- Aug 23, 2017
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Yep, they are relics of the past, but damn impressive relics. We always referred to the shells as lobbing Volkswagen bugs over the horizon. (About the same weight - 2000 pounds)I know the Navy says Iowa and Missouri are inefficient and unnecessary and expensive. But I have always thought having a ship that big with guns that powerful that can anchor in most any country's' harbor and sling 16" shells 30 miles has some very impressive psychological value. Add in the fact that most, if not all, military forces today do not have the capability to seriously degrade those ships without resorting to nukes and you've got real gunboat diplomacy.
When I saw it, we were on an exercise with navies from Canada, Japan, Australia and New Zealand. We were told the exercise involved selling a few small, old frigates to the Japanese. Having their "war department" folks and admirals on our flag ship while launching bugs from the guns on the deck they surrendered WW2 on was pretty assertive. Kind of a not so subtle reminder.