US President Donald Trump unveiled the brand new naval “Golden Fleet” of battleships at a briefing from his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Seashore, Florida, on Dec. 22, 2025. (Reuters/Yonhap)
US President Donald Trump held a press convention at Mar-a-Lago, Florida, on Dec. 22, 2025, to announce a brand new class of naval vessel that he dubbed the “Golden Fleet.” This event served not solely as an announcement of the plan to assemble new naval vessels, but in addition as a declaration of his intent to make sure US maritime supremacy and broaden American territory.
“Every one in every of these would be the largest battleship within the historical past of our nation; the most important battleship within the historical past of the world ever constructed. It’s 100 instances extra highly effective than the earlier Iowa class,” he stated on the time.
Trump’s boast might really feel exaggerated, however the knowledge launched by the US Navy exhibits that the 35,000-ton deliberate battleship is greater than double the scale of the most important class of destroyer, which has a displacement of round 15,000 lengthy tons.
The ship might be geared up with hypersonic missiles, electrical railguns and high-powered lasers, so his confidence is well-founded. The president personally dubbed the battleships as a part of the “Trump class” of vessels. Becoming, as his motto has been “peace by energy.”
“[These battleships will] assist preserve American army supremacy, revive the American shipbuilding trade and encourage worry into America’s enemies everywhere in the world,” he emphasised. He additionally stated that the US would, for the primary time since 1994, begin to assemble battleships to permit the nation’s Navy to experience its former glory, mentioning President Theodore Roosevelt’s Nice White Fleet and the legendary USS Missouri, which performed a pivotal position in World Battle II.
The solutions given in response to reporters’ questions after the press convention have been something however refined. Trump brazenly projected army energy to different nations, mentioning Venezuela, Colombia and Greenland by identify. He said that it could be “sensible” for Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro to step again from energy, whereas saying that Colombian President Gustavo Petro ought to “watch his ass” as Colombian drug factories “make cocaine” and ship it to the US.
Trump additionally added that the crackdown on medicine, which began at sea, might be continued on land, and that each one nations in Latin America could be topic to such operations, increasing the scope of Washington’s army operations to embody Latin America and the Caribbean.
Concerning Greenland, Trump talked about that the issue of buying Greenland was associated to “nationwide safety” points, stating, “For those who check out Greenland, you lookup and down the coast, you’ve got Russian and Chinese language ships in all places. We want it for nationwide safety.”
Within the early hours of Jan. 3, the US deployed particular forces to Venezuela, arresting the Venezuelan presidential couple and extraditing them to New York. Trump’s rash conduct prompts many issues — perhaps he’ll try and not solely broaden US territory to incorporate Latin America, but in addition to Greenland. That is the context by which we see Trump clearly placing an emphasis on strengthening the US Navy.
The specter of Roosevelt and Mahan?
Trump’s plan for the Golden Fleet and expansionism harkens again to Roosevelt’s push to strengthen US naval energy within the twentieth century and his expansionist insurance policies. Roosevelt is the determine most answerable for reorienting US diplomacy from isolationism to expansionism. He started the development of the Panama Canal and laid the inspiration for a US naval hegemony by army intervention in Latin America and forays to East Asia.
A former undersecretary of the US Navy, Roosevelt believed {that a} robust maritime pressure was important for the US to safe worldwide energy. The US Navy did certainly turn out to be the second greatest navy on the planet after the UK throughout Roosevelt’s time period.
The Nice White Fleet talked about by Trump is a major legacy left by Roosevelt. Roosevelt ordered the formation of a fleet of 16 US Navy battleships to circumnavigate the globe and go to 60 harbors in Asia, Europe and South America from 1907 to 1909. Painted in white and adorned with gold ornaments, the group of vessels was dubbed the “Nice White Fleet.” Roosevelt wished to impress upon the world the prowess of the US Navy whereas additionally holding tabs on Japan, which was making an attempt to unfold its affect in Asia.
Roosevelt is greatest identified for his aphorism, “Converse softly and carry an enormous stick.” The Nice White Fleet is an effective instance of 1 such “massive stick.” Trump’s option to say that the brand new fleet will “encourage worry in America’s enemies everywhere in the world” appears to be an try and emulate Roosevelt.
Roosevelt’s ideology was additionally affected drastically by US Navy strategist Alfred Mahan. James Stavridis, a retired US Navy admiral, as soon as commented that Mahan was Roosevelt’s “mental mentor.” In his guide, “The Affect of Sea Energy upon Historical past,” printed in 1890, Mahan posited that management over the ocean was what determined the rise and fall of sure powers, placing ahead a mannequin of maritime imperialism that depends on robust fleets and an intensive world community.
He contended that England, a small island that lacks pure sources, managed to broaden its management over the world by asserting energy at sea by its hefty naval energy and creating colonies, arguing that the US ought to comply with in these footsteps.
“England’s naval bases have been in all elements of the world; and her fleets have directly protected them, saved open the communications between them, and relied upon them for shelter,” Mahan wrote, putting clear emphasis on large, highly effective fleets. The Nice White Fleet was the embodiment of that imaginative and prescient.
Greater than a century later, Trump’s Golden Fleet appears to be taking over the mantle left by Roosevelt and Mahan. “It’s a counter to everyone, it’s not [only] China,” Trump commented in the course of the press convention, emphasizing how the US “simply wished peace by energy.”
Trump is concurrently contemplating the enlargement of management over Latin America and the Caribbean, acquiring the North Pole and Greenland, and countering China. Within the Western Hemisphere, one wants a powerful navy if one desires to undertaking army energy within the identify of waging a battle in opposition to medicine.
If a contingency occurs within the Taiwan Strait, the ocean might turn out to be the principle battleground. China at present has the world’s largest maritime pressure, with 234 working warships in comparison with the US’ 219. 70% of Chinese language warships have been launched after 2010, whereas solely 25% of US vessels have been, placing China . This case mirrors what occurred on the finish of the nineteenth century, when Germany’s enlargement of its fleet put England on its toes.
The propriety of an enormous battleship
US Navy strategists have had so much to say about Trump’s Golden Fleet. Whereas many agree with the significance of bolstering US maritime forces, consultants are divided on whether or not an enormous battleship is what the nation wants.
Bryan Clark, the director of the Middle for Protection Ideas and Expertise on the Hudson Institute, who participated on this US Navy undertaking, argues {that a} large battleship is required to strengthen the protection capabilities of plane carriers.
In an interview with The Wall Road Journal, Clark said that trendy battleships are geared up with long-range missiles, slightly than massive weapons, noting how necessary it was for contemporary battleships to have stronger firepower — extra missile launchers and working capabilities for hypersonic weapons. To take action, the US Navy wants larger warships, ones larger than the Arleigh Burke-class destroyers (9,000 tons).
Then again, Mark Cancian, a senior adviser with the Middle for Strategic and Worldwide Research’ Protection and Safety Division, argues that it’ll “take years to design, price $9 billion every to construct, and contravene the Navy’s new idea of operations, which envisions distributed firepower. A future administration will cancel this system earlier than the primary ship hits the water.”
The distributed firepower technique is a technique of maximizing firepower by deploying belongings in a widespread method whereas nonetheless holding them intently linked by a community by coordinating a mess of varied sensors and weapons methods. Cancian’s competition is that gargantuan battleships might show a legal responsibility of their vulnerability to assault in in the present day’s circumstances at sea, the place community connectivity and the flexibility to function distributed autonomous unmanned methods are essential.
Recognized for its army and safety insights, the conservative-leaning CSIS Protection and Safety Division is a assume tank that by all accounts serves as a pillar of the military-industrial complicated, which makes it slightly outstanding that it has come out so vocally in opposition to the technique put forth by the present sitting president. This implies that there’s greater than a bit pushback inside the US Navy itself. But the willpower proven by Trump and the highest brass means that the Golden Fleet undertaking received’t disappear any time quickly.
Weaknesses in Trump’s technique from the attitude of Mahan
Mahan proposed three pillars required to be a maritime energy: world connectivity with productiveness by worldwide commerce, maritime transport capabilities encompassing service provider ships and warships, and securing maritime strongholds by colonial or alliance networks. In brief, maritime energy is outlined not by the variety of warships one has — or how massive they’re — however by the mixed energy of commerce, trade and alliance networks.
These three areas are exactly the place Trump’s technique fails.
Trump has eroded the idea of worldwide commerce by a return to commerce protectionism and America’s shipbuilding trade is almost nonexistent. On prime of that, commerce conflicts with key allies are consuming away on the cohesion of maritime networks. Given these structural constraints, it’s unclear whether or not the undertaking to bolster US naval energy that revolves across the Golden Fleet will obtain a lot in the best way of tangible outcomes.
By Park Hyun, editorial author
Please direct questions or feedback to [english@hani.co.kr]
