US Carrier War: Design, Development and Operations PDF
Preview US Carrier War: Design, Development and Operations
First published in Great Britain in 2011 by Pen & Sword Aviation an imprint of Pen & Sword Books Ltd 47 Church Street Barnsley South Yorkshire S70 2AS Copyright © Kev Darling 2011 9781783033393 The right of Kev Darling to be identified as Author of this Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission from the Publisher in writing. Typeset in Palatino by Phoenix Typesetting, Auldgirth, Dumfriesshire Printed and bound in China by Printworks International Ltd Pen & Sword Books Ltd incorporates the Imprints of Pen & Sword Books Ltd incorporates the Imprints of Pen & Sword Aviation, Pen & Sword Family History, Pen & Sword Maritime, Pen & Sword Military, Pen & Sword Discovery, Wharncliffe Local History, Wharncliffe True Crime, Wharncliffe Transport, Pen & Sword Select, Pen & Sword Military Classics, Leo Cooper, The Praetorian Press, Remember When, Seaforth Publishing and Frontline Publishing. For a complete list of Pen & Sword titles please contact PEN & SWORD BOOKS LIMITED 47 Church Street, Barnsley, South Yorkshire, S70 2AS, England E-mail: [email protected] Website: www.pen-and-sword.co.uk Table of Contents Title Page Copyright Page Preface CHAPTER ONE - Origins and Development CHAPTER TWO - Neutrality and Atlantic Crossings CHAPTER THREE - War in the Pacific: Attack and Fightback CHAPTER FOUR - War in the Pacific: Turning Point to Victory CHAPTER FIVE - War in the Pacific: Battles and Defeats CHAPTER SIX - War in the Pacific: The Setting of the Rising Sun CHAPTER SEVEN - Police Action in Korea CHAPTER EIGHT - Further Korean Carrier Operations CHAPTER NINE - Vietnam–A Long-Drawn-Out Affair CHAPTER TEN - From Desert Storm to the Future APPENDIX ONE - Primary Carrier Aircraft of the US Navy APPENDIX 2 - US Navy Aircraft Carriers Bibliography Index Preface When you look at the progress of US Navy aircraft carrier design over the past eighty years, the development is nothing short of amazing. Allied to the development of the vessels themselves are the aircraft that flew from them. The first US Navy carrier was a converted collier that would become the USS Langley, featuring a flight deck of 524 feet. Within five years the next carriers were beginning to show a consistent trait: that of larger hulls and flight decks that were capable of operating a reasonable number of aircraft. After the Lexingtons, built on the hulls of cancelled battlecruisers, came the Yorktowns, of a similar size but built as carriers from the outset. By 1941 the service achieved consistency in carrier design when the Essex class was commissioned. Eventually a total of twenty-four ships would enter the Navy List and would serve through the Pacific campaign, the Korean war and on to the Vietnam war. While the Essex class as built had a flight deck of 860 feet, it would come as no surprise to find that the Midways were even longer, at 932 feet, in order to cater for any increase in aircraft size and capability. Just after the end of the Second World War, the plan to build carriers of an even greater size were derailed slightly when the USAF opposed their construction. These vessels would have been the United States class, and their cancellation caused a rift between the Navy and Air Force. The latter was determined to be the service to carry the nation’s nuclear weapons, and it managed to gain the funding for the Convair B-36s to carry them, even though the Navy managed to prove eventually that the carrier was a more flexible and viable platform. Although the United States class had been cancelled, the design work that had gone into it would have a profound effect on the ships that followed. The first to benefit would be the Forrestal class, whose flight deck had grown to over 1,000 feet. The extra length plus an angled deck and deck extensions meant that this new breed of carrier could operate more than eighty modern aircraft. It would be the launch of the USS Enterprise in 1960 that would introduce another new and important feature to the carrier fleet–that of nuclear power. From that point on the US Navy would invest in nuclear- powered carriers only, with their conventional cousins going out of service throughout the 1990s. Over the next few years the US Navy will be introducing carriers that border on science fiction in their use of technology. It should also be remembered that the US Navy would invest in the smaller escort, or jeep, carriers as there was a desperate need for flight decks to support the war in the Pacific. The quickest way to produce such a vessel was to take a standard merchant hull and add aviation capabilities. The resultant ships were gainfully employed in both the Atlantic and the Pacific, although they were quickly disposed of at the end of the Second World War, except for a handful that remained in service as transports. Matching the progress of carrier development was that of the aircraft that operated from them. Like the rest of the world’s navies that operated aircraft carriers, the initial aircraft types operated were biplanes, although the monoplane was just starting to appear. When the United States entered the war after Pearl Harbor, the manufacturers rose to the occasion by providing a range of fighters and attack aircraft that were big, powerful, well armed and capable of delivering and taking great punishment. At the pinnacle of this effort was the Grumman Corporation, which would create most of the carriers’ fighters, the line ending with the F-14 Tomcat. The current fighter attack aircraft is the Boeing Super Hornet, although this will soon be joined by the Lockheed Martin F- 35C. 35C. Given the history of the US Navy aircraft carriers, it should come as no surprise to find that this book is very much a primer for the history of this service. Even so, it could not have been assembled without the help of my good friend Dennis R. Jenkins, who assisted with the US Navy, the Library of Congress and the National Archive and Records Agency. I would also like to thank Rick Harding, Trevor Jones and John Ryan for their help in tracking down those elusive photographs. CHAPTER ONE Origins and Development On 25 November 1917 the four vessels of Battleship Division Nine, accompanied by the destroyer USS Manley as escort, departed from Lynnhaven Roads, Virginia, bound for the anchorage of the Grand Fleet at Scapa Flow in the Orkney Islands. Regarded as an uneventful transit, it was complicated by storms that increased in ferocity as the voyage continued. After battling through the weather, Battleship Division Nine arrived at Scapa Flow on 7 December. Having survived their introduction to the Atlantic, the four battleships were assigned to the Sixth Battle Squadron of the Grand Fleet. While their role would be one of blockade, one thing did impinge itself thoroughly upon the US Navy officers, was the number of aircraft being carried aboard the ships of the Royal Navy. Not only were the battleships and battlecruisers complete with a range of aircraft, the fleet’s cruisers also carried aircraft, and even the destroyers were capable of launching aircraft, although these smaller vessels towed their aircraft for launching on lighters. The irony is that the US Navy was the pioneer in launching aircraft from naval vessels. The first attempt was courtesy of Samuel P. Langley, whose model of the ‘Aerodrome’ was undertaking successful flight trials in 1896. Such was their success that the US Government would issue a contract in 1898 for a full-scale version of the ‘Aerodrome’. While Langley was building his aerial machine, the US Army and the Navy convened a joint board to study the future of flight in both services. Unfortunately for both, the Langley ‘Aerodrome’ failed its flight trials from the Potomac river at the end of 1903.
Description:The list of books you might like
