"Inside the Navy’s Big Aircraft-Carrier Budget Gamble" Topic

"The Navy is dealing with the military's impending budget fiasco by putting its premier hardware — aircraft carriers — on the firing line. It's unexpected, but it might actually be a smart move — if Congress cancels the deepest budget cuts. But if Congress keeps the cuts, then the Navy's readiness to handle the security threats of the next several years will seriously decline — in many ways because of how the Navy buys stuff.

No, the Navy isn't scrapping its aircraft carriers, the number-one symbol of American global power. In fact, last June, with the budget storm brewing, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta publicly swore the U.S. would remain an 11-carrier Navy. But last week, the Navy took the drastic step of canceling the deployment of the USS Harry Truman, which was scheduled to head for the Middle East; and delaying the years-long refueling of the USS Abraham Lincoln. The fleet was already down one carrier, with the December decommissioning of the USS Enterprise.

But the way the Navy buys, builds and maintains those carriers means that they're going to be the first hit during the current budget battle.

Like the rest of the military, the Navy is short of cash by about $9 USD billion, because Congress hasn't passed the fiscal 2013 defense bill, and so instead is funding the military at last year's levels using a stopgap measure called a Continuing Resolution. On top of that, nearly every military program that isn't related to the Afghanistan war and troop pay is scheduled for a cut of nearly 10 percent on March 1 thanks to sequestration, a mechanism to compel President Obama and Congress to pass a big budget deal. Obama and congressional Republicans swear they want to avert sequestration; they've failed to do so repeatedly.

Faced with those cuts, the Navy made a big choice. It opted in the last few months to preserve most of its multi-year shipbuilding programs — at the expense of ship deployments and what's called "Operations and Maintenance" (O&M) accounts. In other words, the Navy opted for its future over its present…"
Full article here
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Isn't better to built tranditional carriers?
What are the advantages of nuclear aircraft carriers if they have to be four years inactives and the huge amout of money you have to invest to change their pieces?

Amicalement
Armand

Nuclear powered ships mean that no matter what the price of fuel oil is, the carriers can deploy. Nuclear power also means more internal space for aviation fuel and ammunition.

It takes a phenomenal amount of power to make a carrier, each one has to be able to put at least 30 knots of wind over the bow for flight operations, and you need lots of steam for the catapults. Nuclear power does that pretty well.

When the America-class helicopter carriers were being designed, the break-even point for making them nuclear powered was crude oil prices at or above $140 USD/barrel. And LHAs don't need to be able to put 30 knots of wind over the bow, so the break-even cost for a carrier is probably less than $140 USD/barrel.

Much as I know I will get screamed at for saying this, and as much as I am a traditionalist in love with naval avation, I will say it anyway- Carriers are not the combat platform for the future of the navy. Technology will make them both less necessecary, and more vulnerable over the next 20-30 years. Smaller, faster nuclear powered ships, including submarines, using cruise missles, rail guns and platforms for launching stealth pilotless aircraft with JDAMS will make more than 4-6 carriers unnecessary in 2-3 decades.

… will make more than 4-6 carriers unnecessary in 2-3 decades.

The Air Force can already hit anywhere in the world without needing a carrier. The reason you have a carrier is to reduce time of flight to target, so I don't see the need for the number of carriers to change much.

That said, what flies off the carriers is going to change a great deal, so they might not be the super-carriers that we're used to.

Carriers are not the combat platform for the future of the navy.

Idunno…. if the planet is 2/3ds water, and if 95% of the world's commerce moves across that water… then it seems that having the ability to project power very quickly and accurately from the center of an ocean is something that won't go out of style in the near future.

platforms for launching stealth pilotless aircraft

You probably have a point there, although that's arguably just a new way of saying "aircraft carrier."

I have a feeling, though, that unless those platforms produce as many jobs and government contracts in as many home states, that's gonna be a tough sell.

Everybody loves to rant about Big Government Spending, except in his congressional district….

Yup. It's hard to talk about cutting carriers when that means putting tens of thousands of people out of work in your own state.

Heck, even Clinton agreed to build a third Seawolf-class to prevent EB from closing.

Yup. It's hard to talk about cutting carriers when that means putting tens of thousands of people out of work in your own state

Here's the problem with American defence – it's become a glorified jobs creation program. And the Yanks pretend they don't like socialism.

The USAF has made plans to retire certain older aircraft (e.g. C-5A) and abolish some units. Overall no major cut to capability.

However congress people from those states affected are fighting tooth and nail to prevent aircraft retirements or squadron abolitions due to potential job losses.

Result is air force has to look at other options such as cutting flight hours and training.

So Congress people keep military bases open and obsolete hardware on the flight line, but the USAF takes a hit to its capability.

"Heck, even Clinton agreed to build a third Seawolf-class to prevent EB from closing."

The Seawolf, the F-18E/F, and the LCS program are all firm evidence that the Navy needs adult supervision.

And the Yanks pretend they don't like socialism.

We don't. We've just bought into the "No True Scotsman" definition peddled by our parties.

Here's the problem with American defence – it's become a glorified jobs creation program.

You might argue that any government program with a budget funded by taxpayers (who don't want to fund these programs) is a 'glorified job creation program,' whether military (Defense contracts) or domestic (e.g., Obamacare for the health care and pharmaceutical industries).

Seawolf made great sense when it was designed. It could single-handedly eat an entire carrier group, and the Soviets were working on real carriers. Lots of them, in fine Stalinist style.

Then the Berlin Wall came down, and all those programs stopped on the Russian side.

And after dumping billions into developing the successor to the Los Angeles class, with plans to build 30 of them, the program was cut to TWO hulls. Did I mention entire buildings that had been built to train new sailors on the systems in the Seawolf class?

Electric Boat said to their Congressmen, 'hey, we're going to have to lay off people, and once they're gone they take the corporate knowledge of how to work with HY80 steel and meet all the safety specs with them. If you allow the last shipyard making submarines to close, how will you make more in a few years when the Los Angeles start being decommissioned?'

It's not like defense industries, especially the shipyards, can find foreign buyers like back in the early 1900s. Just like the US no longer has the institutional knowledge to make battleship armor plates or gun barrels, allowing EB to close because there were no current orders would have put the US in the situation the UK was in when they got rid of their big carriers.

Nuke carriers are far better, since they don't have to be refueled very frequently, and aren't tied down, if you happen to lose an oiler, or two.

On the budgetary front, I was pleased to see that a top level general said he would be advocating "doing less with less", instead of the usual "more with less" response usually given, if the budgetary axe falls as planned.

That guy should get a medal for being brave enough to stand up and say that.

Very true Mako. The Navy can't figure out which course to take. They publish "Want us to do x mission, give us x dollars for it" but they never push it. Until the Navy gets its shipbuilding program straightened out they'll always be short of cash.

One of the problems with the Seawolf class was how long it spent on the drawing board. Initially the SSN-21 was designed immediately after the initial 12 1st flight 688's were built. At that time the Seawolf was a quantum leap forward, but as continual improvements were made to the 688's under construction such as the installation of BSY-1, the huge gap in price was not considered justified for the decreasing marginal gap in capability. Every hull tht was cancelled from the SSN-21 class meant that a decade of R&D costs were spread across a smaller number of hulls. The increased costs resulted in further cuts and on and on.