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Old 03-16-2010, 05:53 PM
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Legbreaker Legbreaker is offline
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Location: Tasmania, Australia
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I am aware of at least one exercise in the late 80's - early 90's where an Australian submarine (an old Oberon class I think), sucessfully penetrated a carriers defensive screen, sunk the carrier with torpedos AND escaped without being detected (besides the obvious carrier sinking to the bottom of course).

That was one old and unsupported diesel powered sub against the might of a US carrier group....

One other question that needs to be asked is why would all the pre-war carriers and their escorts still be floating at the time of the offensive? The war had already been going for some time and it's quite probable NATO would have suffered significant losses.

Also, not every ship will be in the area. Many will have to be assigned to protect convoys from around the world, convoys which as in WWII are very vulnerable to attack by enemy subs and the loss of which would seriously effect the ability of the ground forces in Europe and elsewhere to continue attacking (perhaps even their ability to defend!).

Carriers are important assets, however they do not win wars by themselves. As Patton said in August 1944, "God dammit my men can eat their belts but my tanks got to have gas."
You can have all the guns, tanks, planes and soldiers you could ever want, but if you can't supply them, you've already lost.

Quote:
Sun Tzu defined 13 principles in his The Art of War while Napoleon listed 115 maxims. American Civil War General Nathan Bedford Forrest required only one: "get there firstest with the mostest".
Logistics is key to success.
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