already gives us:

I would agree if we were just talking about striking point targets.  But area and suppressive fires demand a lot of munitions - guided or not. 

But yes, this starts to become a corner case, especially if you still have a gun to cover shorter-ranged engagements of this sort, and if you're willing to move closer to shore. 

Generally, I might agree.
But the whole purpose of creating guided shells with the near-surgical precision that GPS gives us isn't intending their use for area and suppression fires.

(Field use with Excaliburs in A-stan, and eventually Iraq, will confirm or deny this more, depending on their success rate).

 

So seeing as the LRLAP-equipped AGS seems to have had its unguided shell requirement/capability removed,

I therefore used the same argument for this proverbial "Land Attack Burke" (or whatever other vessel): precision, surgical strikes moreso than general fire support where we just saturate an area with unguided shells and hope for the best (this isn't the coast of France in 1944 or Guadalcanal in 1945 anymore. No one has an excessive amount of heavily-reinforced coastal emplacements that need D-Day type barrages of massed fire support to crack the enemy's defenses).

 

Notice that the only real large scale carpet bombing we've done since VietNam was the Desert Storm strike on the Highway of Death, that section of road where supposedly the entire Iraqi Army was vacating Kuwait from.

It proved to be more of a target of opportunity (and stupidity on the enemy's part, for even allowing themselves to be caught so), because notice that we've never carpet bombed any Iraqi cities outright,

nor so have we carpet bombed any Afghani cities or entire valleys (not on the scale of WW2 or Viet Nam).

 

The whole point of theses latest precision weapons is just that: why cut off an entire arm or leg when PGMs allow just removing the infective tissue?

 

If you really want to go the saturation fire support route, then secure your land areas and use all the towed guns you can muster.

Otherwise, I want as much surgical precision as possible: a B-2 dropping 16 trajectory-correctable JDAMs is a better option than releasing a stick of dumb bombs and hope I at least take out something of value to the enemy.

 

Besides, as for suppression fires: doesn't it make more sense to just elimiate the threat altogether, rather than firing off aimed but still indiscriminate shots that there's no guarantee will achieve any destruction on our adversary, and might even encourage him to dig in deeper (Viet Nam & A-stan caves & tunnel networks).

I want the precision to attack the hidey-holes and escape tunnel entrances, not just pulverize a countryside and hope I hit something worthwhile.

That's why AGS will have its GPS-precise LRLAPs shells, rather than having a 20-30rpm rate of fire to saturate an area with unguided munitions.

 

If I really need to target a large staging area or equipment compound, that's where those DPICM-submunition carriers come in handy.

Or if I have a flotilla of rapidly-closing terror boats, then I want more massed shell volleys the closer they get (ideally, equipped with multi-option 3P-type fuzes for whatever caliber deck gun(s)).

Otherwise, I still want the surgical precision, so if I can procure steerable shells that cut down on the number of shots needed, all the better (reduces barrel wear if I need fewer rounds, so I'm servicing my gun less often).

...should've said, "this isn't the coast of France, Italy, or the PTO in 1942-1945."

 

 

Why?  Because ESSM has a 10" motor section.  So four-packing produces a container that is at least 20" x 20" (more with spacing, container thickness, etc.).  A Mk41 is only sized to carry 21" diameter weapons. 

A ~7" missile packed 3x3 would be at least 21" x 21".  If that's too big, then make it 6.6" diameter (3x3 = 19.8"x 19.8"), but longer, it doesn't really matter.  One can play with the sizing to fit the cells.  There is plenty of vertical length left for longer missiles.  Even tactical Mk41 cells can handle 16.6 foot long VL-ASROCS. 

Points well taken, Herald.

But who says we need to keep a 40:1 ratio for the whole flight?

Don't the Extended Range versions of Standard SM-2s (and -3 ABMs) drop their booster sections after use?

Would this surface attack round fare any differently?

(Although yeah, a 40:1 does seem extreme.)

 

Would we really need something in a 6-to-7-inch diameter missile to be 20 feet long to get a comparable payload to ranges equal to or exceeding that of the LRLAP?

(we've already established that an AGS turret needs a lot of barrel clearance for turret traversing, but how deep does the proposed reduced-magazine-capacity model sit into a Burke hull with all its fixin's?)

That Israeli LAR-160-derived naval rocket system (6.3-inch diameter) from the Armada pdf you posted up has the potential to get there (even if not currently in a VLS-friendly format), in a variant that wouldn't need to be 20 feet long to get the job done with futher development of rocket motor-to-warhead size ratios, as well as an adequate fin/strake design (Argentina had a same-diameter CAL-160 under development, carrying a 50kg warhead to 30km in a length of just under 11feet at 110kg weight).

 

Any SAM or SSM could see incremental range increases if fitted with expendable launch boosters.

 

I think you're over-exaggerating B.Smitty's idea...

 

 

 

You don't get a long thin 6 inch diameter rocket that burns steadily for 20+ seconds to give you 100n km range without giving up a lot of mass to contain the pressure of the burn as that SRM burns in to out in long thin case. You don't get much payload either that way either.  What do you know about rockets specifically? Telemetry is more my schtick, so I need sa good feel for how ignorant we both are on this subject. 

How much space are you giving up for fins? Separator sleeve walls? etc.etc.etc.

If anything the step rocket makes the inverted pendulum problem WORSE.

And you are using an existing adapatable VLS. That isn't SYLVER, which stupidly lacks the capacity to adapt electrical interfaces and accept collared launch cells much larger than the crap ASTER. So that leaves you the  short, medium, and long versions of the Mark 41 which is so designed to accept a broad family of 21 inch/25+ foot length boosted weapons.