The Growth and the Leap Ahead

 I like this slide, but I keep thinking this slide needs to be associated with a slide that details what kind of ships the US Navy is buying through the years.

In FY2012 numbers, the FY14 budget is around $150 billion, which can be compared with the green number.

The Naval Strike Warfare Center ("Strike U") is probably the most important major initiative in the 1980s, because in 1983 it is legitimate to say naval aviation was terrible at actually hitting targets. Following the embarrassment in Lebanon, strike warfare in naval aviation reoriented itself much in the same way Top Gun reoriented intercept.

This increase in naval aviation strike efficiency combined with the addition of long range cruise missiles on both ships and submarines had an effect that was greater than the naval buildup in the 1980s, it increased the lethality at range of each platform. By 1989 not only was the US Navy fielding 14 CV/CVNs, 4 Battleships, over 100 cruisers and destroyers, and 99 submarines; but each ship was increasingly more capable. The ultimate effect of the naval buildup of the 1980s wasn't simply the expanded growth of the fleet, but in every category of naval power the force was extending the gap separating the capability of US naval power and naval power throughout the rest of the world.

It is simplistic to focus on the raw numbers of fleet size when looking at the 1980s when measuring naval power of the United States relative to the world. It is more important to focus on the elements within each community that increased capabilities relative to the world. Technology was only a small part of the story, the increased emphasis on quality training for the all-volunteer force was at least as important as technology was in extending the gap between what US naval forces were capable of and what competitors were capable of.