Posted on 08/09/2016 5:49:50 AM PDT by Mariner
The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) is urging the U.S. Navy to delay procurement of the service’s Flight III version of the long-serving Arleigh Burke-class (DDG-51) destroyer. The new destroyer subclass will replace the original SPY-1 phased array radar with an advanced SPY-6 gallium nitride-based active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar—which will be many times more powerful. However, the new warship will require extensive redesign to accommodate the new radar and a host of other upgrades.
“The Navy has not demonstrated sufficient acquisition and design knowledge regarding its Flight III procurement approach and opportunities exist to enhance oversight,” reads an Aug. 4 GAO report titled Delaying Procurement of DDG 51 Flight III Ships Would Allow Time to Increase Design Knowledge. “If the Navy procures the lead Flight III ship in fiscal year (FY) 2016 as planned, limited detail design knowledge will be available to inform the procurement.”
The GAO also disputes the Navy’s cost estimates for the new ships, noting that the service has not updated those figures for the new Flight III design. “The Navy’s anticipated cost savings under the FY 2013-2017 Flight IIA multiyear procurement (MYP) plan do not reflect the planned addition of Flight III ships,” the report states. “While the Navy did not update its cost savings with Flight III information, doing so would increase transparency and could help inform expected savings under the next MYP.”
(Excerpt) Read more at nationalinterest.org ...
Ah, yes - beautiful downtown Bath. I was there in the late 60’s for precomm on the Harry E. Yarnell (DLG-17). It was interesting being billeted on a naval air station until the ship was ready for us.
It's a common and known problem. The thing about Aegis is, one platform can detect, track, and pass along targeting to other non-radiating Aegis platforms. Those non-radiating platforms can act as missile launchers, whose missiles are even guided by the radiating Aegis ship.
I'm interested in understanding why you think the next major naval war would be visual, going back to the WWII days. If we're involved with something like that, we've screwed up, big time. Our sensor ability (underwater, satellite, and EMCON) should be superior to any other force, as well as our air power. Why would we get close enough to allow the enemy to see us visually?
since when was “affordability” a criteria when the government is involved? That only true for us slobs in the real world.
Have remote but potent roving radar emitter units intermittently illuminate the target area, and allow passive radar receivers decipher the returns based on the transmit units positions.
For a modern ship, those are pretty good looking.
The only 2 questions I have are, where are the Trash Cans and the Hedge Hogs for ASW?
I suspect that TPTB would say that they’re in a vertical launching tube.
That’s not hoe you fire Hedge Hogs mor hoe you roll depth charges.
Like a flashlight in the woods in the dark. You can see it coming long before it illuminates you.
But not all ships need to turn on a radar/sonar to know the AA/ SW/ ASW picture.
Carriers look huge when you are standing next to them in port. From 10nm away they start to look small. At 100nm they are tiny.
OK, so you are 200 nautical miles away and you know that there is a SPY-6 equipped radar on a given bearing. What are you going to do about it?
It is not like the ships are defenseless. In addition, from a targeting perspective, they have an annoying tendency to change course and speed.
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The mother of all spec changes was when the geniuses at the Pentagon decided to change the aircraft carrier John F. Kennedy from nuclear power to conventional steam power.
30 years ago, that would be true.
Today at strike has to run the Aegis gauntlet from Sm2 to RAM to CIWS etc.
Today, if you fail to radiate, you die.
Visual detection is done by satellites. "They" always know where you are.
Always.
Now it's all about point defense.
I’ve seen the AF do the same thing. The F-22 was supposed to be an air superiority platform. The expanded the mission to justify more aircraft when Congress started cutting the budgets.
The navy did the same thing with the Remote Minehunting System (RMS). When the Pentagon decided that the role was to narrow, they expanded it to include anti-sub missions.
The thing that use to make me mad was that the contractor were always blamed for cost overruns.
I was given a year to develop software for the Navy. They specified that it had to run on a DOS based computer. We tried to convince them that it was a bad idea because the Navy was already transitioning to Windows, but the Navy was adamant. Eleven months later I had the software done and the Navy changed the specs - it was basically a complete rewrite of the software and they were upset when we told them it would cost them more money.
That's the laughable element.
To stall shipbuilding (CRITICAL INFRASTRUCTURE) until the last penny is known an predictable is like telling the SSA they cannot send another check until they can predict their 2018 costs to +/-.5%.
We ARE going to buy these ships. Period.
To delay them over the predictability of a $50mil variance is just plain stupid.
They cost $2bil each...how much more do they need to know?
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