According to a directive issued Thursday, the new mandate would likely cost billions of dollars and revert the Navy’s most advanced ships to a system that takes more sailors to operate and is more difficult to maintain.
US President Donald Trump has ordered the US Navy to remove the advanced system used to launch fighter jets from its newest type of aircraft carrier and return to using older steam catapults that he has long said he prefers.
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The memo issued on Thursday directs the Pentagon and the Navy to present Trump with plans to remove the Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System, also known as EMALS, within two months. It also says the Ford-class carrier’s electromagnetic weapons elevators should be replaced.
According to the directive, the new mandate would likely cost billions of dollars and revert the Navy’s most advanced ships to a system that takes more sailors to operate and is more difficult to maintain.
The move follows years of Trump's criticism of the new, magnetically driven catapult technology that launches fighter planes off the carriers' decks even as some tech experts believe some of the key advantages of the system are its ability to launch aircraft at faster speeds while being easier to maintain, requiring fewer sailors to operate and using less space aboard the ship.
It also comes at a time when the Navy is having difficulty staffing its ships with enough sailors and the US military is attempting to secure financing from Congress for more equipment.
Trump’s memo directs the fourth Ford-class carrier, the USS Doris Miller, to be the first ship to include the new changes. That will leave the USS Gerald R. Ford, as well as the forthcoming USS John F. Kennedy and USS Enterprise, untouched.
Trump's ire with the latest tech dates back to 2017
During his first term, Trump, in an interview with Time magazine, claimed the new system is “not good” and “doesn’t have the power” of the older steam systems.
“You’re going to goddamned steam,” Trump said at the time. The topic has frequently come up since then at rallies and other events.
While the US president is looking to roll back the latest technology, the newest Chinese aircraft carriers employ electromagnetic catapults, and France said it plans to use the system on its new carrier.
However, redesigning an already finalised ship for such a major system change will not be an easy task. EMALS aboard the USS Ford cut the number of sailors needed to operate the catapults from about a dozen to two earlier this year.
Trump’s memo that mandates the removal of the system also noted that one of the issues facing shipbuilding is the Navy’s constant design changes, “which have resulted in cost growth, delays, and cancellations.”
According to General Atomics, the company that makes EMALS, the decision not to proceed with the system on the USS Doris Miller “warrants careful reconsideration".
General Atomics said the work on Doris Miller’s catapults and arresting gear was already halfway complete and said, "Changing course now would introduce significant cost, schedule, and integration risks.”
The move comes as Congress will weigh the necessary budget and funding bills that the Trump administration has said they need to fund the Pentagon and the Iran war.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth estimated last month that the war’s cost grew to $37.5 billion (nearly €32.6 billion) as Republicans prepared a $95 billion package (€82.7 billion) to fund the military, along with other White House priorities.
Hegseth said the supplemental war funding is an “urgent, necessary” injection of money, and with Trump’s proposed $1.5 trillion (around €1.31 trillion) defense budget a generational investment in the military.
The House narrowly adopted both, but the Senate still must act when it returns in September.