CNO to Hill: Reprogram By January Or Programs ‘Paralyzed’

CNO to Hill: Reprogram By January Or Programs ‘Paralyzed’
CNO to Hill: Reprogram By January Or Programs ‘Paralyzed’

PORTSMOUTH, VA:  Go ahead and cut our budget across the board if you really have to. But please, then give us authority to move money around to save our top priorities — and give it to us soon. That’s the message, in a nutshell, from the Navy’s top officer. [Editorial note: Just to be clear,…

US Military Could Not Handle One Major Theater Operation If Sequester Sticks

US Military Could Not Handle One Major Theater Operation If Sequester Sticks
US Military Could Not Handle One Major Theater Operation If Sequester Sticks

CAPITOL HILL:  Even the cameras stopped clicking in a hushed Armed Services hearing room today as Rep. Jim Cooper told the Joint Chiefs of Staff and his colleagues on the biggest committee in Congress today that America’s lawmakers had failed the country. “You gentlemen make life and death decisions in the Tank almost every day,”…

Rep. Forbes On The Shrinking Sub Fleet: HASC Hearing Preview

Rep. Forbes On The Shrinking Sub Fleet: HASC Hearing Preview
Rep. Forbes On The Shrinking Sub Fleet: HASC Hearing Preview

[UPDATED]: WASHINGTON: Tomorrow is a big day for Navy submarines on Capitol Hill. A hearing of the House Armed Services seapower and projections forces subcommittee will focus on some of the knottiest issues in undersea warfare: – staying ahead of the Russians and Chinese. – getting extra funding for the Navy’s new ballistic missile submarine,…

Navy Needs More Cash If Syria Strikes Last Past September: CNO

Navy Needs More Cash If Syria Strikes Last Past September: CNO
Navy Needs More Cash If Syria Strikes Last Past September: CNO

WASHINGTON: If “this potential operation” against Syria continues into October, when the new fiscal year begins, the Navy’s going to need more money. That, in turn, means Congress has to act. Ideally, legislators would pass a supplemental spending bill, Chief of Naval Operations, Adm. Jonathan Greenert said this morning. Failing a supplemental, though, Greenert said…

Navy Sub Chief Rebuts Critics Claims On SSBN-X; Don’t Cut our Boats

Navy Sub Chief Rebuts Critics Claims On SSBN-X; Don’t Cut our Boats
Navy Sub Chief Rebuts Critics Claims On SSBN-X; Don’t Cut our Boats

WASHINGTON: If you think the military doesn’t listen to critics or friends, then you haven’t read one of the most interesting blog posts ever from the Pentagon. It’s by the Navy admiral in charge of the nation’s submarines. The piece, by director of undersea warfare Rear. Adm. Richard Breckenridge, popped up on Navy Live, the…

Here’s Your HASC Markup Handbook With Amendment Predictions

Here’s Your HASC Markup Handbook With Amendment Predictions
Here’s Your HASC Markup Handbook With Amendment Predictions

CAPITOL HILL: Tracking the winners and losers of this year’s House authorization markup — the draft bill produced by the House Armed Services Committee — is one of Washington’s most exhausitng pastimes. The final bill often does not appear until 2 or 3 or 4 or 5 or even later in the morning the day…

Sen. McCain Slams $2.5B Carrier Cost Increase; Navy Struggles To Fund SSBN-X, Destroyers

Sen. McCain Slams $2.5B Carrier Cost Increase; Navy Struggles To Fund SSBN-X, Destroyers
Sen. McCain Slams $2.5B Carrier Cost Increase; Navy Struggles To Fund SSBN-X, Destroyers

CAPITOL HILL: It’s been a rough 48 hours for the US Navy. Yesterday, the Littoral Combat Ship was battered by House appropriators and questioned by a leaked report. Today it was the Senate Armed Service seapower subcommittee’s turn to grill the Navy about its aircraft carrier and submarine programs. While the automatic 10-year budget cuts known as sequestration played a major role…

Navy Budget Share Grows, Boosted By Pacific Strategy Shift

PENTAGON: The Navy would get the largest budget share among the three military services in the 2014 budget submitted Wednesday, but would still see a drop in total funding from what Congress provided for this year in the final version of the continuing resolution. The $155.8 billion requested for the Navy Department in the president’s…

Sequester Will ‘Gut’ DoD Modernization; Navy’s SSBN-X, Long Range Strike, Other New Starts In Peril

WASHINGTON: Every senior civilian leader and the Navy agree that America needs replacements for the Ohio-class nuclear missile submarines if our nuclear deterrent is to remain credible. But the SSBN-X, as the program is known, is at risk from the mandatory budget cuts known as sequestration, the influential head of CAPE, the Pentagon’s budget and…

Navy Fears Pentagon Neglects New Missile Sub; SSBN(X) Must Survive Almost 80 Years

WASHINGTON: Right now, the Navy is designing the ballistic missile submarine that will provide 70 percent of the nation’s nuclear deterrent until 2080. Yet even as the service prepares to award research and development contracts this December, the submarine community is deeply worried that the rest of the military is neglecting the program — which…

HASC Bill Shows GOP Stuck in Cold War; Reduce SSBN-X, Nukes

There is broad bipartisan agreement that few national security issues are as critical as how to deal with America’s crippling debt. This means we should spend scarce dollars on the weapons we need for current threats and not on programs with diminishing strategic relevance. Republicans on the House Armed Services Committee, however, apparently are still…

Sequestration Is More Likely Than You Think

Sequestration: it’s a term only Washington could love. Behind the bland euphemism lie dramatic cuts to the U.S. military, shipbuilding and aerospace manufacturing jobs, and in communities across America. Washington politicians insist a half trillion in defense cuts — and the attendant degradation to our national security — is a reasoned belt tightening. In reality,…

Missile Subs Delay Is Good News, Bad News Story For Shipbuilders

The Navy’s proposal to delay construction of new ballistic-missile submarines (SSBNs) meant to succeed the current Ohio class is both good and bad news for America’s shipbuilders, according to the program manager for the new “boomer” sub. But key members of Congress -– already at odds with the Administration over delays to the Virginia-class submarine…

OMB Plan to Slice SSBN-X Fleet Won’t Save Dough, DoD Says

Omaha: The White House plan to cut the size of the Ohio-class replacement submarine fleet just doesn’t hold water, according to a senior defense official and several Navy officers. The Office of Management and Budget wants the SSBN-X purchase to shrink from 12 to 10 boats. To compensate in part for the reduced number of…