“Misery loves company,” as the one cynical saying goes. 

Accordingly, it turns out that Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) isn’t the only surface warship in the U.S. Navy (USN) fleet that’s proving to be an embarrassing, overpriced financial boondoggle. There’s also the beleaguered Zumwalt-class of guided missile destroyers, which, according to my National Interest colleague Brandon J. Weichert, have run up a $24.5 billion price tag in exchange for, “persistent functionality and performance issues.”

But before we officially pronounce the Zumwalts “dead in the water,” it looks like there’s a last-ditch effort underway to save the ships and keep them operationally viable: hypersonic missiles. 

The question is: will it matter? 

Zumwalt-Class Destroyer Initial History and Specifications 

These ships seemed as first to get off to a promising start. Not to mention a proud and revered namesake in the annals of U.S. Navy history, Admiral Elmo Russell "Bud" Zumwalt Jr, who was tapped as the nineteenth Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) in July 1970, in the process becoming the youngest officer ever named to the post at just forty-nine. Admiral Zumwalt’s accomplishments included: the commissioning of the Oliver Hazard Perry-class guided-missile frigates (FFG), and the creation of the Ohio-class ballistic missile submarines (SSBN), and the championing of the F-14 Tomcat as the USN’s replacement for the F-4 Phantom II. 

Appropriately enough, USS Zumwalt (DDG-1000) was the lead ship of the class, built by General Dynamics Bath Iron Works, laid down on November 17, 2011, launched on October 28, 2013, christened on April 12, 2014, and commissioned on October 15, 2016. She and her sister ships, the USS Michael Monsoor (DDG-1001) and USS Lyndon B. Johnson (DDG-1002), bear the following specifications and vital stats: 

· Displacement: 15,907 tons fully laden 

· Hull length: 610 feet (190 meters)  

· Beam Width: 80.7 feet (24.6 mches) 

· Draft: 27.6 feet (8.4 meters) 

· Propulsion: 

o   Two Rolls-Royce MT30 gas turbines (35.4 MW (47,500 hp) each driving Curtiss-Wright electric generators 

o   Two Rolls-Royce RR4500 turbine generators (3.8 MW (5,100 hp) each) 

o   Two propellers driven by electric motors 

o   Total: seventy-eight MW (105,000 shp) 

· Max speed: thirty knots (fifty-six kilometers/h; thirty-five mph) 

· Crew Complement: 128 core crew of commissioned officers and enlisted sailors; twenty-eight air detachment crew 

· Armament (as originally designed):

o   Two 155 millimeter (six inches)/62 caliber Advanced Gun System 

o   Two 30 millimeter (1.2 inches) Mk 46 Mod 2 Gun Weapon System 

o   Twenty Mk 57 vertical launch system (VLS) modules, 4 cells per module, 80 launch cells total, with a capacity for: 

§  Four RIM-162 Evolved Seasparrow Missiles (ESSM) 

§  One Tomahawk cruise missile 

§  One RIM-174 Standard Extended Range Active Missile (ERAM) 

§  One RUM-139 vertical launch anti-submarine rocket (ASROC) 

On-paper, these ships looked they could be “The Next Big Thing.” Raytheon’s official website declared them to be “America’s next-generation combat ships” and boasted about the following features: a Total Ship Computing Environment (TSCE); electronic modular enclosures; an integrated undersea warfare system designed to protect the ship from enemy mines, submarines, and torpedoes alike; an integrated power system allowing for a so-called “all-electric” ship. 

A Troubled Present 

In a nutshell, here’s a laundry list of the mechanical maladies plaguing the Zumwalt-class ships: an Advanced Gun System underperforming, only attaining two-thirds the forecast range, around 70 miles or 112.6 kilometers; a lack of ammo due to excessive cost, the Long Range Land Attack Projectile [LRLAP] GPS-guided shells cost $800,000 each; and unreliable engines. 

Accordingly, originally planned fleet of thirty-two ships was pared down to three. 

A More Hopeful Future, Thanks to Hypersonic Missiles? 

However, one cannot write off the Zumwalt destroyers just yet. Those woefully unreliable (not so) Advanced Guns are being removed to make room for hypersonic missiles, more specifically Conventional Prompt Strike (CPS) hypersonic missiles; the upgrade will consist of four Multiple All-Up Round Canisters (MACs), each carrying three CPS missiles. As my colleague Peter Suciu reports, “It will require significant modification to the three destroyers, but it has been argued that the CPS concept could extend the long-range strike capability for the U.S. Navy, as the hypersonic missiles would be able to strike nearly any target in the world in less than an hour.”

“The focus would remain on attacking high-value or fleet targets with the extremely fast hypersonic weapons, which can fly faster than five times the speed of sound…Once updated, the Zumwalt-class destroyers will reportedly be capable of performing a range of deterrence, power projection, sea control, and command and control missions while allowing the U.S. Navy to evolve with new systems and missions…At least that's the current plan.” 

Long story short, the jury is still out on the Zumwalt-class; if they survive, it wouldn’t be the first time a seemingly doomed weapons system has gotten a proverbial second wind and cheated death. Time will tell…and until then, “Don’t Give Up the Ship!”  

Image Credit: Creative Commons and/or Shutterstock.