What an emergency-built fleet might look like

What would smaller, quickly built warships look like in a conflict with China?

He would look to adapted commercial support hulls and uncrewed vessels supported by crewed mother ships.

Offshore-support-style vessels, including X-Bow supply ships, offer practical hull forms that could be built or adapted quickly. Their commercial lineage provides volume and production experience while accepting that a full high-end combatant cannot be improvised overnight. They could work with the uncrewed vessels already being tested by the US Navy. A crewed support ship could serve as mother ship, maintaining and controlling a wider group of simpler craft while concentrating the people and specialist equipment they still require.