{"id":171635,"date":"2025-07-14T11:21:40","date_gmt":"2025-07-14T15:21:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=171635"},"modified":"2025-07-14T11:28:16","modified_gmt":"2025-07-14T15:28:16","slug":"littoral-combat-ships-end-of-an-error","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=171635","title":{"rendered":"Littoral Combat Ships- End of an Error"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nIndependence Class LCS<\/em><\/p>\n

U.S. Navy Accepts Delivery of Final Independence-Variant Littoral Combat Ship, Pierre<\/h3>\n

MOBILE, Ala. \u2013 The U.S. Navy accepted delivery of the future USS Pierre (LCS 38) from Austal USA\u2019s shipyard in Mobile, Alabama, July 11.<\/p>\n

Pierre is the 19th and final ship marking the completion of the Independence-variant littoral combat ship (LCS) construction phase\u2014a sustained acquisition effort involving Navy personnel, industry partners, and program management teams for over two decades.<\/p>\n

Pierre successfully completed acceptance trials?the week of June 9, achieving the highest measured quality score of any LCS in the past 15 years. This performance reflects the notable progress made over the course of the program and the expertise honed by the LCS shipbuilding and acquisition teams.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe delivery of the final Independence-variant LCS marks the end of a chapter, but not the story,\u201d said Capt. Matthew Lehmann, program manager of the LCS Program Office. \u201cThe LCS program, for all its complexities, has pushed the boundaries of naval design and operational concepts. The LCS represents a bold vision for a more agile and adaptable Navy. We are seeing the Fleet operating these ships with the advanced mission packages they were designed for and they are continuing to evolve those operational concepts as more unmanned technologies come online.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Sea Power Magazine<\/a><\/p>\n

The last Independence Class lipstick-slathered pig has left the shipyards. The ships have suffered from just about every self-inflicted wound possible. Integrating a bunch of novel technologies led to manufacturing problems that left the entire class in desperate need of post-acceptance reconstruction. The highly touted “modularity” supposedly built into the designs never panned out. Worse still requirements creep- the bane of Military Acquisition- reared its ugly head early on in the program as the class became a solution in search of a problem. Big Navy’s strategic concept shifted away from controlling the littoral- the very reason for the existence of the ship- towards broader warfighting missions never envisioned by developers. This is difficult to achieve when welded to the pier undergoing structural repairs and training crews to operate and maintain systems never fully tested under at-sea conditions.
\nBig Navy failed to learn the lessons taught by the A-12 stealth attack jet program, and now is stuck with this albatross. Small wonder the Navy has limited production and decommissioned the worst offenders. Out of 50 ships envisioned for the class only 21 will be in service- six Freedom class and 15 Independance class ships equipped with a new mine countermeasures capability. This technology has yet to actually deploy, and any ship can be a minesweeper. Once.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Independence Class LCS U.S. Navy Accepts Delivery of Final Independence-Variant Littoral Combat Ship, Pierre MOBILE, Ala. … Littoral Combat Ships- End of an Error<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":657,"featured_media":171636,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[703,691,238],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-171635","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-big-navy","category-good-idea-fairy","category-government-incompetence"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/171635","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/657"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=171635"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/171635\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/171636"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=171635"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=171635"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=171635"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}