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Interesting but how fast and how far on a mission profile that requires economical cruise to station and then a sprint at maximum speed or high speed run to operation area?

Good ideas blark18! The 32 cell VLS is great but I would increse the number of SM-2 loadout to twelve, so it would be eight quadpak ESSM, eight VLS Harpoon (for which Boeing is trying to find a launch customer), four VL-AROC and eight Tac Tom for flexibility in the VLS or put Harpoon III, which is the current model in regular quad mounts in which case loadout would be eight ESSM quad paks, sixteen SM-2 and eight Tac Tom for action against high value shore targets.

I would choose the five inch gun would be a licensed Oto Melara lightweight mount capable of firing at 35-40 rounds/minute a creditble AA capability and equip it with the proposed Sideshooter installation (which can be found at freepatentsonline) in which a twenty-one round RAM launcher is on either side of the gunhouse and connected to the elevation drives of the gun so that it elevates/trains with the gun mount.

Besides having forty-two RAM launchers, other payloads such as chaff and Nulka could be carried and the proposed WLY-11 antitorpedo torpedo which is a small weapon at 6.75 by 120 inches. The fire control system would select the appropiate weapon which would be either gun, RAM or decoy or ATT for torpedoes. The RAM launcher does not have to face the target so it can be fired off boresight and the missile could engage targets in the 'blind' zone astern. This would be your point defense/CIWS.

I would also consider some ships having an HFSWR OTH radar for surveillance over the horizon of ships and aircraft and to give warning of a missile attack out to 30nmi and twice that for fighters and double that for ship surveillance. HFSWR can also detect a TBM launch and provide initial early warning of such a launch and has been successfully tested on a land based installation. It needs funding for shipborne installations.

Now we need bunkerage for several thousand miles and the ability to reach the thirty knot 'fleet maximum speed' of other USN ships.

Perhaps I now have a different ship, yes but a powerful one.

With respect to radar, the lightweight 'corvette' or 'frigate' lower cost version of SPY-F or SPY-1K could be installed and yes the costs go up but so does the utility. I hope it is good value for the costs of my proposed systems.