Photo: MATTHEW WEINBERGER/DVIDS
Growing the size of the Navy has been a bipartisan goal of successive administrations and Congress over the last decade. The service faces capacity limitations as it struggles to meet the demands of its current aggressive operational tempo with a fleet that is small by historical standards and faces delays in conducting maintenance. The demand to increase the Navy’s ship count has only grown as China’s navy has overtaken the U.S. fleet in terms of size with the blistering rate of production of its own shipbuilding industry.
Despite the Navy’s plans for growing the fleet and bipartisan efforts and funding from Congress, the U.S. shipbuilding enterprise—including the Navy, Department of Defense (DoD), Congress, and industry—has failed to consistently produce ships at the scale, speed, and cost demanded. These longstanding challenges stem from a series of interwoven, systemic issues within both the U.S. government and industry, as well as broader socioeconomic trends. This report outlines the challenges facing the U.S. naval shipbuilding enterprise, their underlying drivers, and some efforts the government has taken to mitigate them.
This report is made possible by generous support from the Smith Richardson Foundation.
Brief by Henry H. Carroll and Cynthia R. Cook — May 15, 2025
Commentary by Alexander Palmer, Henry H. Carroll, and Nicholas Velazquez — June 5, 2024
