Trump’s $275 Billion ‘Golden Fleet’ Could Sink Before It Ever Sets Sail

The high cost of the new, proposed Trump class of battleships could sink the program before it even gets out of port, as Democrats rebel and national security experts caution the massive vessels may not be cut out for 21st Century naval combat.President Trump has vowed to build the Golden Fleet, akin to President Ronald Reagan’s aim to construct a 600-ship Navy in the 1980s. At its centerpiece would be 15 Trump-class nuclear-powered battleships, with the lead ship USS Defiant set to be launched in the 2030s.But Dr. Robert Farley, who teaches security and diplomacy at the Patterson school, a graduate level professional school affiliated with the University of Kentucky that focuses on global affairs, said a combination of political and practical foes may be aligning against the battleships. “Momentum for the battleships is weak, and the number of enemies seems to grow by the day,” Dr. Farley wrote in 19fortyfive.com. “Odds are that we are watching another major naval procurement project sink without a trace.”Democrats on Capitol Hill reacted explosively to a Congressional Budget Office report that put an eye-popping total price tag on the Trump class at $275 billion. The first ship would cost $23.4 billion. Over the life of the program costs would dip slightly, averaging $18 billion per ship.The USS Gerald R. Ford, the Navy’s newest and biggest aircraft carrier, cost just over $13.3 billion to construct — including more than $2 billion in cost overruns due to delays. An Arleigh Burke-class destroyer costs about $3 billion, while a new Virginia-class attack submarine costs about $2.5 billion under a renegotiated deal with its builder.The battleships are still on the drawing board, and would be funded in the fiscal year 2028, with the appropriation coming as soon as next year.Congressonal Democrats used the numbers from the CBO report to highlight the ships’ name, suggesting the ships are a vanity project for the President.“The Navy never wanted these ships,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said on the Senate floor. “The American people never asked for these ships. The only person who wants these ‘golden ships’ is Donald Trump. So he can slap his name on them.”A Trump-class battleship would be three times the size of an Arleigh Burke-class destroyer. It would be equipped with conventional and hypersonic missiles, laser weaponry that’s still in development, and be able to launch nuclear missiles. No Navy surface ship has carried nuclear weapons since 1991.The ship’s deck would be equipped with a rail gun, defensive missiles, guns and decoys, missile batteries to launch antiship, antiaircraft and land attack missiles, and “optical dazzlers intended to counter and disrupt unmanned aerial systems,” the CBO said.“They’ll never be built,” Tom Nichols, a former Naval War College professor wrote on social media.“We don’t need battleships at all, named for anyone,” Mr. Nichols added.“This is not the 1940s,” wrote Tom Rogan, a foreign policy writer and editor in an op-ed in the Washington Examiner. “Facing what would be a saturation of extremely high-speed weapons enabled by advanced radar, sonar and space sensors, the Navy needs warships that can fight and evade amid an onslaught of enemy attacks.”Mr. Rogan contrasted the vulnerability of large surface warships like the Trump class to the battery of antiship missiles that China’s People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force can bring to bear, especially in the waters of the Taiwan Strait closer to mainland China.“The Chinese military has a vast number of highly capable anti-ship missiles,” Mr. Rogan wrote. “Which is also why the US military has invested significantly in means of tricking the Chinese military into attacking nonexistent or dispensable drone vessels.”The Chinese, in contrast, are busily building both maritime vessels and up to nine aircraft carriers.Democrats in Congress have focused little on the battleships’ combat effectiveness, instead contrast the ballooning price tag with affordability priorities.“Trump’s latest waste of time and money: $275 BILLION in taxpayer dollars for a “golden fleet” of Navy battleships with his name on them,” Mr. Schumer wrote on social media. “Not a single penny to lower costs for the American people. Plenty to serve Trump’s egomania and narcissism.”“While Americans drown in costs because Trump has made life more expensive, his priorities remain corruptively self-serving,” Sen. Andy Kim wrote on social media.“Americans can’t afford the basics: gas, groceries, healthcare,” Colorado Democratic Sen. John Hickenlooper said. “The last thing taxpayers should be funding are bloated warships with Trump’s name painted on them.”A naval official told Congress in May that the Trump-battleships would be built using modular construction in multiple locations across the country, then undergo final assembly at HII’s Newport News Shipbuilding in Newport News, Virginia. They would be assembled at the half-mile long dry dock where the Ford-class aircraft carriers are built.“If the Trump administration continues to push the battleship forward despite a skeptical Congress, it will amount to a massive redistribution of US investment toward the surface fleet at a time when the value of large surface warships has come into questions,” wrote Dr. Farley.Dr. Farley, who teaches security and diplomacy, wrote that a Congress that flips Democratic after the 2026 midterms is even less likely to fund the fleet.“If the Trump class battleships had emerged from a more conventional design process and a more regular assessment of strategic need, we would still expect costs to increase as the entire project came into focus,” Dr. Farley wrote. “But this process did not take place before the President committed his prestige and political capital to the project.”Steven Henderson, the co-founder and CEO of the autonomous shipbuilding company Fleetzero, reacted more ruefully to the $275 billion Trump class price tag.“And sink from a $2K fiberglass bomb disguised as a discarded Yeti cooler,” Mr. Henderson said.

Trump’s $275 Billion ‘Golden Fleet’ Could Sink Before It Ever Sets Sail

Trump’s $275 Billion ‘Golden Fleet’ Could Sink Before It Ever Sets Sail

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