$1.3 BILLION AVAILABLE TO INITIATE
SEALIFT SHIP CONSTRUCTION PROGRAM
By Jim McCaul, President
IMA Associates, Inc.
Congress, in late October, appro-
priated $900 million to fund a new
fast sealift program. When added to
the $375 million remaining from last
year, a total of $1.3 billion is now
available for initiating a major ship
construction effort. High priority
has suddenly been accorded sea-
lift—and it is highly likely that this
program will proceed on an acceler-
ated basis over the next year.
Construction of these ships repre-
sents the primary new business
prospect for the U.S. maritime in-
Cover: Aircraft carrier USS John F. Kennedy
(CV-67) transiting the Suez Canal. Her bat-
tle group is supporting "Operation Desert
Shield." Photo, top: USS Thomas S. Gates
(CG-51) in the Suez Canal.
dustry over the next six to 12
months. All of these ships will be
built to commercial standards—al-
lowing the maximum participation
by equipment manufacturers.
Current Sealift Inventory
The U.S. Navy has an inventory
of more than 60 sealift ships. Until
the Kuwait invasion, about one-
third of these ships had been in
active service carrying dry and liq-
uid cargoes for the military. Another
third were deployed in forward loca-
tions—loaded with equipment and
supplies which were intended to be
available to troops flown to meet
military emergencies. The remain-
ing third were rapid deployment
ships maintained in ready reserve
status. Exhibit 1 lists ships current-
ly in the military sealift inventory.
Many of the ships in this invento-
ry have been added during the early
1980s. The Navy funded a major
effort to build a prepositioned/
ready reserve fleet as a result of the
Iran hostage situation. The program
included acquisition of eight Sea-
Land containerships for conversion
to fast sealift ships, construction
and/or conversion of 13 preposition-
ing RO/RO ships, conversion of two
tankers to hospital ships and acqui-
sition of five T-5 sealift tankers.
Currently, there are no additional
ships on order.
Sealift Planning
DOD's need to respond to mili-
tary emergencies in distant loca-
tions drives the requirement for
sealift capability. Essentially the
Department of Defense plans its
requirements around the amount of
tonnage needed to be delivered im-
mediately following a deployment
decision.
The sealift requirement is divided
into three phases: the initial phase
handled by prepositioned ships; the
surge phase handled by rapid de-
ployment and other available ton-
nage; and resupply phase handled
(continued)
December, 1990 27
Digital Wave Publishing