THE ADVANCED NAVAL SHIP AND ITS COMBAT SYSTEM
Authors: ADLER RONALD E. 
Published: March 2009

The present Navy planning procedure is not well suited for successful development of non‐conventional, advanced naval ships. This paper highlights the key problems and recommends some solutions.

In the early stages of concept design of the advanced naval ship, many of the key ship parameters, as well as cost ceilings, become arbitrarily set and frozen. Mission analysis, which should be done at the earliest stage of designing the ship, is often performed after‐the‐fact or is pro forma, and its results are often ignored. Thus, they do not impact ship design. Typically, considerations of hull and propulsion dominate, while the ship's proposed combat system and concepts of operations, which may ultimately make or break the ship program, are ignored or relegated to second class status. In many cases, combat system configuration selected does not exploit the unique performance capabilities of the ship. Consequently, the resulting ship has limited military utility and does not usually stand up well in a comparison with conventional ships on the basis of effectiveness, cost and risk. Furthermore, program justification to Navy, OSD and Congressional Reviewing Authorities is shaky.

This paper proposes that mission analysis be done in parallel with ship concept design by a balanced team of ship designers, systems analysts, and weapon system engineers. By using mission analysis at the earliest stages of the design process, this team can make a number of “trade‐offs” between ship parameters and weapon/sensor performance leading to the definition of a suitable ship and an effective combat system. These “trade‐offs” should be performed with the objective of attaining highest military effectiveness at minimum cost. Ultimate military effectiveness should never be compromised merely to achieve some exotic ship performance capability. Since high military effectiveness for the advanced ship will result synergistically from the combination of the appropriate weapon or sensor that can capitalize on the unique performance capabilities of the ship, a way must be found to develop those few needed weapon and sensor systems. That way is beset by many organizational and management problems inherent in the Navy's R&D process. Nevertheless, if derived and supported by mission analysis, a detailed set of weapon/sensor performance requirements can be defined. These requirements should be entered into the RDT&E process but must continually be justified and defended along with the advanced ship until completion of their parallel development. Demonstrations of key prototype weapon/sensor systems should be conducted on prototype ships, which should be designed and built in parallel.

The advanced ship planner must give greater recognition to the importance and contribution of properly integrated and effective combat system to his overall ship concept. This recognition of the need for high military effectiveness at lowest cost will lead to small displacement ship designs that have greater percentages of their total‐ship cost devoted to the combat system—as opposed to hull and propulsion—than is current U. S. Navy practice. This approach could best assure a highly effective, yet moderate cost, advanced naval ship.