This paper assesses the adequacy and affordability of current US Navy plans in light of current trends in naval warfare, expected future budget environments, and, most importantly, the likely operational demands associated with three enduring, long-term strategic challenges. These challenges are: defeating both the Sunni Salafi-Takfiri and Shia Khomeinist brands of violent Islamist radicalism; hedging against potential challenges posed by authoritarian capitalist states such as China and Russia; and preparing for a world in which there are more nuclear-armed regional powers. After conducting this assessment, the report lays out recommended changes to the current Navy plans in order to envision a future fleet that is both more capable and more affordable.
These recommended changes are shaped by the observation that the US Navy finds itself alone at the top of the global naval hierarchy with a comfortable margin of superiority. Given that the size of the Navy’s battle force stands at 280 ships — less than half the size of the ultimate Cold War fleet — this may be surprising to some. However, while the US battle force is smaller than it has been in over seven decades, so too are the rest of the world’s navies. Furthermore, the Navy is transitioning from a fleet of ships to what officials describe as FORCEnet: a system of collaborative battle networks that would share data from across the force to form common operational pictures and use internet protocol-based systems to enable interactive combat planning, targeting, and execution. This transition means that the Navy is now defined less by the numbers of ships in its Total Ship Battle Force, and more by the combined capabilities found in its Total Force Battle Network (TFBN). Moreover, the Navy’s TFBN is itself part of both a larger National Fleet, defined by the combined capabilities of the US Navy, US Marine Corps, US Coast Guard, and Military Sealift Command, as well as a larger Joint Total Force Battle Network. Once the additional support drawn from these two entities is factored in, the US Navy’s 280-ship fleet likely enjoys no less than a thirteen-navy standard in aggregate fleet combat power.
However, since 1990, comparing the US Navy against foreign navies is no longer an adequate way to judge US naval power. Instead, the Navy, along with the entire joint force, must prepare to fight two regional adversaries in overlapping timelines. Under this new two-war standard, in addition to conducting traditional naval fire and maneuver, the evolving TFBN would need to complete many additional tasks, such as: screening the arrival of joint forces, supporting joint operations ashore with air and missile attacks, and defending the joint force and allies from the same. In addition to preparing for two overlapping wars, the Navy also sizes its forces so that they can maintain persistent forward presence during peacetime. More than a decade’s worth of Navy analysis suggests that a two-war-plus-presence TFBN standard requires between 300 and 346 active ships, with a current objective target of 313. This means that the current 280-ship active fleet is now just 33 ships short of the Navy’s stated requirement.
Current Navy Plans
The Navy plans to meet this 313-ship TFBN goal with an aggressive thirty-year shipbuilding and force modernization plan. However, these plans suffer from two deficiencies. First, the resulting fleet lacks certain capabilities required to meet the operational demands of the three aforementioned strategic challenges. Specifically, it lacks the range to face increasingly lethal, land-based, maritime reconnaissance-strike complexes, or nuclear-armed regional adversaries. Moreover, it does not adequately take into account the changing nature of undersea warfare, or the potential prospect of a major maritime competition with China.
Second, even if the Navy’s desired TFBN could match up perfectly against future operational requirements, the signs are that the Navy’s plans are far too ambitious given likely future resource allocations. Between FY 2003 and FY 2008, the Navy spent an average of $11.1 billion a year for new-ship construction (in constant FY 2009 dollars). In comparison, the average annual cost for new-ship construction projected by the Navy and Congressional Budget Office (CBO) is $20.4 and $22.4 billion, respectively. Moreover, these costs do not include the substantial resources necessary to build the twelve replacements for the current strategic ballistic missile submarine force. It seems clear, then, that the Navy needs to scale back its current plans; they are simply too ambitious for expected future budgets.