How Massive WWII Battleships Still Shape Maritime War

By James Holmes, Warrior Contributor, Navy

We are constantly told that the aircraft carrier doomed the battleship to obsolescence at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941.

The Iowa-class briefly found new life during the 1980s and 1990s, including stints of combat duty, but they have slumbered in retirement for over three decades now.

All are museum ships, two in the Atlantic, two in the Pacific. They are yesterday’s news.

What the Iowa-Class Battleships Can Teach Us

And yet these are not mere relics in steel. They still have something to teach us about how to build a fleet able to win the affection of the American people.

Why the Iowa-class still excites public interest, then, constitutes a question of present-day importance.

Naval magnates fret ceaselessly about how to get ordinary folk to rediscover their love affair with their navy and to rededicate themselves to the cause of sea power at a time when storm clouds are gathering in the Western Pacific.

A society that gazes out to sea—and remembers how past generations dealt with seaborne strife—is a society predisposed to invest in a battle fleet of proportions and capability befitting an oceangoing superpower. How can the leadership cultivate such a society?