The Past, Present, and Future Fleet Constitution

My friend Mike has strong opinions in favor of naval transformation, many of which I have been known to disagree with. We often see the same problems, but we have often come to two very different conclusions regarding what those problems are, and what needs to be done to fix them. Today Mike is taking a shot at the current constitution of the US Navy, and I disagree with his analysis.

The defensive over an offensive mindset has been ingrained in the Navy's leadership at least since the latter Cold War period and prevails with us to this day. It is an attempt to maintain out-of-date naval platforms and strategies far beyond their relevance in modern warfare (the fleet we want rather than the one we need). Deep into the Cruise Missile Age, the USN clings to the doctrine of massive carrier battlegroups, with only a limited striking power compared to the great expense to defend them, i.e. the Aegis cruisers and destroyers, plus nuclear powered attack submarines. Of even more dubious value, are large expeditionary amphibious ships, sold to the public for US Marine peacekeeping duties, despite the fact that for over half a century the USMC has acted mostly as a land-based adjunct to the Army in all our nation's major wars.

Mike starts with his post with displeasure of the Maritime Strategy and ends it by going point by point on each system listed to describe the weaknesses, but this paragraph stuck out as the where I am in primary disagreement. In making his points, he breaks out of his strategic approach of defensive vs offensive mindset into a detailed tactical analysis why these are the wrong platforms for the Navy. Mike and I have gone back and forth on aircraft carriers and submarines, so no need to go through it again, and we have very different ideas on expeditionary warfare, but my biggest issue with his analysis is that I have a hard time finding fault with the current surface fleet as it has come to be. In review of how the fleet got to this point, we believe the Navy gradually trended to the requirements that defined the time, an evolutionary process for staying relevant to changing conditions and requirements that needs to be applied today.

I disagree with Mike's assessment that the Navy emerged from the cold war with a defensive mindset, in fact I observe just the opposite. Starting before the Gulf War, reinforced by Kosovo followed by Iraq and Afghanistan (not to mention Desert Fox and other operations), the Navy has been offensive minded with its fleet constitution plans from at least the end of the cold war. We observe it is in fact the emphasis of the cruise missile to support the warfighter that has created the force Mike observes as the problem.

We observe it was because of the MK41 VLS, specific to support the Tomahawk cruise missile, that the Spruance class destroyers were converted from a defensive ASW platform into an offensive strike platform in the 80s. It was the liberal use of tomahawks in the 90s that continuously validated the purchase of 62 DDG-51s, each sporting between 92 and 96 VLS cells. We have heard good arguments in the past that claim the reason the FFG-7 has been neglected since the early 90s is in fact due to the lack of VLS cells.

When discussing the constitution of the surface fleet, the 22 CG-52s and 62 DDG-51s represent the primary battle line of the United States Navy, for both today and the future. We have previously highlighted this fleet of 'battleships' as the greatest surface Navy in history, providing more cruise missile firepower than the next 17 largest Navies combined. This reinforces our position that the current battle line of the US Navy is not the problem,

As we look at the Navy, we find little fault in how the Navy has developed its current fleet to this point. Supported by the ideas of Network Centric Warfare, empowered by warfighter technologies including AEGIS and CEC, and deployed for purposes of land attack; we observe the fleet of today reflects the demands of yesterday. As we look back, we cannot identify where the Navy should have changed, but as we look forward we have concerns. The Maritime Strategy is still very unpopular, including within the Navy, and the materials and resources being developed for the warfighter and the peacemaker are not very well aligned with the strategy, including this upcoming fiscal year.

The new Maritime Strategy transitions the Navy into a revolution of security affairs, the specific "soft power" aspect of the Maritime Strategy that Mike doesn't like. From our point of view, Mike should be incredibly pleased with the decisions the Navy has made, not frustrated. We observe the Navy to be in the best possible position to implement the Maritime Strategy, in fact it will not find itself in a better position in terms of the budget for decades. With the battle line established, specifically the 84 AEGIS ships discussed above, the Navy finds itself in the unique position to build the rest of its surface force to implement the strategy, as the current surface combatants making up the shipbuilding budget of the next several years doesn't include any money for replacing current ships of the battle line.

However, instead of spending money for naval specific forces to implement the new Maritime Strategy, the Navy has instead chosen to deploy the Amphibious fleet without Marines and leverage the Military Sealift Command fleet for these emerging soft power roles. In fact, the Navy has chosen not to change a single aspect of its future force to support the new Maritime Strategy, a fairly clear signal that the Navy either rejects its own strategy, or at minimum lacks the courage or conviction to match resources to the Navy's own strategy.

The suggestion that the DDG-1000 (a new ship for the battle line) or the Littoral Combat Ship (a mini mothership) is in line with the new maritime strategy is a suggestion we reject outright. To suggest otherwise is to proclaim the new Maritime Strategy is calling for more ships of the battle line, or that the Maritime Strategy suggests that all surface combatants will only forfill two roles, that of the top rated battleship or that of an unrated specialized ship, with nothing in between.

We are students of maritime strategy, we absorb it and discuss it often, and I can not find a single maritime strategist in history that suggests the optimal constitution for fleets is all battleships supported by small specialized unrated ships, yet that is what the resource alignment tells us about the Navy's new Maritime Strategy at this time. Consider for a moment how amazing this is, that if our current Naval leadership truly believes existing plans for fleet constitution is wise, that the DDG-1000 and LCS is truly the way ahead in context of the existing CG and DDG fleet, that leadership would fail by any measurement all historical study of the constitution of fleets in the context of maritime strategy.

Unlike Mike, we don't have a problem with the past or present, nor do we have a problem with the future as outlined in spirit by the new strategy. However, if material resource allocations do not change to reflect the Maritime Strategy then it will prove our faith in the strategy is misguided, because it would prove the Navy strategic intentions and visions as stated are not genuine.