The future of the U.S. Navy
The rise of China’s naval capability has prompted a critical rethink in Washington.

In a nutshell
- China now has a larger navy than the United States
- This naval power gap has sparked a broad debate
- The role and usefulness of aircraft carriers has come into question
For the past two decades, the world has watched the naval balance of power shift in the Far East, wondering what the future holds for the United States Navy. Amid the backdrop of the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) 20-year national shipbuilding surge and the weakened state of the U.S. shipbuilding industry, significant changes seem likely.
Now, with the election of Donald Trump and his “America First” agenda, the ongoing debate in Washington about the future of the U.S. Navy may soon find resolution. The outcome will not only affect America’s national defense but will likely also alter the naval forces and security postures of both Europe and Asia. These changes will determine the future of global naval supremacy and whether the post-World War II ideal of “freedom of the seas” remains available to all nations.
China’s counter-intervention posture
Today the Chinese military, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), has the weapons necessary to seriously degrade, or even deny access to the U.S. Navy in the waters of the Western Pacific Ocean. These missile systems have the range to reach Guam. The PLA’s emerging longer-range hypersonic weapons may soon threaten naval forces beyond the Second Island Chain.
Facts & figures
Understanding the Island Chains in the Pacific
First Island Chain: This strategic line extends from the Kuril Islands in the southern reaches of the Russian Far East through Japan, the Ryukyu Islands, Taiwan, the northern Philippines and Borneo. It serves as a defensive barrier and a point of contention, especially between China and the U.S. and its allies in the region.
Second Island Chain: Running from the Japanese archipelago through the Volcano Islands, Marianas, Guam and the western part of Micronesia, this chain is used by the U.S. for deeper strategic defense and surveillance operations against China.
Third Island Chain: Although less defined, this chain typically refers to the line from the Aleutian Islands through Hawaii and further into the Pacific. It represents a more remote line of strategic defense for the U.S. and is critical for broad Pacific operations.
Over the past 20 years, the PLA’s sea-denial strategy has extended through and beyond the First and Second Island Chains. This strategy, known by the U.S. and allies as China’s anti-access/area-denial (A2AD) strategy, has prompted American defense officials to reconsider their reliance on current naval design, procurement, production and fielding processes. The core question is whether it is practical to continue relying on nuclear-powered aircraft carrier strike groups as the linchpin to counter a PRC invasion of Taiwan or other aggressive actions in the Indo-Pacific maritime domain.
Facts & figures
Chinese missile threats

U.S. Navy ship programs like the littoral combat ship, the Zumwalt-class cruiser, and the Ford-class carrier have had serious flaws in ship design, development and production. These issues, namely exorbitant costs, delayed deliveries and inadequate capacities, have become too significant for the U.S. Defense Department to ignore. As a result, there is now an open debate about the future of the U.S. Navy.
The anti-carrier argument
Of late, this debate has been publicized by a series of articles in defense-related publications about the survivability of U.S. Navy aircraft carriers in the face of the Chinese threat. The thrust of the argument is that the PRC’s “anti-ship” ballistic missiles, hypersonic reentry vehicles and the entire range of the Chinese A2AD weapons have effectively rendered American aircraft carriers obsolete, like U.S. Navy battleships after the Japanese attack at Pearl Harbor. These articles assert that carriers are vulnerable to a variety of weapons, and that the ships can be defeated using a range of tactics and technologies at a much lower cost. The argument was even picked up on by the Trump administration’s nominee for secretary of defense, Pete Hegseth, who noted that “if 15 hypersonic missiles can take out our 10 aircraft carriers in the first 20 minutes of a conflict, what does that look like?”
On the other hand, there are several tactics and technologies available to defend against those threats to aircraft carriers. For instance, with an improved, longer-range air wing, U.S. Navy carriers could conduct operations in the South China Sea while hidden among the islands of Indonesia and the Philippines. Consider Indonesia, which consists of 17,000 islands covering a vast area – much larger than standard maps suggest. The distance from Banda Aceh in northwest Indonesia to the southeastern border with Papua New Guinea is greater than the distance from Juneau, Alaska, to Orlando, Florida – approximately 8,390 kilometers. The Philippines adds another 7,400 islands spread across roughly 770,000 square kilometers. Together, these regions comprise nearly 24,000 islands over an area of almost 5 million square kilometers.
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Additionally, the majority of long-range detections of naval warships come from overhead sensors, which can be countered by emissions control and other non-kinetic effects. Since ships are constantly moving, tracking them becomes even more challenging. The final step – shooting a detected, identified and tracked target – is perhaps the hardest. Thus, the U.S. Navy’s aircraft carrier force can avoid common forms of long-range detection, as well as change course at will to complicate tracking and targeting, and it operates in vast oceans filled with the world’s commerce. Hitting a target from hundreds or thousands of kilometers away is an exceedingly difficult task.
America’s damaged shipbuilding posture
This public debate about the future of the U.S. Navy is exacerbated by the poor state of the U.S. shipbuilding industry. For example, in April 2024, the U.S. Navy announced significant delays in its shipbuilding schedule. The new Constellation-class frigate may be up to three years late, the aircraft carrier Enterprise (CVN-80) is expected to be 16 to 18 months behind schedule, and the lead boat for the Columbia-class ballistic missile nuclear submarine could be delayed by 12 to 16 months. Additionally, the Virginia-class Block IV and V fast attack nuclear submarines are facing delays of two to three years. Furthermore, the San Antonio-class amphibious transport dock ships, the Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, and the John Lewis-class fleet replenishment oilers are all “late to contract,” affecting their delivery times.
As noted in July 2024, the balance of naval power in the Western Pacific has undeniably shifted in favor of the PRC, which now maintains an advantage over the U.S. Navy in terms of total warships. China’s overall naval battle force is expected to grow to 395 ships by 2025 and 435 ships by 2030, with most of this growth occurring in major surface combatants, including at least six aircraft carriers. By comparison, the U.S. Navy, which stands at 292 naval combatants as of January 29, 2024, is projected in the Biden administration’s 2024 budget submission to include only 290 battle force ships by the end of the fiscal year in 2030.
Facts & figures
Given these two strategic trend lines – the reality of the PRC’s A2AD capabilities within the First and Second Island Chains, and the U.S.’s relative inferiority in the number of major naval combatants in the Pacific – discussions in Washington about the future of the U.S. Navy have shifted. The focus has moved from the survivability of its primary power projection platforms, the aircraft carrier strike groups, to distributed operations supported by advanced intelligence.
The strategy aims to complicate PLA efforts to maintain area denial and thus thwart a PRC invasion or blockade of Taiwan. This approach relies on new technologies such as drones and unmanned platforms, which are smaller, cheaper and quicker to build than the larger capital ships, the most important warships, of the current U.S. Navy Fleet.
Scenarios
As outlined in the Navy’s 2024 Navigation Plan, the U.S. is likely to continue to focus on Distributed Maritime Operations, which spread the fleet across a broader area. This strategy requires the PLA to use more sensors, platforms and weapons to detect, degrade and defeat U.S. forces. A hybrid fleet, comprising existing multi-mission conventional forces like a carrier strike group, alongside an expanded nuclear submarine force enhanced with robotic and autonomous systems, will need considerable operational coordination to succeed.
This approach will increasingly rely on artificial intelligence to navigate the complex, information-centric maritime battlespace. The main advantage of this hybrid fleet is its potential to significantly enhance the U.S. Navy’s reach, resilience and lethality, especially in anticipation of a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan by 2027.
Moderately likely: Revitalization of U.S. naval shipbuilding
As noted by Dr. Peter Navarro, the former assistant to the president and director of the Office of Trade and Manufacturing Policy, “a true renaissance of America’s shipbuilding industry will require a large-scale overhaul and new strategy before it can churn out the ships we urgently need to maintain our status as the greatest maritime power in world history.” Such an effort was last pursued in the late 1930s with the Two Ocean Navy Act when the U.S. Congress recognized an impending war with Japan and Germany was inevitable.
Even with today’s bipartisan consensus on China, the second Trump administration will face an uphill task of garnering the support necessary to revitalize the U.S. naval shipbuilding industry. That said, it will also likely make this scenario a cornerstone of the “America First” agenda. However, the reality is that such an effort will require consistent leadership over an extended period, something the U.S. Navy has struggled to secure in the post-Cold War era.
Least likely: Gutting the fleet
While the least likely of scenarios, there exists a possibility that the U.S. Navy could be reduced at an even greater pace than during the Obama and Biden administrations. As with the United Kingdom’s recent announcement of major naval decommissions as part of a broader defense reform strategy, the incoming Trump administration could have no choice but to come to the same conclusion.
With government spending having quadrupled since the 1970s and the national debt reaching $36 trillion – rising by $1 trillion every 100 days – pressure is mounting within the new Trump administration to potentially enact severe budget cuts, possibly to the U.S. Navy. The establishment of a Department of Governance and Efficiency could lead to reassessments of the value of continued funding for aircraft carrier strike groups, questioning their return on investment. The first 100 days of the new Trump administration will be critical in determining whether such measures will be pursued.
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