Identifying Pathways for U.S. Shipbuilding Cooperation with Northeast Asian Allies

Abstract

Military conflict in the Indo-Pacific will demand overwhelming American naval power. The challenges in U.S. shipbuilding, including capacity shortages, industrial base constraints, cost overruns, and delayed delivery, suggest that the United .States. should explore alternative pathways for delivering capability to the Navy. One option is enhancing cooperation with close allies, such as Japan and the Republic of Korea. The paper identifies options for cooperation such as allied participation in maintenance, repair, and overhaul (MRO), allied purchase and revitalization of U.S. shipyards, various methods of co-production including modular construction, and purchase of allied-built ships. This study offers metrics to evaluate these pathways such as time, cost, economic viability, political and regulatory feasibility, and the crucial variable of these pathways’ impact on U.S. shipbuilding capacity.