Amphibious assault ships are useful, but this effort to preserve industrial capacity ignores the Pentagon’s concerns that amphibious assault has fundamentally changed. The four Ohio class guided missile submarines — the former ballistic missile submarines USS Ohio (SSGN 726), USS Michigan (SSGN 727), USS Florida (SSGN 728) and USS Georgia (SSGN 729) — will start retiring by around 2028. Procuring a few Columbia class submarines to support a commando/unmanned craft mothership-type mission might be quite useful. That will not happen with the transition away from the Ohio class to the Columbia Class missile boats. The old Ohio class subs simply won’t have enough life left to convert.

Source: Forbes July 19, 2021 14:15 UTC