River Monitor

River Monitor

River monitors were heavily armored, and normally mounted the largest guns of all riverine warships. The name originated from the US Navy's Brown Water Navy's USS Monitor, which made her first appearance in the American Civil War, and being distinguished by a single revolving turret.

On 18 December 1965, the US Navy, for the second time in one hundred years, authorized the reactivation of a Brown Water Navy for riparian operations in South Vietnam. In July 1966, Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara authorized the formation of a Mobile Riverine Force (MRF); a force, that would bring back the heavily armored single turret River Monitor.

River monitors were used on inland waterways such as rivers, estuaries, deltas and lakes. Usually they had a shallow draft which was necessary for them to be able to operate in enclosed waters; but their displacement, size and draft varied depending on where they were used.

Most river monitors were lightly armored although this varied, with some carrying more armor. Exceptional examples, however, most notably the Royal Navy's Lord Clive Class monitors, which could operate in coastal or certain riparian/esturine situations, bore extra-thick armor plating and heavy shore-bombardment guns, up to a massive 18-inches (457 mm) in size. Typically, however, river monitors displayed a mixture of gun sizes from 3-inch (75 mm) to 6-inch (152 mm), plus machine guns. This type of vessel overlaps with the river gunboat.

Read more about River Monitor:  Asia, Europe, United States

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