America’s Sailors Are Overworked—We Can Fix That
Deployed American aircraft carriers are home to some 5,000 souls onboard and are often described as “floating cities.” But they’re more densely populated than any city on Earth. And in recent years, Washington has asked our sailors and Marines to serve increasingly long and intense deployments to the Middle East and in the Pacific aboard these carriers and the ships that comprise their strike groups. These deployments are consistently breaking records, the kind of which no crew wants to be the record-holder.
Elongated tours with fewer morale-boosting port stops that let troops “touch grass” are part of a broader trend in which America stretches its Navy to meet global challenges, and in doing so defers training, delays maintenance, and strains the military with more time away from home. In an increasingly competitive and contested world at sea, reducing America’s reach would be a misstep. To relieve this burden while maintaining our security, we should invest today in the ships, sailors, and systems of tomorrow.
The U.S. Navy has played a crucial role in defending American bases, troops, and allies from recent Iranian attacks. With two of the globe’s eight critical maritime chokepoints, the Strait of Hormuz and the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, intermittently closed at the moment, the growing importance of a well-resourced Navy’s effect on domestic economic stability is on display. Ukraine’s strikes on the Russian navy have turned a new page in warfare through the prominence of unmanned naval drones, and standoffs between China and the Philippines have shown how an authoritarian navy can bully its neighbors. As global competitors develop and refine their naval forces, the U.S. will have to do the same to keep pace.
More ships can be helpful, but they should be built with modern conflict in mind. Naval warfare is evolving, and America’s future ships will face waves of drones, anti-ship missiles, and other mass-produced threats. Defending against a volume of threats with expensive, finite interceptors is a losing exchange, and ships that return to port to reload create gaps that other vessels must fill. The future of naval warfare requires dedicated anti-drone systems, directed energy weapons, and affordable long-range missiles that can hit the systems targeting our ships. Further agility will come from the ability to reload at sea and field masses of containerized payloads.
Naval drones will also be critical to helping meet growing demands at sea, as they can scout, patrol, refuel, surveil, and strike with less risk to crewmembers. Unlike larger manned ships, these platforms can be more readily produced at scale, and every mission they absorb can help shorten deployments or prevent skipped port calls. U.S. Navy leaders should more quickly address the necessary support questions regarding its robotic fleets. This includes who is in charge of these unmanned fleets, where they are stored when not in use, from which assets they are launched and recovered, coordinated command and control with manned assets, rules of engagement, what happens to them when the tech refreshes and the robots are outdated and discarded, power generation and sustainment on deployment, and training and doctrine for future crews.
To operate the next generation of America’s Navy, the U.S. needs to recruit the next generation of sailors. But an overstretched Navy creates a vicious cycle where would-be recruits see the strain and stress placed on America’s sailors and understandably question if it is a path they want to pursue. Fewer recruits in the pipeline means more responsibility falls to those already serving, perpetuating the cycle of overburdening sailors and deterring future volunteers. Conversely, a well-resourced Navy is attractive to recruits, creating a virtuous cycle bolstering not just enlistments but retention of current sailors. America’s Navy already offers pathways to working with some of the most advanced technology on the planet, which is a powerful recruitment incentive on its own. By providing crews with the resources to meet today’s security challenges and curb overdrawn deployments, the elements of life in the Navy that most inspire recruits can stand out while the downsides are mitigated and better managed. After years of struggling, the Navy’s recruitment numbers have recently begun to improve. By improving the lives of sailors, this positive trend can continue.
When a fleet is overstretched, it must decide between training exercises and paid leave for visits home, between schoolhouse time and workups. Recent strikes in the Middle East, for example, meant the Trump administration had to choose between sending a carrier, the USS Theodore Roosevelt, to back up forces in the region or lead multinational training exercises with allies near Hawaii. In these situations, military planners are placed in a no-win situation where they must pick between the near-term relief of forces in combat zones or the long-term readiness of the U.S. Navy. Ultimately, the choice to ride ships and crew to their breaking point in the near term means fewer ships and crews available to the next flashpoint, as maintenance cycles necessarily double or triple from the extensions of today.
We have made this choice starker than it should be. Defense planners will always have to choose from available ships, but too many are waiting for repairs. This is why alleviating this problem by modernizing our drydocks, piers, ports, and shipyards would have a compounding effect. More modern and voluminous infrastructure will allow more ships to become available faster, which in turn allows forces to balance training, rest, education, change of duty stations, and combat operations. Beyond America’s homeland facilities, expanding the ability to repair ships in allied countries like South Korea and Japan is another essential step in the right direction. Not only does this further relieve America’s overworked yards, but the time saved in crossing the ocean to return for repairs will prove pivotal in a protracted conflict.
Despite the challenges faced by America’s Navy, it remains peerlessly capable and inspiring. Innovative technology, military training, and partnerships with allies give it a massive edge over adversaries. But keeping this lead means sustaining the fleet by reducing deployment cycles and speeding up repair periods, while simultaneously building the manned and unmanned fleets America needs. We owe at least that much to the sailors and Marines who have been stretched thin by years of grueling operations without relief in sight.
Mackenzie Eaglen is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), where she works on defense strategy and military readiness. Concurrently, she is co-chair of the National Commission on the Future of the Navy, established by Congress to study the strategy, budget, and policies concerning the strength of the US Navy and Marine Corps. Brady Africk is an AEI research analyst specializing in open-source intelligence.