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On December 29, 2022, the Russian Navy commissioned three new vessels (Project 955A Borey-A class submarine Generalissimus Suvorov, Project 12700 Alexandrit-class MCM ship Anatoliy Shlemov, Project 21631 Buyan-M class Grad). The fourth vessel was also rolled out of the shipyard hall at Sevmash Shipyard on the same day. Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin and Defense Minister Sergei Shoygu attended the events via video link. . . . More Kalibr missiles in the Baltic Sea On December 29, the flag was raised on the tenth Project 21631 Buyan-M corvette of the Baltic Fleet, the Grad. These undersized vessels (949 tons, 74.1...

In 1958, the Navy proposed overhauling the Iowa-class ships by removing all of the 16-inch guns and replacing them with anti-aircraft and anti-submarine missiles. The new “guided missile battleships” would also carry four Regulus II cruise missiles, each of which could flatten a city a thousand miles distant with a nuclear warhead more than 100 times as powerful as the bomb used on Hiroshima.

The Project B tests were held in the Chesapeake Bay in July 1921. Airplanes of the First Brigade sank a captured German destroyer and then a an armored light cruiser. Next was the German battleship Ostfriesland, considered “unsinkable” due to its extensive compartmentalization. After a day of 230- and 600-pound bombs dropped by Marine, Navy, and Army aircraft, the battleship settled three feet by the stern with a five-degree list to port. Ostfriesland, it turned out, was not unsinkable from the air.

Even after the USS Missouri (BB-63) was officially decommissioned in 1992, the “battleship retirement debate” continued – with some military pundits arguing that the old battlewagons were still the best way to provide fire support for amphibious assaults as well as to other troops near shorelines. A counterargument was made that smaller warships such as the U.S. Navy’s Arleigh Burke-class destroyers could provide similar support fire from vastly smaller platforms, while close air support fighters and even advanced missile systems can do the job that was once the domain of the battlewagons.

She was briefly decommissioned, and then reactivated for the Korean War, and provided naval gunfire support duties against enemy bunkers, command posts, and artillery positions. Wisconsin earned five battle stars for her World War II service, and one for the Korean War. When she joined the United States Navy reserve fleet – the “Mothball Fleet” – in 1958, it was the first time the United States Navy was without an active battleship since 1895. However, that wasn’t the end of the line for USS Wisconsin. President Ronald Reagan called for a 600-ship U.S. Navy in the 1980s, and as a...

Today, the massive USS Iowa (BB-61) calls the Port of Los Angeles home, where she is a museum ship and serves as a testament to the might of the United States Navy from World War II to the end of the Cold War. The largest and most powerful battleships built for the U.S. Navy, the Iowa-class were also the final battleships that entered service with the Navy. Unlike slower battleships of the era, this class was also designed to travel with a carrier force, and even be able to transit the Panama Canal, enabling the mighty warships to respond to...

Roma was the third Littorio-class battleship, and by all accounts, she was graceful in appearance – a testament to Italian designs – unlike the blocky designs of British or German battleships. She was well-armored, fast-moving, and quite capably armed. Built with a compartmented hull and an ingenious system of bulkheads and expansion cylinders the Roma was in theory as fortified as her namesake – where Rome’s mighty walls fended off attackers for centuries.

Two of the warships actually began construction – with Schlachtschiff H laid down by Blohm & Voss in Hamburg on June 15, 1939; while the Schlachtschiff J was laid down by AG Weser in Bremen on August 15, 1939, just two weeks before Germany invaded Poland. Construction was halted in October as the war effort focused on the construction of U-boats rather than battleships. By 1940, the material used in the early construction of the two super battleships was scrapped and then directed to other uses.

The final battleship battle in history has long been considered a one-sided slaughter. The Battle of Surigao Strait, which was part of the larger Battle of Leyte Gulf, took place from October 24-25, 1944, and was one of only two battleship-versus-battleship naval battles of the entire campaign in the Pacific during the Second War II. Both were fought between the United States Navy and the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN).

Designed to take on any enemy warship, the Yamato and Musashi each had about 23,000 tons of armor, which was maximized in the areas that needed it the most, whereas it was minimized in less vulnerable areas. Additionally, the warships were designed to protect against threats below the waterline, while extensive compartmentalization was meant to keep the hull watertight and buoyant. It was expected that the battleships could withstand a torpedo strike and maintain an even keel.

Armed with a main battery of 16-inch guns that could hit targets nearly 24 miles away with a variety of artillery shells, the Iowa-class were among the most heavily armed U.S. military ships ever put to see. The battleships’ main battery consisted of nine 16″/50 caliber Mark 7 guns in three-gun turrets, which could fire 2,700-pound (1,225 kg) armor-piercing shells some 23 miles (42.6 km). Secondary batteries consisted of twenty 5″/38 caliber guns mounted in twin-gun dual-purpose (DP) turrets, which could hit targets up to 9 miles (16.7 km) away.

The U.S. Navy began construction of its first fast battleships in 1937, with the two ships of the North Carolina class. The restrictions of the Washington and London Naval Treaties had imposed a battleship “holiday,” and mandated limits on the size of new warships.

Italy’s Regia Marina was one of the busiest navies of the interwar period. Four old battleships were rebuilt so completely that they barely resembled their original configuration. This helped Italy achieve what was really, by the late 1930s, significant ship-to-ship superiority over the French Navy.

Can we imagine a scenario in which two titans of World War II, the German battleship Bismarck and the Japanese battleship Yamato, would come into conflict? Difficult, but not impossible. Had the Battle of the Marne gone the other way, Germany might have forced France from the World War I in the early fall of 1914, just as it did in the spring of 1940.

Despite the vast scope of the Second World War, the navies of the United States and Nazi Germany fought few, if any, direct surface engagements. By the time of America’s entry into the war the Royal Navy had already sunk or neutralized the lion’s share of Hitler’s Kriegsmarine, with only Hitler’s U-boats remaining a substantial German threat.

In the early 1940s, the U.S. Navy still expected to need huge, first rate battleships to fight the best that Japan and Germany had to offer. The North Carolina, South Dakota, and Iowa-class battleships all involved design compromises. The Montanas, the last battleships designed by the U.S. Navy, would not.

Word For The Day, Wednesday, April 16, 2014-- dreadnought ; In order that we might all raise the level of discourse and expand our language abilities, here is the daily post of "Word for the Day". dreadnought [ dred-nawt]hear it pronounced noun 1. a type of battleship armed with heavy-caliber guns in turrets. 2. an outer garment of heavy woolen cloth. 3. a thick cloth with a long pile. 4. (slang) a heavyweight boxer 5. a person who fears nothing Origin: From the British battleship Dreadnought, launched in 1906, the first of its type. 1800–10; dread + nought (fear nothing)...

Past fears that carriers were vulnerable to new technologies weren’t proven right… nor were they proven wrong. Over at The National Interest this week, former Naval Diplomat shipmate — U.S. Marines say there are no former Marines, just Marines; are there former shipmates? — Bryan McGrath wades into the debate over Tom Ricks’s Washington Post column urging the U.S. military to get smaller to get better. Let me wade in as well; the water’s fine. Ricks takes aim at the U.S. Navy’s fleet of nuclear-powered aircraft carriers in particular. He cites the expense of CVNs, but Bryan zeroes in mainly...

Need some help. I hope I'm in the right forum. Sometime ago, I read a comment about a book recalling the last battle involving the big "battle wagons". I believe it was WWII in the Pacific. I would really like to purchase this book. Hopefully, someone can help. Thank you, in advance.

An ancient Greek trading ship that had lain on the seabed off the coast of Gela in southern Sicily for 2,500 years was brought to the surface for the first time on Monday. The ancient Greek vessel is 21 metres long and 6.5 metres wide, making it by far the biggest of its kind ever discovered. Four Greek vessels found off the coasts of Israel, Cyprus and France are at most 15 metres long. The one in Gela is also of particular value for scholars who will be able to delve into Greek naval construction techniques thanks to the amazing...