US naval strategy during World War II was based on a simple algorithm: build ships faster than the enemy could sink them. Despite the seeming absurdity of this approach, it fully corresponds to the conditions in which the United States found itself before the war: colossal industrial capacities and a huge resource base made it possible to "crush" any adversary.
Over the previous 50 years, the "American vacuum cleaner", taking advantage of the troubles in the Old World, has collected all the best from around the world - a competent and highly qualified workforce, leading scientists and engineers, "luminaries of world science", the latest patents and developments. Hungry during the years of the "Great Depression", American industry was just waiting for an excuse to "jump off the bat" and break all the Stakhanov records.
The pace of construction of American warships is so incredible that it sounds like an anecdote - in the period from March 1941 to September 1944, the Yankees commissioned 175 Fletcher-class destroyers. One hundred seventy-five - the record has not been broken until now, "Fletchers" became the most massive type of destroyers in history.
For the sake of completeness, it should be added that along with the construction of the Fletchers:
- continued construction of "obsolete" destroyers under the Benson / Gleaves project (series of 92 units), - since 1943, destroyers of the Allen M. Sumner type (71 ships, including the Robert Smith subclass) went into production.
- in August 1944, the construction of new "Girings" began (98 more destroyers). Like the previous Allen M. Sumner project, the Gearing-class destroyers were the next development of the very successful Fletcher project.
Smooth-deck hull, standardization, unification of mechanisms and weapons, rational layout - the technical features of the "Fletchers" accelerated their construction, facilitated the installation and repair of equipment. The efforts of the designers were not in vain - the scale of the large-scale construction of the Fletchers surprised the whole world.
But could it be otherwise? It is naive to believe that a naval war can be won with only a dozen destroyers. Successful operations in the vast ocean require thousands of combat and support ships - just remember that the list of US Navy combat losses during World War II contains 783 names (ranging from battleship to patrol boat).
From the point of view of American industry, the Fletcher-class destroyers were relatively simple and cheap products. However, hardly any of his peers - Japanese, German, British or Soviet destroyers - could boast of the same impressive set of electronic equipment and fire control systems. Versatile artillery, an effective complex of anti-aircraft, anti-submarine and torpedo weapons, a huge supply of fuel, amazing durability and phenomenally high survivability - all this turned the ships into real sea monsters, the best destroyers of the Second World War.
Unlike their European counterparts, the Fletchers were originally designed to operate on ocean communications. The 492-ton fuel oil reserve provided a cruising range of 6,000 miles with a 15-knot speed - an American destroyer could cross the Pacific Ocean diagonally without replenishing fuel supplies. In reality, this meant the ability to operate in isolation for thousands of miles from points of material and technical supply and to carry out combat missions in any area of the oceans.
Another important difference between the Fletchers and European-built ships was the rejection of the "pursuit of speed." And although, in theory, a boiler-turbine power plant with a capacity of 60,000 hp. allowed the "American" to accelerate to 38 knots, in reality the speed of the overloaded fuel, ammunition and equipment "Fletcher" barely reached 32 knots.
For comparison: the Soviet G7 developed 37-39 knots. And the record holder - the French leader of the destroyers "Le Terribl" (power plant with a capacity of 100,000 hp) showed 45.02 knots on the measured mile!
Over time, it turned out that the American calculation turned out to be correct - ships rarely go at full speed, and the pursuit of excessive speed only leads to excessive fuel consumption and negatively affects the survivability of the ship.
The main armament Fletcher's were five 127 mm Mk.12 universal guns in five closed turrets with 425 rounds of ammunition per gun (575 rounds per overload).
The 127 mm Mk.12 cannon with a barrel length of 38 calibers proved to be a very successful artillery system, combining the power of a five-inch naval gun and the rate of fire of an anti-aircraft cannon. An experienced crew could make 20 or more shots per minute, but even an average rate of fire of 12-15 shots / min was an excellent result for its time. The gun could effectively work against any surface, coastal and air targets, while being the basis of the destroyer's air defense.
The ballistic characteristics of the Mk.12 do not cause any particular emotions: a 25.6-kilogram projectile left the barrel cut at a speed of 792 m / s - a fairly average result for naval guns of those years.
For comparison, the powerful Soviet 130 mm B-13 naval gun of the 1935 model could send a 33 kg projectile to the target at a speed of 870 m / s! But, alas, the B-13 did not have even a fraction of the versatility of the Mk.12, the rate of fire was only 7-8 rds / min, but the main thing …
The main thing was the fire control system. Somewhere in the depths of the Fletcher, in the combat information center, the analog computers of the Mk.37 fire control system were buzzing, processing the data stream coming from the Mk.4 radar - the guns of the American destroyer were centrally aimed at the target according to the automatic data!
A super-cannon needs a super-projectile: to combat aerial targets, the Yankees created a phenomenal ammunition - the Mk.53 anti-aircraft projectile with a radar fuse. A small electronic miracle, a mini-locator encased in a 127 mm shell!
The main secret was the radio tubes, capable of withstanding colossal overloads when fired from a gun: the projectile experienced an acceleration of 20,000 g, while making 25,000 revolutions per minute around its axis!
In addition to the universal "five-inch", the "Fletchers" had a dense air defense contour of 10-20 small-caliber anti-aircraft guns. The originally installed quad 28 mm mounts 1, 1 "Mark 1/1 (the so-called" Chicago piano ") turned out to be too unreliable and weak. Realizing that nothing worked out with anti-aircraft guns of their own production, the Americans did not" reinvent the wheel "and launched licensed production of Swedish 40 mm Bofors anti-aircraft guns and Swiss 20 mm semi-automatic Oerlikon anti-aircraft guns with belt feed.).
The original Mk.51 fire control director with an analog computing device was developed for the Bofors heavy anti-aircraft machine gun - the system proved itself to be the best, at the end of the war half of the Japanese aircraft shot down were due to the twin (quad) Bofors equipped with the Mk. 51.
For small-caliber automatic anti-aircraft guns "Oerlikon" a similar fire control device was created under the designation Mk.14 - the US Navy was not equal in accuracy and effectiveness of anti-aircraft fire.
It should be noted separately mine torpedo weapon Fletcher-class destroyer - two five-tube torpedo tubes and ten Mk.15 torpedoes of 533 mm caliber (inertial guidance system, warhead weight - 374 kg torpex). Unlike the Soviet destroyers, who never used torpedoes throughout the war, the American Fletchers regularly carried out torpedo firing in combat conditions and often achieved solid results. For example, on the night of August 6-7, 1943, a formation of six Fletchers attacked a group of Japanese destroyers in Vella Bay - a torpedo salvo sent three of the enemy's four destroyers to the bottom.
To combat submarines on the American destroyers since 1942, the Mk.10 Hedgehog ("Hedgehog") multi-barrel jet bomb launcher, of British design, was installed. A salvo of 24 depth charges could cover the detected submarine 260 meters from the ship's side. In addition, the Fletcher carried a pair of bomb-dropping devices to attack an underwater target in the immediate vicinity of the ship.
But the most unusual weapon of the Fletcher-class destroyer was the Vought-Sikorsku OS2U-3 seaplane, designed for reconnaissance and, if necessary, attacking a target (detected submarines, boats, point targets on the shore) using bombs and machine gun weapons. Alas, in practice it turned out that the destroyer did not need a seaplane - a too laborious and unreliable system that only worsens other characteristics of the ship (survivability, anti-aircraft gun fire sector, etc.). As a result, the Vout-Sikorsky seaplane survived only on three " Fletcher ".
The survivability of the destroyer. Without exaggeration, the Fletcher's vitality was amazing. The destroyer Newcomb withstood five kamikaze attacks in one battle. The destroyer Stanley was pierced through by the Oka jet projectile operated by a kamikaze pilot. The Fletchers regularly returned to the base, having severe damage fatal to any other destroyer: flooding of the engine and boiler rooms (!), Extensive destruction of the hull's power set, the consequences of terrible fires from kamikaze hits and holes from enemy torpedoes.
There were several reasons for the Fletcher's exceptional survivability. Firstly, the high strength of the hull - straight lines, an even silhouette without refined contours, smooth decks - all this contributed to an increase in the longitudinal strength of the ship. The unusually thick sides played a role - the Fletcher's skin was made of 19 mm steel sheets, the deck was half an inch of metal. In addition to providing anti-splinter protection, these measures had a positive effect on the strength of the destroyer.
Secondly, the high survivability of the ship was provided by some special design measures, for example, the presence of two additional diesel generators in isolated compartments in the bow and stern of the boiler-turbine installation. This explains the survival of the Fletchers after the engine and boiler rooms were flooded - isolated diesel generators continued to power six pumps, keeping the ship afloat. But that's not all - for especially difficult cases, a set of portable gasoline installations was provided.
In total, out of 175 Fletcher-class destroyers, 25 ships were lost in combat. The Second World War ended, and the history of the Fletchers continued: a huge fleet of hundreds of Belle destroyers was reoriented to solve the problems of the Cold War.
America had many new allies (among which there were former enemies - Germany, Japan, Italy), whose armed forces were completely destroyed during the war years - it was necessary to quickly restore and modernize their military potential in order to oppose them to the USSR and its satellites.
52 Fletcher were sold or leased Navy of Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Greece, Turkey, Germany, Japan, Italy, Mexico, South Korea, Taiwan, Peru and Spain - all 14 countries of the world. Despite their venerable age, the strong destroyers remained in service under a different flag for more than 30 years, and the last of them were decommissioned only in the early 2000s (Mexican and Taiwanese navies).
In the 1950s, the growth of the underwater threat from the rapidly increasing number of submarines of the USSR Navy forced a new look at the use of old destroyers. The Fletchers, which remained in the US Navy, were decided to be converted into anti-submarine ships under the FRAM program - fleet rehabilitation and modernization.
Instead of one of the bow guns, a RUR-4 Alpha Weapon rocket launcher was mounted, anti-submarine 324 mm Mk.35 torpedoes with passive homing, two sonars - stationary sonar SQS-23 and towed VDS. But most importantly, a helipad and a hangar were equipped at the stern for two unmanned (!) DASH (Drone Antisubmarine Helicopter) anti-submarine helicopters capable of carrying a pair of 324 mm torpedoes.
This time, American engineers clearly "went too far" - the level of computer technology of the 1950s did not allow the creation of an effective unmanned aerial vehicle capable of performing the most complex operations on the high seas - to fight submarine submarines at a distance of tens of kilometers from the ship's board and to carry out takeoff and landing operations on a cramped helipad swaying under the waves. Despite promising successes in field conditions, 400 of the 700 delivered to the fleet "drones" crashed during the first five years of operation. By 1969, the DASH system was removed from service.
However, the modernization under the FRAM program has little to do with the Fletcher-class destroyers. Unlike slightly newer and slightly larger "Girings" and "Allen M. Sumners", where about a hundred ships underwent FRAM modernization, the modernization of the Fletchers was considered unpromising - only three Fletchers managed to go through the full "course of rehabilitation and modernization" ". The rest of the destroyers were used in escort and reconnaissance missions as torpedo and artillery ships until the end of the 1960s. The last veteran destroyer left the US Navy in 1972.
These were the real gods of naval warfare - versatile warships that brought the victory of the US Navy in the Pacific theater of operations on their decks. The best destroyers of the Second World War, which had no equal on the sea. But most importantly, there were a lot of them, a monstrous number - 175 Fletcher-class destroyers.
