The military press seems to be coming around to the conclusion that has been floated here at the Institute for quite some time. The aircraft carrier has seen its time and it is time to retire the tired and anachronistic technology.
Poor concepts, design and planning; serial changes to design during construction; serious operating issues when in sea trials brings it back to be fixed; more serious defects in operations, more insufficient fixes. No one held accountable for the fraud waste and abuse that is yet another US Navy building program committing the government to contract for two more of these monstrosities. Delivered years late and way, way over budget. Like the Zumwalt and the LCS, it was “commissioned” before it actually worked.
The US Navy spends roughly $40 billion annually on shipbuilding projects, yet these projects are regularly behind schedule and battling rising costs.
The USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN 78) carrier strike group is currently in Composite Training Unit Exercise (COMPUTEX), a rehearsal each US Navy Carrier Strike Group performs before departing for deployment by early summer to the Red Sea, according to U.S. officials familiar with the matter. We’ll see how that works out.
The rise of drones, which can be deployed in kamikaze mode, and/or in buzzing swarms, has proven disruptive to the operations of surface vessels—despite costing a mere fraction of what a surface vessel costs. More concerning perhaps, are improvements in anti-ship missiles and the onset of hypersonic missiles—all of which pose significant threats to surface vessels.
The United States hasn’t lost an aircraft carrier since World War II. In the eighty years since, the standards for what constitutes an acceptable military loss have lowered drastically. Americans are generally not comfortable with the loss of life or technology.
The loss of something like an aircraft carrier would be unfathomable to the contemporary American, and indeed, staggering in its proportions. Thousands of sailors would potentially be lost.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/why-does-the-navy-s-new-ford-class-aircraft-carrier-cost-13-billion/ar-BB1ofK8Q?ocid=ASUDHP&apiversion=v2&noservercache=1&domshim=1&renderwebcomponents=1&wcseo=1&batchservertelemetry=1&noservertelemetry=1
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