QUEBEC, CANADA - USS Freedom, the first of the Navy's new class of near-shore warships, is making her way from the Wisconsin shipyard where she was built, through the Great Lakes and down the East Coast to Norfolk, Virginia, where she will begin a year of tactical tests. Along the way, Commander Don Gabrielson, Freedom's first skipper, is taking every opportunity to push the lightweight fighter and her specialized crew to their limits -- and getting in all kinds of trouble, in the process. Freedom's first cruise is a demonstration of a new kind of ship, a new kind of sailor and a new mindset for dirty, dangerous coastal warfare.
On the Great Lakes, Gabrielson opened up the throttles -- Freedom has airplane-style controls and the same turbine engines as a Boeing jetliner -- and topped out at "40-plus" knots, where most warships struggle to make 30. The Canadian Coast Guard radioed over to ask Freedom to slow down. Gabrielson's response, he told me during my visit to the ship on Monday, was, "There's no speed limit here!"
The skipper said a high top speed is a big advantage for reacting quickly to pop-up threats, even if it means gulping fuel like nobody's business. Gabrielson said he can even use Freedom's giant, churning wake "as a weapon," to overturn the small boats used by pirates and other coastal ne'er-do-wells.
Passing through a series of locks between Lakes Erie and Ontario proved dicier than the speed trial. Freedom is 58 feet wide; the locks, only 80. Keeping the 3,000-ton ship from scraping the sides was a struggle for the tiny crew. Freedom
is designed for a "core" crew of just 40 people, supplemented by another 30 or so who accompany "modules" fitted with weapons, sensors and robots. It's been an open question in Freedom's five-year development how a small crew would handle such a large ship, especially if she were attacked. Would there be enough hands to cook, clean and stand watch -- never mind fight fires, pump out flooded compartments and repel boarders?
To get the most "bang" from a small crew, the Navy has doubled up their training. Nobody gets assigned to Freedom
without years of experience, a proven ability to handle all sorts of tasks, plus qualifications on pistols, rifles and machine guns. The youngest sailor aboard is 26, compared to 18 for most vessels. The Navy calls these cross-trained sailors "hybrids." Passing through the locks was a test for the very first all-hybrid crew. "Even the skipper got into the act, hauling in and resetting fenders set from the bridge wings," Defense News' Chris Cavas reported.
Even so, Freedom collided with a gate, tearing a gash in her bridge. The damage was "minor," according to blogger Galrahn, who was aboard during the accident. I asked Gabrielson if he were worried -- the Navy does, after all, have a tendency to relieve skippers for inflicting even minor damage on their ships. No, he said. The Secretary of the Navy "looked me in the eyes and gave me his full support," Gabrielson told me.
"If I use this ship like I'm supposed to, I'm going to scrape bottom," Gabrielson said. Traditionally, running aground is, ahem, grounds
for a pink slip in the Navy. But that's going to have to change as more
Littoral Combat Ships come on line, and the Navy surges these ships into dangerous, crowded, shallow coastal waters where a little cosmetic damage is the least of anyone's concerns. Gabrielson perhaps represents a new breed of aggressive skipper suited to leading a hybrid crew: he's not afraid to get his hands, and his ship, a little dirty and bruised.
What I saw on Monday was an impressive ship with an even more impressive crew. The Navy's taking a chance, investing so heavily in small crews and daring skippers to undertake risky missions in a hugely complex new warship. But if Freedom and her hybrid sailors are any indication, the potential pay-off is well worth the risk.
