Navy's newest destroyer is as much an experiment as a ship-killer

SAN DIEGO - With slick sides and sharp angles, the Michael Monsoor and its sister ship Zumwalt cut a distinct silhouette along the waters of San Diego.

Unlike a nearby aircraft carrier whose radar juts into the air, the Monsoor's composite material deckhouse is polygonal and covered with material that can absorb radar waves and increase the destroyer's stealth. Its "tumblehome" hull looks like something you'd see on a ship built before World War I.

Make no mistake, the Monsoor guided-missile destroyer is one of the U.S. Navy's most technologically advanced ships. But developing that technology was more difficult than expected, and its deployment has been complicated by