In Defense of the Indefensible San Antonio Class

I have been critical of the LPD-17 program, fairly I think, and I'm not alone. The program has any number of problems ranging from cost overruns to design considerations, and any criticism thrown at the LPD-17 program is almost certainly justified. About a month ago, the USS San Antonio (LPD 17), the most expensive amphibious ship ever built, was finally given the green light.

The rest of the class isn't without problems, the USS New Orleans (LPD 18) is going to cost around 350 million over budget, another black eye on the program, despite these costs being a direct result of the original first in class CAD screwup. How does someone balance 1.1 billion dollars in contractor screw ups and 1.5 billion in Hurricane costs, in what is now a 15.5 billion dollar program for 9 ships when the original plan called for 12 ships. I'm not counting the 10th LPD-17, which will likely be included in this years budget.

Well, in defense of the indefensible, what exactly makes the LPD-17 class so expensive, and is it worth it? You decide.

The San Antonio class is a 25,000-ton expeditionary warship (making it approximately twice the size of the next largest LPD in the world) designed to operate 25 miles off a defended shore, and in a nuclear environment. The ship has a radar cross section equal to or smaller than a DDG-51/79 with whipping hardening for its hull girders; shock hardening; blast hardened bulkheads; fragmentation protection; and nuclear blast protection.

The San Antonio class also has a four-zone collective protective system, and an ability to receive contaminated casualties through a specially-designed triage center off the flight deck. It has extensive fire insulation along with mist firefighting and smoke ejection systems. It is equipped with the same SPQ-9B X-band radar and cooperative engagement capability being installed on AEGIS/VLS combatants, a first class electronic countermeasures system, towed torpedo decoys, and a variety of other offboard decoys.

The San Antonio class will be armed with two 21-round RAM launchers, two 30mm guns counter-boat guns, and has the space and weight for 16 VLS cells, which could carry either 64 ESSMs or 32 ESSMs and eight land attack missiles (which would represent more firepower than most of the worlds frigates),

Accounting for these characteristics, the San Antonio class will be the most survivable amphibious warship ever built, and if we remove the costs of the first in class ship (not LPD-18), these substantial upgrades come at a cost of around 10 million dollars per thousand tons of light displacement more than the Whidbey Island class LSDs in FY2008 dollars.

The amphibious warfare capabilities of the San Antonio class include carrying 700 troops, with a surge capacity of 800, and will have two medical operating rooms, a 24-bed ward, and overflow capacity for 100 casualties. The San Antonio class has a flight deck that will accommodate two MV-22s or CH-53s, or four CH-46 equivalents; a hanger that can store an additional MV-22 or CH-53, two CH-46 equivalents, or three AH/UH-1s. The San Antonio class includes a new low-maintenance well deck that can store either two LCACs or one large displacement landing craft. For storage the ship supports 24,000 square feet of vehicle stowage on three vehicle decks, one of which can carry 14 EFVs (enough to carry a full rifle company); and 34,000 cubic feet of cargo and ammunition stowage in two major holds. Moreover, the San Antonio class was specially designed with the amphibious patrolling mission in mind, with berthing spaces designed to maintain platoon unit cohesion, sit up bunks for its embarked troops, and increased air conditioning capacity.

Why am I going through this exercise? Earlier this year I had the opportunity to 'tag along' in a tour of the PCU USS Mesa Verde (LPD 19) with one of my colleagues, a retired 16 year veteran of the Marine Corp. As we were given the tour, I was constantly being educated by my colleague why specific aspects of the LPD-17 class were clearly designed by Marines for Marines, and how well thought out the ship obviously was in design. This type of admiration is obviously contradictory to most of the commentary out there regarding the class, but it explains why I am not surprised at all to read the details included in Christopher Cavas's latest report.

Shipbuilder Northrop Grumman declared a “clean sweep” after the Navy’s third LPD-17-class amphibious ship completed a series of builder’s trials in the Gulf of Mexico.

“These were very successful builder’s trials,” spokeswoman Debbie McCallum said Aug. 17. “We’re very pleased.”

The Mesa Verde is the third ship of the long-troubled San Antonio class of 25,300-ton amphibious dock ships, but is the first to be built at Northrop’s Ingalls shipyard in Pascagoula, Miss. Most of the ships are being built at the company’s Avondale shipyard near New Orleans.

Yes, it is true that the LPD-17 class at 90 million dollars per thousand tons of lightweight displacement makes the class the most expensive amphibious ship ever built. The first in class actually costs 130 million dollars per thousand tons of lightweight displacement, when historically amphibious ships have averaged 70 million dollars per thousand tons of light displacement (all figures according to CBO).

The question is should amphibious warships be built to operate 25 miles off a hostile coast, with low observability on par with combatants like AEGIS destroyers, with the capacity to carry firepower greater than most of the worlds frigates, with design considerations that matter in amphibious operations like larger hallways and advanced well decks and hanger facilities? I think the answer, in this era of the long war, is an emphatic yes, so I for one will look forward to December 15th, 2007 and hope for good news between now and then regarding the Navy sea trials of the USS Mesa Verde (LPD 19).

It might not be popular to say among SWOs, but given the option of the DDG-1000s or the LPD-17, I'll take the LPD-17. The last 5 DDG-1000s will cost 3.5 billion per in FY08 dollars according to the CBO. A new LPD-17 costs 1.7 billion in FY08 dollars according to the CBO, if they are built at a rate of 1 per year. That means for the cost of the last 5 DDG-1000s (17.5 billion) one could buy 10 new LPD-17s which wouldn't necessarily need to be amphibious ships, but NECC motherships for MSO and littoral/tributary support operations, Global Fleet Station specialized ships, or hospital ship replacements.