LCS Decision Delayed

It looks like we will have to wait a little longer before the Navy picks the winner of the Littoral Combat Ship competition. Chris Cavas at Defense News has the story. I think everyone was expecting the announcement sometime over the next month...

But the Navy, in a statement released Monday afternoon, announced it will request Final Proposal Revisions (FPRs) "soon" from competing firms Lockheed Martin and Austal USA.

"The Navy anticipates that FPRs will be received in September 2010, and will require that these revised offers remain valid for 90 days," the service said in its statement.

Cmdr. Victor Chen, a spokesman for the service's acquisition department, could not give a specific date for the FPRs to be turned in. If the responses are received by Sept. 30, the service would then presumably have until Dec. 30 to announce its decision.

This is a positive, not negative, development. There are so many talking points about this program that annoy intelligent people that at some point, the Navy needs to be more realistic when engaged in the Littoral Combat Ship discussion. We saw a little of that by VADM Harvey when he testified in front of the House in response to the Balisle report.

Slow down - take your time - make the right decision. I roll my eyes every time I hear a flag officer suggest we are going to build 55 Littoral Combat Ships (no chance, just because this CNO is unable to be realistic, don't expect the next one to be unrealistic too), but I am in full support of the current plan for two contracts to build 10 and 5 in two yards. I don't know if it will actually save money as has been suggested, but because I believe we will build about 20-25 of these platforms as a first run I see long term potential value giving more than one prime contractor and more than one shipyard experience building smaller surface combatants.

Whenever the Navy can slow down in this program without increasing costs of the program - I support the decision. The ship might be touted for its speed, but it is the speed of the program that has long raised greater concern with me. Better to get it done right than get it done fast.