Navy Community - discussions, photos, video - Navy Times

Where are the ships?

The first joint Navy, Marine Corps and Coast Guard maritime strategy is laudable on many fronts, but it fails to deliver a plan to equip the sea services with the tools needed to achieve it.

The strategy correctly argues for global cooperation — the so-called “1,000-ship navy” — to ensure peace and economic prosperity. The sea services must project force, but also conduct more “soft power” missions such as maritime security operations, engagement, and humanitarian and disaster relief. People, training and networks for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance are priorities.

Conspicuously lacking, however, is the desperate need for recapitalization. In fact, the Navy and Coast Guard appear to be undermining the very programs — Littoral Combat Ship and Deepwater — they will need to equip them for the future.

A cynical interpretation of the strategy is: “Thanks to our chronic mismanagement of our resources, we are unable to field a fleet of appreciable size commensurate with global responsibilities, so we must rely on you, our allies, to help us do the job.”

Those looking for direction in this document for the kind of fleet needed to do the job will not find it. The Navy is down to 279 ships today. A larger fleet was mapped early last year, when the Navy released its 30-year, 313-ship plan. That it is now formulating a strategy on what to do with that fleet is backward.

Navy officials say the strategy is the intellectual foundation for a bigger force, whispering of a classified annex that justifies building plans.

Bunk. The classified annex isn’t part of the maritime strategy. It’s the Navy Strategic Plan, an annual list of scenarios upon which the service builds its six-year budget.

By not including or even alluding to a recapitalization plan in the strategy, the Navy missed a golden opportunity to link its strategy and equipment needs in a single clear case for lawmakers.

With a money-gobbling war in Iraq, flat future funding levels and rising global commitments, making that combined case to legislators was essential. Mark this as an opportunity missed.

The Navy and Coast Guard need large numbers of ships, built economically, using as much proven technology — or affordable innovation — as possible. They must be equipped with networks that will allow them to magnify their efficacy. It’s a big world, and numbers count for capability — and relevance.

Yet the Navy by its own hand is mismanaging LCS, the key vessel in its strategy, and the lead vessels of a planned 55-ship class are over budget. Overruns on lead ships are common and should have been expected.

The Coast Guard appears to be souring on its Deepwater effort to link air, sea and command assets into a brilliantly networked package. The service had argued that good command systems and unmanned aerial vehicles would reduce the number of ships it needs.

But service officials plan to cancel key UAV and other efforts, undermining its ability to act as an integrated force — a capacity underscored by the new maritime strategy — and will get still fewer hulls in the bargain.

The Navy says it has set forth its case for growth. Now, it’s time to build a practical case for realizing it. Now is a time for leadership.