BREAKING: Trump announces new ‘Golden Fleet’ of Navy battleships

He said that the ships would be larger than other battleships, such as the USS Missouri, the USS Wisconsin, and others. "There’s never been anything like these ships," Trump said. "These have been under design consideration for a long time, and it started with me in my first term, because I said, why aren’t we doing battleships like we used to?" He said that these ships would be the "fastest, the biggest by far," and "100 times more powerful than any battleship ever built."

"These cutting-edge vessels will be some of the most lethal surface warfare ships. It will be actually the most ever built, other than submarines." The ships, he said, will "help maintain American military supremacy, revive the American shipbuilding industry, and inspire fear in America’s enemies all over the world. We want respect. We’re going to have it. We already have it."

He said that while the Navy is starting with two ships, that could grow to between 20 and 25. "We envision that these ships will be the first of a whole new class of battleships to be produced in the years to come."

The ships would weigh between 30,000 and 40,000 tons, and would be the "flagships of the American naval fleet." He stressed that these ships would be built in the United States.

"So the battleships are going to be armed, just in terms of huns and missiles, at the highest level. They’ll also have hypersonic weapons, many hypersonic weapons, state-of-the-art electric rail guns, and even the high-powered lasers that you’ve been starting to read about. We have lasers where you aim the laser at a target, it just wipes it out. We’re going to have—there’ll be the most sophisticated lasers in the world, and the most sophisticated laser in the world will be on the battleship that we’re building. They’ll also carry the nuclear-armed sea-launched cruise missiles currently under development, which will be instituted pretty quickly."

War Secretary Pete Hegseth said, "We're rebuilding the military. President Trump did it once, he’s doing again with historic investments today in shipbuilding, and we're reestablishing deterrence, whether that's at the border, whether it's through Golden Dome, what happened with Midnight Hammer and what Iran found out, those drug boats and of course, the Houthis opening up the shipping lanes, American strength is back on the world stage, and the announcement of the Golden Fleet anchored by new battleships, the biggest and most lethal ever, accomplishes all three of those things and marks a generational commitment to American sea power."