US Military Crisis: The United States Navy is heading into a crisis few are willing to openly discuss. Housed in the four Ohio-class guided-missile submarines, over 600 Tomahawk cruise missiles are set to vanish from service and the Navy has no immediate way to replace them.
For decades, these submarines have been the backbone of America’s undersea strike power. They can secretly deliver hundreds of missiles while staying nearly invisible. But the very vessels that gave Washington its covert edge are being retired faster than the Navy can build their replacements.
Each Ohio-class SSGN carried up to 154 Tomahawks, turning the four submarines into an undersea arsenal of 616 missiles. Converted from nuclear ballistic missile submarines in the mid-2000s, these vessels have been central to American strategic planning. It allows the United States to launch surprise and high-volume strikes anywhere in the world. Their stealth and firepower provided a powerful but unseen tool in both combat and contingency operations. Now, that tool is disappearing, leaving a gaping hole in US naval capabilities.
Washington claims that new Virginia-class Block V submarines, which are fitted with the Virginia Payload Module, will fill the void. On paper, this seems plausible as each Block V boat can carry around 40 Tomahawks. It is a fraction of the Ohio-class capacity. But in practice, the math doesn’t work, and the industrial base cannot keep up.
The Navy is presently producing over one Virginia-class submarine per year that is far below the rate needed to replace the retiring SSGNs. Shipyard delays, workforce shortages and the simultaneous pressure of building Columbia-class ballistic missile submarines make a quick recovery impossible.
The surface fleet faces its own disappearing act. Each armed with 122 vertical launch cells, the Ticonderoga-class cruisers are being retired, while their replacements, the Arleigh Burke Flight III destroyers, provide fewer cells and must reserve many for air and missile defense. The combination of these retirements reduces the Navy’s ability to launch large and coordinated Tomahawk strikes from the surface. The United States is heading into the mid-2020s with fewer launch options than it has had in decades.
This is more than a logistical problem. It is a strategic vulnerability. For nearly two decades, the Navy has relied on SSGNs as its primary stealth strike tool, giving planners unmatched options in the opening moments of any conflict.
With these submarines gone and replacements delayed, the United States may no longer have the ability to overwhelm adversaries with sudden and massive missile salvos.
Experts warn that this gap will last until the early 2030s, a decade in which US power projection could be weaker than it appears on paper.
Even new missile variants like the Maritime Strike Tomahawk, which is designed to attack ships, do not solve the underlying problem. There are still not enough launch cells to match the lost firepower, and the Navy’s long-range strike capacity is in temporary but serious decline. In the Indo-Pacific, where Washington’s strategy depends on rapid and distributed strikes, this shortfall could embolden rivals and change the balance of power.
Some defense analysts suggest that the United States may have deliberately overstated its capabilities to maintain the image of invincibility while losing critical strike assets. The public face of the Navy emphasises new submarines and missiles, but beneath the surface, the Tomahawk arsenal is shrinking at an alarming rate.
What Washington does not admit is that the country’s most potent underwater strike tools will be largely absent just when tensions are rising across the globe.
The Navy will still be able to mass fires through aircraft, surface ships and allied launchers, but the surprise and stealth that once defined American power will be significantly reduced. For a country that has long relied on fear and technological dominance to project influence, the missing 616 Tomahawks mean more than just missiles. They show a hidden but serious loss of strategic credibility.
The countdown has begun. By the late 2020s, the Ohio-class SSGNs will be gone, and with them, a massive undersea arsenal that few in the world could match. The United States will still claim strength, but beneath the surface, the truth tells a different story.
