Feature 3 | SHIPBUILDING
Report brands US Navy shipbuilding
plans “unrealistic”
A report by the Centre for Strategic & International Studies (CSIS)
published in August has branded the US Navy’s shipbuilding plan as a
“costly illusion” that is unaff ordable and unrealistic.
he report is the latest damning strategy, the report said. for 21st Century Seapower is a set of
indictment of the state of naval “Key mission areas such as amphibious concepts that was not linked to any
Tshipbuilding in the US, and says lift capability and the number of attack clearly defined force plan, modernisation
that the US Navy’s procurement policy submarines are likely to be affected plan, programme, or budget,” said
“is in serious disarray.” by funding shortfalls. To compensate Kaeser. “Navy shipbuilding plans
Unrealistic force plans, over-optimistic for such gaps, the US Navy relies on are now shaped more as the result of
cost estimates, unrealistic projections untested and unbudgeted assumptions budgetary constraints than as a response
of technical feasibility, and inadequate about extended service life cycles to strategic requirements. They seem to
programme management have created an for amphibious ships, cruisers and be an expression of wishful thinking
unaffordable shipbuilding programme. destroyers,” said the author of the report, rather than a realistic strategic guideline
This has led the US Navy to phase Hans Ulrich Kaeser. for naval procurement.”
out capable ships for new ships that “The problem starts at a conceptual The Congressional Budget Office
it cannot fund, threatening its ability disconnect between strategy and reality. (CBO) estimates that the execution
to implement an effective maritime The US Navy’s Co-operative Strategy of the US Navy’s current 30-year
shipbuilding plan would cost an average
US$25 billion per year, 30% above US
Navy estimates.
Cost overruns - such as the estimated
US$1 billion for the CVN-78 aircraft
carrier - jeopardise the entire programme,
said the report. “Over-optimistic cost
estimates have led Navy officials to shift
funding to the out-years. This will cause
a temporary shortfall of carriers and a
breach of US law,” the report claims.
As also explained in the executive
summary of the report, unrealistic cost
estimates and doubts about requirements
have led to the cancellation of the
DDG-1000 guided-missile destroyer
project. After expenditure of more
than US$10 billion, the programme has
been abandoned at two ships, and the
production line of the older Arleigh
Burke class destroyer will have to be
re-opened.
A similar fate has struck the Littoral
Combat Ship (LCS) programme, where
a threefold cost increase and unrealistic
schedules led to the cancellation of
appropriations for the next two ships
and to consequential rescheduling of
the programme.
The CSIS report cites a number of systemic problems in US Navy shipbuilding efforts that In the report’s view, this discrepancy
have led to delays and cost over-runs on programmes such as LCS. between plans, strategy and reality
30 Warship Technology October 2008
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