1 of 7 | The LHD-class amphibious assault ship USS Bataan is shown in a dry dock slip at Norfolk, Va., during a regularly scheduled maintenance period on Nov. 18. A Government Accountability Office report released this month found that as of March, only two of the Navy’s seven LHD amphibious assault vessels were in satisfactory material condition. U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Spec. 2nd Class Bradley Rickard

The GAO’s report, issued Dec. 5 under the requirements of the fiscal year 2023 National Defense Authorization Act, pulled no punches in warning that the Marines’ ability to carry out such missions is under compromise.

“Amphibious warfare ships are critical for Marine Corps missions, but the Navy has struggled to ensure they are available for operations and training,” the report found. “In some cases, ships in the amphibious fleet have not been available for years at a time.”

The report comes after Marine Corps leaders issued repeated warnings over the condition of the fleet and the Navy authorized spending nearly $10 billion on replacement ships — but at the same time deferred maintenance on existing craft, the GAO reported.

Unique capabilities

The amphibious ships are battle-force vessels, meaning they count toward the quoted size of the Navy and its force-level goal.

The primary function of Navy amphibious ships is to transport U.S. Marines and their weapons, equipment and supplies to distant operating areas, enabling them to conduct expeditionary operations ashore.

Although amphibious ships can be used to support Marine landings against opposing military forces, they also are used for operations in permissive or benign situations in which no opposing forces exist.

Because of their large storage spaces and their ability to use helicopters and landing craft to transfer people and equipment from ship to shore without need for port facilities, amphibious ships are deemed essential for a wide range of combat and noncombat operations.

Some of the Navy’s contingent of amphibious ships are forward-deployed to various overseas operating areas at any given time, typically in multi-ship formations called amphibious groups, or ARGs.

The Navy’s current amphibious ship force is made up entirely of large craft, including the so-called “big-deck” amphibious assault ships, designated “LHA” and “LHD,” which look like medium-sized aircraft carriers, and relatively smaller ships designated “LPD” or “LSD,” sometimes called “small-deck” amphibious ships.

Federal law requires the Navy to include at least 31 operational amphibious warfare ships, consisting of at least 10 LHA/LHD-type “big-deck” vessels, with the remaining ships to be LPD/LSD-type.

Critical to deterrence

Thirty-two ships are in the fleet — the “absolute minimum” needed, former Marine Corps Commandant David Berger told the Senate Armed Forces Committee during testimony in April 2023.

Calling the amphibious ships “critical to crisis response,” he warned that their poor condition is imperiling the U.S. ability to project its power when needed the most.

“They’re critical to deterrence,” he said. “That’s how we evacuated citizens out of Lebanon. That’s how the U.S. made our initial entry into Afghanistan in 2001 — all from the sea.”

The fleet now is tasked to do all those things “plus deterrence, plus integrated deterrence and campaigning,” Berger said. “And my concern here is, the first time this nation can’t respond to a crisis and someone else does, is the last time they trust us.”

Navy/Marine ARGs have been in action several times in recent months, demonstrating what military officials say is their usefulness in many different kinds of situations.

For instance, sailors assigned to the America Amphibious Ready Group and Marines from the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit conducted humanitarian assistance and disaster relief operations in Papua New Guinea after the eruption of Mount Bagana on July 31, 2023.

And following the surprise attack by the Palestinian militant group Hamas on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, a Navy/Marine ARG led by the USS Bataan immediately responded to provide support for the U.S. Central Command in the Red Sea.

“Their rapid response demonstrated the ARG/MEU’s ability to provide expeditionary sea-based contingency response packages during times of crisis without the constraints and restraints of access, basing and overflight,” current Marine Commandant Eric Smith testified to Congress in April.

GAO: Half of fleet in substandard condition

Given the crucial role they play in the United States’ ability to quickly send Marines into rapidly emerging threat zones, it may seem essential to keep all of the amphibious assault fleet in top operating condition.

But that is hardly the case, the GAO report found.

“Amphibious warfare ships are critical for Marine Corps missions, but the Navy has struggled to ensure they are available for operations and training,” it stated.

“In some cases, ships in the amphibious fleet have not been available for years at a time. The Navy and Marine Corps are working to agree on a ship availability goal but have yet to complete a metrics-based analysis to support such a goal.

“Until the Navy completes this analysis, it risks jeopardizing its ability to align amphibious ship schedules with the Marine Corps units that deploy on them. As of March 2024, half of the amphibious fleet is in poor condition and these ships are not on track to meet their expected service lives,” the GAO found.

Furthermore, the audit agency said this state of affairs has impaired the Marine Corps’ ability to train for amphibious assault missions.

The Navy, it found, is also facing problems with procuring spare parts, testing the reliability of ship systems and performing maintenance in a timely manner. For example, the GAO found that the Navy canceled maintenance for aging amphibious ships it plans to retire, even though it had not yet completed the steps required for their necessary divestment waiver processes.

The report said Navy officials have since halted the practice of canceling such maintenance prior to getting divestment waivers, but the have yet to update their official policy to reflect that decision, which the GAO said is needed to ensure these ships remain functional should Congress restrict funding for expected replacement vessels.

Meanwhile, the statutory requirement that the Navy have no less than 31 operating amphibious assault vessels available at any given time could pose problems for the service.

While it is considering extending the service life for some ships to meet the requirement, “these efforts will require up to $1 billion per ship, according to the Navy, with six ships needing service life extensions in the next three decades amid rising ship construction costs and maintenance backlogs,” the report found.

Four new amphibious ships coming under $9.4B contract

After many months of debate over the future of program, the Navy on Sept. 24 announced its had awarded a $5.8 billion “block buy” contract for the construction of three San Antonio-class small-deck ships and a modification to a separate, $3.6 billion contract for the construction of a big-deck ship.

Both types are built by Huntington Ingalls Industries/Ingalls Shipbuilding of Pascagoula, Miss.

The service has traditionally been tight-lipped when responding to reports about the operating condition of its fleet, citing security concerns. Its reaction to the GAO report was similarly muted.

In a statement issued to media outlets Dec. 3, a spokesman for Secretary of the Navy Carlos Del Toro said “the Department of the Navy remains committed to building and maintaining 31 amphibious warships, as mandated by Congress.

“We look forward to working with Congress and our partners in industry to find innovative ways to meet that requirement, such as the block-buy of three LPDs and one LHA we announced in September. We, alongside the Navy and Marine Corps team, are focused on ensuring we have the fleet and the force our nation needs.”

USS Boxer: Long stint out of action

Perhaps no one ship symbolizes the troubles facing the amphibious assault fleet more than the USS Boxer, an 840-foot, big-deck amphibious assault ship that was stuck pier-side at Naval Base San Diego for five years for a lengthy process of costly overhauls and repairs.

After finally returning to service in April, it was immediately sidelined again for emergency repairs to its rudder. The 30-year-old vessel was back in service again by July and has since been deployed in the Indo Pacific region on an abbreviated mission ahead of yet more upcoming assessments of its seaworthiness.

The ship’s high-profile problems in some ways have come to symbolize the disconnect between the Navy’s operations and the needs of the marine expeditionary units.

The issue was addressed publicly earlier this month by Adm. Lisa Franchetti, the Navy’s chief of naval operations, during a forum held by the Stimson Center, a foreign affairs think tank focusing on international security.

The maintenance of the amphibious fleet is “a big focus area for us,” she said, as top officers ask themselves questions such as “Where are we in the maintenance of all the ships? And then also, what are all the Marine Corps training requirements?”

How the Navy has handled the USS Boxer is illustrative of the approach it is taking, Franchetti said.

“Boxer had a rudder maintenance issue, and it needed to be fixed. It took a lot longer than we planned, and that was going to impact the Marines’ ability to deploy,” she said. “But together, we work through it. We work through how could the Marines still get their training and certification that they needed to do.

“As the Boxer was still delayed in her deployment, we got the other two ships out there. They were on deployment, a part of her ARG crew. And then we were able, once the Boxer got underway, to get her trained, certified quickly get her over there and have the deployment even extended beyond the original plan, so we could continue to provide more options to our nation’s leaders.”

During its brief deployment this summer, the Boxer was able to render humanitarian and disaster relief after a typhoon in the Philippines, she noted, adding, “So she was there when she needed to be” to provide a capability “that we need all around the world every single day.”