Flags to Congress: Smaller budgets could cripple maintenance, put sailors at risk

The surface fleet’s readiness is reaching a tipping point with as many as 30 ships facing overhaul cancellations on top of nearly $2 billion in deferred ship maintenance that has been put off for the last decade, two admirals told lawmakers Aug. 1.

“We really have to get after that maintenance on our ships so that we can preserve those ships to their expected service life to maintain the fleet,” testified Rear Adm. Tom Rowden, the Navy’s director of surface warfare, before a House Armed Services subcommittee. “If we don’t get after that then we may have to look at, because of the increasing cost, having to decommission ships early.”

Rowden and Rear Adm. Timothy Matthews, who oversees fleet readiness for the chief of naval operations, warned that the sequester cuts coming as soon as the next fiscal year could “derail” the surface fleet’s painstaking return to full readiness after a decade of underfunding and straining operational tempo.

When pressed by lawmakers on the long-term stakes, their outlook became more stark.

Rep. Rob Wittman, the Virginia Republican who chairs the readiness subcommittee, asked pointedly about the danger to sailors in an underfunded fleet, where gear is not working and deployments are extended.

“If they are in a wartime situation does that also mean that, potentially in that situation, more sailors may die on the high seas?” Wittman asked.

Rowden paused for a moment before answering.

“Yes, sir,” Rowden replied. “I would say that’s a correct characterization.”

The hearing was an opportunity for Navy leaders to paint a picture of how dire sequestration could be for the fleet — they estimated it would drop to 257 ships — and for lawmakers from military districts who are desperate to avert a second year of heavy, across-the-board cuts. Members of both parties lambasted the cuts as senseless and harmful.

The services have warned that lower-priority assets may go without funding. In the Navy, aircraft carriers and submarines require timely maintenance, which leaves the surface fleet — a force suffering from chronic underfunding — in line to face the brunt of the budget cuts.

Nowhere is this more evident than dry-dock work. These expensive and long-term repairs must be scheduled well in advance and are susceptible to funding hiccups, let alone the full-scale budget showdowns earlier this year. Those cuts forced the service to suspend 23 ship availabilities earlier this year. All of them have now been funded and rescheduled, officials said. But the crisis is far from over.

Nearly two-thirds of the fiscal 2014 overhauls, set to start as soon as October, are in jeopardy if the massive sequester-triggered cuts take effect again. Navy officials say those cuts would amount to an additional $14 billion, on top of the $10 billion this year. Navy officials were unable, as of press time, to provide a list of the estimated 30 ships whose overhauls are now on the chopping block.

These overhauls, if deferred, would add to the backlog of 89 ships whose dry docks have been postponed for the past 14 years, a bill that totals as much as $2.4 billion, Rowden said.

In addition, civilian furloughs are extending some overhauls, and could, over time, lead to longer deployments for sailors.

The Navy also is concerned that war funds, which account for a substantial portion of maintenance money, are set to vanish and may not be upped in the Navy’s base budget.

“The surface ship Navy takes the brunt of the effect of the [overseas contingency operations funding] decrease,” Matthews testified. “We fund almost all of the availabilities in our budget in the surface-ship Navy with OCO funding, to the tune of about $1.3 billion in ’14, for example.”