Modern Cutters for IndoPaCom Partners Is a Win-Win Opportunity

In 2021, testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee, then-U.S. Indo-Pacific Command (IndoPaCom) commander Admiral Philip Davidson noted, “Absent a convincing deterrent, the People’s Republic of China will be emboldened to take action to undermine the rules-based international order and the values represented in our vision for a Free and Open Indo-Pacific.”¹ To help provide that deterrent, U.S. strategic documents emphasize developing regional partner states’ naval forces to enable them to challenge China’s unilateral maritime claims and flouting of international treaty and law.

While some U.S. allies and partners in the Indo-Pacific possess or are in the process of fielding blue-water power-projection capabilities, many regional naval forces—whether designated as navies or coast guards—are sized primarily for enforcing their exclusive economic zones and providing maritime security close to home. This has two major implications for U.S. decision-making. First, no single regional partner can go toe to toe with China alone. Second, U.S. Coast Guard forces and capabilities are closer to the needs of most of regional partners.

The latter has resulted in an increasing number of Excess Defense Article (EDA) sales of legacy Coast Guard assets to regional navies as the service modernizes its fleet. On the surface, this is an attractive, cost-effective solution. However, it might not be the best way to support allied naval forces.

Two asset classes, the 154-foot fast response cutters (FRCs) and the 418-foot national security cutters (NSCs), are nearing the end of their congressionally approved production runs, are currently in service with U.S. Coast Guard forces in the Indo-Pacific, and are well suited to meet the capability needs of partner nations. Instead of closing the production lines for these cutters, the United States should continue to build these ships, then decommission and transfer an early hull number to a regional partner for every additional ship built. This approach not only would have practical capability and diplomatic advantages for partner nations, but it also would facilitate a more capable Coast Guard and help maintain a more robust U.S. defense industrial base—a win for both.

Partner Benefits

One lesson from the Russia-Ukraine war is the importance of logistics and the ability to supply a partner with arms and ammunition, as well as battlefield intelligence. Legacy ships are equipped with older combat systems that may require ammunition no longer being acquired and information systems that lack secure interoperability with modern systems. If partners were equipped with modern ship classes, the United States could reach into its existing ordnance stocks to supply them should a conflict turn hot. In addition, modern electronics would help ensure interoperability and secure information sharing between and among the United States and its partners.²

Another benefit of equipping partner nations with modern surface assets is the availability of parts. One reason often cited by the Coast Guard for decommissioning the ships that make up current EDA sales is the difficulty and expense of obtaining the parts and technical expertise to maintain them. This difficulty carries over. For example, it took nearly two years for the Philippines to obtain parts to repair the Gregorio del Pilar (ex-USCGC Hamilton [WHEC-715]) after she was damaged during operations in the South China Sea.³

As many key systems on board these legacy ships are either original equipment and close to 50 years old or were installed during midlife refits, parts often must be custom fabricated or are no longer available at all. It is unrealistic to expect partner nations to be able to maintain vessels the U.S. Coast Guard—the 12th largest naval force in the world—could not effectively support in the country in which the ships were designed and built. This situation will only worsen for partner nations as more individuals with experience on these transferred ships and their systems reach retirement age.⁴

Commonality of equipment also would offer opportunities for partner personnel to participate in the high-quality training at Coast Guard and Navy “C” schools, as well as encourage cross-training and sharing of best practices among operators. This has been a common practice at the annual multinational Tradewinds exercise for Caribbean nations that operate small craft similar to those of the Coast Guard.

An often overlooked aspect is the national pride and public optics of fielding modern frigate-sized vessels and the impact that has on partner nations, even if their requirements can be handled by smaller craft or land-based systems. For example, the vice chief of the Indonesian Maritime Security Agency, with whom the U.S. Coast Guard has a close working relationship and conducts capacity-building activities, told CNN he was “not interested in used vessels” when asked about the decommissioning USCGC Adak (WBP-1333).⁵ On the other hand, offering used vessels of the same classes the Coast Guard is actively fielding, instead of ones it is scrapping, would present a very different optic. Actions are critical if the United States wants to demonstrate it desires truly collaborative relationships and that it views regional navies as partners, not just pawns in a competition between the United States and China for regional dominance.

U.S. Benefits

In addition to the benefits discussed above, equipping partner navies with newer cutters would offer four advantages that relate primarily to U.S. interests.

First, it would maintain the defense shipbuilding industrial base. U.S. shipbuilding is a very small and highly technical industry that relies on government contracts for survival, as U.S. yards are not competitive in the international market for either commercial or military vessels. Once a shipyard shuts down and its skilled tradesmen leave for new jobs, it is hard to restart or start another yard capable of producing military ships. Even reductions in contract volume can result in layoffs, which can delay acquisition programs. Maintaining shipbuilding capability and capacity is a national security imperative; were the situation in the Indo-Pacific to devolve into conflict, the United States would need to rapidly build, replace, or repair sizable numbers of ships. Continuing the production of FRCs and NSCs to support EDA transfers could help maintain domestic shipyard capacity.⁶

Second, it would provide economies of scale. There is a massive investment in cost and time for the first hull of a ship class. However, as production continues, cost and time per hull drop significantly, and any design problems are identified and worked out. By keeping FRCs and NSCs in production, design changes and technology upgrades could be incorporated to meet evolving requirements—similar to the different flights of the Arleigh Burke–class destroyers—instead of requiring a clean-sheet design, which often takes years of work prior to construction.

Third, keeping the cutters in production would aid U.S. Coast Guard–Navy integration. Historically, one obstacle to integration has been the Coast Guard’s failure to keep up with system upgrades for shared “Navy-type/Navy-owned” (NT/NO) systems. This results in the cutters—which at launch had the same capabilities as their Navy counterparts—becoming less relevant to operations and often unable to integrate in a modern networked environment.⁷ By keeping the FRCs and NSCs in production, the Coast Guard could integrate the latest versions of NT/NO systems into new hulls as they are produced. Most engineering work necessary for the upgrades would be done for these new-production cutters, which would lower the cost for sustainment commands to upgrade already fielded cutters.

Fourth, if regional partners are fielding modern integrated systems designed and built by U.S. defense contractors, those companies would have additional opportunities to market upgrades and maintenance and repair services. In addition, China and other strategic competitors would find it more difficult to make inroads by offering military hardware or training to nations that already have adopted U.S. defense systems. In the listing of major arms sales on the Defense Security Cooperation Agency site, most entries for sales related to naval warfare to countries in the Indo-Pacific over the past three years relate to logistics or technical support and upgrades to existing U.S. systems.⁸

Changing the Coast Guard’s major acquisition plan to continue ship production and transfer NSCs and FRCs to IndoPaCom partners would not be easy or inexpensive, but there would be considerable benefits to this approach. Transferring modern assets not only would demonstrate a deepening trust of and commitment to U.S. partners, but also would facilitate interoperability, improve deterrence, and ensure the United States can support its regional partners in the event of a future conflict, while providing benefits to the U.S. defense industrial base and the Coast Guard.