Pentagon Plan Sets Navy Up To Quickly Shed 30% Of Cruiser And Destroyer Fleet
The Navy’s new shipbuilding plan, released in mid-June, telegraphs enormous cuts to America’s large surface combatant fleet of cruisers and destroyers. The mild verbiage from the report, saying “that growing the small surface combatant force enables reductions in the quantity of large surface combatants while yielding a more distributed and lethal force,” masks a likely brutal downsizing.
The cuts will be deep and potentially rapid. Today, 92 large combatants are in the fleet, but the Navy’s longer-term plans suggest the legacy large surface combatant fleet of Ticonderoga Class (CG 47) cruisers, Zumwalt Class (DDG 1000) destroyers and Arleigh Burke Class (DDG 51) destroyers will shrink to a fleet of 63 to 65 large surface vessels over the next 30 years. Amphibious assault vessels (LHA/LHDs and LPDs) and command, support and fast transport ships will be cut as well, and the future small surface combatant fleet of littoral combat ships and frigates is only projected to grow to between 40 and 45 ships from a current fleet of 35.
The cuts are widespread, but one place the axe falls hardest is upon the Navy’s large surface combatant fleet. First, the Department of Defense will force the Navy to eliminate the entire 22-hull Ticonderoga Class cruiser fleet. But even that drastic cut is not enough for the Navy to get to the Department of Defense’s current projection of 63 to 65 ships. With 88 Arleigh Burkes in service, under construction or already authorized, Arleigh Burke destroyer procurement will likely cease and 27 older Flight I, Flight IA and Flight II Burkes will be ushered out of the fleet. pg
The only question is just how fast the cuts to the large surface combatants will happen.
If left to normal attrition, most of the 27 older Arleigh Burke Class destroyers, deprived of a few hundred million dollar service-life extension six years ago, will simply age out over the next 30 years. Commissioned between 1991 and 1999, early-Flight Burkes were built with a service life expectation of about 35 years and, since the Navy has been unable to find money to systematically modernize and extend the life of the aging ships, most of the older Arleigh Burke destroyers are set to start decommissioning sometime after 2026.
That would be relatively normal practice. But, in a rush to claw back additional money, lock in savings, and make the proposed cuts permanent, aged Ticonderoga cruisers and older Burkes may well be pulled from service quite quickly—far faster than anyone outside of the Pentagon expects.
