HMS Hood VS Arleigh Burke-class destroyer (Guns ONLY)

[Battlecruiser]

NO Tomahawk missiles, NO Harpoon SSMS; JUST Guns and Torpedos

HMS Hood's Pros & Cons are:

PROS
* 4 turrets outfitted with 8 15-inch guns
* Shell's weight is 1,920 pounds (870 kg)
* 12 5.5-inch secondary guns carrying 82 pound (37.19 kg) shells with 12 rounds per minute
* 6 3,206 pound (1,454 kg) 21-inch torpedo tubes with TNT filled warheads carrying 515 pounds (234 kg) of the stuff
CONS
* Deck vitals protected by 0.75 to 3 inch ( 19-76 mm) armor
* 15-inch guns can be fired at 2 rounds per minute
* Primitive Radar
* Has a slightly farther firing range than the Burke's
* Slightly slower at 31 knots

Arleigh Burke-class Pros & Cons are:

PROS
* Double-spaced steel armor designed to act as a buffer off rockets & kevlar spall liners (A warship's armor belt in otherwords)
* Advanced Radar
* Top Speed is "In excess of 30 knots"
* Main gun can fire 20 rounds per minute
* Has Stealth-like abilities when it comes to maneuvering
* Firing range is 4,440 nautical miles versus Hood's 5,332 nm's
CONS
* Carries only one turret, a 5-inch gun, carrying 70.0 pound (31.75 kg) shells
* Torpedos carrying warheads that contain from 96. 8 to 100 pounds (44 kg - 45 kg) of ammunition


In which kind of scenarios would be in Hood's favor? What kind in the Burke's favor?

[Rick Rather]

NO Tomahawk missiles, NO Harpoon SSMS; JUST Guns and Torpedos

HMS Hood's Pros & Cons are:

CONS
* Deck vitals protected by 0.75 to 3 inch ( 19-76 mm) armor

This is not a con if a modern 5" round cannot penetrate it. Modern warships are not well-armored, so there is little need for true AP rounds.

* 15-inch guns can be fired at 2 rounds per minute

...but full broadsides equate to ~16 rounds/minute, which is not much less than Burke's.

* Has a slightly farther firing range than the Burke's

This is a con...why?

Arleigh Burke-class Pros & Cons are:

PROS
* Double-spaced steel armor designed to act as a buffer off rockets & kevlar spall liners (A warship's armor belt in otherwords)

Not really. This armor is good for stopping splinters & shrapnel, which is useful in age of HE/Frag warheads, but it cannot stop a main gun round.

* Has Stealth-like abilities when it comes to maneuvering

??????? This sentence makes no sense whatsoever.

* Firing range is 4,440 nautical miles versus Hood's 5,332 nm's

Whaaaat?

CONS
* Torpedos carrying warheads that contain from 96. 8 to 100 pounds (44 kg - 45 kg) of ammunition

Correctly placed in the "cons" section. These torpedoes have a minimum depth setting that prevents them from being used against surface ships.

In which kind of scenarios would be in Hood's favor? What kind in the Burke's favor?

Without missiles, Burke is at a pretty severe disadvantage. She'd probably hit Hood a lot more, but without penatrating the armor, the best she can hope for is that topside fires from destroyed secondaries might get out of control. Burke can also go for a "mission kill" by destroying Hood's fire control directors.
In terms of size and tonnage, Burke is roughly equivalent to a light cruiser. Even though she has superb damage control capability, if she starts taking 15" HE hits, she's in trouble. Her best chance is in a night fight.

[paul.mercer]

Gentlemen,
An interesting senario.
I think it also depends at what range the engagement takes place and it what weather conditions, if it is around 10,000 yards or less in calm seas then even Hood's relativly primitive radar should be able to obtain hit quite quickly which would be very bad news for her adversary and I would guess that 5 or 6 hits with 15" would probably finish it with the Arleigh Burke class destroyer going to the bottom or being blown out of the water. Modern ships with their thin armour do not seem to be designed to paticipate in gun battles, especially if one ton shells are being lobbed at them!
In boxing terms 'a good big one will always beat a good little one'!

[Karl Heidenreich]

Man, without missiles nor torpedoes the Arleigh Burke is just a tin can. Hood will take some time with her shitty Dreyer table to take it, but when she does one 15" high explosive and the Arleigh Burke is history. Just look to what some camel driver terrorists did to the USS Cole with home made stuff. And if it's just guns the Hood had the range advantage.

[Rick Rather]

Asymmetric technologies can lead to some odd conclusions. For example, 12 WWII destroyers, under reasonably good circumstances, could sink the Bismarck. A Burke - even with missiles - could not (though it would make a mess of the upper works). However, a Burke with missiles would mop the floor with a dozen WWII destroyers.

[RF]

My initial reaction is to agree with Karl; this does to me look like a total mis-match.

[Battlecruiser]

My initial reaction is to agree with Karl; this does to me look like a total mis-match.

I actually do agree with you

[RF]

Then I'm not clear why you have posed this thread - you could for example try to even the odds up by having several destroyers spaced apart, or better still on opposite flanks?

[paulcadogan]

Ha! I'd throw in the Harpoon anti-ship missiles...

Imagine Hood unleashing all her UP rockets with their hanging wires acting like chaff to divert the missile. (Far fetched I know, but so was the movie "Battleship" - but it was still good fun!) or her pom poms desperately trying to be Phalanx's!

How would Hood stand up to a Harpoon hit?

[tommy303]

You would have to have something to even up the odds a bit.

[Pandora]

how many harpoons has Arleigh Burke-class destroyer?

[paulcadogan]

According to this site, they carry only 8 Harpoons - but 56 Tomahawks....

http://www.naval-technology.com/projects/burke/

So take out the Tomahawks, but with the Harpoon's range Hood would be dealing with them before she even knew the Burke existed!:oops:

With the Harpoon being a sea skimmer, so coming in with a flat trajectory, how would it manage Hood's vertical and turret/barbette armour? Her magazines should be relatively safe shouldn't they?

[ElBanditoVerde]

The Mk45 is an absolutely pitiful gun, I honestly don't understand why the US navy insists on putting it on their ships. The US conducted an operation against a couple of Iranian oil platforms in the late 80's (Operation Archer?) where a couple of Burkes tried to destroy some oil platforms with their 5-inch guns, iirc all they ended up doing was starting a fire and eventually they had to send in some SEALs with a bunch of high explosive to do some real damage because they had exhausted their magazines.

The problem with this scenario is range. By taking the Burke's missiles away in what I assume to be an attempt by the op to force the Burke to come within range of the Hood's 15"s we are left with a peculiar situation. The Burke will always detect the Hood first at extreme range with her seahawks but without much more than angry thoughts to send why would the Burke close with the Hood? I suggest a revision where the Burke gets all her missiles back with some sort of range limitation that would force her to engage the Hood at average battleship ranges.

On a side note how would the Hood's radar hold up to the Burke's ECM?

[neil hilton]

Arleigh Burke s 5in pop gun would only ever be able to cause superficial damage to Hoods superstructure , it would never be able to penetrate anywhere vital, whereas a single 15in hit from could sink Arleigh Burke or at least mission kill her. Arleigh Burkes electronics would be easily knocked out by such a massive hit, maybe permanently or temporarily during which time she would be a sitting duck with a crew working under manual reversion for all her equipment. Modern ships just arent designed to take that level of punishment like ye olde designs which are almost all mechanical and thus much more robust to shock damage.
Arleigh Burkes radar would easily jam Hoods radar but wouldn't be able to do all the fun things modern radars can do to each other simply because Hoods radar doesn't have any advanced capabilities. So Hoods gunnery would be optically controlled.
Arleigh Burke manoeuvrability would be so good, variable pitch propellers powered by instant power gas turbines along with bow thrusters and a sophisticated radar that can track incoming shells would give her a good chance at dodging Hoods shells at long range and maybe even at medium range.
Factoring in Arleigh Burkes missiles, the Harpoon has a titanium nose cone but is still quite slow which makes it semi armour piercing, It wouldn't be able to penetrate Hoods belt but would be able to penetrate the ends fore and aft, nothing vital there, causing maybe a fire or some flooding. The Thomahawks are also semi armour piercing, designed to penetrate reinforced concrete bunkers but not armour plate, their guidance system is much more advanced but can't track moving targets as far as I am aware.
Arleigh Burkes real threat would be the lightweight mk 46 homing torpedoes but she would have to get within 5nm to use them.

[Rick Rather]

Arleigh Burkes real threat would be the lightweight mk 46 homing torpedoes but she would have to get within 5nm to use them.

As mentioned previously, Mk46 torpedoes have a minimum depth setting so that they do not home-in on the ship that launched them (or another ship in its battle group). This feature (which is not selectable) prevents them from being used against enemy surface ships.