Initiative.

This is coolbert:

A penny here, a penny there. Soon you have a warship?

Thanks here to the outstanding Internet web site https://www.strategypage.com

"Procurement: Crowdfunding Naval Supremacy"

"December 8, 2023: In 2022 Ukraine conducted a crowdfunding campaign to raise $25 million so Ukraine could build at least a hundred USVs (Unmanned Surface Vessels). These were used to carry out a series of attacks on Russian warships, ports, and other coastal targets in Black Sea. Ukraine needed to protect its coastal waters and use of the Black Sea for shipping that carried Ukrainian exports and imports."

Crowdfunding effort behalf the Ukrainian military successful. Naval assets to be funded by private donations and not through government taxation and budgeting.

"Crowdfunding is a way to raise money for an individual or organization by collecting donations through family, friends, friends of friends, strangers, businesses, and more. By using social media, people can reach more potential donors than traditional forms of fundraising."

Consider within context of the Ukrainian naval crowdfunding effort a much more prior American precedent:

"The Initiatives of 1798"

Dime & nickel private donations the American citizenry funding the construction of warships without congressional approval or funding.  

"The private American citizens who conceived of these ships put up the money, arranged for the designs, selected the timber and materials, laid the keels and planked up the hulls, selected the officers, and sent the ships off to war. Into each ship they put their experience, belief in their country, and their confidence in the future. The subscription warships were a compelling expression of that society’s projection of itself."

"In diverse parts of the United States, thousands of dollars were being raised by citizens without government sanction or direction. The Senate bill did not pass before subscriptions in Newburyport [Massachusetts] , Philadelphia, and New York were well underway, and the Senate bill was not printed in newspapers until Baltimore had begun its list. The House did not take up the bill before Norfolk, Richmond, and Petersburg, Virginia, had also entered the subscription frenzy."

Worked well in 1798. Worked well in 2023 also!

coolbert.