Winged Brothers by Ernest Snowden

Author:Ernest Snowden
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Naval Institute Press
Published: 2018-07-14T16:00:00+00:00

More contentious was the Navy’s parallel pursuit of a class of super-carriers reminiscent of the cancelled USS United States that was purpose-built to host a full complement of jet-powered aircraft up to and including the largest jets capable of delivering atomic weapons. Now, however, with the lessons of Korea and naval aviation’s contribution in that conflict still fresh and with the ongoing introduction of new jet aircraft types, circumstances conspired to propel the Navy down a dual path of robust, steadily paced modernization of older carriers and slower incremental recapitalization of the carrier inventory with new super-carrier types. That recapitalization started with the lay-down of the keel of USS Forrestal in July 1952, six months before Ernie arrived to take over the Navy’s aviation ships section in OPNAV.

Ernie would throw himself into the preparing, amending, updating, and refreshing of the justification for the carrier program, refining the funding request, and shaping the congressional testimony to sustain the advocacy and momentum for super-carriers USS Saratoga (CV 60) and USS Ranger (CV 61), the latter’s keel laid down in August 1954. The stability of these nascent super-carrier programs was never ensured once the funding requests passed from the Navy to the Office of the Secretary of Defense and then to Congress. A vigorous defense of the amounts and uses of super-carrier dollars was critical. In precise and impactful phraseology surely edited by if not written by Ernie as an obligation of his staff work, Admiral Fechteler testified before the House of Representatives appropriations committee in May 1953:

With the advent of jet propelled aircraft, our Essex Class carriers became obsolescent. Conversion has delayed the Essex Class becoming obsolete … These various items that have to be built into the ship [Forrestal and subsequent super-carriers] are due to the fact that we are operating heavier aircraft; the ship requires increased fuel capacity; we must have more and higher capacity catapults; you have higher speeds so you must have different arresting gear; you must have additional ordnance capability because these high performance planes can deliver a heavier load; and, finally, you must build into your ship a stronger hull to reduce damage by bombs, torpedoes and other weapons.23

Later in the same hearing, Ernie’s immediate boss, Vice Adm. Ralph Ofstie, deputy CNO for air, delivered his remarks. Continuing the theme struck by Admiral Fechteler, Ofstie (also employing wording most assuredly drafted by Ernie) told the congressional appropriators: “The carriers must be able not only to launch and recover rapidly the most modern aircraft but they must also be of sufficient size to accommodate increased amounts of ordnance and fuel. We have devised an interim solution in our carrier modernization program, but the ultimate answer lies in carrying through the program of replacement, of which the Forrestal is the first.”24

Ernie may have been one of perhaps a dozen or more captains with long, uninterrupted carrier flying experience and distinguished combat leadership at the squadron, air group, and fleet staff level—peers who might have been assigned this weighty responsibility.

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