Jay A. Stout
The Navy desperately needs new ships, aircraft and weapons as it prepares for the coming war with China. But instead of procuring them in the numbers it needs, the service has wasted—and continues to waste—money on ill-considered programs. Examples include the Littoral Combat Ship, which has cost $60 billion—twice the initial projections.
An embarrassingly flawed concept that failed to meet its objectives, the Navy stopped its planned buy of 55 vessels at only 35 and has already retired seven, despite the fact that they completed only a fraction of their service lives.
Likewise, the Navy had planned to build the Zumwalt-class destroyer class around a revolutionary gun. The gun was a failure, and instead of procuring 32 of the cutting- edge destroyers, the Navy bought only three. At $8 billion each, they are maritime white elephants—grotesque examples of procurement profligacy.
The Navy is hardly the only wastrel. Among its many flawed programs, the Air Force’s KC-46 aerial refueling tanker suffers from chronic mismanagement, cost overruns and the troublesome nature of an advanced, remote-controlled refueling boom. The expensive remote-control requirement was imposed despite the fact that manually operated booms had proved reliable and effective.
The challenge the U.S. military faces is that it cannot match its enemies ship-for-ship, or aircraft-for-aircraft or even man-for-man. We consequently create innovations to negate our enemy’s advantages. This isn’t new. Examples include the English longbow, which ended the dominance of the mounted knight. Steam engines replaced sails to impart unprecedented speed and flexibility to warships. And the aircraft carrier gave navies the ability to deliver overwhelming firepower from long range.
Infatuation with drone technology
But problems arise when the services become infatuated with advanced technologies regardless of their relevance. Unmanned aircraft, or drones, are an example. Although effective in certain scenarios, they cannot resolve every challenge. Nevertheless, they are among the current enchantments which so fascinate procurement professionals.
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