I would really like to hear from Mark Vandroff on this. Unfortunately he is still a few years away from full retirement so he probably can't speak out either.
I was irritated when Gary Roughhead was named to the Marinette Marine board.
I sat in a car during commissioning events for USS Minnesota in 2012 (his wife is the sponsor) and listened to him extol the virtues of LCS. I don’t remember if he was referring to one hull or the other, but in retrospect I know he was in on the original push and design so no way was he going to agree that he messed up.
And to my knowledge he’s still on the board.
That’s my definition of recycling the swamp and trying for a different response.
(1) He was the second CO of USS PORT ROYAL (CG 73). Clearly, not a "Ship Driver". We were his "Major Command Afloat" ticket punch. I had been onboard since the very beginnings, first crew reporting to the Precommissioning Unit. The first Captain, Nicholas Richards... he was a "Ship Driver". I had even run into him a few times before in '92, when he was (P-CO) of PCU BARRY (DDG 52)
(2) When he got selected as Commander, PACFLT in '05... Uh, oh.
(3) I had just retired in August of '07, when he got 'tapped' for CNO by Pres Bush (Sep '07)... Oh Crap!
(4) Another tidbit. He was a Board Member on the now deduct Med Tech Company Theranos (claimed advance tech for blood testing/screening). Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes is now doing a Federal Prison (11 years, 3mos) sentence.
LCS is one of the most clearly seen and widely predicted failures of the DoW acquisition system. I say "one of". Was anyone held accountable for the "sun rises in the east" failure? Asking because I don't know but suspect I know the answer. History does not repeat (or rhyme), but patterns of human behavior in general, and large institutions in particular, most certainly do. If the same people / agencies responsible for LCS are allowed to participate AT NO COST to their reputations and / or bottom line in future major acquisitions like the Constellation, bad on us. Period. Dot.
more importantly let in be known to the Navy contracting community, that their presence on a marketing team, customer relations team or involvement in any proposal or offer, will not be helpful to the firms score.
The real villains here are those supposedly responsible for shipbuilding (hint; Navy Secretary,) and unchecked, mid-level tech warrant holders (a bunch of EDO retired and active duty Captains) who made excessive changes to the design without understanding the deep strategic and budgetary effects of their choices, that were in some cases based on World War 2-era unofficial "rules" that were not really rules at all. This is why the current administration is ripping NAVSEA apart at its seams and replacing it with the PAE organization. LCS suffered from some of these same problems in that demands for greater LCS "survivability" helped to delay building and raise costs as well. FREMM should have been an easy build in flights as Sal suggests, with Flight 0 being the basic FREMM design. Demands that the passageways be wider, that the CMWDS be steel and not composite and that the rudder be suitable to a WW2 design are among many changes that killed FREMM. Detailed here under the Italian section of the report: https://centerformaritimestrategy.org/publications/pier-review/
The “real villains” are the people who privatized naval shipbuilding. When naval ships were built in US Naval Shipyards there were, literally, thousands of workers who knew how to build ships. When NAVSEA was looking for folks to promote into administration, they had a large pool of people who were actively engaged in the design and construction of warships.
There were jobs, billets, for folks who had developed technical expertise in warship construction. There were decades of actual knowledge; knowledge gained by hands-on experience. A forty-year civil servant; who rose from foreman, to manager, and eventually senior management could say, “Sir, that shit won’t work.”
When we shut down our yards, we lost those guys. Everybody on this blog loves to scream “shut down, NAVSEA,” as if the folks who work there are not patriotic American trying to serve the country we all love. The fact of the matter is that they do not have the experience in building ships to competently supervise shipbuilding. That’s not their fault, it is ours.
When our Navy was strong; we had US Naval Shipyards engaged in building US Naval ships. Not all our ships, but enough for us not to be entirely dependant on the “good will” of multinational corporation. It is not a coincidence that the inability of the U.S. Navy to pay people to build ships arose after the Congress and President took them out of the shipbuilding business themselves.
We also like to piously talk about 'letting the market decide' while every other nation subsidizes the shit out of their ship building industry and we lose ours.
The admirals, captains, and SES turds who keep doing this to the Navy must be identified publicly. Not just the ones still on the job, either. The ones who retired and moved on to cushy jobs at defense contractors need special attention and public shame.
How come our Navy's grand high muckety-mucks never get demoted or fined for repeated incompetence? We get more of what we reward & less of what we punish.
On one of my ships, the pork chop was in a state of panic because the ship store made too much money because shipyard workers bought a lot of souvenirs. He had to figure out a way to lose money.
Yet flag officers who cost the navy billions get Legion of Merit medals. Go figure.
I have some experience in the first issue. Easy solution. Transfer profits to MWR and have free everything for the crew (entertainment, transportation, etc.), sailors' cost refunded with valid receipt. 100% legal.
I did exactly that in Korea when our CO made a "deal" with the MSCO guy in Pusan and I got a container of "free" provisions from outside the system. Lots of prime rib in the clubs for the next several months.
Think "Fraud" and what comes to mind? Minnesota and "The Learing Center/Somalis/$9 Billion"? Newsom and the Train to Nowhere, no track laid, and $15 Billion? Or Mullen/Roughhead/Greenert/Richardson/Gilday?
My grad school roomie has a son who works at the IRS. I'd love to turn that kid and have him send the tax files of NAVSEA flags and SES's, and the CNOs.
See when I think fraud, I think Trump, Hegseth. And the pillow man. All with charities that aren’t about being charitable. Before all of the rest of the insider teading and general grift.
They were a very tight design. The ship's office had to be precisely located due to the weight of paperwork onboard, and there was a limited margin for growth.
The digital age would have fixed that. Playing with CG by moving the MK75 gun down to the main deck might have helped some.
But yes, they were tight. Though some clever work likely could have salvaged the basic hull for weapons upgrades. Or just keep making the missiles so it kept it's AA capability, that's what really killed it.
During an engine room field day on a submarine, the Ship's Control Team ends up having to compensate for weight of everyone being closer to the stern of the ship. Yes, weights we think of as inconsequential can cause problems on a ship.
What really crippled them, though, was the removal of the Mk-13 GMLS due to the USN withdrawal of the RIM-66/SM1-MR . Whatever stocks were on hand in the early 00's were reserved for allied nations still using them so all OHPs in the USN had the missile launcher removed.
That said, they still had significant ASW capability in hull and towed sonar as well as the ability to embark 2 helos. The space vacated could have likely been used for VLS cells that as a minimum could have quad packed ESSM and perhaps ASROC. Maybe Harpoon canisters forward of the bridge.
Ultimately, I think, what killed it was deleting the MK-13. That severely nerfed it as a convoy escort. Was the MK13 slower at launching missiles than a VLS cell? Probably, but it could only manage 2 intercepts at a time (limited by the CW illumination radars), so not really a huge deal. I have to think that updating the missiles and/or just continuing on with production would have been the smart thing to do. Most of the OHPs were retired or sold early and those that weren't weren't really that great afterwards without the AA capability.
During the Tanker War the US had something like 70 OHPs potentially available (yeah, maintenance and training unavailability) to take into Earnest Will. What I wouldn't give for something like 70 modernized Black Swan-class SOW with Bofors 40 Mk4 from yesterday's post replacing the six QF Mk XVI's. Yeah, they would be vulnerable to Anti-ship ballistic missiles but they would have the capability to hold their own against air & sea drones. Would still need the Burkes for the ASBMs but there would be enough of them service their convoys against the far more numerous low end drones.
Isn't that basically what the HII 4921 Frigate proposal was? And on top of that it had excellent range (8000nm). And we could have build it quickly along side the legend.
It's not as if the existing FREMM's are a bad design, they are clearly one of the best frigates around. On top of that, they are already proven to be a flexible design easily fitted to the needs of multiple fleets or diverse roles within a single country's navy, so even 80/20 was probably excessive. The Italian navy might be my favorite navy right now. The ships are beautifully engineered and very capable at the intended roles. More importantly they looked at the budget and built the most capable navy they could: the balance of ships is nearly ideal imo.
They have a pair of modestly sized but state of the art carriers with F-35b and plenty of helos, a few AA destroyers and some ASW frigates to escort said carriers. Then you have a 6+ multi-role frigates which can operate independently or attached to a fleet. Splash in some subs and patrol, a goodly portion of aux, oiler, minesweepers, and amphibious assault craft and you have yourself a navy with every tool to act decisively and completely independently as well as work within an existing alliance structure. This is bang for your buck and the ships look gorgeous which never hurts. I think if you gamed it out, they might have the best fleet in the Mediterranean.
Frankly that's the American military in general, look at the F-35 or the Bradley. We had it right in the cold war, the F-14 still might be the best interceptor ever made, the A-6 was a sturdy litter bugger who could fly thru a hurricane with an operating range that humbles the F/A-18. Oh, and it had twice the weapons payload of a 35C. Then you had the A-7 as a cheap, easy to operate day bomber with even longer range than an A-6. Now we field bombers that made compromises so they could serve in the CAP role, and arguably more poorly than the 55-year-old F-14.
To contrast, my appraisal of the state of the Royal Navy: a mishmash of shoddy rust buckets and newfangled contraptions that prioritize past glory over current effectiveness. They also lack Volcanos.
So so much time and treasure lost. If they only had heeded our warnings and listened to our combined centuries of naval experience, we would have a Frigate Class in the fleet and in production. Pathetic.
150 +- flag officers in the Navy. The fact that we cannot build a much needed multi mission frigate platform over decades is nothing short of pathetic. I don't care what the reasons are...they are excuses for failure. As usual the sailors get screwed. Frankly it makes me sick
Who is getting busted down LT? Who is going to jail? If that doesn’t happen the rest is BS. Also - as John B suggests, we need names (with photos and bio’s)
I don't even care anymore. The sea side of the house seems so incompetent it is possible the Three Stooges could do a better job. Or, NAVSEA has been compromised by the CCP. I'm 66 now and it's just been one long slide down.
Read the interview yesterday. Mr. Moutafis danced lighly through the minefield to avoid pissing off an incompetent and vindictive customer.
I would really like to hear from Mark Vandroff on this. Unfortunately he is still a few years away from full retirement so he probably can't speak out either.
Mark is a good man.
I was irritated when Gary Roughhead was named to the Marinette Marine board.
I sat in a car during commissioning events for USS Minnesota in 2012 (his wife is the sponsor) and listened to him extol the virtues of LCS. I don’t remember if he was referring to one hull or the other, but in retrospect I know he was in on the original push and design so no way was he going to agree that he messed up.
And to my knowledge he’s still on the board.
That’s my definition of recycling the swamp and trying for a different response.
When he visited us in Afghanistan, the first thing he said was that diversity was his number one priority as CNO.
Going back farther...
(1) He was the second CO of USS PORT ROYAL (CG 73). Clearly, not a "Ship Driver". We were his "Major Command Afloat" ticket punch. I had been onboard since the very beginnings, first crew reporting to the Precommissioning Unit. The first Captain, Nicholas Richards... he was a "Ship Driver". I had even run into him a few times before in '92, when he was (P-CO) of PCU BARRY (DDG 52)
(2) When he got selected as Commander, PACFLT in '05... Uh, oh.
(3) I had just retired in August of '07, when he got 'tapped' for CNO by Pres Bush (Sep '07)... Oh Crap!
(4) Another tidbit. He was a Board Member on the now deduct Med Tech Company Theranos (claimed advance tech for blood testing/screening). Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes is now doing a Federal Prison (11 years, 3mos) sentence.
Yikes!
Alas, personnel is policy. Attempting to apply policy fixes to personnel problems never works. I've lived it for a long time.
LCS is one of the most clearly seen and widely predicted failures of the DoW acquisition system. I say "one of". Was anyone held accountable for the "sun rises in the east" failure? Asking because I don't know but suspect I know the answer. History does not repeat (or rhyme), but patterns of human behavior in general, and large institutions in particular, most certainly do. If the same people / agencies responsible for LCS are allowed to participate AT NO COST to their reputations and / or bottom line in future major acquisitions like the Constellation, bad on us. Period. Dot.
What a complete, perfect, massive failure of the institution. Can't build a new frigate in the last 52 years.
High-low mix should have us with 2 or 3 frigates per destroyer, yes? Our shortfall is now 100+ frigates.
Gahhhhhh.
We need to name the SES's, GS15's, Captains, etc that screwed this up .. Let the acting SECNAV fire them ..
And Admirals.
more importantly let in be known to the Navy contracting community, that their presence on a marketing team, customer relations team or involvement in any proposal or offer, will not be helpful to the firms score.
Then make the same point to their successors
There is an underlying theme wjith these failed programs. No accountability.
I can't imagine a private sector company having such a track record of failure without people being held accountable.
Filling out the right spreadsheet on-time seems to be the objective, not the delivery of working ships to the sailors that need them.
Our Country deserves better.
A private sector company that provided such crappy products consistently would be out of business, and thus the problem would be solved.
Unfortunately, it doesn't work like that with the government. Once the rot has set in there is little hope, the reference to the DMV was apt.
At least the CEO didn’t repeat the 85/15 80/20 lie. Of course its because he really didn’t say anything at all.
The real villains here are those supposedly responsible for shipbuilding (hint; Navy Secretary,) and unchecked, mid-level tech warrant holders (a bunch of EDO retired and active duty Captains) who made excessive changes to the design without understanding the deep strategic and budgetary effects of their choices, that were in some cases based on World War 2-era unofficial "rules" that were not really rules at all. This is why the current administration is ripping NAVSEA apart at its seams and replacing it with the PAE organization. LCS suffered from some of these same problems in that demands for greater LCS "survivability" helped to delay building and raise costs as well. FREMM should have been an easy build in flights as Sal suggests, with Flight 0 being the basic FREMM design. Demands that the passageways be wider, that the CMWDS be steel and not composite and that the rudder be suitable to a WW2 design are among many changes that killed FREMM. Detailed here under the Italian section of the report: https://centerformaritimestrategy.org/publications/pier-review/
Oh, good. We are finally getting some MBAs with buzzwords to fix things. That will work out great!
I have an MBA, and you’ve hurt my feelings.
Me, too.
My apologies to you both. DMADV baby, DMADV!
Useful tool from the 80s but only part of a good MBA program.
Apparently neither lawyers or money fixed the problems.
If the lawyers and the money fail, option three?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F2HH7J-Sx80
Only if we get Roland to help.
You forgot to and guns to mix. (Apologies to WZ)
Well no, you need guns too when the $hit has hit the fan....
We've all gotta duck ...
Can someone explain the difference between PEO Carriers and PAE Carriers, with the same 2-star admiral in charge?
The “real villains” are the people who privatized naval shipbuilding. When naval ships were built in US Naval Shipyards there were, literally, thousands of workers who knew how to build ships. When NAVSEA was looking for folks to promote into administration, they had a large pool of people who were actively engaged in the design and construction of warships.
There were jobs, billets, for folks who had developed technical expertise in warship construction. There were decades of actual knowledge; knowledge gained by hands-on experience. A forty-year civil servant; who rose from foreman, to manager, and eventually senior management could say, “Sir, that shit won’t work.”
When we shut down our yards, we lost those guys. Everybody on this blog loves to scream “shut down, NAVSEA,” as if the folks who work there are not patriotic American trying to serve the country we all love. The fact of the matter is that they do not have the experience in building ships to competently supervise shipbuilding. That’s not their fault, it is ours.
When our Navy was strong; we had US Naval Shipyards engaged in building US Naval ships. Not all our ships, but enough for us not to be entirely dependant on the “good will” of multinational corporation. It is not a coincidence that the inability of the U.S. Navy to pay people to build ships arose after the Congress and President took them out of the shipbuilding business themselves.
We also like to piously talk about 'letting the market decide' while every other nation subsidizes the shit out of their ship building industry and we lose ours.
Names.
The admirals, captains, and SES turds who keep doing this to the Navy must be identified publicly. Not just the ones still on the job, either. The ones who retired and moved on to cushy jobs at defense contractors need special attention and public shame.
How come our Navy's grand high muckety-mucks never get demoted or fined for repeated incompetence? We get more of what we reward & less of what we punish.
On one of my ships, the pork chop was in a state of panic because the ship store made too much money because shipyard workers bought a lot of souvenirs. He had to figure out a way to lose money.
Yet flag officers who cost the navy billions get Legion of Merit medals. Go figure.
I have some experience in the first issue. Easy solution. Transfer profits to MWR and have free everything for the crew (entertainment, transportation, etc.), sailors' cost refunded with valid receipt. 100% legal.
I did exactly that in Korea when our CO made a "deal" with the MSCO guy in Pusan and I got a container of "free" provisions from outside the system. Lots of prime rib in the clubs for the next several months.
Think "Fraud" and what comes to mind? Minnesota and "The Learing Center/Somalis/$9 Billion"? Newsom and the Train to Nowhere, no track laid, and $15 Billion? Or Mullen/Roughhead/Greenert/Richardson/Gilday?
My grad school roomie has a son who works at the IRS. I'd love to turn that kid and have him send the tax files of NAVSEA flags and SES's, and the CNOs.
See when I think fraud, I think Trump, Hegseth. And the pillow man. All with charities that aren’t about being charitable. Before all of the rest of the insider teading and general grift.
Aside from age, what was wrong with the OHP-class FFGs? Could they not have been built with more modern propulsion and electronics equipment?
They were a very tight design. The ship's office had to be precisely located due to the weight of paperwork onboard, and there was a limited margin for growth.
The digital age would have fixed that. Playing with CG by moving the MK75 gun down to the main deck might have helped some.
But yes, they were tight. Though some clever work likely could have salvaged the basic hull for weapons upgrades. Or just keep making the missiles so it kept it's AA capability, that's what really killed it.
Thing is, it was the first ship to have a significant amount of CAD work!
While that can tighten up the margins with CAD, you can certainly leave space and weight based on the design standards in place.
That said, the likely criteria was pack it tight, keep the hull to the minimum to make it cheap and fast to build.
I'd laugh, but realize you're not joking.
During an engine room field day on a submarine, the Ship's Control Team ends up having to compensate for weight of everyone being closer to the stern of the ship. Yes, weights we think of as inconsequential can cause problems on a ship.
Thank God we went paperless/s.
We'll have a paperless Navy when we have a paperless toilet!
We went "paperless" with something called NALCOMIS. I lost two 44x6 engine storage spaces so we could store two semi-trailers of printer paper.
Like the US Air Force has?
Well, we mostly got rid of approach plates
My answer has always been nothing really.
What really crippled them, though, was the removal of the Mk-13 GMLS due to the USN withdrawal of the RIM-66/SM1-MR . Whatever stocks were on hand in the early 00's were reserved for allied nations still using them so all OHPs in the USN had the missile launcher removed.
That said, they still had significant ASW capability in hull and towed sonar as well as the ability to embark 2 helos. The space vacated could have likely been used for VLS cells that as a minimum could have quad packed ESSM and perhaps ASROC. Maybe Harpoon canisters forward of the bridge.
Ultimately, I think, what killed it was deleting the MK-13. That severely nerfed it as a convoy escort. Was the MK13 slower at launching missiles than a VLS cell? Probably, but it could only manage 2 intercepts at a time (limited by the CW illumination radars), so not really a huge deal. I have to think that updating the missiles and/or just continuing on with production would have been the smart thing to do. Most of the OHPs were retired or sold early and those that weren't weren't really that great afterwards without the AA capability.
During the Tanker War the US had something like 70 OHPs potentially available (yeah, maintenance and training unavailability) to take into Earnest Will. What I wouldn't give for something like 70 modernized Black Swan-class SOW with Bofors 40 Mk4 from yesterday's post replacing the six QF Mk XVI's. Yeah, they would be vulnerable to Anti-ship ballistic missiles but they would have the capability to hold their own against air & sea drones. Would still need the Burkes for the ASBMs but there would be enough of them service their convoys against the far more numerous low end drones.
Isn't that basically what the HII 4921 Frigate proposal was? And on top of that it had excellent range (8000nm). And we could have build it quickly along side the legend.
Why hasn’t the new SecNavy summoned Sal, John and Sal to his office and put them in positions to help him turn the fleet around?
A few bureaucrats need to be treated like Admiral Byng. At the very least half the flags need to be sent packing.
I can't like the comment twice, so I'll just say I did.
It's not as if the existing FREMM's are a bad design, they are clearly one of the best frigates around. On top of that, they are already proven to be a flexible design easily fitted to the needs of multiple fleets or diverse roles within a single country's navy, so even 80/20 was probably excessive. The Italian navy might be my favorite navy right now. The ships are beautifully engineered and very capable at the intended roles. More importantly they looked at the budget and built the most capable navy they could: the balance of ships is nearly ideal imo.
They have a pair of modestly sized but state of the art carriers with F-35b and plenty of helos, a few AA destroyers and some ASW frigates to escort said carriers. Then you have a 6+ multi-role frigates which can operate independently or attached to a fleet. Splash in some subs and patrol, a goodly portion of aux, oiler, minesweepers, and amphibious assault craft and you have yourself a navy with every tool to act decisively and completely independently as well as work within an existing alliance structure. This is bang for your buck and the ships look gorgeous which never hurts. I think if you gamed it out, they might have the best fleet in the Mediterranean.
"The ships are beautifully engineered and very capable at the intended roles."
The thing that kills the US Navy is the 'intended roles' part. When you just say 'Yes' to that question you end up in design hell.
Frankly that's the American military in general, look at the F-35 or the Bradley. We had it right in the cold war, the F-14 still might be the best interceptor ever made, the A-6 was a sturdy litter bugger who could fly thru a hurricane with an operating range that humbles the F/A-18. Oh, and it had twice the weapons payload of a 35C. Then you had the A-7 as a cheap, easy to operate day bomber with even longer range than an A-6. Now we field bombers that made compromises so they could serve in the CAP role, and arguably more poorly than the 55-year-old F-14.
To contrast, my appraisal of the state of the Royal Navy: a mishmash of shoddy rust buckets and newfangled contraptions that prioritize past glory over current effectiveness. They also lack Volcanos.
So so much time and treasure lost. If they only had heeded our warnings and listened to our combined centuries of naval experience, we would have a Frigate Class in the fleet and in production. Pathetic.
150 +- flag officers in the Navy. The fact that we cannot build a much needed multi mission frigate platform over decades is nothing short of pathetic. I don't care what the reasons are...they are excuses for failure. As usual the sailors get screwed. Frankly it makes me sick
Could be worse, we could have more admirals than ships like some countries I can think of.
Well! At least we're not the RN.
Who is getting busted down LT? Who is going to jail? If that doesn’t happen the rest is BS. Also - as John B suggests, we need names (with photos and bio’s)
I don't even care anymore. The sea side of the house seems so incompetent it is possible the Three Stooges could do a better job. Or, NAVSEA has been compromised by the CCP. I'm 66 now and it's just been one long slide down.