Lawmaker: Third DDG 1000 far from done deal

Zumwalt uncertainty
Congressman says final decision not yet made


Lawmaker: Third DDG 1000 far from done deal
By Philip Ewing - Staff writer
Posted : Wednesday Aug 20, 2008 6:54:27 EDT

Even after the Navy made what looked like another about-face and said it supports a third Zumwalt-class destroyer, the fate of the ship known as DDG 1002 was far from clear Tuesday.

After the third Zumwalt-class destroyer apparently disappeared from this year’s shipbuilding plan in July — when Navy officials said they only wanted the two of the proposed seven Zumwalts — the ship seemed to reappear Monday, when top Navy officials sent letters to members of Congress saying that the Navy would continue advocating for the third Zumwalt. In particular, Navy Secretary Donald Winter reassured Sen. Susan Collins, a Maine Republican, that the ship would be built at her home state’s Bath Iron Works.

“The Navy’s latest decision will help ensure a more stable workload for BIW,” Collins said in a statement, “and it will enable the continued development of the DDG 1000 advanced technologies that will be used on future ships such as the CG(X).”

Winter told The Politico newspaper on Tuesday that the U.S. shipbuilding base couldn’t recover from a gap in work if it ran out of ships to build.

“We want to be able to continue production of surface combatants, particularly destroyers. We want to avoid any gap, if you will, that would impact the industrial base or the fleet.”


Rest of article at: http://www.navytimes.com/news/2008/08/navy_zumwalts_081908w/%2e




uhc comment: $5.3 billion dollars for a destroyer.

If you are going to link to Army/Navy/... Times articles,
can you add a simple "%2e" work-around at the end of the URL
so we don't get 404 pages?

Example:
http://www.navytimes.com/news/2008/08/navy_zumwalts_081908w/%2e