The Solution

The Bartlett Maritime Plan™

Plan Details as of August 7, 2023.

Create more than 41,000 Jobs

The Bartlett Maritime Plan™ uniquely and innovatively brings an entirely new, previously untapped labor pool in Ohio to the U.S. Naval Shipyard industrial enterprise.

The selection of Ohio for the CRCs is strategic, taking advantage of the relatively close proximity to east coast shipyards (overnight drive), strong logistic connection to west coast shipyards and robust available labor pool along the Great Lakes. Possessing 128% of the required skilled trades, this labor pool is largely idle or underemployed (for now) and is eager to apply their skills to submarine maintenance and repair. Shared with Navy leadership, this labor plan is also scalable and reproducible to support the development of follow-on, more expansive opportunities, such as the new Charleston Naval Shipyard option mentioned below.

Save the Navy Billions in the Cost of Capital & Years in Facility Development.

The Bartlett Maritime Plan™ uniquely and innovatively applies existing legislative authorities to facilitate a multi-party Public-Private-Partnership (P3) to affordably finance the required capability and capacity expansion for the U.S. Naval Shipyard industrial enterprise.

The Bartlett Maritime Plan™, developed with advice from our investment bankers at Goldman Sachs and our attorneys at Squire Patton Boggs, leverages existing law and regulations to allow access the capital markets to bring this opportunity to the U.S. Navy.   As an added benefit, and over an agreed amortized period, the Navy will then own the facilities via an authorized but never before utilized provision in federal law enabling long-term lease-purchases for this type of facility.  Said another way, already oversubscribed Navy military construction (MILCON), shipbuilding (SCN), and operations (O&MN) budgets are all protected, and these facilities become entirely affordable within Federal budget restrictions.

Adds Urgently Required New Submarine Construction Module Manufacturing Capacity to Support Electric Boat & Newport News Building both Columbia Class & Virginia Class Submarines

The Bartlett Maritime Plan™ can only achieve its goals by supplementing and supporting the existing U.S. Navy nuclear powered fleet shipyard industrial enterprise. As such, this plan is not a threat to any existing commercial (e.g., EB/NNS) or government shipyard or program (e.g., SIOP). Additionally adds urgently required new submarine construction module manufacturing capacity to support Electric Boat and Newport News building both Columbia Class and Virginia Class submarines.

The proposed Component Repair Center (CRC) facilities, which are in close proximity to east coast shipyards and logistically well-connected to support the west coast shipyards, will serve as baseline capabilities to begin addressing the attack submarine availability crisis.  These facilities include:

          · CRC – Lorain.  Construction of a ship component overhaul, repair, remanufacturing, and testing facility, to be built on a brownfield site located in Lorain, OH.

      · CRC – Lordstown.  Construction of a ship component and equipment rotatable pool and material stocking and kitting facility to be built on a greenfield site located in Lordstown, OH.

        · CRC – Foundry.  Acquisition, modernization, and installation of forge equipment at an existing highly specialized foundry located in a selected but publicly unspecified location.

The development and operation of these new industrial facilities targets bottlenecks in current maintenance processes and is anticipated to shorten typical 2-year SSN overhauls by 100 days each.  The collateral and cascading benefit is the depressurization of shipbuilding schedules for both new Virginia Class SSNs, the new Columbia Class Ballistic Missile submarines, and the proposed next generation SSN(X), with relief coming as soon as 6-months following contract award and full capability of the proposed facilities within 2 years.  This program is both completely scalable, as discussed below, and offers benefits expandable to other ship classes.

A Fifth Naval Shipyard is Included as a Program Option

Once the CRC facilities are established and the funding and oversight regimes are proven, the Bartlett Maritime Plan™ provides a follow-on option for a much needed fifth Naval Shipyard in Charleston, SC.  This new, advanced design shipyard is site-ready at the Naval Weapons Station in Goose Creek and could begin construction as early as 2024.

The Bartlett Maritime Plan™ complements, but does not threaten, existing Naval Shipyards and nuclear build yards.

The Bartlett Maritime Plan™ facilitates accelerating SIOP implementation.

The proprietary Bartlett Maritime Plan™ has been formally proposed to the U.S. Navy for a nominal phase 1 planning, research, and concept demonstration program.

No New Legislation is Required to implement The Bartlett Maritime Plan™

Nearly 40% of US Attack Submarines Are Out of Commission for Repairs

By Anthony Capaccio

July 11, 2023 at 5:00 AM EDT

Delays at naval shipyards mean that nearly 40% of US attack submarines are out of commission for repairs, about double the rate the Navy would like, according to new data released by the service.

As of this year, 18 of the US Navy’s 49 attack submarines — 37% — were out of commission, according to previously undisclosed Navy data published by the Congressional Research Service. That leaves the US at a critical disadvantage against China’s numerically superior fleet.

The maintenance backlog has “substantially reduced” the number of nuclear submarines operational at any given moment, cutting the “force’s capacity for meeting day-to-day mission demands and potentially putting increased operational pressure” on submarines that are in service, CRS naval analyst Ronald O’Rourke said in a July 6 report.

That’s up from 28% overall in 2017 and 33% in 2022, and below the industry best practice of 20%.

The Naval Sea Systems Command blamed “planning, material availability, and shipyard execution,” according to a statement issued in response to the new statistics. The service has launched several initiatives to address these “primary maintenance delay” drivers, it said.

The command gave an updated maintenance backlog status, saying that 16 of 49 subs, or 32%, were out of commission as of late June.

US defense officials and lawmakers consider the submarine force a key advantage over China’s bigger navy. The inactive subs are not the nuclear ballistic missile Ohio-class submarines but fast attack boats that can fire torpedoes and Tomahawk cruise missile at vessels and land targets, and perform stealth missions such as surveillance.

The previously undisclosed backlog woes stand in contrast to current Pentagon policy that’s called for increased visibility worldwide for the US sub force as a message to China, Russia and North Korea. The US has occasionally showcased its submarines in the past, but the pace picked up in the last year with publicized port visits in the Arabian Sea, at Diego Garcia, at Gibraltar and in the Atlantic.

The most recent was a June appearance by the guided-missile submarine USS Michigan in Busan, South Korea.

One current example of the extreme backlog is the USS Connecticut, one of three premier Seawolf-class submarines. It struck an underwater mountain in the South China Sea 20 months ago and won’t be back in service until early 2026 at the soonest.

The best year for attack sub availability was fiscal 2015 when 19% — or 10 of the then 53 subs — were in overhaul, according to figures contained in a June 13 Navy information paper.

In 2022, the Government Accountability Office said the Navy lost 10,363 operational days from 2008 through 2018 — the equivalent of more than 28 years — “as a result of delays in getting into and out of the shipyards.”

The newly disclosed statistics “are not surprising considering how the shipyards have been struggling to support the fleet with old facilities and inefficient layouts,” GAO spokesman Chuck Young said. The Navy is five years into a 20-year plan to redesign the four shipyards.

Young said the Navy still doesn’t have reliable cost or schedule estimates five years after the improvement effort began, and likely won’t have a better forecast until 2025.