Not to be out­done by the boys in green, the US Navy has its own future com­bat sys­tem, com­plete with cost over­runs, bal­loon­ing weight, and dubi­ous per­for­mance in early tests. It’s called the DD(X), noted pre­vi­ously here at Defense Tech.
The House of Representatives recently cut large chunks out of the DD(X) bud­get, and a GAO report noted that the design is cur­rently over the allot­ted weight for this stage of devel­op­ment. Meanwhile, crit­ics won­der why we should build multi-​​billion dol­lar destroy­ers when we could reac­ti­vate bat­tle­ships for less money.
Since the House slashed the money for the pro­gram, the Navy has responded accord­ing to DefenseNews:

U.S. Navy lead­ers are shoot­ing back, tout­ing the ships improved war-​​fighting abil­i­ties in coastal regions and tech­no­log­i­cal ben­e­fits and claim­ing the $3.3 bil­lion war­ship gives tax­pay­ers more bang for their buck.
DD(X) has a sig­nif­i­cant advan­tage over the DDG destroyer in the lit­torals, said Vice Adm. Joseph Sestak, the Navys head of war­fare require­ments and pro­grams.
New radar, under­wa­ter sen­sors and com­put­ers will make the new destroyer a supe­rior near-​​shore hunter of ships and subs than the Arleigh Burke-​​class war­ships that have been com­ing out of the ship­yards since 1989, Sestak said.
For exam­ple, Navy analy­sis indi­cates that the DD(X) will be sig­nif­i­cantly bet­ter against Boghammers, swarm­ing small boats armed with mis­siles that are oper­ated by Iran, he said.
Sestak said the analy­sis indi­cated that losses due to enemy attacks can be reduced by up to 31 per­cent if a DD(X), rather than sev­eral DDGs, is present.
I would not take the DDG into the lit­torals as I would a DD(X), he said.

The DD(X) cer­tainly appears to have some fan­tas­tic poten­tial, includ­ing a stealthy design and advanced automa­tion that would keep crew size very small. But, like all new ideas, there are some prob­lems:

Designers have sub­sti­tuted an Advanced Induction Motor (AIM) for the planned Permanent Magnet Motor (PMM) in the ships power sys­tem after the PMM failed in tests ear­lier this year. Although the AIM incor­po­rates proven tech­nol­ogy, it is heav­ier, larger, nois­ier and less power-​​dense than the PMM, requir­ing sev­eral changes in the ships design.
The vol­ume search por­tion of the dual-​​band radar still is encoun­ter­ing tech­ni­cal prob­lems, although the mul­ti­func­tion radar has suc­cess­fully com­pleted its tests to date.
Fire and shock test­ing for the composite-​​construction super­struc­ture have been delayed due to ques­tions about the mate­ri­als to be used.
The periph­eral mis­sile launch sys­tem needed to be redesigned after an immense explo­sion caused dam­age dur­ing tests a year ago.

While these issue are prob­a­bly all sur­mount­able, the ques­tion becomes “should the effort be made if it’s going to cost so much?”. The ships are going to cost between $2 bil­lion and $5 bil­lion per copy, though the House’s recent bud­get capped that at $1.7 bil­lion.
For that many clams, most folks would like to see more than a cou­ple of 155mm guns sup­port­ing the troops on shore, a pri­mary mis­sion of the DD(X). In fact, the two remain­ing bat­tle­ships are sup­posed to stay in reserve until their fire-​​support capa­bil­ity can be matched by a new sys­tem. Despite this require­ment, the Navy is mov­ing to per­ma­nently deac­ti­vate the bat­tlewag­ons.
While bat­tle­ships couldn’t con­tribute much to the cur­rent bat­tles in Iraq or Afghanistan, two other poten­tial hot spots (namely China and North Korea) present many oppor­tu­ni­ties for heavy bom­bard­ment by either the cur­rent low-​​tech 16″ shells or the pro­posed guided and/​or extended-​​range ver­sions. At an esti­mated $1.5 bil­lion per ship to reac­ti­vate and upgrade, they look like a steal com­pared to the DD(X).
Whether or not reac­ti­vat­ing bat­tle­ships makes sense for the Navy, the DD(X) pro­gram is in seri­ous trou­ble, and with it the future of new big ships in the fleet.
THERE’S MORE: Navy Newsstand:

The DD(X) National Team and the Navy con­ducted the third con­sec­u­tive suc­cess­ful guided-​​flight test of the 155mm Long Range Land Attack Projectile (LRLAP) June 16.
Preliminary results indi­cate the muni­tion suc­cess­fully con­ducted pre­planned maneu­vers along a 60 nau­ti­cal mile flight path dur­ing the 280-​​second flight.
This impor­tant test high­lights another suc­cess­ful mile­stone to develop and field long-​​range, GPS-​​precise gun muni­tions for our fleet, said Rear Adm. Charles Hamilton, the pro­gram exec­u­tive offi­cer for ships. The suc­cess of LRLAP is vital to our efforts to deliver DD(X) to the fleet as planned. Each one of these shots brings us closer to that goal.
The DD(X) devel­op­ment team, both in the Navy and indus­try, con­tin­ues to make major strides to demon­strate crit­i­cal new capa­bil­i­ties such as LRLAP for DD(X), accord­ing to Capt. Charles Goddard, the DD(X) pro­gram man­ager. Our rig­or­ous devel­op­ment and test pro­gram is focused using pro­to­type sys­tems to fully eval­u­ate and mature these tech­nolo­gies for DD(X) and other future ships.

NOTE: This will be my final post at Defense Tech. Noah will return tomor­row and, after a cou­ple of days to clean up the mess we left and restock the fridge, Defense Tech will be back to nor­mal. It’s been a blast post­ing here, and I hope to see some of you at Murdoc Online from time to time. I thank Noah for the great oppor­tu­nity.
–posted by Murdoc

Commenter Murc points out that the stealth speed­boat noted last Friday is most likely a SEALION (SEAL Insertion, Observation, Neutralization) tech­nol­ogy demon­stra­tor. While not planned to enter full-​​scale pro­duc­tion, the first SEALION has been in test­ing for some time and a sec­ond will be deliv­ered later this year.

As a tech­nol­ogy demon­stra­tor, SEALION I is not armed but is designed accept a vari­ety of mod­u­lar mis­sion pay­loads and could accept a mod­u­lar weapons sys­tem, accord­ing to pro­gram offi­cials. SEALION II is being designed to accom­mo­date a short-​​range strike mis­sile, to demon­strate a mod­u­lar pay­load with a precision-​​strike capa­bil­ity.
Navy offi­cials said “there will be no test fir­ing of the mis­siles from SEALION II nor will the craft be deliv­ered with mis­siles.“
SEALION II will be slightly longer that SEALION I and fea­ture sev­eral new capa­bil­i­ties, includ­ing a pop-​​up infrared imag­ing sys­tem built by DRS Technologies (Parsippany, N.J.), as well as a mod­u­lar mis­sion pay­load bay. The boat also fea­tures the Craft Integrated Electronics Suite, built by Azimuth Inc., a West Virginia-​​based com­pany spe­cial­iz­ing in high-​​technology ser­vices. The elec­tron­ics suite, along with a local area net­work com­puter, will enable SEALION II to oper­ate with a two-​​man crew, instead of the three needed by SEALION I.

As I noted on my own site, Special Forces always get the cool stuff.
–posted by Murdoc