U.S. Navy Adopts Nuclear Propulsion for Future Battleships in Updated Shipbuilding Plan

The U.S. Navy’s latest annual shipbuilding plan, released May 12, 2026, designates its future Trump class vessels as BBGNs and equips them with nuclear propulsion. The document outlines plans to acquire 15 of the nuclear-powered guided-missile battleships between fiscal year 2028 and 2055.

One initial official estimate places the cost of each vessel at $17 billion. Nuclear propulsion will provide functionally unlimited range and a major increase in onboard power generation for advanced weapons. The battleships are designed to deliver high-volume, long-range offensive fires while serving as a robust forward command and control platform.

They are not intended as destroyer replacements but as high-end additions to the fleet’s high-low mix. The vessels will feature 128 Mark 41 vertical launch system cells capable of firing both nuclear and conventional missiles, including hypersonic types.

They will also carry an electromagnetic railgun, two 5-inch guns, laser directed energy weapons and additional close-in defense systems.

” A U.S. Navy official told The War Zone on May 12 that the battleship requirements balance survivability, lethality, affordability, endurance, operational flexibility and industrial feasibility. The service has not yet responded to additional questions about when and why the decision to adopt nuclear propulsion was finalized.

The May 12 document reflects a change from the proposed fiscal year 2027 budget released four weeks earlier, in which the service described the vessels as non-nuclear BBGs powered by diesel generators, gas turbines and propulsion motors. Now-former Secretary of the Navy John Phelan told reporters on April 21 that nuclear propulsion was possible but unlikely as officials weighed trade-offs between cost, complexity and speed of delivery.

” Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Daryl Caudle had expressed similar reservations in January, noting that while nuclear power offered persistence, the associated construction timeline fell outside the operational need for rapid deployment of the new battleships.

The shift to nuclear propulsion comes as U.S. naval shipbuilders face significant strain. Newport News Shipbuilding, a division of Huntington Ingalls Industries, is the only yard currently producing nuclear-powered surface vessels, specifically Ford class carriers that have experienced delays and cost growth.

The same industrial base is also committed to Virginia class attack submarines for both the U.S. Navy and Australia under the AUKUS agreement, as well as the Columbia class ballistic missile submarines critical to the nuclear triad. The shipbuilding plan emphasizes lessons from past programs and calls for modern digital engineering, advanced production practices, artificial intelligence-enabled design tools, precision modular construction and deeper supplier integration.

The battleships will use a highly modular architecture enabling distributed construction across the industrial base while U.S. shipyards focus on final assembly, integration and testing.

The Navy states that the nuclear-powered battleship will provide longer endurance, higher speed and the ability to accommodate advanced weapon systems required for modern warfare. Vastly increased power generation will support electronic warfare tools and high-output lasers, reducing reliance on expensive single-use munitions.

The internal volume allows the ships to embark a fleet command staff and serve as a Maritime Operations Center at sea. They can lead a Surface Action Group, integrate with a Carrier Strike Group for layered defense or operate autonomously against advanced threats.

The first ship, to be named USS Defiant, is scheduled for ordering in fiscal year 2028 with expected entry into service in fiscal year 2036. The program will therefore extend well into the next presidential administration. Russia operates the only nuclear-powered surface combatant in service anywhere in the world today, the battlecruiser Admiral Nakhimov of the Kirov class.

The U.S. Navy has not operated nuclear-powered surface combatants since the 1990s, when the cruiser USS Long Beach, frigate USS Bainbridge and four Virginia class nuclear cruisers were decommissioned.