President Donald Trump has announced plans for the US Navy to build new “Trump-class” battleships that will be nuclear-armed and larger, faster and 100 times more powerful than any predecessor.
Two such ships will be built to begin with, and up to 25 ultimately, as the US pushes to revive its shipbuilding through the promise of a “Golden Fleet”. The first ship will be called the USS Defiant.
Mr Trump said he will have a direct role in designing the warships. “The US Navy will lead the design of these ships along with me, because I’m a very aesthetic person,” he said on Monday.
“We just wanted peace through strength. Hopefully we never have to use them, but there will never be anything built like these,” Mr Trump said, adding that the ships would be built using American steel and assembled by robots and humans.
A poster displayed at a news conference in his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida showed an artist’s rendering of the Defiant, with missiles and heavy gunfire bursting from its flat deck.
Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth said the new battleships will carry nuclear-armed, sea-launched cruise missiles.
The ships will be “the biggest and most lethal ever” and mark “a generational commitment to American sea power across the entire [Defence] Department”.
The development of the warships will lead to “more tonnage and firepower under construction than at any time in history”, US Navy Secretary John Phelan said. He added that components will be built in every US state.
According to the newly created website for the Golden Fleet, this “guided missile battleship” is set to be roughly the same size as Iowa-class battleships but only weigh about half as much, around 35,000 tons, and have far smaller crews – between 650 and 850 sailors.
When asked if the new ships will be built to counter China, Mr Trump said they would serve as a “counter to everybody”.
“It's not China,” he said. “We get along great with China. I have a great relationship with President Xi [Jinping] and not China. It's just everybody. You don't know who comes along but we just wanted peace through strength.”
Amid a military build-up in the Caribbean before possible military action against Caracas, Mr Trump also said the US would keep the oil from the Venezuelan tanker that was seized on December 10.
“We're keeping it. We're keeping the ships also,” he said.
The Golden Fleet also envisions an increase in other types of war vessels, including a smaller, more nimble frigate class previously announced by the US Navy, Mr Trump said.
Only a month ago, the US Navy scrapped plans to build a new, small warship, citing growing delays and cost overruns. Instead it decided to go with a modified version of a Coast Guard cutter that was being produced until recently. The Navy has also failed to build other newly designed ships, such as the new Ford-class aircraft carrier and Columbia-class submarines, on time and on budget.
