– Naval News – Last week, the U.S. Navy Ohio-class ballistic missile submarine (SSBN) USS Maryland conducted a full at-sea crew exchange to prevent sailors from possible COVID-19 exposure. At-sea crew transfer is quite unusual. Transfer of the entire crew of a submarine is even more exceptional.

– USNI Proceedings – If the day ever comes when the Navy decides it should stop building aircraft carriers, will it be able to?

– Defense News – The US Navy could face a three-year delay in testing of the MQ-25 Stingray carrier-based tanking drone if it doesn’t get its designated test ships through the required modernizations on time, a possibility the Navy said was remote.

– CIMSEC – In reviewing the proposed EABO operations, many different capabilities are mentioned, but one, naval mines, are given scant attention, and to the point of being almost completely ignored.

– USNI News – The Navy and its NATO allies and partners are underway for the 49th iteration of the Baltic Operations (BALTOPS) exercise – which this year will focus on naval warfare at sea, partly by design and partly in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

– CIMSEC – The Arctic is changing physically and the security dimensions of the region are changing along with it. The region will not be ice-free overnight, and the United States is not without partners in addressing those changing strategic considerations. It behooves the United States to not pursue a hardline balancing arrangement against Russian militarization and instead pursue what it has been doing for some time, preparing for the potential of Arctic operations across all service branches. The pursuit of this policy perspective will signal American commitments to regional security without exacerbating the militarization of the Arctic into a full blown arms race, enabling an emerging littoral to be sufficiently addressed without intensifying competition within one of the most peaceful and cooperative regions of the world.

– CIMSEC – Strategic chokepoints and littorals are the arena of current and future power struggles. Great power competition is layered within these maritime and littoral domains. To a lesser extent, but still consequential, are the potential actions of regional and non-state actors capable of causing disruption along maritime chokepoints and littoral zones. The United States will be required to address multi-layered challenges to its maritime dominance in these areas while also fulfilling the role of humanitarian and the facilitator of free and open commerce.

– War Zone – The carrier just left on a cruise and it’s packing a new electro-optical and infrared sensor system that will enhance its situational awareness.

– Naval News – The Dry Combat Submersible (DCS) is about a year from achieving Initial Operational Capability (IOC) for USSOCOM’s US Navy SEALs.

– ABC – The goal is to keep ships at sea as “Covid-free bubbles.”

– USNI News – The Navy and the Department of Defense haven’t finished their homework needed to inform how the Navy builds its future fleet, a panel of naval experts told a House panel on Thursday.

– War Zone – Although they are both huge supercarriers, the futuristic-looking Ford class has major external differences from its iconic predecessor.

– War on the Rocks – Diego Garcia is America’s major geostrategic and logistics support base in the Indian Ocean. Sovereignty over the island is increasingly being challenged by Mauritius, but it seems unlikely that Washington would be interested in doing a deal that would facilitate its transfer.

– CIMSEC – Naval mine warfare has played a significant role in every major American military conflict. If employed in support of sea control strategies under development by the Navy and Marine Corps, and should its full potential be leveraged by emerging technologies, MIW can serve as the lynchpin for deterring aggression in the maritime domain, and if necessary, for defeating adversaries at sea.

– CIMSEC – The ability of the United States to sustainably conduct expeditionary operations in the strategic chokepoints and littorals of Asia could crumble in the absence of the allied access it has come to rely on.

– USNI News – If the Navy has spent the last three years taking USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78) from a construction project to a platform that can launch and recover jets, the service is now taking steps to turn the ship into one that can fight in maritime combat.

– Defense News – The Navy recently inked a $200 million contract with BAE Systems to upgrade the amphibious assault ship Boxer to be able to operate with the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, the fifth landing helicopter assault ship to be so amended.

– Defense News – An internal study from the Office of the Secretary of Defense is looking to pour money into large robot submarines that the U.S. Navy says will free up its larger manned submarines for more complex missions.

– Defense News – The U.S. military is banking on unmanned surface and subsurface vessels to boost its capacity in the face of a tsunami of Chinese naval spending. But before it can field the systems, it must answer some basic questions.

– Defense News – In the coming years, the U.S. Navy will be faced with a decision that will radically shape the carrier air wing: Is the service willing to sacrifice dozens of new Super Hornet jets for the promise of a sixth-generation fighter in the 2030s?

– C4ISRNet – “The goal of the Sea Train program is to be able to develop and demonstrate long-range deployment capabilities for a distributed fleet of medium-sized tactical unmanned vessels.”

– War on the Rocks – The ability to project sea power must be a strategic priority for the entire government and not solely a U.S. Navy challenge to solve.

– Guardian – Kauai has one of the Pentagon’s most valued testing sites. It’s an economic driver, but some residents say the military shouldn’t be on the islands at all

– CIMSEC – CIMSEC had the opportunity to discuss the formation and future of the U.S. Navy’s Information Warfare (IW) community with Vice Admiral Brian B. Brown, commander of U.S. Naval Information forces (NAVIFOR).

– USNI News – For nearly two decades, the Navy has grappled with replacement concepts for the hospital ships. It’s eyeing retirements for the ships in 2035 and 2036 under its long-range shipbuilding plan, but those projections are far from certain.