Navy is getting rail guns

[munky73770]

http://www.military.com/features/0,15240,160195,00.html?ESRC=navy-a.nl

Sweet.

[[ecgn] btt]

I am not sure this is necessary. Naval guns are a thing of the past. There is no real threat to our navy. What can a rail gun do better then cruise missiles or carrier aircraft?

[Darknut]

btt]I am not sure this is necessary. Naval guns are a thing of the past. There is no real threat to our navy. What can a rail gun do better then cruise missiles or carrier aircraft?

Well, you can't block or intercept the shots unlike cruise missiles.

[ShipWreck]

What next? Sharks with frikken laser beams on their heads?

[SavageParrot]

Plus it's got to be a crap load cheaper. A shell can't be more than 1k and that's a huge overestimate, I'd imagine it could be a lot less depending on how scientific you want to be about the payload, a cruise missile is what 60k possibly more? Wikipedia has tommahawks at 600k...

If you're in range then shelling is just good economics and these extend that budget range.

[Hunter/Killer]

btt]I am not sure this is necessary. Naval guns are a thing of the past. There is no real threat to our navy. What can a rail gun do better then cruise missiles or carrier aircraft?

"the potential for rail guns to deliver supporting fire from up to 220 miles away "

WWII type ship to ship naval battles may be a thing of the past but delivering support fire inland is still needed. Also a smaller version could be very good at defending from incoming missles.