It has been proposed that container ships with weapons and equipment in shipping containers could create auxiliary cruisers to provide needed numbers for the Navy. I proposed the same thing many years ago.
In the past half decade, innovators have heeded calls to increase the Navy’s ship count by putting containerized missiles on merchant ships. They have improved the weapons, drones, and sensors to the point the Navy is experimenting with mounting them on container ships. Even so, U.S. politicians, military leaders, and analysts continue to overemphasize the number of destroyers, cruisers, frigates, etc., the Navy needs. But the Navy has acknowledged it cannot meet its goal of 380-plus ships any time soon[.]
If numbers matter, we should pursue numbers.
I proposed a modularized auxiliary cruiser long ago. But contrary to the image above, after seeing a number of photos of container ships with stacked containers tilted and in danger of tumbling off, I suggested stacking the containerized mission modules isn't ideal. Lots of containers fall off container ships--1,500 per year--from many causes not even related to combat:
This included stormy weather, ship design, propulsion issues and how containers are lashed together, including varying regulations around the latter. The degradation of containers and resulting metal fatigue could also be considerations.After USNI sat on my essay for close to a year, I retracted it, eventually adapted it for power projection missions in AFRICOM, and sent it to Military Review, where it won third place in their annual contest.
I recently wrote about the concept. And I've noted the cited Dutch development.
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NOTE: The image is from the article.
