While a 355, 500 or 737-ship Navy is an important aspiration, the final tally must be grounded on the threat, tactical capability, affordability, as well as the infrastructure capacity of the U.S.
Nearly three-fourths of the world’s surface is covered by water, the vast majority of it being saltwater oceans. This enormous operational area must be kept in mind when considering the mission, as well as the maintenance and sustainment requirements, of our sea services. We must also understand the criticality of open shipping lanes to the world’s economy (including the arctic maritime area), secure underwater cables vital to banking and internet communications, and regulated fishing to the food security of billions of people. None of these things can be ensured without a robust and effective American maritime force capable of safeguarding these assets for our national interests and the stability of the global community. Learn more here.
Recent events across the world, including conflicts in Ukraine, Gaza, and the Red Sea, and the increasing tensions in the Indo-Pacific Command and South American/Caribbean regions, have taxed our maritime services significantly. This increased operational tempo has come with a price on our ships, equipment, stockpiles, and people. Meanwhile, due to a rising China and bellicose Russia, the U.S. no longer enjoys a monopoly on sea control or seapower. Despite these issues, our sea services must prepare for the possibility of great power competition within the next several years.
As a result of these destabilizing events around the world, the Trump administration has refocused the Department of Defense (also known as the Department of War) efforts to curb a perceived overextension of U.S. forces and adopt a more “America First” isolationist perspective. The new National Defense Strategy prioritizes U.S. homeland defense and the Western Hemisphere while relegating existing emphasis on China as the premier adversary to the United States as the top global threat to the nation to a secondary concern, which includes other potential adversaries such as Russia and Islamic extremists.
Building on this new NDS, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has focused on three key efforts for the department:
• Rebuilding our military
• Restoring the warrior ethos
• Reestablishing deterrence
Secretary of the Navy John Phelan has taken the president and Secretary Hegseth’s guidance and developed three priorities that he plans to steer the Department of the Navy to shape the future force in support of this direction in terms of readiness, accountability, and deterrence:
• Strengthening shipbuilding and the maritime industrial base
• Fostering an adaptive, accountable, and innovative warfighter culture
• Health, welfare, and training of Department of the Navy military and civilian personnel and their families
In 34th Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Daryl Caudle’s first “Message to the Fleet,” he reiterated long-standing Navy operational priorities to “deliver peace through strength, securing our national interests and prosperity.” Admiral Caudle has taken a more operational approach to his tenure as the new CNO. In addressing the current global challenges, he stated: “To prevail, we must build and sustain a Navy that is ready to fight and win — today, tomorrow and well into the future.” To do this, he plans to focus on three main themes: foundry, fleet, and fight:
• Foundry: This represents the total force, which includes the shore infrastructure and maintenance depots, and educational institutions needed to create, sustain, and modernize U.S. naval power. “Without a strong foundry, there is no fleet.”
• Fleet: The fleet is the nation’s decisive instrument of maritime power. It is “forged” from people, platforms, and payloads and is designed to deter aggression, project power, and secure our national interests on and from the sea.
• Fight: Fighting is the end-state application of foundry and fleet. While the U.S. Navy has been highly successful for nearly 250 years, the new maritime fight is different, requiring greater innovation and adaption of new technologies in a rapidly evolving maritime landscape.
The FY 2026 Marine Corps active operations budget request continues to support readiness and modernization efforts by prioritizing funding aimed at further reinforcing Force Design transformation initiatives. The Marine Corps is organized, trained, and equipped as a naval expeditionary force that is ready 24/7 to operate, along with allies and partners, inside actively contested maritime spaces in support of fleet operations with the implementation of the Stand-in Force concept.
And the Coast Guard, not only essential to homeland security but also to “gray zone” operations in the Indo-Pacific, is adapting to an ever-increasing portfolio of foreign and domestic operations. Acting Commandant of the Coast Guard Admiral Kevin Lunday released the Coast Guard’s Force Design 2028, which is expected to drive “transformational changes” throughout the department. It focuses on four main areas for the future of the Coast Guard:
• Organization
o Transforming strategic and operational decision-making to enhance mission effectiveness
o Revolutionize the Coast Guard’s organizational design to contend with a rapidly changing world
• People
o Grow the Coast Guard’s future force
o Deliver a high-quality, mission-aligned workforce
o Ensure force readiness and resiliency for a complex and uncertain future
• Technology
o Change how mission-critical capabilities are acquired, deployed, and maintained to accelerate continuous technology insertion to make Coast Guard operations more effective and mission support more efficient
o Rapidly identify and adopt advanced capabilities for frontline operators through innovative methods, data enablement, and empowered delivery teams, setting the standard for digital excellence across the federal government
o Advance core information technology systems and enhance our cybersecurity posture to maximize operational effectiveness
• Contracting and acquisition
o Revolutionize Coast Guard major acquisition and shore infrastructure program planning and execution
o Create a high velocity contracting and procurement organization for the Coast Guard by 2028
o Optimize Coast Guard acquisition workforce agility and responsiveness
Learn more here.
The Navy oversees a vast maintenance portfolio including its surface fleet, submarines, and aircraft. It has requested additional funds and programs related to maintenance in preparation for increased demand. The Marine Corps continues to use a Total Force (active and reserve component) approach for the planning and execution of ground equipment depot maintenance. For FY 2026, program increases are attributed primarily to updated maintenance strategies and service-life extensions for automotive equipment and the addition of new radar systems into the ground depot maintenance program. The Coast Guard is recapitalizing its fleet, and the new vessels it introduces will not only need their own upkeep and maintenance, but the home ports and facilities supporting these vessels will also need alterations. The Coast Guard is also engaged with in-service vessel sustainment, which is the Coast Guard’s strategic class-by-class evaluation of its vessels to determine what major maintenance and upgrades are necessary to reach or extend their service lives. Learn more here.
Delivering decisive combat power is more than just putting ordnance on target. It depends on the ability to sustain combat action and maintain and prolong combat operations until the adversary is beaten or surrenders.
The 2018 National Defense Authorization Act codified the goal of producing a 355-ship fleet, though recent Navy 30-Year Shipbuilding Plans have provided multiple options ranging below and above this figure. The Navy’s Maritime Sustainment Strategy identifies four key lines of effort:
· Operationalize the shore
· Integrate logistics command and control
· Enable assured power projection
· Strengthen sustainment for distributed operations
The Navy-Marine Corps leadership team is pushing a more integrated and sustainable force design and structure than ever before. A fully integrated naval force is at the forefront of all discussion, plans, and driving policies regarding resources. The 39th Commandant of the Marine Corps, General Eric Smith, released his Planning Guidance in August 2024 that builds on the evolving Force Design 2030 and reiterates his priorities:
1. Balancing crisis response and modernization
2. Naval integration and organic mobility
3. Quality of life
4. Recruit, make, and retain Marines
5. Maximize the potential of our reserves
In 2020, a Hudson Institute study proposed a battle force fleet size of 581 ships, including a mix of traditional aircraft carriers, submarines, destroyers and cruisers, amphibious ships, logistics ships and 139 unmanned surface and submersible vessels. There have been other official sources advocating for a bigger Navy by 2045, dramatically increasing the size of the future submarine fleet, with new smaller surface combatants and amphibious warships. Without additional funding for the Navy, a force structure size of 355, 500, or more ships will never be realized, and the nation will find itself at greater risk in protecting the maritime commons for U.S. and allied interests abroad.Learn more here.
This section lists nearly two dozen specific recommendations to address the ongoing issues impacting the operations, maintenance, and sustainment of our sea services. Detailing needs from the Arctic to the Indo-Pacific, from shipbuilding to C4ISR, from manning to production, this section provides the results of exhaustive research into the issues identified previously. Learn more here.
When viewed from space, the sheer size of our global maritime commons are vast. It is important to keep this picture in mind when considering our four U.S. maritime organizations and how they are being tasked and employed all over the world daily. Make no mistake, our maritime forces have a monumental task of protecting American interests in the maritime commons. Here are a few statistics to put this critical national security mission in context:
• 71 percent of our planet is covered by water; 97 percent of this maritime environment is saltwater.
o Of the 3 percent of freshwater on this planet, the United States owns 45 percent of that volume with the largest freshwater lake system in the world.
• The United States is the third-largest country by land area in the world behind Russia and Canada.
• The United States has the third-largest population in the world at about 345 million people. India (1.45 billion) and China (1.42 billion) are ahead.
o However, India has lost over 630,000 people due to migration, and China has lost 319,000 people, while the U.S. gained 1.29 million people in 2024.
o According to projected population growth pyramids, the world’s population is expected to grow from about 8 billion people in 2024 to 10.35 billion people by the year 2100 (in 76 years). During that time, the population of the United States is expected rise almost another 50 million people to 394 million, while the Chinese population is expected to lose over 663 million people, and Russia will lose 32 million people to drop to about 112 million total.
o About 3 billion people (about 44 percent) around the world live within 200 kilometers of a coastline.
• According to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration statistics, the U.S. has nearly 95,500 miles of coastal shoreline.
• The United States owns over 4 million square miles of maritime water (about 7.77 percent of the world’s total Exclusive Economic Zone area) as part of its recognized EEZ water space (which extends out 200 nautical miles from our coastline), second only to France (because of its vast overseas territories). The U.S. EEZ holds critical natural resources for our nation, including fishing, oil reserves, and minerals.
Looking at these statistics, it is also important to view how the nations of the world are using the maritime environment. Here are two graphics of the maritime shipping lanes that show just how critical the maritime commons are to the economic security of our nation and the rest of the world.
Now look at the underwater communications cable laydowns around the world. These underwater cables carry well over 90 percent of the world’s international internet, telephony, and data transmission that control the global markets. All the banking systems of the world send trillions of dollars across these underwater cables 24 hours a day at the speed of light. Any disruption of these vital lifelines would have disastrous consequences for our nation and the world.
Expanding on this global perspective, a review of the latest data from the Uppsala Conflict Data Program from the Department of Peace and Conflict Research at the Uppsala University in Sweden shows that there are over 200 various types of armed conflict around the world all the time—and this statistic has grown dramatically over the past 20 years. And the most sobering statistic—over 3.3 billion people have died in armed conflicts around the world over the past 35 years.
Given the facts above, it is surprising that there is still an ongoing discussion on whether the United States needs a robust and capable maritime fleet to maintain the security of our maritime spaces, protect our people, natural resources and coastlines, support our global allies, and keep the sealines of communication (and underwater communication lines) open or not. Nevertheless, there is no doubt that the United States is a maritime nation, and always will be.
Right now, the U.S. Navy only fields about 293 battle force ships. Of those, a little over 100 ships are forward-deployed around the world, and of those, about 60 ships are currently underway.
With 11 different congressionally mandated mission sets involving both homeland security and non-homeland security missions, the U.S. Coast Guard deploys hundreds of operational assets to perform missions and support geographic combatant commanders worldwide. The service has 259 cutters (vessels greater than 65 feet) of various sizes and mission focus and about 200 fixed and rotor wing aircraft carrying out a multitude of critical tasks in support of our national defense and security strategies.
This section focuses on how our U.S. maritime services are addressing these operational and geostrategic challenges and where we think more action needs to be taken by Congress, the executive branch, and American citizens. The crux of the matter is that the solution is not just about shipbuilding numbers; it is much broader, requiring a coordinated, whole-of-government approach encompassing several lines of effort that must all be executed simultaneously rather than piecemeal or sequentially and must be implemented and committed to for decades to be successful. The complexity of these issues intertwines in a symbiotic nature where maritime operations bleed into sustainment issues, which in turn impact maintenance issues, budgets, manpower, infrastructure, and more.
Recent events across the world, including conflicts in Ukraine, Gaza, and the Red Sea, and the increasing tensions in the Indo-Pacific and South American/Caribbean regions, have taxed our maritime services significantly. There is no doubt that the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps are the most lethal and capable maritime forces the world has ever known and that the U.S. Coast Guard, deployed locally and globally, is the most effective maritime constabulary force. However, this increased operational tempo has come with a price on our ships, equipment, stockpiles, and people.
The United States is a maritime nation. Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution directs Congress “to provide and maintain a Navy,” proving our Founding Fathers recognized nearly 250 years ago that a strong Navy was the most reliable guarantor of U.S. interests at home and abroad. The U.S. Navy and Coast Guard protect our waterways and sea lanes, ensuring the free movement of goods and services across the globe. Both are forward-deployed, dissuading potential adversaries, assuring allies, and building partnerships. The U.S. Navy ensures robust maritime logistics remain intact in times of conflict to support the other services, especially in a contested modern, multidomain environment. The Navy and Coast Guard are also first responders to global crises. Investing in these services generates jobs, expands the pool of skilled American workers, and generates secondary and tertiary economic benefits. It is the bedrock for securing our nation and American interests for generations to come.
However, with a rising China and bellicose Russia, the U.S. no longer enjoys a monopoly on sea control or seapower, and mere numbers of maritime assets may no longer be the appropriate measure of maritime strength. Adversarial regimes such as North Korea and Iran (with its proxies such as the Houthis in Yemen) persist in taking actions that threaten regional and global stability. And while the Navy’s priorities have been defined by the National Security Strategy and National Defense Strategy, which directs our maritime forces to protect the American homeland, promote economic prosperity, and advance American influence throughout the world, new technologies and expanding warfare domains have caused the Navy to look at its future force structure in a new light.
U.S. Navy
After a lengthy gap in the Navy’s senior leadership role, Admiral Daryl Caudle assumed the duties as the 34th chief of naval operations August 25, 2025. In his first “Message to the Fleet,” he reiterated long-standing Navy operational priorities to “deliver peace through strength, securing our national interests and prosperity.” Admiral Caudle has taken a more operational approach to his tenure as CNO. In addressing the current global challenges, he stated: “To prevail, we must build and sustain a Navy that is ready to fight and win — today, tomorrow and well into the future.” He plans to focus on three main themes during his tenure as CNO: foundry, fleet, and fight:
· Foundry: This represents the total force, which includes the shore infrastructure and maintenance depots, and educational institutions needed to create, sustain, and modernize U.S. naval power. “Without a strong foundry, there is no fleet.”
· Fleet: The fleet is the nation’s decisive instrument of maritime power. It is “forged” from people, platforms, and payloads and is designed to deter aggression, project power, and secure our national interests on and from the sea.
· Fight: Fighting is the end-state application of foundry and fleet. While the U.S. Navy has been highly successful for nearly 250 years, the new maritime fight is different, requiring greater innovation and adaption of new technologies in a rapidly evolving maritime landscape.
During his recent congressional nomination hearing, Admiral Caudle laid out a clear vision for the Navy moving forward against a challenging maritime backdrop “defined by global competition, technological saturation, and unpredictable threats that challenge our American dream.” His goals for the Navy are:
· Relentlessly pursue full-spectrum readiness — modernizing the fleet’s capabilities, scaling readiness capacity, and aggressively forging resilient and resourceful Sailors to optimize combat power.
· Deepen integration across all warfare domains — from sea, air, cyber, space, and the undersea — massing effects from multiple vectors, platforms, and environments, seamlessly integrating these effects with the joint force and with our allies and partners.
· Outpace our adversaries, harnessing innovation in warfare at a faster pace with ingenuity, skill, and brilliance of our American workforce and a reimagined industrial base.
· Leveraging modern, modular, and scalable platforms, investing in human capital and warfighting excellence, and integrating capabilities across domains, while ensuring the Navy is not only lethal and survivable but also adaptable and sustainable — ready to fight and win for decades to come, securing freedom of navigation and projecting power where and when it matters most.
Due to the emerging threat of China and the years of shrinking U.S. Navy fleet size and diminished shipbuilding capacity within the United States, the CNO sees the Navy in a “duality of urgency — being ready both today and tomorrow,” without the option of choosing one priority by sacrificing the other. The constitutional charter of “protection and prosperity owed to the American people demands both — seamlessly integrated, realistically affordable, and highly effective.”
The Department of the Navy’s FY 2026 President’s Budget request is $292.2 billion comprised of $248.9 billion in discretionary funds (from the Reconciliation Act bill) and $43.3 billion in mandatory funds, an increase of $29.2 billion/11.1 percent from the FY 2025 enactment. The budget request resources the Department of the Navy’s leadership priorities supporting the National Defense Strategic guidance that focuses on the president’s commitment to restore peace through strength in the face of threats. Highlights of the Navy’s budget submission include the following:
· Provides for a deployable battle force of 287 ships in FY 2026 (115 surface combatants, 63 submarines, 36 support ships, 31 combat logistics, 31 amphibious, and 11 aircraft carriers).
· Procures 19 battle force ships in FY 2026 — three in discretionary funding (one Columbia-class submarine, one Virginia-class submarine, and one ocean surveillance ship) and 16 in mandatory funding (two Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, one Virginia-class guided-missile cruiser, one amphibious transport dock ship, one amphibious assault ship, nine landing ships medium, and two replenishment oiler ships.
· Procures 43 fixed-wing, rotary-wing, and unmanned aircraft in FY 2026 — all in discretionary funding (23 joint strike fighters, 12 CH-53K helicopters, four E-2D aircraft, three MQ-25 Stingray unmanned aircraft systems, one UC-12 aircraft).
· Research and development of future capabilities for all types of conflict, including nuclear cruise missiles, TACAMO modernization, uncrewed vehicles, and classified efforts ($29.2 billion).
· Military construction funds 48 projects (37 active Navy/11 active Marine Corps) in support of new missions, recapitalization of aging infrastructure, shipyard improvements, and global posture ($7.4 billion). Planning and design funds for future projects for the Shipyard Infrastructure Optimization Program and Indo-Pacific Command requirements; $749 million is part of the mandatory request.
· Sustains current readiness in key accounts: ship maintenance ($16.2 billion —discretionary); ship operations ($7.3 billion — $5.4 billion discretionary, $1.9 billion mandatory); flying hours ($10.6 billion active service and $11.4 billion reserve — discretionary); and air depot maintenance ($1.8 billion active — discretionary — and $2.0 billion reserve — $1.9 billion discretionary, $0.1 billion mandatory).
Department of Navy FY 2026 Budget Highlights, Office of Budget, 2025
In FY 2026, ship operations funds 25,748 steaming days across a fleet of 288 ships. The operating tempo supports 58 underway days per quarter for deployed ships and 24 days per quarter for nondeployed ships. With the inclusion of $1.9 billion in reconciliation funds, the account is funded to 100 percent of the modeled requirement. This includes full funding for the critical readiness basket (operating target), which covers repair parts, consumable maintenance items, and travel for training. FY 2026 also reflects the transfer of Military Sealift Command maintenance and repair to ship maintenance. Additionally, ship operations now includes support for landing craft, air cushion; landing craft, utility; and hospital ship operations (USNS Mercy and USNS Comfort). Without reconciliation funding, the Navy would face limited operational flexibility — reducing the fleet’s ability to respond across all theaters, particularly in support of great power competition in Europe and the Pacific.
The Marine Corps continues to maintain approximately one-third of its Fleet Marine Force forward-deployed around the globe. More than 30,000 forward-stationed or forward-deployed forces supported fleet operations last year. Additionally, the Marine Corps provides tailored military combat-skills training and advisor support to foreign forces as part of Marine Corps Forces Special Operations Command and enabled full-spectrum cyberspace operations while supporting joint and coalition forces as part of Marine Corps Forces Cyberspace Command.
The FY 2026 Marine Corps active operations budget request continues to support readiness and modernization efforts by prioritizing funding aimed at further reinforcing Force Design transformation initiatives. The Marine Corps is organized, trained, and equipped as a naval expeditionary force that is ready 24/7 to operate, along with allies and partners, inside actively contested maritime spaces in support of fleet operations with the implementation of the Stand-in Force concept. To achieve this, the Marine Corps continues its transformation from a legacy force to a modernized force while maintaining a military advantage in a fiscally responsible and executable manner. The Marine Corps readiness accounts continue to support the foundational efforts required to strengthen innovation and experimentation, as well as to provide resources to the Fleet Marine Force, including training and field- and depot-level maintenance across both ground and aviation programs. The FY 2026 budget also includes investing in force lethality to achieve combat overmatch, building information operations capacity, including cyber forces conducting full-spectrum cyber operations, and supporting the viability and reliability of data networks.
Acting Coast Guard Commandant Admiral Kevin Lunday released the Coast Guard’s Force Design 2028, which is expected to drive “transformational changes” throughout the department. The document focuses on four main areas for the future of the Coast Guard:
Organization
Transform strategic and operational decision-making to enhance mission effectiveness
Revolutionize the Coast Guard’s organizational design to contend with a rapidly changing world
People
Grow the Coast Guard’s future force
Deliver a high-quality, mission-aligned workforce
Ensure force readiness and resiliency for a complex and uncertain future
Technology
Change how mission-critical capabilities are acquired, deployed, and maintained to accelerate continuous technology insertion to make Coast Guard operations more effective and mission support more efficient
Rapidly identify and adopt advanced capabilities for frontline operators through innovative methods, data enablement, and empowered delivery teams, setting the standard for digital excellence across the federal government
Advance core information technology systems and enhance our cybersecurity posture to maximize operational effectiveness
Contracting and acquisition
Revolutionize Coast Guard major acquisition and shore infrastructure program planning and execution
Create a high velocity contracting and procurement organization for the Coast Guard by 2028
Optimize Coast Guard acquisition workforce agility and responsiveness
The Coast Guard conducts 11 statutory operational missions, managed within six mission programs that cross the full spectrum of maritime activities.
Maritime law enforcement: Migrant interdiction; drug interdiction; living marine resources; other law enforcement
Maritime response: Search and rescue; marine environmental protection
Maritime prevention: Ports, waterways, and coastal security; marine safety
Marine Transportation System management: Aids to navigation; ice operations
Maritime security operations: Ports, waterways, and coastal security
Defense operations: Defense readiness
In addition to the 11 missions codified in the Homeland Security Act of 2002, other responsibilities include providing products and services for the intelligence community; conducting activities and efforts to advance U.S. diplomacy and international relations; cybersecurity; bridge administration; Great Lakes pilotage; and other waterways management functions supplementary to aids to navigation.
The FY 2026 President’s Budget requests $14.5 billion for the Coast Guard, including $13.2 billion in discretionary funding, to renew the Coast Guard and sustain capability and resilience safeguarding and protecting the American people. When combined with reconciliation resources, this funding empowers the Coast Guard to invest in capabilities that will protect our national security, ensuring the service has mission-capable and worldwide deployable force packages to defeat adversaries and criminals who seek to harm the American way of life.
Operations and support: The FY 2026 President’s Budget request provides prescribed pay and benefits for the workforce and furthers the following critical initiatives to secure our borders, bolster American maritime dominance, and renew the Coast Guard to restore strength and readiness after years of degradation:
Deliver assets and capabilities to the fleet — $92 million for personnel, operations, and maintenance sustainment funding for new cutters, boats, aircraft, shore facilities, and capabilities. These funds include operations, maintenance, crew, and mission support elements for four fast response cutters; crew for an offshore patrol cutter; operations, maintenance, and crew for two waterways commerce cutters; operations and maintenance for the future USCGC Storis; and crew, operations, and maintenance for an HC-130J aircraft. Further, funds support the operations and maintenance of newly acquired or recapitalized shore facilities, including projects in Alaska, Connecticut, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, North Carolina, and South Carolina.
Mission-enhancing investments
$27 million for operational deployments of maritime domain awareness capabilities and cutter-based maritime unmanned aircraft systems to support maritime interdiction operations.
$22 million to continue financial system modernization.
$20 million for sustainment and renewal of mission-enabling enterprise information technology capabilities to adopt secure, state-of-the-market technologies.
$8 million to procure service-life boat replacements and establish a full-time multimission boat station in the U.S. Virgin Islands.
$6 million to bolster Coast Guard capacity to support 2026 World Cup and America250 whole-of-government security efforts.
$3 million to strengthen the capacity of the Coast Guard’s Marine Safety program and streamline the burdensome patchwork of federal, state, and local requirements for the commercial vessel community.
Force Design 2028 — $27 million to grow, transform, and modernize the workforce. Investments include expanded recruiting and accessions capacity to attract patriotic young Americans with a propensity to serve their country, growing the Coast Guard medical workforce to ensure readiness, and modernizing the personnel readiness system to streamline workforce management, onboarding, administration, and career tracking for all employees.
Indo-Pacific Expansion — $116 million to strengthen Coast Guard operations in the Indo-Pacific region with more frequent and effective surface deployments to counter Chinese aggression. Investments include increased funding for operations, maintenance, and expeditionary logistics; cutter technology enhancements; and accelerating expanded maritime UAS capabilities. It further establishes a maritime engagement team to bolster Indo-Pacific partner capacity and increases regional staffing for maritime advisors, liaison officers, and attachés.
Procurement, construction, and improvements: Following years of underinvestment, the FY 2026 President’s Budget request reverses the downward trend in the capital acquisition budget. This overdue investment delivers the modernized assets the Coast Guard needs to conduct military operations; control, secure, and defend America’s border and maritime approaches; and protect the free flow of commerce in and out of the nation’s ports.
Surface — $1.44 billion to continue the Coast Guard’s largest fleet recapitalization since World War II. Major investments will advance the vital polar security cutter program to deter and respond to malign actors in the high latitudes and fund construction of two offshore patrol cutters to recapitalize outdated multimission law-enforcement capability that is more than 60 years old. Additionally, two fast response cutters will provide assets for high-end coastal operations, and two waterways commerce cutters will promote the free flow of trade. The budget also supports the recapitalization of multiple classes of Coast Guard boats that are critical for maritime security, law enforcement, and search and rescue. Modernizing the fleet will provide the adaptive force packages the Coast Guard needs to control, secure, and defend the U.S. border and maritime approaches, enforce U.S. laws in our sovereign waters, protect the critical flow of commerce, and fulfill the Coast Guard’s responsibilities as a military service.
Aircraft — $184 million to advance ongoing recapitalization of fixed and rotary-wing aircraft, including growth of the MH-60T helicopter fleet by four hulls; continue management of the ongoing HC-130J aircraft acquisition program; initiate service-life extension activities for the HC-144 medium-range surveillance aircraft fleet; and provide increased support for the Coast Guard’s UAS portfolio enhancing the command, control, communications, computers, cyber, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance capabilities of forward-deployed assets conducting drug interdiction operations and enforcing immigration laws.
C5I and other — $100 million for C5I programs, including deploying sea commander and sea watch systems aboard major cutters, enhancing maritime domain awareness, and modernizing obsolete equipment on national security cutters that enables them to meet joint military requirements. Provides support for IT modernization and facilitates acquisition program oversight and management activities.
Shore infrastructure — $21 million for furthering survey and design efforts and advancing planning efforts for future shore infrastructure projects that are necessary to train, support, and maintain the modernized and expanded Coast Guard the nation requires.
Research and development: $68 million to expand critical mission capabilities through applied research, development, testing, and evaluation programs in uncrewed systems, polar operations, waterways management and environmental response, operational performance improvements and modeling, and space-based operations. This investment will begin a transformational era of Coast Guard R&D in countering weapons of mass destruction by transferring funding for continued investment in technical forensics, detection capability development, and transformational R&D.
The FY 2026 request is $1.9 billion more than the 2025 President’s Budget request, funding 97 percent of the total requirement and supporting 57 chief naval operations availabilities across public and private sectors. This increase is primarily driven by the transfer of Military Sealift Command maintenance and repair. The FY 2026 budget requests funding for workload planning and contracting strategies that provide industry with consistent, reliably funded work. The budget also sustains investments in naval shipyard capacity, increasing full-time equivalent levels to 36,488 and continuing targeted wage increases in critical trades to address high attrition and retain skilled industrial talent. Additionally, the Navy continues to use other Navy procurement funds for private-sector ship maintenance, supporting 27 CNO availabilities across the U.S. Pacific Fleet and U.S. Fleet Forces Command. This investment builds on previous success, offering greater stability for industry partners and reinforcing the Navy’s commitment to financial discipline and efficient program execution.
The aircraft depot maintenance program funds repairs, overhauls, and inspections of aircraft and aircraft components to ensure sufficient quantities are available to meet fleet requirements to decisively win combat operations. The aviation depot repair process, including supply chain and engineering support, has incorporated commercial best practices to improve performance on targeted production lines. These process reforms improved organic depot capacity and repair velocity and contributed to an improved aircraft mission-capable rate. In FY 2026, we will continue to sustain and improve our readiness rates and decrease long-term downed aircraft. To create the mission-capable aircraft required to provide aviation operational availability, the FY 2026 budget maximizes readiness by prioritizing funding based on criticality and impact. An increase in aviation logistics provides for maintenance costs associated with adding more F-35, MV-22, and KC-130J aircraft to the fleet. Additionally, FY 2026 funding for air depot maintenance requirements and the aviation enabling programs would allow for the Navy and Marine Corps to meet readiness goals.
The Marine Corps continues to use a total force (active and reserve component) approach for the planning and execution of ground equipment depot maintenance. The FY 2026 budget was developed through programmatic changes based on strategic guidance and building readiness. For FY 2026, program increases are attributed primarily to updated maintenance strategies and service-life extensions for automotive equipment and the addition of new radar systems into the ground depot maintenance program.
The FY 2026 President’s Budget request provides $92 million for personnel, operations, and maintenance sustainment funding for new cutters, boats, aircraft, shore facilities, and capabilities. These funds include operations, maintenance, crew, and mission support elements for four fast response cutters; crew for an offshore patrol cutter; operations, maintenance, and crew for two waterways commerce cutters; operations and maintenance for the future USCGC Storis; and crew, operations, and maintenance for an HC-130J aircraft. Further, funds support the operations and maintenance of newly acquired or recapitalized shore facilities, including projects in Alaska, Connecticut, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, North Carolina, and South Carolina.
In-service vessel sustainment is the Coast Guard’s strategic class-by-class evaluation of its vessels to determine what major maintenance and upgrades are necessary to reach or extend their service lives.
The Coast Guard has determined that strategic major maintenance and recapitalization can improve reliability of its vessels, help control maintenance costs, and increase time underway conducting missions. If necessary, additional work can be completed to allow vessels to operate efficiently past their service life until replacements are procured. Systematic evaluation of Coast Guard surface assets and creation of a recurring acquisition construction and improvement funding stream through ISVS provides a cost-effective way to ensure the service has the surface assets necessary to complete its missions. ISVS work can be classified as service-life extension programs, major maintenance availability, or mission effectiveness projects.
• Service-life extension projects: Major maintenance and system upgrades to extend a vessel’s life beyond its original design.
• Midlife maintenance availability: Major overhauls to keep a ship functioning for its designed life.
• Mission effectiveness projects: This includes replacing old equipment and performing major maintenance.
All ISVS program work is performed using the most cost-effective option to meet cost, schedule, and performance requirements. Current ISVS program work is performed by the Coast Guard at the Coast Guard Yard in Curtis Bay, Maryland, and commercial shipyards. Curtis Bay has previously demonstrated its ability to efficiently plan and execute major ship overhaul projects.
While the FY 2026 President’s Budget request for the Coast Guard does not detail specific ISVS plans for 2026, the service’s Force Design 2028 initiative points to a strong emphasis on integrating advanced technology, human-machine teaming, and modernization of logistics systems, which will likely influence future ISVS efforts.
Here’s what to expect for ISVS.
• Continued focus on modernization: The ISVS program’s goals align with the broader Force Design 2028, which emphasizes the adoption of advanced technology, human-machine teaming, and a modern logistics system.
• Legacy cutter sustainment: ISVS will continue to provide critical support for legacy cutters, like the medium endurance cutters, until they are replaced by newer vessels such as the offshore patrol cutter fleet.
• Strategic recapitalization: The program’s goal is to ensure that the existing fleet is reliable, mission-ready, and cost-effective, reducing life-cycle costs while increasing operational availability.
Current ISVS projects:
• The service-life extension program for the 140-foot Bay-class icebreaking tugs is to restore mission readiness and extend the service life of this nine-cutter fleet by approximately 15 years. The fleet was commissioned between 1978 and 1988, with most hulls operating beyond their planned 30-year service life. Critical reliability and supportability issues have severely degraded the fleet’s mission readiness. Completed efforts include repair of corroded and damaged hull plating, structural refurbishment and replacement of unsupportable or maintenance-intensive equipment. The program is currently continuing with HVAC improvements.
• The SLEP for the USCGC Polar Star (WAGB 10) is to recapitalize several major systems and extend the service life of the cutter until the second polar security cutter is operational. The SLEP will occur in a five-year phased production between 2021 and 2025. The Polar Star is a 399-foot cutter, the service’s only active heavy polar icebreaker, which was commissioned in 1977. The Coast Guard initiated the final of five planned phases of the SLEP for the Polar Star, the service’s sole operational heavy icebreaker, on March 30, 2025, at Mare Island Dry Dock in Vallejo, California.
• Major maintenance availability for 225-foot Juniper-class seagoing buoy tenders is to ensure the 16 vessels in the class achieve the full 30-year designed service life was completed July 29, 2025. Work included completion of hull and structural repairs and replacement of obsolete, unsupportable or maintenance-intensive equipment, including updates to the machinery control system, propellers, and HVAC systems.
• The SLEP for the 270-foot medium endurance cutters involves targeted system replacement to address system reliability, supportability, obsolescence, and interoperability. This work includes upgrades or replacements to the electrical power generation and distribution system as well as the main propulsion engines. The mission is to facilitate continued operations during transition to the offshore patrol cutter by extending the service life of 270-foot cutters for up to 10 years. The USCGC Legare (WMED 912) arrived at the Coast Guard Yard in Baltimore on June 24, 2024, as the fourth medium endurance cutter to undergo SLEP work and the second to receive all major SLEP work items, including replacement of the main diesel engines.
• The major maintenance availability program for the 175-foot coastal buoy tenders has started. On July 15, 2025, the Coast Guard began a major maintenance availability for the first of 14 175-foot Keeper-class coastal buoy tenders, the USCGC Ida Lewis (WLM 551). The MMAs will ensure the coastal buoy tenders remain operationally reliable and effective through their 30-year planned service lives.
• The SLEP for the USCGC Healy (WAGB 20) will occur in a five-year phased production between 2026 and 2030. The Healy is a 420-foot cutter, the service’s only active medium polar icebreaker, which was commissioned in 1999. When completed, the SLEP effort will recapitalize several major systems and extend the service life of the cutter until the polar security cutters are operational.
• The SLEP for the 47-foot motor lifeboats is being conducted in partnership with the Boats Acquisition Program to take advantage of the program’s subject matter expertise, reduce support costs, and improve operational availability. The service-life extension work will significantly overhaul up to 107 of the service’s 117 47-foot MLB fleet. The 47-foot MLB fleet was placed in service during the 1997-2002 timeframe with an expected service life of 25 years. The 47-foot MLB SLEP was initiated to extend the useful life of the MLB fleet by 20 years through 2047. The SLEP will reduce support costs and improve operational availability through renewal of the propulsion, electrical, steering, towing, navigation, and hull and structural systems, along with other minor work items.
Delivering decisive combat power is more than just putting ordnance on target. It depends on the ability to sustain combat action and maintain and prolong combat operations until the adversary is beaten or surrenders. On May 1, 2024, Deputy Chief of Naval Operations for Installations and Logistics Vice Admiral Jeffrey Jablon testified before the Senate subcommittee on Military Construction, Veterans Affairs and Related Agencies and spoke about the new Navy sustainment strategy that was designed to align directly with the CNO’s America’s Warfighting Navy guidance in support of the National Security Strategy and national defense. Formerly known as the “Maritime Sustainment Strategy: Sustaining Naval Forces Across the Competition Continuum,” it outlines a strategy for “moving with purpose and urgency to improve the Navy’s capabilities, capacity, and competencies relative to this critical warfighting function.” The MSS introduces “sustainment in depth” as a “layered, systemic approach designed to build genuine agility and resiliency” into the maritime logistics enterprise, with the main principle being that operational and campaign sustainment begins at the shoreline and ends with a Navy that is capable of “providing the right materiel and services, at the right place and right time, across the competition continuum, regardless of operational tempo and level of demand from distributed operational forces.” To accomplish this task, the MSS has established four lines of effort, which are aligned with the joint warfighting concept:
These lines of effort are to be integrated across five maritime sustainment vectors: rearm, refuel, repair, resupply, and revive, and three crosscutting enablers of data, distribution, and decks. This maritime sustainment strategy promotes deliberate, impactful infrastructure investments that fully integrate the shore enterprise as a warfighting capability.
To accomplish its mission, the Navy must be resourced appropriately to balance all elements of being a forward-deployed fighting force. The FY 2018 National Defense Authorization Act codified a goal of 355 ships for the Navy fleet. This maritime force structure number has undergone numerous fluctuations over the past several years, and it is still not a firmly determined or fully funded inventory planning figure. The Navy’s current 30-year Shipbuilding Plan (released in March 2024) provides Congress with two alternative long-range shipbuilding procurement profiles with a Future Force Design inventory of between 342 and 387 battle force ships depending on which alternative is chosen. This plan explores not only new ship classes but also the procurement of uncrewed/autonomous vessels, as well as modernization and service-life extension programs for most ships in the current fleet that will continue in service for decades to come. Additionally, aircraft, weapon systems, ordnance, and command and control must be procured in support of this battle force inventory and exist in sufficient quantities. Finally, a steady flow of citizens must be recruited, trained, and retained in our all-volunteer service.
The Navy-Marine Corps leadership team is pushing a more integrated and sustainable force design and structure. A fully integrated naval force is at the forefront of all discussion, plans, and driving policies regarding resources. While the guidance used to design force planning and structure around the great power competition was laid out in the 2018 National Defense Strategy and Marine Corps General David Berger’s 38th Commandant’s Planning Guidance, further guidance such as Force Design 2030 was published for congressional authorizers, appropriators, and planners to guide future force structure discussions.
The 39th Commandant of the Marine Corps, General Eric Smith, released his Planning Guidance in August 2024 that builds on the evolving Force Design 2030 and reiterates his priorities:
A key enabler for the Marine Corps has been codified in the 2024 NDAA and requires not less than 31 operational amphibious warfare ships, of which not less than 10 shall be amphibious assault ships. The Light Amphibious Warship program is pressing forward with the medium landing ship, which is seen as a critical element of the Marine Corps Stand-in Force that supports both the expeditionary advanced base operations and the distributed maritime operations concepts.
Since the end of the Cold War, America’s naval forces have focused on power projection with no comparable peer competitor. However, the past decade has forced Navy and Marine Corps planners to change, consistent with pacing threats. Centered on the Navy’s distributed maritime operations concept, the Navy and Marine Corps team is moving forward with a major transformation. Instead of building maritime forces around large capital ships, the plan utilizes the entirety of the maritime theater by disaggregating assets and complicating the adversaries’ counter-operations. The Navy’s focus has shifted to the total capabilities of the fleet rather than a specified number. Whatever the final number, the type of ships the Navy is expected to buy will change significantly. While a 355-, 500- or 737-ship Navy is an important aspiration, the final tally must be grounded on the threat, tactical capability, affordability, and infrastructure capacity of the U.S.
In late 2020, the Hudson Institute released its landmark Navy force structure analysis, “American Sea Power at a Crossroads: A Plan to Restore the U.S. Navy’s Maritime Advantage.” This was the first plan to be released on paper following a tumultuous period where the Navy’s force structure assessment was taken over by the Office of the Secretary of Defense and several additional studies were commissioned, including Hudson’s. This detailed study proposed a “battle force fleet size” of 581 ships, including a mix of traditional aircraft carriers, submarines, destroyers and cruisers, amphibious ships, and logistics ships but also 139 unmanned surface and submersible vessels. “The Navy needs a new fleet design to affordably address its challenges and exploit its opportunities while maintaining today’s operational tempo,” says the report. Hudson’s proposed force structure would rely on an “implicit or explicit concept for how the Navy will deter aggressors or win if deterrence is unsuccessful.” The fleet design integrated the Navy’s new generation of operational concepts: littoral operations in a contested environment, and expeditionary advanced base operations. These concepts require a Navy that embraces a “decision-centric” warfare mindset that optimizes new characteristics widely considered mandatory for future platforms:
· A defensive capability in each platform designed to defeat “a prompt adversary attack and enable U.S. forces to effectively fire their offensive weapons.”
· An “offensive weapons capacity distributed across numerous platforms and able to sustain strike and counter-maritime operations.”
· Scalable “force package diversity,” giving combatant commanders and the national command authority a wider range of options.
· A “force package complexity” designed to thwart adversary targeting capabilities.
· An affordable and sustainable procurement process that will bring this new fleet into reality.
There have been other official sources advocating for an increased Navy by 2045, dramatically increasing the size of the future submarine fleet, with new smaller surface combatants and amphibious warships. Some plans have provided even more unmanned surface and submerged autonomous vessels designed to expand the battle space and complicate targeting for a potential Chinese adversary. So, while there is flux in the final Navy and Marine Corps force structure analysis about specific quantity and capabilities, Defense Department and Navy leadership agrees we need to expand the future integrated naval force and be more modern, networked, lethal, and ready.
The Navy League strongly supports a U.S. Navy shipbuilding and conversion budget of more than $40 billion annually to meet the future shipbuilding goal, whatever that ultimately proves to be. We also highlight the production timeline of the Ohio replacement program (Columbia-class) and the importance of recapitalizing the strategic ballistic submarines outside the shipbuilding and conversion budget in the National Sea-Based Deterrence Fund. Congress should be attentive to the need to work around continuing resolutions, if necessary, to keep the program on schedule. Finally, and most importantly, the Navy League supports a larger share of the Department of Defense’s fiscal year budget being dedicated to Navy acquisitions, operations, and infrastructure as we move into an expanding great power maritime threat environment. Without additional funding for the Navy, a force structure size of 355, 500, or more ships will never be realized, and the nation will find itself at greater risk in protecting the maritime commons for U.S. and allied interests abroad.
Ship procurement
Whatever the exact mix determined by Navy-Marine Corps planners, the current and future fleet plans will include the following ship classes:
· Ballistic missile submarines and their Trident II D5 missiles: The nuclear triad of strategic bombers, intercontinental ballistic missiles, and submarine-launched ballistic missiles has provided the United States with strategic deterrence that prevented global war for more than 50 years. The Navy’s top acquisition priority and the most survivable leg of the triad, the SSBN, provides 70 percent of the deployed nuclear warheads under the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty. Today’s 14 Ohio-class SSBNs are scheduled to be replaced by 12 Columbia-class submarines.
· Aircraft carriers: Supercarriers are needed to provide sufficient worldwide coverage of combatant commanders’ Title 10 directed requirements. It is vital to maintain the currently scheduled refueling of the Nimitz-class carriers, which are essential elements of a shipbuilding strategy that ensures our persistent forward presence well into the future. Over the next two years, the Navy has a capacity goal of 11-12 nuclear-powered aircraft carriers.
· Large surface combatants and small surface combatants: Acquisition of Arleigh Burke-class destroyers as well as the modernization of the Navy’s cruiser and destroyer inventory will ensure the sustainment of the land-attack, fleet air, missile-defense, and anti-ballistic missile capabilities. Initial design of the DDG(X) next-generation guided-missile destroyer is a critical element of the Navy’s future force structure. Finally, proven lethality and survivability enhancements implemented in the Constellation-class frigate program will deliver much-needed and cost-effective capability improvements to the fleet platforms. These ships will take full advantage of a proven parent design and incorporate lethality and survivability upgrades that will make this small surface combatant a capable multimission addition to the surface fleet. The current 30-Year Shipbuilding Plan has a goal of between 82 and 83 large combatants and 29 and 30 small combatant ships over the next two years.
· Attack submarines: In an environment with the growing threat of layered, offensive, and defensive precision missile systems, our submarine force’s asymmetric stealth advantage and immunity from missile attacks enables success for the entire joint force. Sustaining the gold-standard Virginia-class acquisition program, to include procurement of at least two hulls per year through FY 2025 and the Virginia Payload Module, is vital to the sustainment of this critical capability. However, the 2025 President’s Budget request only has one nuclear-powered attack submarine in the shipbuilding and conversion budget. The 30-Year Shipbuilding Plan has an inventory goal of between 48 and 49 fast-attack submarines over the next two years. Note: This does not include potential additional shipbuilding plans in support of AUKUS agreements, which will have an impact on overall submarine building capacity.
· Amphibious ships: Force Design 2030 promotes a mix of large amphibious assault ships along with a new light amphibious warship. This mix is designed to meet a range of amphibious operations in the littoral environment in support of Marine expeditionary units and Marine littoral regiments. The 30-Year Shipbuilding Plan and the 2024 NDAA both show an inventory goal of 31 operational amphibious assault ships.
· Combat Logistics Force: CLF ships and auxiliary vessels make up a critical element of the sustainment of forward-deployed Navy capabilities. These ships include replenishment ships, tenders, repair ships, salvage ships, and hospital ships. The 30-Year Shipbuilding Plan shows an inventory of 32 CLF ships over the next two years with an expected growth to 56 ships by 2054.
· Unmanned surface and subsurface vessels: This new and emerging inventory category is growing in importance and will be a key force multiplier to the manned-combatant force of the future. The vessels increase the fleet’s capacity for distribution and expand the intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance capabilities for commanders in the maritime domain. The current Battle Force Ship Assessment Requirement shows a planned inventory of 134 uncrewed vehicles. This number will undoubtably shift in the coming years as new capabilities and missions are developed for these assets.
· Maritime pre-position ships: While not in the battle force, the Navy plans to shrink from 14 maritime pre-position ships down to 10 ships in FY 2025. However, the National Defense Reserve Fleet is expected to maintain its inventory of 56 ships, with 47 Maritime Administration Ready Reserve Force ships and nine RRF used roll-on/roll-off ships for a total of 66 strategic sealift ships. Our forward-based maritime pre-position squadrons with civilian mariner and military force protection detachments are critical to the nation’s global humanitarian disaster and crisis response capabilities. The Navy’s mobilization forces provide transportation capability that enables rapid response to contingencies worldwide. Pre-positioning ship squadrons are forward-deployed in key ocean areas to provide the initial military equipment and supplies for operation. Most operate in full operating status with a few operating in reduced operating status. The number of days indicates the time from ship activation until the ship is available for tasking. ROS-5 indicates it will take five days to make the ship ready to sail, fully crewed and operational. The pre-positioned response is followed by the surge ships, which are maintained in ROS-5 in the continental U.S. The surge ship inventory includes recent used vessel purchases and decommissioned ships as the fleet is modernized.
Aircraft
Robust, technologically superior naval airpower has long been and will continue to be a critical deterrent to aggression against the U.S. and its allies and partners. The FY 2026 President’s Budget request provides the aircraft procurement request of $17.1 billion (including $0.1 billion in mandatory funding). This includes 43 fixed-wing, rotary-wing, and unmanned aircraft (all in discretionary). Our aviation investments include: 23 F-35 Lightning B and C aircraft, 12 heavy-lift CH-53K King Stallion helicopters, four E-2D Advanced Hawkeye aircraft, and one UC-12W operational support airlift. To continue the Department of the Navy’s investment in unmanned platforms, three MQ-25 unmanned aircraft systems are procured plus advanced procurement for long-lead time material for future aircraft.
Weapons
The weapons procurement request for FY 2026 is $7.9 billion ($2.2 billion in mandatory funding). This level of funding represents a continued investment in weapons procurement. The focus is to continue to build up and replace expended critical munitions inventories while increasing line capacity. By partnering with industry and increasing sources with $296 million in weapon’s industrial base funding to increase production and strengthen secondary and tertiary suppliers, the Department of the Navy will be able to increase capacity of critical munitions and meet inventory requirements on a more efficient timeline. The request continues procurement for the Naval Stike Missile (106 discretionary) and Long-Range Anti-Ship Missile (30 discretionary). There is increased production for several weapons, including the Standard Missile (28 discretionary, 111 mandatory), Joint Air-to-Ground Missile (277 discretionary), Small Diameter Bombs II (273 discretionary), Long-Range Anti-Ship Missile ER (26 discretionary, 64 mandatory), and Tomahawk Missiles (57 mandatory). Other ship weapons include the Rolling Airframe Missile (123 discretionary), Evolved Sea Sparrow Missile (305 discretionary), Patriot PAC-3 (12 mandatory), MK54 Lightweight Torpedo Mod 1(54 mandatory), MK 48 heavyweight torpedo (63 mandatory), and LSC Surface-to-Surface Mission Mods (10 discretionary). Other aircraft weapons include the AIM-9X Sidewinder (146 discretionary), Advanced Anti-Radiation Guided Missile (147 discretionary), and Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missile (51 discretionary).
C4ISR
Cutting-edge C4ISR (command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance) is central to a naval strike group’s combat capability and a critical force multiplier. C4ISR is not just an enabler of more efficient and effective operations; it also provides information, command and control, and precision targeting essential to ultimate success, especially when executing distributed maritime operations in a multidomain battle environment.
Information technology and cyberwarfare
The Department of the Navy investments in enterprise information technology and cyber activities ensure the Navy and Marine Corps’ ability to project naval power and sustain maritime operations in a continuously evolving threat environment. The department remains focused on optimizing its information technology ecosystem to support warfighting and business mission objectives and on securing our enterprise networks, weapon systems, platforms, and critical infrastructure. For the FY 2026 President’s Budget request, this includes significant investments in zero trust implementation for unclassified and classified networks, resilient transport, and cryptologic modernization. The Department of the Navy will sustain or increase investments for FY 2026 in the following areas ($2.047 billion):
· Operational readiness of cyberspace operations forces
· Manning, training, and equipping cyberspace operations forces
· Recruiting and retaining cyber personnel
· Synchronizing cyber effects with related nonkinetic effects
· Developing offensive and defensive cyber capabilities
The Navy League continues to support the direction the Navy is taking in cyberwarfare and cybersecurity to promote assured command and control, electromagnetic maneuver warfare, and cyber and integrated fires. We must be ready to fight and win in contested and denied environments by leveraging our superior technology. The integration of all elements of cyberwarfare — from policy and requirements to research and development, training, fielding, and operations under the Navy Cyber Command/U.S. 10th Fleet — has established the Navy as one of the nation’s critical resources in this complex and rapidly evolving warfare discipline.
The FY 2026 budget request of $57.261 billion prioritizes the Marine Corps’ commitment to Force Design, which remains the Marine Corps’ vehicle to create innovative formations, equipment, and concepts and ensures we remain lethal on any battlefield while optimized against the pacing challenge. The Department of the Navy’s request for FY 2026 reflects the Marine Corps’ ability to provide ready forces for global force management tasking while maintaining contingency-ready forces. The Marine Corps is balancing readiness with two critical requirements in mind, sourcing day-to-day missions and modernizing to meet the demands of the future operating environment. The Marine Corps readiness appropriations (excluding funding support in Navy appropriations) increase to $12.9 billion. The budget supports an active force of 172,300 Marines, emphasize forward deployment and posture, and enhances operations, activities, and investments tailored to increase joint force lethality and to strengthen alliances and attract new partnerships. These efforts ensure that the Marine Corps is prepared to operate inside actively contested maritime spaces in support of fleet and joint force operations.
FY 2026 Operation and Maintenance, Marine Corps Funding
Department of the Navy FY 2026 Budget Highlights, Office of Budget, 2025
The Coast Guard is the principal federal agency responsible for maritime safety, security, and environmental stewardship in U.S. ports and inland waterways, along more than 95,000 miles of U.S. coastline, throughout the 4.5 million square miles of U.S. Exclusive Economic Zone, and on the high seas. As a military service, a law enforcement organization, a regulatory agency, a member of the U.S. intelligence community, and a first responder, the Coast Guard supports Department of Defense combatant commanders on all seven continents, secures U.S. maritime borders, combats transnational criminal organizations, and safeguards the $5.4 trillion U.S. Marine Transportation System. The service leverages an expansive array of military, interagency, international, and industrial relationships, capabilities, and authorities to maximize strategic effect and support Department of Homeland Security and national priorities.
The FY 2026 budget includes $14.5 billion; 53,138 positions; and 51,892 full-time equivalents for the Coast Guard. The FY 2026 budget improves readiness and capability and continues the recapitalization of legacy Coast Guard assets while transforming the way the service recruits, trains, and supports its personnel. The budget advances Force Design 2028 initiatives to transform the Coast Guard to prepare for the future across multiple lines of effort, including optimizing personnel, accelerating the adoption and implementation of technology, and modernizing acquisition and contracting processes. When combined with reconciliation resources, the Coast Guard will invest in capabilities to protect our national security and stop illegal drugs and migrants from crossing our maritime borders.
In FY 2026, the Coast Guard will accept delivery of more capable, modernized assets, and the budget provides the resources to operate and maintain these new assets, including personnel and sustainment funding for a newly acquired polar icebreaker, an offshore patrol cutter, and two waterways commerce cutters, as well as sustainment, crew, and mission support elements for four fast response cutters. Additionally, the budget provides sustainment and crew funding for an HC-130J aircraft and acquisition, conversion, and sustainment for MH-60T helicopters.
The FY 2026 budget continues efforts for the Coast Guard’s highest acquisition priorities, including the offshore patrol cutter, and provides funding to support the service’s transition to an all MH-60T rotary wing fleet. Specifically:
· $1.7 billion to recapitalize legacy surface assets and make capital improvements to extend the service life of cutters and boats, including $216 million for production of two fast response cutters to operate in the coastal zone; $812 million for construction of the seventh offshore patrol cutter and long-lead time materials for the eighth OPC; $98 million for the waterways commerce cutter, including program management and production activities; $130 million to support acquisition of the polar security cutter; $152 million for in-service vessel sustainment activities on the 47-foot motor life boat, 270-foot medium endurance cutter, USCGC Healy, 175-foot coastal buoy tender, and 418-foot national security cutter.
· $184 million to recapitalize and sustain fixed- and rotary-wing aircraft, including: $165 million for sustainment and growth of the MH-60T helicopter fleet; $6 million for program management for the HC-130J acquisition; $1 million for installation of small, unmanned aircraft systems for the national security cutter fleet.
The FY 2026 budget strengthens Coast Guard operations in the Indo-Pacific region ($116.4 million). Key investments include sustaining more frequent and effective surface deployments through increased funding for operations, maintenance, C5I enhancements, and acceleration of expanded maritime unmanned aircraft system capabilities. It also increases expeditionary logistics for long-range power projection. It establishes a maritime engagement team to provide law enforcement training to Indo-Pacific partners and increases regional staffing for maritime advisors, liaison officers, and attachés.
· Navy-Marine Corps’ use of experimentation and focus on force design to achieve a more integrated naval force. The Navy League also supports the aspirational goal of whatever force structure the Navy and Marine Corps finally determines, while acknowledging the fleet of the future will change with a mix of crewed and uncrewed platforms and will adapt to supporting more distributed operations to take back the initiative in a great power competition.
· Full funding of the Navy’s FY 2026 shipbuilding plan with defined milestones to ensure the buildup of a more integrated and larger naval fleet.
· A larger allocation of the fiscal year defense budget to fully realize a larger and more integrated maritime force structure to effectively compete with near-peer rivals.
· Continued development, procurement, and deployment of the Navy portion of the ballistic missile defense system, including long-range surveillance and tracking capability to queue ground-based intercept systems, and ultimately, the ability to detect, track, and engage medium- and long-range ballistic missiles distant from the United States.
· The sea services’ maritime domain awareness effort, which integrates national and global partner intelligence resources and information systems to provide the best intelligence picture of the world’s oceans.
· The Navy’s efforts to upgrade the quality and scope of mine countermeasure capabilities and improve the forward-deployed readiness of mine warfare forces.
· Increased emphasis on, and funding for, Navy and Coast Guard operations in the polar regions to protect our access to natural resources, as well as preclude these regions from becoming sanctuaries for potential adversaries. Communications, logistics, ship, and aircraft modifications are essential for such operations.
· Increased emphasis on antisubmarine warfare, as our skills in that arena have atrophied in the face of an increasing threat.
· 31 Navy amphibious ships and sufficient sealift platforms to provide the expeditionary lift support for present and future combatant commander requirements.
· Continued funding for combat logistics force assets, including oiler/dry cargo carriers; large, medium-speed roll-on/roll-off ships; and new classes of sealift pre-positioning vessels. These assets will be employed in the maritime pre-positioning force (enhanced) squadrons.
· Realistic and sufficient operational training to ensure the safe, combat-effective performance of our men and women, to include adequate flight hours and steaming days, live-fire events, and active sonar operations in ocean environments (taking into consideration how such operations impact marine mammals).
· Accelerating the development of survivable tactical intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance unmanned aircraft system capability.
· Capitalizing on the significant goodwill fostered by cooperation with multiple countries in response to piracy concerns.
· Procurement of sufficient weapons and munitions to meet operational planning requirements. Additionally, there has been substantial war-gaming support to justify a recommendation that the Navy fund vertical-launch system rearming capability at sea to allow Navy combatants to remain on station for longer periods of time.
· Expansion of maritime fleet ranges in terms of access and readiness, while reducing impediments and obstructions that may limit the usefulness of these ranges for critical technology testing, maritime combat doctrine development, and robust and realistic training opportunities for fleet assets in a variety of live-fire individual, combined, and joint exercises.
U.S. Coast Guard
· Continuing to invest in the transformation of the Coast Guard’s workforce, including support to further develop and modernize recruiting, training, retention, health care, child and family support, and personal and professional development.
· Maintaining full funding for the service’s largest recapitalization effort since World War II, with particular focus on:
polar security cutters
offshore patrol cutters
waterways commerce cutters
the transition to an all MH-60 fleet
· Accelerating investment in technology to include continuation of the Coast Guard’s Technology Revolution initiative and additional funding to support the construction of resilient infrastructure.
· Continued funding for the highest priority needs from the Coast Guard’s annual Unfunded Priorities List to address service needs for operational assets, shore infrastructure, and personnel support.
· The Coast Guard, Navy, and Marine Corps review the tri-service strategic plan every four years.
