Battleships (Wing Commander)
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In the Wing Commander universe, the battlefleets of the Terran Confederation and Empire of Kilrah maintain a number of powerful battleships, most of which are destroyed at the Battle of McAuliffe. None of these ships are given classes.
[edit] Design
In 2634, battleships made up the majority of the major powers' capital ship fleets. Like their blue-water predecessors, these ships were large, well-protected mobile fortresses, virtually invulnerable to conventional attack. Only the weapons of another capital shIp were capable of penetrating their extenive shielding and armor, and their massive plasma cannon could smash through any target it could be brought to bear on.
[edit] McAuliffe
On 23 August 2634, Confederation Day, most of the battleships of the Confed Navy were docked at the skyhook of the Naval Base at McAuliffe. Most of the crew were away on leave due to the holiday, so the attack caught the defenders completely by surprise. Waves of torpedo-armed Kilrathi bombers swept down, destroying the base's skyhook and the ships attached to it.
Confed was quick to respond, and the battleships North Carolina and Yorkshire arrived with the TCS Ark Royal battle group. Both ships, although outnumbered four-to-one by the Kilrathi battleships, fought bravely, although Yorkshire was destroyed.
[edit] Descendants
Although McAuliffe effectively discredIted the fighter-less heavy capital ship, it did not spell the end of the big-gun warship entirely. Both sides produced large, well-armed designs mounting heavy anti-capship weapons such as Anti-Matter guns and laser batteries; the difference was that for the first time fighter protection was given a high priority. Their hulls bristled with flak cannon and point-defense weapons, and they often carried so many fighter squadrons that they were used as carriers in their own right (notable examples include the KIS Snakeir and KIS Sivar. The Supercruiser TCS Concordia was a more traditional design - one that favored heavy weapons over fighters; nevertheless, it carried a potent 20 fighters and was often accompanied by other fighter-carrying warships.
In some ways, the Confederation and Vesuvius-class ships can be considered as carrying on the legacy of the battlewagon - both designs are heavily armed for ship-to-ship combat, and at least the Confederation was classified as a "dreadnaught" (though the term is quite ambiguous). Neither are true battleships, however - their main weapons are not their guns, but the massive fighter and bomber wings they house in their hangars; their operating doctrine is that of the carrier battle group, not the stately battle fleet. The true space battleship, like its distant ancestor, is as dead as the fleets at McAuliffe.
