The US Navy (USN) has decided to accelerate fielding a new generation of revolutionary small but fast ships as a way to jump-start 'transformation', according to service officials and industry sources. However, the strategy to achieve this goal remains unclear. Under current navy plans, construction of the first of as many as 60 Littoral Combat Ships (LCSs) will begin in Fiscal Year 2005 (FY05), much sooner than initially planned. Development of the LCS is being promoted by navy and Department of Defense (DoD) leaders as an affordable and revolutionary ship that will perform integrated network-centric operations that allow a 'high-low' mixture of forces. Some of these forces will be large, but expensive, multimission warships and some will be less capable but affordable platforms that can quickly be reconfigured for specific missions.
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