{"id":14456,"date":"2012-06-04T15:52:42","date_gmt":"2012-06-04T19:52:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/?p=14456"},"modified":"2012-06-04T15:52:42","modified_gmt":"2012-06-04T19:52:42","slug":"the-pentagon%e2%80%99s-3-billion-battleship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/14456\/the-pentagon%e2%80%99s-3-billion-battleship\/","title":{"rendered":"The Pentagon\u2019s $3 Billion Battleship"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Technically, the pricey new ship in the U.S. Navy\u2019s fleet as of 2014 is a destroyer named <a href=\"http:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/politics\/2012\/06\/04\/planned-stealth-destroyer-could-underpin-us-navy-china-strategy\/ \" target=\"_blank\">DDG-1000<\/a>.\u00a0 It comes equipped with electromagnetic \u201crailguns,\u201d a \u201cwave-piercing\u201d hull that doesn\u2019t leave a wake, and \u201cadvanced sonar and missiles.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>But before you get too excited, the DDG-1000 program might get terminated before too long for two reasons.<\/p>\n<p>The first is that like the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cfif.org\/v\/index.php\/the-issues\/43-taxes-and-economy\/848-omnibus-spending-bill-a-litmus-test-for-gop-budget-cutters-\" target=\"_blank\">F-35 Joint Strike Fighter<\/a>, the DDG-1000 is threatening to set records with cost overruns.\u00a0 According to <a href=\"http:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/politics\/2012\/06\/04\/planned-stealth-destroyer-could-underpin-us-navy-china-strategy\/ \" target=\"_blank\">Fox News<\/a>, at $3.1 billion per ship a DDG-1000 costs about twice as much as current destroyers.\u00a0 (The total price tag hits $7 billion each \u201cwhen research and development is added in\u2026\u201d)<\/p>\n<p>The second is perhaps even more problematic.\u00a0 Chinese Rear Admiral Zhang Zhaozhong issued a warning about the alleged capabilities of the \u2018super-stealth\u2019 DDG-1000.\u00a0 All he would need to overcome the ship\u2019s technological advantages would be to swarm the vessel with several fishing boats laden with explosives.\u00a0 If one gets through \u2013 on a suicide mission, of course \u2013 it could literally blow up US taxpayers\u2019 investment.<\/p>\n<p>Nice things cost money, and even the best technology can be laid to waste by comparatively low-tech responses.\u00a0 Still, public and private watch dog groups need to keep an eye on how the DDG-1000 develops.\u00a0 We can\u2019t afford not to.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Technically, the pricey new ship in the U.S. Navy\u2019s fleet as of 2014 is a destroyer named DDG-1000.\u00a0 It comes equipped with electromagnetic \u201crailguns,\u201d a \u201cwave-piercing\u201d hull that doesn\u2019t leave a wake, and \u201cadvanced sonar and missiles.\u201d But before you get too excited, the DDG-1000 program might get terminated before too long for two reasons. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[3588,59,1696,3589,2401,56,848,61],"class_list":["post-14456","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-posts","tag-ddg-1000","tag-deficit","tag-department-of-defense","tag-destroyer","tag-f-35","tag-government","tag-pentagon","tag-spending"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14456","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14456"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14456\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14463,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14456\/revisions\/14463"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14456"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14456"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14456"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}