Any recent perusal of the defense news or blog pages would suggest the Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) is in for a rough year. The USS Milwaukee (LCS 5), the newest commissioned LCS unit, suffered a serious engineering casualty last month that could delay her entry into the active fleet for months. Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter has proposed cutting LCS production from 52 to 40 units and from two shipyards to one in order to support the addition of new and legacy offensive systems to the fleet. The most recent Government Accountability Office (GAO) report on LCS says the ship does not meet Navy survivability requirements. USS Fort Worth, successfully deployed to Singapore in a variety of missions suffered an engineering casualty that appears similar to that of Milwaukee.Critics have demanded other solutions from masses of small ships to a conventional frigate replacement for the now retired Oliver Hazard Perry class. Should the Navy retain the LCS in the face of such criticism?
The relatively small size of America’s fleet means thata much higher percentage of ships must be forward-based in order to meet demands for both presence and war fighting missions articulated in the 2015 Cooperative Maritime Strategy. The ships that meet this mission must be reasonably priced and produced in numbers sufficient for global activity.The aging low-end component of this force must be replaced by an economical successor. Small ship capabilities on a common hull will reduce procurement and maintenance costs over the life of the platform. Moreover, separating some capabilities such as weapons and sensors through modularity is still a good solution to reduce wear and tear on both people and equipment over the life of a ship. The LCS remains the best program to pursue a modular small combatant.
The LCS program has been plagued with legitimate problems to be sure, but defense media sources would rather garner headlines for reporting problems such as the Milwaukee and recent Fort Worth engineering problems rather than analyze why the Defense Department and the Navy chose and have retained the LCS concept. Two presidential administrations, five secretaries of defense, and multiple changes in civilian and military naval leadership have supported the continuation of the program. Perhaps it is because the LCS remains the best, most economical choice for replacing multiple aging, small combatants for a global U.S. naval strategy.
Forward Presence and Warfighting
The 2015 Cooperative Maritime Strategy states that 300 ships will be required to provide both presence and war fighting capability in forward operating areas. The Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral John Richardson, has said the Navy should not have to choose between the two concepts and that both are requirements for a balanced fleet. The Navy expects to forward station 120 ships by 2020 in order to meet both goals. It has sourced the bulk of its forward deployed forces since 1948 from rotationally assigned ships permanently based in the United States. The success of that system, however, was predicated on a sufficient overall number of warships to permit the constant maintenance and crew training of the ships in that rotation. It has generally taken three warships to produce one deployed unit, with the other two in maintenance or training. The precipitous drop in the overall number of deployable ships since the early 1990s, combined with increasing overseas responsibilities to which naval forces are assigned, is rapidly making this system untenable.
The LCS is geared to support both presence and warfighting in its planned concept of operations (CONOPS). Using multiple crews that deploy to the ship (instead of moving the ship back and forth over long distances, with associative wear and tear) and a nominal force of 40 LCS (if Secretary Carter’s reductions are approved) means that 20 of these ships will be forward deployed. This 50 percent availability is much improved from the present nominal 20-33 percent permissible through traditionally crewed and deployed vessels. The most recent deployment of USS Fort Worth (LCS 3)testifies to the value of the LCS in presence operations, specifically in interacting with smaller, regional navies. Littoral combatants are now also planned to carry anti-ship cruise missiles as part of their armament starting later this year. Given the success of the Fort Worth deployment and the potential capability of its anti-ship missile armament, the LCS supports both presence and warfighting as required by the Cooperative Maritime Strategy.
A Reasonable Price
Much of the negative coverage of the LCS program centers on its cost and supposed waste of tax dollars on a program that has yet to produce a capability. The LCS program suffered from a number of problems over the decade of the 2000’s that contributed to the initial high cost of $670 million for theFreedom and $704 million dollars for theUSS Independence (LCS 2). Both ships were originally expected to cost $220 million.
Such cost increases are common in Navy shipbuilding, but perhaps were not as visible before the age of the Internet. The Oliver Hazard Perry class frigates that the LCS was partially designed to replace rose in expected cost from $64.8 million dollars in 1973 when the lead ship was authorized to $174 million per ship in 1978. Similar to the LCS, the cost of the first FFG 7 substantially rose to $239.6 million by 1975. Perhaps the defense media should do more historical research before blasting LCS program cost increases as outside normal practice.
A dedicated replacement for the Perry class frigate (FFG-X) (built for $202 million in 1979) was estimated to cost a minimum of $680-$700 million dollars in 2003 by the Congressional Budget Office. Today, that cost would likely be even greater due to inflation and the spiraling cost of advanced electronics. It is unlikely that these ships would be built in equal numbers to LCS given these costs and because fewer would be available for overseas service in the traditional rotational or forward based concepts. The CS sea frame, the basic ship without a mission package costs $479 million a copy (with $440 million per unit in the latest block buy.) The mission modules that provide anti-surface, antisubmarine, and mine warfare capabilities to the ship presently cost between $20.9 million and $97 million dollars with an additional cost of $14.9 million per module for common material. Given these figures, the LCS remains a much better value and provides greater potential forward deployability than does a traditional multi-mission warship.
The built-in rotational crew concept of the LCS also means that the littoral combatant force will have a much smaller permanent footprint than larger combatants that are permanently based overseas. There is no need to house dependents or provide the additional services associated with overseas dependent occupancy. The focus of deployed assets associated with the LCS can be entirely focused on ensuring the ships’ operational capabilities.
A Different Time, A Different Fleet, A Different Small Combatant
The Perry class frigates exited a very different fleet than that which they entered in the late 1970’s. They were designed to replace retiring World War II vintage destroyers as convoy and replenishment group escorts. They were expected to fight in a highly contested conflict for control of North Atlantic shipping lanes in a hypothetical World War III against the Soviet Union. The FFG-7 class was the zenith of Cold War escort development, and was the first U.S. ship of this type to incorporate a significant air defense capability with a missile magazine of 40 slots (36 surface to air missiles and 4 anti-ship cruise missiles).In short, while labeled frigates, the Perry class ships had an armament more consistentwith the guided missile destroyers of the late 1970s rather than the convoy escorts that immediately preceded them. A Congressional Budget Office study from 1981 specifically set the Perry classapart from previous classes of Cold War escort ships (previously known as destroyer escorts) due to their much more robust capabilities. The United States at this time possessed a high-end surface fleet consisting of 27 guided missile cruisers (nuclear and conventional) of varying capability, 10 Terrier missile-armed Farragut destroyers, and 23 less capable Adams class destroyers (60 ships). These were capable units for their time, but concerns were mounting that the surface navy could no longer protect the carrier fleet from guided missile attack. The Spruance class destroyers (31 units) then entering the fleet were primarily antisubmarine warfare vessels and not capable of significant anti-air or anti-missile combat. The AEGIS cruiser wasprojected at that time to be $1.2 billion dollars a copy and had not yet entered service. The introduction of a frigate class with more capabilities in common with a modern destroyer made sense for the fleet of the late 1970’s.
Today’s surface combatant force (a nominal 84 units) is a very different force than that which the Perryclass entered. The high-end surface combatant force is entirely comprised of ships equipped with the AEGIS combat system. These vessels have differing capabilities based on the various baselines of the AEGIS system they support, but have more commonality than at any point since 1945. They are networked to support each other and other units at a level unsurpassed in the history of naval warfare. Their vertical-launch missile systems offer a mix of capabilities and rate of fire far in excess of past combatants. There is no need for a large frigate in a fleet with these capabilities. Intelligence and/or future strategic requirements may suggest a larger frigate than the modified LCS with greater range, but unlike the late 1970s there is no need for an escort with a destroyer’s armament to plug a gap in overall U.S. surface force capabilities.
Modularity Offers a Cost Effective Solution
The need for economical solutions to the problem of fielding low-end capabilities such as patrol, mine warfare, and antisubmarine warfare in littoral areas has plagued the Navy since the end of World War II. The smaller warships that have traditionally performed these roles have been slow, and lacking in either range or capability. Single mission small ships like the Avenger class MCM’s and the Cyclone class patrol ships have been less able to accommodate significant updates over their service lives. Assigning a high-end warship like the DDG 51 class to such missions is overkill in both cost and capability.
The LCS, through its system of modular capabilities resident on a common hull offers an affordable solution to the problem of how to field multiple low-end capabilities and rapidly and affordably update them over time. Each LCS mission package is an assembly of sensors, weapons, associated equipment, and the sailors needed to operate them. The mission module list currently features surface warfare, antisubmarine warfare and mine warfare packages. An LCS can only support one module at a time. LCS represents a compromise in a common hull for all three missions that it is larger than the MCM and PC units, but smaller than the Perry class frigates it replaces.
Modularity decouples the acquisition pathways of the ship and the capability. Individual capabilities can be developed and fielded rapidly outside the more complex process required for a ship where all such systems are always integrated. This open architecture should lead to lower costs over the life of the ship. For example, if the ship does not have to accommodate conditions inherent with permanent installation aboard a naval vessel (i.e., carry its towed array sonar through heavy seas ora shifting electrical load, then perhaps that piece of equipment will have a longer life span, require less maintenance and be a more effective tool when needed by the warfighter. The Navy remains committed to the concept of modularity as it looks forward beyond present ship classes. The LCS will provide a vital first look at modularity integrated from the start in a combatant ship class.
For fielding an open architecture, modular small combatants have proved much more challenging than the Navy expected. The Navy expected too much, too early, and at an underestimated cost of $220 million per sea frame. The LCS has been beset by other problems, however, unique to its class and time. The test and evaluation community, born and developed in the Cold War, and geared to evaluate incremental rather than revolutionary change, seems unwilling to support modularity as a way of rapidly fielding new concepts. As Soviet Admiral Gorshkov supposedly once described his own nation’s acquisition system, “perfect has become the enemy of good enough.” The ship’s modular capabilities are unfamiliar to generations of uniformed and civilian naval personnel, and early, aggressive methods of the LCS program to promote the ship by attacking critics had a definite negative impact on acceptance. Defense media outlets have much greater access to both the service and the public through the Internet than in the past. They regularly excoriate programs like the LPD 17 San Antonio class one day, and sing its praises a short time later. The LPD-17 class, like the LCS, has undured over a decade of unremitting criticism from defense media outlets. One wonders how the FFG-7 or DD 963 classes, both labeled as under-armed and unsurvivable, or the excessively expensive AEGIS systemwould have fared in an Internet age of instant criticism and anonymous condemnation.
The LCS program represents a reasonable attempt to field a common small combatant that meets present U.S. requirements and fits within the force structure of the 2nd decade of the 21st century. Its cost remains significantly lower than other proposed solutions from the analysis community. It has suffered unremitting criticism from an analysis community unhappy with the Navy’s choice of small combatant, from a defense press eager to publish bad news stories, from a retired community unfamiliar with its concept, and from legions of “hobbyists” who heretofore never had access to the age-old, messy process of compromise involved in producing a warship. In spite of criticisms, the LCS still represents the best way forward to produce a small combatant that meets multiple mission requirements in the 21st century.
Steven Wills is a retired surface warfare officer who spent most of his operational career in small combatants. He is now a PhD candidate in Military History at Ohio University. His forthcoming dissertation examines the change in U.S. Navy strategy from 1989-1994 with an emphasis on the effects of the end of the Cold War, the Goldwater Nichols Act, and the First Gulf War on that change.
TomG 
Michael Watson 
Conceptually, the LCS is not a terrible idea, but its execution is: neither of the sea frame designs will be able to meet the original intended purpose. Both hull designs are wrong because they fell prey to a common American military mistake, overemphasizing an operational requirement long past its strategic utility.
America has lost wars by doing irrelevant things well, and the LCS is a platform which would continue that tradition. Both LCS designs go very fast, but this speed is achieved at the cost of the space to properly carry out the actually relevant missions.
The engineering casualties highlight the weakness of the LCS designs, but they are minor issues. The LCS was a misguided program before them, and will remain so even if they are fixed.
The author seems to think modularity is a viable concept. The empirical evidence suggests otherwise.
We are a decade plus into the program and have fielded one very low-capability module (SUW). ASW has not been fielded. MCM is a train wreck.
Glad to see that you have not totally abandoned our conversation. The surface to air missile program worked for nearly 15 years to develop a viable set of weapons. Isn’t a viable capability worth the wait.
Early Naval SAMs are a bad analogy for LCS. The operational need for long-range Fleet Air Defense was well understood. They were also fielded in an evolutionary vice transformational manner. And they melded well into existing doctrine.
One cannot claim that modularity is cost-effective, when we haven’t seen the “effective.” As of January 2016, we’re 0 for 3 in the required mission areas.
Maybe 1/2 for 3 if you count SUW, although killing a ship with another ship is really not all that important. Which is why the whole Distributed Lethality push is nonsensical.
It is also indefensible to say that LCS is “the best option” when no other options were rigorously analyzed prior to decision to procure LCS. Nor were reasonable trade studies conducted on the desired ship characteristics (speed, range, payload, etc.)
The 2003 CBO study by Eric Labs and DOT&E boss Dr. Gilmore was fairly comprehensive. It suggests a dedicated replacement frigate was/remains too expensive. While not in a dedicated CBA, there has been a good deal of analysis by smart folks on LCS for nearly 15 years. Where are the better alternatives? Certainly they would have gotten some greater traction within the Navy? Can they really remain so hidden that they can only be discovered by another round of analysis?
I personally think modularity is a viable concept on ships with the space, and where the modular missions do not radically diverge from each other. Specifically, I think we should be putting mine countermeasures modules on LPDs and the upcoming LX(R). Amphibs have the space and configuration for load-unload of modular equipment, and mine countermeasures would not be a far divergence from amphibious assault–in fact, most amphibious assaults will require integrated mine clearance. By contrast, the LCS tries to combine high-speed FAC/FIAC warfare with slow MCM and long-duration ASW, three missions which are at considerable odds with one another.
Too little range on the LCS.
Too small to take advantage of the modularity.
Transfer what has been built to the US Coast Guard.
The better thing to do is create a corvette class (like Swedish Visby) AND a dedicated frigate in a 3-1 ratio.
Only numbers will solve the problem, not movie magic.
The Swedes have not been happy with the Visby class. The class has been in development almost as long as LCS (2000-2012) , has a lower nominal range than LCS (2500nm at 15 kts) and has not delivered that capabilities first intended. Not sure how the Visby would fit into US service.
Let’s see. A LCS sea frame is about 440 million, with 3 modules at an average of , let’s say, 54 million each?
That puts it at about 600 million each for 40 vessels, or 24 billion total.
That could buy about 80 Sa’ar 5 class corvettes, comparable in endurance, superior in armament, and already made in the US. They can do anti-air, anti-submarine, and mine-sweeping already.
If you wanted to keep the buy down to 52 ships, the savings could be used to buy Skjold-class corvettes, which are faster, stealthier, and more heavily armed, and the Sea Fighter, which takes the LCS concept into a more interesting direction.
Bottom line, the LCS is a handout to our shipbuilding industry. If we bought a foreign design, you better believe Huntington Ingalls and Lockheed Martin would scramble to give us something better than this piece of shit.
My LCS of choice (that actually could do the job advised) would be Finlands’s ‘Hamina class’.
Fast, stealthy
Same 57mm gun
Long range anti-ship missiles
SAMs
Depth charges
Rhib
and about 1/4 the cost of these abortions.
500nm range, no helicopter facilities which means limited ASW capability. The $101 million dollar price per unit is nice. This ship falls into the small combatant, New Navy Fighting Machine (NNFM) Concept put forth by Naval Postgraduate school faculty and the Office of Net Assessment. This concept envisions replacing much of the surface fleet with dozens of single mission warships like Hamina. While perhaps a good tactical solution, the NNFM concept does not fit well into a global US strategy. A large flotilla of such craft would have to be built for and based in every forward-deployed theater in order to assure a uniform presence. These ships are slow to move between theaters and a conflict could be lost before a replacement mass of such ships could change theaters. Think of the slow transit of the Russian Baltic Fleet in 1904/1905 to replace the destroyed Russian Pacific fleet and you get an idea of the problem of sending small ships on transoceanic voyages.
I hear you Steve.
The Hamina class & the other Scandi-vessels are fine for the brown water archipelagos of their coastlines.
But the thing is, they do what they say then can.
We recall that the brass promised the LCS would be the combatant for the 21st century…
However they are anything but.
It is ridiculous that these vessels will have to return to San Diego or wherever for a few weeks if their mission deviates slightly….
Such a waste of 3,500 tonnes and 130m of hull to deliver so little when the shooting starts.
Personally, I (and many others) feel that a normal multi-mission frigate just like the rest of the planet uses would have been fine.
I’m a fan of the ‘Valour’ class in use by South Africa & Algeria.
They deliver presence & capabilities way beyond the LCS & again for less money.
Better for the navy lower ranks & the taxpayer…. just perhaps not for the brass & Lockheed Martin.
The Sa ar V’s were built by Ingalls for the Israelis over the period 1992-1994 for $260 million a unit. Adjusted for inflation, that’s $430 million a unit in 2015. Add to that the spiraling cost of warship electronics as documented by the RAND corporation in 2006 and the cost of a new Sa ar V would likely increase to at least $450-$470 million a unit. The Sa ar V’s were not subject to US laws regarding acquisition and testing, which would likely raise their unit cost to higher levels. Given these figures, is LCS such a “handout”?
I appreciate the reply, Mr. Willis
I purposely low-balled the Sa’ar 5 mostly because the cost included development cost. Ships are already in operation, and have the kinks worked out. We could even train on Israeli ships before the ships are even built.
I stick by the handout analogy for one reason; there are two designs. We have sacrificed a lot of capabilities over the past generation for the sake of commonality and cost reductions. Having two completely different designs makes little sense, as you would have to have SIX different modules to fufill all missions. Unless, of course, both Newport News and Huntington Ingalls were short on work and we needed to keep up the industrial base
If we are going to stick with the LCS, we should at least cancel the Independence-class, and do what we did for the Saudis with the Freedom-class (add a Mk-41 launcher, add a 76mm gun, install capabilities permanently). That way, we have something that can defend itself better, take advantage of the Vulcano and DART rounds, and still do it for far less than a true frigate.
I’m not completely discounting your points, but I do disagree in some key areas.
This is my other account, if you were wondering
Imagine a combat scenario.
An LCS is over in the Philippines, about to be engaged by a similar sized chinese corvette.
Ready for battle?
No, the US captain will have to radio the chinese vessel.
“Hey Guys…. I hate to be a pill, but we were out here with our mine-hunting kit & you know that despite being pretty big, carrying 2 things just aint what these ships do…..
If you don’t mind, we’re gonna sail back to San Diego and load our ‘surface warfare’ gear, this will take about a week… so let’s say meet back here in about 3 weeks?..
Cool, thanks boys…
Now when we get back, we still won’t have much anyway, so if its also coolio with you, can we fight within a few miles of each other?
Our weapons won’t reach further… you know how it goes!.
Thanks again guys, you’ve been swell!”
The LCS was never a good design, for that matter neither was the FFG-7. As has been noted by others — the water skiing requirement (50+ kts) was neither achieved nor particularly useful when one considers what was sacrificed trying but failing to achieve it. We forgot the lessons that led to the all steel Burkes, both given the superstructure of the Loch-Mart variant and the entire structure of the G-D version.
Paying $400 million dollars for a nearly bare hull was also a failure. While modular weapon systems has merit — the change of the fly, plug and fight concept has serious problems with it. The human factor being the chief one — the people’s skill using the equipment is more important than the equipment but has anyone considered where these modules will be stored or where the swap will occur — the Navy has not only planned to divest itself of the expertise in the warfare areas (mines, submarines, anti-surface) but disestablishing the organizations where it resides but now takes on the planning and force protection issues that previously the Army and Air Force suffered from.
I would look the Danish Absalon class and its derivatives as better and cheaper alternatives — a fifty knot speed may allow us to waterski or have our scarfs rakishly stream behind us on the bridge wings but will not out run a ASCM. Manned and unmanned aircraft are more than a match for the swarming small boats the LCS planners thought we should run away from if it came to that.
The Absalon’s are interesting vessels to be sure, but what role would they serve in the US Navy? The Danes subcontract elements of their ships out to cheaper Eastern European shipyards to achieve low costs. Could the U.S. do the same to Mexican shipyards? Congress would likely oppose such a measure. The Danes have recycled much of the equipment installed on the Absalon’s from retired Danish ships. The US might be able to do that, but US equipment is generally more worn and dated when it comes off a ship that has been in service for 30+ years. The Absalons have some features of an amphibious warship and the slow speed (23 knots) to match, which makes them too slow for US battle force operations. The LCS’s speed may be too high, but speed is an asset for the baseline LCS operating in a low end role such as counter-piracy, or in tactically avoiding superior forces.
There are plenty of ports in the US and overseas where LCS mission modules can be exchanged. That process will not likely be as fast as first forecast and be more of an operational rather than a tactical capability.
By making mine warfare and littoral ASW modular, the Navy is not curtailing, but rather expanding these capabilities. A mine warfare module might also be deployed to an amphibious ship and parts of an ASW module employed on a combat logistics force unit. For modularity, LCS is a beginning and not an end.
The HUITFELDT variant of the ABSALON class makes 28knots on diesels (44,000shp). About the same as the FFG-7, which was not adequate for Carrier Strike Group roles. Hull and machinery traditionally costs 15% of a warship’s acquisition (not the case with LCS) so increasing the installed power to achieve a 30+ top speed through a combined diesel/gas/electric arrangement might be optimal and should not drive up the bottom line as much or call for as many dangerous compromises as the LCS’ 50kt one did. Recycling sensors and weapons from decommissioned hulls makes sense too for a combatant intended to operate with our higher end hulls — but we already do a lot of that. A ship with a 360 degree view from her bridge — a large flight deck, flexible mission bay, ability to operate with or independently from a strike group with a smaller crew would help us maintain our posture around the world. The ability to host marine or special forces contingents, operate VTOL unmanned and manned aircraft, and deploy well armed small craft would be an excellent platform. As the LCS recently demonstrated — it can run away from a potentially hostile threat, but it has yet to establish it can deal with one.
Those are all good points on the Iver Huitfeldt class. Given the US acquisition/test and evaluation, I don’t see how such a ship could be built by the US for less than $1 billion a copy. Denmark. The 2003 CBO study on the surface force I cited was fairly clear on what a replacement frigate would cost. If the FFG-X concept were viable, I suspect the analysis community would still be vigorously pushing it, but that seems to no longer be the case. The US does recycle some systems to be sure, bu differing baselines in individual pieces of equipment (like guns for example) make this a complicated process, especially if the weapon/system is no longer being manufactured.
I wonder if the “$1 billion” can be challenged?
By that I mean, the cost of something will always find a way of increasing if such increases are tolerated.
Steel has never been cheaper, the mk41 vls has been around for a long time, as have 3″ guns etc….
If Europe can deliver several examples of superior frigates for competitive prices, I can see no reason why the US cannot…. considering Blohm + Voss & Navantia are building in the unionised & relatively high waged Germany & Spain.
Of course, this would require a means of finding that most elusive of things, sating greed amongst the ship building fraternity.
There are ways we have not explored to reduce the cost of hulls and machinery back to the historical 15% of total acquisition – given the growth in weapons systems costs we’re really getting ripped off on LCS so much we can barely afford the modules needed to make them relevant. And again, 50kts was a bogus requirement. You’re assessment on costs though is hard to argue with given that the British are up to a billion pounds each, roughly, for their Type 26 Frigates. Even then, it’s a better ship than the LCS. Steel is cheap — and lightweight, robust, and powerful engineering systems exist. Going turbine/diesel electric could provide the top end to meet Carrier Strike Group requirements and efficient loiter speeds to reduce the logistics tail when deployed on its own. An 8,000ton steel ship with a large flight deck/mission bay, refurbished MK 45 gun, CIWS/RAM, 8-24 tubes of MK41 VLS, 30mm Machine Guns, lightweight torpedoes, and perhaps some canister launched Harpoons would be a great asset to have. If it could support small scale marine or special forces operations equally as well as humanitarian missions its utility would be off the charts compared to a similarly priced LCS with a few HELLFIRE missiles.
Steve – the Danes were able to build state of the art frigates for about $325M each in 2010 dollars. There are a lot of reasons why, some you cite, such as reuse of equipment, but there are many other innovative reasons that you do not cite. Most of the innovation that drove down construction costs had to do with tightly connecting the design with automated production processes through the most advanced CAD available, 3D Smart Marine and an intelligent use of COTS and commonality that did not sacrifice combat effectiveness or survivability ( they are all shock tested as per NATO STANAG). As an example, there are 3 different watertight doors used in the Danish Frigates, compared to hundreds in an American warship. Each door covers a wide range, where in the US we make each door to exactly the requirement of that space. Things like this drive costs through the overhead. Building modules in Eastern European yards was not so much about low cost compared to US yards. It was low cost compared to Danish yards. These yards were prior Soviet operations that required a lot of investment to get them up to speed, so the savings were not as great as you assert. It was more about timing of the build strategy. I agree with you that to build a similar ship in a US yard would require some big changes, not just by the shipbuilder, but more so by the Navy and the many outdated military specifications and processes (we still have mil specs for protecting vacuum tubes) that overburdened technical warrants must enforce. Some progress was made in certain aspects of the LCS program, but largely onesies and twosies and we fell short on modularity in particular for many of the reasons cited here, chiefly because of muddled operational concepts and clinging to the speed requirement that has resulted in not just a very weak frigate, but a weak corvette by most global standards (the iron triangle of speed payload and endurance still applies). It might eventually be a fair replacement for the MCM and PC, but to try and call it a frigate replacement is a stretch. Even reducing the number to 40 will leave us with too many of these very limited ships as a percentage of our surface warships.
The LCS is, has been, and always will be a failed experiment, pushed on the service, over budget, under capable, and unsupportable. They even attempted to “design” tactics and doctrine after they started building it, because they realized it wasn’t going to even answer the capability requirement they had advertised it for. It is a complete joke. I feel sorry for the crews who are constantly pulling uphill to try to make-up for its shortcomings. The best that the service could do at this point, is halt the line, bite the bullet, and build some new Frigates.
Mr. Wills — thanks for making yourself so readily and outspokenly available here!
Too few of the WotR authors are will to do that.
I followed the thread here with great enjoyment.
Steve, the 2003 CBO report was hardly a ringing endorsement for the LCS. Or a slam dunk against a frigate.
If anything – the report highlighted the many uncertainties that existed in terms of as to what the Navy wanted out of LCS and whether it even made sense.
Here are some gems in no particular order. Reading these thirteen years later, they still ring pretty true.
“It is not clear that the Navy needs a very high speed ship to perform the missions that the Navy has in mind if the ship is capable of embarking helicopters.”
“Should the LCS be required to embark a medium sized helicopter, it would need a displacement of at least 4,000 tons.”
“Of the many uncertainties surrounding the LCS, the big gest question is whether the tactical concept of operations for that ship makes sense.”
“If an enemy had [OTH] targeting capability and [ASCMs] effective enough to compel larger combatants to remain far out at sea, could it not engage smaller ships closer to its own shore and overwhelm their small loads of short range self defense missiles and guns?”
“Conversely, if the larger combatants had to move closer to shore to provide longer range air and missile defense for the LCSs, why could they not perform the [ASW], antiboat, and [MCM] missions them selves? Indeed, the three missions now assigned to the LCS
appear heavily dependent on helicopters (and, in the future, unmanned systems); it is not clear why larger combatants could not use those systems to similar effect.”
“Finally, there is the question of what the LCS will cost.”
Agree. The 2003 study was a firm endorsement of the $700 million dollar frigate. The speed component came from the original anti-small boat requirement and stayed on when the LCS CONOPS switched to a defense of friendly units in the littoral rather than an offensive attack. The high speed still has some use in flotilla operations, but may be less helpful if LCS is to be employed as a blue water escort. The helicopter facilities seem to work fine for the size of the ship and support two SH-60R’s. The world is much changed from 2003 and the Navy is attempting to adjust LCS to that reality at minimum cost. A full size Perry replacement (then and probably now) has been judged too expensive to produce in large numbers. Instead, the modular LCS which is a compromise of a frigate, MCM and PC capabilities, but in larger numbers has been selected as the solution.
We paid an incredible price for the LCS’s speed, such that it is great at going fast, but not good at much else.
“The helicopter facilities seem to work fine for the size of the ship and support two SH-60R’s.”
********************
Steve, I think you mean two MH-60Rs. There is no such helicopter as an “SH-60R”.
Are you certain that both LCS types can *support* two Romeos? And by support I mean embark, operate and sustain. Not simply temporarily cross-deck.
The ability to support two MH-60s is advertised by the prime contractor as a potential feature – but everything I’ve seen from Navy points to 1 helo + 1 VTUAV.
Some additional observations from looking at pictures of the ships.
1. LCS-1 has a fairly big flight deck but only one hangar door. The hangar doesn’t look big enough to support a 2nd helo.
2. LCS-2 also only has one full-sized hangar but the hangar looks pretty spacious.
3. Embarking an additional 23,500 lbs helicopter and spares doesn’t do much for weight reduction – which is supposedly a big deal for both classes of ships.
I don’t know the answer in terms of helo capacity, but suspect it could be different for LCS-1 and LCS-2 class.
Both Lockheed Martin and Austal say their LCS can support 2 MH-60R’s as one potential package. Others include 1 helo and 1 UAV. I am not sure if either LCS can handle more than 2 UAV’s.
I think the best argument for LCS is that we don’t have anything else in the pipeline and until reforms are initiated it will take to long to come up with something better. But as Captain Van Hook pointed out — these ships really don’t fill the requirements of a Frigate. The PHM’s may have been excellent platforms but they too did not meet a requirement, the PC’s were in service for years before we figured out what we could do with them since the MK V’s proved more useful in the role of inserting Special Forces. While you suggest that a group of LCS supported by a tender/mothership may be the superior (more cost effective) means of anti-piracy missions I note several things: we don’t seem to have much appetite for those missions and equipping an LSD with Romeo Sea Hawks and a well deck full of Mark VI Patrol Boats would be better and cheaper still. The civilian manned Lewis B. Puller type motherships is another alternative and the increasing use of civilian manned vessels to address missions and shortfalls in the Title X Fleet distresses me over the future of the Navy and how it is being managed. The 50kt LCS never should have made to production — seems the Navy has to relearn these expensive lessons every fifteen or twenty years. Like the idea that aluminum is an appropriate material to build a warship, or the putting helo hangers in the transom over propellors (with podded propulsion we may be able to revisit that but we have a history of ignoring the lessons of history.) Thanks for the provocative post.
If this is the best we can do, it is a sad day for both the Navy and the ship building industry.
Captain Van Hook makes some excellent points about the innovative techniques of Danish shipbuilding. I agree the U.S. could learn something from them. The U.S. acquisition/test and evaluation system is not configured to exploit similar conditions as exist in Denmark. LCS is a compromise as well in that it combines multiple capabilities through modular effort on a single hull. It is less capable than a European-style frigate to be sure, but that class occupies the same category in the order of battle (for nations like Denmark) as do the Arleigh Burke class destroyers in the U.S. Navy. Both are their respective Navy’s high end surface combatant. Before the end of the Cold War, most European states operated ships the size of LCS as “frigates” and called larger ships cruisers and destroyers. The U.S. does not need a European-style frigate class because it already has the DDG 51 in large numbers.
My comments on other nations’ ships in no way suggest discredit on their design or operation. Ships like the Iver Huitfeldt and Abasalon are an excellent fit for the Danish Navy. My only criticism is the idea that such ships fit into the U.S. naval order of battle, or that they could be built at the same low costs in the U.S. as they are abroad. Perhaps Senator McCain’s plan to review Defense organization will result in a more efficient and dynamic acquisition system that rapidly fields new technologies as do modern companies, rather than the 1950’s vintage, U.S. PPBE concept.
I agree that Scandinavian-type frigates and corvettes won’t easily fit into the US order of battle, but how will the LCS fit better? The ship has a number of issues that make it a poor fit, among them:
Range: unless the LCS plans to be tied at the hip to the carrier and the AOE, its range isn’t great for fleet operations.
Firepower: thoroughly addressed elsewhere.
O-5 CO: Currently, LCSs and DDGs are both commanded by Commanders. Unless the Navy is working the command pipeline to make an LCS a bonus command, LCS skippers will be at significant disadvantage against DDG captains at the major command screen. LCS captains will be either risk-averse post-command officers or unambitious second-stringers who know their prospects are limited, but either way we won’t have great leadership.
Command is command. It remains the best measure of surface warfare professional achievement, whether it is command of an LCS or a DDG. LCS may evolve into an O-4 command over time as it becomes more institutionalized in the fleet.
On how it fits, read my article. We don’t need a pseudo-destroyer (as the FFG was once described) in such a strong AEGIS fleet. We need ships to handle the low end missions like counter piracy, patrol, coastal ASW, and others where it is overkill to send a DDG. Having LCS frees up the DDG force to meet more serious threats. In spite of A2AD advances, much of the world remains relatively peaceful and low-threat enough that an LCS flotilla could substitute for larger warships. A good example is the recent counter-piracy missions in the Red Sea and Culf of Somalia. An LCS flotilla with a tender would have been a better choice for the US to send than several DDG’s and CG’s.
“A good example is the recent counter-piracy missions in the Red Sea and Gulf of Somalia.”
Good example, right until you break open a map!
The distance from Bahrain to Mogadishu is 2,500 nm. One way with no stops.
How are you going to do that in a ship (LCS-3) that has a predicted cruising range of less than 2,000 nm?
You have made that argument before. Note I said a tender would be required. The predicted range of the LCS-1 variant is based on ONE estimate by DOT&E. Certainly one test on one unit of that variant is not enough for a definitive argument on operational range. There are also several places such as Djibouti where an LCS flotilla might refuel. USN ships regularly refuel in places other than US naval facilities.
It’s also a chart Mustard, not a map!
“The LCS sea frame, the basic ship without a mission package costs $479 million a copy (with $440 million per unit in the latest block buy.)”
That’s just the Navy’s advertises sticker price. The Navy has had to spend quite bit after the initial delivery to get a working ship.
According to GAO report the Navy spent an additional $46 million (LCS-3) and $77 million (LCS-4) to correct defects, complete ship construction, and assist with tests and trials, among other tasks.
Adding these costs yields a seaframe which costs over $500 million. With zero mission modules. Still a bargain?
http://www.gao.gov/assets/680/675598.pdf