It’s been a rough few months for the Littoral Combat Ship program ever since its truncation from 52 to 32 ships earlier this year over questions about its survivability, cost, and how it fits into the overall Navy strategy. And although LCS manufacturers Lockheed Martin and Austal USA hold out hope that they can modify the ship to meet yet-to-be-released requirements for the next-generation frigate program that will replace it, experts believes the platform has an uphill battle.
Benjamin Freeman, a senior policy advisor at think tank Third Way, believes that the LCS can’t be counted out as it ticks a number of boxes on the Navy’s wish list: it’s a versatile platform that features exchangeable mission modules that can perform a variety of different essential maritime missions. But the drawbacks outside of those promising capabilities are so big, they threaten the LCS program’s ability to adapt for a future competition, Freeman argued.
By the time that Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel truncated the program, it was obvious that the LCS was not living up to expectations. At $550 million per ship, a completely packaged LCS was proving to be an extremely costly program. Additionally the exchangeable mission modules, which were supposed to take only a day to switch, were instead taking place over a timeframe of weeks.
If LCS manufacturers Lockheed Martin and Austal USA hope to win back orders for the LCS by modifying the vessel to fit the requirements of the upcoming next-generation frigate competition, Freeman believes that the ship will need to be modified for more survivability – and that won’t help its already unpleasant situation in the cost department.
“The changes the LCS needs to become a viable, survivable Navy ship would dramatically increase per-ship costs,” he said. “Exactly how much is uncertain, but, my guess is that we’re talking about at least an additional $100 million per ship.”
The reason that modifications are so expensive is that currently the LCS only has marginal armor and a handful of defense capabilities, such as a single 57mm deck gun and a few short-ranged missiles. Improvements above that would require significant changes to the design.
And improvements in just one area won’t be enough to address survivability concerns, said Dakota Wood, a senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation. For example, even if the program was able to increase the amount of armor on the LCS – which would make the ship heavier so that it could sustain more damage from hits – it won’t be much good if additional firepower is not added to the LCS so that it can defend itself.
The Navy could add additional self-defense capability as well, but that just keeps increasing the price tag in an environment that is not conducive to it.
“These kinds of modifications come at a time when funding for the Navy’s shipbuilding has already come under a lot of stress,” Wood said.
What will the LCS be up against when the competition for the next-generation frigate heats up? Wood believes it’s not likely to come from outside the United States, as although European navies are quite experienced in building frigates, pursuing foreign options – even ones that meet the requirements — “imply an inability of the U.S. to indigenously design and produce a frigate-class warship.”
Perhaps the most obvious frontrunner is Huntington Ingalls Industries’ National Security Cutter (NSC), which the company is currently producing for the Coast Guard. The fourth NSC recently completed acceptance trials, and the fifth ship has been christened.
The NSC is not without its drawbacks. For example, the intention of the LCS was to have a ship that could travel at speeds in excess of 40 knots, whereas the NSC travels at the much slower pace of 28 knots. Still, this might not be enough to give the LCS platform a significant leg up over the NSC in an upcoming competition, Wood said.
“The speed aspect of the LCS has always been questionable, as it was unclear why the LCS actually needed to travel this quickly,” he said.
Freeman believes the LCS could hold another advantage over the NSC: the latter is not as well suited for anti-submarine or counter-mine missions, meaning the ship could be less versatile than an LCS-based platform. Whether that will be enough to shift the Navy’s support back to the platform will depend on whether it can solve its other problems of cost and survivability, which will not be simple problems to overcome.
Ultimately, the NSC holds the edge because it looks and acts like a frigate, Wood said. At the end of the day, that’s what the Navy is targeting, and not just a rehashed LCS.
“A modified NSC would more closely reflect a frigate-class surface combatant in displacement, armament, and robustness,” Wood argued. “Although the NSC is slower than the LCS, it is an ideal frigate in that it does fit within the Navy’s preference for a ship that has long endurance at reasonable speed, a quality which is very desirable for both open-ocean and littoral operations that occur thousands of miles away from home.”
Reporting and analysis by Ayla Ybarra