The Littoral Combat Ship, or LCS for short, was supposed to be the Ferrari of naval ships.
They were designed to be fast, nimble, versatile, and crewed by a small team.
Unfortunately, that is not what the LCS program ended up being.
Instead these ships were a huge disappointment, fraught with mishaps and malfunctions.
If you imagine everything that the Littoral Combat Ships were supposed to do, and then
imagine how all those things could go wrong, that’s what ended up happening.
Basically, after 20 years, the only thing that is impressive about the LCS program is
how much of taxpayers’ money it wasted.
At first the LCS program looked promising.
The Navy began shaping the plan of action in the 1990’s.
It started with the idea of creating a versatile ship, which could get into hard to reach areas.
The other selling point for the government was that it would be inexpensive and only
need a small crew.
As we’ll see, neither one of these promises were kept.
Another aspect of the Littoral Combat Ship that appealed to Navy officials was the plug
and play modules that could easily be swapped between missions.
Each ship would be like a box of LEGOS.
The frame of the ship would be consistent, but based on what a specific mission called
for, different modules could be plugged into the ship’s hull.
The ship would become modified for the mission at hand.
The modules could be: equipment containers, anti-submarine sensors, countermeasure equipment,
or mine detectors.
In theory this would be great.
But you won’t believe the crazy problems that the Navy ran into while getting ready
to deploy these ships.
Before the problems started, the Littoral Combat Ship was hyped up to be a fighter.
It was claimed to be capable of going up against larger ships with ease.
It would also be able to infiltrate harbors and difficult to reach waterways because of
its size.
But none of this ever happened, and the new vision for the Littoral Combat Ship in the
2000’s was as a fast lightweight vessel that could carry out basic missions.
Even this expectation ended up being too difficult for the Littoral Combat Ships to meet.
The LCS program planned to have two ship types.
The first was the Freedom variant, which was designed and built by Lockheed Martin at their
Fincantieri Marinette Marine Corperation’s shipyard in Wisconsin.
The second was the Independence variant, created by General Dynamics Bath Iron Works.
This variant was constructed in the company’s Mobile, Alabama Shipyard.
Something to note is that neither one of the variants was built by the Navy itself, or
at Naval shipyards.
This was most likely done to save money.
In hindsight it may have been worth it for the Navy to build the ships themselves, to
reduce the amount of problems they ran into in the future.
Both variants had to adhere to specific guidelines, so that the ships could be outfitted with
modules.
But the material and way of constructing the ships was left up to the companies.
This meant two different ships were built, both of which had their own unique problems
and ended up wasting much more money than was originally budgeted for.
Let’s dive into the problems the Littoral Combat Ships faced, and why it ended up being
the most expensive mistake the Navy has ever made.
The first problem with the LCS program was that the ships were unnecessarily complicated.
The fact that two independent contractors were making the same ship in different ways,
shows how things could get confusing fast, and they did.
The first iteration of the Littoral Combat Ship was so ambitious that there was no way
they could ever have been completed within the given budget.
Later on we will break down exactly how much money was wasted, but for now just know it
was a lot.
The only way to complete the ships was by making concessions.
The design had to change, the modules had to change, the amount of crew had to change,
basically everything about the Littoral Combat Ship had to change just to get it out of drydock.
The complicated process of dividing the resources and having two separate builders for the LCS
program obviously was a huge waste of money.
Of the ships that were built and put through testing missions, all ended up having to make
adjustments or repairs at one point or another.
The initial tests were so bad, that the Navy reduced its order by 20 ships.
This brought the number of ships down to 35, which actually ended up being 35 too many.
Some of the problems the Littoral Combat Ships ran into were so basic you won’t believe
it.
The word combat is in the name of the ship, so you’d think that they would be able to
carry out basic battle functions.
This assumption would be wrong.
As the ships were put through combat simulations they more often than not failed, or were not
lethal enough to finish the mission.
It would seem that a combat ship should be good at least one thing, combat.
Unfortunately, for the LCS program, their ships couldn’t even do that right.
The most frequent combat deficiencies that the Littoral Combat Ships had was lack of
basic radar systems.
Due to limitations in the ship’s design, the radar system rarely seemed to work the
way it was supposed to.
This was a huge problem when a mission called for tracking down an enemy, or engaging in
combat with submarines.
Another combat inadequacy was the limited anti-ship missile defence capabilities.
The Littoral Combat Ships may have had weapons to fight with, but the defence weapons were
very limited.
Maybe the designers thought the enemy ships would just never fire at the Littoral Combat
Ship in a conflict.
We think this seems unlikely.
On all Naval ships there are redundancies put in place for vital systems.
This is because if you are in the middle of the ocean, and something goes wrong, there
is no tow-boat to bring you back to drydock for repairs.
So, the ship needs redundancies to prevent catastrophic failures.
The Littoral Combat Ships did not come equipped with such redundancies.
Among other problems this means that a single hit could result in complete loss of propulsion,
combat capability, or the ability to control and mitigate damage to vital systems.
Again, maybe this is okay if the Littoral Combat Ship never found itself in combat,
but again we think this is unlikely.
If you find yourself on a Littoral Combat Ship we recommend bringing lots of books and
other activities to keep yourself busy, because if you break down it could be a long time
before someone comes to rescue you.
One of the big selling points of the Littoral Combat Ships was their customizability using
the module system.
However, during testing, installation of modules seemed to always take longer than planned,
thus delaying the mission.
Once the Littoral Combat Ship was finally equipped with the correct modules, they sometimes
failed to work properly.
Imagine being on a mine sweeping mission in a deadly underwater minefield.
All of a sudden the mine detection module on your Littoral Combat Ship stops working.
You’d be up poop creek without a paddle.
Which is pretty much how every sailor felt while working through the problems that plagued
the Littoral Combat Ships.
The failure of modules was not an isolated incident either.
In three different modules there were crippling technical failures and unscheduled delays.
The plug and go system of the LCS modules was more of a hindrance than a help.
As the Littoral Combat Ships and modules ran into more and more trouble, the Navy began
rethinking the whole program.
By this time it was too late though, they already had several ships made and ready for
testing.
But the next problems they ran into were truly remarkable.
After the module mishap, the Navy decided to do away with the multi-mission concept
of the ship, and stuck with the basic uses and capabilities of the design.
One thing that the Littoral Combat Ship had going for it when it was equipped with specific
modules, was that it only needed a small crew to make the ship operational.
Specific jobs and missions meant only specific people were needed to man the ship.
Less sailors meant less casualties in combat situations, and lower cost when carrying out
missions.
Now that the Navy had decided the ship was going to carry out several functions all at
once, it needed a bigger crew.
This obviously led to higher costs to man the vessel and more sailors being put in harm's
way.
But even with the larger complement of crew, the sailors couldn’t keep the Littoral Combat
Ship from falling apart, sometimes literally, as you’re about to see.
The Littoral Combat Ship was designed to move quickly and to infiltrate difficult to access
places.
However, this can only be accomplished if the ship has working engines and fuel.
Two things that the LCS program seemed to fail to take into consideration.
The Navy prioritized ship speed over most other basic functions.
It was supposed to be able to reach 47 knots, or around 54 miles per hour.
This speed came at a great cost, the Littoral Combat Ships burnt through fuel at an alarming
rate.
This meant that the ship would not be able to compete with similar crafts in the Chinese
and Russian navies.
The Littoral Combat Ship may have been able to initially outrun or pursue another ship,
but once it ran out of fuel, it would be useless.
Another problem with the propulsion system of the Littoral Combat Ships was constant
breakdowns of the engines.
One such breakdown occurred on one of the Freedom variations of the ship.
Due to the lack of redundancies for vital systems mentioned earlier, a seawater leak
flooded part of the engine on the ship.
The saltwater got into the engine’s oil supply and caused a catastrophic failure.
The ship had to be returned to dock where most of the engine needed to be rebuilt.
The engines are what make the Littoral Combat Ship so fast, but if they are constantly breaking
down, it doesn't really matter how fast the ship is supposed to be.
All of the failures of the LCS program has led to the Navy scrapping their plans for
the Littoral Combat Ships after two decades.
Initially each ship was supposed to cost around 220 million dollars.
But due to setbacks and poor designing, it is estimated that each of the 32 completed
Littoral Combat Ships cost around 655 million dollars per ship.
That is over 400 million dollars more per ship than was budgeted.
In case you don’t want to do the math, the Navy spent around 21 billion dollars on the
LCS program, making it the most expensive mistake they have ever made.
At this point you may be asking yourself what does the Navy plan to do to rectify their
mistake?
Can the Littoral Combat Ship be fixed?
The Navy has decided to take the money that was not flushed into the LCS program as of
2019, and use it to purchase 20 new missile frigates that have proven to be more reliable
instead.
As for the already constructed Littoral Combat Ships, the Navy plans to retire them even
though some are only six years old.
It seems as if the only way to mitigate the most expensive mistake the Navy has ever made,
is to get rid of that mistake and forget it ever happened, which is what the plan is for
the Littoral Combat Ships at this point in time.
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