Navy Unveils Surprise Plan For Littoral Combat Ships

[Peter1469]

The Navy has new plans for its Littoral Combat Ships: they are going to be armed with the new Naval Strike Missile, and 15 LCSs will be outfitted with an anti-sub module, and another 15 with anti-mine capabilities.


Navy Unveils Surprise Plan For Littoral Combat Ships

The Navy plans to put its new Naval Strike Missile on 31 of its 35 Littoral Combat ships over the next 18 months, while outfitting 15 ships with an anti-submarine module, and 15 others with anti-mine capabilities.

That breakneck pace of the proposed LCS upgrades is the clearest sign yet of the Navy’s concern over its being outgunned by the Chinese surface navy, and the premium being placed on keeping eye on new generations of capable Chinese and Russian submarines prowling below.


The new details were offered by Adm. Mike Gilday in testimony before the House Appropriations defense subcommittee, representing his most ambitious public comments concerning the LCS fleet to date.


The LCS class has struggled to find a place in the fleet after its original mission modules — designed to be moved on and off ships given whatever mission they were performing — failed to develop as planned. But Adm. Mike Gilday told the committee today, “we’re very bullish on LCS” moving forward, a departure from previous comments where he portrayed the class as a problem to be surmounted.

[MMC]

Navy will fall far below mandated 355 ships as China churns out war vessels.....



Not since the Cold War era has the demand on Navy shipbuilding been so high, but the difference now is a flat defense budget and a decade of lost buying power, a top service official told lawmakers.


By law, the Navy must have a 355-ship fleet but presently has just 296 ships, and its latest 30-year shipbuilding plan would not reach the requirement until 2031 to 2033 if it was funded fully. But that plan projects 4.1% budget increases each year. This year’s defense budget is flat (0% growth), making the benchmark to keep pace with China’s rapidly growing navy impossible, service officials and hawkish lawmakers warn.


“China and Russia are rapidly modernizing their militaries, attempting to undermine our alliances, undermining the free and the open international order we’ve worked so hard to sustain,” he said.



To put the challenge into context, Gilday said the last time the Navy had to build so many ships to keep pace with an adversary was the period from 1981 to 1985. The foe back then: the Soviet Union.


“We were trying to recapitalize the strategic deterrent and grow the conventional force,” he said. “During that time, the DOD budget rose at an annual rate of 7.5%. Right now, our buying power has been flat since 2010.”


The fiscal year 2021 budget does not put the Navy on a funding trajectory to afford 300 ships, while assessments by the Navy, industry, and think tanks call for a sea service larger than 355 ships to meet America's national security and global alliance needs.


“In terms of challenges in the future, I would tell you, I think it comes down to not technology, per se, but numbers of ships,” he said, responding to a question about increasing competition in the Arctic and far north, where the Navy has conducted some 20 exercises in the past 18 months as polar ice caps melt and open new waterways......snip~


Gilday told lawmakers the U.S. Navy was not going to keep up with China and can only barely maintain the fleet size it currently has.....snip~

Navy will fall far below mandated 355 ships as China churns out war vessels | Washington Examiner