– Virginian Pilot – As the military shrinks after a decade of war and faces mandatory cutbacks under sequestration, the budget proposal signals which ships the Pentagon considers most vital. Here’s a guide to some of the basic takeaways.

– San Diego Union Tribune – The Navy is launching a San Diego-based “Top Gun” school for young ship officers, modeling it on the aviator version that Hollywood made famous. The point is to create a generation of Navy “ship drivers” who are experts at tactics the United States hasn’t used in pitched battle since World War II — the guns, missiles, torpedoes and aircraft intended to defend their ship and fight others.

– War is Boring – The U.S. Navy’s newest and most powerful aircraft carrier has docked in Antalya, Turkey—meaning she is within striking distance of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula. And it appears Russia is deploying anti-ship missiles in response.

– War is Boring – One day after the Pentagon announced it was sending an extra six F-15C fighters to help defend the Baltic against Russian warplanes, the U.S. Navy said its destroyer USS Truxtun was headed into the Black Sea for long-planned exercises with the Romanians and Bulgarians.

– San Diego Union Tribune – Navy helicopter pilots take part in historic shift from stick and rudder to joystick.

– National Defense – As ice melts in the Arctic, the Navy anticipates that it will have to increase its presence in the harsh northern region, but not until after 2020, according to a new roadmap released by the service Feb. 24.

– War is Boring – A summary of US naval forces in the region, primarily the USS George HW Bush carrier strike group and the USS Bataan amphibious ready group.

– Virginian Pilot – For sailors aboard deployed Navy ships, little sleep has long come with the territory.

– Virginian Pilot – The Navy started making plans in the late 1990s to retire the most powerful and crash-prone helicopters in its fleet. By then, several of the service’s MH-53E Sea Dragons – the only U.S. helicopter capable of towing a specialized sled through water to detect and clear mines – were approaching the end of their planned service lives, and Navy leadership needed to make a decision: Invest a significant amount of money to keep the helicopters flying, or develop a replacement. They chose the latter…

– BreakingDefense – At 11 years old, the robot helicopter called the MQ-8 Fire Scout is a at least a preadolescent. But ever since the reconnaissance drone’s first flight in 2002, it’s had one big problem: It’s a little bit…little. So, at the Navy’s request, manufacturer Northrop Grumman basically did a brain transplant. It put the Fire Scout’s software, appropriately modified, in a much larger helicopter. If the new adult-sized Fire Scout, designated MQ-8C, meets the Navy’s expectations, it will be able to fly about 50 percent faster, 25 percent higher, and more than twice as long than the current model, MQ-8B. That would make the C-model a much more effective scout for the fleet, which is especially important for a controversial warship with size issues of its own: the Littoral Combat Ship.

– USNI News – On Monday the Pentagon capped the Littoral Combat Ship program at 32 ships and the Navy has been tasked with finding a more lethal surface combatant to follow on to the two LCS hulls that have been mired in controversy for the better part of a decade. Announced Monday by Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel, the Pentagon is directing the service to, “submit alternative proposals to procure a capable and lethal small surface combatant, consistent with the capabilities of a frigate,” he said in remarks to reporters at the Pentagon.

– War is Boring – The Pentagon’s controversial 2015 budget proposal calls for some big changes in what kinds of weapons the U.S. military buys. Among other reforms, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel wants the Navy to stop building lightly armed Littoral Combat Ships and replace them with a new, more deadly small warship—a frigate, one able to fight and survive in even the most dangerous waters.

– DefenseTech – The Navy’s Virginia-class fast attack submarines are slated to serve for the next 50 years, but service leaders are already debating what submarine or system might replace it.

– USNI News – The U.S. Navy will “lay up” half of the service’s fleet of Ticonderoga-class missile cruisers under the President’s fiscal year 2015 budget proposal. “Half of the Navy’s cruiser fleet— or 11 ships —will be ‘laid up’ and placed in reduced operating status while they are modernized, and eventually returned to service with greater capability and a longer lifespan,” Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel told reporters during a briefing at the Pentagon on Monday.

– National Defense – Naval aviators plan to fly the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter from an aircraft carrier at sea this fall. Pilots who have operated the aircraft say they are cautiously optimistic about its future despite a string of technical setbacks.

– USNI News – The Pentagon will cut the final number of the Navy’s Littoral Combat Ships (LCS) by 20 — from 52 to 32 — and shortly begin a study on a new frigate for the service, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel told reporters at a Fiscal Year 2015 Defense Department budget preview on Monday afternoon.

– San Diego Union Tribune – Faced with fewer dollars, not enough ships, and allies and enemies alike touchy about shore access, the sea services are getting creative as they craft a maritime strategy for the future.

– War is Boring – The Navy’s new—and so far only—gun-armed, robot-hauling war boat arrived in Bahrain on Feb. 8. The 65-foot, 50-ton-displacement Coastal Command Boat is assigned to Task Group 56.7, America’s patrol force in the Persian Gulf.

– Defense News – The United States will “help” the Philippines in the event that China occupies disputed islands in the South China Sea, the US Chief of Naval Operations said Thursday.

– The Diplomat – The Navy is exploring the feasibility of sub-launched hypersonic missiles for conventional prompt global strike program.

– US Naval Institute Proceedings – If the United States wants to prevent China from flexing its military muscle and disrupting the status quo it should adopt and advance a subsurface strategy.

[I would say this is the most insightful essay I’ve read in Proceedings in a very long time. A great idea for a new grand strategy for the US in the Pacific. – Michael]

– Aviation Week – The first of four U.S. Navy guided-missile destroyers to be forward deployed as part of NATO’s ballistic missile defense of allied populations and territory arrived at Naval Station Rota in Spain on Feb. 11.

– USNI News – USS George H.W. Bush (CVN-77) is scheduled to depart for a Middle East and Mediterranean deployment on Saturday as the centerpiece of Carrier Strike Group 2.

– Aviation Week – As anyone who follows the Littoral Combat Ship is quite aware by now, the Pentagon Director of Operational Testing and Evaluation (DOT&E) has once again taken the LCS program to task for problems with both the ships and the mission module packages as well as the related equipment.

– USNI News – Amphibious Ready Group (ARG) Bataan left Naval Station Norfolk, Va. for an eight month deployment on Saturday.