warfare has been re-emphasized by the US and allied navies.

The risks of long-range missiles are forcing planners to rethink combat operations to keep carriers and other ships out of range of those missiles until the US can knock them out. In order to continue operating in such a scenario, the US Navy is pursuing longer-range aircraft and weaponry. For the first time, the carrier-based refueling drone was tested on a carrier.

USS Carl Vinson carrier strike group one
USS Carl Vinson and its strike group during an exercise with the Indian navy in 2012.Official US Photograph - US Navy News Stand

Chinese forces have to find and track US carriers.

While a missile is in flight, carriers can move, meaning the missile needs to be able to locate them or to receive updated guidance. Flying at thousands of miles per hour can affect the accuracy of the missile and be spotted by radars.

The effectiveness of anti-ship missiles hinges on a comprehensive targeting architecture, which is still a work in progress for China, according to Andrew Erickson, a professor at the US Naval War College.

China could overcome deficiencies in its own guidance systems by firing more missiles at a specific area. Campanga said that moving around at 30 knots made it very challenging and that their carriers wouldn't wait for those missiles to arrive.

The Ford's commanding officer said that the carrier's speed and maneuverability meant that they had to figure out who was where.

We are maneuverable, we are fast, and we will use all of those things to our advantage.

The original article is on Business Insider.

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