Military Officer - October 2006 - (Page 46) M ULLEN , 59, grew up in Los Angeles and graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1968. He spent much of his early career aboard destroyers and cruisers and later commanded three ships, a cruiserdestroyer group, and a carrier battle group. He was the director of surface warfare in the late 1990s, served in various joint assignments in both the Atlantic and Pacific fleets, and, just a few years ago, was vice CNO. Mullen began his assignment as CNO with three priorities: sustaining current readiness, building for the future, and developing a strategy that is “right for our people.” The fleet had dropped to 281 ships. Projected budgets and escalating ship costs showed the fleet continuing to fall. “What I saw was a number around 200 or 220, depending on what assumptions you make. I thought it really important to stop that decline,” he says. After six months of study, Mullen and his staff concluded the U.S. Navy must have 313 ships to be properly sized for its missions. He submitted a shipbuilding plan to Congress in February that will get the Navy there by 2012. He concedes there are plenty of skeptics, including analysts inside and outside of government. He also concedes 313 ships will be out of reach unless costs can be contained. “We haven’t been exceptionally good at that in recent years,” Mullen says. He hopes the Navy, DoD, industry, and Congress can form a “strategic alliance” to control ship construction costs. The Navy’s big part will be to “control our appetite for the Star Wars version of every single ship.” Mullen got the ball rolling by knocking $200 million to $300 million off the cost of the next generation DD(X) destroyer by eliminating some spaces and capabilities. The ships still will cost $3 billion apiece. He also lowered the projected cost for a new carrier, CVN-79, by $1 billion and warned industry that if the Navy has to pay more than $2 billion apiece for Virginia-class submarines by 2012, in 2005 dollars, it won’t accelerate its purchases to two boats a year, as planned. “We are working our way through [cost] targets for every major program so people understand where the limits are. And the message from me is: That’s all we can afford,” says Mullen. 46 MILITARY OFFICER OCTOBER 2006 PHOTOS/IMAGES: TKTK
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