Admiral Rickover was an ardent opponent of the DOD 5000 philosophy, believing that it directly and indirectly encouraged an acquisition system which had a perverse combination of incentives for graft and corruption, of disincentives for productive delivery of platforms and systems, and an almost complete lack of accountability / transparency.
The relationship between our military and the MIC is an incestuous one. I believe the graft, corruption, and other criminal actions by many military and civilian personnel are rampant. Rickover was spot on, and likely underestimated the seriousness of the issue. Given the size and complexity of the military and its intertwining with the MIC, it cannot be trusted to inspect itself. It would take something on the order of DOGE to root out the worst of the rot and make extreme examples of those who are guilty of debasing the trust we placed in them.
Look at the relatively slight actions taken against those found guilty in the recent Fat Leonard activity in our 7th Fleet. It would take an irresponsible person to think that only the 7th Fleet engaged in the criminal activity, or that there is only one Fat Leonard getting rich off of our corrupt military.
Your Navy got complacient and too self-assured, unwilling to change the beneficial status quo and assuming that all the problems could be just pushed into future because "we surely would think of some solution tomorrow". Your leadership believed too much into free market as absolute solution, disregarding actual, material production (like producing steel, machinery, building cargo ships) in favor of financial operations. Finally, your population believed in their own exceptionalism too firmly, outright refusing to admit the existence of competitors at first, and disregarding and downplaying them second, inventing all possible excuses for that.
Our Congress and multiple presidential administrations gutted the defense industrial base and encouraged endless mergers that caused a lot of facilities to close. The USN had no power over those things. Congress took the resulting savings and frittered it away on foolishness the way every Western Democracy did in the years from 1991 to now.
Agree, but whenever the topic of USN shipbuilding comes up, people want to blame the "MIC" or blame "the admirals". This form of blame doesn't get to the root causes of the problems afflicting the navy, which means they won't do anything to solve them either.
It is not limited to the Admirals, or SES types. But that does not excuse not holding any of the Admirals or SES accountable. It is a festering wound that needs to be punctured and doused with harsh legal/corrective/criminal antibiotics.
I don't disagree that the admirals need to be held responsible for their piece of things, but this thread has featured a lot of 'death to the admirals' and very little 'what actually happened that got us here'. If you want to punish somebody, punish them for their piece and don't let the other criminals get away with their part of the crime.
It's pretty much never the armed service that creates these cockups, and there's very little incompetence in the admiralty that's to blame here. Congress mandated a mission for DD(X) that made no sense, then killed DD(X). Congress killed CG(x) instead of pursuing some kind of Tico replacement. Congress allowed the Defense Industrial Base to collapse. Various Presidential Administrations from Clinton, through Bush Jr., to Obama pursued foolish schemes such as 'skip a generation of weapons'. The government kept kicking the can down the road and pretending the Chinese were our pals. Clinton gave them the money to build a massive military by giving them permanent favored nation status and getting them into the WTO. Bush ignored their games, even as they were holding our aviators hostage (the debacle with the EP-3 should never be forgotten). Obama tried to 'pivot to Asia', but did very little to make that stick, and infamously had the tooling for the F-22 destroyed and the program truncated.
All very well said. But along the way, our military leadership got onboard for a variety of reasons I suspect not the least of which would include internal politics and ambition. They threw away what worked and their supposed knowledge of institutional history. Some of the biggest cheerleaders for our failed programs and structure have worn a rather significant number of stars on their uniforms.
Indeed it was a total government failure. But the elite that we pay to rise above and offer at least value if not effective solutions not only failed but fed the scoundrels. They seemed to enjoy the system. Hopes are on the closeted rebels of the Flag class and more importantly the JOs that didn’t fully buy into subpar education…meaning indoctrination.
No blame on FOGOs for Fat Leonard, LCS, Fitzgerald/McCain, Bonhomme Richard, DDG-1000, LPD-17, Ticonderago modernization, Red Hill fuel debacle, SSN Maintenance backlog, Constellation Frigate, ....? Hard to take you seriously.
So, since this is a thread that was about FF(X) and not about Bonhomme Richard or Tico modernization or most of the other things you raised, I'm not sure why I was supposed to start slinging blame at admirals. As far as DDG-1000, a lot of that blame does belong with Congress for insisting the thing become a BB replacement and then deciding to cancel the whole shebang after steel was already cut. I don't particularly care if you take me seriously or not. I'm stating the brutal facts. Civilian leadership sets the tone. However emotionally satisfying it may be, blaming FOGOs all the time won't fix the mistakes the civilian leadership has caused.
Knowing what you want is the basic problem with clients' requirements, even in a more malleable discipline like software engineering, where we don't deal with steel and welding.
How is it that our Navy brass and its commanders do not know what they want?
Maybe they are just pen pushers behind the desk?
Or maybe they operated on the "Show me a stone" paradigm?
Our admirals know what they want. They just can't get it. They wanted a frigate with CAPTAS sonar and a modest number of VLS cells. Congress/President said, "thou shalt use some other country's ship and make it fit". They couldn't. Even as Constellation was sinking, there were some in Congress wanting to add more VLS tubes to an already overweight/overwrought design.
They were arrogant, bought and paid for, and looking for that retirement job. Ever since Woodrow Wilson's presidency the Ivy League have walked away from God and started working for OLD DELUDER SATAN. Even Harvard changed their shield. Now we have over 5 generations of Ivy League trained leaders in every part of government, at every level of leadership who honor that tainted mindset. If you deny God . . . how successful will you be? David Barton presentations apply.
Plenty for small boats, aircraft, and missiles; more rounds can be carried, and a feeling you won't be using a gun against larger surface combatants m.
Its posted, but the Nay does some weird thing where theirs are the only budget docs I can't get opened. Sometimes they work on my phone. I wish I knew the trick others are using.
The soon to be retired flags, who will soon be board members on the defense industry "primes" and the congress critters who dole out the defense funding in return for campaign donations are on full alert. The endless litany of defense acquisition "guidance" and milestone requirements still remain in effect as far as I know (if not Hurrah!). Efforts to "speed up the process" will face challenges from "risk assessments", AoA studies, and etc. etc. as the dead horse is drug out of the closet to be beaten once again for the first time. All of these are lucrative for the "primes". Our acquisition process is now all about money and whose pocket or influence power base it goes to. Actual capability for the warfighter is incidental, indeed accidental should it occur. Changing this incentive structure will literally shatter the rice bowls of the flag ranks. Perhaps this is why they hate Hegseth and Trump so much? Perhaps? Maybe? The world wonders...
This is the most encouraging FF(X) piece you’ve written—not because the ship suddenly looks formidable, but because the Navy has finally recommitted to a process that has actually worked. The FY27 language matters less for what it promises and more for what it acknowledges: that the DDG‑51 flight model, not a frozen baseline or a PowerPoint‑perfect design, is how you build enduring combat power.
Your discomfort with Flight I is still exactly right. A minimally adapted NSC is useful, but only briefly. If Flight I lingers, the program will quietly fail while meeting every bureaucratic milestone. The difference today is that Flight II is no longer hypothetical—it exists in the budget and in explicit references to VLS, ASW, and Aegis‑based integration. That’s a real line crossed.
But invoking the Burke model comes with an obligation many forget. DDG‑51 didn’t succeed because Flight I was great; it succeeded because Wayne Meyer’s philosophy was enforced without mercy: build a little, test a little, learn a lot. Capability was inserted early, tested at sea, corrected fast, and then iterated again. Long design pauses weren’t a feature—they were the enemy.
That’s where the timeline still fails the smell test. A Flight II stuck in design well into the 2030s isn’t evolution—it’s drift. Meyer didn’t win by waiting for perfection; he won by forcing real capability into real ships and letting testing, not studies, drive the next step. If FF(X) follows the form of the Burke model without its tempo, the comparison is just ceremonial.
Your hull‑number question isn’t trivia. If the Navy really believes this is the return of the frigate, it should claim that lineage openly. Programs that hedge their identity tend to hedge their ambition, too.
So, here’s the hard test: if FF(X) is to matter, Flight II must arrive by 2032 with integrated VLS, real ASW, Aegis‑level combat system integration, protected growth margins, disciplined manning, and a faster build rhythm than Flight I. Miss that window, and we’ll have built another pause disguised as progress.
The irony is this: by your own WorldWar™ clock, we’re measuring years again—exactly what Meyer spent his career trying to kill. Ships don’t get better by waiting. They get better by being built, tested, broken, fixed, and sent back out—before the next WorldWar™ starts.
"build a little, test a little, learn a lot" - This is not only how successful ship programs are run, it is also the way children become successful adults. If no one is allowed to actually fail, we will not understand the limits of design and physics and there will be no progress. Right now, we seem to be stuck in some sort of participation trophy meme. Lessons learned with DDG-51 Flight I is what led to the addition of the helo hangar. We even learned a lot from building and testing the T-AGOS 19 class. A T-AGOS is absolutely not a frigate or destroyer, but we still learned a lot, even on builder's trials.
We already have pages and pages of lessons learned from various shipbuilding programs and various weapons procurement programs.
We have the Russia-Ukraine war as a source of information and data concerning oncoming weapons technology which could be applied to a war at sea, with proper discretion.
We have smart people who know enough about all these topics to manage the technical and programmatic risks of applying all this knowledge to a 21st Century war at sea.
What we haven't had and what is desperately needed is an honest conversation concerning what a major war at sea in the 21st Century among peer naval adversaries will look like, and what kind of US Navy and supporting USAF resources will be needed to fight that major war at sea.
Only after we have that conversation, can we take the knowledge and the experience we already have in our hands and apply it usefully to the task of rebuilding the US Navy to handle a major war at sea with the Chinese.
Absolutely agree. We need conversations like you wrote about with all the seriousness of a country that will need at some point in the near future to fight for its very existence.
And in the meantime, we need to get SOMETHING to sea. I believe we are capable of walking and chewing gum at the same time.
Are we going to get SOMETHING to sea just to get SOMETHING to sea knowing full well that the 'something' won't be useful for fighting an extended war at sea with the Chinese?
We could have a more combat oriented flight of an existing warship faster that has VLS, Aegis CSL / COMBATTS-21 and limited ASW sooner than we will see this in an HII ship. MMSC at Fincantieri. No reason we can't be building more than one class of small combatant. We've been doing it for many years now.
It's not that simple, to install VLS into the hull, not designed to hold them from beginning. The VLS have a long deck penetration; it would require holing several decks, rearranging equipment beneath. For the Fligh I, the container launchers would suffice. Four Mk-70 container launchers on stern would give you 16 cells - perfectly enough for ESSM's, VL-ASROC & some strike missiles.
noted, though I will point out, that it was nearly twice the size of the previous (Adams) class, but the same number of weapons, 2 guns, ASROC, a missile launcher and 6 torps.
There clearly was space to add weaps. in that extra 4,000 ton displacement
You won't get that many 40' containers aft, but you could get 4 x 20' with 16 PRSM Blk II. That could eventually be 240 120mm rockets each equivalent to a 155mm shell.
Yeah, I'm puzzled why USN didn't move to adopt PRSM - especially considering that it could work as anti-ship missile too, giving American warships finally some supersonic capability.
They'll do for now, once FltII is in the water they can be re-fitted or, kept to patrolling permissive environment AO's like how the current NSC's are used.
What exactly could be done about it? New shipyard are costly, and require a lot of highly trained manpower - which USA didn't exactly have, since your civilian shipbuilding is very small. China is able to ramp up their naval construction because they have immense civilian shipbuilding; they could easily pick the best engineers, mechanics, welders, ect. for higher pay on naval shipyards. USA did not have such capability.
We’d do what we had to if our homes and family were attacked. We would start to design something using available designs, solutions, materials, vendors, weapons systems and power plants. We’d use a hull design from someplace like the Naval Institute Press. We’d use the biggest COTS diesel engines we could get our hands on, we figure out a weapons suite and a communication flow and keep going from there.
Yeah, problem is, other guy would be doing the same. And since the other guy is China - which is literally the industrial heart of the world - they would always got more and better.
It's not so much boldness of action, but pre-set cultural stereotype about "small but better army of Good Guys defeating hordes of Bad Guys through boldness and daring thinking". Problem is, while it is not impossible, on practice it's way more often that side with more resources & better numbers would win. Farragut, for example, have vast resources of Union on his side; his daring actions were supported by both superior numbers and superior industrial capabilities. During most of the wars that America won, America actually played as juggernaut, throwing enormous numbers of troops and materials at the enemy. While Americans are certainly capable of boldness and unquestionable heroism, the general rule of American warfighting was always "bid for time to prepare, and then hammer the enemy with reasonable disregard for losses".
That expresses my thoughts exactly. Thank you, Andy.
As one reads about WWII, the books pile up. One realizes how many ways we competed with Japan and Germany. We competed in realms, and we kept it up.
Quantity was crucial, yes, but so many different types of airplanes, bombs, ships, subs, radar, Navaho language, decoding experts and equipment, communications, replenishment, artillery and ammunition. That’s just a starter kit.
The white oak forest management at Naval Support Activity Crane shows that it is possible for the Navy to think long term, plan, and act accordingly - as long as there is no defense megacorporation with their hand in the till.
Problem is, that there are no government-controlled shipyards in USA anymore. You can't force megacorps to relent by threatening "oh well, we just would build new ships on government yard, and you would got no contracts at all - unless you would agree to limit your appetites!"
Speaking of the USS Constitution, my reading says it won because it was bigger, with thicker/denser live oak wall, had bigger guns and more men, so it could pound away. Modern navies, including the U.S., are not building those kinds of warship ships (or at speed). All this chatter about advanced missiles and such (I ran the Navy and Marine Corps weapons budgets (1986-1992, all the missiles, torpedoes, guns and ammunition and visited all the manufacturers and some ammunition plants), and still believe the most effective weapons in modern naval history were the U.S. 5-inch-54 and fast-firing U.S. and British 6-inch guns that could rain fire on the enemy. Missiles are nice and have range, but these 2 and three inch pop guns aren't going to do it when you need volume and are surrounding by an enemy employing saturation attacks.
Just buy/license/steal the JSDF Mogami class FFG. Better gun, checks all the boxes, and the Aussies like it too. Commonality with our allies all in the same sphere. Public keel-hulling under a Ford class for anybody at NAVSEA that Foxtrot's it up or becomes a spec.creaper.
People seem obsessed with Mogami, but the Korean FFX Batch III/IV would probably be a better ASW ship / escort. Mogami's powerplant is similar to the US FFX. 1 geared gas turbine with 2 geared diesels. The Korean ships have a shaft mounted PMM for quiet running to 17 knots. Also the same engines in the gensets as Constellation. My bet it Connie's electric motor is a doubled up version of Korea's FFX.
At over $1 Billion with no VLS nor sonar to be delivered in 5 years is a BIG FAT GTFO.
We are are large surface combatant and if we are unable to build a sub $1 Billion escort FFG then scrap it and use the funds for more Burkes.
In fact open up another yard for building Burke Lite till the ens of time.
The time for an FFG was 1998-2003 but instead we focused on transformation and the Street Fighter. If that name didn’t send you running for the lifeboats it should have.
No longer are we a capable nation at building small water craft. If there is a “true need” for a Frigate pick up the phone and buy from the Japanese.
Till then focus ever naval engineer, welder, rigger, electrician, systems integrator on the hulls we build now and designing, cutting steel and launching those at scale including multiple variants to fill the needs of the FFG.
A Burke Lite, C2 LPD-C2, LPD-Arsenal, etc
The USN should only be allowed 2 new clean sheet hulls no more SNN(X) & CGN/BBGN. Leverage the hulls we have and get crazy with a High/Low mix of specialty variants. Existing hulls are known and have existing supply chains. Use the money saved from more failed new hulls to invest in actual workforces and new yards. Force the existing MBAs at Hill & GD to cut the bullshit with stretching out backlogs and incentives early delivery.
If we do this we will find out quickly as new workers join and we expand assembly halls both at exiting and geographically diverse new yards we will find the talent to then consider new Hulls at a lower cost given new blood and existing blood that is trapped in a static work place. New yards create opportunities for those who have 15-20 years experience but are trapped stuck behind those above them who are not leaving their current position till they finally retire.
This will do more to inject opportunity into the workforce. In building and running engineering trams I have stolen more “fast tracker” engineers from places like BAE. After BAE paid for them to get advanced degrees and those late 20 somethings knew they were looking at another 10 plus years before getting ahead. Even with BAE then offering to send them for thier PhDs. It’s amazing the untapped energy that gets unleashed when they are given the opportunity.
You won't see sub billion dollar frigates any more, but might get a corvette. First FFX is over 1.6B total, more than they have budgeted for it this year as they started funding it last year. I agree, there would be a lot of benefit in switching to a cheaper Burke flight. If numbers are important, possibly a no extra VLS SSN until we get all the SSBNs built.
Boy there is some bureaucratic bullshit in that submission. It took a lot of MBA's to write that.
Here's a tip - WRITE IN ENGLISH! Clear, concise, english.
Avoid acronyms. Don't write for wonks and dweebs in other government offices. Write for everyone. Here's a great word, "Cutter." A single-masted, fore-and-aft-rigged sailing vessel with two or more headsails and a mast set somewhat farther aft than that of a sloop. Think of the Coast Guard, swooping down on smugglers in a swift cutter. Do you get the same feeling with NSC? How 'bout National Security Cutter?
"National Security" gives the image of a bunch of fat guys cosplaying as "warfighters." Contrast that with "Legend-class Cutter" and the image is of a Boatswain and his mates launching the small boat to save some lives, in weather no sane person would venture out in.
I understand the theory of getting Flight I in the water before locking down the design for Flight II, but let me propose an alternative design process, because there is not enough F'ing time.
Flight I, do what you are doing, but with urgency.
Flight II, design concurrently, by starting with the Burke Flight III and taking away stuff until you get a ship that has capabilities yet is only at 80% of the FFX tonnage (allowing for growth.)
Flight III, lessons learned from floating Flight I and tuning Flight II list
and get rid of the 57, this Army tanker/historian know high velocity guns and a 76mm has range, mass, and better growth potential.
Yeah, engineering doesn't work like that. You can't take a Burke and snatch parts off and get a cheap, lightweight frigate. You just get a stripped-out Burke with the structural weight of a Burke and similar build times.
The problem with not enough time is the fact that welding a hull together takes a fair chunk of the time to build a ship and qualified shipbuilders is what is killing us in terms of building out a fleet. Stripping the things that non-shipbuilders supply and that are merely 'installed' in the hull does not actually speed up the process. You just end up with a Burke that took the same amount of time to build but ends up being less capable.
Cheaper to build and run compared to what, though? And now, you have the very thing the Perry was accused of being, which is less survivable. Ie one turbine on each shaft with no diesel to make up for that fact means that you have one prime-mover for each shaft. Which means you can easily lose that shaft in an emergency.
At the end of the day, it would be cheaper to just design what is desired. By the time you get done redesigning the Burke, because that is what would be required here, you'd have a slow, heavy frigate that is closer in mass to a Burke than an FF(X).
The only reason I could even countenance buying FF(X) is that the USN is in a trick bag, otherwise I'd rather they just paid Gibbs and Cox to design something that doesn't suck.
How did the Navy lose its way so badly?
How did the bureaucracy become the driver of the Navy?
How did our admirals become so incompetent?
Incentives, disincentives, and almost complete lack of accountability / transparency.
Admiral Rickover was an ardent opponent of the DOD 5000 philosophy, believing that it directly and indirectly encouraged an acquisition system which had a perverse combination of incentives for graft and corruption, of disincentives for productive delivery of platforms and systems, and an almost complete lack of accountability / transparency.
The relationship between our military and the MIC is an incestuous one. I believe the graft, corruption, and other criminal actions by many military and civilian personnel are rampant. Rickover was spot on, and likely underestimated the seriousness of the issue. Given the size and complexity of the military and its intertwining with the MIC, it cannot be trusted to inspect itself. It would take something on the order of DOGE to root out the worst of the rot and make extreme examples of those who are guilty of debasing the trust we placed in them.
Look at the relatively slight actions taken against those found guilty in the recent Fat Leonard activity in our 7th Fleet. It would take an irresponsible person to think that only the 7th Fleet engaged in the criminal activity, or that there is only one Fat Leonard getting rich off of our corrupt military.
Your Navy got complacient and too self-assured, unwilling to change the beneficial status quo and assuming that all the problems could be just pushed into future because "we surely would think of some solution tomorrow". Your leadership believed too much into free market as absolute solution, disregarding actual, material production (like producing steel, machinery, building cargo ships) in favor of financial operations. Finally, your population believed in their own exceptionalism too firmly, outright refusing to admit the existence of competitors at first, and disregarding and downplaying them second, inventing all possible excuses for that.
Our Congress and multiple presidential administrations gutted the defense industrial base and encouraged endless mergers that caused a lot of facilities to close. The USN had no power over those things. Congress took the resulting savings and frittered it away on foolishness the way every Western Democracy did in the years from 1991 to now.
Yes, this is so, but it is one major factor among several major factors for what has happened in the last thirty years.
Agree, but whenever the topic of USN shipbuilding comes up, people want to blame the "MIC" or blame "the admirals". This form of blame doesn't get to the root causes of the problems afflicting the navy, which means they won't do anything to solve them either.
It is not limited to the Admirals, or SES types. But that does not excuse not holding any of the Admirals or SES accountable. It is a festering wound that needs to be punctured and doused with harsh legal/corrective/criminal antibiotics.
I don't disagree that the admirals need to be held responsible for their piece of things, but this thread has featured a lot of 'death to the admirals' and very little 'what actually happened that got us here'. If you want to punish somebody, punish them for their piece and don't let the other criminals get away with their part of the crime.
It's pretty much never the armed service that creates these cockups, and there's very little incompetence in the admiralty that's to blame here. Congress mandated a mission for DD(X) that made no sense, then killed DD(X). Congress killed CG(x) instead of pursuing some kind of Tico replacement. Congress allowed the Defense Industrial Base to collapse. Various Presidential Administrations from Clinton, through Bush Jr., to Obama pursued foolish schemes such as 'skip a generation of weapons'. The government kept kicking the can down the road and pretending the Chinese were our pals. Clinton gave them the money to build a massive military by giving them permanent favored nation status and getting them into the WTO. Bush ignored their games, even as they were holding our aviators hostage (the debacle with the EP-3 should never be forgotten). Obama tried to 'pivot to Asia', but did very little to make that stick, and infamously had the tooling for the F-22 destroyed and the program truncated.
All very well said. But along the way, our military leadership got onboard for a variety of reasons I suspect not the least of which would include internal politics and ambition. They threw away what worked and their supposed knowledge of institutional history. Some of the biggest cheerleaders for our failed programs and structure have worn a rather significant number of stars on their uniforms.
Indeed it was a total government failure. But the elite that we pay to rise above and offer at least value if not effective solutions not only failed but fed the scoundrels. They seemed to enjoy the system. Hopes are on the closeted rebels of the Flag class and more importantly the JOs that didn’t fully buy into subpar education…meaning indoctrination.
Due to the nature of the promotion system, I don't think we're liable to see 'revolt of the Admirals 2, Electric Boogaloo' any time soon.'
No blame on FOGOs for Fat Leonard, LCS, Fitzgerald/McCain, Bonhomme Richard, DDG-1000, LPD-17, Ticonderago modernization, Red Hill fuel debacle, SSN Maintenance backlog, Constellation Frigate, ....? Hard to take you seriously.
So, since this is a thread that was about FF(X) and not about Bonhomme Richard or Tico modernization or most of the other things you raised, I'm not sure why I was supposed to start slinging blame at admirals. As far as DDG-1000, a lot of that blame does belong with Congress for insisting the thing become a BB replacement and then deciding to cancel the whole shebang after steel was already cut. I don't particularly care if you take me seriously or not. I'm stating the brutal facts. Civilian leadership sets the tone. However emotionally satisfying it may be, blaming FOGOs all the time won't fix the mistakes the civilian leadership has caused.
Our Navy doesn't know what they want anymore.
Knowing what you want is the basic problem with clients' requirements, even in a more malleable discipline like software engineering, where we don't deal with steel and welding.
How is it that our Navy brass and its commanders do not know what they want?
Maybe they are just pen pushers behind the desk?
Or maybe they operated on the "Show me a stone" paradigm?
Our admirals know what they want. They just can't get it. They wanted a frigate with CAPTAS sonar and a modest number of VLS cells. Congress/President said, "thou shalt use some other country's ship and make it fit". They couldn't. Even as Constellation was sinking, there were some in Congress wanting to add more VLS tubes to an already overweight/overwrought design.
They were arrogant, bought and paid for, and looking for that retirement job. Ever since Woodrow Wilson's presidency the Ivy League have walked away from God and started working for OLD DELUDER SATAN. Even Harvard changed their shield. Now we have over 5 generations of Ivy League trained leaders in every part of government, at every level of leadership who honor that tainted mindset. If you deny God . . . how successful will you be? David Barton presentations apply.
When several CNO's don't pay attention and willfully ignore drift and accretion.
Here's to hoping Flight II has a proper deck gun!
She won't be getting a 5" I'm afraid. Navy will stick with 57mm until proven otherwise.
A 76mm Oto Melara would be just fine. I don't understand the fascination with 57mm and can only attribute it to someone's perverse incentive.
Apparently, the 57-mm require less manpower to maintain, so it was viewed as superior solution. Despite 76-mm being clearly more capable.
RPM
For the first 40 rounds. Then the gun goes vertical, and reloads the two twenty round cassettes from the in mount ammo, and returns to firing.
I show it has 120 rounds ready to fire.
Plenty for small boats, aircraft, and missiles; more rounds can be carried, and a feeling you won't be using a gun against larger surface combatants m.
Wish I could see the rest of the budget, which will spell out exactly what electronics, ordnance, and HM&E systems will be installed.
Its posted, but the Nay does some weird thing where theirs are the only budget docs I can't get opened. Sometimes they work on my phone. I wish I knew the trick others are using.
Open with Microsoft Edge.
No go. Its like they iced out my IP or something.
I have Microsoft package but I open PDF and print docs with Microsoft Edge. Works every time. Adobe wants money for PDF and scrabbles my printer.
Does a deck gun matter anymore in the age of drones and anti-ship missiles?
Ripped a HIMARS launcher and bolted it on the deck for a change. Use PrSM rounds instead.
2 pods per 20 foot container is already a thing. 16 PRSM on the fantail, maybe 8 more behind the Mk 110.
The soon to be retired flags, who will soon be board members on the defense industry "primes" and the congress critters who dole out the defense funding in return for campaign donations are on full alert. The endless litany of defense acquisition "guidance" and milestone requirements still remain in effect as far as I know (if not Hurrah!). Efforts to "speed up the process" will face challenges from "risk assessments", AoA studies, and etc. etc. as the dead horse is drug out of the closet to be beaten once again for the first time. All of these are lucrative for the "primes". Our acquisition process is now all about money and whose pocket or influence power base it goes to. Actual capability for the warfighter is incidental, indeed accidental should it occur. Changing this incentive structure will literally shatter the rice bowls of the flag ranks. Perhaps this is why they hate Hegseth and Trump so much? Perhaps? Maybe? The world wonders...
Marry in haste repent at leisure. Could it be better than the long DoD 5000 engagement?
Not perhaps, but almost certainly so. B*stards. Worse than dereliction of duty.
"...are we going to have FF(X) Hull-1 be FF-1098 or FF-1108?"
If the CV precedent is used, where hull numbers 50 through 57 were skipped, we will skip the intervening hull numbers.
I would also imagine that putting them into the same numerical sequence as the FFGs might be an option, so FFG-62 *et seq.*
1 July 2030 President Harris will still be keeping a couple of real estate barons on call to go to Islamabad.
If that comes to pass ship building will be a tier 3 problem at best.
This is the most encouraging FF(X) piece you’ve written—not because the ship suddenly looks formidable, but because the Navy has finally recommitted to a process that has actually worked. The FY27 language matters less for what it promises and more for what it acknowledges: that the DDG‑51 flight model, not a frozen baseline or a PowerPoint‑perfect design, is how you build enduring combat power.
Your discomfort with Flight I is still exactly right. A minimally adapted NSC is useful, but only briefly. If Flight I lingers, the program will quietly fail while meeting every bureaucratic milestone. The difference today is that Flight II is no longer hypothetical—it exists in the budget and in explicit references to VLS, ASW, and Aegis‑based integration. That’s a real line crossed.
But invoking the Burke model comes with an obligation many forget. DDG‑51 didn’t succeed because Flight I was great; it succeeded because Wayne Meyer’s philosophy was enforced without mercy: build a little, test a little, learn a lot. Capability was inserted early, tested at sea, corrected fast, and then iterated again. Long design pauses weren’t a feature—they were the enemy.
That’s where the timeline still fails the smell test. A Flight II stuck in design well into the 2030s isn’t evolution—it’s drift. Meyer didn’t win by waiting for perfection; he won by forcing real capability into real ships and letting testing, not studies, drive the next step. If FF(X) follows the form of the Burke model without its tempo, the comparison is just ceremonial.
Your hull‑number question isn’t trivia. If the Navy really believes this is the return of the frigate, it should claim that lineage openly. Programs that hedge their identity tend to hedge their ambition, too.
So, here’s the hard test: if FF(X) is to matter, Flight II must arrive by 2032 with integrated VLS, real ASW, Aegis‑level combat system integration, protected growth margins, disciplined manning, and a faster build rhythm than Flight I. Miss that window, and we’ll have built another pause disguised as progress.
The irony is this: by your own WorldWar™ clock, we’re measuring years again—exactly what Meyer spent his career trying to kill. Ships don’t get better by waiting. They get better by being built, tested, broken, fixed, and sent back out—before the next WorldWar™ starts.
When is Phib gonna get the “like 100x” button on substack!
"build a little, test a little, learn a lot" - This is not only how successful ship programs are run, it is also the way children become successful adults. If no one is allowed to actually fail, we will not understand the limits of design and physics and there will be no progress. Right now, we seem to be stuck in some sort of participation trophy meme. Lessons learned with DDG-51 Flight I is what led to the addition of the helo hangar. We even learned a lot from building and testing the T-AGOS 19 class. A T-AGOS is absolutely not a frigate or destroyer, but we still learned a lot, even on builder's trials.
We already have pages and pages of lessons learned from various shipbuilding programs and various weapons procurement programs.
We have the Russia-Ukraine war as a source of information and data concerning oncoming weapons technology which could be applied to a war at sea, with proper discretion.
We have smart people who know enough about all these topics to manage the technical and programmatic risks of applying all this knowledge to a 21st Century war at sea.
What we haven't had and what is desperately needed is an honest conversation concerning what a major war at sea in the 21st Century among peer naval adversaries will look like, and what kind of US Navy and supporting USAF resources will be needed to fight that major war at sea.
Only after we have that conversation, can we take the knowledge and the experience we already have in our hands and apply it usefully to the task of rebuilding the US Navy to handle a major war at sea with the Chinese.
Absolutely agree. We need conversations like you wrote about with all the seriousness of a country that will need at some point in the near future to fight for its very existence.
And in the meantime, we need to get SOMETHING to sea. I believe we are capable of walking and chewing gum at the same time.
Are we going to get SOMETHING to sea just to get SOMETHING to sea knowing full well that the 'something' won't be useful for fighting an extended war at sea with the Chinese?
There's really no need to have an LLM write your comments for you.
We could have a more combat oriented flight of an existing warship faster that has VLS, Aegis CSL / COMBATTS-21 and limited ASW sooner than we will see this in an HII ship. MMSC at Fincantieri. No reason we can't be building more than one class of small combatant. We've been doing it for many years now.
Wait, asw capability in flight 2?!?!?
Umm, not a USN FF without a HMS, LAMPS, and a tail, it’s only a gray puddle pirate right?
Tbf, we need a lot of puddle pirates. People say "but the Coast Guard" forget they're going to be pretty busy to do as much as some want them to.
... and the Congress still has not decided to pass an appropriation for DHS, including the Coast Guard.
The Flight I ships could be refitted in the future, don't forget. They won't be fully capable, but they would be still better than nothing.
VLS must be designed in, and it purposely isn't
It's not that simple, to install VLS into the hull, not designed to hold them from beginning. The VLS have a long deck penetration; it would require holing several decks, rearranging equipment beneath. For the Fligh I, the container launchers would suffice. Four Mk-70 container launchers on stern would give you 16 cells - perfectly enough for ESSM's, VL-ASROC & some strike missiles.
my issue is with "Flight I ships could be refitted in the future"
how would VLS be added later?
See Spruance class.
noted, though I will point out, that it was nearly twice the size of the previous (Adams) class, but the same number of weapons, 2 guns, ASROC, a missile launcher and 6 torps.
There clearly was space to add weaps. in that extra 4,000 ton displacement
The ASROC missiles were stored vertically on the Spruance class giving them enough room for a VLS.
See Project 1390 for adding VLS to the Australia O.H. Perry frigates. They added VLS and kept the main gun.
Agree, 8 VLS cells were added in the bow, and the gun admidships stayed.
Are you suggesting that VLS could go in front of the FFX forward mount?
oh, and they added 10% hull length to the "Long" Perry
You won't get that many 40' containers aft, but you could get 4 x 20' with 16 PRSM Blk II. That could eventually be 240 120mm rockets each equivalent to a 155mm shell.
Yeah, I'm puzzled why USN didn't move to adopt PRSM - especially considering that it could work as anti-ship missile too, giving American warships finally some supersonic capability.
1. PrSM didn't originally come in an anti-ship flavor.
2. The USN prefers things that fit in Mk-41, as it simplifies logistics.
The only reason to look at it now is that Flight 1 is going to be denuded of firepower.
Hull mounted sonar is not a refit either, so flight one is really never going to be a frigate - in my opinion.
I’d much rather see a sonar dome installed without a sonar than none at all.
They'll do for now, once FltII is in the water they can be re-fitted or, kept to patrolling permissive environment AO's like how the current NSC's are used.
The astonishing lack of shipbuilding urgency will continue without the 2026 design deadline.
What exactly could be done about it? New shipyard are costly, and require a lot of highly trained manpower - which USA didn't exactly have, since your civilian shipbuilding is very small. China is able to ramp up their naval construction because they have immense civilian shipbuilding; they could easily pick the best engineers, mechanics, welders, ect. for higher pay on naval shipyards. USA did not have such capability.
We’d do what we had to if our homes and family were attacked. We would start to design something using available designs, solutions, materials, vendors, weapons systems and power plants. We’d use a hull design from someplace like the Naval Institute Press. We’d use the biggest COTS diesel engines we could get our hands on, we figure out a weapons suite and a communication flow and keep going from there.
Yeah, problem is, other guy would be doing the same. And since the other guy is China - which is literally the industrial heart of the world - they would always got more and better.
You have deftly laid out the recipe for defeatism.
I am channeling Admiral Farragut and his “Damn the torpedoes! Full speed ahead.”
Boldness of action makes its own opportunities.
It's not so much boldness of action, but pre-set cultural stereotype about "small but better army of Good Guys defeating hordes of Bad Guys through boldness and daring thinking". Problem is, while it is not impossible, on practice it's way more often that side with more resources & better numbers would win. Farragut, for example, have vast resources of Union on his side; his daring actions were supported by both superior numbers and superior industrial capabilities. During most of the wars that America won, America actually played as juggernaut, throwing enormous numbers of troops and materials at the enemy. While Americans are certainly capable of boldness and unquestionable heroism, the general rule of American warfighting was always "bid for time to prepare, and then hammer the enemy with reasonable disregard for losses".
Okay, fine. Heavily restating, you said, “Just weigh the opposition’s resources against yours and if you come out short, just capitulate.”
Now, let’s restart with your alternate plan. I will check back after I do some yard work.
We might be able to create an advantage for ourselves with smaller ships and USVs.
That expresses my thoughts exactly. Thank you, Andy.
As one reads about WWII, the books pile up. One realizes how many ways we competed with Japan and Germany. We competed in realms, and we kept it up.
Quantity was crucial, yes, but so many different types of airplanes, bombs, ships, subs, radar, Navaho language, decoding experts and equipment, communications, replenishment, artillery and ammunition. That’s just a starter kit.
Well, technically speaking, the Navy does have one frigate on the commissioned list.
The white oak forest management at Naval Support Activity Crane shows that it is possible for the Navy to think long term, plan, and act accordingly - as long as there is no defense megacorporation with their hand in the till.
Problem is, that there are no government-controlled shipyards in USA anymore. You can't force megacorps to relent by threatening "oh well, we just would build new ships on government yard, and you would got no contracts at all - unless you would agree to limit your appetites!"
Threaten to nationalize HII as they are a monopoly as things stand.
Speaking of the USS Constitution, my reading says it won because it was bigger, with thicker/denser live oak wall, had bigger guns and more men, so it could pound away. Modern navies, including the U.S., are not building those kinds of warship ships (or at speed). All this chatter about advanced missiles and such (I ran the Navy and Marine Corps weapons budgets (1986-1992, all the missiles, torpedoes, guns and ammunition and visited all the manufacturers and some ammunition plants), and still believe the most effective weapons in modern naval history were the U.S. 5-inch-54 and fast-firing U.S. and British 6-inch guns that could rain fire on the enemy. Missiles are nice and have range, but these 2 and three inch pop guns aren't going to do it when you need volume and are surrounding by an enemy employing saturation attacks.
FF 2047 of course
Burst out laughing
Just buy/license/steal the JSDF Mogami class FFG. Better gun, checks all the boxes, and the Aussies like it too. Commonality with our allies all in the same sphere. Public keel-hulling under a Ford class for anybody at NAVSEA that Foxtrot's it up or becomes a spec.creaper.
People seem obsessed with Mogami, but the Korean FFX Batch III/IV would probably be a better ASW ship / escort. Mogami's powerplant is similar to the US FFX. 1 geared gas turbine with 2 geared diesels. The Korean ships have a shaft mounted PMM for quiet running to 17 knots. Also the same engines in the gensets as Constellation. My bet it Connie's electric motor is a doubled up version of Korea's FFX.
Agree. The latest of the Chungnam Class is an example.
Can we get Anduril and /or SpaceX to build these in new shipyards?
Those yards don't need to be salt water. Could be up the Mississippi, the Columbia, or even the Hudson.
Anduril bought the shuttered Foss shipyard to build USVs. There is a ton going on there and 30 large USVs in the 5 year planning forecast.
At over $1 Billion with no VLS nor sonar to be delivered in 5 years is a BIG FAT GTFO.
We are are large surface combatant and if we are unable to build a sub $1 Billion escort FFG then scrap it and use the funds for more Burkes.
In fact open up another yard for building Burke Lite till the ens of time.
The time for an FFG was 1998-2003 but instead we focused on transformation and the Street Fighter. If that name didn’t send you running for the lifeboats it should have.
No longer are we a capable nation at building small water craft. If there is a “true need” for a Frigate pick up the phone and buy from the Japanese.
Till then focus ever naval engineer, welder, rigger, electrician, systems integrator on the hulls we build now and designing, cutting steel and launching those at scale including multiple variants to fill the needs of the FFG.
A Burke Lite, C2 LPD-C2, LPD-Arsenal, etc
The USN should only be allowed 2 new clean sheet hulls no more SNN(X) & CGN/BBGN. Leverage the hulls we have and get crazy with a High/Low mix of specialty variants. Existing hulls are known and have existing supply chains. Use the money saved from more failed new hulls to invest in actual workforces and new yards. Force the existing MBAs at Hill & GD to cut the bullshit with stretching out backlogs and incentives early delivery.
If we do this we will find out quickly as new workers join and we expand assembly halls both at exiting and geographically diverse new yards we will find the talent to then consider new Hulls at a lower cost given new blood and existing blood that is trapped in a static work place. New yards create opportunities for those who have 15-20 years experience but are trapped stuck behind those above them who are not leaving their current position till they finally retire.
This will do more to inject opportunity into the workforce. In building and running engineering trams I have stolen more “fast tracker” engineers from places like BAE. After BAE paid for them to get advanced degrees and those late 20 somethings knew they were looking at another 10 plus years before getting ahead. Even with BAE then offering to send them for thier PhDs. It’s amazing the untapped energy that gets unleashed when they are given the opportunity.
You won't see sub billion dollar frigates any more, but might get a corvette. First FFX is over 1.6B total, more than they have budgeted for it this year as they started funding it last year. I agree, there would be a lot of benefit in switching to a cheaper Burke flight. If numbers are important, possibly a no extra VLS SSN until we get all the SSBNs built.
Boy there is some bureaucratic bullshit in that submission. It took a lot of MBA's to write that.
Here's a tip - WRITE IN ENGLISH! Clear, concise, english.
Avoid acronyms. Don't write for wonks and dweebs in other government offices. Write for everyone. Here's a great word, "Cutter." A single-masted, fore-and-aft-rigged sailing vessel with two or more headsails and a mast set somewhat farther aft than that of a sloop. Think of the Coast Guard, swooping down on smugglers in a swift cutter. Do you get the same feeling with NSC? How 'bout National Security Cutter?
"National Security" gives the image of a bunch of fat guys cosplaying as "warfighters." Contrast that with "Legend-class Cutter" and the image is of a Boatswain and his mates launching the small boat to save some lives, in weather no sane person would venture out in.
I'd love to see a 3-d printed fig...
I understand the theory of getting Flight I in the water before locking down the design for Flight II, but let me propose an alternative design process, because there is not enough F'ing time.
Flight I, do what you are doing, but with urgency.
Flight II, design concurrently, by starting with the Burke Flight III and taking away stuff until you get a ship that has capabilities yet is only at 80% of the FFX tonnage (allowing for growth.)
Flight III, lessons learned from floating Flight I and tuning Flight II list
and get rid of the 57, this Army tanker/historian know high velocity guns and a 76mm has range, mass, and better growth potential.
Yeah, engineering doesn't work like that. You can't take a Burke and snatch parts off and get a cheap, lightweight frigate. You just get a stripped-out Burke with the structural weight of a Burke and similar build times.
We aren't saying cheap or lightweight. We are talking cheaper to build and run.
- Delete 2 gas turbines
- Delete bow sonar
- Swap SPY-6V1 for V3 EASR and remove the illuminators
Most basic definition, not the entirety of what I would do.
The problem with not enough time is the fact that welding a hull together takes a fair chunk of the time to build a ship and qualified shipbuilders is what is killing us in terms of building out a fleet. Stripping the things that non-shipbuilders supply and that are merely 'installed' in the hull does not actually speed up the process. You just end up with a Burke that took the same amount of time to build but ends up being less capable.
Cheaper to build and run compared to what, though? And now, you have the very thing the Perry was accused of being, which is less survivable. Ie one turbine on each shaft with no diesel to make up for that fact means that you have one prime-mover for each shaft. Which means you can easily lose that shaft in an emergency.
In the things I would do, I would add the 1.5MW gear mounted PMM for hybrid propulsion.
At the end of the day, it would be cheaper to just design what is desired. By the time you get done redesigning the Burke, because that is what would be required here, you'd have a slow, heavy frigate that is closer in mass to a Burke than an FF(X).
The only reason I could even countenance buying FF(X) is that the USN is in a trick bag, otherwise I'd rather they just paid Gibbs and Cox to design something that doesn't suck.
They make 27 knots on 2 gas turbines and might do better without the bow sonar and a little less weight. That is better than the objective for FFG.