Last month we noted that controlling interest in the world’s third largest shipyard, Daewoo Shipbuilding & Engineering Co., was up for bids and that the expected sale price would be in the neighborhood of $ 8 billion.

We also noted the fact that the Navy had just indicated its intention to build three DDG-1000 destroyer-type vessels for an announced cost of $ 15 billion.

What jumped out as us as we were writing that commentary was the terminology used to describe the functional capabilities of these entities. Korean Ship“BUILDING” vs. U.S. “DESTROYER”-type vessels. We should be proud of ourselves. It also occurred to us that $ 15 billion, or so, could have rebuilt at least two U.S. shipyards equal in size to the giant Daewoo yard mentioned above. Shipyards are what we need. Destroyer-type warships we can do without. We already have dozens of vessels with the capacity to destroy.

In fact, the Navy has about a dozen active super-carriers, along with a number of smaller ones, and has just contracted for the first of three new Ford-class super-carriers. A figure of $ 7.8 billion was publicly announced as the cost of the first such vessel, the CVN-78, although an earlier announcement revealed that the actual cost would be closer to $ 13 billion. That same report advised us that some $ 25 billion per annum would be budgeted for the Navy shipbuilding program.

That isn’t all. Our present administration, according to the New York Times News Service, is pushing through a broad array of foreign weapons deals that will total $ 32 billion for this fiscal year.

“This is not about being gunrunners,” said Bruce S. Lemkin, the Air Force deputy undersecretary who is helping to coordinate many of the biggest sales. “This is about building a more secure world.”

No, Mr. Lemkin. $ 32 billion worth of armaments and $ 25 billion annually to construct warships have nothing to do with “building”. The sole purpose of that funding is to “destroy”.

But if “building a more secure world” is what you have in mind, why not begin here at home? Millions of unemployed Americans need jobs. Millions of homeless Americans need affordable housing. And millions of the ill and elderly are in need of adequate health care.

But it all begins with job creation. Steady jobs pay the bills, put food on the table and roofs overhead. Steady jobs also give buyers the purchasing power that revives dying economies, and it should be obvious by now that the military-industrial complex has failed us. Instead of allocating billions for unproductive and unnecessary armaments, why not direct these funds to our shuttered shipyards? Our only chance of recovery lies with our once formidable shipbuilding capability and the patented container-type ship we’ve been describing. The construction of merchant ships will generate millions of jobs and will once again make us the world’s leading maritime nation.