The US Great White Fleet sailed into Sydney Harbour in August 1908 and virtually the entire city turned out to greet the ships. There were parades, balls and parties as we fell for the first time under America’s beguiling sense of power.
The fleet had circumnavigated the globe to trumpet the US’s arrival as a world naval power and now president Donald Trump plans to set to sea in Theodore Roosevelt’s wake.
What the planned new Trump-class warship should look like – if all goes to planCredit: AP
Trump has announced that the US will commission a new series of heavily armed “battleships” named after himself, as part of a revamped “Golden Fleet” aimed at expanding the US Navy to catch up with China. “They’ll help maintain American military supremacy, revive the American shipbuilding industry and inspire fear in America’s enemies all over the world,” Trump said.
He boasted the new class of warships would be 100 times more powerful than previous battleships and larger than any other surface combatant on the oceans. He criticised current warships as ugly, apparently unaware that their designs reflect radar and he has mooted aesthetics as a criterion for US Navy design teams.
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Long fascinated with battleships, Trump was unable to resist his passion for branding himself on favourite projects. However, dubbing the new ships “Trump class” breaks naming conventions, including not naming ships after living persons.
But he had to float something big to create the impression that both American industry and military were poised to regain hegemony on the high seas.
The US has faded considerably as a maritime power since the 1940s and although there were fits at rebuilding, the fleet has languished and now numbers some 300 vessels. For the first time in living memory, the US faces a serious competitor for naval dominance in the form of the People’s Republic of China. Beijing moved to fill the void and, with some 400 ships, the Chinese navy is now the biggest in the world. Not only that, about 60 per cent of worldwide orders now go to China’s shipyards.
But the Trump class battleship has a major credibility problem.
