Cost big factor in decision to sack destroyer

Faced with cost estimates upward of $5 billion per ship, the Navy had no choice but to let its prized DDG-1000 Zumwalt destroyer program end after the first two ships are built, analysts said Wednesday.

Congressional investigators long had been concerned that the Navy tried to incorporate too many new technologies on an untested platform. The originally envisioned 32 ships dipped to 12 and then seven as costs grew.

"I don't think this thing was a shock because fundamentally the whole program was a big fat target for many years," said Jay Korman, defense analyst at The Avascent Group.

Sen. Susan Collins, a member of the Armed Services Committee, said Wednesday that the Navy instead plans to build nine more of its current Arleigh Burke destroyers, possibly with some added capabilities that went into the newer warship.

The DDG-1000's growing cost came as the Navy is trying to expand to a 313-ship fleet. Officially, the new ships are to cost roughly double the $1.3 billion price of a Burke destroyer. But estimates for the first two run as high as $5 billion.

Loren Thompson, a defense analyst with the Lexington Institute, said the Navy can't afford the DDG-1000 but it can't afford to stop building ships, either, if it wants to achieve its shipbuilding goals and maintain a shipbuilding infrastructure.

Another problem with the DDG-1000 design was its potential vulnerability. Bombarding the shore with guns is cheaper than using missiles, but the ship would be vulnerable to attack if it came within 100 miles of shore to use its 155-millimeter guns, Thompson said.

"The Navy should have understood a long time ago that putting a $3 billion destroyer off the coast of a hostile country so that it could use gunfire was a dangerous proposition," he said.

Finally, there was no known threat to justify the warship, experts said.