The “age of American naval dominance is over”, Jerry Hendix, a former Navy Captain warned in a high-profile article in The Atlantic.
Hendrix’s article imagines a scenario in which China or other enemy nations seize control of what are now international waters and the cargo that moves across them. “The great container ships and tankers of today would disappear, replaced by smaller, faster cargo vessels capable of moving rare and valuable goods past pirates and corrupt officials.” A handful of nations would end up controlling the chokepoints of international trade and America would not be one of them.
Navy Secretary Carlos Del Toro has already conceded China’s naval supremacy.
Last month, the Biden appointee stated that China has “got a larger fleet now so they’re deploying that fleet globally.”
The People’s Liberation Army Navy topped the US Navy in 2020. By 2025, it will have an estimated 400 ships. We’re still below 300.
Biden’s current defense plan is to have 350 by 2045. And by then we will have lost.
“They have 13 shipyards, in some cases their shipyard has more capacity — one shipyard has more capacity than all of our shipyards combined. That presents a real threat,” Del Toro conceded. “They’re a communist country, they don’t have rules by which they abide by.”
We don’t have China’s shipyard capacity because it isn’t a priority. Biden’s Navy budget would buy 9 ships and retire 24. That means we’ll be down to 280 by 2027. The administration has plenty of money, with over $1 billion directed to Afghanistan aid, hundreds of millions for the ‘Palestinians’, and foreign aid for every one of our enemies, but plans for a shrinking military.
Communist China has its priorities, but so do Biden and Del Toro.
“As the Secretary of the Navy, I can tell you that I have made climate one of my top priorities since the first day I came into office,” Del Tore declared a week after admitting that China had taken the naval lead and would hold on to it for the conceivable future.
The Navy’s 2023 budget wastes $718 million on fighting global warming. That’s more than 10% of the $6.2 billion in maintenance costs for 151 Navy vessels.
China’s Communist leadership is focused on building warships to win a war, ours isn’t.
What does it mean that under Biden, the Navy has made global warming into its priority?
Last year, the Navy joined California and assorted failed blue states in committing to “net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050”. Net Zero emissions is an impossibility. In practice it means wasting a fortune on buying carbon credits from politically connected leftist companies. It also means that we will not be quickly and efficiently constructing warships because that’s not ‘green’. Winning wars isn’t green either, losing them however might be.
A Navy official absurdly claimed that, “to remain the world’s dominant maritime force, the Department of the Navy must adapt to climate change.” Going ‘green’ means that being a dominant marine force is not the priority. Much like diversity, equity and inclusion, which the woke brass have taken to claiming will improve our deadliness, it’s a betrayal of the mission.
China, which is rapidly becoming the dominant marine force, doesn’t give a damn about adapting to climate change except when it comes to peddling its junk solar panels assembled by slave labor to woke companies that will resell them at a massive markup while gobbling up tax credits because when we go ‘green’, it only weakens us and strengthens our enemies.
Communist China aims for a ‘victory-ready’ force while Biden’s after a ‘climate-ready’ force.
While China builds warships to achieve naval dominance in the next decade, the US Navy’s goal for the next decade is to have “100 percent zero-emission vehicles by 2035” and “100 percent carbon pollution-free electricity”. No word on whether firing torpedoes will also be carbon-pollution free, but that’s not a problem for a leadership that never intends to use them.
There will be “hybrid-propulsion” for naval vessels and more money lavished on “green fuels”.
Apart from the massive waste of money, hybrid systems are more expensive and more prone to breakdowns. Forcing ground vehicles to rely on lithium batteries comes with more expensive maintenance costs and worse operations in extreme weather. All of this pandering to green special interests not only corruptly steals money from national defense, but puts lives at risk.
Del Toro claims that the problem with our shipbuilding capacity is that, unlike China, we don’t use slave labor, but during WWII, we built a massive fleet in a short time with no slaves. But that was an age in which skyscrapers could also be built in a year. It was also a time when there were no environmental reviews and we focused on the mission, not corrupt woke politics.
Under the Democrats, politics, from DEI to climate goals, is the mission: winning isn’t.
The People’s Liberation Army Navy is not investing in “low-carbon fuels” or electric cars for its personnel. Instead it’s been busy holding drills with Iran and South Africa in a matter of a few weeks to show off a growing ability to operate on a global scale with its international allies.
While our military brass obsessed over diversity, equity and inclusion, the PRC turned the South China Sea into its own private backyard, enabling it to potentially cut off traffic to the United States. China has built up chains of islands studded with its naval outposts so that its fighter jets and ant-ship and anti-aircraft missiles now encompass not only the coasts of Taiwan and China, but much of the coastlines of everything from Thailand to Malaysia to the Philippines.
The People’s Republic of China has military goals, our military now only has political goals.
The US Navy brass claim that “leveraging our diversity is the key to reaching the Navy’s peak potential” and that their priority is changing the weather and fighting global warming.
China’s priority isn’t fighting the weather, it’s fighting us.
100 percent zero emission vehicles? Does that mean horse-drawn vehicles? Horses also expel gas:-).
It means they pay someone else to take the emissions off their balance sheet by buying credits.
Like maybe a company from Al Gore’s green investment funds. Or one from Kerry’s family.
Horses would be less malodorous.
.I stIll don’t see how that works or why the capital arrow, on my keyboard keeps turning itself on.
really don’t know how that works either? but to solve your keyboard problem………you have a sneaky left pinky that slips off the “A” key and bumps the “Caps Lock” on! I’ve been doing it for a while, of course I’m 76y.o?
It doesn’t “work”. It’s not meant ro. It’s a joke … on us.
Lots to be said. My former SF Bay city was the largest shipyard in the world during WW2.
One thing that struck me while reading the article is how absurd it is to apply Green to military equipment. The priority with such equipment has to be functionality and such, how it will perform during wartime versus enemy equipment, which is not Green.
Imagine a bunch of electric vehicles on our side versus a bunch of highly polluting gas guzzlers on their side 🙂
Don’t worry, there will be many charging stations on future battlefields. And fighting will pause for hours while tanks are recharging. We are being led by insane people.
Also don’t forget the convenient charging stations in the middle of the oceans.
and Also in the flight paths of Aircraft all over the world.!!!
It’ll will be Great to see those Hover Craft floating around the Sky while being charged for 12 hours for a 15 minute flight!!!!
lol, thanks Kasandra, great humor! My first laugh of the day 🙂
The EV tank charging stations will be right next to the transgender post-op surgical care centers and the racial affinity group yard where both armies will pause in the middle of the war for self-care.
We are insane, if we follow the evil ones leading us to destruction.
Corrosion Control is vital to Naval Operations. DEI is a type of rust that destroys unit cohesion, and sows distrust thru guilt trips and group shaming.
History tells us that it’s similar to Mao’s “Struggle Sessions” in the 60’s…. But it’s been updated as a new type of Psychological Warfare so as to impose forced thought control.
Navy should compartmentalize, batten down the hatches and go to full GQ.
Excellent!
Good point about corrosion control. I’ve read some about problems the British Navy had dealing with that in the Age of Sail. During the Napoleonic Wars sometimes the British Navy got so stressed that they had to delay ship maintenance, I think there were cases of the bottom of their ships rotting out.
The Navy has engaged in this DEI crap since the late 80’s it just didn’t have a clever name. Back then we just called it reverse discrimination. In fact it appears the entire government has been overrun by the navy less the gay enlisted uniforms.
How would you like to be sitting on a USA aircraft carrier or destroyer right now? I’d be making sure my funeral plans and life insurance were in order.
They’re sowing paralysis throughout the Navy and can win a war without the Chinese ever having to fire a shot.
That’s the plan.
He doesn’t realize that whatever he does will be offset by China. The inmates are running the asylum. We won’t win the next war with these clueless people in charge.
They don’t intend to win any wars. Except the domestic war to seize control of America. Their objective is to make the Navy into a leftist institution. They don’t care about beating China, they care about beating us.
Are they going back to Sails again will they be putting Sails on Aircraft Carriers and what about Submarines? This screwball is going to mess up our National Defense with the Go Green load of malarkey
Don’t give them any ideas.
No silly, it’s obviously rubber bands for the silent service!
The plan for the destruction of the US military was executed by Obama. Trump did nothing to unwind Obamas acts, And Biden is carrying on with Obamas work.
Its too late to save our Republic from Chinese takeover if we leave it up to Washington.
Whatever happened to “We the People”? I guess I didn’t get the memo!
My late father was in the USN WW II and Korea was in the Battle of the Coral Sea lost his ship the Lexington one of my Uncles was in the Sea Bees(Drove a Grader)and another was in the Coastguard. Now look at what liberal Eco-Freaks have done with it John Pual Jones is spinning in his Grave
It is time to stop listening to the cowards/traitors who cry “we must not get violent with our usurpers. That is what they want”, when that is exactly what we need! Our government is illegal. It is our duty to uncorrupt it!
.I stIll don’t see how that works or why the capital arrow, on my keyboard keeps turning itself on.
More democrat money laundering through leftist NGOs.
It’s called a self-feeding extortion loop thru guilt trips, social media shaming and threats of urban violence.
The author Daniel Greenfield rocks! He knows what’s going on!
I pray every day for the destruction of the democrat party and liberals bent on destroying this country
Finally(@) – what the US navy really needs is MORE solar-powered ships, especially subs… that’ll fix it!
p.s. – thanks for providing comment form
I’ve noticed most writers refuse to allow comments. FPM has huevos.
Uh, Navy Secretary, maybe you should focus on protecting our country and stop with the climate BS.
It’s scary when Victor Davis Hanson says the US Naval Academy is probably THE most woke of all the institutions.
Our only salvation are the Enlisted ranks that haven’t been turned.
“As China War Looms, Navy’s Priority is Going ‘Green’ ”
Meaning: the ‘fifth column’ operation to weaken the US has succeeded. In saner times, all those involved would have been arrested and put on trial. We all know that China would not tolerate this kind of treachery.
This Pinhead needs to be stranded in the middle of the Sea in a leaky rowboat surrounded by Sharks and with Storm coming his way and no lifejacket
This has been the plan since the Obama administration–slowly eviscerate the US Military. It began with his purge (you cannot call it anything else) of many gererals/admirals who would not toe the party line.
Not to worry folks. A World War III is unavoidable. When the smoke clears those humans left alive will not have any of the concerns we have today. They will be putting things back together, trying to rise up from the barbarism left them from the war.
People right now don’t have anything about how the Navy does things!!! It isn’t for fun; it is for keeping our country!!! My father was in the Navy on the Nashville CL 43 the WWII, and they fought until it was over!!! We need men like they were!!!
And this article was written before the new Navy recruiting ad showcasing their new Mission Statement… i.e., the “Trans” Mission.