Ken Calvert Presses Navy Officials About Deterrent Requirements And Ship Building Timelines

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During a House Appropriations Committee held before the congressional recess, Rep. Ken Calvert (R-CA) questioned Navy and Marine Corps Officials about shipbuilding timelines concerns.

Transcript

00:00forward to your questions. Thank you, General. I'll first recognize myself for five minutes

00:05before we get into questions for both sides. Obviously, Mr. Secretary, the committee is

00:14continually concerned about the reported 18 to 24-month delay in the Columbia-class submarine

00:21program. As you know, the retirement timeline for the Ohio-class boats is apparently, you know,

00:28unless I'm corrected on this, is non-negotiable due to the aging hulls, which means any further

00:34delay in Columbia directly threatens our ability to meet STRATCOM's minimum deterrence requirement.

00:41As you well know, the significant part of our nuclear deterrent is carried on the Columbia,

00:46will be carried on the Columbia program. Secretary Phelan and maybe Admiral Kilby may want to come

00:53into this too. You can walk us through the primary drivers behind the additional 18 to 24-month delay

01:00of the Columbia-class submarine program. And beyond the issues we've already seen, whether

01:05supply chain disruptions, workforce shortages, or integration challenges, what risks remain most

01:15concerning to you as we look ahead? Thank you for the question. I know it's an important issue to you

01:24and top priority for myself and Admiral Kilby as well. I think it is a combination of a first-of-class ship,

01:34still an inexperienced workforce. It is supply chain issues. It is also a lack of modernization

01:43in some of the plants. And I think, honestly, it's just sitting and going and talking to the workers

01:52in ways of improving workflow. And so these are things that I've met with the CEO of General Dynamics

02:00and Huntington Ingalls to talk about this and go through it. It was very interesting in some of their

02:07assessments of what they did not perceive to be as problems, where when I went and sat down with the

02:14workers, I got completely the opposite. So let me just give you a couple of examples which might help

02:19you understand in ways we think we can shift the schedule left. So in Japan, I went to JMU.

02:28They get the productivity out of one eight-hour shift that we get out of three shifts. I believe that's for two reasons.

02:37One, their average worker is 50 years old. It is a career. They spend time there. They've been in that shipyard

02:44a very long time. Two, when I spoke to the welders in Japan, they do spend zero time on paperwork.

02:52Our welders spend between 30 and 40 percent of their time filling out paperwork to match designs,

03:00et cetera. That is a problem. The training, when they come from training and get actually on site,

03:08it's completely different. So these are things that they need to work on, and I've spoken to General

03:14Dynamics about it. We are working on a couple of different other ideas as well. There were a couple

03:19things I saw at Bath Ironworks, to be honest, that were excellent, and there were some things being

03:25implemented at Portsmouth that were really good that we need to start to integrate and do. This is a

03:32very big concern. I do think we can get the calendar shifted left, but it's going to take a lot of hard

03:39work and a lot of effort, and it is my number one priority right now, given the strategic importance of

03:47this. Thank you, Mr. Secretary for that. Admiral, do you want to add anything to that? I think the

03:53Secretary covered it. I do have the same concerns he does. I have the same observations about maturity of

04:00workforce and skilled labor. So at our public yards and our private yards, there has been a diminished

04:07loss of that experience so supervisors don't have the same experience they used to. That's an important

04:15thing for us to correct. Additionally, we're looking at extending those holes in our Ohio class

04:22that can make sure we don't have a gap in strategic deterrence. The first one is USS Alaska, which will

04:27extend through a pyre in 2029, and there are four additional holes. So I think that's an insurance

04:34policy to make sure that we are still the most survivable leg of the nuclear triad, sir.

04:39Thank you for that. It's interesting to note that what's going on in Japan and South Korea,

04:49where they have a significant amount of the world's shipbuilding capability, is, you know,

04:54we've dropped now to, what, 3 percent of shipbuilding worldwide. The Chinese are, what, 50 percent of ship

05:02construction, the Japanese and the, and the Koreans are about 35, 40 percent combined, and then the rest

05:09of the world. And so it's disappointing that we've got ourselves in this situation. So we have a lot

05:14of work ahead of us, as you mentioned, Mr. Secretary, to, to straighten this up. Ms. McCollum, you wanted me

05:21to recognize Mr. Cuellar. Mr. Cuellar, you're recognized. Thank you, Mr.

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