Posted on 04/30/2026 7:03:01 PM PDT by daniel1212
The easiest way to misunderstand the Navy’s shipbuilding mess is to treat it as a shipyard story. That is how the issue is usually framed. Too few workers, too much complexity, too much bureaucracy, too many delays. None of that is wrong, but it is only the visible part of the problem.
The deeper problem sits upstream. The Navy’s procurement troubles reflect not just industrial strain, but a long stretch of strategic drift. If Washington cannot decide what kind of fleet it wants, shipbuilders will never deliver it on time...
For most of the Cold War, the Navy knew what it was for. Its central task was to deter and, if needed, defeat the Soviet Navy. Carrier groups projected power, attack submarines stalked Soviet submarines, and surface combatants helped protect sea lines and the larger fleet around them.
...
After the Cold War, that discipline weakened....Then came the post-9/11 years, and the drift deepened. American strategy turned toward counterterrorism, irregular warfare, and operations near shore. The Littoral Combat Ship belongs to that moment..
.. China’s naval rise forced the United States back toward a much older problem....The Western Pacific is not a permissive operating environment. It is a contested theater that punishes strategic confusion.
The trouble, of course, is that warships are not built overnight.
..The Zumwalt-class destroyer remains the cleanest illustration of the pattern.
(Excerpt) Read more at nationalsecurityjournal.org ...
Jeez…. how did we ever manage to prevail in WORLD WAR ELEVEN?
We still have 8 more world wars to get it right...
I had an interview at Bath Ship Works in Maine and the pay for what they expected was laughable. If ship builders won’t pay enough to afford to live near where ships are built (the ocean) they won’t be getting skilled labor.
We had an industrial base back then.
Since we went global, those domestic capabilities are limited and foreigners have the industrial base.
Not hard to solve; keep up deportations and ending of visas, the American worker becomes again seen as valuable, and with good pay comes good work.
Today I wouldn’t be surprised if you told me along with shoddy pay shipyards are hiring illegals or import visa slobs.
Exactly.
I see more and more online ads for welding training and suspect it has a lot to do with shipbuilding and infrastructure industries crying because they don’t have enough talent available.
Maybe it was my position but when o went in I had to show my passport proving citizenship.
Not like fake IDs have stopped illegals.
A similar Problem of directional uncertainty plagues they air force. They can’t make up their mind whether they want to have manned aircraft Or bots or train people in real airplanes Or just use simulators. Then there is the new T7 trainer. These things leave them uncertain as to These things leave them uncertain as to which direction they are going but it has made them certain they don’t want to spend money on systems that may be changed which. Thus there is a part shortage for our training aircraft.
The military seems to have done a good job On orders to destroy Iran. Notwithstanding the fact That the Iranians now hold the world hostage By closing the straits of By closing the straits of hormuz With a bunch of speed boatshormuz. For all the damage done so far Our military doesn’t seem to be able to do a damn thing about it.
Shipbuilding wise And otherwise other than building vast data centers Our industry and our military don’t seem to be able to even organize a piss up and a pub
We need more welders, plumbers, electricians, etc and far far fewer women’s studies, African studies, interpretive dance, etc majors.
By closing the straits of By closing the straits of hormuz With a bunch of speed boatshormuz. For all the damage done so far Our military doesn’t seem to be able to do a damn thing about it.
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It dis not help that someone sold 47 a bill of goods to the effect that all objectives could be accomplished from the air in a matter of weeks. Too late now, the war is over and not likely to restart anytime soon, nor is any deal likely either.
Wanna bet the admin staff have ten folded in the past 40 years?
I don’t think so much it was that they sold him a bill of goods as it was that he thought there was also an end strategy. Military doesn’t do that, State Department and Politicians do. I have said before here that it took us three years to realize that there had to be a victory plan for Europe and thus came the Marshall Plan. Unrealized to some MacArthur already had such a plan for Japan.
I also think someone got weak kneed after he saw what happens when someone gets shot down. The truce began and has not ended since two days after the rescue of the WSO of the 15E and has drawn out since with nothing but threats. Even the A-10s shooting speed boats ended so far as I can tell and the red line is way out in the Gulf of Oman.
We need more welders, plumbers, electricians, etc and far far fewer women’s studies, African studies, interpretive dance, etc majors.
Actually, we need more robots. It should be mostly automated by now.
We need the best in our shipyards; my opinion. Foreign, unskilled just won’t do it for this kind of work. These workers must be paid adequately or we are in an awful mess. Not that we aren’t already thanks to the Democrats. Good thing these particular clowns weren’t around as much or somebody else would have won WW11. I’d help if it were possible, but at this point I’m too old to work in a defense plant as my father once did.
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