Priorities in government and space

The root of the problem with governmental involvement in choosing
missions and vehicles is the human element. Politics.

DDG-1000 USS Zumwalt / DD(X)
Multi-Mission Surface Combatant
Future Surface Combatant
Developed under the DD(X) destroyer program, DDG-1000 Zumwalt is the
lead ship in a class of next-generation, multi-mission surface
combatants tailored for land attack and littoral dominance, with
capabilities designed to defeat current and projected threats as well
as improve battle force defense.

Northrop Grumman and General Dynamics were competitors for the DD(X)
contract. The Navy asked the Pentagon's chief weapons buyer to
approve the winner-take-all approach, which would force the losing
bidder out of the shipbuilding market. In March 2005 twenty lawmakers
said the contract to build the Navy's next-generation guided missile
destroyer, the DD(X), should not be a winner-take-all contract.

In March 2005 Adm. Vernon Clark, the chief of naval operations,
abandoned his goal of building the Navy to a 375-ship fleet. New
procedures like keeping ships deployed overseas while rotating the
crews mean the Navy will need no more than 325 ships and possibly as
few as 260. The rate of building new destroyers would not support
more than one shipyard at acceptable costs. The plan envisioned
building about 1.4 destroyers annually, but never two a year.
Building those ships in two yards would cost an extra $300 million
per ship.

The DD-51 (Arleigh Burke) destroyers are built at both Bath Iron
Works in Maine and at the Ingalls Shipyard in Mississippi. One of the
two ship builders would lose the contract if the Navy adopts the sole-
source plan in the future. The men and women of these shipyards have
demonstrated time and again that they build the world's best surface
combat ships. But more than local employees, they are a national
asset which America must retain. A loss of that magnitude could drive
BIW, one of Maine's largest private employers, out of business and
would create a monopoly for destroyer production. With DD(X), local
employees at Northrop Grumman Ingalls, the leading DD(X) contractor,
can be ensured of a relatively steady employment.
This is Mississippi's largest private employer. To put it into
perspective, Ingalls is about three times the size of Nissan, the
state's second largest in terms of job numbers. So the local
implications of DD(X) to Mississippi are clear, especially along a
Gulf Coast struggling to bounce back from Hurricane Katrina.

The Navy agreed to put on hold its plans to contract with a single
shipyard for building all of the nation's stealth DD(X) Destroyers,
calling the sole-source proposal "premature." However, the Navy has
said it will continue to seek more information on the sole-source
strategy, and has not made any final decisions on whether to adopt
such a proposal in the future.

The Navy's new DD(X) program is the centerpiece a family of three
surface combatant ships, including a destroyer, a cruiser and a
smaller craft for littoral operations. The DD(X) contract could end
up totaling $100 billion for some 70 warships in the DD(X) family:
destroyers, cruisers, and a downsized seagoing killer called LCS,
short for littoral combat ship. The cruiser and destroyer are
expected to share a common hull design. The Littoral Combat Ship has
an advanced hull designed for high speed and a shallow draft.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/ship/dd-x.htm
(cont'd)

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