Submarine construction continues apace in the latest US Navy budget request, which asks for two more Virginia-class submarines and another installment for the missile sub Columbia. Here, the Virginia-class attack submarine USS Montana (SSN-794) is seen just after launch in March 2021 at Huntington Ingalls Newport News Shipbuilding. HII Photo
This post is part of a series looking back at the top naval stories from 2021.
This year began with a level of uncertainty for Navy acquisition, as an...
Guided-missile cruiser USS Shiloh (CG-67) conducts carrier strike group integrated operations USS Ronald Reagan (CVN-76) on June 10, 2021. US Navy Photo
Dispatching the Navy’s Japan-based forward-deployed aircraft carrier to the Middle East earlier this year to bolster the withdrawal from Afghanistan was a major strategic error, a top lawmaker on the House Armed Services Committee said today.
Rep. Elaine Luria (D-Va.), a former nuclear-qualified surface warfare officer and current vice chair of...
USVs Ranger and Nomad unmanned vessels underway in the Pacific Ocean near the Channel Islands on July 3, 2021. US Navy Photo
Full of merchant traffic and security threats, the densely packed waterways of the Red Sea, Arabian Sea and the Persian Gulf will be a testing ground for the Navy’s push to make unmanned systems a practical part of the fleet, service leaders said on Wednesday.
U.S. 5th Fleet’s Task Force 59 will stand up on Thursday and be the second testing outfit for the Navy’s unmanned...
Ghost Fleet Ship Nomad arriving at Point Loma, Calif., on May 29, 2021. Image via Twitter
NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — The emerging fleet of U.S. military Large Unmanned Surface Vessels (LUSV) are set to navigate the open seas, avoid other vessels and carry out complex directives from a land-based command center over a secure commutations network. What they can’t do yet is pump their own gas.
For the foreseeable future, the LUSVs will require a small crew detachment aboard to carry out tasks not...
https://news.usni.org/2021/08/03/navy-large-usv-will-require-small-crews-for-the-next-several-years
USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN-71) transits the Pacific Ocean on Dec. 18, 2020. US Navy Photo
To counter threats from China, a top U.S. lawmaker Friday called on the U.S. Navy to develop a new maritime strategy that would rebalance how it deploys and strategically scattered persistent deterrent force in an arc throughout the Indo-Pacific region.
Two decades of focus on the Middle East has strained U.S. naval forces and worn out its fleet of carriers, said U.S. Rep Elaine Luria (D-Va.), a retired...
https://news.usni.org/2021/07/30/lawmaker-calls-for-new-u-s-maritime-strategy-with-pacific-focus
USVs Ranger and Nomad unmanned vessels underway in the Pacific Ocean near the Channel Islands on July 3, 2021. US Navy Photo
The pair of Ghost Fleet ships the Navy and the Pentagon’s Strategic Capabilities Office are using as testbeds to prove large autonomous vessels can operate effectively at sea are slowly moving toward completely unmanned operations.
Unlike the medium unmanned surface vessel demonstrators Sea Hunter and Sea Hawk, the much larger converted off-shore oil and gas support vessels...
https://news.usni.org/2021/07/27/ghost-fleet-hulls-moving-toward-completely-unmanned-operations
USVs Ranger and Nomad unmanned vessels underway in the Pacific Ocean near the Channel Islands on July 3, 2021. US Navy Photo
The next pair of ships slated for the Navy and the Pentagon’s test program for autonomous ships are under construction on the Gulf Coast and set to join the service next year, defense officials told reporters on Tuesday.
The Navy’s two new Ghost Fleet Overlord surface ships will join two existing hulls developed by the Pentagon’s Strategic Capabilities Office as part of the...
https://news.usni.org/2021/07/13/two-more-ghost-fleet-unmanned-test-ships-to-join-fleet-next-year
Ghost Fleet Ship Nomad arriving at Point Loma, Calif., on May 29, 2021. IMage via Twitter
The Pentagon’s second autonomous test ship is in California after completing a 4,421 nautical-mile journey from the Gulf Coast to the West Coast after passing through the Panama Canal, according to a Monday statement provided to USNI News.
Nomad, one of two Ghost Fleet Overlord test ships developed by the Department of Defense’s Strategic Capabilities Office, arrived in California on May 29. The converted...
Ghost Fleet vessel Nomad transits the Miraflores locks in the PAnama Canal on May 18, 2021. USNI News Graphic
An experimental unmanned surface vehicle has transited the Panama Canal on the way to its new home in California, USNI News has learned.
Nomad, a former offshore patrol vessel retrofitted with systems to allow the ship to operate autonomously, passed through the Panama Canal this week, according to ship spotters tracking data from Marine Traffic.com. A Navy official also confirmed the...
https://news.usni.org/2021/05/20/ghost-fleet-ship-nomad-transited-panama-canal-headed-to-california
Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruiser USS Monterey (CG-61) transits the Mediterranean Sea on March 24, 2021. US Navy Photo
The vice-chair of the House Armed Services Committee does not support the Navy’s “divest to invest” strategy of ridding the fleet of aging and expensive-to-maintain ships and systems to free up money for the development of unmanned platforms and other new technology, saying the sea service needs to focus on getting ready for a near-term battle instead of looking too far...