The Ships for America Act would be good for the Navy as well

It is hardly a secret that the U.S. Navy’s shipbuilding program is in the doldrums. Year after year, regardless of the strenuous efforts of both the Navy’s civilian and military leadership, the service has been unable to achieve the force levels it has set for itself.

For several years it remained committed to a goal of 355 active manned ships that it outlined in 2016. In 2020, the Navy issued a requirement for a more distributed fleet architecture that would comprise a minimum of 382 ships and at least 143 unmanned units. In both cases, the maximum goal was considerably higher — 446 manned ships, 242 unmanned.

A year later, under the Biden administration, the Navy revised its plan yet again, this time downward. The new plan involved a minimum of 321 manned ships — a level that fell below that of 2016 — and 77 large unmanned ships.

In 2022, the Navy revised its numbers yet again. The Chief of Naval Operations Navigation Plan called for a fleet of 373 manned ships as well as about 150 large unmanned surface and underwater vehicles. The manned warships included 66 attack submarines, 12 strategic ballistic missile submarines, 12 aircraft carriers, 96 large surface combatants, 56 small surface combatants, 49 amphibious ships and 83 support ships.

In practice, the Navy has not been able to exceed 300 manned warships, and has completed only four unmanned ships. Indeed, it had than fewer than that total number when the 2024 fiscal year ended earlier this week. Moreover, the administration’s fiscal 2025 proposals actually result in a decline in force levels due to early retirements of currently operational warships. While the administration proposes increases beyond 2025, “out year” plans rarely materialize, especially when there is a change in administration.

Not surprisingly, there has been considerable finger-pointing as to who is to blame. Navy leaders point to an industry that they claim is more interested in profits, cash flow and stock buybacks than in timely and efficient production. Industry argues that the service constantly imposes engineering change orders that complicate construction schedules.

Both the Navy and its traditional industrial base blame Congress for its addiction to continuing resolutions and its inability to pass budgets in a timely manner. And Congress blames the Navy for cost overruns, schedule delays and a penchant for building hugely expensive and increasingly vulnerable warships at a time when an aggressive China continues to outpace U.S. shipbuilding production.

Many in Congress also hold the Biden administration to account for reducing force levels — even if only temporarily — rather than increasing them. To that end, legislators have voted to increase ship production for fiscal 2025, though when such legislation will pass is unclear; the government is currently operating under a continuing resolution that will extend at least until Dec. 20.

There is an element of truth in all of the foregoing assertions about the Navy, industry and Congress. But casting aspersions on those involved in modernizing the fleet will not build more ships. The Navy needs solutions, not a blame game. Moreover, the need for solutions has become increasingly urgent precisely because China threatens American interests in the Pacific, the theater in which the Navy has long had a primary operational role.

To that end, there is considerable merit in the recently unveiled Ships for America Act. Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) and Rep. Michael Waltz (R-Fla.) are cosponsors of the legislation, which calls for incentives, including tax credits and deductions for shipbuilders and shipowners to move cargo on U.S.-flagged ships; technological innovation; and strengthening and expanding the maritime workforce.

Should Congress approve this bipartisan legislation, it could have a positive effect on the Navy’s shipbuilding base. More shipyards would be in a position to support shipbuilding needs. More shipyard workers that are in short supply, such as welders and fitters, could bolster the current legacy Navy industrial base workforce. And innovative high-tech breakthroughs in commercial shipbuilding could be adapted to Navy shipbuilding needs, much as the Department of Defense has absorbed numerous other Silicon Valley breakthroughs.

Ultimately, what the Navy needs are not only more funds and stable year-over-year budgets, but to spend those funds wisely and efficiently. To that end, it should actively support passage of the Ships for America legislation and, should it pass, adapt some of the ideas the legislation highlights.

Beyond supporting Ships for America — indeed, in order to benefit from any high-technology advances that the legislation anticipates — the Navy must incorporate a culture that not only fosters but mandates a willingness to take risks in terms of warship design, development and operations. Silicon Valley and America’s other high-tech centers have achieved their breakthroughs precisely because they have encouraged risk-taking.

While civilian and military Navy leaders have tried to change entrenched Navy culture, they need more than vocal congressional support. In particular, Congress should mandate that both military officers and civilian leaders should be evaluated on the basis of their willingness to take risks in program development and, for those who are program managers, on the basis of their adhering to planned schedules and budgets.

By overhauling its system of evaluating personnel, the Navy would go a long way towards expanding and modernizing the fleet of the 21st century in the most efficient and expeditious manner.

Dov S. Zakheim is a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and vice chairman of the board for the Foreign Policy Research Institute. He was undersecretary of Defense (comptroller) and chief financial officer for the Department of Defense from 2001 to 2004 and a deputy undersecretary of Defense from 1985 to 1987.