President Obama wants the U.S. Navy to patrol the vast Pacific Ocean and build itself up in the Middle East. Which is a nice dream. But the Navy is conceding it won’t build many ships to make it a reality — especially over the next five years. The Navy’s acknowledged as much — tensely, defensively, and always with a retort — for months. But now it’s officially revised its long-term shipbuilding plan downward and provided details about what’s effectively a five-year shipyard freeze.
According to the new shipbuilding plan...(.pdf), released Wednesday by Deputy Defense Secretary Ashton Carter, the Navy won’t build any new ballistic missile submarines until 2021. It won’t build any big-deck amphibious assault ships, key for the Navy and the Marines to fight as a team, until 2017, when it will build… one more. After next year, the Navy won’t fund the construction of ships above replacement levels until 2018. All told, the Navy’s downgrading the total number of ships in 30 years it wants to maybe 300, a drop of at least 13 ships. And all this will occur as the Navy surges in the Persian Gulf and the Western Pacific.