SAN DIEGO – Three Navy and Marine Corps officials recently hinted the fiscal year 2025 budget request will include more HII-built [HII]
San Antonio-class amphibious ships after they were taken out of the Navy’s future plans amid a review that sought to lower costs.
“As we gather here this morning, we have nearly 100 ships under contract. 100 ships under contract and over 50 in construction including Ford, Constellation, San Antonio-class LPDs which will hopefully be back in the budget…” Secretary of the Navy Carlos Del Toro said here Feb. 15 during the WEST 2024 conference co-hosted by the U.S. Naval Institute and AFCEA.
Del Toro also said the LPD program “has actually been one of our most successful programs that actually has remained on budget and on time.”
He seems to have changed his tune from cost concerns last year.
Last March during another conference, Del Toro said the Flight II LPDs were trending to cost nearly as much as a Flight III Arleigh Burke-class destroyer. He hoped an Office of the Secretary of Defense-directed procurement pause tied to an amphibious ship study would be finished by June or September with a final answer that may include ways to lower the cost. (Defense Daily, March 15).
Regardless, this moth Del Toro said since the Navy is committed to providing the Marine Corps the lift capabilities they need in various sizes and capabilities, “that’s why I have been as focused as I have been on LPD Flight II and getting it back into the budget and supporting it, as well as LSM as well too…”
He said when military acquisitions rush things, they often make big mistakes, so while he wants to move fast “you also have to be responsible to ensure that the capabilities that you’re building actually deter the threats that you’re trying to defeat. And, so it’s hard, it’s complicated, when it comes to shipbuilding. We’re trying to get to a better place. I’m very hopeful about LPD.”
Earlier during the conference, Marine Lt. Gen. Roger Turner, Commanding General of III Marine Expeditionary Force and Marine Forces Japan, confirmed his impression that the Flight II San Antonio-class ship would be in the FY ‘25 budget request.
During a panel discussion he said surface ship capability is key to maneuver and sustainment of forces, “so I think for us is that recognizing that the viability of the amphibious force both the big deck amphibs, the LPD Flight II which now appears to be moving out in earnest pending appropriations and the NDAA and the like, then the Landing Ship Medium [LSM] has been contemplated, and now it’s in the program, kind of waiting for appropriations as well.”
While smaller connectors like LCUs and LCACs are important, “we need those surface capabilities to be able to maneuver and sustain under pressure here in the first island chain as critical capabilities to the III MEF.”
Lastly, Lt.Gen. Karsten S. Heckl, commander of Marine Corps Combat Development Command and Deputy Commandant for Combat Development and Integration, also obliquely implied the LPDs are coming back to the Navy’s planning documents.
![The San Antonio-class amphibious transport dock ship future USS Fort Lauderdale (LPD-28) was launched at the Huntington Ingalls Industries’ [HII] Ingalls Shipbuilding Division in Pascagoula, Miss in March 2020 (Photo: U.S. Navy by Huntington Ingalls Industries).](https://www.defensedaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/lpd-28-launching-2020.jpg)
“We don’t have the [president’s budget request for fiscal year 2025] yet, so I’m not going to get in front of the Commander in Chief, but the Navy has – we’ve been really, really good partners. …and I couldn’t be happier with where we are. And I think when you see it come out, you’re gonna be pretty happy, too, so I think we’re in a good spot,” he said during a separate panel on Feb. 13.
The Navy received significant criticism for not including LPD-type ships in its future procurement plans in the FY ‘24 budget beyond the future USS Philadelphia (LPD-32) due to an amphibious ship study review seeking cost savings directed by the Office of the Secretary of Defense (Defense Daily, April 18).
However, last August a Navy notice said it intends to issue a solicitation to HII for long-lead time material and detail design and construction for three more San Antonio-class Flight II LPDs, LPD-33-35 (Defense Daily, Aug. 9, 2023).
During the March 2023 conference, former Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Michael Gilday said the LPD Flight II grew from $1.47 billion cost for the first ship, the future USS Harrisburg (LPD-30), to $1.5 billion for the future USS Pittsburgh (LPD-31), with apparently future price increases beyond that.
He said LPD-32 would probably be $1.9 to $2 billion, so LPD-32 was trending to be at least a 25 percent increase without a multi-ship bundle buy. Gilday also said the production line was running behind.
At the same event, former Marine Gen. David Berger disagreed with those numbers, arguing the difference of base dollars or current year dollars means the LPD Flight II ships are cheaper than the earlier Flight I ships.