The Navy's anti-battleship bias began Dec. 7, 1941, when the Japanese surprise attack destroyed the U.S. Pacific Fleet's battleships. Although admirals in 1946 vowed never to bring back battleships, they served effectively in the Korean, Vietnam and Gulf wars. Congressional pressure brought the USS New Jersey to Vietnam for six months, leading the Marine commandant, Gen. Leonard Chapman, to conclude, "Thousands of American lives were saved." The Marines calculated that 80 percent of 1,067 U.S. planes lost in Vietnam could have been saved had battleships fought the entire war.
The admirals moved to get rid of battleships forever when Republican Rep. Richard Pombo proposed sending the USS Iowa to Stockton, Calif., as a museum. The Navy supports that as well as making the USS Wisconsin a museum in Norfolk, Va., and repealing the existing requirement to keep two battleships in reserve.
The Navy's anti-battleship campaign began March 15 when Adm. Charles Hamilton briefed the House Armed Forces Committee. It is no coincidence that Hamilton has been the Navy's point man promoting DD(X).
Never has it been clearer how the military-industrial complex functions. Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, General Dynamics and BAE Systems are mobilized behind DD(X) and against battleships. Congressional staffers, eyeing a future in the Pentagon or the armaments industry, know the way to future advancement is not to be pro-battleship.
"The Marine Corps supports the strategic purpose of reactivating two battleships," said a Nov. 19, 2004, General Accounting Office report. Since then, current Marine leaders have adhered to the naval position and walked away from boosting battleships, but not retired Marines. Gen. P.X. Kelley, the renowned former commandant, said in a June statement: "I would hate to see a premature demise of the battleships . . . without a suitable replacement on station. In my personal experience in combat, the battleship is the most effective naval fire support platform in the history of naval warfare."
The Army is an interested but silent listener to this debate. Its generals have failed in their fight over stressing tube artillery. If Congress now turns the last battleships into museums, the losers will be the grunts who carry rifles.