Race against Time: The Second Trump Administration`s Naval Policy

Objectively speaking, the US Navy remains the world’s most powerful maritime force. However, it faces a determined challenge from a fast-growing Chinese fleet. The Trump administration has promised early steps to address the shortfall in American shipbuilding capacity. Adjustments to naval force structure are also expected, although these plans are still being developed.

Background

Donald Trump returned to office in January 2025 promising to strengthen America’s military through “record funding” and to make the US armed forces “the most powerful military of the future.” A brief look at defence and naval policy during President Trump’s first term in office (2017–2021) can provide some perspectives for these more recent statements. In fiscal terms, the first Trump administration had a good record on defence spending compared with that of the previous Obama regime despite the impact of Congressional restraints relating to budgetary control during the later years of his presidency. The budget for the Department of the Navy – which includes funding for the US Marine Corps (USMC) – saw growth that was broadly in line with the overall increase achieved in defence spending.

Regarding US Navy structure, President Trump had campaigned in 2016 on the goal of achieving a 350 ship fleet.  He subsequently adopted the navy’s goal of increasing the fleet to 355 vessels. By July 2020 the fleet had actually grown to 301 ships. Whilst this was up from 274 four years earlier, much of this procurement had been initiated before Trump took office. In October 2020, then US Defense Secretary Mark Esper presented the Battle Force 2045 concept. This foresaw a fleet of approximately 500 vessels, including between 140 and 240 unmanned units, by 2045 in order to maintain global obligations and provide the capacity to fight a major war. This construct remains the template for the navy’s current fleet planning, although target figures are periodically adjusted.

Despite the long-term focus on growth, which was maintained under the Biden administration, short term force structure has stagnated since 2020. In March 2025, the US Navy fielded a battle force of just 295 deployable ships. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) analysis of the navy’s FY2025 shipbuilding plan predicts that a combination of increased retirements and delayed construction will see the battle force bottom out at 283 units in 2027 before real fleet growth resumes.

Overall strategy: Focus on China

The Pentagon has considered China as the United States’ number one ‘pacing challenge’ since the early days of the Biden administration, reinforcing a longer-term ‘pivot to the Pacific’. This stance was formally articulated in the 2022 National Defense Strategy, which prioritised addressing China’s growing influence and assertiveness. The Trump administration is taking this approach one step further. On 29 March 2025 an internal planning memo from the desk of US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was leaked. This Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance document cites the United States’ strategic priorities as deterring a Chinese invasion of Taiwan, and defence of the US homeland. “China is the Department’s sole pacing threat, and denial of a Chinese fait accompli seizure of Taiwan – while simultaneously defending the US homeland is the Department’s sole pacing scenario,” Hegseth wrote.

Trump’s Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth (seen here touring Guam) continues to affirm the US commitment to the security of Indo-Pacific allies, a commitment which disproportionally relies on maritime forces. [US Navy]Regarding force planning, the guidance states that the services should exclusively consider conflict with Beijing when planning contingencies for a major power war. While this does not equate to abandonment of other geographic regions, the document states that the US is now willing to “assume risk” in other parts of the world. This includes increased pressure on European, Middle Eastern and East Asian allies to take much greater (if not sole) responsibility for deterring Russia, Iran and North Korea. The guidance also implies that the US will devote fewer resources to constraining militants in the Middle East and Africa who are regionally destabilising but lack the ambition to launch international attacks.

Fleet expansion and maintenance

Any conflict in the Indo-Pacific region will disproportionally involve the United States’ maritime forces, including the US Navy and USMC. Given this, President Trump’s statements early in his second term have highlighted the need to improve naval readiness and force posture. During a 6 January 2025 television interview given shortly before his inauguration, he declared that the US has been “sitting back watching” and “suffering tremendously” while China’s fleet grows. He declared his intent to initiate a significant fleet expansion quickly, and implied he was open to contracting with allies in order to increase procurement rates. The latter approach had already been advocated by President Biden’s Navy Secretary, Carlos del Toro, in 2024 after touring shipyards in Japan and South Korea.

During his Senate confirmation hearing on 14 January 2025 then designate Defense Secretary, Pete Hegseth, stated that shipbuilding would be a top priority of the administration. “We need to reinvigorate our defense industrial base in this country to include our shipbuilding capacity,” Hegseth said. “Shipbuilding is an urgent national security priority. If confirmed, I will immediately direct the Secretary of the Navy and the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment to create a shipbuilding roadmap to increase our capacity.” Subsequently, on 4 March, President Trump announced his intention to establish the Office of Shipbuilding within the White House. While the office will pursue revitalisation of both the commercial and military shipbuilding sectors, the president emphasised the impact on the defence industrial base and the need to speed up and expand naval shipbuilding. “To boost our defense industrial base, we are going to resurrect the American shipbuilding industry, including commercial shipbuilding and military shipbuilding…It will have a huge impact to further enhance our national security,” Trump said during an address to Congress. Further details about the new office’s authority and likely approach are, however, still awaited.

Strengthening the Navy’s industrial base was also a focus during Navy Secretary John Phelan’s confirmation hearings in February 2025. Speeding construction of new vessels while reigning in cost overruns is only part of this equation, with Phelan citing the need to replenish stockpiles of munitions and to overcome the fleet’s significant maintenance backlog as important objectives. Phelan, a financier with no prior government or military experience, was specifically chosen in order to replace the status quo within the department. “The U.S. Navy is at crossroads, with extended deployments, inadequate maintenance, huge cost overruns, delayed shipbuilding, failed audits, subpar housing, and, sadly, record-high suicide rates,” Phelan stated during his confirmation hearing. “These are systemic failures that have gone unaddressed for far too long. Frankly, this is unacceptable…My role is to…step outside the status quo and take decisive action with a results-oriented approach.”

Details of how the new secretary plans to alleviate the shortfalls within the shipbuilding industry – shortfalls that have multiple causes including insufficient and outdated infrastructure as well as a lack of skilled labour – are yet to emerge. In general terms Phelan has spoken of incentivising industry while holding contractors responsible for cost overruns and delays. Increasing competition with regard to the supply of components is also regarded as a potential solution. However, the new secretary has cited the need to conduct a “root cause analysis” before proposing concrete solutions to the shipbuilding crisis.

Budgetary priorities

Finding ways to finance increased naval procurement is a fundamental consideration. Shortly before leaving office in January 2025, President Biden’s defense secretary, Lloyd Austin, had proposed an increase in defence spending of approximately USD 50 billion per annum over previous projections beginning with the FY2026 budget in order to support a much needed growth in defence acquisitions, as well as operations and training. The recommendation would have raised defence spending to more than USD 1 trillion by 2028. While the new administration seems to agree on the amount of additional funding needed, it is taking a different approach to that suggested by Austin.

For the moment, Donald Trump has backed away from his campaign’s stated goal of major defence budget increases; instead the administration’s current fiscal focus is on the annual reallocation of around USD 50 billion in planned defence spending away from lower priority programmes – including those associated with climate change and diversity programmes – to key procurement accounts. The White House also wants to make drastic cuts to the civilian staff of the US Department of Defense (DoD) on the assumption that federal government bureaucracies are oversized and inefficient.

Medium and large-sized unmanned surface vessels such as the 55 metre, 240 tonne NOMARS (No Manning Required Ship) Defiant (USX-1) are likely to make up a major portion of the future US Navy fleet. [DARPA]The implications of the administration’s plans are uncertain. If internal DoD savings of USD 50 billion can, indeed, be realised, this could put numerous programmes across all the services on a much more solid footing. For example, the CBO’s January 2025 Analysis of the US Navy’s 2025 Shipbuilding Plan finds that the required procurement budget over that timeframe will average USD 40 billion per annum. This is 17% more than the navy’s estimate of USD 33.2 billion. The CBO concluded that “including the costs of operating and maintaining those ships, buying new aircraft and weapons, and funding the Marine Corps, the Navy’s total budget would need to increase from USD 255 billion today to USD 340 billion (in 2024 dollars) in 2054 to implement the 2025 plan.” This funding shortfall is expected to cause delays or lead to programme cancellations. The hardest hit by these shortfalls are capital-intensive and long-term projects, including shipbuilding, aircraft and missile systems. Clearly, this problem could be significantly reduced by the allocation of billions of dollars from lower priority objectives

However, most analysts agree that savings of this magnitude cannot be achieved without cutting into training, maintenance and personnel accounts, risking operational readiness. Currently discussed plans to cut 50,000-60,000 DoD civilian positions are also expected by many to impact readiness and, ironically, oversight of military research, development and acquisition programmes. It remains to be seen whether the administration can overcome these concerns.

Force structure options

The stated goal of fleet expansion will not preclude cancelling acquisition programmes which are perceived as troubled or which do not align with the administration’s strategic priorities. The Columbia (SSBN-826) class strategic submarine programme is suffering delays, but is considered safe because it is integral to revitalising the nation’s strategic arsenal. Likewise, the Virginia (SSN-774) class unclear-powered attack submarines remain a priority. The Trump administration has expressed strong support for unmanned systems and other advanced technologies, and is expected to approve development and production of the 6th generation manned carrier-based strike fighter, the F/A-XX.

The keel laying ceremony for the first Columbia class ballistic missile submarine, USS District of Columbia (SSBN-826), in June 2022. Given the Trump administration’s support for strengthening nuclear deterrence, the Columbia class strategic submarine programme is expected to continue with no cuts or delays. [US Navy]However, some acquisition projects which were until recently considered high priority may face cancellation over technology issues and doubts over performance. One possible candidate for the red pen is the Constellation (FFG-62) class frigate, which is now three years behind schedule and USD 200 million per ship over budget. John Phelan has labelled the ship a “mess.” Both he and President Trump have blamed US Navy leadership for demanding belated and counterproductive changes to the frigate’s design, which have led to unplanned weight increase and threaten to reduce manoeuvrability. Given the comparatively early state of the class’s construction programme and the outlook for high-performance large unmanned vessels – which could assume some of the roles assigned to the class – it is not inconceivable that the programme could be cancelled or reduced in order to free resources for other projects.

A work in progress

It is only four months into the new administration; early days by any measure. The immediate focus on addressing the catastrophic shortfall in shipbuilding and maintenance infrastructure are promising. The big question is how quickly existing shipyards can be reformed, modernised and expanded? South Korean and Japanese industry are likely to offer lessons which can, at least in part, be applied in the United States as well, although the process of revising procedures, retraining personnel, and installing new technology will take time. Building new shipyards, component factories, and maintenance facilities, or reactivating closed installations, will take even longer. Nonetheless, a start has been made, and needs to be carried through with resolve; even partial progress will be an improvement.

In the interim, procurement of foreign built (rather than simply foreign designed) platforms would provide a time-sensitive boost to the fleet. President Trump has repeatedly praised the Italian FREMM on which the Constellation class was originally based, and has spoken of an option to procure vessels in allied nations if domestic reforms are inadequate. Whether this remains a serious option given the preference for boosting domestic industry displayed by the levying of tariffs on imports from these same nations, as well as likely Congressional opposition to shifting critical defence work overseas, remains to be seen.

The decision to focus exclusively on the Indo-Pacific region and homeland defence, as outlined in Secretary Hegseth’s interim guidance document, is also problematic. While Washington may expect allies to assume a greater share of the burden of securing regional seaways, the US Navy’s assets would be sorely missed in the North Atlantic or other strategically vital regions. The joint US Navy/US Air Force bombing campaign against the Houthi militia in March 2025 seems to reflect recognition of this fact. Even though US commercial shipping interests may be less reliant on Red Sea transit than European, Middle Eastern or Asian commerce, the waterway is of strategic importance to the United States, including as a key transit route for military ships and logistics vessels. The unavoidable truth is, global superpower status and global presence go hand in hand. For Washington, the US Navy and USMC are fundamental to this global presence.

Sidney E Dean

Author: Sidney E. Dean is a freelance writer and editor specialising in strategic studies, military technology and military history. He serves as North American correspondent for ESD and other Mittler Verlag publications.