Where has the US Commercial Shipping Industry disappeared

The US Navy and US Maritime Administration will have to justify why it is so prolific in spending on naval ships rather then building US merchant navy fleet. What is really being protected by the US Navy needs an in depth study. Is the US Navy protecting a meagre number of US cargo ships, exclusive economic zones, guarding against illegal fishing ,offshore hydrocarbons, undersea minerals,offshore wind installations, undersea fiber optic cables, drug and human trafficking  or maintaining its maritime corridors. The US merchant navy comprises of around 175 ocean going and self propelled ships of more then 10000 GRT. This figure is abysmally low when considering that the global merchant fleet comprises around 43,000 ships. The US military lacks sufficient “ sealift “ capacity which is vital in the event of a prolonged maritime crisis and also to augment its oversea military strike and deployment capability. The US has only one shipyard left involved in construction of civilian vessels and is exposed to supply chain vulnerabilities.

China has a huge shipbuilding industry

China on the other hand constructs over 1000 ocean going ships on an annual basis. China has already acquired stakes in many of the large container terminals worldwide. If the US Navy shifts towards drone surveillance and unmanned crafts as first responders the burden on the economy is likely to be lessened. Another significant advantage of enhancing commercial fleet for the U.S. Navy is that it can use commercial containerships and compatible containerized missile systems and sensor technology.Littoral states such as Iran are constrained to deploy Container hulls which can accommodate relatively large mission payloads as a small part of the container ship’s capacity.Commercial ships can support naval logistics in times of hostilities and serve as hospitals, decoys and store weapons and payloads. A comparative analysis of costs of US Naval ships and US commercial ships, obtained from various open access sources, is depicted below ;

 Costs of Commercial Ships

300-metre containership                    $130 million

30000-deadweight products tanker     $50 million

Newbuild prices

$81.0 million for VLCCs

$53.0 million for Suezmax

$43.0 million for Aframax

$145 million largest container ships

$ 100 million Crude Oil Tanker

Big bulk carriers $60 million (simple construction requirements ) to construct half the price of a large container ship

$ 95 million  Very Large Crude Carrier between 200,000 to 320,000 DWT (double hull if run aground )

$ 190 million LNG Tankers (Specialist product carriers)

$ 240 million transport ship (Boka Vanguard transports offshore oil platforms weighing 110,000 tonnes)

$ 1 billion Cruise ship of  2000-3000 passenger capacity (accommodation desks above waterline )

$ 80 million for car carrier (17,000 tonnes)

$  7.5 million ASD terminal/escort tug (length 32 metres , 2 Caterpillar 2,350kW main engines, delivers speed of 13 knots and bollard pull of 75 tonnes)

$ 36 million state-of-the-art trailing suction hopper dredge (Damen Dutch shipbuilders )

Naval Ships

 $ 1.2 billion  cost guided missile frigate US Navy

$ 13 billion US Gerald R. Ford Aircraft Carrier

$736 million  742-feet vessel full load displacement of
49,850 tons  capacity to carry 157,000 barrels of oil

$ 3.8 billion French “ Le Terrible “ submarine

$1.35 billion French Barracuda submarine

$ 1 billion Spanish Destroyer (5000 tons)

$ 640 million US Corvette/Cutter (4000 tonnes)

 

By Nadir Mumtaz