On the FY 14 Shipbuilding Plan

AEI's Mackenzie Eaglen and I have an Op-Ed at RealClearDefense this morning.  Here's a key point: "The latest interim plan will cause aggregate combat power to decline along with numbers, leaving the fleet less capable of dealing with open ocean submarine threats, enemy surface fleets, and the majority of threat aircraft and missiles. Additionally, the Navy continues to under-resource its amphibious ships, meeting neither the Marine Corps’ combat requirement of 38 ships nor the worldwide combatant commanders’ requirement for a similar number."

We can talk all we want about re-balancing and relying more heavily on American Seapower, but in the end, what we buy is a reflection of what we value. 

The plan relies on over-optimistic budget assumptions (which is not surprising, but is rather the norm in the kabuki played out between the Navy and Congress when it comes to the shipbuilding account) and ignores the impact of sequestration.  It does not appear to reflect any real shift in emphasis to Seapower derived of the strategic guidance issued by the President last year.  It retires ships long before the end of their service lives not because they aren't useful, but because we cannot afford to both operate them and build the future force given the current resource allocation.

We cannot afford the Navy we have nor the Navy we need.  We must either strategically re-prioritize to obtain the resources necessary to buy and operate that Navy (progress toward which I see little evidence of), or we need to change the Navy we have to one we can afford.  Jerry Hendrix wants to de-emphasize carriers.  I want to shed the SSBN nuclear deterrence mission.  Wayne Hughes wants to alter the fleet design.  Simply shrinking the same fleet we have now to one 2/3 of its size over the next 15 years (the actual glide-slope we are on)  is not the answer, unless what you desire is the ability to do what we do now a little less well, in fewer places with diminished simultaneity. 

Bryan McGrath