In August 1998, in a stunning turn of events, the U.S. The Navy has reactivated two of its legendary Iowa-class battleships, the Iowa (BB-61) and Wisconsin (BB-64), both of which returned to the Naval Vessel Register (NVR) on December 30, 1997. This came in response to extensive lobbying by people who, along with a critical vote on the floor of the Senate Armed Services Committee on June 29, 1995, started raising questions of whether these legendary warships are relevant and cost-effective to modern naval warfare.
The mighty Iowa-class battleships, with their mighty guns capable of firing out to 27 miles, are a little out of date against contemporary naval tactics. Today’s doctrine for naval forces in combat puts much greater emphasis on over-the-horizon attacks using MV-22 Ospreys and helicopters launched more than 25 miles offshore. This largely obsoletes the battleships’ heavy firepower.
Alternatives to the battleships’ artillery have already emerged or are on the horizon. The Winston Churchill (DDG-81) is set to introduce the 5-inch/62-caliber gun, capable of striking targets up to 63 nautical miles away. By 2008, the vertical gun for advanced ships (GAS) is expected to extend that reach even further. Additionally, missile systems like the Army Tactical Missile System and various Tomahawk variants offer greater range and payload flexibility from cruisers and destroyers.
Even with these developments, plans to bring these nautical behemoths back to life never wavered, at least with gigantic fiscal implications. Reactivation will cost well over $1 billion, more than the cost of a brand new Aegis destroyer equipped with 90 missiles. Also, the problem is logistical: retrofitting with modern systems; and finding qualified crew for their ancient weapons, not to mention extensive training.
These concerns range from the limited number of 16-inch barrel liners available to the industrial costs of manufacturing more, to the high-value risk of stationing these vessels close to shore in conflict zones. Each battleship requires a crew of 1,600, which is sufficient to man about ten of the far more technologically advanced Arleigh Burke DDG-51-class destroyers.
Reactivating these battleships by no means represents a new venture. In the 1980s, when the Cold War was at its height and the Soviet Union was intensely building up its armed forces, the four Iowa-class battleships were recommissioned as part of the Bush Administration’s plan for a 600-ship Navy under President Reagan’s direction. The same battleships that were first decommissioned shortly after World War II, because of the rise of the aircraft carrier that had made the battleship obsolete, would now undergo some radical modernizations to make them relevant in today’s naval warfare. Upgrades included the addition of Tomahawk and Harpoon missile systems, advanced radar and fire control systems, and Phalanx Close-In Weapons Systems to better defend against modern threats.
Revved up and showcased with power in Operation Desert Storm, the collapse of the Soviet Union and still more changes in the navy led to them being decommissioned finally by 1992. Debates over their obsolescence, the cost of reactivation, and the impossibility of keeping old guns alive in a modern format once and for all sealed their fates to become museum ships by 2006. Thus, the glorious battleships ended an era, showing that attitudes toward sea-based warfare had changed and were evolving, as had military technology.
It was shown in 1997 with the reactivation of the Iowa and Wisconsin battleships that, despite all odds of being able to function in a fleet so modern and vastly different from those of the times, these naval giants still had a lot to offer.