Tico, the remaining ones at least, with 128 VLS cells giving alot of AA to shootdown supersonic Russian missiles but Kirov for antiship capability as USN Harpoon is vulnerable to shootdown by Kirov layered AA defense.

Ok, so they both win? Seems they both have plenty of defensive capability, but who really wins?

Who has better ability to track and engage simultanious targets (incoming missile defense)? Who has better OFFENSIVE weapons (evade missile defense and hit the target)? How about survivability after XXXX direct missile hits? When it is all said and done, which would you rather be standing on (in) after the story is over?

Give me a Tico any day.

Thanks, I can go along with that. ;)

In building the Kirovs, the Russians found out the hard way why nobody else has built a "battle cruiser" since the 1920's. (I consider the American "Alaska" class and the German "Admiral Scheer" class to be something entirely different, namely "armored cruisers" similar to the pre-dreadnaught types.) The original concept (in 1968!) was for a 7,000-8,000 ton vessel with straight nuclear propulsion. Gorshkov rejected this on the grounds that it would be little more than a nuclear-powered "Kynda". As progressive design proposals evolved, it grew into an "all-singing" surface combatant of 20,000+ tons. This was the reason for the (contrary) mixed nuclear and steam-turbine plant; neither one could get the beast above 24 knots by itself, making nonsense of the concept of a "fast combatant" (it was projected as an escort for the [never-really-completed] aircraft carriers.) In the end, what they got was an overly large and complex vessel that became a manpower and logistics "black hole", not to mention that each member of the class ended up costing about 2x the original estimates, or to put it another way, for the cost of 1 "Kirov" they could have bought about 3.5 "Sovremenny"-class, which are very nearly as effective surface combatants >as< the "Kirovs". I agree that a stand-up fight (more like "stand-off", actually) between a Ticonderoga and a Kirov would leave the Tico still standing afterward, but I honestly believe that a Spruance class DD could see one off, given a captain and crew of typical USN professionalism, in spite of the best efforts of the equally professional Russian crew. There's a reason that only one Kirov is still in (limited) operation, and it seems to be more due to inherent engineering problems than simple lack of funds. A good source of info on this class, and its design evolution, is Pavlov, A.S. WARSHIPS OF THE USSR AND RUSSIA 1945-1995. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1997 (Trans. by Gregory Tokar, ed. by Norman Friedman.) ISBN 1-55750-671-X.

Would Harpoons fired by a Tico(fired in pairs? I forget how that works) be enough to penetrate a Kirov's defenses? All I know is the Tico has enough AA firepower to put down all the missiles put its way. No idea how it does offensively.

We've dumped the harpoons in favor of the TacTom which has 3x the range and 2x the bang factor. Not to mention much better technology to mess with the enemy.

No American surface combattant has much of a antisurface missile punch with the Harpoons. They were installed in 8 missile batteries. That's it. 8 Harpoons per ship. Now, Harpoon was/is a good weapon, but it has it's limitations. It's a subsonic missile, not at all stealthy, and it's warhead is medium sized. Against a target with a heavy antiair capability, even an 8 missile salvo ought not be lethal. It's debatable whether it had a prayer of getting through the defenses of an alerted Kirov, without some help. OTOH, as far as defense is concerned, Tico was state-of-the-art. Russian surface to surface technology had one, big advantage, though; they had a couple of really formidable missiles. Supersonic, which meant reduced engagement envelopes, timewise. One of those missiles had a monster-warhead. A carrier killer. A warhead large enough to sink a 100k ton hull would pulverise a Tico. If it could get through.

??? I thought TacTom(Anti shipping Tomahawk right?) was put down a while ago. To be honest I'm not sure what's the future direction of antishipping-seems to be either a modified seeker package for SLAM-ER, JSOW, or JASSM.