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In the early 1980s, even as the Aegis missile system was being introduced with the Ticonderoga class guided missile cruisers, the US Navy looked to improve its air defense capability. It would be years before all the Ticos would reach the fleet, and even longer before the Burke class DDGs reached the fleet in numbers. 

The existing fleet of 57 guided missile cruisers and destroyers were still using their original missile control systems, which, let us recall were first designed in the late 1940s and early 1950s.

Accordingly, the Navy began the New Threat Ugprade program to replace the radars, missile guidance systems, and even the missiles themselves in use in the fleet. 

It was a spectacularly successful program, well run, with great results. The NTU ships were in some areas more capable than the Aegis ships they would serve alongside. 

There was just one problem. Right as large numbers of ships began receiving NTU, the Soviet Union collapsed, and with it, the threat NTU was intended to address. Many ships had their upgrades cancelled, and even those that were upgraded were decommissioned within just a few years.