While we have a record defense budget on the books and the acting SECDEF has put forth clear guidance to get to 355 warships by 2030, there are more than a few things we have to keep in mind before we mint new command pins.

First of all, we simply don’t have the shipbuilding budget yet to get there – with or without creative accounting of future unmanned systems.

Second, do we have our industrial base to build, and then sustain and repair the fleet in a way to keep them combat effective in the long run.

As we do a lot of talking and spending, on the other side of the Pacific Ocean, the Chinese are building.

As outlined by H.I. Sutton over at Forbes, a picture tells the story;

While the U.S. Navy launches a handful of AEGIS destroyers each year, the single image below of a Shanghai shipyard shows nine newly constructed Chinese warships.
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The below photo, snapped from an airplane window on December 13,
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Nearest the camera, a line of four newly constructed destroyers catch the sunlight. Two are Type-052D air-defense destroyers, generally equivalent to the U.S. Navy’s Arleigh Burke Class AEGIS destroyers. These displace 7,500 tons and can carry 64 large missiles including long range surface to air missiles (SAMs) and cruise missiles. The other two are larger Type-055 Class ships. These are also described as air-defense destroyers but are verging on cruisers in terms of size and fit. These are about twice the displacement and carry over 100 large missiles.

Behind them is the shipyard with its mass of construction halls and cranes. In the basin where the newest ships are docked after launch are another four destroyers. Again there are both Type-052D and Type-055 ships. Together with another Type-055 under construction on the left of the image, this brings the total number of large destroyers visible to 9. To put that into context, the Royal Navy’s entire destroyer fleet is just 6 ships.

We also need to remember that should conflict come to WESTPAC, we have to cross a wide Pacific Ocean. To China, WESTPAC seas are their VACAPES and Gulf of Mexico … and all the advantages a continental power has with robust air and rocket forces at their disposal.

We have bases and allies nearby, but they are few and subject to host nation steadfastness. Are we ready to extend power without them – or with limited access to them?

The Chinese have, as our land brethren may say, “Interior Lines” as we have to use “Exterior Lines.” Interior Lines with locally superior numbers vs. Exterior Lines with fewer numbers has … well … a track record.

No challenge is impossible, but we are well past the “easily dismissed” pivot point.

Less talking, more doing; the porcupine is growing to adulthood.