Hunter’s amendment, adopted by voice vote, puts advanced procurement funding for two Virginia-class attack submarines into the budget. One would be built in 2010 and the second in 2011. The budget request sent to Congress earlier this year included funding for only one Virginia.6 months vs 8 months is a very interesting comment, because that implies the House added a brand new Virginia class on top of what was proposed last year. We have previously covered what has been discussed as the 2-1-2 plan, basically the Navy would build 2 submarines in FY10, 1 submarine in FY11, and 2 submarines again in FY12 eight months apart, which would shift construction of submarines from one every 12 months, to three build every 8 months, before going to two a year, or one every 6 months. If they Navy is going to every 6 months, that implies the House wants to begin construction of two Virginia class submarines starting in FY10 instead of FY12. Next comes Aircraft.
Rep. Roscoe Bartlett of Maryland, ranking Republican on the seapower and expeditionary forces subcommittee, described this as a rate of one sub every six months.
An amendment regarding F/A-18 Super Hornet procurement also was adopted by voice vote at the urging of Rep. Todd Akin, R-Mo., who warned the Navy won’t have enough fighters as planes age.Roughead played this issue like a champ, and deserves credit. Congress has now made it an obligation for him to make the aircraft shortfalls an issue for FY10. This issue wasn't even on the radar 3 months ago. Observe the brilliance at work here, Roughead didn't speak up on the F-18 shortages, which are real, until after Boeing lost the Tanker deal with Northrop Grumman. Rather than asking to increase the speed for the Joint Strike Fighter, which would be very expensive to do (remember, faster delivery always costs more), Roughead is requesting the most affordable option with Super Hornets, which just happen to be made by Boeing. With the timing, Roughead has given Congress some cover with Boeing allow them to support the Air Force tanker deal Northrop Grumman won. Very well done.
“Aircraft carriers are nice things to have and float around, but without airplanes they are not very good,” Akin said.
For the surface fleet things get interesting. The House rejected the Navy's request to retire the USS Enterprise early. That isn't a surprise, we look forward to Plan B, which we did not think Congress would supply with its additional directions on the subject. The Navy has been directed to study options including brining the retired John F. Kennedy back into service or delaying the retirement of the Kitty Hawk. There was also news on the surface ship issue.
The bill also includes full funding for a 10th San Antonio-class amphibious transport dock, destroyer funding for either continuing the Zumwalt-class DDG 1000 program or returning to the Arleigh Burke class, and money for the two final ships of the T-AKE class of ammunition ships.Basically the House replaced the DDG-1000 with 1 LPD-17 and 2 T-AKEs. What also isn't said is that the House funded 2 Littoral Combat Ships, increased the cost cap above $460 million, but also did not fully fund both ships relying on some left over supply from LCS-3 and LCS-4 which were canceled. Someone smarter and more informed than I will have to explain the LCS story in better detail, because it looks like some Congressional math at work.
Regardless, the House version of the shipbuilding budget is now 2 SSN, 2 LCS, 1 JHSV, 1 LPD-17, and 4 T-AKEs, 10 ships, as predicted by Murtha.
The House version of the bill faces an uphill battle with the cancellation of the DDG-1000, because the Maine mafia will not be happy. The House didn't ignore Bath Iron Works though, they added $400 million to restart DDG-51 production if the Navy desires, or to use the money as long lead time for a DDG-1000 at some distant point in time in the future. This change has the Maine mafia screaming, setting up an ugly committee battle.
The Navy needs to step in, because the Maine mafia is going to go down in flames on this issue. When you think about who is going to form the committee, it is very likely Senate Webb is going to be involved, and the political opportunity to deliver 10 ships for a potential Vice Presidential candidate is coming down the track like a train. Notice who is doing all the talking, I quoted Republicans, they are very proud of the House bill. Gene Taylor has done an excellent job here, he has essentially controlled everything, masterfully played the politics while sticking to a strategy outlined from the beginning, and did it with broad bipartisan support. It is also clear Gene Taylor is tuned in with some very smart people in the Navy, because he is supporting the Navy in all the critical areas of the fleet while fighting the Navy on the questionable decisions. The Maine mafia defending the DDG-1000 faces near certain defeat against what will ultimately be broad bipartisan support, with many Senators trading Navy ships for programs in other services.I don't know what the Navy will do, maybe nothing, but I do know what I would do. I'd ask the committee to take the $400 million and invest it in long lead design and construction for a modified non-AEGIS combatant version of the General Dynamics Littoral Combat Ship hull. There is still $10 billion dollars in the DDG-1000 budget in future years, a lot more money if you count the LCS budget, and that adds up to a bunch of frigates in times of constrained budgets that could and should all be produced at Bath while NG continues building LPD-17 hulls of various types. That would legitimately get the fleet growing again with smaller surface combatants relevant to the emerging maritime era.
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