– USNI News – The Navy intends to support a near-term increase in ship inventory and deployed forces by forward-deploying some ships with rotational crews, tackling often-overlooked manpower costs and reestablishing the readiness squadron concept. However, many questions still remain about the feasibility of the buildup in force structure and operations at sea.

– USNI News – Following its inaugural deployment to the Asia-Pacific, the U.S Navy’s P-8A Poseidon Patrol Squadron 16 has been playing a key role not only in regard to operations in the region but also in cooperation and engagement activities with U.S partner nations.

– Breaking Defense – Faced with erratic funding from Congress, the Navy has pursued cost-efficiency so rigorously that it has cut corners and compromised peacetime safety and, very possibly, wartime performance. Crews are shorthanded and spare parts stockpiles are low.

– War on the Rocks – The Navy has done well to acknowledge its shortcomings, but it is a long road ahead to get healthy. The recent budget deal is a positive step toward one aspect of giving the service dollars to jump start advance procurement of future ships. While long-term, stable funding is needed to refocus the military toward high-intensity warfare and the modernization of the nuclear triad, raising the spending caps alone is insufficient to address the Navy’s systemic woes.

– War Zone – Amid news of the partnership and the Navy’s questionable budget plan for the program, we talked to General Atomics and got their take.

– USNI News – The Eastern Mediterranean is becoming “one of the most kinetic areas in the world,” as the U.S., NATO, Russia and China operate more and more in the crowded region, the Navy’s top officer in Europe said on Tuesday.

– Defense News – The Navy will grow by more than 40 ships over the next five years, the Navy’s Budget director said Monday. But while the fleet will grow rapidly in the near term, the gains will sputter out shortly thereafter.

– USNI News – The Navy’s MQ-25A Stingray unmanned aerial tanker project, previously described as a rapid acquisition program for the department, is now not set to be integrated into the air wing until 2026.

– Defense News – The U.S. Navy is getting larger and adding an extra ship to its fleet in 2019, over its 2018 request, but the total shipbuilding budget request seems to make little headway toward a 355-ship fleet called for in a review last year.

– Breaking Defense – It takes a million dollars and at least 50 technical experts just to get a carrier strike group’s networks working right before a deployment.

– USNI Proceedings – Naval technology and systems complexity have exploded over the past 50 years, while our surface warfare officer (SWO) assignment policies have not changed since World War II—i.e., any surface warfare officer can go into any billet on any ship type. Unlike their submarine and aviation counterparts, the leaders of the surface warfare community have embraced the generalist philosophy to the point of destruction.

– USNI Proceedings – The Navy’s ability to accomplish its mission is at risk from one primary factor—the high cost of manning its ships. There is no question that personnel costs consume an increasing percentage of the Navy’s budget. Over the past several decades, numerous commissions and studies have identified the challenge of the cost of military manpower, especially its impact on the total ownership cost of weapon systems.

– National Interest – How can the U.S. Navy destroy North Korea should Washington give the word? It can’t. Or at least it stands little chance of doing so by its lonesome barring improbable circumstances. What the navy can do is contribute to a joint or multinational campaign that destroys the Northern regime or its armed forces. But even that would involve perils, hardships and steep costs.

– War Zone – The service wants to put off critical testing for years, but a recent Pentagon report says the USS Ford barely works in optimal conditions.

– USNI Proceedings – A small force of U.S. Navy patrol ships has sailed the waters of the Arabian Gulf for the last 15 years, guarding key maritime infrastructure, conducting escort operations, exercising with international partners, supporting special operations forces, and keeping an eye on regional military moves. The ten Cyclone -class patrol coastals (PC) are some of the Navy’s busiest warships and likely would be the first to see action if Iran becomes openly belligerent. Refitting the Cyclone -class might buy the Navy some time but ultimately the Cyclones inevitably are wearing and need to be replaced.

– USNI Proceedings – The term “lethality” can be associated with any number of things in the Navy. Oftentimes it will be associated with a weapon system, such as those found on a naval aircraft, surface combatants, or submarines. But how often are our personnel associated with lethality?

– Popular Science – Railguns are another way the PLAN hopes to get an edge in 21st-century naval warfare.

– USNI Proceedings – Excessive time spent away from ships is doing a disservice to surface warfare commanding officers.

– Defense News – The Nuclear Posture Review, formally unveiled Friday, recommends adding a low-yield warhead for submarine-launched ballistic missiles, as well as the addition of a nuclear-capable submarine-launched cruise missile to America’s arsenal.

– Breaking Defense – The Navy’s has been forced to resort to awkward, inefficient, even dysfunctional expedients to cope with Congress’s chronic inability to pass a proper spending bill on time, the Chief of Naval Operations said here this morning.

– Defense News – The Navy and Missile Defense Agency is investigating what caused a failed intermediate range ballistic missile target intercept over Hawaii. But despite the failure, experts say that in the long run the SM-3 IIA has no choice but to succeed.

– CIMSEC – Medicine is a continuously evolving field, constantly learning from previous experience and improving. This is all the more true in the wartime trauma environment where resources are limited, conditions are austere, and time is either too short or too long. Our brothers and sisters ashore learned through Viet Nam and the early days of Iraq and Afghanistan that combat injuries will become combat fatalities unless personnel on the scene can stabilize the wounded for treatment by a higher echelon of care. As we consider a return to great power conflict and war at sea, our maritime forces should avail themselves of these lessons in order to prevent unnecessary losses of life in future combat.

– National Interest – James Holmes on what does the latest Navy Strategic Readiness Review say about the state of the U.S. Navy?

– Breaking Defense – The Pentagon’s Strategic Capabilities Office will test-fire a radical new missile defense system in less than a year. The Hyper Velocity Projectile, a supersonic artillery round, is fired from ordinary cannon at 5,600 miles per hour and can kill incoming threats for a mere $86,000 a shot.

– War Zone – Since 2015, the US Navy has been finalizing requirements for a weapon to make sure its jets can break into increasingly heavily defended areas.