The U.S. Navy Littoral Combat Ship: Current Issues and How to Employ It in the Future

Abstract

The Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) faces issues from budget cuts and overworked crews to behind-schedule mission modules with unproven technology. Built to low survivability standards and minimally manned, the LCS is not intended to operate in hostile environments, yet its mission sets constitute ASW, SUW, and MIW, which would occur in a medium to high threat environment. Mission Modules are behind schedule and are using unproven technology. The SUW mission module currently has no missiles, the ASW package was scrapped for an entirely new one that is in development, and the MIW mission lacks both remote vessels and the airborne mine detection system. Currently LCS is manned with two "core" crews, "blue" and "gold", which rotate every 40 days. This is supposed to alleviate the over burdened and stressed crewmembers who must work more hours than a "typical" sailor. The Navy announced plans to base four LCS ships in Singapore by 2016 and rework the ship manning so there are three crews assigned to two-ships on a rotational basis flying to and from the U.S. Forward basing of LCS could be the answer.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Mar 07, 2012
Accession Number
ADA601555

Entities

People

  • Gregory M. Zimmerman

Organizations

  • Marine Corps University

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Air Platforms
  • Ground and Sea Platforms
  • Space
  • Weapons Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Aircrafts
  • Boats
  • Detection
  • Guided Missile Ships
  • Marine Transportation
  • National Security
  • Naval Operations
  • Naval Warfare
  • Navy
  • Test And Evaluation
  • Warning Systems

Readers

  • Economics
  • Maritime and Naval Warfare Studies
  • Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering.