South Korean shipbuilders first to benefit from Trump’s plan to keep US Navy afloat

South Korean shipbuilders could be among the first US partners to benefit from President Donald Trump’s push to rebuild America’s naval industrial base, analysts said.

Trump last week signed a National Security Presidential Memorandum allowing foreign shipbuilders with US investments to build up to two vessels at their parent shipyards – a move aimed at quickly addressing gaps in US Navy capacity while restoring the country’s own shipbuilding sector.

The directive comes as Washington seeks to strengthen its naval position against China in the Indo-Pacific, where US officials have warned that America’s shipbuilding capacity has fallen behind strategic demand.

Under the memorandum, foreign companies must either build a new US shipyard or acquire a controlling stake in an existing one – a requirement that South Korea’s Hanwha already meets after taking over Philadelphia’s Philly Shipyard, one of the few large commercial yards on the US East Coast, in 2024.

Foreign shipbuilders must also train American workers and transfer proprietary techniques to their US operations. Additional vessels will have to be built in the US.

“We’re now studying this announcement,” a Hanwha Ocean spokesman said, declining to give further details.