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Why does the US Navy want to eliminate 9 warships that are only a few ‘old soldiers’?

U.S. Navy Chief of Staff Michael Gilday defended plans to phase out a relatively new nine-ship near-shore combat vessel in the upcoming fiscal, even as the force tries to keep up with the U.S. Navy’s growing fleet. China.

Among the nine littoral combat ships the US Navy wants to be decommissioned soon are the USS Indianapolis, USS Billings and USS Wichita, all of which entered service in 2019, according to CNN.

Why does the US Navy want to eliminate 9 warships that are only a few 'old soldiers'?  - 1 . photo

The littoral combat ship USS Wichita

US Navy

Speaking at the US House of Representatives Armed Services Committee on May 11, the US Navy Chief of Staff Michael Gilday confirmed that the aforementioned anti-submarine ships could not perform their main tasks. “I refuse to put more money in [loại tàu chiến] It’s impossible to track a high-end submarine in the current environment,” Gilday told members of the House Armed Services Committee, according to CNN.

Mr. Gilday added that the main reason for the early dismissal of nine near-shore combat ships was that the ship’s combat system “didn’t work technically.” Early decommissioning would save the Navy about $391 million, estimated in its budget proposal for fiscal 2023, which begins October 2022. However, that savings is only a tiny fraction of the cost poured into these nine ships, totaling about $3.2 billion.

In August 2021, visit close-in combat ship USS Tulsa in Singapore, Vice President of the United States Kamala Harris highlighting the US Navy’s mission of “assisting in ensuring peace and security, free trade and freedom of navigation”, and the role of this type of ship in dealing with the situation. China increasingly dominant in the western Pacific. However, many near-shore combat ships have problems such as stalling and limited armament.

The littoral combat ships have been hailed as America’s deterrent against China because they are designed to operate in shallow seas such as East Sea. However, the removal of up to 9 ships in a year as above seems to show that this expensive surface combat ship is not meeting expectations.

The US Congress has the final say on the military budget proposal and has not supported previous proposals to eliminate ships. The reduction in the number of warships may be even harder to accept as US lawmakers note the growing size of the Chinese navy and the disparity between the US and Chinese fleets.

In 2015, the Chinese navy (PLAN) had 255 combat ships, and by the end of 2020, this number will increase to 360, more than 60 more than the US Navy, according to CNN, citing research from the Office of Intelligence. US Navy (ONI). ONI predicts that within the next four years, the PLAN will have 400 warships.

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