The Navy's Science and Technology Board Fast-Tracks the Journey to Achieve a "Hybrid Fleet"
- July 18, 2025
The U.S. Navy is committed to fielding a "Hybrid Fleet." This concept was first articulated by then-CNO Admiral Michael Gilday and embraced by his successor, Admiral Lisa Franchetti. The Hybrid Fleet initiative was described in the Chief of Naval Operations Force Design 2045 which called for 350 crewed ships and 1 50 large uncrewed maritime vessels.
The concept of Hybrid Fleet evolved due the U.S. Navy's ongoing challenge of building enough crewed ships to adequately meet the Navy's global commitments. The Chief of Naval Operations Navigation Plan for America's Warfighting Navy put it this way: "We cannot manifest a bigger traditional Navy in a few short years."
A recent report by the Department of the Navy Science and Technology Board entitled The Path Forward on Unmanned Systems, seeks to accelerate the goal of achieving a Hybrid Fleet by offering a path forward to design, develop and field uncrewed systems - especially uncrewed maritime systems - in order to achieve the Navigation Plan's goal of: "Scaling robotic and autonomous systems to integrate more platforms at speed."
