The US Navy's plan to expand its fleet will cost $1bn over the next 30 years
According to a new analysis by the Congressional Budget Office, the proposed US Navy warship fleet expansion plan will require $40.1 billion in annual ship construction costs through 2054. The total cost of implementing this plan will exceed $1 trillion.
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Under the latest proposal, the US Navy plans to increase the number of warships to 381 over the next 30 years. Currently, the fleet consists of 295 ships, but by 2027, the number may be reduced to 283 due to the planned decommissioning of 13 ships, which exceeds the number of new ships that will be commissioned.
"The pace of shipbuilding will be fastest in the early 2030s, reflecting the service's desire to increase fleet size as quickly as possible," the Congressional Budget Office said in its report.
Four modern US aircraft carriers of various types. Illustration: Wikipedia
The CBO estimates that implementing this plan would require a 46% increase in funding for the Navy compared to the average annual spending over the past five years. By 2054, the total annual budget of the Navy will reach $340 billion - a third more than the current budget of $255 billion.
Of this amount, approximately $40 billion will be spent on building new ships, and another $45 billion will be spent on operating, maintaining and arming the existing fleet.
The Congressional Budget Office's estimates are 8-16% higher than the Navy's own projections. The CBO took into account previous delays and difficulties in ship construction, as well as the fact that some projects were more complex than expected. The report noted that the Navy's cost estimates for some ships were unrealistically low.
The Budget Office also stressed that the proposed shipbuilding plan is expensive both compared to current funding levels and by historical standards. It is noted that funding for shipbuilding has been growing over the past 10 years and has reached its highest level since President Ronald Reagan launched the 600 Ship Programme in the 1980s.
"Since 2015, lawmakers have allocated an average of $2.5 billion a year more for shipbuilding than the president has requested, in part because of concerns that the fleet is too small to perform all of its missions," the report says.
To meet this ambitious plan, US shipyards will have to significantly improve their productivity compared to the results they have achieved over the past decade, the Congressional Budget Office notes.
Source: CBO.gov
