America's Zumwalt-Class Destroyer: Too Few, Too Advanced and Too Late?

The U.S. Navy’s first DDG-1000 destroyer Zumwalt (Note; It’s not USS until the ship is commissioned) is set to undergo an initial set of sea trials in December.

The ship is one of three DDG-1000-class vessels the service is buying—which effectively means that the ships are glorified technology demonstrators for the various high-tech innovations found onboard.


“We’ve got a builder’s sea trial with a notional start of the 7th of December,” said Sean Stackley, assistant secretary of the Navy for research, development and acquisition in an interview with Defense News. “That is the critical milestone in terms of being able to deliver in the spring. We need a successful trial. We’ll learn things from the trial, we always do. First-of-class, we expect to learn a lot.”

The roughly 15,700-ton vessel has been years in the works and features a host of new technologies including an Integrated Power System—which generates 100 percent of the electricity needed for each vessel's propulsion, electronics and weapons. According to Raytheon—one of the key subcontractors—the system provides 58 MW of reserved power while “steaming” at 20 knots.

Advanced Induction Motors (AIM) provide the actual propulsion for the ship using electromagnets to turn the drive shaft. The ship was originally expected to use much more capable and compact permanent magnet motors—but the development program failed to deliver. The next application for such technology is the Ohio Replacement Program ballistic missile submarine.

The Zumwalts also feature a “Total Ship Computing Environment” which is a single, encrypted network that controls all shipboard computing applications for everything from machinery controls to the radars and weapon systems. It also has a pair of 155 mm guns capable of firing long-range projectiles that can strike a target from a distance of sixty-three nautical miles and eighty missile tubes. Those tubes carry the standard variety of naval missiles including the Standard and Tomahawk.

Published On National Interest

By Dave Majumdar




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