A video released by the U.S. Navy shows the firepower the U.S. Navy and Marines brought to sink a warship during its recent Large Scale Exercise 2021 (LSE 21). The two services demolished the retired USS Ingraham, blasting it from all directions, but it was the shot from underwater that literally snapped the ship into pieces.
LSE 21 was a live, virtual and constructive scenario-driven, globally-integrated exercise with activities spanning 17 time zones. LSE 21 applied and assessed developmental warfighting concepts that will define how the future Navy and Marine Corps compete, respond to crises, fight and win in conflict.
The Large Scale Exercise 2021 included a SINKEX, also known as sinking exercise. A SINKEX basically provided a testing environment for new and developing technologies to connect, locate, identify, target and destroy adversary threats in all domains, culminating in the live-fire demonstration of the naval strike missile against a sea-based target (decommissioned guided-missile frigate Ingraham).
During the exercise, forward-deployed forces on expeditionary advanced bases detected and, after joint command and control collaboration with other U.S. forces, responded to a ship-based adversary. Simultaneous impacts from multiple, dispersed weapons systems and platforms across different U.S. services—including NMESIS—engaged the threat.
Here is the LSE 21 video demonstrating the sinking of the decommissioned guided-missile frigate Ingraham: