As a career Naval intelligence officer, I spent years observing China’s maritime ascent. Briefing after briefing warned of China’s increasingly aggressive intentions of seapower, and yet, all that analytical churn has had negligible impact on U.S. naval posture. Now, watching from the sidelines, I remain alarmed by the widening gap between the naval and shipbuilding capabilities of the United States and the People’s Republic of China. What once was a slow, methodical buildup by the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) has accelerated into a rapidly growing strategic threat to U.S. maritime supremacy—both commercially and militarily. Without exaggeration, the United States is facing an urgent national security crisis.

While the U.S. rested on the laurels of its past naval dominance, China has systematically executed a comprehensive, state-directed maritime strategy that is now reshaping the global balance of naval power. If the U.S. fails to respond with urgency and scale, we risk ceding control of the seas—and with it, the geopolitical influence that flows from maritime power.

The data is staggering. According to the April 2025 Report to Congress on Chinese Naval Modernization, China’s navy currently operates over 370 battle force ships, a number projected to grow to 435 by 2030. Meanwhile, the U.S. Navy is struggling to maintain around 290 ships, with ambitions—still largely unfunded—of reaching 316 by 2053. Equally alarming, China’s shipyards possess more than 230 times the shipbuilding capacity of the U.S. According to a recent report by The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), China “built more commercial vessels by tonnage in 2024 than the entire U.S. shipbuilding industry has built since the end of World War II.” You might want to read that sentence again.

But the disparity is not merely in tonnage or hulls. China’s state-supported shipbuilding industry benefits from over 150 shipyards, including eight major naval production sites capable of building large warships, aircraft carriers, and amphibious assault ships in parallel. In stark contrast, the U.S. Navy is dependent on just seven private shipyards, several of which are overburdened, outdated, and struggling with workforce shortages. Further, the Congressional Report on U.S. Navy Force Structure indicated that nearly every major U.S. shipbuilding program is behind schedule and over budget.

Meanwhile, China’s maritime ambitions have expanded beyond the Indo-Pacific. As documented in the December 2024 U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings, China’s global maritime reach now spans 10,000 miles beyond Taiwan, including permanent naval bases in Djibouti and increasing influence in ports across Pakistan, Cambodia, and Equatorial Guinea. The foundation of this expansion is China’s merchant fleet—the world’s largest—which can be rapidly converted to military use in a real-world shooting war. Again, by contrast, the U.S. merchant fleet has dwindled to fewer than 180 international trading ships, severely limiting sealift capacity in a contested environment.

Taken together, this paints a picture of a maritime balance that is tipping rapidly and dangerously toward Beijing. Initiatives such as President Trump’s Executive Order on Restoring Maritime Dominance and the reintroduction of the SHIPS Act signal a growing recognition of the problem, but they are insufficient in both scale and urgency. Rebuilding a competitive naval force cannot be done incrementally or through bureaucratic half-measures.

The United States must enact a modern-day Marshall Plan for shipbuilding, one rooted in the understanding that maritime supremacy is the backbone of American global power. The plan must be bold, multifaceted, and sustained. Five critical priorities stand out:

Massive Industrial Investment: As proposed in the SHIPS Act, Congress must allocate $20–30 billion over the next decade to modernize and expand U.S. shipyards—revitalizing dry docks, increasing capacity, and restoring tiered supplier networks. Geographic diversification of shipyards is also critical to ensure resilience in a conflict.

Workforce Development: The U.S. faces a massive shortage of skilled labor in shipbuilding. The government should launch a unified Maritime Workforce Initiative, partnering with trade schools, unions, and community colleges to train tens of thousands of welders, electricians, engineers, and naval architects.

Procurement Reform: The Navy’s acquisition system must be radically—let me repeat, radically—overhauled. The complex, inefficient cost-plus contract system has made U.S. shipbuilding painfully slow and expensive. The Navy should adopt simpler, modular designs that speed up production, reduce costs, and make the fleet more adaptable.

Dual-Use Shipbuilding: The U.S. should incentivize the construction of commercial ships—tankers and container vessels—at domestic yards. This will boost shipyard throughput, maintain a steady workforce, and provide an auxiliary fleet in times of war.

Strategic Messaging and Public Buy-In: Maritime security is fundamental to national prosperity and defense. A public campaign, similar to the WWII-era “Victory Ship” program, could make shipbuilding a patriotic endeavor and reinvigorate public support for maritime dominance.

This is not hyperbole; the situation is dire. U.S. naval leaders have privately acknowledged a “worst-case scenario” in which the Navy may not be able to reliably contest Chinese aggression in the Western Pacific within the next five years. If the U.S. fails to act now, or fails to act boldly, we will not only lose our naval edge but forfeit our ability to shape the international order.

The oceans have always been the lifeblood of American power. In the 20th century, our shipbuilding might help win world wars and deter Soviet aggression. In the 21st century, it will determine whether we remain on the field as a superpower, or, like me, retire to the sidelines as an observer, in an era defined by Chinese maritime dominance. The time for incremental fixes is over. The clock is ticking—and only an “all-hands-on-deck” national response will suffice.

Andy Thaxton is a retired Naval intelligence officer with 28 years of active-duty service. He currently works with the FBI.

This article was originally published by RealClearDefense and made available via RealClearWire.