“Shipbuilding. Shipbuilding. Shipbuilding.” 

That is the priority of President Trump when it comes to revamping the American Navy,  the nominee for Secretary of the Navy, John Phelan, said during his confirmation hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee on Thursday. He added that Mr. Trump will even text Mr. Phelan at 1 a.m. with complaints about rusty guided-missile destroyers.

If confirmed, Mr. Phelan would be the first person in 15 years to lead the Navy without having served in any branch of the armed forces. As the founder of a private investment firm, he insisted that he would harness his business experience “to step outside the status quo and take decisive action with a results-oriented approach.”

That means heeding the president’s commands to bolster America’s shipbuilding capacity in order to deter an axis of adversaries encroaching on the seas, including Iran, North Korea, Russia, and Communist China.

“Today we face a strategic inflection point,” Mr. Phelan said in his testimony. “Adversaries, in particular China, are aggressively expanding their naval capabilities. Every shipbuilding delay, every maintenance backlog, and every inefficiency, is an opening for our adversaries to challenge our dominance. We cannot allow that to happen.” 

After World War II, America led the world in commercial shipbuilding. Today, it produces fewer than 1 percent of the world’s commercial vessels. For military uses, the American fleet currently maintains 280 vessels and is on track to reach 300 in the early 2030s. Meanwhile, the People’s Liberation Army of the People’s Republic of China is on track to grow to 395 ships by 2025 and 435 ships by 2030, making it the biggest navy in the world by number of hulls. 

The quality and capabilities of Naval vessels generally outpaces those of the PLA. Mr. Phelan called the Columbia-class submarine program, a US Navy project to build 12 nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines that began in 2020 and is expected to enter service in 2031, “the most important nuclear deterrent we have.”

Yet, in a geopolitical moment seen by many as the most perilous since the end of the Cold War, no advantage can be taken for granted. In December, the People’s Liberation Army launched the first of its next generation of amphibious assault ships, the Type 076, which features an electromagnetic catapult and the unique ability to host fighter jets and drones, not just helicopters. These warships would help with an assault on Free China, and could become the world’s first “drone carrier.”

Delays are plaguing the shipbuilding industry. The Navy’s rollout of the $22 billion next-generation Constellation Class frigate program has been pushed from 2026 to 2029. Auditors at the Government Accountability Office made clear that the blame lies with the Navy itself for “botched metrics” and “inadequate” review practices. 

Funding is not the issue, the Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Senator Wicker, said during Thursday’s hearing. “If we threw a zillion dollars at the apartment of the Navy today, we couldn’t build the ships because we don’t have the industrial base,” he said.  “We’ve got to fix that, and I think that’s why the president looked to an entrepreneur and a serious business person.”

According to Mr. Phelan, the delays are likely arising from finger pointing between requirements, contractors, and laborers. He said he plans to review shipbuilding contracts and bolster incentives for private companies to make profits off of the industry.

Mr. Phelan also discussed improving recruitment and retention in the branch through outreach and marketing to highlight the benefit of service to young Americans as well as more competitive wages. The Navy missed its recruiting targets for the first time ever in fiscal year 2023, recruiting only 30,236 new active duty sailors out of its 37,700 planned accessions for the year.

For the 2025 fiscal year, however, the Navy has set its highest recruiting goal in at least 20 years, at 40,600. Since October 1, the service has brought in 14,111 new recruits and sent 12,751 to boot camp, a turnout which Rear Admiral James Water, who is commander of Navy Recruiting Command, called an “incredible four months.” Mr. Phelan described this upward trajectory as “a reflection of the president’s victory, and secondly, a return to the war-fighting ethos.”