The Design Base Pays for Itself, As it Should

The Navy has invested in the Block III Virginia class submarine in a big way, but what catches my attention is the cost savings because a few elected officials kept their eyes on the ball and paid attention to detail, keeping everyone focused.

The U.S. Navy on Monday awarded a $14 billion contract to General Dynamics Corp and Northrop Grumman Corp for eight Virginia-class submarines, saying it had met a "nearly impossible" target of cutting the cost of each ship by $400 million.

The five-year contract calls for production of one submarine in 2009, one in 2010 and two submarines in each of the following three years, the Navy said, noting it would cut acquisition costs of the 2012 ships by about 20 percent.

General Dynamics, based in Falls Church, Virginia, is the lead contractor for the nuclear-powered submarines, but shares construction equally with Los Angeles-based Northrop.

The Navy said it invested $600 million in more than 100 design changes to make the ship more efficient to produce and cut its build time to 60 months from 84 months. Overall, the effort will cut $4 billion from the overall submarine program.

First, credit both General Dynamics Corp and Northrop Grumman Corp for taking on the challenge to get the Virginia class submarine costs to target, shaving $400 million off a ships cost is not easy, and they did it while increasing capabilities of the submarine. Fantastic work.

Note the lesson here, the $600 million was invested over a period of many years towards the submarine design base, insuring they kept working but had plenty of money to build a better submarine. What is the result? $4 billion in savings for just these eight submarines, and there will be more savings down the road as we buy more.

This is what is missing in the rest of shipbuilding. There is no investment regarding design for the Littoral Combat Ship hull, nor the DDG-51 for that matter. I still think cheap ships start with a robust shipbuilding design industry, something Congress should think about as a way to pull the Navy out of the hell they find themselves buried in with very few designs and several less than exciting options despite really good hulls like T-AKE and LPD-17 to build on.

While I hate to use Great Britain for a model of anything, when the MoD was facing tough choices for cuts, note they have essentially discarded everything over there from ships to shipyards, BUT they have kept funding a robust design industry. Why? Because MoD knows if they lose their design base, they really do lose their ability to build a Navy.