By Emelie Rutherford
While the Navy’s new destroyer-building proposal to the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) calls for building eight more DDG-51s starting in fiscal year 2010, service officials told lawmakers last week they also would like funding for an addition DDG-51 in FY ’09.
The chances of lawmakers authorizing and appropriating those funds for a ninth new DDG-51, however, appear slim, considering the FY ’09 defense authorization and appropriations approval processes are underway in Congress. In addition, some powerful lawmakers are skeptical of the Navy’s newly unveiled plan–submitted earlier this month in a FY ’10 Program Objective Memorandum (POM) request to OSD–to stop the DDG-1000 buy at two and buy eight more DDG-51s starting in FY ’10.
Vice Adm. Barry McCullough, deputy chief of naval operations for integration of capabilities and resources, testified last Thursday at a House Armed Services Seapower subcommittee hearing that the Navy wants “authorization of full funding to restart DDG-51 in FY ’09 to support our proposed FY ’10 Program Objective Memorandum” for eight DDG-51s from FY ’10 through FY ’15.
Asked to elaborate on the service’s FY ’09 wishes, McCullough said: “We believe that to enable that program, a PB ’09 adjustment to make a DDG-51 in FY ’09 supports our POM ’10 submittal. And that’s what we would like to see happen…but that’s in support of our POM ’10 submittal.”
Subcommittee member Rep. Joe Courtney (D-Conn.) asked what will happen if Congress doesn’t provide FY ’09 funds for a DDG-51, noting “it is kind of late in the process.”
Allison Stiller, deputy assistant secretary of the Navy for ship programs, replied that the last DDG-51 was appropriated in FY ’05, and that there would be “a significant production break if you wait until FY ’10.”
“So the desire is to consider an ’09 [ship] as well,” she said. “That’s part of the discussion that we’re having.”
The Navy is currently crafting a new acquisition strategy “for a FY 2009 DDG 51 and follow-on procurements,” Stiller and McCullough state in written testimony.
The White House’s official FY ’09 budget request includes $2.55 billion for a third DDG-1000–which does not factor into the Navy’s new destroyer plan. The Senate Armed Services Committee’s marked-up FY ’09 defense authorization bill supports buying that third DDG-1000, and the Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee is expected to stick with buying the newer destroyer as well when it marks up its bill next month.
The House-passed FY’09 defense authorization bill gives the service the option of spending $400 million in advance-procurement monies for restarting the DDG-51 production line or for further developing the DDG-1000, but the spending bill the House Appropriation defense subcommittee marked up last week includes no money for DDG-51s while keeping $450 million in advance-procurement funds for DDG-1000.
Stiller acknowledged to House members at last Thursday’s hearing–which drew lawmakers from outside the subcommittee who are resisting the destroyer change–that the Navy could in theory build a third DDG-1000 in FY ’09.
“If another [DDG-]1000 was authorized and appropriated, from an acquisition perspective, I have an approved acquisition strategy for the [DDG-]1000 program as well,” she told Courtney. “So a surface combatant is ’09 is critical we believe to the industrial base.”
Full House Armed Services Committee member Rep. Niki Tsongas (D-Mass.) quizzed Stiller on her assertion that it’s important to buy a surface combatant in FY ’09, and noted appropriators’ resistance to providing the DDG-51 funds next fiscal year.
Tsongas–whose state is home to DDG-1000 combat-systems developer Raytheon [RTN]–asked if Stiller would support funding for an additional DDG-1000 in FY ’09 instead of no surface combatants in the fiscal year.
Stiller replied: “Ma’am, as you know, our president’s budget submission for ’09 included DDG-1000. … (As) Adm. McCullough said in his opening statement, we’re here today to talk about where the Navy is headed as part of our POM ’10 submission to OSD. So from an execution perspective, yes ma’am, I can execute a DDG-1000 in FY ’09. But it comes back to a requirements decision. Does the department support and need that ship? But from an acquisition perspective, yes ma’am, I absolutely could execute either way.”
Stiller and McCullough’s written testimony says the Navy “urges the Committee’s support for full funding of the surface combatant procurement account for FY 2009 and approving our proposal regarding DDG’s.”
Stiller said the Navy and the two shipyards that build both destroyer classes–General Dynamics‘ [GD] Bath Iron Works (BIW) in Maine and Northrop Grumman‘s [NOC] Ingalls yard in Mississippi–are ready to restart DDG-51 production. She acknowledged an estimated 50-week delay with ordering a reduction gear, because the DDG-51 line has been shutting down, yet she said the shipbuilding sequence could be changed to allow for later gear delivery.
Lawmakers and aides speculated the Navy realizes it is unlikely it will receive funds from Congress for an actual DDG-51 ship in FY ’09, but wanted to make it clear any funds for restarting the ship effort in the fiscal year would be welcome.