Coast Guard Deepwater Acquisition Programs: Background, Oversight Issues, and Options for Congress

Ronald O'Rourke
Specialist in Naval Affairs

The term Deepwater has referred to more than a dozen separate Coast Guard acquisition programs for replacing and modernizing the service’s aging fleet of deepwater-capable ships and aircraft. Until April 2007, the Coast Guard pursued these programs as a single, integrated acquisition program that was known as the Integrated Deepwater System (IDS) program or Deepwater program for short. Since April 2007, the Coast Guard has pursued them as separate acquisition programs. These acquisition programs include plans for, among other things, 91 new cutters, 124 new small boats, and 247 new or modernized airplanes, helicopters, and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).

The Coast Guard’s proposed FY2012 budget submission proposes to eliminate the use of “Deepwater” as a term for grouping or referring collectively to these acquisition programs. The budget submission states that “Consistent with the dissolution of Integrated CG Systems and the disaggregation of the Deepwater Acquisition into asset-based Acquisition Program Baselines, the proposed changes align projects that were formerly grouped under Integrated Deepwater Systems (IDS) with the existing authorized structure for Vessels, Aviation, Shore, Other Equipment, and Personnel and Management.”

The year 2007 was a watershed year for these acquisition programs. The management and execution of what was then the single, integrated Deepwater program was strongly criticized by various observers. House and Senate committees held several oversight hearings on the program. Bills were introduced to restructure or reform the program in various ways. Coast Guard and industry officials acknowledged certain problems in the program’s management and execution and defended the program’s management and execution in other respects. The Coast Guard announced a number of reform actions that significantly altered the service’s approach to Deepwater acquisition (and to Coast Guard acquisition in general). Among these was the change from a single, integrated Deepwater acquisition program to a collection of separate acquisition programs.

The Coast Guard’s management of these acquisition programs, including implementation of recommendations made by the Government Accountability Office (GAO), is a topic of continuing congressional oversight. Additional oversight issues include reporting of information to Congress on these programs; cost growth in, and budget planning for, these acquisition programs; a Coast Guard fleet mix analysis that could lead to changes in planned asset quantities; and execution of individual acquisition programs.

The Coast Guard’s FY2012 budget appears to request $975.5 million in acquisition funding for these programs, including $289.9 million for aircraft, $512.0 million for surface ships and boats, and $173.6 million for other items.


Date of Report: December 20, 2011
Number of Pages: 65
Order Number: RL33753
Price: $29.95

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