Notes to the New Administration Week

By Andrew Tenbusch and Trevor Phillips-Levine

Dear Secretary-Designate Phelan,

Much like constructing an investment portfolio, developing a balanced naval force involves spreading risk and resources across complementary assets. While large, heavily armed, and exquisitely equipped warships deliver formidable returns in terms of deterrence and combat power, they are also expensive to build, crew, and maintain. They are also difficult to integrate with smaller, less capable partner navies. To remain both cost-effective and globally engaged, the U.S. Navy needs a balanced mix of high-end capital ships and smaller, more economical vessels, even if the latter are inherently less armed and defended. This tradeoff is not only acceptable but strategically beneficial, given the Navy’s role in day-to-day operations.

In naval terms, the “high-end” segment of the fleet—supercarriers, large amphibious assault ships, submarines, and destroyers—constitutes our “blue-chip” investments, yielding substantial deterrent and warfighting value when employed in crises or conflict. However, operating them continuously for routine missions equates to wearing down premium assets on relatively low-threat tasks, akin to using golden sledgehammers to drive nails.

While high-end platforms remain critical, the Navy’s attempts to field smaller, lower-end ships have encountered pitfalls, as illustrated by the Littoral Combat Ships and the Constellation-class frigate (FFG-62) program. Originally envisioned as a cost-effective adaptation of the European multi-purpose frigate (Fregata Europea Multi-Missione (FREMM)), it was supposed to benefit from an existing hull design and propulsion system. Instead, design changes aimed at countering peer adversaries’ capabilities have ballooned the ship’s complexity, resulting in only about fifteen percent commonality with its FREMM predecessor and significant cost, schedule, and performance risks.

Yet these frigates should not need the same level of capability as a destroyer. Their true value lies in handling missions along the low-intensity end of the competition continuum, where their inherent affordability, simplicity, and smaller crew requirements deliver operational efficiency. By assigning them to daily presence tasks and maritime security operations, the Navy can conserve its more capable vessels for high-risk scenarios, preserving their readiness and deterring potential adversaries without incurring excessive operating costs.

Moreover, the Constellation-class frigate, like the Littoral Combat Ship, operates well within the environments where global partnership-building occurs, particularly alongside allied navies that field similarly-sized and equipped ships. These lower-end combatants facilitate trust-building exercises and joint patrols, strengthening alliances in ways that large, capital-intensive platforms sometimes cannot. And if conflict were ever to break out, they could reposition to conduct maritime interdiction, protect sea lines of communication, or support operations in secondary theaters, freeing the Navy’s high-end assets to focus on major combat.

As Secretary of the Navy, you have the unique opportunity to apply an investor’s mindset to our naval force design: prioritizing strategic returns, hedging against risk, and maximizing the value of every platform. By recalibrating the fleet to feature both capital-intensive “blue-chip” combatants and smaller, relatively lower-cost “growth” vessels, you can ensure the Navy remains agile across the full competition continuum. This portfolio-style approach not only delivers sustainable presence and alliance-building on a global scale, but also preserves high-end readiness for critical moments when exquisite capability proves indispensable. In doing so, you will champion a modernized sea power strategy that delivers robust dividends to the nation while smartly managing limited resources.

Andrew “Kramer” Tenbusch is an FA-18 weapons systems officer currently assigned to Strike Fighter Wing Pacific. He previously served as a fellow with the Halsey Alfa Advanced Research Group at the U.S. Naval War College.

Trevor “Mrs.” Phillips-Levine is a naval aviator currently assigned to U.S. 7th Fleet. He is a CIMSEC Senior Editor.

The views expressed here are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official positions or opinions of the U.S. Navy, the Department of Defense, or any part of the U.S. government.

Featured Image: SOUTH CHINA SEA (Sept. 7, 2021) An F-35C Lightning II, assigned to the “Argonauts” of Strike Fighter Squadron (VFA) 147, launches from the flight deck of Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson (CVN 70) while the carrier transits the South China Sea with Independence-variant littoral combat ship USS Tulsa (LCS 16).