Analyzing the new US maritime strategy

The United States Navy (USN) needs a threat and a maritime strategy. It had both during the Cold War but since then its situation has been more difficult. Without a contemporary strategy to deal with prevailing asymmetric threats, the Navy is finding it increasingly harder to compete with the other US Services for scarce defense dollars in the tighter budgetary environment that currently prevails in Washington. Shipbuilding programs are being cut and the USN faces a period of downsizing unless it can come up with a new maritime strategy.