Congress Must Save the Navy from Catastrophic Failure: Barreling toward a Hollow Navy
Last updated 07:26 AM EDT • Read time: 5m
The U.S. Constitution clearly states that Congress is responsible “To provide and maintain a Navy.” Never has this clause been more important. In June 2022, I argued that the Navy was broken and Congress needed to launch a commission, which it did six months later. Unfortunately, for political reasons, the commission did not begin work for several years, burning time needed to fix the Navy. Congress has failed to fix the broken Navy, but it now risks allowing the Navy to become something worse: a hollow force that exists on paper but cannot generate the ships, aircraft, submarines, and sailors necessary to fight and win a war.
Whether or not Congress turns things around hinges on three decisions. The first, is whether the U.S. changes a carrier design already in production, which could amount to a soft kill of a hull on which the Navy has already spent billions. The second is whether the Navy will be forced to absorb an indefinite war that consumes the fleet and causes deferred maintenance costs to explode. And the third is whether we adopt a modernization plan that could crowd out the unmanned and AI-enabled systems needed for the next war.
The carrier redesign is driven by the tenuous argument that returning to steam could lower costs and improve reliability. But redesigning a $15 billion ship already being built will cost billions more and cause a yearslong delay that will exacerbate the now publicly known strained carrier fleet. The design decisions, such as the shift from a steam to an electromagnetic aircraft launch system (EMALS), the electromagnetic weapons elevators, and the placement of the island, were made decades ago. Suppliers, shipyards, and the Navy have already conformed to these design decisions. This is not simply about changing equipment; it is about changing the design of the ship, essentially wasting another decade and tens of billions of dollars. A Navy that cannot build ships fast enough cannot afford to redesign its most expensive and complex ship without taking out the rest of the Navy’s budget in the process. Congress does not need to decide whether steam is better than electromagnetic launch. Congress simply has to decide whether it is willing to let the Navy turn an aircraft carrier already in production into another engineering experiment.
When it comes to naval readiness, concerns are well-documented as evidenced by the recent GAO reporting that the attack submarine fleet has lost more than 15,000 operational days over the past decade. The Iran war has added colossal strain to the Navy’s already fragile force generation capacity. The lack of additional funding for maintenance means that these ships will not be fixed and instead will sit in dry dock, awaiting repair, for years to come. This leaves fewer ships available to deter China and fight in the Middle East, which means the remaining ships will have to stay at sea longer to pick up the slack. Put simply, it is a readiness death spiral with no way out. If Congress is constitutionally responsible for providing and maintaining a Navy, Congress has the right to know what it will take to restore the Navy.
As for modernization, there is no question that Navy must evolve, but it must do so without destroying the Navy that exists today. The $350 billion budget reconciliation is not simply a nice-to-have modernization fund. It is actually the bridge between today’s Navy and tomorrow’s Navy. Without these funds, the Navy is caught in a modernization trap. While the Navy’s explicit service-specific slice sits at $39 billion, a significant portion of the $245 billion Defense-Wide fund directly feeds naval priorities such as unmanned undersea vehicles and air drones. Additionally, funds for the Defense Production Act will go to strengthen the Navy’s supply chain
Congress has the next four months before NDAA passage to take three critical steps: Stop the carrier redesign, fund the war’s consequences, and pass the $350 billion.
First, the authorizers need to prohibit the Navy from expending any funds to alter the aircraft carriers under construction. The prohibition needs to be specific: Do not change the catapult to steam, do not remove the electromagnetic drive from the weapons elevators, and do not move the island from its current position aft. This is not about refereeing an engineering debate. Instead, it is about the basic discipline of finishing what has already been started.
Second, the appropriators must pass an emergency supplemental to regenerate the Navy. This is not an argument over the merits of the war. Such debates will be judged ultimately by history. This is about providing funds to restore a battered fleet largely responsible for maintaining deterrence across the Pacific.
Lastly, pass the $350 billion reconciliation request. While many have given up on these funds, it is clear that without them, the entire modernization of the Navy comes to an end.
Congress is not merely a funding body. It is the single institution the Constitution charges with providing and maintaining the Navy. The nation needs Congress to do its job by stopping the carrier redesign, funding the war’s consequences, and passing the $350 billion for modernization. With four months to go, the clock is ticking.
MG Ferrari is a Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. He previously served as the Director of Program Analysis and Evaluation for the U.S. Army and was the Commanding General of White Sands Missile Range.