Right now, the U.S. Navy is spending $21 billion in a once-a-century effort to recapitalize aging public shipyard infrastructure. At the same time, an entirely different part of the Navy is mulling the composition and characteristics of America’s future next-generation submarine fleet. Unfortunately, neither of the two groups seem fully integrated, raising the specter that America’s fleet of brand-new attack subs will struggle to fit in America’s newly-refurbished dry docks.
If America’s future SSN(X) subs are super-sized, they will likely outstrip the existing repair facilities in America’s four Navy-oriented Public Shipyards. With few in the Pentagon imposing any real constraints on new weaponry, the Navy maintains, essentially, an unhealthy conceit that America will build any dockside infrastructure necessary to support any new platform emerging from the Pentagon’s baroque weapons development process.
For new weapons, maintenance and sustainment are never primary design drivers. When America decides on a new weapon system, the initial documents are capability-focused, deemphasizing long-term sustainment. The process undeniably produces some fearsome weaponry, but it’s also how America ended up building a new type of aircraft carrier unable to employ any existing dry dock used to maintain the Navy’s current fleet of ten Nimitz-class (CVN-68) aircraft carriers. To accommodate the new Gerald R. Ford-class (CVN-78) aircraft carrier, the Navy’s two carrier-sized dry docks will need hundreds of millions—if not billions—in improvements.
With the first Ford-class carrier already built and fighting at sea—and no public shipyard dry dock yet ready to repair it—the cautionary take-away for Navy planners is that it is far easier to build fancy new ships than it is to build the docks necessary to maintain them.
Today, the Navy’s insatiable appetite for bigger-and-better submarines is already outstripping the Navy’s maintenance capabilities. A bigger SSN(X) will make an already tough problem even worse.
After going from an essentially a simple, single-class attack submarine fleet, with 17 dry docks ready to support a sub fleet dominated by Cold War-era Los Angeles-class (SSN-688) boats, the Navy, in 2004, got busy complicating their relatively simple maintenance planning processes by beginning the gradual fleet transition to the Virginia-class (SSN-774) submarine. Currently, 22 Virginia-class subs are in commission.
That’s all well and good, but the Virginia-class subs turned out to be a bit bigger than their Los Angeles-class predecessors. When the fleet of new subs was small, it wasn’t a big problem that the modern subs could only be serviced at 12 of the Navy’s 17 existing attack sub-certified dry docks. Today, as new Virginia-class subs inexorably replace the remaining 26 Los Angeles-class subs in the fleet, Virginia-class maintenance space is getting hard to find.
And that’s not all. As the Navy’s initial optimistic—and near-fraudulent—Virginia-class maintenance estimates ballooned into months of additional dry dock time, the Virginia-class submarines have also grown longer, limiting maintenance options even further. The latest Virginia-class variants are so much longer than the original USS Virginia (SSN-774), the new arrivals will, as of 2020, only have seven dry docks ready to take them.
It makes scheduling fleet maintenance all the harder.
As the Navy mulls buying more large-diameter, large-payload Columbia-class (SSBN-826) sized submarines, and, at the same time, eyes a large-diameter next-generation attack sub, the Navy would be smart to conduct a last-second rethink and, if needed, reorient their shipyard investments to better reflect the future fleet’s super-sized attack submarine maintenance needs—needs that will likely grow in conjunction with the physical growth of the subs themselves. If not, in just a few years, America will need to start rebuilding the increasingly unusable inventory of Virginia-class attack-sub ready dry docks all over again.
That’s no way to run a Navy.
Either America stops the 20-year, $21 billion Shipyard Infrastructure Optimization Program (SIOP) right now, pausing to ensure Congress and Pentagon leadership that the dry dock modifications in the current plan are being built to accept, if needed, a fleet of far heavier, deeper-riding and larger attack subs with a 43-foot beam (Virginia-class attack subs have a 34-foot beam), or the Navy needs to move really quickly to constrain their developmental scope and stick to considering new attack submarines that fit within the Navy’s existing dry dock support infrastructure.
The imperious king of the nuclear navy, Admiral Rickover, may be dead, but it is never too late to try and drive his focus on design discipline back into the Navy.
Push For Large-Diameter Subs Is Longstanding And Obvious:
The SIOP effort should already be well on its way in building lots of extra-large dry docks. From the time the Navy stood up the SIOP program office in May 2018, the Navy has publicly telegraphed their desire to procure bigger attack submarines. Even a passing familiarity with past Navy submarine building trends strongly hinted that SIOP planners would be smart to orient their sub maintenance yard improvements so the public yards can accommodate a large future fleet of Columbia-class sized submarines. But it isn’t clear just how the SIOP is orienting the public yards to offer viable maintenance options to the future super-sized sub fleet.
If the SIOP is not already looking beyond the Virginia-class attack subs, somebody, somewhere, needs to be fired. A big bet on big subs seems likely. Outside of the future 12-hull Columbia-class SSBN fleet, the Navy is mulling a fleet of up to five “large payload” submarines. Other large utility subs may follow. Two years ago, I wrote that the Navy should consider extending the Columbia-class production run, adding in some flexible battle-taxi type commando submarines—addressing an oft-unacknowledged but often-met Navy requirement for supporting some type of undersea amphibious assault capability.
The modern Navy has always provided undersea commando transport. After World War II, two Balao-class submarines—the USS Perch (SS 313) and USS Sealion (SS 315) had the job. Then the job passed to the cast-off Regulus missile subs USS Tunny (SS 282) and USS Greyback (SSG 574). Once those platforms retired, old or otherwise surplus ballistic missile subs were converted into commando/special mission assets.
Today, four Ohio-class SSGN conversions can berth and deploy teams of around 70-100 troops, and they’ve been a smashing success. While the Virginia-class subs can carry special mission troops as well, the large-diameter subs are far more flexible and accommodating.
Beyond troop carriers, a wide-diameter subs in the attack role offers far-greater opportunities to carry more ammunition while supporting a wide range of robotic craft. According to the latest report from the Congressional Research Service, the next generation SSN(X) is going to somehow meld all the characteristics of the three primary submarine classes in the fleet, producing something that has a submerged displacement larger than 9,138 tons. Even if they are smaller than the future ballistic missile submarines, the big new attack subs would likely be very hard-pressed to fit into the already-cramped facilities at the Portsmouth Navy Yard on the New Hampshire/Maine border.
If the Navy’s strategists and weapon designers think big, wide subs are the right target, then the organization must pause the SIOP and ensure the Navy’s shipyard-builders are doing more than just recapitalizing undersized dry docks. If the future National Maritime Strategy indicates that bigger subs are the future, then the Navy needs to be open in the fact they are planning out submarine repair yards able to accept far wider, heavier vessels that sport a far larger draft.
The Navy’s new leadership must act with urgency. The time for engineering and design discipline is now—when the shipyards actually have money to build the maintenance capabilities the next Navy needs.
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