Senator Kelly’s ‘moonshot’: revitalising US-flag fleet and American shipbuilding

Throughout his career as a merchant mariner, naval aviator and a Space Shuttle commander, US Senator Mark Kelly has been an optimist. “I’m the guy who had to climb into the spaceship four times built by the lowest bidder. You have got to be an optimist,” the senator joked.

Now, as the senior US Senator from Arizona, Mr Kelly has embarked on the equivalent of a moonshot — revitalising the US-flag merchant fleet and American shipbuilding industrial base through rethinking US maritime policy. 

Providing the keynote address at Marine Money Week in New York on 16 June, he told delegates, “The US-flag is nearly non-existent in international maritime commerce today.” Only 80 out of 50,000 ships sailing globally in international trade operate under the US flag.

China, by contrast, controls 5,500 ships under its flag, and its shipbuilders hold contracts to construct 62% of the global orderbook over the next decade.

“Maritime transportation logistics are critical to national security. In a prolonged conflict overseas, the US and our allies are going to have to rely on the US merchant marine to provide the sea lift we need to support overseas operations,” said Mr Kelly.

The US faces a shortage of mariners, training, welders, shipbuilding capacity and a host of maritime supply chain issues.

“Addressing all these challenges requires us to comprehensively rethink our national maritime strategy. We haven’t had one. For the first time in 50 years, we’ve seen leaders in the United States, in both parties, begin to take the steps to do that,” he said.

For the first time in decades, US-flag shipping and American shipbuilding are in the spotlight in the White House and on Capitol Hill. Mr Kelly noted the Biden Administration’s US trade representative had concluded in January that China had “unreasonably targeted” the maritime and shipbuilding industries to manipulate the industry globally, which led the United States to propose some actions to counter its unfair trade practices. This was followed in April by President Trump’s executive order to revitalise and rebuild the US maritime industry.

The bipartisan and bicameral SHIPS Act for America aims to take up the heavy lifting of setting ambitious “bold new targets” and “significant investments” in constructing US-flag ships that will sail in international trade at American shipyards. The bill calls for the construction of 250 US-flag ships over the next 10 years. Between US Navy and commercial ship construction, US shipyards deliver on average less than 10 oceangoing ships annually.

“I fully understand the scope of the challenge we are seeking to overcome. It is a big challenge. It’s going to take some time, and it’s going to require the US government to send a clear and consistent signal to the maritime industry. And I want all of you to understand that my goal is to ensure our maritime revitalisation efforts provide certainty to the industry across administrations,” concluded Senator Kelly.