USS Sterett (DDG-104) is pierside at Naval Base Ventura County in 2017. US Navy Photo
The Navy now plans to buy its first Large Surface Combatant ship in Fiscal Year 2025, pushed back two years from a planned 2023 start date.
Though the new warship is not meant to directly replace either the Ticonderoga-class cruisers or the Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, the original timing would have allowed the Navy to stop its Arleigh Burke DDG production at the end of the current multiyear contract in 2022...