- Acting Navy Sec. Hung Cao said this is the Navy’s “1939 moment” at a Potomac Officers Club summit
- Industry leaders in 1939 worked together to ramp up weapon system production for World War II
- Cao said the Navy and industry need to produce faster to combat China
Now is the time for industry to help the Navy try new things, slash bureaucracy and build weapon systems faster to prevent the U.S. from being technologically lapped by China, according to acting Navy Secretary and 2026 Wash100 Award popular vote winner Hung Cao.
Cao told a packed and effusive ballroom during his energetic keynote at the Potomac Officers Club’s 2026 Navy Summit on Thursday that now is the nation’s “1939 moment” like when industrialists like Bill Knutson, Henry Kaiser and Henry Ford brought industry together in the late 1930s to ramp up industrial production to support the U.S. in World War II. Ford turned his Ford Motor Company auto plants into aircraft production factories to build the B-24 while Kaiser built ships.
Kaiser, Cao said, built three ships every two days. This is compared to today’s military production rates, Cao said, when the U.S. is building one destroyer every six to eight years, one submarine every 11 years and an aircraft carrier every 15 years.
“We just can’t keep that rate, it’s too slow and we need to move forward. We’re doing four to five engineering change proposals every week on destroyers that we’ve been building for years. I’m putting an end to all that,” Cao stated.
Be the first to learn of new intelligence acquisition reform efforts at the Potomac Officers Club’s 2026 Intel Summit on Sept. 24! Hear directly from Dustin Gard-Weiss, CIA executive director, how the agency is reducing procurement friction and prioritizing commercial technologies during his intriguing keynote. Learn how the Drug Enforcement Agency is executing digital modernization efforts from Carrie Thompson, DEA deputy assistant administrator for the office of intelligence programs. Secure your seat today for his highly-anticipated GovCon forum!
How Does Hung Cao Plan to Accelerate Acquisition?
Part of Cao’s strategy for accelerating the speed of acquisition is treating industry better. For this, he is drawing on experience from his time as CACI vice president and client executive. He recalled working on an electronic warfare program where his team won a competition for an electronic warfare program but the Navy didn’t provide the contract for another five years, making the EW technology outdated.
Cao specifically requested industry to bring suggestions for bureaucracy that’s slowing them down. He displayed during his keynote an inch-thick manual that he said was a technology manual for a dot matrix printer, a technology largely phased out in the early 2000s. Cao suggested that it probably costs him less to buy new printers than to print that entire manual.
“You’re spending more time writing these reports than you are actually developing what I need you to develop for us,” he said. “I don’t need you to write reports every single day.”
Cao said China is surpassing the U.S. in many technological applications, including ship manufacturing and hypersonics. This, he said, means it’s time for the Navy to try new things, “throw things against the wall and see what works.”
This includes embracing new entrants and small businesses to diversify the defense industrial base and infuse competition into otherwise monopolized technologies. Cao said he doesn’t want to have one vendor with a lock on 70 percent of his munitions.
Dive deep into restructuring defense architectures for AI-era threats at the Potomac Officers Club’s 2026 Intel Summit on Sept. 24. At the Cybersecurity in the Age of Advanced AI panel discussion, get the real story on maintaining effective security under faster attack cycles and compressed timelines from zero-day to exploit from our stellar panel of top IC officials and industry experts. Buy your ticket now!
We’re doing four to five engineering change proposals every week on destroyers that we’ve been building for years. I’m putting an end to all that. — Cao
How is the Navy Embracing Rapid Acquisition?
Cao and the Navy are embracing rapid acquisition strategies that allow officers to quickly issue contracts to contractors offering innovative capabilities. This, he said, will require firms to invest more money up front in internal research and development, but the payoff will be worth it.
“When we go to those trade shows, you have to give us that quick elevator speech that allows us to go, ‘Okay, let’s get you in the office and see what you can do,’” he said.
What is the Navy’s Plan for a Fifth Shipyard?
Cao gave an update on President Trump’s effort to build a fifth shipyard, saying the U.S. needs to build new merchant ships in addition to new warships. He said the U.S. only has 155 U.S.-flagged merchant vessels while China has 11,000 merchant ships.
The Navy hasn’t decided whether to build a fifth shipyard on the East or West Coast. Ideally they’d like to have it on the West Coast, but issues are apparently arising with California energy requirements, earthquake fault protection and the Pentagon’s East Coast location.
Cao said building a fifth shipyard would add at least 540,000 jobs in the U.S.
“We are a maritime nation,” Cao asserted. “We depend on the sea lanes for our economy, and that’s why we need to build ships.”
Cao also reiterated the Navy’s need for a new large surface combatant to replace the service’s aging Ticonderoga (CG-47)-class Aegis cruisers. He said a new surface combatant would bolster the fleet and improve firepower capacity.
What Is the Navy’s Shipbuilding Plan?
The Navy’s May 2026 Shipbuilding Plan is a blueprint for $7.6 billion worth of investment in fiscal year 2027 and $78 billion over the five-year Future Years Defense Program. This is enough to procure 14 surface combatants, including seven DDGs, three BBGN next-generation battleships and four frigates.
“It would be great to have a large combatant that has 200, 300 [vertical launch system] cells so we can stay in the fight,” Cao said.
