The Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) is either of two classes of relatively small surface vessels designed for operations near shore by the United States Navy. It was "envisioned to be a networked, agile, stealthy surface combatant capable of defeating anti-access and asymmetric threats in the littorals", although their ability to perform these missions in practice has been called into question.
Littoral Combat Ships are comparable to corvettes found in other navies. The and the are the two LCS variants. Each is slightly smaller than the U.S. Navy's earlier but larger than Cyclone-class patrol ships. Each has the capabilities of a small assault transport, including a flight deck and hangar for housing two SH-60 or MH-60 Seahawk helicopters, a stern ramp for operating small boats, and the cargo volume and payload to deliver a small assault force with fighting vehicles to a roll-on/roll-off port facility. Standard armaments include Mk 110 57 mm guns and RIM-116 Rolling Airframe Missiles. They are also equipped with autonomous air, surface, and underwater vehicles. Possessing lower air defense and surface warfare capabilities than destroyers, the LCS emphasizes speed, flexible mission modules, and a shallow draft.
The first LCS, , was commissioned on 8 November 2008 in Veteran's Park, Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The second ship, the trimaran , was commissioned on 16 January 2010, in Mobile, Alabama. In 2012, ADM Jonathan W. Greenert stated that the LCS would be deployed to Africa in place of destroyers and cruisers. In 2013 and 2014, the Navy's requirement for LCSs was progressively cut from 55 to 32 vessels in favor of a newly proposed frigate more capable of high-intensity combat. In late 2014, the Navy proceeded with a procurement plan for enhanced versions of the LCS and upgraded older ships to meet the program's 52-ship requirement; the modified LCS will be redesignated as FF, or frigate. In December 2015, Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter ordered the Navy to reduce planned LCS and FF procurement from 52 to 40 and downselect to one variant by FY 2019.
In July 2017, the Navy released a request for information for a new multi-mission guided-missile frigate that can perform the same roles as the LCS while having better offensive and defensive capabilities. Almost any existing design that can be adapted to FFG(X) requirements can be considered, extending beyond versions of the two LCS hulls. In April 2020, it was announced that Fincantieri Marinette Marine had won the contract with its FREMM multi-purpose frigate-based design.
Design features
The concept behind the Littoral Combat Ship, as described by former Secretary of the Navy Gordon R. England, is to "create a small, fast, maneuverable and relatively inexpensive member of the DD(X) family of ships". The ship is easy to reconfigure for different roles, including anti-submarine warfare, mine countermeasures, anti-surface warfare, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, homeland defense, maritime intercept, special operations, and logistics. Due to its modular design, the LCS will be able to replace slower, more specialized ships such as minesweepers and larger amphibious-type assault ships.
Most of the mission modules' functions are performed by carried vehicles such as helicopters or unmanned vehicles such as the Spartan Scout, AN/WLD-1 RMS Remote Minehunting System and MQ-8B Fire Scout as part of the Navy's goal to "unman the front lines". Performing functions such as sonar sweeps for mines or submarines as well as launching torpedoes against hostile submarines at a distance from the ship is less risky. Placing sensors on remote vehicles allows the LCS to exploit concepts such as bistatic sonar. DARPA's Tactically Exploited Reconnaissance Node (TERN) program aims to build a medium-altitude long-endurance unmanned aerial vehicle (MALE UAV) that can operate from LCS-2 and can carry a payload of out to an operational radius of .