In response to these systemic issues, in April 2025, the Trump Administration signed Executive Order 14269, Restoring America’s Maritime Dominance, to revitalize the U.S. shipbuilding ecosystem and reestablish naval dominance. In February 2026, the Maritime Action Plan was officially released, alongside a comprehensive administrative framework to construct the Golden Fleet and the newly announced Trump-class battleship, the first of its kind since the Iowa-class vessel was commissioned and designed during the Second World War. While political pundits debate the overall feasibility of the Golden Fleet’s construction, namely the proposed battleship by the Trump Administration, the July 2026 House-passed version of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for the Fiscal Year 2027 appropriates approximately $1 billion in advanced procurement for the battleship. With substantive efforts being prompted by the Administration to reinvigorate the American maritime industrial base (MIB) and the potential construction of a new primary combat ship, pernicious adversarial actors are likely to target the American workforce as a strategic asset for intellectual property and gain a seamless advanced insight into American maritime engineering.
Threat Assessment: The American Shipbuilder as a Foreign Asset
It’s widely established that near-peer adversarial actors have actively and clandestinely targeted the U.S. defense industrial base; notable actions include cyber operations and corporate obfuscation to embed itself within the lower tiers of the U.S. supply chain. This extends to the United States’ MIB, with a 2025 Section 301 Investigation Report by the Office of the United States Trade Representative indicating China’s multi-decadal systemic campaign targeting and marginalizing the U.S.’s maritime, logistics, and shipbuilding sectors to diminish the U.S.’s naval dominance and destabilize its maritime enterprise. Accordingly, the shipbuilding enterprise has evolved into a principal arena intensifying the active U.S.-China competition.
Like other critical sectors, the U.S. shipbuilding workforce remains an integral and irreplaceable component of the United States’ naval security apparatus. The U.S. workforce maintains a diversified amalgamation ranging from skilled tradespeople specialized in heavy structural metalwork, including riggers, machinists, and fabricators, to engineering and professional staffers, including marine engineers and naval architects. Shipbuilders, across the entire broad spectrum, must maintain a rare cross-disciplinary specialized functional knowledge in heavy industrial manufacturing with high-tolerance engineering to architect and translate schematics into operationally lethal maritime assets. Given their operational access and proximity to primary engineering nodes of the U.S. shipbuilding ecosystem, American shipbuilders can act as a strategic asset for foreign intelligence agencies.
Depending on the Department of Defense and the type of vessel being designed and fabricated, shipyards may operate under distinct defense industrial security requirements. Notably, security clearances are not uniformly distributed across the shipbuilding workforce; engineers, naval architects, and program managers with access to sensitive combat systems or nuclear propulsion designs may require specialized security clearances unique from floor-level trade workers who work directly on physical ship components within controlled shipyard environments.
With the civilian-military fusion igniting China’s apoplectic resolve to advance its shipbuilding ecosystem and supersede U.S. blue-water naval superiority, and with the potential appropriations for the Trump-class battleship, Beijing will almost certainly target the American workforce across all levels to co-opt intellectual property for the advancement of its naval complex. The PRC is infamous in utilizing all-source aggregation of intellectual property from foreign hardware to reverse-engineer industrial systems into its own defensive apparatus. Historical precedents include integrating exfiltrated aerodynamic geometry and radar-cross-section data into the Shenyang J-31 and the J-35 variant and leveraging segments of stolen data from the Pentagon’s Sea Dragon to advance its own anti-submarine tracking algorithms.
Counterintelligence Implications: Human Vulnerabilities and Behavioral Exploitation
Upon close examination of the U.S. shipbuilding threat matrix, human vulnerabilities remain in the background of nominal security discussions; however, past instances illustrate this risk, including that of former U.S. Navy machinist and Petty Officer Second Class Jinchao Wei, who was sentenced to 16 years in January 2026 for selling sensitive technical ship manuals, operational data, and mechanical blueprints to Chinese intelligence. According to a U.S. Department of Justice statement, Wei received more than $12,000. While Wei’s salary is not publicly disclosed, it was known that he operated as a Petty Officer Second Class; under U.S. Navy compensation metrics, E-5 salaries are approximately $110,038. The case of Wei notably demonstrates the overall feasibility that a trusted domestic insider can compromise their own nation’s strategic assets on behalf of foreign authorities despite maintaining an established position within the U.S. military apparatus and acting solely for personal financial gain.
While not all Americans pose an inherent threat to information security, laborers and engineers with security clearances undergo comprehensive background investigations assessing qualifications, financial records, personal conduct, and foreign contacts. However, despite these bureaucratic efforts, individual cases can expose a notable vulnerability matrix. Despite years of cultivated specialized expertise and skills, alongside a rigorous hiring process, the U.S. shipbuilding workforce, according to U.S. Navy leadership, earns significantly less than Buc-ee’s or Amazon employees. . Under such conditions, this could, at best, result in a lack of retention among skilled laborers and, at worst, culminate in resentment and discontent, leaving an exposed vulnerability for foreign intelligence recruiters to exploit. In an environment of economic vulnerabilities such as inadequate wages relative to the cost of living, lifestyle inflation, high consumer debt, and a scarcity mindset, the prospect of illicit supplementary compensation could induce a target to facilitate the disclosure of state assets.
With the prospect of a new Trump-class battleship emerging at the forefront of the NDAA discourse and the continual ebb and flow of economic vulnerabilities regarding shipbuilding wages, Beijing may target the shipbuilding workers across the entire spectrum for direct access to specialized knowledge of the new vessel. Because of the PRC’s proficiency in reverse engineering, Beijing likely will not seek entire design schematics; instead, the threat vector bifurcates based on operational access. For floor-level trade workers, external entities may target component-specific operating manuals and unclassified component layouts to map physical engineering nodes, whereas underappreciated naval architects or engineers facing career bottlenecks may be induced to exfiltrate export-controlled system algorithms and core design schematics. Like Wei, the primary focus remains on acquiring piecemeal, highly sensitive data packets that can be co-opted directly into their own shipbuilding architecture.
Ultimately, the strategic integrity of the Trump-class battleship, and by extension the Golden Fleet, depends less on kinetic shipyard safeguards and more on addressing the non-kinetic motivating variables that leave personnel susceptible to outside solicitation. Notably, during recruitment cycles, adversarial agencies may leverage a diverse matrix of behavioral drivers, including ideological alignment and ego, to extract sensitive data. Though the U.S. cannot inherently identify all negative externalities in individual workers, to diminish the likelihood of foreign asset recruitment, stabilizing the economic baseline remains a critical defense mechanism, as this will alleviate proximate financial pressures on the workforce, potential professional alienation, and the likelihood of operational resentment that may leave workers feeling underappreciated .
Looking Ahead
While the Senate’s version of the NDAA seems to have rejected the House’s version allocating provisions for the Trump-class battleship, the fundamental economic issues remain a constant within the American shipbuilding industry, regardless of whether advanced procurement funds are authorized. Presently, the current administration remains adamant about revitalizing the shipbuilding ecosystem and will continue to advance policy initiatives targeting such efforts. At the forefront of the discussion must be retaining industry workers and assuming countermeasures to illicit actors.
Chinese espionage appears to be on an upward trend; according to Article 7 of China’s National Intelligence Law, passed in 2017, Chinese citizens and entities can be called upon to assist state intelligence agencies when requested. Though various shipyard workers may require specialized clearance before operating and manufacturing a vessel, a status notably allotted to American nationals and naturalized citizens, China has been a known proponent of birth tourism, leveraging federal regulations to acquire birthright citizenship with the primary motive of granting long-term options such as living, working, or studying in the United States once a child born in the states and raised in mainland China reaches maturity. A child raised under such conditions can arguably leverage their birthright citizenship status to potentially obtain a U.S. clearance while simultaneously providing information directly to the PRC.
Though the U.S. cannot account for the machinations of individuals acting on behalf of the PRC, it can institutionalize guardrails that diminish native-born American workers’ exposure to foreign influences. Similarly, not every worker in the shipbuilding industry acquires security clearance. By instituting a universal bureaucratic clearance requirement, agencies can adequately scrutinize individual workers across all variables prior to accessing shipbuilding information. While this may require an exorbitant amount of resources, it can allow the U.S. to comprehensively analyze an individual’s threat potential, including non-kinetic factors such as ideological beliefs and contacts with foreign nationals, such as those who are found to be a product of birth tourism. In addition to addressing the income disparities of the labour workforce, domestic counterintelligence agencies should remain observant of illicit financial flows among workers across all sectors and flag anomalies as potential indicators of compromise. While such a proactive measure does not address the non-kinetic behavioral vulnerabilities, it does allow for a two-front solution—adequately compensating workers as well as identifying potential risk vectors.
Catherine Marie Abbott holds a master’s degree in security policy studies from George Washington University and a bachelor’s degree in political science from the University of Missouri-Kansas City, specializing in maritime security and intelligence analysis. Her research primarily focuses on maritime logistics, emerging technology, and intelligence processing, with a distinct focus on analyzing overlooked variables and externalities that disrupt strategic decision-making.
The views expressed in this piece are the sole opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Center for Maritime Strategy or other institutions listed.
Center for Maritime Strategy
By Catherine Marie Abbott
Context
Despite being historically regarded as a global hegemon, unique for its unparalleled technological innovations, blue-water superiority, and lethality in the maritime domain, the United States’ shipbuilding enterprise has declined over the years, stemming from reverberating systemic issues within U.S. governance and the maritime industry sector. In comparison to near-peer competitors, namely the People’s Republic of China (PRC), the United States presently contends with shipbuilding delays, with a notable 82% of new warship construction behind schedule, whereas Beijing’s naval forces received two new Type 055-class guided missile destroyers alongside the potential for a new naval auxiliary vessel in China’s current carrier strike group.
In response to these systemic issues, in April 2025, the Trump Administration signed Executive Order 14269, Restoring America’s Maritime Dominance, to revitalize the U.S. shipbuilding ecosystem and reestablish naval dominance. In February 2026, the Maritime Action Plan was officially released, alongside a comprehensive administrative framework to construct the Golden Fleet and the newly announced Trump-class battleship, the first of its kind since the Iowa-class vessel was commissioned and designed during the Second World War. While political pundits debate the overall feasibility of the Golden Fleet’s construction, namely the proposed battleship by the Trump Administration, the July 2026 House-passed version of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for the Fiscal Year 2027 appropriates approximately $1 billion in advanced procurement for the battleship. With substantive efforts being prompted by the Administration to reinvigorate the American maritime industrial base (MIB) and the potential construction of a new primary combat ship, pernicious adversarial actors are likely to target the American workforce as a strategic asset for intellectual property and gain a seamless advanced insight into American maritime engineering.
Threat Assessment: The American Shipbuilder as a Foreign Asset
It’s widely established that near-peer adversarial actors have actively and clandestinely targeted the U.S. defense industrial base; notable actions include cyber operations and corporate obfuscation to embed itself within the lower tiers of the U.S. supply chain. This extends to the United States’ MIB, with a 2025 Section 301 Investigation Report by the Office of the United States Trade Representative indicating China’s multi-decadal systemic campaign targeting and marginalizing the U.S.’s maritime, logistics, and shipbuilding sectors to diminish the U.S.’s naval dominance and destabilize its maritime enterprise. Accordingly, the shipbuilding enterprise has evolved into a principal arena intensifying the active U.S.-China competition.
Like other critical sectors, the U.S. shipbuilding workforce remains an integral and irreplaceable component of the United States’ naval security apparatus. The U.S. workforce maintains a diversified amalgamation ranging from skilled tradespeople specialized in heavy structural metalwork, including riggers, machinists, and fabricators, to engineering and professional staffers, including marine engineers and naval architects. Shipbuilders, across the entire broad spectrum, must maintain a rare cross-disciplinary specialized functional knowledge in heavy industrial manufacturing with high-tolerance engineering to architect and translate schematics into operationally lethal maritime assets. Given their operational access and proximity to primary engineering nodes of the U.S. shipbuilding ecosystem, American shipbuilders can act as a strategic asset for foreign intelligence agencies.
Depending on the Department of Defense and the type of vessel being designed and fabricated, shipyards may operate under distinct defense industrial security requirements. Notably, security clearances are not uniformly distributed across the shipbuilding workforce; engineers, naval architects, and program managers with access to sensitive combat systems or nuclear propulsion designs may require specialized security clearances unique from floor-level trade workers who work directly on physical ship components within controlled shipyard environments.
With the civilian-military fusion igniting China’s apoplectic resolve to advance its shipbuilding ecosystem and supersede U.S. blue-water naval superiority, and with the potential appropriations for the Trump-class battleship, Beijing will almost certainly target the American workforce across all levels to co-opt intellectual property for the advancement of its naval complex. The PRC is infamous in utilizing all-source aggregation of intellectual property from foreign hardware to reverse-engineer industrial systems into its own defensive apparatus. Historical precedents include integrating exfiltrated aerodynamic geometry and radar-cross-section data into the Shenyang J-31 and the J-35 variant and leveraging segments of stolen data from the Pentagon’s Sea Dragon to advance its own anti-submarine tracking algorithms.
Counterintelligence Implications: Human Vulnerabilities and Behavioral Exploitation
Upon close examination of the U.S. shipbuilding threat matrix, human vulnerabilities remain in the background of nominal security discussions; however, past instances illustrate this risk, including that of former U.S. Navy machinist and Petty Officer Second Class Jinchao Wei, who was sentenced to 16 years in January 2026 for selling sensitive technical ship manuals, operational data, and mechanical blueprints to Chinese intelligence. According to a U.S. Department of Justice statement, Wei received more than $12,000. While Wei’s salary is not publicly disclosed, it was known that he operated as a Petty Officer Second Class; under U.S. Navy compensation metrics, E-5 salaries are approximately $110,038. The case of Wei notably demonstrates the overall feasibility that a trusted domestic insider can compromise their own nation’s strategic assets on behalf of foreign authorities despite maintaining an established position within the U.S. military apparatus and acting solely for personal financial gain.
While not all Americans pose an inherent threat to information security, laborers and engineers with security clearances undergo comprehensive background investigations assessing qualifications, financial records, personal conduct, and foreign contacts. However, despite these bureaucratic efforts, individual cases can expose a notable vulnerability matrix. Despite years of cultivated specialized expertise and skills, alongside a rigorous hiring process, the U.S. shipbuilding workforce, according to U.S. Navy leadership, earns significantly less than Buc-ee’s or Amazon employees. . Under such conditions, this could, at best, result in a lack of retention among skilled laborers and, at worst, culminate in resentment and discontent, leaving an exposed vulnerability for foreign intelligence recruiters to exploit. In an environment of economic vulnerabilities such as inadequate wages relative to the cost of living, lifestyle inflation, high consumer debt, and a scarcity mindset, the prospect of illicit supplementary compensation could induce a target to facilitate the disclosure of state assets.
With the prospect of a new Trump-class battleship emerging at the forefront of the NDAA discourse and the continual ebb and flow of economic vulnerabilities regarding shipbuilding wages, Beijing may target the shipbuilding workers across the entire spectrum for direct access to specialized knowledge of the new vessel. Because of the PRC’s proficiency in reverse engineering, Beijing likely will not seek entire design schematics; instead, the threat vector bifurcates based on operational access. For floor-level trade workers, external entities may target component-specific operating manuals and unclassified component layouts to map physical engineering nodes, whereas underappreciated naval architects or engineers facing career bottlenecks may be induced to exfiltrate export-controlled system algorithms and core design schematics. Like Wei, the primary focus remains on acquiring piecemeal, highly sensitive data packets that can be co-opted directly into their own shipbuilding architecture.
Ultimately, the strategic integrity of the Trump-class battleship, and by extension the Golden Fleet, depends less on kinetic shipyard safeguards and more on addressing the non-kinetic motivating variables that leave personnel susceptible to outside solicitation. Notably, during recruitment cycles, adversarial agencies may leverage a diverse matrix of behavioral drivers, including ideological alignment and ego, to extract sensitive data. Though the U.S. cannot inherently identify all negative externalities in individual workers, to diminish the likelihood of foreign asset recruitment, stabilizing the economic baseline remains a critical defense mechanism, as this will alleviate proximate financial pressures on the workforce, potential professional alienation, and the likelihood of operational resentment that may leave workers feeling underappreciated .
Looking Ahead
While the Senate’s version of the NDAA seems to have rejected the House’s version allocating provisions for the Trump-class battleship, the fundamental economic issues remain a constant within the American shipbuilding industry, regardless of whether advanced procurement funds are authorized. Presently, the current administration remains adamant about revitalizing the shipbuilding ecosystem and will continue to advance policy initiatives targeting such efforts. At the forefront of the discussion must be retaining industry workers and assuming countermeasures to illicit actors.
Chinese espionage appears to be on an upward trend; according to Article 7 of China’s National Intelligence Law, passed in 2017, Chinese citizens and entities can be called upon to assist state intelligence agencies when requested. Though various shipyard workers may require specialized clearance before operating and manufacturing a vessel, a status notably allotted to American nationals and naturalized citizens, China has been a known proponent of birth tourism, leveraging federal regulations to acquire birthright citizenship with the primary motive of granting long-term options such as living, working, or studying in the United States once a child born in the states and raised in mainland China reaches maturity. A child raised under such conditions can arguably leverage their birthright citizenship status to potentially obtain a U.S. clearance while simultaneously providing information directly to the PRC.
Though the U.S. cannot account for the machinations of individuals acting on behalf of the PRC, it can institutionalize guardrails that diminish native-born American workers’ exposure to foreign influences. Similarly, not every worker in the shipbuilding industry acquires security clearance. By instituting a universal bureaucratic clearance requirement, agencies can adequately scrutinize individual workers across all variables prior to accessing shipbuilding information. While this may require an exorbitant amount of resources, it can allow the U.S. to comprehensively analyze an individual’s threat potential, including non-kinetic factors such as ideological beliefs and contacts with foreign nationals, such as those who are found to be a product of birth tourism. In addition to addressing the income disparities of the labour workforce, domestic counterintelligence agencies should remain observant of illicit financial flows among workers across all sectors and flag anomalies as potential indicators of compromise. While such a proactive measure does not address the non-kinetic behavioral vulnerabilities, it does allow for a two-front solution—adequately compensating workers as well as identifying potential risk vectors.
Catherine Marie Abbott holds a master’s degree in security policy studies from George Washington University and a bachelor’s degree in political science from the University of Missouri-Kansas City, specializing in maritime security and intelligence analysis. Her research primarily focuses on maritime logistics, emerging technology, and intelligence processing, with a distinct focus on analyzing overlooked variables and externalities that disrupt strategic decision-making.
The views expressed in this piece are the sole opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Center for Maritime Strategy or other institutions listed.