C4ISRNet – The U.S. Navy is developing an campaign plan for unmanned vehicles that will prioritize commonalities across the service’s ever growing portfolio of drones and unmanned vessels.

CIMSEC – In this discussion, Capt. Tangredi discusses uncertainties facing the new fleet design, possible intentions behind the Defense Secretary’s rejection of the Navy’s force structure assessment, and alternative means to revamp the fleet for great power conflict.

CIMSEC – In this conversation, Capt. Kline discusses advantages realized by fielding a fleet with greater platform variety, how to mitigate risk to emerging fleet networks, and the impacts of the Robotics Age on naval force structure.

Popular Mechanics – The U.S. Navy is developing a new sea mine to make the lives of enemy submarines in wartime a lot trickier. The new Hammerhead mine is designed to lie in wait on the seabed floor, listening for the telltale signs of enemy submarines. Once a foe passes over, Hammerhead unleashes a homing torpedo that hunts down and destroys the offending sub.

(Thanks to Alain)

CIMSEC – In this conversation, Capt. Barber discusses the Navy’s longstanding resistance to new ship types, whether Battle Force 2045 can be afforded, and how to begin building this new fleet.

USNI News – Automated unmanned systems technology is advanced enough to allow the Navy to design a new mine-warfare concept of operations.

USNI Blog – Peer nations do not subscribe to the anti-CVN movement. The United Kingdom, China, and India have embraced aircraft carriers as a national priority despite advances in antiship missiles or price tags. China even has plans to develop four to six aircraft carriers by the 2030s with future variants approaching the size of Ford-class carriers with modern catapults, arresting gear, and nuclear propulsion.

Breaking Defense – The United States is stepping up its military presence and activity in and around the small island nation of Palau in the Philippine Sea, a strategic location coveted by Pentagon planners as the US looks to expand its footprint in the region.

USNI News – Navy Secretary Kenneth Braithwaite visited Palau during a weeklong swing through the Pacific, making him the second high-ranking Defense Department official to visit to the small island nation in the last two months as the Second Island Chain is being eyed to play an even larger role in military plans and operations going forward.

USNI News – In order to accommodate the equivalent of an intermediate-range ballistic missile aboard the Navy’s current crop of destroyers, the service would need to undertake complex modifications to both the Zumwalt and Arleigh Burke classes of ships to install along-range hypersonic strike weapon on DDGs, as the national security advisor called for this week.

Defense News – Although some dismiss Esper’s Battle Force 2045 concept as a political ploy shortly before an election, it could lead to a more effective and affordable future fleet — as long as Navy and Department of Defense leaders can avoid loading it down with expensive options.

War Zone – The Navy is exploring new options for replenishing its submarines out at sea, which could have broader impacts on how it resupplies all of its fleets.

Breaking Defense – The U.S. Navy plans to put hypersonic missileson all Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, President Donald Trump’s top national security official said Wednesday.

War on the Rocks – Recent wargames suggest the U.S. Navy would have a hard time fighting China, but this might be nothing compared to infighting Secretary of Defense Mark Esper and his successors will have to manage to build a navy that can hold its own in the Pacific.

Breaking Defense – The Navy is inching closer to fielding a new anti-submarine mine designed to deploy from underwater drones and loiter for weeks at a time around critical chokepoints, looking for enemy submarines to sink.

Defense News – The Navy’s first stealth destroyer, USS Zumwalt, test fired an SM-2 missile out of its MK 57 vertical launch system Oct. 13.

USNI News – A new report from the Hudson Institute, Sustaining the Undersea Advantage: Disrupting Anti-Submarine Warfare Using Autonomous Systems, outlines a potential use for unmanned surface, undersea and aerial vehicles: to help track and even engage with a swarm of enemy submarines.

USNI News – While service officials have pointed to the Shipyard Infrastructure Optimization Plan (SIOP) as a way the Navy is pushing for modernization and efficiency in its yards and facilities to enhance throughput and readiness, some lawmakers have voiced concerns about the plan’s timeline.

War on the Rocks – When not in the midst of a pandemic, members of Congress and high-level defense officials travel all over the world and attend all sorts of fancy conferences. Some of these trips are valuable, others less so. None of these trips are as important as the wargame that should take place in Newport in early 2021. Done right, 72 hours with members of Congress and defense leaders locked in a room together examining maps, strategy, forces, and assumptions could bring about the oft-promised naval rebuild that, until now, has yet to materialize. Now that the Pentagon finally has a plan, it is time for Congress to pull up a chair and join it at the table.

Defense News – The US Navy’s top officer has tasked a former surface warfare officer turned engineering duty officer to create a powerful, all-connecting network service leaders believe they will need to fight and win against a high-end foe such as China.

USNI Proceedings – At a time when the U.S. Navy faces intense competition from peer and near-peer adversaries, the submarine force still provides a significant advantage—one we do not take for granted.

War Zone – Stout’s sailors went from March to October without setting foot on land and performed maintenance usually done in port while at sea.

War Zone – An inside look at how ‘Havoc’ turns U.S. Navy EA-18G crews into wizards of the invisible art of electronic warfare.

War Zone – A cost-cutting effort years ago left the DDG-1000 destroyers with degraded capabilities and a one-off combat system, but that could be changing.

Defense News – The U.S. Navy is looking to build a new generation of destroyers from a clean-sheet design, following the model of one of its most successful ship classes, the Arleigh Burke-class DDG, the service’s top officer said Tuesday.