A Case in Point

Here is a case in point to the last post. The Navy can't build the ships it needs because they've become too expensive. Its not rocket science people! Build cheaper ships!!!!

Two subs and two destroyers will be needed by 2012 to keep up with ships leaving the fleet. Optimistically, O'Rourke said, those four new ships will cost $8 billion.Pessimistically, he said, they'll cost $12 billion - more than what's typically spent on the entire shipbuilding budget now. Planned purchases of a small vessel called the littoral combat ship could bring that total to $13 billion."Now you've used up your entire prospective shipbuilding budget and you haven't bought anything else" - such as aircraft carriers, carrier refueling costs, amphibious assault ships, and other surface combat ships, O'Rourke said during a panel discussion at a U.S. Naval Institute Joint Warfare Symposium at the Virginia Beach Convention Center.

Maybe they'll get the idea:

And what's true of submarines, O'Rourke said, is also true of the DD(X), the replacement for the Arleigh-Burke class of destroyers."We're going to have the same kind of limited options," he said of the new destroyer. "The ship is only really affordable at one per year."He suggested the Navy should determine the most critical new technologies and capabilities of that ship and eliminate the rest.That could cut 25-30 percent off the cost of the ship, he speculated.

I always wondered why we needed 10,000 ton destroyers equipped with 100 missiles launchers that cost $1 billion each, like the Burkes. The Europeans have only 35-40 launchers on their new missiles destroyers and frigates, and they cost $500 million or less.
Once the Navy planned to build a missile barge, at over $500 million each that could carry 500 cruise missiles or more. Yet they were cancelled in favor of a $3 billion destroyer. Too bad since we need less expensive platforms which take advantage of the new precision weapon's that don't need a super expensive and vulnerable battleship as a launcher. They just need a ride to where the action is!