Congressional Research Service Report on the US Navy Light Amphibious Warship
Contents
Introduction
- Light Amphibious Warfare (LAW) program
- 28-30 new ships
- Support Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations (EABO) concept
Background
US Navy Amphibious Ships In General
Roles and Missions
- Navy amphibious ships are operated by the Navy, using Navy personnel
- Count towards the stated size of the Navy
- Lift embarked Marines and their equipment to distant operating areas
- Support Marines as they conduct expeditionary operations ashore
- Because of their ability to transport a large amount of people, equipment and supplies, without requiring extensive port facilities amphibious ships are useful for a wide range of combat and non-combat operations
- Amphibious ships are normally forward-deployed as part of multi-ship formations known as Amphibious Ready Groups (ARGs)
- Can also be deployed on an individual basis for engagement with foreign countries or to conduct humanitarian missions
Current Types of Amphibious Ships
- Big deck amphibious ships: LHA/LHD (look like small aircraft carriers)
- Small deck amphibious ships: LPD/LSD
- The LAW ships would be much smaller than either type
Amphibious Fleet Force Level Goal
Current Force Level Goal
- The Navy, as a whole, has a goal of having 355 ships
- Result of a force structure assessment (FSA) that was conducted in 2016
- This force structure includes 38 amphibious ships
- 12 LHA/LHD type ships
- 26 LPD/LSD type ships
- This force structure predates the LAW concept and thus does not include any LAWs
- The Navy's current amphibious ship force consists of 32 ships: 9 LHA/LHDs and 23 LPD/LSDs
- The 38 ship goal is designed to ensure that the Navy has enough amphibious transport capability to transport the assault echelons of 2 Marine Expeditionary Brigades
Proposed Change In Force Level Goal
- In 2020, the US Navy conducted a new force structure assessment, the Integrated Naval FSA (INFSA)
- The assessment has been completed, though its results have not yet been released
- Statements from Gen. David H. Berger, Commandant of the Marine Corps, suggest that the INFSA will call for changing the amphibious ship force level goal to one that includes:
- Smaller amphibious ships
- Ships like the Expeditionary Sea Base (ESB) and Expeditionary Fast Transport (EPF) ships
- Ships based on commercial ship hull designs
- Unmanned surface vessels (USVs)
- The LAWs would be smaller ships based on commercial hulls
- The rationale for this change is the result of the development of the Distributed Maritime Operations (DMO) concept
- US Navy and Marine Corps forces operating in a less concentrated manner
- Complicate an adversary's ability to detect, identify, track and target US forces while still allowing US forces to bring lethal force to bear
- To implement DMO, the US Navy wants to
- Reduce the proportion of large ships
- Increase the proportion of small ships
- Create a third category of unmanned surface vessels (USVs) and unmanned underwater vessels (UUVs)
- The Navy and Marine Corps argue that a more distributed fleet architecture is
- Necessary due to improving Chinese anti-ship capabilities
- Technically feasible due to improvements in networking and unmanned vehicle technologies
- Just as lethal, if not more lethal than the current fleet composition
- No more expensive, and perhaps less expensive, than the current fleet
- In parallel with DMO, and with an eye towards operations against China in the Western Pacific, the Marine Corps has developed the following doctrines:
- Littoral Operations in a Combat Environment (LOCE)
- Expeditionary Advanced Basing Operations (EABO)
- Under EABO the Marine Corps envisions platoon-sized units hopping from island to island, firing anti-ship cruise missiles and conducting other tasks to contribute to US efforts to deny sea control to Chinese forces
- The LAW ships would be critical to this concept, as they would be primarily responsible for embarking, transporting, landing and subsequently re-embarking these small units
- LAWs would rely on stealth and speed for survivability
- Hide among islands and commercial sea traffic
- Receive defensive support from other US naval assets
- What happens in the opening days of a conflict when this support is hard to come by?
- Seems like a bit of circular reasoning -- these ships will rely on other US Navy assets for defensive support, but their job is to deploy Marine Corps forces who will fire anti-ship missiles to allow those US assets in
- Rely on deployed Marine Corps forces to fire anti-ship cruise missiles against attacking adversaries
Light Amphibious Warship Program
Overview
- $30 million in R&D funding for 2021
- First ships to be procured in 2023
- All 28 ships notionally procured by 2026
- That seems fast, but on the other hand, these are small ships
- However, as the LCS program showed, the small ship programs can turn into fiascoes just as easily as large ship programs can
Ship Design
- Relatively simple and inexpensive
- Features
- Minimum length of 200 ft
- Maximum draft of 12 ft
- Crew of no more than 40 sailors
- Ability to embark at least 75 Marines
- 8000 sq. ft. of cargo area for weapons, equipment and supplies
- Stern or bow landing ramp to allow Marines to disembark directly onto a beach
- Modest suite of C4I equipment
- 25 or 30mm gun system along with .50 cal machine guns for self defense
- Minimum transit speed of 14 knots
- Minimum unrefueled transit range of 3500 nautical miles
- Ability to operate within fleet groups or independently
- Expected 10 year service life
- LAWs will be much smaller than existing amphibious ships
- Current LHA/LHDs are 844 to 855 ft. long and have a full load displacement of between 40,000 and 45,000 tons
- Current LPDs have a length of 684 ft. and have a displacement of 24,900 tons
- A LAW, by contrast will have a length of between 200 and 400 ft. and will have a displacement of 1,000 to 8,000 tons
- Maximum draft of 12 ft will allow it to transit shallow waters on its way to and from beaches
- Navy would prefer storage be open-deck
- No well deck
- Design speed of 14 knots is slower than the 22 knot design speed of larger amphibious vessels, but is fuel efficient and allows the LAWs to be fitted with simpler powerplants
- 10 year lifetime requirement is considerably less than the 30-45 year lifetime requirements for larger ships and potentially allows for the use of cheaper construction options
- I really don't like this
- A 10-year lifetime is practically a blink of an eye
- I guarantee that these ships will still be in use more than 10 years after their delivery
- The US Navy already has enough issues with maintenance, this is just asking for more trouble
Procurement Schedule
- 28 LAWs over the 4-year period from FY2023-FY2026
- Annual quantities of 3, 6, 10, and 9
- LAW ships do not appear in FY2021 five-year plan but could appear in FY2022 plan
Procurement Cost
- Navy has stated that it wants per-unit costs to be "several digit millions, not triple digit millions"
- Can be interpreted as either meaning less than $100 million per ship or a cost that's closer to $100 million than several hundred million
- By comparison LHAs have a procurement cost of $3800 million and LPDs have a procurement cost of between $1800 million and $2000 million
- As a point of comparison Coast Guard's new Fast Response Cutters are 154 ft. long and have a unit procurement cost of $65 million
- The Navy's new TATS towing and salvage ships are 263 ft. long and have a procurement cost of about $80 million
Potential Builders
- The LAW design is small and simple enough to be built by a number of shipyards
- The Navy has stated that it received responses from 9 shipyards in response to a Request for Information (RFI)
Acquisition Strategy
- The Navy wants to award contracts to multiple firms to conduct industry studies that will inform the Navy about cost/capability tradeoffs in the design
- Following that, the Navy will award multiple contracts for preliminary designs
- From those designs, the Navy will choose a preferred design and builder
- The preference is to have a single shipyard construct all 28-30 ships
- However, the Navy is open to splitting the contract between multiple shipyards if that will permit faster and cheaper delivery
FY2021 Funding
- $30 million for initial R&D for industry studies and concept design
- Project 4044 (Next Generation Medium Amphibious Ship) of PE (Program Element) 0603563N (Ship Concept Advanced Design)
- Of the $30 million, $21.5 million will be used to support contracts for design studies, of up to $3 million each
Issues For Congress
EABO Operational Concept
- Merits of the EABO operational concept
- Too focused on China at the expense of other missions?
- How will the Marine Corps gain access to the islands from which it will operate
- Resupply?
- Survivability of Marine Corps forces on the islands
- Contribution that Marine Corps forces will make to sea denial operations
- The key question is whether EABO is a cost-effective use of forces
LAWs Within Overall Navy Fleet Architecture
- How will the LAW fit into the Navy's fleet architecture, given that this is currently a matter of discussion between the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) and the Navy
- How can the cost-effectiveness of this force be known if the rest of the fleet structure is still in flux
Preliminary Cost Target
- Congress should push the Navy to be more specific in its cost targets for the LAW
- Should also assess whether the cost target is feasible given the features the Navy wants the ship to have
Industrial Base Implications
- In the past, all Navy amphibious ships have been built by the Ingalls Shipyard of Pascagoula, MS
- However, the Navy has stated that it intends the LAW design to be simple enough to be handled by a variety of shipyards
- What implications does this have for the distribution of Navy shipbuilding work among US shipyards?
- How many jobs will a LAW contract bring?
- What impact would the LAW program have on other Navy procurement programs?
