The United States is rapidly preparing for a potential war with China, most likely over Taiwan, by addressing critical vulnerabilities in its naval operations.
A key challenge: U.S. Navy destroyers can fire off their missile payloads in minutes but may take months to reload at port - an unacceptable delay in a high-stakes conflict in the Pacific.
A U.S. Navy destroyer can fire dozens of cruise missiles in minutes. But loading the warship with new missiles at the port could take two months. In a war against China, this could be a fatal problem.
To overcome the delay, Navy engineers pulled a 30-year-old crane from storage, connected it to computers, and used it to build a new prototype system for reloading at sea. The TRAM system promises to cut the time needed to reload rockets, perhaps only for days, according to the Wall Street Journal.
"The ability to rearm at sea will be critical to any future conflict in the Pacific," Navy Commander Carlos del Toro said after a recent TRAM test off the coast of California, to which Wall Street Journal reporters were given exclusive access.
Until recently, the Navy did not feel the need to quickly rearm large warships. They only occasionally launched a large number of Tomahawk cruise missiles or other expensive missiles.
Now, senior Pentagon officials fear that if a war breaks out in the western Pacific between China and Taiwan and the United States intervenes, large boats and warships will run out of ammunition within days, or perhaps hours.
The newspaper reports that slow charging causes the navy headaches in the Red Sea. Warships deployed there to protect cargo ships from Houthi rebels in Yemen must sail through the Suez Canal and to ports in Greece or Spain to reload, leaving the sea unprotected for extended periods.
"We should have fully developed this capability decades ago," retired Navy Admiral James Stavrodis told the Wall Street Journal, "After a significant launch of Tomahawk missiles, I had to get my warships out of the front line to rearm," Stavrodis said.
