The Navy's experiment to reduce manpower on surface ships has been terminated for failure.
It was a bad idea to begin with. It takes people to keep a ship maintained and clean. Which is why I have been skeptical of the real-world ability of a 40-man crew to sail and maintain a LCS. Oh, it's one thing to maintain a brand-new ship, when the gear mostly works. It's quite another thing to maintain a ship that is over ten years old, when the gear needs more maintenance.
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Dear Miss Fit:
The other aspect of reduced manning that's scary is the impact on damage control. I've long contended that one of the U.S.N.'s most notable strengths is superior damage control. But it takes a lot of troops to (a) keep operating the ship, (b) keep fighting the ship, and (c) put the fire out and stop the flooding.
I suspect that there are technical work-arounds to ameliorate the maintainability issues inherent in reduced manning, but the damage control issues seem to me to be less tractable.
Regards,
Frank
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