– USNI News – If the Navy buys lower-cost, low-survivability vessels and puts them into harm’s way without adequate passive and active protection against burgeoning undersea, surface and air/space-borne threats, it runs the unacceptable risk of cheap kills––missions, ships and people.

– USNI News – The Navy’s imperative to provide “uninterrupted strategic deterrence” with its ballistic missile submarines requires it meets two goals: development of the new boats must stay on schedule, and the old boats must make it to the end of their expected service lives.

– Breaking Defense – On Friday, a Navy official told us a critical test report on the embattled Littoral Combat Ship was “unfair.” This afternoon, we found out the Pentagon’s independent test office has already circulated a coldly scathing response.

– National Interest – Winston Churchill once famously remarked that Bolshevism must be “strangled in its crib.” In that same spirit, should the United States now seek to strangle China’s economy as a means of deterring its aggression?

– Defense News – One of the biggest questions facing the future of US Navy carrier-based aviation is what will be the primary mission of its new unmanned jet. Some believe the aircraft – to be produced by the Unmanned Carrier-Launched Airborne Surveillance and Strike (UCLASS) program – should be a stealthy strike jet able to penetrate an enemy’s defenses without risking a pilot. Others want a spy plane, able to launch from a carrier and produce high-quality, real-time intelligence…Now it would seem a decision has been made between strike and recon. The winner? Aerial refueling.

– Sea Power 2016 Almanac – The Sea Power 2016 Almanac, an excellent guide to the US Navy and US Coast Guard, can be freely downloaded as a PDF.

– BBC – A US warship has sailed near a disputed island in the South China Sea to challenge efforts to limit freedom of access. The vessel passed close to Triton Island in the Paracel Islands, a statement said.

– Breaking Defense – In the brutal naval battles of the future, the first clash of arms will be a clash of electrons. If you don’t win the invisible battle of the airwaves, you can’t win the visible battle of missiles.

– USNI News – Officials at U.S. 5th Fleet confirmed to USNI News Iranian forces flew an unmanned aerial vehicle over French carrier Charles de Gaulle (R91) and USS Harry S. Truman (CVN-75) earlier this month.

– Breaking Defense – Think of international conflicts as earthquakes. Many little ones are better than one “Big One” — a global war. Social science suggests that the more often two rival powers interact, the more likely they are to resolve their differences through many small, manageable conflicts rather than one violent conflagration. That makes naval presence worldwide a very desirable capability.

– Breaking Defense – As the Pentagon prepares to roll out its 2017 budget, one strategically crucial piece is the so-called Third Offset Strategy. That’s the US military’s high-tech, high-stakes plan to keep our edge over Russia, China, and other rapidly advancing rivals. This morning, the Chief of Naval Research outlined some of what the Navy’s piece of that strategy would be.

– Defense News – The US Navy in Europe is going dark. The four destroyers in Rota, Spain, and ships operating in 6th Fleet are switching off their radars and sensors to operate with more stealth and train for fighting cyber and electronic attacks

– National Interest – Thanks to advances in modern, ultra-quiet conventional diesel-electric submarines, Washington will need to adjust its tactics if it were to tangle with any nation sporting these increasingly sophisticated weapons of war.

– USNI News – Textron’s Common Unmanned Surface Vehicle (CUSV) program has moved into the production phase and will begin delivering its minesweeping capability to the fleet by early next year, even as the program is also situating itself to enter the minehunting, patrolling and other surface warfare mission areas.

– Breaking Defense – Is the Littoral Combat Ship a real warship? That question has bedeviled the small, sleek, lightly armed ships for years. Now it’s taken on new urgency as the Defense Department and the Navy both refocus on high-intensity, high-tech warfighting against “great powers” — i.e. China and Russia.

– Reuters – The U.S. military has stepped up discussions on converting its Aegis missile defense test site in Hawaii into a combat-ready facility that would bolster American defenses against ballistic missile attacks.

– AP – The Navy is launching a carrier strike group to be powered partly by biofuel, calling it a milestone toward easing the military’s reliance on foreign oil.

– Defense News – An interview with Rear Adm. Pete Fanta, Director of Surface Warfare, US Navy.

– Defense News – One of the prime attributes of the DDG 1000 Zumwalt-class destroyers is the design’s 78-megawatt integrated power system, able to switch electrical power between propulsion, sensor and weapon systems. It’s long been touted as the best platform to field new energy-gobbling weapons like rail guns and lasers. A year ago, however, it appeared the first ship that might carry a rail gun to sea might be a joint high speed vessel (JHSV) fitted with a temporary installation. Briefers at naval exhibitions spoke publicly of the plans, and at least one model of the proposed demonstration was on display. Plans for the at-sea demonstration remain in place, officials said, but it’s looking more likely that a test using an expeditionary fast transport (EPF) — the new designation for JHSVs — won’t take place at least until 2017, if at all.

– USNI News – The Navy hopes to have an over-the-horizon missile on a Littoral Combat Ship by the end of the year.

– USNI News – After two months, Secretary of Defense Ash Carter provided a clear explanation of an U.S. Oct. 27 South China Sea freedom of navigation operation (FON op) that both enraged China and left domestic maritime observers with lingering questions on American intentions.

– FoxtrotAlpha – Northrop Grumman scored another win this last year after its Tactically Exploited Reconnaissance Node (TERN) concept was tapped for full-scale demonstration. The DARPA and Office of Naval Research-led program seeks to give Navy surface combatants, like destroyers and Littoral Combat Ships, fixed-wing aircraft carrier-like capabilities, albeit on a smaller scale. It’s a move that could change naval warfare, and warfare in general, as we know it.

– AP – Nuclear-armed U.S. submarines that went more than a decade without calling on foreign ports in part because of post-Sept. 11 security concerns are once again visiting other countries, a shift intended to underscore their global presence and lift sailor morale.