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PrefaceThe Department of Defense is likely to face years of declining resources as the U.S. government grapples with fiscal challenges. At the same time, there is no evidence that the demand for U.S. forces, in particular naval forces, is going to decline. For its part, the planned replacement rate of ships in the U.S. Navy will result in an aging fleet; the cost of maintaining ships, especially in the surface fleet, will increase accordingly. Reduced budgets will only make surface ship maintenance more difficult. This will exert particular pressure on the parts of the Navy establishment supporting materiel procurement and readiness. This study looked in particular at surface ship maintenance to assess trends, determine the impact of a constrained fiscal environment, look in detail at some ship classes, and then look at potential mitigations for what appears to be a currently unsustainable maintenance path.This research was sponsored by the Assessment Division (N81) of the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations and conducted within the Acquisition and Technology Policy Center of the RAND National Defense Research Institute, a federally funded research and development center sponsored by the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Joint Staff, the Unified Combatant Commands, the Navy, the Marine Corps, the defense agencies, and the defense Intelligence Community.For more information on the RAND Acquisition and Technology Policy Center, see www.rand.org/nsrd/ndri/centers/atp or contact the director (contact information is provided on the web page).
SummaryThe Department of Defense is likely to face years of declining resources as the U.S. government grapples with fiscal challenges. These challenges affect ...
