Requiem for a Frigate

...it didn't have to be like this...

Remember, we must revisit the failures of the past in order that they shall not be repeated. Well, that’s the theory.

Of all the disastrous series of failures this century to build a surface combatant, none were as unnecessary and avoidable as the failure of the Constellation Class FFG.

Over six years ago, we found out that we were going to build a U.S. version of the Franco-Italian FREMM in a push to finally get a proper frigate into the fleet. I was ecstatic…but wary.

Throughout the process, we had indications and warnings that the same institutional circus and its convoy of clown cars, which begat LCS, CG(X), and DDG-1000, had a hand on the wheel of what was then FFG(X). The primary warning was the shoehorned 57mm requirement that was put in there only as a way for the LCS builders to compete to…well…we all know the story.

Going from 80/20 to 20/80 was simply sabotage. We knew that, but didn’t have the primary source information to really pin it down, just secondary indications. If it wasn’t rank incompetence, it was intentional. Yes, I know the bureaucracy ran with the brain of an Ottoman, the efficiency of a DMV, and a lust for diktat of a Soviet, but it could not have been set up to fail more than it was. SECNAV Phelan’s cancelling of the program was inevitable.

We finally have some inside information from the builder of their side of the story. I’ll cover it in a minute and will end up with a bit of optimism, but if you will allow me—I need to rage just a little bit.

Our fleet’s need for a frigate to replace the Oliver Hazard Perry Class was as clear as day. The Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) was a theory of an answer to a different question, so the blob tried to make the trusting believe we did not need a frigate just so they could get the funds for their personality driven kludge of bad theory, the LCS.

A core of us knew that was wrong, but we lost the argument. We were not alone, but in the mid-00s there were not that many of us. Here on the CDR Salamander Front Porch, we were on the leading edge in calling out the catastrophic failure of the LCS concept and the need for a frigate NOW back in the first decade of this century. As we knew early on, the more of these that came into the fleet, the less people would be able to defend everything from the manning CONOPS to the tactical utility of the entire pair of classes.

For the new folks, here was the Front Porch’s stand that I reviewed again last year.

As a matter of fact, let’s look back at how I started an October of 2007 post.

Let me beat that drum a little harder - license build a EuroFrigate NOW!!! Do it while we still have time - time to keep the Fleet numbers treading water and have enough shipyards open.

A revolutionary project on PPT is just that - on PPT. An evolutionary project (see pre-WWII Cruiser development and the history of Carrier development as an example) results in ships pier-side and ships underway. Good officers have bought the line over this decade that LCS with all its toys will let them cover 10x more water than the old SPRUcans did - and do it better? ADS was to be one of the keys in doing this.

We have put all our eggs in that gilded crap-basket of an LCS - thanks to Sid, we have the proof much of the oversold ASW capability increase portion has gone poof. With ADS gone we now have, well, an poorly configured, expensive, undermanned Corvette.

The final form of Plan Salamander came together about 2010:

Fast track a true multi-mission EuroFrigate design to be license built here for a run of no less than 12 and no more than 24 ships until a domestic design comes on line as the DDG replacement. NANSEN or ABSALOM would be a nice start. Not perfect - but good.

The full execution of Plan Salamander to license build a EuroFrigate was not successful, as the cancelling of the Constellation Class proved. Why? That is best explained by a bi-partisan panel of political appointees and retired senior leadership that we will never see. I’ll save you the trouble. The base problem was that those same people given stewardship over the future of the surface force, faced with cascading failures, never sent the right people with a pair of pliers in one hand and a blowtorch in another over to NAVSEA and OPNAV. No. We continue to let the Janissaries run things as before.

Why? That is a story that needs to be told. I have my theories, but perhaps for a different day.

What did this look like on the industry end? In a refreshingly open interview by Howard Altman at TWZ with George Moutafis, CEO of Fincantieri Marine Group, we have a better view than before.

When you know when you need something delivered and at what pace, then enable the right level of decision-making. Because otherwise – I don’t want to sound this the wrong way – but perfection sometimes is the enemy of more than good enough.

Classic NAVSEA. A Good Idea Fairy with a 3,000 nm screw driver. The exact mindset that allowed the LCS CONOPS to get past the PPT, created VLS cells on LPD-17 that were never filled, built an entire class of ships based on a gun with unaffordable, bespoke ammunition, and hobbled the FORD class with cascading technology risk forced on hull-1.

I think the initial and envisioned approach was a healthy one. Had we kept on track with what was, back then, the principles that led to the selection – but also how it was originally set up – we probably would have kept closer to the original design. And thus allowing [us] to be closer to the original schedule. And thus allowing [us] also to build the vessel that was desired, without delays or major changes.

Correct. This is what we begged for. As we build our version of the already operational FREMM, if we want perfect—we can design its replacement—but take what we have now and displace water.

But no. That would just underline the failure of those who begat LCS, DDG-1000 etc. Unlucky for us, the same institutions and, in some cases, the same people who were involved with LCS became involved with the Constellation Class..

…from the get-go, when the award was made, it was made because there was a review of the requirements, a review of the design, and a review of all the elements that led to recognition that the parent design possessed exactly the right features to represent the path forward. So collectively, we had marched on that path. We might find ourselves in a different situation right now, but like I said, it’s one thing asking somebody to change their M.O. and adopt a new approach without fully empowering them or doing something drastic to signal that type of transformation. And it’s another where we said ‘we will try this new approach.’ But there was a lot of follow-through that was needed.

Everybody has developed experiences in certain ways, and everybody – especially when you have folks that have been doing it for decades – has developed their own rules of thumb and approaches to dealing with certain situations. It’s not easy to pivot an entire structure to a new idea or a new approach. So like I said, probably it was the right idea, but a little bit ahead of its time.

The man is the CEO of a company that has a lot of business with and coming from the U.S. Navy. He has to be careful. Read between the lines. It is all there. I’ll play around with the highlighting feature to let you know the parts that raise one of my eyebrows.

At this point of the interview, there is a discussion that there is now some change in the process, and I assume the people, to avoid what we saw most of this century.

Read the full article for the details, but here’s a hint.

So I’m hopeful that this new approach of the PAE [Navy Portfolio Acquisition Executives] setup will be an enabler to adopt the lessons learned: of how to move fast, of how not to mess with a design especially when it’s meeting and exceeding requirements, of how to manage change – not in the rollout of a change, but in the decision-making of whether to adopt change or not. So a lot of those new ideas that they’ve been trying to apply are promising to that effect.

Trust but verify. Like we’ve seen with the defenestration of DEI through DOW, a lot of people have just changed their job titles and the name on their door, but continue to brew their bad stew.

We’ll see.