Navy Cancels Program

The Navy has canceled its DDG1000 destroyer program.Only three of the advanced,stealthy ships will be built.The U.S. Marine Corps had desired them for fire support,but the combination of rising costs and a shift in priorities to ballistic missile defense led the Navy to return to its DDG51 program,the Arleigh Burke class of destroyers.Paul Francis of the Government Accountability Office said it was a painful decision for the Navy to truncate the DDG 1000.It was a business case that wasn't executable.Why do ship systems get approved that can't be built for the money estimated?Representative Joe Sestak(D-Pennsylvania),a retired admiral,said we were going to the littorals;now we're going back to the blue seas.Mine is a statement of disappointment in the process.Whither the Navy of the future?The Navy hopes to restart the DDG51 in 2009.It wants a fleet of 313 ships by 2017.Besides ballistic missile defense,it is concerned about the Chinese navy build-up and detecting quiet submarines.