Trump Mandates Return to Steam Catapults for New Aircraft Carriers

The mandate requires the Pentagon and the Navy to submit transition plans within two months, focusing on replacing both the electromagnetic launch system and the ship’s weapons elevators. This shift targets technology that Trump has publicly criticized since 2017, when he dismissed electromagnetic systems as lacking the raw power of steam. While the President argues for simplicity, the decision complicates a program already halfway through construction on the Doris Miller.

General Atomics, the manufacturer of EMALS, warned that abandoning the system at this stage introduces significant integration risks and financial costs. Critics of the reversal point to the strategic disparity, noting that both China and France are actively adopting electromagnetic catapult technology for their own naval expansion. Furthermore, the Navy has previously highlighted that EMALS allows for higher sortie rates while reducing the crew requirement for catapult operations from a dozen sailors to just two. This change arrives as the Navy grapples with approximately 20,000 unfilled vacancies across the fleet, making the transition to a more labor-intensive steam system a potential operational burden.