Geurts: Shipyards not at risk

WASHINGTON – James Geurts, the Navy’s top acquisition executive, tried to clarify a leaked Defense Department information paper to reporters that warned “at least one” of seven shipyards builds ships for the Navy could close unless Congress handed over billions more to the service. As part of an $11B package DoD is requesting from Congress to mitigate the impact of COVID-19 on the defense industry. The Navy is requesting $4.7B (in part) to ward off chances that “at least one” of the big shipyards would shut down. The information paper, delivered to lawmakers, also warned of more than 100,000 lost jobs across shipyards and factories that make aircraft and other weapons for the military. Geurts told reporters: “There probably should be the word ‘temporarily’ in there.” If a shipyard sees a significant portion of its workforce test positive for COVID, “we might have to temporarily close down” the shipyard for a period of time … Not that we would have to shut down a shipyard permanently.” The memo contains no such caveat. It states a shipyard could close unless the Navy gets the funding. Mark Cancian, a defense expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, acknowledged that all Navy shipyards “have a backlog of work, including Bath (Maine) Iron Works, which was the subject of speculation about closing.” BIW is six months behind on building seven destroyers and reeling from a six-week strike. The Mobile, Ala.-based Austal USA shipyard is looking at the end of its contract to build dozens of aluminum Littoral Combat Ships, which may mark the end of the Navy’s interest in aluminum hulls. That shipyard “would be at more risk,” said Bryan Clark of the Hudson Institute. He noted that the Navy needs BIW to build future destroyers, since relying on Huntington Ingalls Industries’ Pascagoula, Miss., shipyard, the nation’s only other shipyard that can build these destroyers, is too risky. (Source: Breaking Defense 08/12/20) https://breakingdefense.com/2020/08/shipyards-not-at-risk-despite-dod-warning-it-needs-money-to-save-them/