The plan aims to build out the US Navy’s lethality, complementing the new Golden Fleet initiative. This article was originally published on our Apex Defense partner site.

The Chief of US Naval Operations, Admiral Daryl Caudle, has set out the US Navy’s new ‘Fighting Instructions’ strategy, detailing the force’s new approach to conducting operations and building readiness.

Unveiled at Apex Defense 2026 in Washington DC on 27 January, the plan acts as the “newest strategic guidance to the fleet”, guiding future naval investments, strategic priorities, and policy decisions into the 21st century, the admiral said.

“Underpinned by my priorities of the Foundry, Fleet, and Fight, the Fighting Instructions are designed to deliver homeland defence, sustain our global network of deterrence, and preserve our national prosperity,” the admiral stated. “It is our navy's answer to a simple but daunting question: How do we ensure we can fight and win across the spectrum of conflict under conditions we cannot entirely predict against adversaries who are increasingly capable?”

A core element of enabling this, the admiral continued, is the force’s new ‘Hedge’ plan, which will be released with the Fighting Instructions strategy in the “coming weeks”.

Hedge aims to augment and extend the reach of the navy to ensure it is “ruthlessly adaptable” to meet “every pressing scenario”, avoiding a force that is single-purpose. This will be achieved by “leveraging modular, scalable units of high- and lower-grade capabilities that can be tailored” to respond decisively to any number of scenarios, acting as a force multiplier to its general-purpose forces.

‘Tailored’ and ‘offset’ forces are a core element of Hedge, he continued. These scalable formations – consisting of crewed and uncrewed platforms, robotic and autonomous systems, and logistics nodes – will “manage risk, expand mass, force-multiply, improve response options, and preserve our combat advantage, he explained.

Explaining this in more detail, he said: “Tailored forces are the customised ensembles of general-purpose forces and the composite packaging of tailored offsets certified for specific missions in particular regions.”

These new plans and frameworks underpin a much wider effort to overhaul the US Navy and increase its lethality. In December, the US administration unveiled its ‘Golden Fleet’ initiative, for example, to boost lethality and shift the force back to adopting larger battleships.