is an important goal building up the force of 355 ships. But at

the same time the Navy wants to get rid of some relatively new

warships when

Unknown: the Navy goes to Congress and and says we want to

retire ships, all Congress wants to think about is we already are

short on ships. Why are you getting rid of more ships?

Brad Howard: One key to growing the fleet is the Littoral Combat

ship or LCS. The LCS is designed for littoral areas, which is

what are closer to shore. larger ships have trouble operating in

these areas because of how shallow the water is, are im

Brad Howard with CNBC and today I'll be going aboard the US

Navy's Littoral Combat ship, it's one of the Navy's newest

and most controversial vessels.

Unknown: So the LCS program, much like every other major

defense program has had its own series of setbacks,

Brad Howard: engine issues and mission module problems in the

evolving state of the world and put the ship in choppy waters.

Unknown: The question of the of the LCS, his ability to defend

itself has become sharper and sharper.

It's a zero sum game. Okay, every dollar you spend to keep

those LCS is going as $1 you can spend on these other I think

higher priorities.

Brad Howard: The next ship the Navy hopes to procure that will

take on some of the missions of the LCS is the constellation

class frigate. This frigate is based on a design already used

by several navies, which means it should have fewer teething

issues than the LCS.

Unknown: But ultimately, at the end of the day, the Navy has

more than 30 of the ships, they have to do something with them.

They've spent tons and tons of money on this, and they are at

the moment now where they have to figure it out because this is

going to be a significant part of the fleet going forward.

Brad Howard: But with a significant investment already

in the LCS can the Navy find a way to make them viable in the

post 911 era of great power competition.

The LCS program began in 2002. After the 911 terror attacks,

the Navy's priorities shifted to fighting terrorism and policing

waters closer to shore. The Navy ended up producing two variants

of the LCS, the freedom class and independence class, the

freedom classes and more traditional steel and aluminum

ship and the independence classes and all aluminum

trimaran style design. Both ships are built for speed and

can hit around 40 knots which is about 46 miles per hour. The USS

Milwaukee a freedom class LCS is training off the coast of

Florida, which means getting there requires a one hour

helicopter ride. The LCS is capable of handling a variety of

helicopters on its flight deck including uncrewed helicopters

'away starboard side'. Behind me is a fire scout the MQ-8C fire

scout is an uncrewed helicopter that is as big as a normal

helicopter, it can help the crew by providing surveillance over

the horizon among other uses. The LCS isn't a giant warship it

seems like every inch is dedicated to a purpose. The

galley where the crew eats is utilitarian, but it provides an

area for the crew to unwind during the weeks or even months

at sea. And the rear of the ship has a hold capable of being

loaded with conex boxes among other types of equipment which

can be particularly useful during humanitarian operations.

The last LCS was ordered in fiscal year 2019. And the

average cost of the last five LCS is ordered was about

$983,000,000, 23 ships have bee commissioned in nine ships ar

currently under construction o in pre construction

Unknown: The freedom class is built by Marionette marine and

Wisconsin and the independence class is built by Austal USA in

Alabama.

Brad Howard: But the LCS hasn't panned out exactly as planned,

which could be the reason the Navy has started to decommission

four vessels.

Unknown: My sense on the LCS is that it probably makes sense.

Both because the ships are expensive to maintain. So you

got high sustainment costs that you want to try to get down,

that they're not meeting the breadth of capabilities that

we're looking for. And that's not to say that there aren't

some missions that the LCS can capably perform. I'm sure there

are. But when you look at the cost of maintaining a ship, that

the sustainment costs aren't working, working out as well as

you would like. You don't have the same mission set that you

need versus beginning to invest in future systems that are going

to give you greater capability.

You have to look at those ships they were test designs there was

a lot of changes that went from those ships into the into the

block by so you know, the program office took a hard look

and I stand by the decision the Navy made,

Brad Howard: both ships have had their share of problems and

criticisms. Some observers are concerned that the independence

class is not up for surface to surface warfare due to its

aluminum hull and light armament. The freedom class has

also had engine problems since its inception,

Unknown: late last year, when it was discovered that the freedom

class the one designed by Lockheed Martin has an issue

with it the combining gear which is basically a part of its its

propulsion, and this has created a conflict between the Navy and

Lockheed Martin everyone In agreement that this is an issue,

and it's potentially an issue for all of Lockheed Martin's

ships.

Brad Howard: In a statement to CNBC Lockheed Martin noted our

solution will soon be rigorously tested at sea to validate the

improved design modification. Following successful sea trials

and navy approval, we will deliver the first modified ship

and implement the design modifications for other freedom

Class ships.

Unknown: In a nutshell, we are right on track to get to put

that problem behind us and move on with the future of the

freedom class.

Brad Howard: So I'm here on the bridge of the USS Milwaukee.

what's notable about it is the combination of training and new

technology allows for the crew on this bridge to be much

smaller than previous frigate designs. The autopilot and

advanced helm controls which are used to steer the ship and

control the speed are a huge part of what makes the ship so

advanced we come

Unknown: to these ships prepared to you know, face anything that

is thrown at us with a three people that we have on the

bridge vice other ships that could have anywhere 12 1415

people,

Brad Howard: the LCS was designed to operate with a small

crew size an Arleigh Burke-class destroyer which displaces about

three times as many tons as an LCS fully loaded needs a crew of

around 300 sailors by comparison in LCS has a crew of around 90

depending on mission needs and additionally each LCS has two

crews that rotate to enable a higher operational tempo.

Unknown: My entire engineering department on LCS is about 12

people that is designed that is about the size of one

engineering division on conventional ships,

Brad Howard: new technologies and sailors working multiple

jobs helped keep the crew numbers so low compared to

larger ships.

Unknown: We by far have the premier surface navy ship

training in the LCS program, and it goes back to the blue and

gold crew. It goes back to the employment concept.

Brad Howard: One downside is that there are fewer sailors in

the event of an incident that requires damage control. Another

is that if a crew member is taken out of action, it could be

difficult to replace their expertise on the fly. What

Unknown: the Navy originally envisioned for the LCS ships was

that they would be equipped with a series of different mission

modules. And what I mean by that was that they would have sort of

a plug and play aspect to that

Brad Howard: the Navy is now pivoting towards dedicated rules

for the LCS is in service.

Unknown: We are still tied to the modular systems. The change

that we made in 2016 was instead of the Envision where we might

swap those modules out over a two or three day period, we

found it was more effective to kind of tie that module to that

ship.

Brad Howard: The LCS is equipped with a rigid hull inflatable

boat or rhib. These boats are also useful for search and

rescue, counter piracy and also for certain sorts of maritime

inspection. The crew of than the Milwaukee took me on an exercise

where the rip would be launched from the LCS in order to send

sailors to board another vessel but a critical hose malfunction

which prevented the doors from opening. The crew quickly and

safely fixed the hose communicating loudly through

each step of the process. After the rhib was launched, the

sailors performed a boarding exercise supported by a

helicopter from the LCS one of the main advantages a ship like

the LCS brings to the fleet is capabilities such as this sort

of interdiction. The small boat and aerial support the LCS can

bring to bear is also useful in humanitarian situations such as

when Haiti experienced an earthquake in August of this

year.

Unknown: USS Billings is one of the first ones on scene so you

have LCS on scene with their helicopter providing

humanitarian relief

culturally, I think the service has never really liked the ship

because it's it's not a Bluewater ship, like lobbing

missiles 1000s of miles away and, and getting into these

really big epic fights in the middle of the ocean. And you

know, the US Navy's never really been enamored since the end of

the World War Two. With small ships, it's never been something