6 Comments

Sadly, I think this reflects on the poor state of our industrial base, more so than the Dept of Navy.

But, If i was DoD or OMB, I'd be sceptical of any Navy shipbuilding plan. We have 3 Zumwalts that have a place for a gun never made. We're throwing away 5-10 year old LCSs because they fd up the design on the drive shaft, and found it "too complicated" to implement their modular program.

Seems the only program anywhere close to resembling successful execution is the Subs. Maybe the management at Surface Warfare should be fired and replaced with Submarine procurement pros. Thats what would happen in a non govt business world.

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Events in the world have overtaken our domestic budgetary needs once more. This administration was hoping to keep Defense steady with no real growth to fund domestic priorities. That train has now left the station. We need, and this is a ballpark estimate, a trillion dollar Defense budget. That is no joke or typing error. We have two near peer competitors (read: enemy in peacetime) knocking at our two big doors (the Atlantic and Pacific.) My old estimate of a 330 ship navy is out the window. We need closer to 375. However, we now require a renewed ground presence in Europe - at least until Putin is.... gone. Not BCTs, but two full up corps and a reserve corps hq with troops. And we need an equivalent increase in USAF capabilities in that theater. Paraphrasing old SGT Stryker, life for us got tough; it will be a lot tougher if we continue to be stupid.

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375: wise estimate. USAEUR: Agreed. Before the Ukraine War I was agitating to fill V corps by reactivating 5 and 8 divisions; now I agree for a few years we need VII Corps with 2 divisions, say 2 Armored and 24 Mech. I think actually the USAF is in prettu good shape.

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The chances of getting all this is zero, because we have closed our eyes and pretended our advanced technology and catchphrase, empty phrases like naval distributed lethality will substitute for the needed warships. One party wants the highly bloated civilian programs for buying votes. The other party wants to cut taxes so that the monied classes have even more money to waste, in the false name of increasing investment,which has not happened from Reagan;s time, when the theory was cooked us. All the rich do with the extra money is play financial games which employ a few tens of thousands. I know I sound like the Ancient Mariner, but doom and gloom are already here - look at the way China is expanding in the South China Sea, SW Pacific, and West Pacific. And all they are doing as yet is taking baby steps to establish presence.The real breakout wont come till 2035-2055, 15-20 years ahead of the 2070 (China is #1 plan).

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Is the phrase “Congenitally Wrong” trademarked? If not, should we do so? I see profit potential here…

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You have accurately and convincingly talked about the verbiage in the way the Navy budget is written, This is a standard indicator of the decline of the navy.

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