Senator: Navy to scrap plan for expensive next-generation destroyer

It's almost a 'given' that, with any new piece of military equipment--especially a new ship class--the budget will be grossly inflated, and the final cost to the taxpayer will be grossly out of proportion to the original bid estimates. The entire process is rife with corruption, pork barrel politics, and a fundamental disdain, if not outright scorn, for the service people who must man and operate these vessels. The comments in this story make it very clear that the project was scuttled due to contractor incompetence, not the Defense Dep't, or the Dep't of the Navy. Let's not get too weepy and sorrowful for the poor blue-collar workers who MIGHT get laid-off or cut back. The contractor's idiocy did this to them--thru greed and incompetence--and not the DOD or the DON.

As a retired sailor I do believe that over time the Navy (and all services) needs to modernize. 25+ year old equipment, while still running smoothly, may not have the technology to keep up what's coming at it or what it has to overcome. Sometimes it's cheaper to build new then upgrade all the old. In this case, is someone telling us that the Arleigh Burke's are outdated? They are the "new" DDG's. Can't they be modernized? I just see this as a case where the contract went to the lowest bidder who really had no clue what it would cost to build what the military wanted. Look at the new Littoral ship that was at the BAE shipyard; didn't that have a $200M overrun? Not only do these builders bid low and not really plan but by the time the bid opens, bids are submitted, the bid is won, and construction begins, a couple years has passed, let alone the year or so it takes to build.

This is just another costly development disaster to add to the list for the Navy. Remember the A-12 Avenger that was supposed to replace the A-6? The littoral cruiser design? There are so many others too.

Time to get the navy back to designing and building its own ships and take the entire process out of the hands of money hungry contractors.

Imagine what money would be available for new, innovative ships and planes if we hadn't had poor civilian leadership and wasted trillions on a war with no reason. But I guess personal vendetta trumps national security.

This ship program has been threatened with termination before and seems to have the proverbial nine lives. Many Congressmen have home industries with interests looking forward to this ship program.

How do we get the product 'better, cheaper, and faster?' Yes we need to reduce crew size as a major cost, but we also need to look at cost benefit for increased technology. Let's look at encompasing all the proven technology we can afford into a platform that can be built by any shipyard at a reasonable ocst and them build a bunch of them. And let's put proven stablizer technology on the ships to improve ship handling and crew comfort.

Rather than lead the Navy, properly define its mission and chart a course into the future, the current top admirals do things like bring back the "McHale's Navy" uniform--service dress khakis. They have the audacity to claim it will "decrease" the number of uniforms needed. That's pure BS and easy for an admiral to say on their salary. The CNO and CJCS both were commissioned prior to Admiral Zumwalt becoming CNO. Their actions indicate they long for a return to those backward days. Retire this bunch of time-worn sycophants. It's way past the time for the post-Vietnam era people to rise to the top, even if it takes Congressional intervention to make that happen. Senator Webb, your help is needed on this matter and I encourage you to take action. Otherwise, the Navy will continue on its current course as it drifts toward a reef with no one at the helm.

The DDG 1000 has a lot of technology incorporated that is supposed to be a model for the rest of the fleet. First the LCS, now this, just wow. I wouldn't be surprised if they do build more Arleigh Burkes, though. Rep. Gene Taylor was pretty convincing on the cost aspects.