Critics have rightly lambasted the Zumwalt-class destroyers as “ships without a mission,” plagued by technological overreach and operational irrelevance.
There has been a strange push to claim the United States Navy’s Zumwalk-class destroyer (DDG-1000) as a modern equivalent of a battleship. This was likely born out of the fact that the Zumwalts took years to build, ran vastly over budget, and, in classic Pentagon fashion, largely underperformed.
Today, however, some of the Zumwalt’s proponents have argued in earnest that the class is the equivalent of a new breed of battleships. That conversation has piggybacked on a recent resurgence of interest in battleships among some naval enthusiasts, who yearn for a return of the enormous warships in an era of sophisticated anti-access/area-denial (A2/AD) systems that threatens to end the age of the aircraft carrier.
Historically, battleships were defined as large, heavily armored warships equipped with a main battery of large-caliber guns, serving as capital ships capable of projecting overwhelming firepower in ship-to-ship combat. These ships, built primarily between the late 19th and the mid-20th centuries, combined immense size, thick armor plating, and powerful artillery to ensure naval supremacy.
The Zumwalt-Class Destroyer Is Not a Battleship!
Many proponents of the Zumwalt-class destroyer have pointed to the fact that the Zumwalt can be used to fire hypersonic missiles—ostensibly giving them similar firepower to the battleships of yore.
Zumwalts have also erroneously been likened to modern battleships because of their substantial displacement and their futuristic design. The ship is built to maximize its stealth capabilities on the sea—reminding one of a stealth plane, with its odd shape and the unique alloys involved in its construction.
Yet these do not qualify as the makings of a modern battleship. Far from it.
To understand why the Zumwalt falls short of this classification, one must first understand the very essence of battleships themselves. They evolved from wooden ships-of-the-line to steel-clad dreadnoughts, peaking in designs like the Iowa-class during the Second World War.
Their important attributes included batteries of massive guns—typically 12 to 18-inches in caliber—capable of hurling shells over 20 miles to devastate enemy ships or coastal targets.
The armor and protection of battleships of yesteryear included thick armor belts of up to 16 inches, in some cases complemented by underwater torpedo protection and compartmentalization to withstand hits from equivalent weaponry.
But the biggest element of the battleship was its size. These massive steel juggernauts of the sea could displace anywhere from 20,000 to 70,000 tons. They were among the largest warships ever built and were all designed for endurance and stability in blue-water operations. Their main purpose was to engage in line-of-battle tactics to assert sea control via direct confrontation with rival forces at sea.
Battleships were ultimately phased out after the Second World War due to the rise of aircraft carriers and missiles, which rendered their gun-centric design obsolete. These trends have continued: today, the missile threat is at its apex, and has been augmented by increasingly sophisticated drones and hypersonic weapons.
The Zumwalt Class No Longer Serves a Purpose
The Zumwalt-class destroyer, named after US Navy Admiral Elmo Zumwalt, was conceived in the 1990s as a next-generation destroyer focused on land-attack missions. To facilitate these close-to-shore mission profiles, the Zumwalts were built for stealth, and increased automation reduced crew requirements.
This is important. Just as battleships and aircraft carriers were products of their era’s style and technologies of warfare, the Zumwalts were byproducts of the immediate post-Cold War era, which envisioned the United States military as the global hegemon—acting as a “global policeman” rather than as a conventional military primed for near-peer conflict. In this way, the Zumwalt class, despite its advanced design, stealth technology, and hypersonic weapon-firing capability, is even less relevant to today’s warfare than the antiquated battleships are!
Only three Zumwalts were built out of an originally planned 32, due to escalating costs and shifting priorities. Each displaces around 16,000 tons and incorporates a wave-piercing tumblehome hull for radar evasion. Armament includes 80 vertical launch cells for missiles, two 155mm Advanced Gun Systems, or AGS (these were the guns that the Navy was going to replace with hypersonic missile launchers), and various secondary weapons. Each of these ships cost over $22 billion when all was said and done, making them more expensive than America’s aircraft carriers.
Critics have rightly lambasted the Zumwalt-class destroyers as “ships without a mission,” plagued by technological overreach and operational irrelevance.
Not only was the ship without a mission, its guns were basically without purpose, too. A battleship’s defining feature was its formidable main battery, yet the Zumwalt-class destroyer’s main armament was judged to be woefully lacking. The two 155mm (six-inch) AGS were intended for precision land strikes, firing Long-Range Land Attack Projectiles (LRLAP) up to 63 nautical miles (73 statutory miles). After it was determined that the specialized LRLAP ammunition would cost $800,000 per round, the entire gun system was unceremoniously canceled in 2016. Of course, not understanding the concept of a sunk cost, the Pentagon’s next plan was to install hypersonic missile tubes, leaving the Zumwalts without functional main guns.
A comparison is in order. True battleships like the Iowa class mounted 16-inch guns capable of firing 2,700-pound shells over 24 miles, devastating fortified targets or enemy vessels. The Zumwalt’s six-inch guns, even when operational, lacked the caliber, range, and volume of fire to qualify as battleship-grade artillery.
The class relies heavily on missiles for anti-ship and anti-air roles, which aligns more with destroyer or cruiser doctrines than the gun-dominated ethos of battleships. This missile-centric approach, while modern, underscores the Zumwalt’s identity as a stealthy guided-missile platform, not a gunship heir to the dreadnought legacy.
Battleships were engineered to endure brutal punishments, with armor belts thick enough to resist shells from their own guns. The Zumwalt-class destroyers, however, prioritize stealth through composite materials, angular design, and radar-absorbent coatings, achieving a radar cross-section comparable to a fishing boat. While innovative, this “armor” is illusory: once detected, the ship has minimal physical protection against missiles, torpedoes, or gunfire. In a peer conflict with adversaries like China or Russia, where hypersonic weapons and saturation attacks are constant threats, the Zumwalt’s lack of armor could prove fatal.
Please Mothball the Zumwalts
The Zumwalt-class destroyer, for all its technological flair, does not qualify as a modern battleship. It lacks the large-caliber guns, heavy armor, and capital-ship ethos that defined battleships, instead embodying a destroyer’s agile but limited profile. Compounded by egregious failures—failed guns, astronomical costs, and operational irrelevance—the program stands as a monument to naval hubris, squandering resources on a vessel that neither revives the battleship legacy nor effectively meets contemporary needs.
Zumwalt-class destroyers have not lived up to their promise. They never will. Trying to make the case that they could somehow become the new battleship of our era is a fool’s errand. In any case, the US Navy needs more hypersonic weapons, unmanned undersea vehicles (UUVs), and submarines—not a return to the battleships of old.
About the Author: Brandon J. Weichert
Brandon J. Weichert, a Senior National Security Editor at The National Interest as well as a contributor at Popular Mechanics, who consults regularly with various government institutions and private organizations on geopolitical issues. Weichert’s writings have appeared in multiple publications, including the Washington Times, National Review, The American Spectator, MSN, the Asia Times, and countless others. His books include Winning Space: How America Remains a Superpower, Biohacked: China’s Race to Control Life, and The Shadow War: Iran’s Quest for Supremacy. His newest book, A Disaster of Our Own Making: How the West Lost Ukraine is available for purchase wherever books are sold. He can be followed via Twitter @WeTheBrandon.
Image: Wikimedia Commons.
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