Randy Forbes Slams Navy’s “Paper Ship” Program

Posted by James Charles / March 24, 2014

The Navy is giving the public false information about its ship count.

A Dangerously Weak Military

“America began the month of March with 283 ships in her fleet. Overnight, this Administration declared we had a 293-ship fleet – yet, no ship was built, no ship was commissioned, not one additional need of a combatant commander was met. This Administration is creating a paper ship Navy. This dangerous deception continues in regards to the most powerful and most versatile instrument of American power: the aircraft carrier. By refusing to execute planning funds or to procure supplies critical to protecting our carrier fleet, this Administration has undeniably made a decision that will advocate to reduce our carrier fleet; they just lack the courage to admit it.”

These words were said in a statement by Rep. Randy Forbes on March 12^th, and are causing more people to speculate about why the current administration is downsizing our military. It is no secret that the government under Obama is cutting the strength of the military drastically. In fact, this very issue was covered by Misguided Children on March 4^th.

The U.S. Navy has publicly set a goal of 306 ships, a number commonly cited to highlight the lack of progress they have made. The official narrative of the Obama administration stated that according to our most recent ship count, we had jumped from 283 to 293. This would be nice, if it was true. The Navy is not even close to meeting the requests of combatant commanders, who have asked for 450 ships total. What is even more appalling is that the Navy does not even expect to reach 306 ships until 2019, according to The Hill.

A Hollow Threat?

Navy Secretary Ray Mabus has a different take on the numbers, however. Last week, he told Congress that the Navy was changing its ship-counting methodology to “allow the counting of ships routinely requested by commanders.” He said on the record:

“I intend to alter the battle force ship counting methodology to be more inclusive of certain conditional situations. This change will provide flexibility to the Combatant Commanders to assess the near-term environment and changing situations in meeting the demands of the Defense Strategic Guidance [DSG], and ensure that the ship types needed to execute the DSG are captured.”

If they want to change their method of counting ships, obviously they can. However, they have done it in such a way that the public is being misled into a false sense of security, if there is a sense of security left at all.