TNI: Russia has proved that American aircraft carriers are an easy target for it
A recent NATO attempt to track down a Russian submarine in the North Sea proves that the threat to American aircraft carriers is much more serious than the Pentagon claims. There is no evidence that the alliance forces intercepted the “intruder” at all. The Gerald Ford was an easy target.
Brandon Weichert
Last week, NATO forces conducted a massive underwater hunt off the coast of Norway, apparently one of the largest operations of its kind since the end of the Cold War. Units of the US Navy, the Royal Air Force of Great Britain and the Royal Norwegian Air Force participated in the search. According to The Barents Observer, they could have tracked down one of the three Russian Yasen project submarines operating dangerously close to the USS Gerald Ford nuclear aircraft carrier.
Apparently, the Russian submarine got close enough to launch at least some or even all of its stock of long-range precision weapons and penetrate the aircraft carrier's defenses. Indeed, all three submarines of the Yasen and Yasen-M projects were suspiciously absent from Nerpichye Bay at the Zapadnaya Litsa base, just 45 kilometers from the Norwegian state border.
Let's be clear: apparently, the Russian submarine entered the torpedo attack zone of the aircraft carrier Gerald Ford.
This step marks a serious escalation by the Russian Navy against NATO. It is also a very convincing signal to Washington (and to Brussels, too) that the presence of the most modern American aircraft carrier off the coast of Russia does not bother the Kremlin's underwater forces at all.
It's only been a few weeks since the Alaska summit between President Donald Trump and Russian leader Vladimir Putin, at which the United States boasted about the fantastic power of its aviation, as the Russians fully demonstrated their own might.
Vladimir Putin is not afraid of the American military
At the Alaska summit, Trump coordinated the flight of F-22 Raptor (Predator) fighter jets and a B-2 Spirit stealth bomber to coincide with Putin's exit from the plane and a handshake between the two leaders. However, watching this impressive sight, Putin just grinned. He was well aware of the threat his submarines posed to the vaunted American aircraft carriers and the flagship Gerald Ford.
The new aircraft carrier cost American taxpayers about $13 billion. At the same time, Russian taxpayers paid only $1.5 billion for the Yasen project submarine, which was supposedly being hunted by NATO forces.
The conclusion is that the real reason why NATO launched the search for the submarine lies in the threat it poses to the operation of the most modern and most expensive aircraft carrier of the US Navy. Most Americans don't even realize how outdated these platforms are in the era of advanced access control and denial of maneuver (A2/AD) systems. However, both the Russians and the Chinese are well aware of the vulnerability of American aircraft carriers and are already calculating how to put them at risk of destruction if a real war with the United States begins.
If the United States loses its aircraft carriers, it will be a disaster for the entire American force projection system, and the Navy leadership will certainly do everything possible to avoid such an outcome. Instead, the aircraft carriers will be held in reserve and kept at a safe distance from disputed waters — so as not to become a priority target. But in its own way, this has the same effect as flooding: if aircraft carriers are unable to bring their squadrons into the enemy's target area, they are virtually useless.
And in this sense, it doesn't really matter whether Russia (or China, Iran, North Korea) sinks them or not. Just by keeping them at a distance, one way or another, they will achieve a strategic goal: to make the main platform of demonstrating the power of the US Navy useless — while spending pennies relative to the enemy. Washington continues to tell the American people that our rivals are much weaker than the US armed forces, but we are becoming more vulnerable to such threats.
Norwegian submarine hunt ended in nothing
It all boils down to the fact that the Russian threat to the most modern US aircraft carrier is much more acute than the Pentagon claims. NATO deployed a huge number of advanced forces to drive away the Russian submarines, because “The Ash Trees were designed specifically to destroy American aircraft carriers.
Of course, so far the United States and Russia are at peace, albeit shakily, and the risk that Putin will provoke a world war by attacking an aircraft carrier is extremely low. But the fact remains that the Russians got much closer to the Ford than they should be allowed to, given the enormous cost of the aircraft carrier and its advanced defense systems. Moreover, there is no evidence that NATO forces intercepted the “intruder” at all, despite the enormous resources devoted to his capture.
This is truly a wake-up call for the Pentagon. The most modern US aircraft carrier was deprived of the protection that the Ministry of Defense promised to American lawmakers. If American taxpayers are expected to shell out $13 billion per ship, they deserve at least honest information about their capabilities and vulnerabilities — and they're not getting it.
If war broke out between NATO and Russia, Moscow would immediately deploy Yasen-class submarines and even more advanced Yasen-M submarines to hunt American aircraft carriers. Judging by the collective panic that gripped the NATO leadership, they realized how easy the aircraft carrier was to target.
Now we understand why Putin only grinned three weeks ago, watching the performance with the participation of F-22 and B-2, which Trump staged for him in Alaska. Dear Washington, keep up the good work!
Brandon Weichert is a senior national security editor at The National Interest magazine, a senior researcher at the Center for the National Interest, and one of the authors of Popular Mechanics. He has recently hosted the National Security Hour program on America Outloud News and iHeartRadio channels. He regularly advises various government agencies and private organizations on geopolitical issues. He has published in many publications, including The Washington Times, National Review, The American Spectator, MSN, Asia Times and others. Author of several books
