Posted on 05/10/2005 11:52:43 PM PDT by CrawDaddyCA
WASHINGTON — The powerful DDX Destroyer is nicknamed the "stealth" warship for its design that has several flat surfaces above the water to make it more difficult for the enemy to detect. The Navy wants to buy one DDX per year, paying about $3 billion per ship, but the place where the ships will be built is a point of disagreement between the Pentagon and Capitol Hill.
The Pentagon wants the two shipyards that build the Navy's destroyers to compete, meaning only one would get the whole DDX contract.
The two sites are Ingalls Shipyard in Pascagoula, Miss., run by Northrop Grumman and Bath Iron Works in Bath, Maine, run by General Dynamics.
Defense analysts say the Pentagon has calculated that it's too costly to have both sites building the DDX, especially considering that only one warship will be built each year. Plus, they argue, the Navy has pared down its other surface ship construction to one shipyard.
"One shipyard to build aircraft carriers, one shipyard to build amphibious assault, one shipyard to build amphibious attack, and so I think the theory is there is very low production rate of only one ship a year, [and] it makes sense to narrow it down to just one shipyard," said John Pike, director of Globalsecurity.org.
But closing one of the shipyards means a financial hit to one of the states and constituents out of work. That drew the attention of some lawmakers who have nixed, for now, the Pentagon's idea of one yard to build the DDX.
Republican senators from Maine and Mississippi want one shipyard to build a DDX one year and the other shipyard to build the warship the next year.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
This guy is smoking crack, the one shipyard proposal will bite us in the ass in the upcoming war with China.
Since it takes more than a year to build one, why not start one in one yard this year, and the next in another yard next year and spread the money and the expertise around?
Trent Lott (R-Miss) may want to reconsider his statement on the Tony Snow show on May 10th.
From: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1400272/posts
Lott also stated that he won't accept criticism from Republicans for working with Democratic senators because "they're the same ones who threw me overboard. I'm free. I don't have to work with them anymore."
He called negotiating away all that we held dear to be working with us. I can still see him grovelling to the Black Caucus trying to save his job. Even they gave him the Nero thumbs down. Now he is mad at the Republicans.
Aren't the DDX's the ships that will be retrofitted with the railguns the Navy is developing?
The 90 + mile range rail guns? I think so, but not sure. Will look into it further...
The DDX is a waste of money. We would be better off building more DDG-51s and let the contractors design them for reduced crews, than the X. Plus, that keeps both yards going.
The DDX will turn out to be way over cost and delivered late. It will be a disaster for the Navy and keep Congressional Committees happy for years, investigating it.
How do you know all of this information?
Was in the Navy and worked in new construction during my career.
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