Navy’s going to need a bigger ship

WASHINGTON - The U.S. Navy Surface Warfare community is moving fast on wanting to buy a new large surface ship to replace aging cruisers, and it’s going to need to be more spacious accommodate future upgrades and weapon systems. Rear Adm. Ron Boxall, head of the Chief of Naval Operations’ Director of Surface Warfare has convened a “large surface combatant requirements evaluation team” to figure out what requirements are going to be needed for the larger ship. The goal, according Boxall, will be to buy the first cruiser replacement in 2023 or 2024. The acquisition process should kick off in 2019. Navy-thinking is that it’s going to need extra power for energy-intensive weapons of the future - electromagnetic rail guns and lasers. A key requirement is adaptability to upgrade and grow more quickly. The replacement ship will incorporate Raytheon’s AN/SPY-6 air and missile defense radar, the same way as the new DDG Flight III. The combatant will have the Flight III requirements as a baseline with room to grow, he said. The new ship will likely borrow elements from both the current DDGs and the Zumwalt-class destroyers that are entering the fleet. Also integral to any future ship will be the ability to host unmanned vehicles (drones), Boxall said. The Navy is starting down a path of incorporating drones into almost every aspect of war- fighting and including aerial refueling drones such as the MQ-25. The Navy has been integrating drones in recent years. The MQ-8 Fire Scout - an unmanned helicopter that can fly off a cruiser, destroyer or Littoral Combat Ship’s flight deck, and be used for targeting, was used in August to kill a target with a Harpoon missile launched from the Alabama-built USS Coronado (LCS 4). Austal USA of Mobile, Ala., builds the Independence variant of LCS. (Source: Defense News 09/17/18)