USN Warship Numbers: What is ideal? (re-titled)

[Haijun watcher]

A return to Reagan-era force levels?

Naval Today

US Navy assessment backs Trump�s 350-plus ship plan


A U.S. Navy report on its future naval force requirements is in line with U.S. president Donald Trump�s plans of building a 350-plus ship navy.

Trump announced the goal of a 350-ship navy during a speech in September when he said his plan was based on a 2014 Pentagon quadrennial review of projected threats and U.S. responses.

The 2016 Force Structure Assessment (FSA), unveiled by the Secretary of the Navy on Friday, recommends a 355-ship fleet including 12 carriers, 104 large surface combatants, 52 small surface combatants, 38 amphibious ships, and 66 submarines.

The assessment will be one input to the navy�s FY-2018 30-year shipbuilding plan. The current proposed navy budget is seen as a bridge to this larger navy, with shipbuilding on an upward glide slope towards 308 ships.

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Trump returning the USN to the level not seen since the Reagan years?

Navy Times

Donald Trump wants to start the biggest Navy build-up in decades
By: David B. Larter, November 15, 2016
Donald Trump has pledged that he'll lead the biggest U.S. Navy build-up since the Reagan administration, but the details on what's likely to be an expensive and potentially decades-long effort remain to be seen.

Trump vowed to build the 350-ship fleet Republican defense hawks have long sought and reverse decades of fleet contraction which has yielded today's battle force of 272 ships. And while the politics of large increases to the defense budget are dicey in the best of times, Trump sees a naval build-up as part of his agenda to create jobs, according to an October internal Trump campaign memo obtained by Navy Times.

The plan, if enacted, would aim to restore the Navy to a size it hasn�t been since 1998, and would mean tens of thousands of new sailor jobs. So far, it remains unclear what mix of ships the incoming administration wants to build more of, from $10 billion Ford-class carriers or $3 billion Virginia-class attack submarines to $500 million littoral combat ships, and how that fleet composition is connected to a strategic vision.

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[Thomas E. Johnson]

Looks like the battleships are coming back.

[Haijun watcher]

Perhaps Trump should have made Bannon SECNAV instead of his last job, since Bannon at least served as a USN officer during the Carter years.

Defense News

Uncharted waters: US Navy still searching for path to a bigger fleet
By: Christopher P. Cavas, April 3, 2017
WASHINGTON � Just about everybody in and around the U.S. Navy agrees there is a pressing need to build a bigger fleet. Just about nobody agrees on a way to get there.

It�s not yet clear what the overall goal will be � 355 ships, the latest figure put forth by the Navy to grow from today�s 308-ship fleet target � or the Trump administration�s oft-stated 350-ship fleet. No one knows how much the new fleet will cost because there have been no decisions on the new force�s makeup � how many submarines, aircraft carriers, big-deck amphibious ships, destroyers and the like will be needed.

No decisions have been reached on how or what to change from existing plans that all date from the previous presidential administration. No one is yet sure what those in power want � what their priorities are, what directions they want to take to reach yet-to-be-determined goals, even who the real players are. Some of those presupposed key players have yet to be named or nominated, much less put in office. There are no timelines yet for reaching any of those conclusions.

No one knows precisely what will be in the next budget because, for one, the Pentagon is still working on the fiscal 2018 budget which won�t be sent to Congress until mid-May, and secondly, Congress, trapped in a seemingly endless inability to pass timely defense budgets, still hasn�t finished work on the 2017 budget or moved on the 2017 supplemental requests. It�s hard to figure what to ask for next year when you don�t know what you�re going to get this year � but that�s what the Defense Department is dealing with.


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[Haijun watcher]

Foxtrot Alpha

The U.S. Navy is Screwed
Gary Wetzel
Today 12:05pm
Filed to: Navy

In May, Chief of Naval Operations Admiral John Richardson and acting Secretary of the Navy Sean Stackley appeared before a Senate Defense Appropriations Subcommittee hearing to discuss the recently unveiled fiscal year 2018 defense budget and its effects on the Navy. The news was not good about the state of the Navy and where the service is headed.

Despite campaign promises to rebuild the military from the twin disasters of sequestration and the 2011 Budget Control Act combined with nearly 16 years of combat deployments, the first Trump budget for the Navy does little to look to the future. This proposed budget only begins to fix the neglect of the past, placing more emphasis on getting the ships and submarines the repairs they desperately need.

The Navy has been in a long budgetary downward spiral since the Cold War ended. Back then, the Navy had just over 500 ships. Since then the fleet has dropped to 275 ships.

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[Haijun watcher]

Republican lawmakers set to introduce legislation calling for a 355-ship Navy

Defense News - June 21, 2017

Sen. Roger Wicker, of Mississippi, who chairs the Senate Seapower Subcommittee, and his House counterpart, Rep. Rob Wittman, of Virginia, are expected to roll out a brief, one-page bill on June 22 that aims for 355 ships �as soon as practicable,� the legislation reads.

The fleet goal is subject to Congress appropriating the money for all the new hulls; today�s U.S. Navy stands at 276 ships, according to its status on the Navy.mil website

Both lawmakers have been calling for the buildup, which mirrors the Navy�s recent force-structure assessment that said it needed 355 ships to meet the demands on its forces.

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[biggles2]

If they can keep from colliding with container ships!

[Haijun watcher]

Defense News

A 355-ship Navy? We�ll see, says Trump�s Navy secretary pick
By: David B. Larter, July 13, 2017
WASHINGTON � The man U.S. President Donald Trump chose to lead the Navy he pledged to build up to 350 ships doesn�t sound confident that a shipbuilding surge is going to happen.

Richard Spencer, a former U.S. Marine Corps pilot who spent the bulk of his career in private finance, told members of the Senate Armed Services Committee that he thought 355 ships sounded like a nice goal but suggested that capabilities were more important than capacity.

The panel voted Thursday to send Spencer to a confirmation vote in the full Senate.

�The 355 is a good number for people to focus on,� Spencer said in his Tuesday confirmation hearing. �Do we know exactly what the mix is? I think, since we're talking out a decade, we might not know, and we shouldn't know right now, because we have evolving technologies.�

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[navydavesof]

I am looking at a few proposals to reach the 355 ship goal with the most cheap and easy means possible. This means building new ships and reactivating and modernizing deactivated ships.

The topic for today is reacquiring the Kidd-class DDGs from Taiwan. One of the best things the USN could do is to reacquire the Kidd-class DDGs from the Taiwanese as they replace them with KDX-III DDGs. We could easily perform the Tico HM&E upgrade, replace the forward 5" with a Mk71 8"/60caliber gun, the forward Mk26 launcher with a 32-cell Mk41 VLS launcher and the aft Mk26 launcher with 64-cell Mk41 VLS tubes, Phalanx block 1B and 2 RAM launchers while keeping the Aegis upgraded Tartar-D system already on board the ship. Replacing the SPQ-9A with the SPQ-9B would greatly enhance the ship's ability to control it's gunfire but also to detect and engage sea-skimming missiles. As modified, these ships would be able to escort amphibs and perform reliable NGFS/naval gunnery strike with guided munitions that can reach to 65nm and attack targets 1000 miles inland with TLAMs. She could carry 2 HH-60s and 12-16 Shadow and ScanEagle UAVs for ISR and gunfire spotting. If the Navy were to be smart...that is a pretty big stretch.

[navydavesof]

that would be a 1st in that the usn gets 3rd hand ships. what condition are they in?

Hey, Dave! Awesome to hear from you, mate!!!

The Kidds a in very good condition. The Taiwanese have maintained them very well. They don't want to decommission them due to use but instead due to arrival of a superior replacement.

Even if they were in poor condition we could service them up to requirements and put them to sea. If such a modernization were to be called for, all of those concerns would be resolved as well.

[Timmy C]

If we accept the RAND conclusion that the majority of a warship's cost comes from their systems rather than the hull, I don't see how replacing those systems with new equipment is any cheaper in the long run once you include the decreased lifespan post-recommissioning (how much life is left?0, and the accompanying need to build a new replacement at the end of that period.

Unless you plan on just rebuying and refitting old ships every few years? Otherwise your fleet number will have to decrease after a few years or you build a new ship. If you're going to have to do the latter, might as well do it now on a hull that'll be good for the next 30-40 years.

[Admiral John Byng]

Doing things on the cheap is rarely successful. The magic 355 might be obtained by building groups of ships that are moderately capable of performing one mission (ASW, AAW ASuW, etc.) with very few self defence systems.

In my opinion this is not worth doing as each ship would be fairly vulnerable and would have limited ability to respond to developing threat scenarios. But given the size of the US fleet it might not matter too much as they would be accompanied by other warships which hopefully could deal with the other types of threat.

As Timmy says new hulls are more useful/cost effective than old.

[navydavesof]

If we accept the RAND conclusion that the majority of a warship's cost comes from their systems rather than the hull, I don't see how replacing those systems with new equipment is any cheaper in the long run once you include the decreased lifespan post-recommissioning (how much life is left?0, and the accompanying need to build a new replacement at the end of that period.

Unless you plan on just rebuying and refitting old ships every few years? Otherwise your fleet number will have to decrease after a few years or you build a new ship. If you're going to have to do the latter, might as well do it now on a hull that'll be good for the next 30-40 years.

No, it would be a modernization of the existing hull. As Carr has recently posted on his blog, the hull is actually a bigger part of the ship's cost than we originally thought. With the precision the Taiwanese have maintained these ships, we would benefit greatly from getting them back.

[Haijun watcher]

NavyDaveSof,

Please note an older thread on this very same topic in the History and Technology section.

EDITED TO ADD: THANKS TO THE MODERATORS FOR THE THREAD MERGE!

I doubt that Taiwan would be willing to part with their Kidd class DDGs unless you offer them something with comparable or better capability. What makes you so sure they will get the KDX-III destroyers from South Korea when even that country won't sell to Taiwan since they're wary of endangering trade relations with mainland China?

Or finally give Taiwan the diesel subs they want despite what your State department says about how doing so will upset mainland China. Yes I'm aware that the Kidds are more AAW-focused than ASuw/ASW, but subs are what Taiwan needs the most.

They're considering building the diesel subs on their own; selling them US-made diesel subs or perhaps expediting the purchase of Soryu class subs from Japan will significantly boost their capabilities.

Popular Mechanics article

Taiwan Has to Build its Own Submarines Because Nobody Is Willing to Anger China

By Kyle Mizokami
Mar 21, 2017
The president of Taiwan has announced the conclusion of the nation's disappointing, decades-long search for someone�anyone�to sell the country attack submarines for its defense: Nobody will, and so the island country will build its submarines. USNI News, citing the Japanese Kyodo News Agency, reports that Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen announced the start of the submarine program today at a Republic of China (Taiwan) Navy base.

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[CL40]

In regards to Taiwan, aren't they still operating a WWII era Tench class sub?

[Haijun watcher]

In regards to Taiwan, aren't they still operating a WWII era Tench class sub?

They're operating 4 subs. Two of them are upgraded "Guppy"/Tench/Balao class still being used for training.

The other two are Dutch-made Walrus class diesel subs made in the 1980s which are used for frontline duties. These 4 subs and the ROCN/Taiwanese surface fleet are still outnumbered by the China's 60+ subs (diesel and nuclear) and an expanding surface fleet that now includes 2 carriers.

Taiwan's better quality in military equipment and training won't cancel out China's quantitative advantage forever; with one of the world's largest economies, it's only a matter of time before China can outspend their Taiwanese cousins when it comes to technological advances and make the qualitative advantage irrelevant.

[maxim]

I would think that the Chinese navy already has qualitatively better ships than the Taiwanese navy - e.g. a Type 052D compared e.g. to an old Kidd class, I would think that the Type 052D is much better, has more advanced radars etc.

The Kidd class were built in 1978-82 - an very outdated, expensive to operate design. Most ships from that period in major navies are already out of commission. There were two navies, which refused to get the Kidd class after they were decommissioned by the US Navy: the Australian and Greek one. I am sure they had very good reasons to do so.

A bigger fleet can be only be only be afforded if cheaper ships, which are cheaper to operate, are bought - i.e. ships perhaps even cheaper than LCS... The USN appears to have today very similar problems than the Royal Navy after its peak of its might.

[navydavesof]

The Kidd class were built in 1978-82 - an very outdated, expensive to operate design. Most ships from that period in major navies are already out of commission. There were two navies, which refused to get the Kidd class after they were decommissioned by the US Navy: the Australian and Greek one. I am sure they had very good reasons to do so.

They would be modernized and manned like the Ticonderoga-class CGs. Manning would be cut by approximately 20% through automation. The Ticonderoga-class HM&E upgrade would allow them another 20 years of service.

A bigger fleet can be only be only be afforded if cheaper ships, which are cheaper to operate, are bought - i.e. ships perhaps even cheaper than LCS... The USN appears to have today very similar problems than the Royal Navy after its peak of its might.

To a point, yes. The 600 ship fleet was built by mass producing the Perry FFGs, reactivating the battleships, buying more CVNs, building a larger amphibious fleet, and maintaining the current fleet. That is all pretty expensive work...except for the battleships. They were really cheap purchases. For the price of a Perry FFG we brought them back, and if we went through with the modernizations in 1993 as was planned, we would have had VLS capable BBs for 1.5 the cost of an FFG.

Today, if we underwent a similar fleet rebuild, we could have a large number of new ships and reactivated old ones. Yes manning would be increased, but we also need the ships fast, and those are the ships we need.

[maxim]

They would be modernized and manned like the Ticonderoga-class CGs. Manning would be cut by approximately 20% through automation. The Ticonderoga-class HM&E upgrade would allow them another 20 years of service.

The Ticonderoga class is another outdated design, which is expensive to operate and the Congress (as far as I remember) forces the Navy to continue to operate them. The Navy probably prefers them to be decommissioned and replaced. To add systems to reduce manning by 20% is for sure an expensive modernisation, especially, if a 40 year old design should be modernised.

For the price of a Perry FFG we brought them back, and if we went through with the modernizations in 1993 as was planned, we would have had VLS capable BBs for 1.5 the cost of an FFG.

But the battleships were very, very expensive to operate - that was also the reason why they were so rapidly decommissioned. It would have been very expensive to bring them to modern standards - and then they would be still expensive to operate.

The USN would need something similar to the cheap Perry class frigates, but for sure at today's standards - or change its strategy to require less ships (if more ships are needed anyway and not only for bragging).

[Haijun watcher]

But the battleships were very, very expensive to operate -

Among those expenses was the requirement for a large crew: the 1980s Iowa class still had large crews even if they were slightly smaller than their WW2-era crew complements.

[navydavesof]

NavyDaveSof,

Hey, mate!

Please note an older thread on this very same topic in the History and Technology section.

Ah, I did not realize that! Thanks much.

355 ships (USN force level goal under Trump)

I doubt that Taiwan would be willing to part with their Kidd class DDGs unless you offer them something with comparable or better capability. What makes you so sure they will get the KDX-III destroyers from South Korea when even that country won't sell to Taiwan since they're wary of endangering trade relations with mainland China?

One of my coworkers recently spent 6 months aboard a KDXIII with the South Koreans, and they claim they have a deal with the Taiwanese to build 4 ships and to license the design for domestic construction.