E-6 trumps O-10

A long time reader who happens to be a First Class, emailed an observation that echos a lot of our discussions over the years. I just wanted to share it with you unalloyed - because he just nails it. Good points need repeating - right Sid?

I was reading your post at the USNI blog regarding the LCS and a couple of my brain cells came together with a thought. Where is BuShips, I mean NavSea, doing in trying to recreate the "Treaty Cruisers" of the late 20's and 30's? I ask this because I just received from Amazon a copy of Norman Friedman's "U.S. Cruisers: An Illustrated Design History". I skimmed the section which talked about the treaty cruisers, the arguments that came from trying to build them, the arguments on how to pay for them, and finally a quick gloss over their record holding the line in the opening days of WW2. So the question is why aren't we building a number of smaller number of evolutionary ships that we could afford instead of trying for a large build of revolutionary ships that we can't afford? The inter-war naval treaties seemed to have a better impact on the Navy's ability to do more with less and think outside of the box on how to use some of these ships (whether carriers, battleships, cruisers, destroyers). I also think it is absolutely amazing how if you look at some of our more famous battles during the opening days of World War 2 were fought with these treaty ships. I know that having a number of different hulls probably isn't conducive to stream lining supply warehouses by having one similar hull. Yet if we do the same thing we did with the Spruance, Kidd, Ticonderoga classes and the only difference between them was some of the weapons systems installed and different sensor suites and wasn't cheaper through out the lifetimes of these ships?

Evolutionary beats Revolutionary.

Oh, and note to my buddies at USNIBooks - check out the price of that jewel ... reprints?