Drift
Littoral Combat Ship
LCS · Navy · Lockheed Martin / Austal USA · truncated
+52%
$12.1B (2004) → $18.3B (2019)
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Baseline
$12.1B (2004)
Current estimate
$18.3B (2019)
Cost growth
+52%
Units
52 → 35
Quantity change
−33%
Unit-cost change
+125%
IOC
2008 (LCS-1) → 2010 (LCS-2)
Schedule slip
+2 yr
Cost basis
TY
Confidence
medium · unreconciled
Truncated (planned 52 → 35 ships) while the seaframe unit cost roughly tripled — a ~$220M (FY05$) target versus a documented ~$590–666M average actual (CRS/GAO). The plotted totals are seaframe-unit-cost × quantity, an indicative construct rather than one cited figure. Navy is decommissioning ~9 hulls early (a reported ~$7B loss).
Source: CRS RL33741. Seaframe-only (excludes mission modules); planned buy 52 → 40 → 35 ships. Plotted totals are seaframe unit cost × quantity — an arithmetic construct, not one cited program figure, so still flagged.
Drift — an independent project by Aous Abdo, built from public GAO, CRS and DoD sources. Cost growth has many causes; a larger number is not by itself evidence of mismanagement. How this is built · Explore the data →