I agree. The observations of foreign shipyards and competitiveness I thought was interesting and bore resemblance to points I'd seen made elsewhere. It read as

I agree. The observations of foreign shipyards and competitiveness I thought was interesting and bore resemblance to points I'd seen made elsewhere. It read as credible. When the author began going into military strategy, that's where he lost me. With all due respect to the writer, it seemed like a lot of off-the-cuff ideas from a layperson who has the outsiders view on what they think naval warfare is like, combined with some knowledge elsewhere that doesn't necessarily apply. The author had a simple solution for dozens of things, my reply to which I can only surmise as "it's not that simple". Ship design and procurement is very complex, and takes into account many factors that are not always apparent (in many cases because they're not very appealing to study). That's not to say that the US Navy always gets it right. But even in the cases where they've gotten it wrong, you can at least follow the path of logic that got them there. These wishlists of "They should just do it this way, it's logically so much better!" I feel often fails to take into account the constraints and limitations of the environment, and how the things to be done fit into the greater warfighting picture. The latter alone I feel results in more misunderstandings of why some weapons are procured over others and why they do what they do than any other factor. There's some good defense journals which cover topics such as these from analysts with backgrounds in the subject matter. I was reading an article from War On The Rocks just yesterday on naval procurement, and their site is good reading for those interested in more from a more knowledgeable base.