Posted on 04/19/2005 3:48:36 PM PDT by Lysandru
The navy's new destroyer, the DD(X), is becoming so expensive that it may end up destroying itself. The navy once wanted 24 of them. Now it thinks it can afford five - if that.
. The price of the navy's new ships, driven upward by old-school politics and the rusty machinery of American shipbuilding, may scuttle the Pentagon's plans for a 21st-century armada of high-technology aircraft carriers, destroyers and submarines.
. Shipbuilding costs "have spiraled out of control," the navy's top admiral, Vern Clark, told Congress last week, rising so high that "we can't build the navy that we believe that we need in the 21st century."
. The price of the new navy is going up fast. The first two DD(X)s are now supposed to total $6.3 billion, according to confidential budget documents, up $1.5 billion. A new aircraft carrier, the CVN-21, is estimated at $13.7 billion, up $2 billion. The new Virginia-class submarines now cost $2.5 billion each, up $400 million.
. All these increases have materialized in the last six months.
SNIP
(Excerpt) Read more at iht.com ...
I was aghast here. A 14,000 ton "destroyer?"
Well, at least this guy understands that the politicians are shafting the USN....
I'm curious... why have the shipbuilding costs gone up so much, so fast?
Will the LCS be built in these 6 shipyards?
Part and parcel of what happens when you let your entire manufacturing industry move overseas in search of cheap labor.
Don't like the sounds of this.
I can see $2 billion for a top of the line sub. But over $3 billion for a destroyer with only 2 6" (155mm) guns? Build 3 more subs for the same cost.
Why don't we just get Walmart to import some destroyers cheap from China?
(BTW, that is sarcasm)
Not necessarilly, depends who you choose...Hyundai seems to crank out ships without any Q/A problems...
When a union janitor makes $33.50 per hour to sweep floors, the problem isn't companies going overseas, the problem is unions driving them off shore as well as prices up.
Many businesses that quoted metal stud and drywall projects closed doors. Bidding on some projects are a year to a year and a half before actual installation. If they never locked in a project quote with a manufacturer they were left at the tip of the waterfall with no-place to go but over the falls, head first.
the problem is no competition.
the politics is controlled by districts that benefit from the contracts.
it's basically middle class welfare.
125% in one year?
good GOD!
justified by what, energy costs for refinement and logistics???
Here's the problem. Too much pork.
Yes, the shipyards are important and the state of our merchant marine and shipbuilding industries is a shame and an embarassment. Unneeded and unwanted (By the Navy) government contracts, however, are not the answer.
Maybe they should make them in China?
Yes. Likewise Kawasaki Heavy Industries.
None of the cost has to do with raw size; sheet metal is cheap.
The cost is all electronics.
Those aren't the primary weapons of any destroyer.
And you can't escort and defend surface ships with submarines.
Lots of new electronics on these ships.
Steel prices have gone up so much that there is big money to be made in scrap metal, to the point that meth-heads in my part of the country (Portland, OR) are going out to highways and stealing roadsigns to turn in for drug money. It's crazy.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.