DATE: Saturday, October 25, 1997            TAG: 9710250311

SECTION: FRONT                   PAGE: A3   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: STAFF REPORT

DATELINE: WASHINGTON                        LENGTH:   32 lines

NAVY SCUTTLES ``ARSENAL SHIP,'' BOWING TO LACK OF ENTHUSIASM

The Navy quietly scuttled its ``arsenal ship'' program Friday, bowing to Congress' lack of enthusiasm for the futuristic, missile-laden vessel but promising to continue development of a ``land attack destroyer'' the arsenal ship was to presage.

Navy Secretary John H. Dalton ``reluctantly'' decided to cancel the program, the Navy said, after concluding that the Navy couldn't reshuffle its budget to keep the ship afloat.

Congress provided only $35 million for the ship, which the Navy had renamed the ``Maritime Fire Support Demonstrator,'' in the 1988 defense budget approved last month. The Navy and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, which was assisting in the ship's development, had sought $150 million.

The Navy had hoped to award a detailed design and construction contract for the ship in 1998.

Three contractor teams, one of which included Newport News Shipbuilding, have been working for about two years on competing preliminary designs. The Navy said their work ``has already produced several technological breakthroughs'' that should be transferable to the land attack destroyer when construction on it begins in 2004.

The demonstrator was to be the most heavily armed ship in history, with 500 missile tubes. But the Navy hoped to man it with a crew of only 20 to 50 sailors, using automated systems to run the ship and computers on other ships to launch and guide the missiles.

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