The Navy has struggled to force itself to even ask for
funding for logistics ships out of fear that it will take funds away from big,
shiny, Burkes and carriers. In the past,
the Navy briefly explored a common hull for a family of logistics ships but
quickly abandoned it when they got cost estimates from industry.
Program
Executive Officer for Ships Rear Adm. Bill Galinis acknowledged earlier this
month that previous designs from industry-led to cost estimates upwards of $1 billion per hull, for the
program that seeks two variants: one to cover sealift, and one to focus on
tasks such as sub-tending and command and control. [emphasis added] …
Galinis
said the original idea – a single hull design to cover five mission sets – is
inherently not optimized for any of the missions, which drove some cost into
the original plan. (1)
ComNavOps has consistently decried the idea of commonality
and modularity (a common hull is a variation of the modular concept) due to the
lack of optimization. This demonstrates,
yet again, the inherent inefficiency of commonality. The problem is, by the time you take an
unoptimized vessel and add in the required degree of optimization to perform,
say, hospital work versus bulk cargo transport, you overwhelm and lose any cost
savings that the common hull might have provided. Commonality only works between closely
related functions (and even that’s questionable) or functions that can accept a
large degree of inefficiency (rarely the case).
Look at the F-35 example of commonality – a dismal failure because the
degree of optimization for each variant turned out to be too great and the
required optimization efforts cost far more than any commonality cost savings.
Side note: Please don’t confuse this with commonality of
component parts like the same pump for the same pumping task across many
different ships. That’s a single piece
of equipment performing the same task, just in many different ships. If you have an identical task, of course
you’d use the identical piece of equipment.
What you wouldn’t do is try to use the same pump to pump oil that you
would use to pump potable water.
Now, the Navy is resurrecting the common hull concept (CHAMP
- Common Hull Auxiliary Multi-mission Platform) based on a commercial design.
…
the Navy asked its industry partners to go back and start with a commercial
hull design, adding in the military-unique requirements only where needed. (1)
That seems reasonable, at first glance, doesn’t it? The problem is that even this approach costs
a LOT of money and there is a much cheaper, common sense alternative: buy used ships for pennies on the
dollar! Even the Navy recognizes the
absurdity of what they’re trying to do.
Former
Navy Secretary Richard V. Spencer, though, cast doubt on the Navy’s ability to
support the CHAMP ships – even at a much lower price tag than the $1 billion
estimate – in remarks in May 2019, when he said it was hard to ask Congress for
money for these new ships when he could ask for far less money to buy used
sealift ships.
“Putting
my business hat on for the business case, I can’t afford a lot of $600-million
ships. I can’t really afford a lot of $400-million ships, when I can go out and
buy used [roll-on/roll-off ships] for $35 to $40 million. (1)
Let’s repeat the relevant portion of that passage:
I
can’t afford a lot of $600-million ships. I can’t really afford a lot of
$400-million ships, when I can go out
and buy used [roll-on/roll-off ships] for $35 to $40 million. [emphasis
added] (1)
So, we see the Navy way which is to buy new ships, of
whatever type, versus the common sense approach of buying used ships for
pennies on the dollar. Want to guess
which approach the Navy will pursue?
There’s the Navy way and then there’s the common sense way.
Hey, new ships are great when the requirement is for a ship
so unique and so optimized that there is no commercially available equivalent
and when optimization would cost more than building new. Aircraft carriers and destroyers and
submarines are good examples. For
logistics support ships, however, a $40M used RO/RO buys you a LOT of ship for
the money and leaves a lot of dollars for whatever optimization you need to
apply.
The Navy way versus common sense.
(1)USNI News website, “Navy Trying Again On CHAMP Auxiliary
Design, After White House Pushback”, Megan Eckstein, 30-Jan-2020,
https://news.usni.org/2020/01/30/navy-trying-again-on-champ-auxiliary-design-after-white-house-pushback
As a 2X CO of logistics ships (plus XO of one, and COS of the SIXTH Fleet logistics force) I applaud you for raising this. Logistics ain't sexy, but as I used to tell my crews:"Without you nobody goes very far, stays very long or does very much". USN vitiated logistics by giving it all to MSC (where the dollar--not fleet effectiveness rules) and compounded that by retiring perfectly good ships (AOE e.g.) again, based upon money. Major fail in common sense--and experience.Thanks!!
ReplyDeleteWith your extensive experience, what are your thoughts on the logistics support for a Pacific/China war given our lack of bases? Can we do it? What will it take? We are so incredibly far from what we had in WWII in regards to the logistics fleet, is it even possible to supply/support a China war? Can we build a viable logistics fleet with used vessels?
DeleteI'd love to hear your thoughts.
Two of my tours were in the Pacific--though we had Subic Bay as a base at the time :-). If we assume that many forward third country bases will not be available (mines/ kinetic action/diplomatic concerns etc.), we would be left with (Probably) Japan, Australia and Guam as our forward logistics hubs. Even with maximum use of merchant ships (either ours, or leased etc) there is no way we could logistically sustain a Pacific campaign which operates inside the First Island chain. Even if we had the capability to initially support a Battle Fleet in the area, any attrition of the supply chain ships (and NONE of them are armed, plus we do not have the capability to convoy them with escorts) would very quickly put the Battle Fleet in an untenable position. Furthermore, I would assert that even with no attrition we could not support an active campaign in the area for very long. We could , in my opinion, expand the logistics fleet with some used vessels; Tankers for fuel lift, container ships for "Dry goods" and RoRos for equipment lift (assuming that we can pull off JLOTS or something like it). Such acquisitions would help, but they cannot alleviate the critical shortages (self imposed) of UNREP ships, particularly fast ones. On top of all that, we have allowed our pool of merchant mariners to atrophy to the point that even if we buy the ships; we could not man them.
DeleteThis is a pretty dismal picture, which to any sane strategic planner indicates that a large scale active maritime campaign in that area is pretty much off the table. It would take heroic efforts (and budget expenditures!) to alleviate these shortfalls. There are some faint glimmers of light on the horizon--such as the recent executive order aimed at having surface naval officers be Coast Guard certified, likewise some enlisted etc. Not enough though.
That is a dismal picture though not surprising. I'll continue to pound on the issue through the blog.
DeleteIf you were 'king for a day' what's the first action you'd initiate to address the logistic fleet problems?
First action would be to reactivate those MSC ships--particularly the AOEs--currently in reserve and ensure that they are manned and ready. Reactivation would include up-to-date C4I and self defense capability.
DeleteA couple ideals
DeleteRestore subsidies for civilian ship building, why we unilaterally stopped them is beyond me. We don't for agriculture nor airplanes when everyone else does.
Expand the Jones act to create more berths for US merchant marine sailors. Might violate WTO rules but...
End flags of connivance/tax havens.
Net effect shipping stuff to the us will be more expensive. But you can't have a both a healthy shipbuilding industry and large merchant marine pool with out some cost and if drop down bargain day price cuts at Walmart are your only concern.
If the US want's ship building and a US Merchant Marine and US flagged ships the simple fact is taxes and cost at the wally mart.
Did you know 13 of 192 foreign flagged US navy contracted ships with non US crews essentially mutinied and turned their ships around in Desert Storm. I really doubt the ratio would be better against China or Russia where the combat risk would be vastly greater then from Iraq of the day.
@ Captain Steve
DeleteBut that requires a navy not obsessed with crew cuts and wonder toys. That would spending on maintenance and dull work a day ships. That would be willing to have a lot more people in the navy reserve and paying them to do more drills than they do now.
It also means a bigger coast guard since if LCS ships are doing drug interdiction clearly the USCG is too small. Or of course the USN is making make work for another failed ship. Or helping the USCG replace (vastly expensively) the patrols ships the navy had not build so the USCG has to do Navy work in the South China sea and Persian Gulf.
Again you get what you pay for and right now another f-35 is far more important than the ships that supply it.
Alas you are, I think, on target. The fundamental problem is, as usual, money; we prioritize the sexy stuff while telling ourselves we can do logistics when needed (apparently with a magic wand of some sort).
Delete"Did you know 13 of 192 foreign flagged US navy contracted ships with non US crews essentially mutinied and turned their ships around in Desert Storm."
DeleteHave not heard that. Give me a reference.
From memory and the easy search brought up this.
Deletehttps://taskandpurpose.com/us-mercant-marine-fleet-military
I for a change have a busy work day today but I will put in some hours to get some verification. But its the same basic circle no US ships no US flags and thus no US Merchant marine sailors.
Possible solutions or not--
Delete1. The Jones act commercial shippers and the US Navy could identify Jones act shipping needs and war time shipping needs that could be satisfied with similar ships. The USN would purchase a fractional ownership of the commercial ships (creating a subsidy for the commercial shippers) that would entitle them to have first use of the ship in time of need.
The payments for the ownership of the ships would be annually until the USN owned 100% of the value of the ship at approximately 75% of the economically useful life. The ships would then be placed in the reserve fleet with 25% of the useful life left to be activated if needed for wartime sealift (ready reserve)
The ships in the program could be exempted from the Jones act requirements for USA build since they would be owned at least in part by the US Navy.
2. US Navy sailor/Merchant Mariner lease back. Create a program that allows USN sailors to serve on US Merchant Marine vessels as full time reserve members of the Navy (adding a few years to their retirement in the process) The sailors would have to be have a Merchant Marine Credential to qualify for the program, but they could get the training in the US Navy. The corporations would pay for 80 percent of the salary and benefits for the USN sailors to the US Navy. The 20% the US Navy would be a subsidy for an increase in Merchant Mariners who could be called upon in time of need. The lease back sailors could be no more than 20 percent of the workforce for the corporations. The sailors could only be in the program for 5 years. It may give some sailors tired of the Navy a way to pad their retirement and still be useful to the Navy in time of War.
3. Preposition supplies at Attu Island like the Marines in Norway. Attu island is larger than Guam, uninhabited and nearly as close to Beijing as Guam. The island should be a Swiss cheese of tunnels deep (500 feet) underground to provide a ready magazine to replenish the fleet. Attu island is closer to Guam than Peal Harbor. The western Pacific is the likely conflict area and Attu Island and Guam are two US territories that should be fortified for war. The lack of civilians on Attu Island would make it a base that could be completely devoted to the mission of fleet support without concerns for competing interests. Dry docks and repair facilities could be developed to repair ships. A submarine pen could be constructed. Intermediate range ballistic missiles and long range cruise missiles capable of hitting China could be placed in hardened shelters on Attu Island. If the policy makers wanted to not spend the money on a new land based ballistic missile, Trident D5 missiles in land based silos on Attu Island would cover all of China and Russia.
"Possible solutions"
DeleteI'm not an expert on this but on the face of it those sound like ideas well worth investigating. I'm impressed! That is some top flight alternative thinking. Keep it up!
Those are some really good possible solutions which deserve analysis and follow-on action. Having said that; I would not want to be the MPSRON Commodore of the Attu group ;-).
Delete"1. The Jones act commercial shippers"
DeleteYou would walking into a political minefield. 'Picking winners...' Mind you its a good plan since we should be willing to pick winners if we get US flagged and run vessels back. But I am pretty sure charges of socialism would come fast and hard.
3. "Attu Island"
Clever - but the hardening would have to be hard indeed since you would sort be signaling intent given the relative openness of US policy.
@ Captain Steve
DeleteI agree that Attu Island would become a very attractive target and be a not so attractive command, but that is why it should be developed to take a serious beating (nuclear weapons beating). We should shape future battles not our enemy. We place ground based nuclear ballistic missiles in hardened structures away from population centers to force an adversary to expend their nuclear missiles in areas that will result in fewer casualties. We should have similar thinking for conventional forces. Make the enemy do the math, make it extremely difficult for an enemy to perceive an advantage. Wars are started because at least one party thinks it can use force without serious consequence. Unfortunately, we are sending signals to China that we will roll over if push comes to shove. We need to make it clear we are in the Western Pacific to stay and will not accept adventurism from China.
"We should shape future battles not our enemy."
Delete"We need to make it clear we are in the Western Pacific to stay and will not accept adventurism from China."
Well said! Spot on.
"sort be signaling intent given the relative openness of US policy."
DeleteDoesn't Guam signal intent? Don't our leased bases in Japan signal intent? Doesn't our presence in SKorea signal intent?
Isn't the point of a standing military to signal intent to would-be enemies?
China is certainly signaling their intent! Shouldn't we signal ours?
@ Kath
DeleteThe Merchant Mariners are vital to any war and we treat them as if they can be replaced with no great difficulty. The current ready reserve fleet is predominately of foreign construction that was converted at considerable expense to fulfill US sealift requirements. It would seem to make more sense to build the ships to US sealift requirements and save the cost of the refit. If US Merchant Mariners are expected to crew the reserve fleet it would also make sense to have similar ships in the Jones act fleet. It make little sense to me to subsidize foreign ship operators when we purchase their ships for conversion when we could just help purchase ships for US ship operators. There should be a number of Merchant Mariners that is considered necessary for war time military logistics and we should be unapologetic about supporting the Merchant Mariners and the companies that employ them, regardless of the WTO.
The defense of the nation is critical and most people understand that somethings need to be under the control of the United States and not subject to foreign influence. We have not had effective leadership making the case for the Merchant Marines and why we need a strong maritime industry.
"foreign construction that was converted at considerable expense to fulfill US sealift requirements."
DeleteChina builds their merchant ships with military conversion in mind. They include features that make a future military conversion easy. That seems like a good idea.
One possibility that ties into new construction is to have all new construction be pre-fit for military conversion and pay the cost plus a fee of some sort for the modifications. That would offer a subsidy and incentive for US shipbuilding. I'm not an expert in this area - just thinking out loud.
I believe that it was practice in the past for USG to subsidize ship construction in return for inclusion of military conversion features (e.g. strengthened deck for deck guns etc). As noted above, something similar would be a good practice now.
DeleteI think its really Congress' way vs common sense. Navy knows buying used will be a tough sell since its Congressmen in shipbuilding districts that get them their budget to begin with. Although several ships were bought and converted at NASSCO a generation ago. If the Navy sold it as something vs nothing and then let it ride we'd be better off either by facing the music or actually doing something sensible. As for modular, I think it depends on timeline and knowing exactly what might go in those modules. The difference between what we have now which is space and no plan and say the Spruance/Kidd/Tico.
ReplyDeleteOnce again this site is well-worth the read. Navies do not exist in isolation, but exist in a world that contains over 50,000 cost-effective commercial hulls, plus the industry that designs/builds/refits them. They are not merely targets to be protected/attacked, but assets that can be used.
ReplyDeleteAt a roughly 10-1 cost difference this is a complete no-brainer. Buy 6 or 7 and have maintenance funds left over for years to come vs one new ship!!
ReplyDeleteTime to put blogging skills to use...
ReplyDeleteThe Center for International Maritime Security would like to hear what you have to say in 1000 to 35,000 words about the USN maintaining naval superiority.
http://cimsec.org/call-for-articles-a-design-for-maintaining-maritime-superiority/42931
Note not associated just ran across it. Seems like fun.
CSBA has an interesting report on this topic called, "Sustaining the Fight: Resilient Maritime Logistics for a New Era".
ReplyDeletehttps://csbaonline.org/research/publications/sustaining-the-fight-resilient-maritime-logistics-for-a-new-era
Worth a read.
The Shugart and Gordon-class Large, Medium-speed Roll-on/Roll-off (LMSR) ships were built based commercially built Maersk ships, each about 15-20 years-old at the time of their conversion. The cost to convert them averaged about $300 million. All things being equal, adjusted for inflation (from 1997), the cost to convert them today would be about $480 million. Still much cheaper than a new build, but still quite a bit of money.
ReplyDeleteI used an old GAO report to calculate the average conversion cost above.
Thanks for the link. I read the report and it's quite confusing as far as numbers and cost but it appears that the Navy built 14 new Large, Medium Speed, RO/RO (LMSR) ships and converted 5 commercial ships (from Tables 4,5). Note that these numbers do not agree with other numbers in the report. The cost data from those tables seems to show a new build cost of $300M per ship (then year dollars) and a conversion cost of around $290M per ship. If I've interpreted that correctly, the conversion costs (unclear whether that included the purchase price - I think it did) essentially equaled the new build cost and the Navy made a very poor decision to convert existing ships. For nearly the exact same cost they could have gotten new ships!
DeleteThe report did not specify what conversions were needed. Firefighting and cargo space dewatering were mentioned as being problematic but no comprehensive list of work was given. The Navy has a tendency to gold-plate such work which drives up cost.
The purchase price portion of the total project cost was not broken out, if it was even included. If the purchase price wasn't included then the decision to convert is just baffling as that would make the conversion more expensive than new builds.
As I said, the report was not a model of clarity.
This is kind of like a "Make or Buy" decision, do I build it in-house or have have someone make it for me? The report was a little muddled, but I think the magnitude of the conversion costs are relevant. Its attractive to buy a used ship at a good price and convert it, but the conversion cost has to be compared with a new build.
DeleteGiven this is a Navy that is building $12+ billion carriers and $4 billion destroyers, a new build $1 billion support ship should not come as a surprise. It seems like the Navy doesn't have a good handle on ship building costs and I would expect pretty much the same when it comes to a conversion as well.
It's a little off topic but shows the navy design criteria for ships:
ReplyDelete“I think there’s more technical complexity packed into this ship than there was in the Apollo program,” Akacem said.
It’s not just the new catapults, elevators, arresting gear — but more practical items like the trash disposal or Bluetooth-equipped ovens in the kitchen.
I got that from https://www.defenseone.com/business/2020/01/aboard-ford-sailors-are-writing-manuals-fixing-problems-and-trying-change-its-image/162788/?oref=d-river
They are more interested in jee whiz than useful. Oh, can anyone tell me what possible use a Bluetooth enabled oven is useful for on land or sea?