US President Donald Trump, flanked by Navy Secretary John Phelan (R), declares the US Navy’s new Golden Fleet initiative, unveiling a brand new class of frigates, at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Seaside, Florida, on December 22, 2025.
Andrew Caballero-Reynolds | Afp | Getty Photographs
On Monday, U.S. President Donald Trump unveiled plans for a brand new “Trump-class” battleship, declaring it could be “the quickest, the most important, and by far, 100 occasions extra highly effective than any battleship ever constructed.”
He hailed the ships as “among the most deadly floor warfare ships,” promising they might “assist preserve American army supremacy [and] encourage worry in America’s enemies everywhere in the world.”
However there’s one obtrusive downside: battleships have been out of date for many years. The final was constructed greater than 80 years in the past, and the U.S. Navy retired the final Iowa-class ships practically 30 years in the past.
As soon as symbols of naval may with their huge weapons, battleships have lengthy since been eclipsed by plane carriers and trendy destroyers armed with long-range missiles.
Whereas labeling the brand new floor combatants as “battleships” might be a misnomer, protection specialists say that there stay a number of gaps between Trump’s imaginative and prescient and trendy naval warfare.
Mark Cancian, a senior adviser on the Heart for Strategic and Worldwide Research, dismissed the concept, writing in a Dec. 23 commentary that “there’s no use for stated dialogue as a result of this ship won’t ever sail.”
He argued this system would take too lengthy to design, price far an excessive amount of, and run counter to the Navy’s present technique of distributed firepower.
“A future administration will cancel this system earlier than the primary ship hits the water,” Cancian stated.
Bernard Lavatory, senior fellow at Singapore’s S. Rajaratnam College of Worldwide Research, described the proposal as “a status undertaking greater than the rest.”
He in contrast it to Japan’s World Warfare II super-battleships Yamato and Musashi — the most important ever constructed — which have been sunk by carrier-borne plane earlier than taking part in a big function in fight.
{Photograph} of the IJN Yamato, the lead ship of the Yamato class of battleships that served with the Imperial Japanese Navy throughout World Warfare II. Dated 1941. (Photograph by: Photo12/Common Photographs Group through Getty Photographs)
Photograph 12 | Common Photographs Group | Getty Photographs
“Traditionally, we checked out battleships and the larger the higher… [and] in a really layman’s perspective of technique, dimension issues,” Lavatory stated.
He added that the scale of the proposed battleship — displacing greater than 35,000 tons and measuring over 840 toes, or just a little over two soccer fields lengthy — would make it a “bomb magnet.”
“The dimensions and the status worth of all of it make it an much more tempting goal, doubtlessly on your adversary,” Lavatory stated.
Bryan Clark, a senior fellow on the Hudson Institute, instructed Trump could also be drawn to the symbolic energy of battleships, which have been essentially the most seen icons of naval firepower for a lot of the twentieth century.
The usMissouri, accomplished in 1944 and the final U.S. battleship constructed, famously hosted Japan’s give up in 1945.
Japanese give up signatories arrive aboard the united statesMissouri to take part in give up ceremonies, Tokyo Bay, Japan, U.S. Military Sign Corps, September 2, 1945. (Photograph by: Circa Photographs/GHI/Common Historical past Archive/Common Photographs Group through Getty Photographs)
Common Historical past Archive | Common Photographs Group | Getty Photographs
Clark famous that the U.S. Navy recommissioned 4 World Warfare II battleships within the Nineteen Eighties as a part of its 600-ship fleet growth technique in the course of the Chilly Warfare to counter the Soviet Union. “This can be an period through which the president believes the U.S. final had naval supremacy.”
Battleships final noticed fight in 1991, when retrofitted Iowa-class battleships supplied shore bombardment hearth assist to coalition forces within the first Gulf Warfare.
The battleship USS Wisconsin (BB-64) launches a BGM-109 Tomahawk missile in opposition to a goal in Iraq throughout Operation Desert Storm. (Photograph by © CORBIS/Corbis through Getty Photographs)
Historic | Corbis Historic | Getty Photographs
What’s in a reputation?
Clark famous that the classification issues lower than the weapons a ship carries.
Based on the U.S. Navy, the “Trump-class” battleship — a part of a brand new “golden fleet” of warships — can be outfitted with weapons resembling typical weapons and missiles, in addition to digital rail weapons and laser-based weaponry. It can additionally have the ability to carry nuclear and hypersonic missiles.
Such a vessel would primarily perform like a big destroyer, no matter whether or not it’s known as a battleship.
Nonetheless, CSIS’ Cancian countered that such a design runs in opposition to the Navy’s distributed operations mannequin, which seeks to scale back vulnerability by spreading firepower throughout many belongings.
“This proposal would go within the different route, constructing a small variety of giant, costly, and doubtlessly weak belongings,” he wrote.
Even when the “Trump-class” battleship proves technically possible, analysts stated price can be the decisive impediment.
Lavatory stated U.S. weapons applications routinely exceed timelines and budgets.
The Navy’s Zumwalt‑class destroyers — the most important floor combatants presently at 15,000 tons — have been diminished from 32 to 3 ships as a consequence of spiraling prices. Extra not too long ago, the Constellation‑class frigate was cancelled as a consequence of design and workforce challenges.
Clark estimated the Trump‑class would price two to 3 occasions greater than right now’s destroyers. With Arleigh‑Burke destroyers priced at about $2.7 billion every, that suggests a single battleship might price upwards of $8 billion.
The price of crewing and sustaining them will put extra strain on an already strained Navy price range, he added.
RSIS Lavatory was extra important in his evaluation, calling the choice a strategic mistake. “On the very least, so far as I am involved, it is strategic hubris.”
