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i 

20–079 2017

[H.A.S.C. No. 114–119] 

BUILDING THE FLEET WE NEED: A LOOK 

AT NAVY FORCE STRUCTURE 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON SEAPOWER AND 

PROJECTION FORCES 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

HEARING HELD 

APRIL 13, 2016 
(II) 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON SEAPOWER AND PROJECTION FORCES 

J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia, Chairman 

K. MICHAEL CONAWAY, Texas 

BRADLEY BYRNE, Alabama 

ROBERT J. WITTMAN, Virginia 

DUNCAN HUNTER, California, Vice Chair 

VICKY HARTZLER, Missouri 

PAUL COOK, California 

JIM BRIDENSTINE, Oklahoma 

JACKIE WALORSKI, Indiana 

RYAN K. ZINKE, Montana 

STEPHEN KNIGHT, California 

STEVE RUSSELL, Oklahoma 

JOE COURTNEY, Connecticut 

JAMES R. LANGEVIN, Rhode Island 

RICK LARSEN, Washington 

MADELEINE Z. BORDALLO, Guam 

HENRY C. ‘‘HANK’’ JOHNSON, JR., Georgia 

SCOTT H. PETERS, California 

TULSI GABBARD, Hawaii 

GWEN GRAHAM, Florida 

SETH MOULTON, Massachusetts 

DAVID SIENICKI, Professional Staff Member 

PHIL MACNAUGHTON, Professional Staff Member 

KATHERINE REMBER, Clerk 
(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

Page 

STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS 

Courtney, Hon. Joe, a Representative from Connecticut, Ranking Member, 

Subcommittee on Seapower and Projection Forces ........................................... 2 

Forbes, Hon. J. Randy, a Representative from Virginia, Chairman, Subcommittee on Seapower and Projection Forces ........................................................ 1 

WITNESSES 

Lehman, Hon. John F., Former Secretary of the Navy ........................................ 3 

Natter, ADM Robert J., USN (Ret.), Former Commander, U.S. Fleet Forces 

Command .............................................................................................................. 5 

APPENDIX 

PREPARED STATEMENTS: 

Forbes, Hon. J. Randy ...................................................................................... 29 

Lehman, Hon. John F. ..................................................................................... 31 

Natter, ADM Robert J. ..................................................................................... 37 

DOCUMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD: 

[There were no Documents submitted.] 

WITNESS RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS ASKED DURING THE HEARING: 

[There were no Questions submitted during the hearing.] 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING: 

[There were no Questions submitted post hearing.] 

(1) 

BUILDING THE FLEET WE NEED: A LOOK AT NAVY 

FORCE STRUCTURE 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON SEAPOWER AND PROJECTION FORCES, Washington, DC, Wednesday, April 13, 2016. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 3:30 p.m., in room 

2118, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. J. Randy Forbes (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. J. RANDY FORBES, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM VIRGINIA, CHAIRMAN, SUBCOMMITTEE 

ON SEAPOWER AND PROJECTION FORCES 

Mr. FORBES. Well, I want to welcome all of our members to our 

hearing today. I am particularly pleased to have some of our Nation’s foremost naval experts providing testimony before our subcommittee. 

We have the Honorable John F. Lehman, former Secretary of the 

Navy, and Admiral Robert J. Natter, U.S. Navy, retired, former 

Commander, Fleet Forces Command. Gentlemen, thank you so 

much for all that you have done for our country and we are delighted to have you with us today. 

When John Lehman stepped down as Secretary of the Navy in 

1987, we had 594 ships. When Admiral Natter retired from the 

Navy in 2003, we had 297 ships. Today, we have 272 ships. The 

size of our fleet is only one metric for Navy strength, but it is an 

important one. And while I firmly believe that the United States 

Navy remains the most powerful and capable maritime force in the 

world, I am concerned about the future and the trend lines that we 

see in those three points. 

We have heard from the Chief of Naval Operations [CNO] Admiral Richardson that we are returning to an era of great power competition in which our maritime superiority will be contested. We 

have heard the gaps in our aircraft carrier presence will continue 

to occur in the Middle East and the Pacific. We have heard from 

the Marine Corps that shortfalls in amphibious ships are driving 

them to consider deploying aboard foreign ships. 

A few weeks ago, Admiral Harris, our commander in the Pacific, 

testified to Congress that the Navy can currently only fulfill 62 percent of his demand for submarines. We all thought that sounded 

pretty dire, but just last week I was informed by the Navy that 

across the board, the Navy will only be able to meet 42 percent of 

anticipated demand for forces in fiscal year 2017. So it turns out 

that Admiral Harris’ situation may actually be above average, an 

alarming realization indeed. 
2 

The conclusion we should all be drawing from this data is that 

we need more ships, and more aircraft, and more investment in 

other elements and enablers of naval power. The administration 

points to a ship construction program that will meet the 380-ship 

Navy in the next few years. However, if one looks under the hood 

of this car, one sees some disturbing details. The administration 

continues to count ships that they intend to shrink wrap and tie 

to the pier. Once again, they are proposing to lay up half our cruisers and truncate the procurement of small surface combatants. 

Now, in fiscal year 2017, they are asking for permission to deactivate an entire carrier air wing. These trend lines are, indeed, 

concerning and point to a clear need to provide additional investment in our Navy and in the other elements of our national defense. They are also evidence, I believe, of malaise and a lack of 

vision in thinking about American seapower. 

While I believe that our uniformed leaders are fully capable of 

providing this vision and leadership, I believe the administration, 

and the next, must place a higher priority on national security and 

the strength of our Navy. Our witnesses today have fought these 

battles before and are a clear source of inspiration as we navigate 

these troubled waters and seek to rebuild our maritime strength. 

We are indebted to them for their service, and today we once again 

call on their wisdom and foresight. I look forward to hearing their 

thoughts. 

But now I turn to my good friend and colleague, the ranking 

member of the subcommittee, Congressman Joe Courtney of Connecticut, for any comments he might have. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Forbes can be found in the Appendix on page 29.] 

STATEMENT OF HON. JOE COURTNEY, A REPRESENTATIVE 

FROM CONNECTICUT, RANKING MEMBER, SUBCOMMITTEE 

ON SEAPOWER AND PROJECTION FORCES 

Mr. COURTNEY. Great, thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding today’s hearing to hear the views of our two distinguished witnesses 

on the Navy’s force structure. As the Chief of Naval Operations Admiral John Richardson shared with our committee last month, the 

Navy is undergoing a review of its Force Structure Assessment. 

Given the changing dynamics around the world, the growing demand for our ships, and the increasing strain on our naval fleet, 

I welcome this reassessment of our force structure requirements, 

which is the subject of today’s hearing. 

Our current fleet requirements stand at 308 ships which, thanks 

to the 84 ships under contract over the last several years, we expect to reach within the next 5 years. That is good news, but it is 

just a start because even under the Navy’s plan, we will not sustain the levels needed to fully support the various components of 

that fleet. 

While the 30-year shipbuilding plan for 2017 has still not been 

submitted to Congress, we expect it to reflect what we saw in the 

2016 plan, that even when we meet the 308-ship goal, key shortfalls will remain. 

For example, we will face shortages in small and large surface 

combatants as well as attack submarines over the next three dec-
3 

ades. Additional shortfalls remain in the fighter aircraft and other 

capabilities that will be key to combating the challenges of the future. 

Notably, one area that the CNO singled out for particular review 

in the Force Structure Assessment was our attack submarine force. 

The current requirement of 48 was set nearly a decade ago before 

undersea resurgence that we see now by China and Russia. 

Retired Admiral Jim Stavridis told our panel that Russian submarine activity is probably 70 to 80 percent of what we saw during 

Cold War times. Admiral Harris told us of his concerns that the 

U.S. submarine force will dip to 41 at a time when China is increasing their fleet size and advancing their undersea capabilities. 

European Commander General Breedlove told us that the submarine shortfall leaves us playing zone defense in the North Atlantic. And above all, our combatant commanders have been clear to 

us that the current fleet of 54 attack submarines, let alone the future force of 41 or even 48, cannot adequately meet the demand of 

our undersea capabilities. 

That is the kind of area that begs for reassessment and I look 

forward to the outcome of their review, not just for submarines, but 

across all aspects of our naval fleet. However, if we are ever going 

to reach the required fleet size, Congress and the Nation must 

grapple with the dual challenges of the Budget Control Act [BCA] 

and the critical need to recapitalize our sea-based strategic deterrent submarine fleet without depleting resources for other vital 

shipbuilding programs. 

If not addressed, both of these issues will significantly impact 

our ability to build and sustain the fleet we need. I hope our witnesses will share their views on both subjects with us today. The 

shortfalls we will face are largely the result of decisions made in 

previous decades which we cannot undo in a single year. What we 

can do, though, is continue to work in a bipartisan way to address 

our current and future shipbuilding needs going forward. 

I am proud that this panel has a record of doing so and I look 

forward to sustaining that record. The witnesses’ input today is 

vital as we prepare to mark up the 2017 defense authorization bill 

and continue to build the fleet we need for the future. I yield back, 

Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. FORBES. Thank you, Mr. Courtney. And without objection, 

Secretary Lehman and Admiral Natter’s written testimony will be 

made a part of the record. No objection, so it will be so entered. 

And with that, Mr. Secretary, we are delighted to have you here 

and we look forward to any opening remarks that you might have 

for us. 

Secretary, you might want to push that. 

STATEMENT OF HON. JOHN F. LEHMAN, FORMER SECRETARY 

OF THE NAVY 

Mr. LEHMAN. Sorry. It has been a long time since I have been 

before this distinguished committee and it really is distinguished. 

I spent hundreds of hours before this committee and your predecessors. Charlie Bennett, I think I spent more time with Charlie 

when I was Secretary than I did with anybody else but my wife. 

And the history that this subcommittee, and its predecessor com-
4 

mittee, has had in building and leading, helping to lead executive 

branches to form the kind of Navy that has prevented wars, and 

prevented us losing wars, stands out among all committees, in my 

judgment, in the history of the Congress. And you have been able 

to carry that tradition and are continuing to lead and show a vision 

of where a bipartisan naval strategy can be achieved. So thank you 

for that. 

I am delighted to be back. It has been a long time. But as you 

know, just so everybody knows my prejudices, the naval tradition 

in my family is old. George Lehman was in the Revolutionary 

Navy. My great grandfather was in the Union Navy. My father was 

in World War II. I was a Reserve naval aviator for 25 years, and 

ended up touching virtually every trouble spot during that period. 

My son was a naval aviator with three tours on the Teddy Roosevelt in all of the combat areas. So I come with prejudices. 

I was Secretary of the Navy for 6 years. The accomplishments of 

the Navy in those years, I think, was made possible because, particularly starting in 1977, 1978, 1979, your subcommittee and the 

Seapower Subcommittee on the Senate side, laid the groundwork, 

the intellectual groundwork at a time when the Nation was not 

fully conscious of what the dangers really were; that we were, in 

fact, losing the Cold War. And as a result of the groundwork and 

the foundation of strategic thinking that was laid by your subcommittee in those years leading up to 1981, the possibility of a bipartisan majority, starting in 1981, led on the Senate side by Scoop 

Jackson and others, and on the House side by Charlie Bennett, and 

with President Reagan adopting basically what your philosophy 

had laid down, intellectual foundations, we were able to reverse 

what was a very unpleasant result of the postwar, the post-Vietnam war letdown and disarmament that had undertaken. 

I think that history will show that it was those years that really 

won the war, the Cold War at sea. It was the demonstration that 

we could build a Navy and maintain a Navy without breaking the 

bank and we could defeat the Soviet forces at sea. And I think that 

was a major contribution to the collapse of the Soviet Union. 

Now, as I have said before, quoting my boss, my old boss, Henry 

Kissinger, ‘‘History doesn’t repeat itself but it rhymes.’’ And we are 

rhyming again now. Not only with the post-Vietnam period of disarmament, but we are rhyming more disturbingly with the 1930s 

and the reverse of what Teddy Roosevelt famously argued for, to 

speak softly but carry a big stick. 

We are currently speaking loudly about Chinese incursions in the 

South China Sea, the Russian Navy incursions, and yet we are carrying an ever-smaller stick. And while the intentions and naval 

policy has always been bipartisan, but sometimes the reality of 

what is really happening compared to what the hope and intention 

of Congress is, are not the same. 

The fact is, we have allowed inattention over 20 years to the 

structure, the practices, the bureaucracy of the Department of Defense that it has become so dysfunctional that we currently have, 

according to the GAO [Government Accountability Office], $450 billion of cost overruns in current programs. Those are going to have 

to be paid. These are contractual obligations. They are not funded. 

That is about 6 years of the procurement budgets for ACAT [Acqui-
5 

sition Category] I and II programs. And every year we are averaging about 20 percent cost overruns regardless of Nunn-McCurdy 

breaches, and so forth. That is what the real numbers are. 

So we are disarming rapidly. We are spending today roughly the 

same in constant dollars as we did at the height of the Reagan administration. And we have an Army not of 20 divisions, as Reagan 

built, but 8. We have an Air Force of not 35 tactical fighter wings, 

as President Reagan built, but 15. We don’t have 220 strategic 

bombers as Reagan had, we have 72. We don’t have a 594-ship 

Navy, as Reagan built with that same amount of money, but we 

have 272. This is unilateral disarmament. 

And I am just so really optimistic and delighted about what you 

did in this committee and working with the Senate to start really 

fundamental reform; not the kind of reform that everybody talks 

about every year, we are going to reform this and reform that. But 

what you all did in the NDAA [National Defense Authorization Act] 

that was signed earlier this year and what you are on the route 

of doing for the NDAA for this year, is truly historic and starts the 

process of dismantling this vast bureaucratic, amorphous entity 

that has strangled innovation, strangled cost control, strangled 

common sense. 

We have got to do that if we are going to get back to the kind 

of effective procurement to rebuild a Navy that is sufficient in size 

and quality to deter as we deterred—the 600-ship Navy as an objective was not to win a war. It was to deter a war and it succeeded. It ended the Cold War without really firing a shot. And unfortunately, today, we are doing the opposite. We are getting weaker. The threat is getting more sophisticated and diverse in more 

places around the world than we had in the nice bipolar Cold War 

and so we have really got to reverse before it leads to unintended 

combat which we could well lose. 

So I look forward to your questions and thank you for inviting 

me. It is a pleasure to be here. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Lehman can be found in the Appendix on page 31.] 

Mr. FORBES. Mr. Secretary, thank you. Admiral Natter. 

STATEMENT OF ADM ROBERT J. NATTER, USN (RET.), FORMER 

COMMANDER, U.S. FLEET FORCES COMMAND 

Admiral NATTER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Chairman Forbes, 

Ranking Member Courtney, ladies and gentlemen, I am honored to 

be here as an independent witness before your subcommittee, sitting next to Secretary Lehman, someone who the Navy certainly 

respects and admires for what he and the administration of President Reagan were able to accomplish. 

I can say that my family doesn’t have near the historical platitudes that Secretary Lehman talked about. Although I must admit, 

I have six brothers, six of whom were naval officers and one Air 

Force officer and we still love him. 

And I have three daughters. All three served in the Navy. Two 

still are naval officers, and two sons-in-law are in the Navy. So I 

have a vested interest like so many of us in what happens to our 

military today, and especially what happens to our young men and 

women serving if we call on them to go to combat. 
6 

I am, quite honestly, worried today about the troubling reduction 

in the size of our Navy and the shrinking of our technology advantage. There is a dangerous myth out there espoused by some that 

our shrinking numbers, happily, can be offset by our technology; 

that our ships today are so much better than our ships of the past. 

The uncomfortable little truth, though, is that although our ships 

are indeed better than they were in the past, our potential adversaries are not producing buggy whips and ships that sail either. 

And in fact, some, not most, but some of their technologies are, in 

fact, better than ours today. The truth is, numbers do count, and 

the truth is, we need more ships and aircraft in our Navy today. 

Let me expand on that a bit. With respect to the Navy’s force 

structure, the current number of that force structure is 308. But 

as a practical matter, that number is not achievable without topline relief of the Navy’s SCN [Shipbuilding and Conversion, Navy] 

account to accommodate the Ohio Replacement Program. Everyone 

knows that. There are solutions out there. There are critics of those 

solutions, for very valid, and very longstanding criticisms of those 

approaches. But the reality is that without an alternative, without 

a top-line increase or some other account to accommodate this national strategic requirement, the Navy’s shipbuilding account is not 

worth the paper it is written on. 

And given today’s realities, what are those? A fast-growing Chinese military force structure and its actions in Asia waters that essentially are grabbing 600,000 square miles of ocean resources; 

with North Korea developing nuclear weapons and the means to 

deliver them—no one disagrees with that. We are watching it happen—with Russian naval deployments returning to Cold War levels—that is not a secret, everyone is aware of that—and with ongoing terrorism deployments on the part of our Navy. 

My view is, given those realities that I just laid out, our minimum number of Navy combatant force structure ships has to be, 

today, given that threat, about 350 ships. I mean, all you have to 

do is look at the number of ships we had when I was commander 

of the 7th Fleet in Asia and the opposition that we faced in those 

days. 

The problems today are much more serious and the numbers of 

those potential adversaries have—the numbers they have are much 

more serious than when I was there, and yet, the numbers of our 

ships and aircraft are smaller. We have got to have at least a 350- 

ship Navy to be able to confront the kinds of challenges that we 

face today, and those technologies that those challenges have, and 

the appropriate number of balanced aircraft to operate with them. 

With that, I am going to hush, and then open it up to your questions. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Admiral Natter can be found in the 

Appendix on page 37.] 

Mr. FORBES. Admiral, thank you. I am going to defer my questions until the end to make sure all of our members can get theirs 

in. So with that, we recognize Mr. Courtney for any questions he 

may have. 

Mr. COURTNEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Again, thank you for 

your great testimony this morning, to both witnesses. 
7 

Secretary Lehman, again, you described the process that occurred in the late 1970s and early 1980s, in terms of, you know, 

trying to determine what a proper force structure number should 

be. 

And could you elaborate a little bit more in terms of just, you 

know, where did that begin? Did it begin with just sort of an assessment of just, you know, what are the threats over, you know, 

out there, and then sort of build the number from that; or you 

know, the industrial base, or you know, what was sort of the origination of that process? 

Mr. LEHMAN. That is an excellent question because, you know, 

the history you don’t know, you are bound to repeat. So one of the 

reasons that the 600-ship Navy, which was truly a bipartisan naval 

rebuilding program, never really changed from the first time it was 

proposed in detail with budgets and was in the supplemental in 

1980. Never changed until the end of the Bush administration and 

the fall of the Soviet Union, was because it wasn’t just pulled out 

of thin air. It wasn’t just political theater. It was derived from a 

careful analysis by multiple sources including CNA [Center for 

Naval Analyses], the Sea Plan 2000 study, the Naval War College, 

about where our true vital interests were in the world and what 

the threat was in each of those areas, mainly from the Soviet 

Union and its allies. 

And then what force structure was needed to effectively deny the 

Soviet Union any thoughts that they could prevail and close off 

chokepoints or interdict the sea lines of communication between 

NATO [North Atlantic Treaty Organization] and North America. 

Every single one of these vital areas, vital to the security of the 

United States, was carefully analyzed. And from that, the force 

structure needed to protect those vital areas was derived. 

And that is basically how we came up with 600 ships and 15 carrier battle groups and 100 nuclear attack submarines, quite apart 

from the strategic equation. There was a logic to it. There was a 

discipline and a rigor to it. And it held up because it was not esoteric. It was not based on complex algorithms of force exchanges 

and so forth. 

And that is what we need and lack today, I think—a bipartisan 

acceptance of what our national strategy really is. And with that 

national strategy, we can derive the force structure, the minimum 

that we have to have, accepting the fact that we, as we did then, 

had fully integrated B–52s, and Air Force assets into the naval 

strategy, the capabilities and force structures of our allies, and we 

do that today. 

So I think using that same discipline, that same rigor, and that 

same logic, that the minimum figure is the one that I would fully 

endorse with Admiral Natter, which is roughly 350 ships. The 

number of aircraft carriers—don’t forget aircraft carriers are the 

one absolute that any naval formation or any naval activity has to 

have. They provide the disk. It is the carrier that provides the disk 

600 miles across of total air superiority that protects every other 

ship whether it is an Army transport, or a fast deployment ship, 

or reefers, or the small boys in a battle group. 

There, my number would be 15. And I think that can be achieved 

if the reforms that this committee has pushed and proposed on fun-
8 

damentally streamlining and reducing that vast, choking bureaucracy in the Department of Defense to get back to fixed pricing and 

get back to the disciplines of no change orders once production is 

approved. 

We are not going to get there right away. But in the meantime, 

we have to show intent because in 1981 we had fewer than 500 

ships. We had 13 aircraft carriers and we had terrible morale. You 

will recall, those of you from the Tidewater area, that in 1979 there 

were four ships that could not deploy because they didn’t have the 

sailors. I mean, retention was terrible. We are heading right down 

that road again. We are succumbing to that same siren song that 

we heard in the 1930s and we heard in the 1970s, we will do more 

with less. 

But yet, we can’t do more with less. We have to do less with less. 

But the temptation to do more is there and so we found in the 

1970s we ended up with 11-month deployments, some of them as 

long as 12-month deployments, when history has proven that if you 

keep sailors at sea away from their families for more than 6 

months over time, they will do it in a surge or a war, but otherwise, you are going to destroy the infrastructure of your Navy in 

skilled people, in morale, in readiness, the up rates of aircraft on 

carriers, the ship systems, and so forth. 

So we are headed down that road. We are doing it. We are, regardless of what people say, the deployments, as you all know, are 

now, many of them, well beyond 6 months. And we are starting to 

see the same impact on retention of our skilled technicians and 

leaders in both the commissioned and noncommissioned ranks. So 

we have got to turn it around. 

Mr. COURTNEY. And so Admiral, right around the time you left 

the Navy was about the last time we did do a Force Structure Assessment, which as the chairman says, is 308 ships. Could you talk 

a little bit about, you know, what the world looked like then as you 

were, again, finishing a distinguished career and what it looks like 

today and why that assessment, reassessment is needed? 

Admiral NATTER. Well, I retired about 10 years ago. We had just 

done a very successful set of operations over in the Middle East 

going after Al Qaeda. The Russians really were no longer confrontational. It was not the Russia of the Cold War days. They were 

rebuilding, trying to internally. China was just coming out of its cocoon. When I was commander of the 7th Fleet about 5 years before 

that, I made port visits to China. I was the first Admiral to go into 

Hong Kong after reversion. The Chinese were much more cooperative than they are today. They were not grabbing islands and 

claiming territorial seas that truly don’t exist. We have got a different environment today. We have much graver threats. 

The idea that there is going to be a confrontation in the Spratlys, 

or more seriously in my view, the Senkakus with Japan, is going 

to directly affect every American. And if we were to go to combat 

with the forces we have today, we would not be as effective and I 

would question our ability to succeed against a China that was serious about going on the offensive against us in that theater. 

I just can’t state enough that we do not have sufficient forces out 

there to take them on, or for that matter, North Korea, who as we 
9 

all know, is developing a nuclear weapon and the means to deliver 

it. 

The idea that we are just going to develop a defensive capability 

against nuclear weapons that are lobbed against our bases in 

Japan, against our ground forces in South Korea, is insanity. Without a strong military, we may as well just withdraw and admit that 

we are going to be isolationists because that is the direction we are 

headed. I am very concerned about it. 

As I mentioned, I have daughters and sons-in-law who are on active duty who have been in harm’s way, and I don’t want to lose 

them without a committed nation behind them. 

Mr. FORBES. The distinguished gentleman from Alabama, Mr. 

Byrne, is recognized for 5 minutes. 

Mr. BYRNE. Thank you. Thank you, gentlemen, and both of you 

have good, strong long-time connections to the State of Alabama. 

Secretary Lehman is from my hometown in Mobile, and Admiral, 

you are a son of the State of Alabama. We appreciate both of you 

and thank you for your service. 

Two weeks ago I was in China at a conference, and one of the 

days in conference we spent talking about the military situation 

there. We had a representative from the United States side, and 

a representative from the Chinese side. And the Chinese representative was remarkably candid and very worrisome. I would like to 

read a portion, just a few sentences of what he had to say, and ask 

you to react to it. To some extent, I think, Admiral, you have already addressed it, but I would like for you to be a little more specific about what we would do in response to this. But, listen to 

what he said. You know, this is the Chinese speaking: 

‘‘As is well known, security frictions between China and the U.S. 

for a long time have occurred mainly within the first island chain. 

Chinese efforts to secure reunification across the Taiwanese Strait 

and to safeguard its territory, sovereignty, and maritime rights and 

interests in the East China Sea and the South China Sea, face incessant U.S. interference and intervention.’’ And here is the key 

sentence. ‘‘The development of a new balance of power will be 

marked by China’s enhanced capacity to safeguard its territory and 

sovereignty and maritime rights and interests and a weakened 

U.S. capability to intervene.’’ That is the Chinese perspective on us. 

So if we are going to reverse that, specifically, what do we need 

to do? 

Admiral NATTER. Well, those are very strong words. Because 

they are said, does not make them truth. There are legitimate disagreements as to who those atolls and reefs really belong to, if anyone, because they are atolls and reefs. And international law and 

maritime practice has a definition about those. 

The idea that the Chinese are claiming an additional 645,000 

square miles of ocean resources, fisheries, mineral rights on the sea 

bed, and potentially waters to restrict maritime commerce and the 

passage of naval ships out of the Straits of Malacca, up to Japan, 

up to our Southeast Asian friends, is absolute insanity. Saying it 

does not make it true, any more than Putin claiming that Ukraine 

is part of Russia makes it true. The reality is, the longer we allow 

this to happen, the more difficult it is going to become to reverse 

it or to stop it. 
10 

The fact that they are putting very capable weapon systems on 

these sand bars and we are watching it happen, in my view, is a 

mistake. Having said that, I would be the first to say if, in fact, 

we are going to contest it, if we are going to challenge it with our 

neighbors in Southeast Asia and in East Asia, we need to do it 

with more capable forces than the United States has deployed 

there today. 

Mr. BYRNE. Mr. Secretary. 

Mr. LEHMAN. Yes, I would echo that. I have made two official visits, not official as far as I was concerned, but as far as the Chinese 

were concerned, since I left the government. Both times at the invitation of very senior people in the Defense Ministry, Liu Huaqing 

who was the head of the Navy and so forth. I find that statement 

totally consistent with the stated intentions in both of those visits. 

My first visit, which was around 1992, they were more in sorrow 

than in anger. ‘‘Why are you disarming? You are abandoning. You 

are creating a vacuum here in the Western Pacific. And you are 

going to create all sorts of instability because your Navy is not here 

anymore. We used to—every time we looked out the window in a 

Hong Kong hotel, we saw a carrier, and its escorts there.’’ And this 

provided a stability that relieved us of the worry that control of the 

strategic straits which are obsessive with the Chinese, the Straits 

of Sunda, and Malacca. They are not going to let that happen. And 

they told us that. And they said, well, we are going to bring—we 

are going to build aircraft carriers because we don’t have base 

rights in those areas. But we are going to not allow the vacuum 

that you are creating to persist. 

And so I find the Chinese, other than some of their more bellicose junior military officers, junior, you know, one- and two-stars 

which seem to have a franchise of making outrageous statements, 

but I find the official statements of their military very consistent 

and not necessarily pointed hostilely at the U.S. I don’t believe that 

they intend to invade the U.S. or seize the Hawaiian Islands, but 

I do believe they are, they view us now, but you know, the Taiwan 

problem is a separate set of issues which we could spend all day 

talking about. 

But the fact is that they really are dependent on virtually all of 

their oil to be imported and imported through straits that are potentially not secure. And so they are building, they told us, they 

are building a 600-ship Navy, and if you try to interfere, you would 

do so at your peril. And that at least we can understand what their 

intentions are, which they do not have the equivalent confidence— 

they don’t know what our strategy is. And I think one reason is because we have no strategy. 

Mr. BYRNE. My time is up. I really appreciate your comments. 

Thank you. 

Mr. FORBES. The gentleman from Rhode Island, Mr. Langevin, is 

recognized for 5 minutes. 

Mr. LANGEVIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Secretary Lehman 

and Admiral Natter, thank you both for your service to our country 

and for your testimony here today. 

For both of you, I don’t disagree with anything you have said in 

terms of strength, in terms of where we were, and where we are. 

The challenge, of course, that we have and the circumstances were 
11 

different back when you were there and where we are now, is the 

significant national debt that—the annual budget deficits and a 

crushing national debt that we have to contend with, which in 

itself, is a threat to U.S. national security—both short-term rate 

and long term. 

So given those circumstances, you know, what is your guidance 

and advice to how we now balance those realities with the priorities that we have in being able to defend the country and have the 

size force that we actually need given the, you know, the budget 

realities that we are in? 

Admiral NATTER. Well, I am not here to testify as the former Office of Management and Budget. Having said that, I fully agree, 

that is a huge threat to the security of this Nation. And there has 

to be a handle on our budget deficit. I think there is bipartisan concern, appropriately, for that. And I think there is recognition in a 

bipartisan way for the problems of the deficit. 

Having said that, the security of this Nation, I think, is first and 

foremost. I think George Washington would have believed that and 

I think he lived that reality. So I think the idea of a 350-ship Navy 

and a balanced military is a priority and that, I think, that it is 

affordable. I think the Nation is going to have to get a handle on 

how it is paid for and how other costs impacts, of the national 

budget, and the deficit, have to be gotten under control. But I am 

not here to testify about that, sir. 

Mr. LEHMAN. Congressman, I think that, as I mentioned earlier, 

Teddy Roosevelt’s famous dictum to speak softly but carry a big 

stick is very important today because we have allowed our defenses, for whatever the sound reasons, and I don’t disagree with 

anything you said on the budgetary issues that we face. 

Nevertheless, we have, in the hopes that after the fall of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War, that we would have a relatively peaceful era ahead that did not require the kinds of sacrifices that we had to do in the Cold War. That has not proved to 

be the case. Our hopes have proved false. And we now have nuclear 

hostile powers even, like North Korea and others emerging. We 

have got the unique problems of Islamist terrorism, and we have 

allowed our deterrence to really erode. I mean, seriously erode. And 

by deterrence, that means are you persuading the potential enemies you have, the potential bad actors that they would suffer 

more than they could possibly gain if they took actions against 

American interests? 

Our deterrence is failing. It is failing to deter the Chinese from 

building its bases in the South China Sea. And it is failing in deterring the Russians from reestablishing a hegemony that they feel 

they have lost in their near abroad. And it is failing to deter a lot 

of other potential actors down the road. 

So what do we do about this? Well, I totally agree with the Admiral. We can afford it. We are only spending 3 percent of the GDP 

[gross domestic product] on defense today. In the Kennedy and Eisenhower years it was 8 to 9 percent. In President Reagan’s years 

it was about 3.5 to 3.75 percent, so you are not talking of a vast 

change to reestablish deterrence. But it is going to take some time. 

And the dangerous thing about doing what we are doing as we 

did in the 1930s, and that is speak loudly and make bold declara-
12 

tions about getting the Chinese out of the South China Sea, as we 

continue to erode our naval and other services’ capabilities is the 

worst of all possible dangerous situations because that leads—historically, has led to miscalculations. You know, in the 1930s, we 

spoke boldly and we imposed embargoes, a steel embargo, the scrap 

embargo, the oil embargoes on Japan, as we disarmed, as we adhered to the Washington Naval [Treaty] agreements and built no 

capital ships until this subcommittee, which was then a full committee, passed the 1936 initiative to start building capital ships. 

Up to that time, we had adhered to the Washington Naval agreements, and the Japanese did not. They withdrew from the Washington Treaties, and so they grew and we shrank. And I think that 

was a major cause of World War II in the Pacific. 

So we have got to maintain deterrence. We don’t have a choice. 

And people have to start articulating this because the American 

people will support it, if their leaders on both sides of the aisle, and 

I might just as an aside to perhaps upset some of my revered Republican colleagues. I know the chairman knows his history better 

than I do, but the fact is, there are only three Presidents in the 

history of the United States that never built a single capital ship 

for the U.S. Navy and those were all Republicans, ending up with 

Hoover. And that is a history we don’t want to repeat for sure. 

So I just, I think we, my last point would be, let’s be careful. As 

Reagan proved, you don’t have to have achieved a 600-ship Navy 

to have 90 percent of the deterrence. You have to make it clear 

that you are heading there. You are rebuilding. There is strong bipartisan support to maintain deterrence. Once you have achieved 

that, because it is a game of perceptions, but perceptions based on 

people who are smart and they read our mail. And they know what 

the reality is of our capabilities and our weaknesses. And so whereas if we had the full deterrent, we might take actions, not necessarily violent actions right away, but we might begin to put the 

pressure on the Chinese and force them out of those militarized islands. But today, we do risk a conflict by miscalculation. And that 

far away with as small of a force as we have today, it might not 

end well for us. 

Mr. LANGEVIN. All right. I appreciate both of your insights, your 

testimony here today. I know my time has expired, but I take your 

words to heart and I thank you for what you have imparted to the 

committee today. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back. 

Mr. FORBES. The chairman of the Readiness Committee, Mr. 

Wittman from Virginia. 

Mr. WITTMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Gentlemen, thank you 

so much for joining us. Thanks for your service. 

I wanted to talk about two issues I believe we see of the Navy 

force structure. One is amphibious lift. I think we are doing more 

to address that this year. I want to thank the chairman for all of 

his efforts and a continuing effort to address what I believe is a 

shortcoming in amphibious lift. 

But I do want to get your perspective on where we are with our 

submarine force. A couple of different tracks, you see China continuing to grow their fleet moving eastward through the South 

China Sea into the Pacific, more presence there. Secondly, with the 
13 

Russians, the fifth-generation submarine, the Yasen-class, the Severodvinsk very, very capable attack submarine. We see those forces 

going in that direction. We see our forces going in the opposite direction. The 30-year shipbuilding plan shows us going down to a 

41-boat force in our attack submarines. We see, too, a gap between 

Ohio-class retirements, Ohio-class replacement availability. We see 

back and forth about a national sea-based deterrence fund to make 

sure that we can fund Ohio-class replacement. 

Give me your perspective on what we need to do overall with our 

submarine force, which I believe is truly going to be the most 

tactically and strategically important element of our Navy, and not 

to discount the others, but to have that as part of that, part of the 

nuclear triad, but also the ability to keep up with pretty advanced 

submarines with the Russians and the numbers of Chinese submarines that we will see out there. 

Give me your perspective on what we need to do both in our attack class, in our Ohio class, to make sure that we counter what 

we see going on with the other, we will call them, near peers? 

Mr. LEHMAN. Well, I strongly support the idea of a strategic 

funding approach to rebuilding our strategic deterrence, because 

while this is one of the proudest of Navy roles and missions, nevertheless, it is only very indirectly related to maintaining command 

of the seas. And if the Navy is forced to fund the entire replacement of the Ohio class, there will, under almost any feasible funding scenario, not be enough money to even maintain the fleet we 

have. 

So as an approach, I think that is the right approach. But our 

submarine force, just to go back to command of the seas, to protect 

our vital interests and restore deterrence, is the idea that we are 

going to end up with 41 or even 48 nuclear attack subs is insufficient, because the biggest vulnerability we have today and in my 

judgment it is severe, is in antisubmarine warfare. We have allowed a lot of our antisubmarine systems, not just the ones on 

ships and submarines, but overall, to deteriorate significantly. And 

we have got to rebuild that. And we have, to me, it is unbelievable 

how a succession of CNOs let this happen. 

But we have no frigates in the fleet. This is unbelievable. And 

the idea—I am a strong supporter of the LCS [Littoral Combat 

Ship] and have been from the beginning. I think both of the 

versions of it are good ships for certain roles, but they will never 

be frigates. I don’t care how much—how big a plug you put in and 

how much fuel you stuff in, they will never be frigates. They were 

never designed to be frigates. 

Frigates are one of the most essential parts of protecting a naval 

force at sea, a Marine amphibious group, an Army resupply flotilla, 

or a carrier battle group, you have got the threats. The submarine 

threat is so much greater today, not only the Russian and Chinese, 

the Russian subs are the equal or better of our best submarines 

from the Cold War. But you have got over 100 very, very quiet diesel electrics or closed-propulsion circuit modern submarines that 

are really quiet. And that is a huge threat because we have really, 

because of higher priorities, we have let that dimension of our protection of surface ships really deteriorate. 
14 

So you know, this always gives, always gave all of my nuke 

friends heart attacks when I would suggest it. And I am not suggesting that we don’t build a nuclear attack submarine fleet up 

above 60, at least, but I believe we need a high-low mix. I think 

the modern, particularly German technology in closed-propulsion 

conventional submarines which cost a quarter or less than a nuclear submarine, a high-low mix is probably what we ought to have 

in the future. And I guess I am not going to be invited to the ArmyNavy game this year, but that is what I think. 

Admiral NATTER. You can take my ticket. 

Mr. FORBES. The gentleman’s time has expired. Ms. Gabbard 

from Hawaii is recognized for 5 minutes. 

Ms. GABBARD. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, gentlemen. 

A follow-up to Mr. Wittman’s question, that was kind of what I 

wanted to talk about as you spoke broadly about the nuclear threat 

coming from North Korea to places like Japan and South Korea. 

Representing Hawaii, this is something that as North Korea beats 

its drums and makes its threats, Hawaii falls within range of their 

ICBM [intercontinental ballistic missile] capabilities and now the 

miniaturized nuclear capabilities that they are talking about. 

And so this question of our submarines, the projected reduction 

and the need for us to be able to maintain that is something that 

is critical. But really, also, the entire ballistic missile defense capability that we are looking at is of paramount importance. 

I am wondering if you could talk a little bit more about that ballistic missile defense and where you see that falls into this need for 

what you talk about a bipartisan strategy, a national security 

strategy. 

Admiral NATTER. Well, with respect to ballistic missile defense, 

as you well know, we have a sea capability as well as a land-based 

capability. But getting back to our own submarine question, the 

only way you are going to really protect yourself and defeat that 

threat is to go on the offensive and knock out their sites before 

they launch, or after they start launching. Because if you remain 

on the defensive, you will never, ever be able to gain 100 percent 

reliability in knocking everything down. That is the beauty of a 

submarine. It is a very offensive weapon system. 

Our purpose in being as a Navy is to destroy the opposition. And 

if you can’t go on the offensive, remain on the offensive and attack 

until that threat is destroyed, you are never going to be batting 100 

percent against the threat coming toward you. BMD [ballistic missile defense], land-based and sea-based, is awfully important, very 

important. And it is pretty well funded. 

But the sea-based threat to that, getting back to the Secretary’s 

commentary on antisubmarine warfare, we need to improve that 

because the Chinese are developing a significant submarine-based 

threat and the Russians are, as I mentioned in my opening remarks, deploying in ways that they have not done since the Cold 

War. 

That is why the Navy is looking at basing antisubmarine warfare 

capabilities back in Keflavik, Iceland. It is not because we enjoy 

cold weather. It is because that is where the Russians operate. And 

we need to work with our allies to go after that threat both offen-
15 

sively and defensively. So ballistic missile defense, I am in. I am 

all in. 

Ms. GABBARD. Thank you. 

Mr. LEHMAN. The ballistic missile defense based on the Aegis has 

a long history, and while I will not indulge my tendency in my 

anecdotage to tell you too much about it, one of the first battles as 

a new kid working for Henry Kissinger that I was engaged in, was 

the attempt by the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency to 

block the Aegis cruiser because they alleged—and frankly, they 

were right—the Aegis missile system, the phased-array radar, did 

violate the ABM [anti-ballistic missile] agreement in SALT I [Strategic Arms Limitations Talks/Treaty]. It had the kind of power aperture that clearly was capable of ballistic missile defense. And of 

course, now it is. It is now part of our ballistic missile defense. 

That was a long, long time ago, well before you were born. And 

here we are. 

Now, the Navy got the mission, and now just as, you know, the 

Navy fought a huge battle in 1947 in this room to get a role in the 

nuclear deterrence and then after some severe battles, they won 

that role and they were in the SIOP, the single integrated operational plan. But then they suddenly found, hey, wait, being in the 

SIOP with the nukes meant that they were tied to launch points 

and no longer could the fleet move. It had to stay where it is. And 

the Aegis ballistic missile defense ships are finding the same thing. 

So while they count in the 300-ship Navy or the 272-ship Navy, 

they are of limited use in a conventional war because then you will 

be in DEFCON 3 [Defense Readiness Condition], or wherever, and 

you are going to be tied to a specific point. 

So I am not arguing for canceling the ABM capability in the 

Aegis cruiser, but it severely limits the strategic capability—I 

mean, the conventional capabilities of deterrence in the fleet. 

So I believe we need ballistic missile defense. We shouldn’t try 

to delude ourselves. You know, again, the reality is that our pursuit of Star Wars helped to end the Cold War because the Russians 

believed that we could do it because we showed them we could do 

so much else. And it was really so far out in terms of cost and capability that it was not an option any of us were really comfortable 

with putting all of the money that would be necessary to get it 

going. 

But it sure paid off because the Russians, it helped to paint a 

picture that gave Gorbachev what he needed between the 600-ship 

Navy kicking him around in the annual exercises and the idea of 

Star Wars, which his military were telling him ‘‘oh, yeah, it is 

going to work. So we have got to have our own. You have got to 

give us three times the budget.’’ That is what ended the Cold War. 

So we do need to stay up on the capability, the technology. We 

need to deploy it particularly in the land, against Iranian threats 

and Russian threats now against their near abroad, and North Koreans, who God knows what they will do. So we should have that 

capability. But let’s not go overboard and tie every Aegis ship to 

a launch point where they are no longer part of the Navy. 

Mr. FORBES. The gentlelady’s time has expired. The gentlelady 

from Missouri, Mrs. Hartzler, is recognized for 5 minutes. 
16 

Mrs. HARTZLER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you both 

for your service. My goodness, all the way back to the Revolutionary War. I mean—— 

Mr. LEHMAN. No, not me. 

Mrs. HARTZLER. You don’t look that old. But I mean, your family 

history of serving in the Navy is just admirable. And Admiral, certainly, you have so much to be proud of too. I can’t imagine your 

whole family involved in the Navy and one son still serving in another capacity. But thank you for your service. 

I wanted to talk a little bit about unmanned capabilities as it relates to the aircraft carriers. And so can you speak to the value of 

unmanned aviation to an aircraft carrier air wing? 

Mr. LEHMAN. Well, let me start. But the fact is that—— 

Mrs. HARTZLER. I don’t think your microphone is on. 

Mr. LEHMAN. Oh, I am sorry. If I left it on all the time, you 

would hear our side comments, which you don’t want to do. 

There is an absolutely important role for unmanned aircraft as 

part of the carrier air wing. But don’t think it is going to solve a 

lot of manpower or cost problems. It takes more people to operate 

in a squadron, to maintain and operate a squadron of UAVs [unmanned aerial vehicles] today with today’s technology than it does 

manned aircraft. 

I am a strong supporter of UCAS [Unmanned Combat Air System]. I think it should have a strike capability, but we shouldn’t 

try to make it all things to all possible missions. Because you 

just—that is what we tried to do with the F–35 and look what happened to that. And so what we should do is move in a measured 

way. To me, you know, as a former carrier aviator, the most important thing for me right now, if I were in that planning phase, 

would be an unmanned tanker as part of the carrier air wing because our strike aircraft today are less capable in terms of range 

and payload than they were 30 years ago. So we need to get more 

range and more payload and that means you need more tankering. 

And the reconnaissance intelligence gathering and so forth, these 

are important functions that UCAS can do. Strike versions as well. 

What we shouldn’t do is try to cram all these different missions 

into one airframe and one system, and it should be done in a measured way. 

Stealth, I am very much a skeptic on stealth. It has its role in 

certain places, but the price and the compromise is in other capabilities that you have to make to be truly stealthy are not worth 

it in my judgment, particularly on a carrier. I don’t think that even 

the F–35 will get more than one truly stealthy flight. 

Because anybody that has ever spent time, as you all have, on 

an aircraft carrier and sees what goes on down on the deck and 

pitching seas and salt spray, and particularly towards the end of 

a deployment, the grease all over the deck and airplanes starting 

to slide, and people running with chains and knocking dents into 

the—nobody who has spent time operationally on a carrier believes 

that stealth can survive on a ship. 

As it is, the Air Force’s stealth aircraft have to go into a clean 

room after every flight to get their full stealth restored. So it 

doesn’t have to be stealthy. It is nice to have perhaps for some missions, particularly ISR [intelligence, surveillance, and reconnais-
17 

sance] missions, but we have got to be careful what we are going 

to give up to get that stealth, particularly in a strike version. It has 

got a role. There are going to be more of them in the future, but 

to try to rush into it and put too many requirements on it would 

be a big mistake. 

Mrs. HARTZLER. I represent Whiteman Air Force Base that has 

B–2 bombers, stealth bombers, so a little bit familiar with that. I 

understand what you are saying. 

Admiral, do you have anything to add in 26 seconds? 

Admiral NATTER. Yes. Thank you. I certainly agree with the Secretary on this. The real value of having unmanned aircraft is to 

augment the air wing and the capabilities of our F–18s and F–35s. 

I see, in addition to an air refueler, which makes a lot of sense 

to me, the ability to put another ISR node up in the air so that you 

have not only the F–35 and the E–2 working through NIFC–CA 

[Naval Integrated Fire Control-Counter Air] to the Aegis cruisers 

and destroyers, you also have an unmanned node up there so that 

you can spread your ability to attack and defend the battle group 

and to attack either land targets or other naval targets. 

As the Secretary of Defense has testified in open hearing, the 

Navy has already conducted a significant range attack on the surface target as well as an air target, utilizing this. And so unmanned aircraft would fit very well into that approach, but I don’t 

foresee in my lifetime an unmanned air wing operating from a carrier. I just don’t see that happening. 

Mr. LEHMAN. Well, I will believe in it when I get on and fly in 

the first unmanned United airliner. 

Mr. FORBES. The gentlelady’s time has expired. 

The gentlelady from Florida, Ms. Graham, is recognized for 5 

minutes. 

Ms. GRAHAM. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you so much, gentlemen. I wish I would have been here 

at the beginning. I found this to be so informative. Really appreciate all you bring to this discussion. 

You mentioned, Mr. Secretary, the Littoral Combat Ship. I am 

interested in talking a little bit more about that. Since I have sat 

down, you have said that the frigate, you don’t want to have the 

LCS and the different roles it can play, you think the frigate would 

be a better ship for some purposes. You have also said that a ship 

can’t be all things for all possibilities. If I have quoted you wrong, 

please correct me. 

How do you see the LCS, its current role, what it is expected to 

do? Can it meet those challenges? And, Admiral, you as well. I 

think the current budget from the President has decreased the 

number of LCSes that we are going to be purchasing. Do we need 

to maintain the number or even increase them? And just how do 

you see this fitting into our Navy operations today? Thank you. 

Mr. LEHMAN. Well, first of all, I have always been a fan of the 

LCSes. They do have a role in littoral combat. The modular idea 

was one of these ideas that, you know, it is a great idea but actually implementing it is going to cost more than it was worth. 

But frankly, in their current versions, I think we have enough 

of them with what the administration has been asking for. But we 

have built up in two shipyards a tremendous capability. I mean, I 
18 

have owned some shipyards. And building a workforce that really 

knows what it is doing and knows how to take care of supply chain 

management and learning curve production, it takes years. And we 

have built that kind of capability in Marinette, and we have built 

it in Mobile. And so whatever we do next, we should do everything 

possible to keep that organic capability alive by participating in 

shipbuilding. 

Right now, building the same Littoral Combat Ship, more of 

them than has been asked for, I don’t see the need for them. Trying 

to make them, either of those two hull forms, which each, in their 

way, is a tremendous really technological achievement, but trying 

to make them into a frigate—a frigate has to be that multi-role 

ship. It has to have, first and foremost, antisubmarine warfare capability. It has got to be able to tow a passive tail, so for passive 

sonar. It has got to have an active sonar. It has got to be able to 

defend itself against cruise missiles. It has got to be able to attack 

other ships and shore. 

The Perry class, which we have now retired the last one of them, 

we called them FFG–7s, they had a little bit of capability in each 

area, a lot of capability in the antisubmarine area. But they were 

great ships. We were able to compete them where there were three 

yards building them. The price came down and down and down because we had that annual competition. 

And they could deploy—they had ranges of over 8,000 miles. So 

they could deploy with any—people criticized them because they 

only had a top speed of 28 knots, but they actually could go faster 

than that. They could keep up with the carriers 98 percent of the 

time and they were great ships. And they were very cost effective. 

You cannot take an LCS of either design and get any—you know, 

they called the F–18—the Super Hornet F–18 was just supposed to 

be—it was really to get through you guys. It was just an F–18. It 

was just a Hornet, a little bigger, it would go longer, faster, et 

cetera. 

It was totally a different airplane. It had no commonality. The 

engines were different. The wing was different. The radar was different. It was a new airplane. And that is what they are going to 

try to do with the LCS. Call it an LCS frigate, but if it is going 

to do the frigate job, it will be an entirely new ship, and yet it will 

have to make compromises to retain some commonality at all with 

the LCS and you are going to get the worst of both worlds out of 

it, I guarantee it. 

What we need to do—even if we went back to the FFG–7 with 

modern technology, we have such vulnerability. Admiral Natter 

used to deploy his battle groups with 28 ships. Today we average 

six ships, which leave these huge gaps in your layers of defense 

particularly against submarines, and particularly against diesel 

submarines, let alone attack submarines—I mean nuclear submarines. 

So I think we need to be realistic about it. And we ought to come 

up with a frigate design that can be built in these same yards or 

at least part of them, if not all of them, and that can be competed 

on a fixed-price base. Don’t let the vast bureaucracy—you know, I 

owned Hawaii Superferry. I am sorry that Ms. Gabbard is not here. 

She hopefully rode it at one point. We built that right next—150 
19 

feet from the first aluminum LCS, roughly the same size ship, both 

built to ABS, American Bureau of Shipping, quality standards. 

In the lifetime of our ship, we had two change orders that we 

found, sand eroded the intakes. There was sort of good commonsense changes that did not require any big design changes. One 

hundred fifty feet next to us, the first LCS, the aluminum LCS, 

which I think was an LCS 2, they averaged 75 change orders a 

week. Seventy-five change orders a week! 

I had one guy down there as my, what my equivalent would be 

SUPSHIPs [Supervisor of Shipbuilding] to supervise and oversee 

the shipyards. It was a great shipyard. The Navy had to build their 

own building to house all their SUPSHIPs people. And as a result, 

ours came in on budget, because we had a fixed-price budget. So 

we were on budget, on time, two change orders. 

Next door, they came in three times the price, the contract price, 

and a year and a half or 2 years late. And when you try to look 

at what the change orders did, they were all, you know, move the 

ashtray from here to there, some Beltway bandit had submitted a 

study that showed if you go from 38 knots top speed to 39 knots 

top speed that, therefore, there were instances where this could 

make a big difference and so that change order came down. Nobody 

knew who approved it, where it came from. It just got into the system from one of the 40 JROC [Joint Requirements Oversight Council] subcommittees. 

So whatever we do here—and this is really—a lot of good ideas 

are coming out of this committee. We have got to do it along with 

fixing and carrying out the reforms that you put into the defense 

bill this year, because if you just pour that money into the current 

dysfunctional system, it is wasting the money. 

Mr. FORBES. Gentlemen, you have been very patient with us. I 

have just a few more questions I would like to ask for the record. 

Admiral, you have spent a fair amount of time with the 7th Fleet 

in the Asia-Pacific area. Can you just give us a little capsule 

version of your experience there? And then if you could also tell us, 

based upon that experience, as you see our force structure there 

now, with also what you see with other forces there, how would you 

assess our capabilities there and your worries, if any? 

Admiral NATTER. Yes, sir. 

As we have discussed prior to that question, the Navy and the 

fleet, when I was commander of the 7th Fleet, had roughly the 

same number of ships that are forward deployed there now, today. 

But we did not have a Chinese Navy that was worthy of being 

called a navy. The Russian Navy was back in port trying to keep 

their ships from rusting to the bottom. I visited Vladivostok. Their 

ships were a disgrace. 

The reality, though, is times have changed. We have a Russian 

Navy that is deploying, as I mentioned before, to Cold War levels. 

We have North Korea that has developed a nuclear weapon and the 

means to deliver it, in the process of means to deliver it. And we 

certainly have the Chinese Navy that is much more aggressive, 

much more capable, technologically and with force levels, and yet 

we still have roughly the same size as the 7th Fleet that we had 

when I was there. 
20 

The idea, as Secretary Lehman has mentioned here today, that 

we are going to say we are not going to stand for them unilaterally 

claiming 645,000 square miles of ocean resources, and yet we don’t 

have the means to put up and to confront them in the early stages 

of what they are doing. Because if we wait, and we don’t get with 

our allies and say this is not something that we are going to allow 

to happen unilaterally, then it is going to become impossible further down the road. 

And if, as Secretary Lehman has mentioned, that we fall into a 

confrontation with them, and we have insufficient forces there to 

act in a responsible way as a capable Navy, then you are going to 

have American citizens who are serving our country die. And I 

would suggest that the government is responsible for that, and I 

would again applaud this committee for what you are doing to raise 

that as an important issue. 

Because I had it relatively easy as 7th Fleet commander; my successor today does not. He has a very, very tough problem to confront. 

Mr. FORBES. Would you be concerned if you were the 7th Fleet 

commander today? 

Admiral NATTER. I think it goes without saying, yes, sir. I would 

be very concerned about the capability of my forces. Individually, 

they are great. 

And let me just say, we have been talking about force levels. The 

men and women serving in your military today are the best citizens this country could ever ask for. We just need to give them the 

tools to prevail if we ask them to go do something. That is what 

I am fearful of today. 

Mr. FORBES. There is a myth that—or at least I think it is a 

myth, I would like to have both of your opinions on it—that we are 

not going to need to increase the number of ships, in fact, the size 

of our force structure today because all of our future battles are 

going to be done with special forces and with unmanned platforms. 

Mr. Secretary, how would you respond to that argument? And 

then, Admiral, if you would give us your thoughts. 

Mr. LEHMAN. Well, of course, the Navy is a very visual service, 

and that is the advantage. Through the Cold War our fleet was 

visible throughout places like Singapore, and later Vietnam, and 

Malaysia, and Hong Kong, and Korea. Everybody knew we were 

there, and everybody knew these ships had real capability. And nobody doubted the ability of America to command the seas—that is 

to protect our allies and to keep free trade traveling and keep freedom of the seas. 

Today, I meet very few people in my travels who believe that is 

the case, even though they are totally pro-American. The fact that 

through most of the last 10 years we have had no combatants in 

the Mediterranean, for instance, when we normally had 40 or 50 

combatants in the 6th Fleet during the Cold War. 

Now, I mean, I travel to places around the Mediterranean and 

they say, gee, we haven’t had a liberty call here for 20 years. We 

haven’t had a Navy ship. Don’t you have a Navy anymore? Because 

they don’t see it because we aren’t there. So who knows what the 

next war is going to be tripped by, but there will be conflicts. There 

have been conflicts. 
21 

Nobody foresaw, before 9/11—Presidents of both parties were 

saying that terrorism, yeah, it is a problem, but it is one that—you 

know, every President that I can recall, including, I must say, my 

sainted boss, President Reagan, their first response to every terrorist act was we will bring these people to justice. Well, who gives 

a damn about bringing these people to justice? You have got to prevent it from happening. And today, more and more of our enemies 

do not see us bringing anybody to justice and still let us be able 

to deter and to stop and to enforce freedom of the seas and so forth. 

Cyber is very important, and we are becoming more and more 

vulnerable to it. I don’t know how many dozens of millions of lines 

of code are in the F–35, for instance. Many of our systems, just as 

our electrical grid, we think we have protected, but the thousands 

of hackers that are all over the world, that is just red meat to 

them. Oh, you think you have got a hack-proof system, and we find 

out that it is not hack proof. 

So who knows where it is going to come from, but history has 

told us that you say we cannot predict where and how the next war 

is going to break out. So you better be prepared for other contingencies than just the favorite ones you would hope would be the 

problem. 

Mr. FORBES. Admiral. 

Admiral NATTER. I am glad you have asked this question, Mr. 

Chairman. I served with the Naval Special Warfare in Vietnam, 

worked with two SEAL [Sea, Air, and Land teams] platoons. I have 

very good friends in Ranger battalions and also Ranger Regiment 

and also in Naval Special Warfare, friends and relatives today. 

They are the very first ones who will tell you that they cannot be 

effective without the support and interaction of conventional forces. 

Let me give you an example: The SS Alabama, those SEALs who 

shot and killed the pirates who took the captain of the Alabama, 

how did they get on station? Air Force aircraft. From what platforms were they enabled to take those pirates down? A United 

States Navy ship supported by other ships and aircraft. Those 

SEALs did not just come out of the water and emerge and start 

shooting. 

Without conventional forces, without air support for our Rangers, 

and SEALs, and other special operators in Iraq and around the 

world, there is no way they can be as effective as they are today. 

There is a good place. They are very valuable to this Nation. I respect the heck out of them. But I agree with them; they would not 

be nearly as effective without strong conventional forces around the 

world. 

Mr. LEHMAN. Yeah. Even the delivery of the Special Forces, for 

instance, in Desert Storm came from the Kitty Hawk. I mean, the 

carriers are not just air wing carriers. I mean, when there was all 

the uproar during the Clinton administration in Haiti, it was a carrier that took the two airborne divisions down to Haiti and delivered them with their helicopters. 

The Navy is able to project power and to provide support anywhere in the world. Anywhere in the world. We have lost bases, 95 

percent of the bases we had during the Cold War in Europe and 

in Asia. We don’t have land bases. When there is a crisis that can 
22 

be solved and put down before it escalates into a conflagration, it 

is the Navy that can go there. 

Yes, Air Force is an essential part of that as well, but 95 percent 

of the tonnage for any military contingency has to travel by sea. 

And if that is the case, whether it is a prepositioned ship in Diego 

Garcia, or a fast deployment ship or whatever, it has got to be protected by total air superiority and submarine superiority underneath. 

So the idea is so typical of Washington armchair think tanks 

that see this great new wave. That is why a mess was created in 

our Ford-class carrier, because the think tanks were saying, oh, the 

Navy is so stodgy. They never know what is happening in technology. We have to have a revolution in military warfare. We are 

going to put 12 new technologies into the aircraft carrier, so there 

you have a hull. It is a Nimitz hull. And it has got seven technologies today that we still don’t know how to make work. 

Mr. FORBES. Last two questions because I know Mr. Courtney 

needs to go as well. 

Our carriers. There have been some arguments that we don’t 

need carriers today. We need to maybe reduce the number we have. 

And there is even a proposal to take one of our carrier air wings 

out in the budget this year. 

Can you just tell us how important you think it is that we maintain at least 11 carriers and 10 air wings, or do you think we can 

reduce them down? Admiral. 

Admiral NATTER. I would love to take that one on, sir. The assumption that we can do away with an air wing assumes that we 

are going to just be operating in peacetime. What happens when 

those aircraft go down through hostile fire? We will suffer casualties in warfare. There will be an opposition who wants to kill us 

as badly as we want to kill them, and they will be successful to a 

point. So the idea that we are operating on zero margin is crazy. 

With respect to the number of carriers, we have been operating 

10 for really—and will be for about 10 years until Ford comes online and is able to deploy. These ships, as the Secretary has said, 

are deploying for 9 months now. It is crazy. And we have adjusted 

the rotation, the Fleet Response Plan to accommodate really longer 

deployments. What does that do? It builds up deferred maintenance 

on the part of these ships and aircraft. 

The F–18s, they can’t get them through depot quickly enough because when they have opened them up they have found problems 

that were more critical than they expected, primarily because of 

the high flight hours on the F–18s. So we need to be able to have 

sufficient force structure for what the national command authority 

is asking our ships, our squadrons, and our people to do. 

Mr. FORBES. Good. Last question for you is this: I think both of 

you basically concurred we need about 350 ships. Is that fair? We 

have both witnesses are nodding. 

Mr. LEHMAN. Yes. 

Mr. FORBES. There was a question that we were asked about 

what the makeup of those ships would be. We can’t get there overnight. But as we start allocating our dollars, where would you suggest we start, as we go from where we are today to perhaps one 
23 

day getting back to 350. What is the most important investments 

we need to make over the next 5-plus years? 

Mr. LEHMAN. Well, I would say the biggest lack is antisubmarine 

capability, and the frigate is perhaps the most glaring deficiency. 

The less sexy things—you know, everybody likes to debate how 

many of this and how many of that, airplanes and ships, but the 

things like the towed arrays, and the former SOSUS [Sound Surveillance System] arrays, and the less sexy things that are fundamentally important to having an environment where you do command the seas. Those are the ones that get left out when you get 

into shooting wars, in the Middle East and elsewhere, and you 

have insufficient budgets, but you are told you have got to keep 

this many ships and hit these many deployments. 

All of that unsexy stuff disappears from the budgets. The committees don’t concentrate on them, because there is only so many 

things that a committee like yours can really take on. And we are 

leaving ourselves today in a very dangerous position vis-a-vis the 

submarines, not just the Chinese, Russian nuclear submarines, but 

the huge proliferation of good, quiet, diesel electric subs. 

And the cruise missile threat and so much is said by people that 

say, oh, get rid of the aircraft carriers, they are just targets. We 

have dealt with the problem of ballistic missile attacks on the submarines for as long as I have been involved with the Navy. The 

Russians had them. The technology has moved on. But our defensive technology has moved on. 

So, yes, we are going to get hit. Any of the surface ships are 

going to get hit by missiles, by conventional missiles. But that 

doesn’t mean that it is going to take them out of action or prevent 

the defeat of our potential enemies. So if there is one issue I would 

urge you to really focus on, it is our vulnerability to enemy submarines of both conventional and nuclear. 

Mr. FORBES. Admiral. 

Admiral NATTER. To me, the question really begs a commonsense 

response, an answer. And that is, what is the best way to achieve 

roughly a 350-ship Navy, because I think in gross numbers that is 

what the requirement is, and do it in a way where we are not wasting money. Industry has got to be involved in this. We don’t want 

to say, all right, start building five submarines a year, for example. 

That is not going to happen without wasting a lot of money. 

What I would suggest is that we establish as an overall goal 350. 

You say we are going to up it to three submarines a year, three 

DDGs [guided missile destroyers] a year. We are going to shorten 

the timeline between the start of a new carrier from 5 years to 4 

years. That will eventually drive it up to 12 carriers. And ASW 

[antisubmarine warfare] ships and aircraft, the P–8 is a good start. 

We need surface ships that can conduct competent ASW. 

And we also need to build amphibious lift. The Marines have a 

steady drumbeat, as you all Members of Congress know. They need 

the lift for their people. The way to do that is in a gradual industry-sensitive way that gets us to where we want to go, gets us on 

the right track, and doesn’t burn money in the process. 

Mr. LEHMAN. Yeah, I would just like to add one fillip to the admiral. I agree with him completely. But in the 1980s, we froze designs, which enabled contractors to bid fixed price. You can’t bid 
24 

fixed price if there is 75 change orders a week. It is impossible. You 

have got to go to cost-plus. That is why everything today in procurement is cost-plus even when they say it is fixed price. It is really every time a change order comes in that allows them to escape 

the strictures of the fixed-price contract. 

So unless the Navy does its part in preventing change orders, 

then you can’t expect contractors to be held to fixed-price competitive contracts. The three and three worked brilliantly during the 

1980s. We had three subs. The low-priced bidder for two got the 

two, and the high-price got the one. And the same with—that is 

how we built all the Arleigh Burke destroyers, how we built all the 

Tico [Ticonderoga]-class Aegis cruisers, all the submarines. We 

competed everything every year. And that discipline got better 

ideas, it got innovations. Because when you are looking at the guy 

running next to you trying to take your extra ship, then things 

happen. That is how we were able to return $8 billion to the Treasury, in effect. So we have got to get back to that. 

But you can’t ask the contractors to take those kinds of risks 

until you get control of the constant change and the bureaucratic 

method of running a business, which average, as you know, in the 

ACAT I and II, we average 22.5 years to go from the requirement 

to the first fielding. That is insane. It took 4 years for Polaris and 

Minuteman, 4 years to do the same thing. But then, of course, the 

defense bureaucracy was about one-tenth the size it is now. 

Mr. FORBES. Gentlemen, we thank you. 

Mr. Courtney, did you have anything else? 

Thank you both again for your service to our country. Thank you 

for laying this foundation for us, which we hope will help us build 

upon to rebuild the number of ships that we need in our Navy. If 

either of you have any last comments that you would like to offer 

before we go? 

Mr. LEHMAN. Keep up the good work. 

Mr. FORBES. Okay. 

Admiral NATTER. Amen to that, sir. 

And I would just like to emphasize again, our men and women 

deserve your support, and I want to thank you and the fellow members of your committee for that support. Good luck with the rest 

of the Hill. 

Mr. FORBES. Thank you. And with that, we are adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 5:05 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.] 
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