Tammen: Too soon to say whether UUVs will count toward 355 warships

The Navy will need time to field its largest unmanned undersea vehicles before the service can make a determination about whether unmanned vessels should be counted toward its 355-ship fleet goal, according to a top submariner.

Rear Adm. John Tammen, director of undersea warfare requirements (N97), speaking today at the Heritage Foundation said the service has not yet introduced large and extra large UUVs "at scale."

"I think once we have appropriate run time with those vehicles, then we'll start those discussions," Tammen said.

Discussions about whether the service should include unmanned vessels in its official ship count have been more prevalent lately for two reasons: the service has made the total number of warships in its fleet the center of a public campaign, and is also in the middle of another force-structure assessment that will update that number, which was derived from the previous FSA in 2016.

Tammen declined to comment directly on the FSA's timing, but Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John Richardson has previously said he expects the assessment to conclude this year. He's also indicated that the 355-ship figure is subject to change.