Zumwalt-Class Will be at Best a Hypersonic Missile Destroyer
The United States Navy’s Zumwalt-class guided-missile destroyers have long been seen as a proverbial hole in the water in which Washington has just thrown money into—with little to show for it. Only three of the streamlined “stealth warships” were ever produced, and the warships have been seen as one of the service’s costliest mistakes.
However, thanks to an innovative new weapon, the warships could soon be quite capable platforms that should be truly feared by America’s adversaries.
Yet, it would still be wrong to suggest these are akin to a twenty-first-century battleship, and questions remain as to whether any additional money should be spent on the program.
The Futuristic Stealth Destroyer
The problems of the Zumwalt class can be traced back to its origins. Designed as a new class of multi-mission stealth warships with a focus on land attacks, the sleek Zumwalt-class destroyers were meant to be able to take on secondary roles including surface and anti-aircraft warfare. The next-generation, multi-mission destroyers were developed with a state-of-the-art electric propulsion system, wave-piercing tumblehome hull, stealth design, and the latest war-fighting technology and weaponry.
Classed as destroyers, the Zumwalt class was also designed to be larger than any active destroyer or even cruiser while meeting the congressional mandate for a warship that has the naval fire support of a battleship. The new vessels were also developed to be capable of performing a range of deterrence, power projection, sea control, and command and control missions—and to operate in both the open ocean and near-shore environments.
However, Navy officials were soon expressing concerns as to whether the ship packed in too much new technology, while also taking on too many roles.
Resembling something straight out of a science fiction video game, the new vessels were truly state-of-the-art and cutting-edge, but history has shown that new designs can be problematic. Even worse much of its technology was entirely unproven.
Troubled Waters for the Zumwalt-class
The streamlined, wave-piercing tumblehome hull has a “knife-like profile,” which provides the 600-foot-long warship class with the radar signature of a fishing boat. And despite concerns over the hull’s stability, when it was tested in January 2020 off the coast of Alaska the lead vessel of the class, USS Zumwalt (DDG-1000), handled rough waters as well—perhaps even better than previous classes of destroyers.
It was far from smooth sailing, and soon after, the $4 billion lead vessel broke down while passing through the Panama Canal just a month after it was commissioned. That was just a portent of the larger problems that soon became clear for the Zumwalt class.
The entire program also faced multiple delays and cost overruns, even as the U.S. Navy called the delivery of the warship a “major milestone.” It had originally planned to buy more than two dozen of the larger stealth destroyers, but that number was reduced to just three as costs ballooned and questions came up over what its role would be.
A 2016 article in The National Review described the vessels as “an unmitigated disaster.”
Gunning for Trouble
One of the biggest issues was exactly how the warships could ever accomplish their primary mission of land attacks. As a new generation of warships, the Zumwalt class was designed to be fitted with two 155mm Advanced Gun Systems (AGS), which are capable of engaging targets with precision-guided shells at a range of up to 60 miles. In wartime, the destroyers could use such an ability to engage targets from close to shore to create a path for an amphibious landing.
The problem is that the Long Range Land Attack Projectile, the precision-guided shell to be used in the AGS, ballooned in price from $50,000 to $800,000 for each round—making it simply too expensive to fire.
Hypersonic Weapons to the Rescue? Not so Fast
In 2022, the Navy Strategic Systems Programs awarded a $22.8 million contract to Lockheed Martin Space Systems to integrate hypersonic weapons aboard the three Zumwalt-class destroyers.
The defense giant was tasked with providing missile production long-lead materials, program management, and system engineering for the Navy Conventional Prompt Strike Weapon System Platform-Specific Development and Production project.
It also called for serious modifications to be made to the warships. The two massive 155mm Advanced Gun Systems aboard the trio of destroyers—which include DDG 1000, the USS Michael Monsoor (DDG 1001), and the USS Lyndon B. Johnson (DDG 1002)—will be completely removed. That will supersede a former plan that had called for leaving the AGS in place.
According to The Associated Press, workers are completing the installation of the missile tubes that supporters of the program say will truly transform the warships into capable surface combats.
“It was a costly blunder. But the Navy could take victory from the jaws of defeat here, and get some utility out of them by making them into a hypersonic platform” Bryan Clark, a defense analyst at the Hudson Institute, told the AP.
Yet, critics contend that this is just the latest in a series of blunders. Instead of developing a warship from the ground up to be a platform for hypersonic weapons, the Zumwalt class is being modified for the role after the fact. But even if it works, concerns remain that the weapons aren’t much of an improvement over the AGS considering the costs.
“This particular missile costs more than a dozen tanks,” Loren Thompson, a longtime military analyst in Washington, D.C. also told the news wire service. “All it gets you is a precise non-nuclear explosion, some place far far away. Is it really worth the money? The answer is most of the time the missile costs much more than any target you can destroy with it.”
The U.S. Navy seems committed to a platform that likely shouldn’t have been built in the first place.
Author Experience and Expertise: Peter Suciu
Peter Suciu is a Michigan-based writer. He has contributed to more than four dozen magazines, newspapers, and websites with over 3,200 published pieces over a twenty-year career in journalism. He regularly writes about military hardware, firearms history, cybersecurity, politics, and international affairs. Peter is also a Contributing Writer for Forbes and Clearance Jobs. You can follow him on Twitter: @PeterSuciu. You can email the author: Editor@nationalinterest.org.
Image Credit: Creative Commons and/or Shutterstock.