This is CBS, I On the World. I'm John Batchel. Gordon Chang at Gordon Ging Chang, my colleague and friend and co-host, and we welcome Rebecca Grant of the Lexington Institute, writing most recently an opinion for Fox News. Navy makes shocking aircraft carrier is the headline. Decision while

China threat rises. Rebecca, a very good day to you. We've talked about the U.S. Navy before,

but now this is an unusual circumstance. The Biden administration is leaving in about 72, 71, I lose count days.

And the Trump administration has a record from the first term, but circumstances have changed all over the world.

What is the decision made by the Navy, understanding that this is a forward-reaching decision and it will be reviewed by the

new administration. Good evening to you. Good evening. The Navy in its budget decided to delay the next

aircraft carrier buy and to not buy it until about 2030.

Bunch of problems with that, the first one being that a number of the suppliers,

there are about 2,000 different companies that contribute to building an aircraft carrier.

And some of those long-lead suppliers may actually go out of business if there's this big of a gap.

The other shocking thing to me is the Biden administration has used aircraft carriers.

They've had five different aircraft carriers rotating just through the Red Sea and North Arabian Gulf Station this year to take care of the hoodies and keep a lid on Iran. So the demand

signals are very, very high for carriers. And it's just a very complexing strategic mistake,

I think, by the Biden team to try to put off buying the next one. The word shocking. Is that

is that what the Navy believes? Is that what outsiders such as yourself

look at this and say it's shocking given the tasking of the Navy? Is that something Washington

believes? Because there's a moment here, Rebecca, to imagine that there's some games being played.

Oh, yes. And I think it was budget games. You know, the shock was with the Navy, certainly, because they had initially

wanted to buy that carrier on a schedule that they'd laid out several years ago. And I think

a shock also to see that it comes at this point in time because we know the Chinese, for example, are building more aircraft carriers.

They have a new one now. The first two didn't have a lot of capacity, but their newest carrier has better catapults and arresting gear and angled deck and is ready

to do some really high sorting rates. So at a moment when China is rushing to perfect and build carriers,

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