The Chairmen Doth Protest Too Much

News today of a little dust-up developing between Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and the Chairman of the House Budget Committee.  Here's how it goes:


Representative Paul Ryan said yesterday:  “We don’t think the generals are giving us their true advice. We don’t think the generals believe that their budget is really the right budget. I think there’s a lot of budget smoke and mirrors in the Pentagon’s budget.”

General Dempsey retorted:  " “There’s a difference between having someone say they don’t believe what you said versus … calling us, collectively, liars,” he said, according to the Wall Street Journal. “My response is: I stand by my testimony. This was very much a strategy-driven process to which we mapped the budget.”

First, Ryan's statement was unwise, impolitic, and technically, untrue.  The generals ARE giving their true advice--or as true as they are capable of giving--on THE BUDGET.  The budget they presented is their very best collective effort to match the resources available to the strategic guidance they were given.   They are doing a reasonably good job doing what THEY are supposed to do. But they do not determine the "resources available". 

Dempsey is also wrong.  As long as Dempsey defines "the process" as being that part of the give and take among the Services, the COCOMS, OSD and the White House that occurred AFTER the $487B bill had been handed them, he's on solid ground.  But that doesn't truly define the whole process--and THAT is what Ryan is getting at.  The $487B bill handed OSD (as a result of a deal with which Congressional Republicans went along) followed close on the heels of two years of cuts that nearly equal that figure.  The suggestion--easily inferred from the CJCS' half-defense--that the Service Chiefs would have voluntarily ponied up the $487B because that is what makes the most sense for the national defense of the US--is disingenuous.  

UPDATE:  For those who wish to view the CJCS as "apolitical" (a view I do not share),  his changing view of the impact of sequestration cuts strikes some as toeing the Administration line. 

Bryan McGrath

Ballistic Missile Defense Takes Center Stage in the Pacific

News broke yesterday that North Korea has been stepping up Air Force training and has begun fueling their rocket scheduled for launch next month. South Korea has already claimed they will shoot the rocket down if it crosses into their territory, and now Japan is saying the same thing.

Japan will shoot down any part of the long-range rocket that North Korea plans to launch next month that enters its territory, the Japanese defense minister, Naoki Tanaka, said Friday.

Speaking at a news conference, Tanaka said he had issued the official order after instructing the Japanese military earlier in the week to prepare the country's missile defense shield against the planned rocket launch.

North Korea announced earlier this month that it would launch a rocket carrying a satellite between April 12 and 16 to mark the 100th anniversary of the birth of Kim Il Sung, the founder of the Communist state.

I have no idea how South Korea could shoot the missile down. Patriot 2 missiles and SM-2 missiles simply don't have the range except under the most optimistic circumstances to shoot down the missile, but Japan fields better technology and has more capabilities like SM-3 to shoot it down.

The US Navy put the X-Band Radar Platform to sea last week, and from everything I hear - the West Sea is getting crowded with naval forces.

The launch is expected in two weeks. The US is rightfully leading from behind on this issue, supporting Japan and South Korea side by side but staying out of the spotlight. With USS Enterprise (CVN 65) soon to be heading towards the 5th Fleet AOR, I expect the USS Carl Vinson (CVN 70) to rotate back to the Pacific, and sometime over the next 2 weeks I suspect we will see the USS George Washington (CVN 73) get underway.

Because He's Brilliant - Duh

I truly believe the think tank community in Washington DC is one reason why the US Army has so much influence right now in the Pentagon. About 70% of the defense analysts in think tanks that focus on defense issues are veterans of the US Army, and it has been like that since around the time of Gulf War I.

It is probably a coincidence the Army has been fighting a land war in Asia for over a decade, and the Army has been fighting a second land war in Asia for almost a decade. Probably. And it is also probably a coincidence that the US Navy has been shrinking during that same time period.

Anyway...

The latest version of the Congressional Research Service report on China Naval Modernization: Implications for U.S. Navy Capabilities—Background and Issues for Congress (PDF) by Ronald O'Rourke has been posted to the FAS website. It takes me about a week to go through this document every year when it is published, so I may not discuss this quickly. One thing stands out though as I looked over the report the first time.

Not counting government sources, the brilliant Andrew Erickson is the most cited source in the report, but I note that Feng is the second most cited non-government source in the report. I think Feng is brilliant - obviously - but...

Why is Feng on Information Dissemination cited more frequently in a Congressional Research Service report on the topic of Chinese Naval Modernization than every think tank in Washington DC combined? Does the Navy employ all of the maritime specialists who work in DC think tanks?

I do not know the answer to those questions, but I do think they are the right questions.

The Brand New Approximately 300-Ship Shipbuilding Plan

The Navy has sent Congress the FY13 Shipbuilding plan. It begins with this letter:

The Honorable Howard P. "Buck" McKeon
Chairman
Committee on Armed Services
U.S. House of Representatives
Washington, DC 20515

Dear Mr. Chairman:

As required by section 231 of title 10, United States Code, I am forwarding the annual long-range plan for the construction of naval vessels. I certify that both the budget for Fiscal Year 2013 and the future-years defense program (FYDP) for Fiscal Years 13-17 provide a sufficient level of funding to procure the naval vessels specified by the plan on the schedule outlined therein.

The plan outlines the naval force structure requirements that are derived in response to the new set of strategic priorities and guidance contained in the recently released Sustaining U.S. Global Leadership: Priorities for 21st Century Defense; the construction plan necessary to meet these requirements; and the fiscal resources necessary to implement the plan. The plan is affordable within the FYDP but presents a resourcing challenge outside the FYDP largely due to investment requirements associated with the SSBN(X) program.

I look forward to working with you to achieve the requisite investments to safeguard our Nation's maritime strength and endurance.

Ashton Carter

Enclosure 1:
Annual Report to Congress on Long-Range Plan for Construction of Naval Vessels for FY2013

cc:
The Honorable Adam Smith
Ranking Member

The House Armed Services Subcommittee on Seapower and Projection Forces has a hearing tomorrow at 10:00am that will discuss Oversight of U.S. Naval Vessel Acquisition Programs and Force Structure of the Department of the Navy in the Fiscal Year 2013 National Defense Authorization Budget Request. I am presuming the FY13 Shipbuilding Plan will be discussed at the hearing, and likely become publicly available from news websites that are not pay wall blocked shortly.

I only have a two thoughts before the hearing, and suspect this topic won't be going away anytime soon.

Thought One

The inherent flexibility of naval people and platforms and assets has been proven again and again. The ability of high-end assets to flex for a number of missions along the spectrum of operations has been a staple of deployments by carrier strike groups and their escorts and their air assets. What has not been proven is the ability of a global navy to use forces that are not dominant or not present overseas to deter challengers, deny regional aggressors, or reassure partners. When you are no longer present in one or two areas of vital national interest with dominant maritime forces, you are at the “tipping point.”

The Navy at a Tipping Point: Maritime Dominance at Stake?, CNA, March 1, 2024

Were you aware that the US Navy no longer needs to be present with ships in one or two areas of vital national interest to preserve Naval dominance and deter aggression? If you were unaware of this magic, as I am, then you are in luck - because the "approximately 300-ship" shipbuilding plan actually makes the suggestion that the P-8 is sufficient maritime presence to preserve our vital national interests in places ships can't be due to insufficient numbers. There are, in my opinion, several very strange assumptions and arguments in the US Navy's new "approximately 300-ship" shipbuilding plan that argue against the necessity for ships. No, I am not kidding.

Ashton Carter is right on the money - the only parts of this plan worth staking a reputation on is Fiscal Year 2013 and the future-years defense program (FYDP) for Fiscal Years 13-17. It is remarkable that this administration implies any sort of emphasis towards seapower in Sustaining U.S. Global Leadership: Priorities for 21st Century Defense (PDF) and follows up that not-really-a-strategic document with a revised shipbuilding plan that significantly reduces the construction of Navy ships being built from 45 to 31 in the FYDP.

It isn't the Republicans who undermine President Obama's new defense policy; the Obama administration has gone ahead and done that for the Republicans. I have no idea why.

In 2006 the 313-ship shipbuilding plan pushed the bulk of shipbuilding to reach the target of 313 ships to the right so that the Navy would be building at least 9 ships and as many as 13 ships a year starting in FY13 until about FY23. Now that FY13 has arrived, the Navy has developed a new "approximately 300-ship" shipbuilding plan that does exactly the same thing claiming exactly the same results in future years as the old plan. The "approximately 300-ship" shipbuilding plan pushes the bulk of shipbuilding into the out years, and now the big ramp up in shipbuilding will now take place beginning in FY18 and go into the middle of next decade.

The Navy is now officially doing the same thing again and again with their shipbuilding plans in the 21st century and expecting everyone to believe the result will be different this time. The new plan - same as the old plan - is to meet a specific number of ships determined by requirement (313 or approximately 300) by loading all of the construction of the ships needed to meet that number in the budget years beyond the FYDP. If the new "approximately 300-ship" shipbuilding plan is doing exactly what failed in the old 313-ship shipbuilding plan, then how can the Navy claim to have a plan - or for that matter - how can the Navy claim to have a valid ship requirement that needs a plan if the Navy doesn't have a legitimate plan intended to meet that requirement?

The shipbuilding plans of the US Navy have become a fallacy of the highest order. The surface combatants and submarines the Navy claims it will build in higher numbers in the out years of the new plan are the next generation evolutions of current surface combatants and submarines, and those next-gen surface combatants and submarines will have additional requirements that will result in the platforms being even larger than they are today, and those platforms will each have a higher expected unit cost. Who exactly is supposed to legitimately believe the Navy can execute a plan that builds these larger, more expensive platforms in higher numbers as per the new "approximately 300-ship" shipbuilding plan? Congress is supposed to believe that? Do leaders in OPNAV honestly believe this plan can be executed?

This is the Tipping Point that CNA continuously warned everyone that was coming, and right now it is time for the CNO to step up because his Inflection Point moment has arrived. The evolution of the current force structure consisting of big deck aircraft carriers, big surface combatants, and big attack submarines results in each generation getting bigger and bigger as requirements are added to each new class of a vessel type, and as they grow they get more expensive. The big deck aircraft carrier, the big surface combatant, and the big submarine as vessel types have now evolved to the point where the Navy has published consecutive shipbuilding plans that push the construction of these vessels in high enough quantity to sustain force structure target numbers to beyond the FYDP - and only by pushing the construction of those ships in quantity beyond the FYDP can the Navy claim legitimacy for their plans to meet their own stated requirements. The shipbuilding plans themselves now represent a cycle of unrealistic execution of shipbuilding plans.

The Navy must break the cycle while they can, and the only way to do so is to fundamentally reevaluate the design of naval vessels of all types in a way that fields sufficient quantity of naval vessels for both presence and power projection while at the same time fielding sufficient combat capacity necessary to win wars. No class of ship - whether aircraft carrier, surface combatant, submarine, amphibious ship, or Littoral Combat Ship - should be immune to the fundamental reevaluation of force structure. This does not automatically mean there won't be big deck aircraft carriers, big surface combatants, or big submarines in the new force structure, but whether one is talking about existing force structure plans or new force structure plans - there will almost certainly be fewer of those vessels than what the "approximately 300-ship" shipbuilding plan suggests.

This new shipbuilding plan - without a shadow of a doubt in my mind - represents the Navy has passed the Tipping Point. Thursday's hearing is useful for beginning the process of taking names regarding those who are in denial of this blatantly obvious and now officially documented reality. This shipbuilding plan is described as a shipbuilding plan for "approximately 300 ships," and Ashton Carter certifies only the realistic aspect of the plan which is the years represented in the FYDP (which can be examined in earlier released FY13 budget materials). The FYDP represents an average of 7.75 ships per year - more than half of which are small combatants or non-combatants - and using the realistic numbers of the FYDP the math suggests a future fleet of approximately 230 ships is the legitimate future of the Navy if the Navy stays on current course with force structure. That's 70 Navy ships below the stated requirement, and under the new "approximately 300-ship" shipbuilding plan it is a very safe bet that most of those 70 ships that will not be affordable in any future where this plan is followed would represent the surface ships and submarines that make up the combatant power side expected in the "approximately 300-ship" fleet.

Thought Two

Though the formal hierarchy is clear, the relative influence of the civilian leadership of the Pentagon vis--vis its most senior uniformed leaders has varied over time. During the 1990s, some observers were concerned about what they saw as the inappropriate assertiveness of uniformed members of the military on policy issues. By contrast, George W. Bush's first defense secretary, Rumsfeld, was dominant in shaping the president's defense polities and was known for having a directive and demanding leadership style toward military subordinates. Though the relationship varies, a key challenge - ensuring democratically appropriate and strategically effective civil-military relationships in which professional military leaders provide senior civilian policy makers with the best possible expert advice - will remain.

American National Security, By Amos A. Jordan, William J. Taylor, Jr., Michael J. Meese, Suzanne C. Nielsen, James Schlesinger, JHU Press, Feb 20, 2024

The first thing that I realized when reading the new FY13 shipbuilding plan is that the Honorable Undersecretary of the Navy Bob Work wrote this plan himself, or at least most of it. Bob Work has a wealth of published reports, and I've read all of them that are public, and because of this I am very familiar with both his writing style and lexicon - both of which come jumping off the page as I read the new shipbuilding plan.

Externally both the folks in OPNAV and the folks in the Office of the Secretary of the Navy praise each other and claim to speak from the same sheet of paper in support of one another, but it is difficult for me to believe that any Admiral in the US Navy actually believes this shipbuilding plan has any legitimacy beyond the FYDP.

I'm not even convinced that Bob Work believes in the legitimacy of this shipbuilding plan beyond the FYDP, and I say that while betting $100 worth of beer at Sine's he wrote the thing himself. I can't explain why the shipbuilding plan is a month late nor why Bob Work wrote the shipbuilding plan himself. Is it unusual or common for a top level civilian in the Navy to personally write this document? I don't know.

Someone please explain to me how professional military leaders in the Navy can provide senior civilian policy makers in Congress with the best possible expert advice on this shipbuilding plan without either being critical of the plan, or being dishonest to Congress about the legitimacy of the plan beyond the FYDP. Is either the Honorable Sean Stackley or Vice Admiral Blake really naive enough to legitimately believe this is a realistic shipbuilding plan for approximately 300 ships of the types outlined in the plan?

I sincerely hope not. The hearing in the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Seapower and Projection Forces on Thursday has the potential to be a fascinating circus. Beware the clowns.

Sean Stackley - Bullish on Aircraft Carriers

Sean Stackley, former LPD-17 program manager with a highly questionable track record, and current Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Research, Development and Acquisition with a much better track record, has become very bullish on aircraft carriers - in the United Kingdom.

A recent Telegraph article tells the story.

Converting HMS Prince of Wales so that it can be used by the Joint Strike Fighter will require significantly less than the £2 billion quoted by officials, the assistant secretary of the US Navy, Sean J Stackley, insisted.

In a letter seen by The Daily Telegraph, he told Peter Luff, the defence procurement minister, that the necessary equipment would cost £458 million before installation. Defence experts estimate the installation cost at £400 million.

For the most part, I think Sean Stackley is exactly right on this. The article cites the reason for the letter being that the US wants "to ensure that the information the British Government is working from is accurate because currently that quite clearly is not the case." I think there is a lot of truth to that as well.

Lets get to the core part of the article then discuss...

Two British carriers are being built, but one will be mothballed following the SDSR. Reverting to jump jets for both of them would not help American military planners, who want to be able to base a squadron of their own jets on a British carrier.

Separate accommodation is being built on board HMS Prince of Wales with communications facilities that would be for “US Eyes Only”.

There are also said to be technological concerns over the jump jet version of the fighter and the Americans might be positioning themselves to ditch it altogether.

“This letter could be a warning shot saying if you Brits go back to jump jet carriers then there might be no planes to fly off it,” said a defence source.

Richard Scott, of Jane’s Defence Weekly, said: “The trouble the Government has is in getting reliable cost data but at least the costs the Americans are giving are quite reassuring.”

An MoD spokesman said: “Work is ongoing to finalise the 2012-13 budget and balance the equipment plan. This means reviewing all programmes, including elements of the carrier strike programme.”

I try to avoid Royal Navy discussions like the plague, because I am an unapologetic biased lover of all things related to the history of the Royal Navy, and think the British government as a collective group today might be the largest collection of strategic fools in any capital city on the planet except Pyongyang. Churchill, bless his soul, is long gone and there is no one in political leadership today that inspires confidence in even the possibility that strategic thinking is applied to defense issues discussed in London these days.

So here are my thoughts, and I suspect they will have nothing in common with whatever Mr. Cameron comes up with.

If the MoD is in fact going to build aircraft carriers, then the Royal Navy would be very smart to build both CVFs and put the Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System (EMALS) on both CVFs, but at this point in time the MoD shouldn't commit to either version of the Joint Strike Fighter until that entire program is more mature. The decision to go with a conventional launching system on the CVF should be obvious - it is the only way the CVF will be relevant in the future should armed unmanned aviation platforms start operating off aircraft carriers anytime in the next 3 decades - which is very likely to occur.

But it is important to highlight that the strategic reasons for building the CVFs are the same strategic reasons to insure it has a conventional launch system like EMALS - in the 21st century the places the Royal Navy is most likely to fight are places where there will be very limited parking for land based aviation support for naval forces. From a purely strategic perspective, that suggests to me that all of the tactical and operational capabilities the Royal Navy fleet will need in order to fight effectively will have to come from the CVFs.

Those capabilities aren't going to be provided by the Joint Strike Fighter, rather will come from other types of aircraft that will absolutely require a conventional launch system like EMALS. A CVF task force with ~30 F-35Cs and helicopters is going to be eaten alive by a CVF task force with a mix of 30 F/A-18E/F/Gs + E-2s + helicopters every day of the week, and lets stop pretending now that ~30 F-35Bs will be supported by some AEW version of the MV-22, because there is a snowballs chance in hell that the Royal Navy would be able to afford both the F-35B and a completely new version of the MV-22 for AEW that doesn't exist today.

I know I am in a minority, but I am still very skeptical the US Navy will ever field the F-35C - so I obviously do not believe the Royal Navy should be committed to the platform. The damage the costs of the F-35C program is doing to naval aviation is bigger than anyone in Washington wishes to admit publicly - YET, but when the US Navy starts planning the early retirement of multiple aircraft carriers (potentially as soon as the FY14 budget cycle) I think people are going to wake up pretty quickly to how much damage F-35C is doing to naval aviation, and what the cost of a single strike fighter has been to naval aviation as a whole.

That goes double if a debate ever breaks out regarding the lack of relevance the future CVW has to the 21st century threat environment at sea - because anyone who thinks the CVN is better off with today's CVW with JSFs instead of F-18s is fooling themselves - ignoring the capabilities that aren't being fielded because the cost of the F-35C sucked all the $$ out of the naval aviation community. When considering this is the decade that naval aviation should be innovating the most due to the US Navy enjoying a substantial lead on competitors, I am convinced naval aviators will look back at 2011-2020 as the lost decade of their community.

And for the record, during the next US Presidential term (2013-2016) the safest bet any navalist can make is that the world will observe 2 brand new aircraft carriers being built in China, and I'm not counting Varyag. If you don't expect 5 aircraft carriers in use by China by 2025, then you are the 1936 IJN Admiral who casually dismissed Isoruku Yamamoto's concerns of American industrial capacity.

My point is simple - things are going to change a lot well before the first CVF is doing anything in sea water. The UK needs to either commit to 2 first class CVFs with conventional launch and recovery capabilities, or commit to zero and build a bigger fleet of surface combatants and submarines - but spending massive amounts of national treasure on two half assed aircraft carriers would be an epic strategic fail greater than the Maginot Line, and the equivalent of a self inflicted Pearl Harbor.

The UK should commit to strategic flexibility for naval forces of the future, which for the CVF would absolutely mean EMALS but doesn't necessarily mean the F-35C.

The President Makes a Dangerous Linkage

The President has made a dangerous mistake by publicly linking America's missile defense system with his desire to cut nuclear arsenals.    

Mr. Obama's recent open mic incident with Russian President Medvedev has raised profile of the issue of strategic negotiations with the Russians.  The President's statement that he would have more "flexibility" after the election could have meant several different things, none of which were clear from his recorded whispers to the Russian leader.  Putting aside for the moment the notion of an American President telling the Russian President that he'd be able to make deals after he no longer has to answer to the American public, the nature of those deals was somewhat mysterious.  I believe we have gained some insight on what the President meant, and fortunately--for those who seek solid sourcing of such things--we have it from the President himself.  It should cause those with an interest in national security some pause.

In remarks made at noon Seoul time on March the 27th, the President made the following statement, ostensibly to explain his "open mic" gaffe of the previous day:  " I don't think it's any surprise that you can't start that a few months before a presidential and congressional elections in the United States, and at a time when they just completed elections in Russia and they're in the process of a presidential transition where a new president is going to be coming in in a little less than two months.

So it was a very simple point, and one that essentially I repeated when I spoke to you guys yesterday, which is that we're going to spend the next nine, 10 months trying to work through some of the technical aspects of how we get past what is a major point of friction -- one of the primary points of friction between our two countries, which is this whole missile defense issue.  And it involves a lot of complicated issues.  If we can get our technical teams to clear out the underbrush, then hopefully, in 2013, there's a foundation to actually make some significant progress on this and a lot of other bilateral issues.

So I think everybody understands that -- if they haven't they haven't been listening to my speeches -- I want to reduce our nuclear stockpiles.  And one of the barriers to doing that is building trust and cooperation around missile defense issues.  And so this is not a matter of hiding the ball, I'm on record.  I made a speech about it to a whole bunch of Korean university students yesterday.  I want to see us, over time, gradually, systematically, reduce reliance on nuclear weapons."

 What the President did in that statement constitutes a direct linkage of the nation's missile defense system with ongoing negotiations to cut strategic nuclear arsenals in Russia and the United States.  The President has made no secret of his long standing objection to nuclear weapons, something he has made the centerpiece of at least one major address during this term.  In his own words (above), he has provided the Russians with additional incentive to insist on continuing to link dismantling of our missile defense system to cuts in nuclear arsenals.  It does not constitute a stretch to posit that the President is willing to make additional concessions on missile defense in order to gain his legacy goal of dramatic cuts, as his assurances to Mr. Medvedev seem to reinforce.  


If cuts to strategic stockpiles cannot be made on the merits of the case for doing so, then such cuts are not worth making.  Sweetening the deal by hobbling our already modest missile defense architecture should never even enter the discussion. 

Congress must make its views known loudly and clearly on this subject.  Senators who view this linkage as dimly as I do should publicly announce that they will support NO strategic arms treaty with even a whiff of linkage to missile defense.  The President has overplayed his hand.

Bryan McGrath

The Politics of Fleet Constitution

I went back and reviewed the Navy Readiness Posture hearing in the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Readiness back on March 22, 2012. The hearing was held 2 days after I wrote this blog post.

The panel included Vice Admiral William Burke, Vice Admiral Kevin McCoy, and Vice Admiral David Architzel. I have a few thoughts.

It should be noted that nobody, not Congress and not the Navy, wants to keep USS Port Royal (CG 73). Considering that the current CNO classified INSURV reports several years ago, the condition of the USS Port Royal (CG 73) has been previously concealed to Congress and the American taxpayer.

All discussions apparently focus on the remaining three FY13 cruisers and to some extent, the three FY14 cruisers also set for early retirement.

Rep. Forbes and the Navy both cited different estimates for the modernization and maintenance of the cruisers scheduled for decommissioning in the March 22 hearing, but in the hearing Admiral Burke does a great job of highlighting how the numbers are actually the same - from different point of views. Rep. Forbes cites an estimate of $592 million in FY 13 and $859 million in FY 14 to modernize the cruisers, while the Navy claims the estimate of savings for early retirement of the cruisers is over $4 billion. It looks like they are both right, and both sides are making interesting arguments.

Vice Admiral Burke and Vice Admiral McCoy's arguments are very smart. Basically what they are saying is that it will cost about $4.1 billion to modernize, maintain, and operate the cruisers through the FYDP (next 5 budget years), and the Navy number includes manpower, training, and equipment costs like the helicopters while the numbers used by Rep Forbes estimates only part of the bill for keeping the cruisers. The concern the Navy has is that just because Congress finds money for modernization and keeping the cruiser hulls, the Navy won't get the additional funding for maintenance and operations of the cruisers in the out years and thus down the road the Navy won't have the extra funding to properly maintain the ships that Congress spent just enough money to save and modernize. That partial support of the early retirement cruisers would force the Navy to maintain the cruisers at the expense of other ships in the out years, which the Navy does not want to do.

The hearing was very interesting to me to listen to the second time because this time I noted that from the opening testimony - the discussion was focused on the cruisers, which I think has been the plan from the beginning. Lets take a step back and observe objectively what is happening.

A few years ago the Obama administration drew up a new strategy for National Ballistic Missile Defense that centered on the Navy's AEGIS BMD capability. A lot of noise was made of this major change, but in terms of shipbuilding, maintenance, and modernization of naval forces capable of fielding ballistic missile defense - no plan has changed since that announcement and no additional funding for ships from the administration ever went to the Navy to take on that rather important strategic role. I think that is important, because it highlights the strategy the Navy has come up with to find more money from Congress during the tight FY13 budget season.

The Navy has put 7 cruisers up for early retirement. Keep in mind that all 7 cruisers put up for early retirement in FY13 and FY14 are capable of being modernized for ballistic missile defense (Port Royal already has BMD capability, but Port Royal is apparently a lemon). I think that is pretty remarkable, because the US Navy actually has 7 cruisers not capable of being upgraded to BMD - the baseline 3 Ticonderoga class cruisers CG 52-58 which do not have the proper radar for AEGIS BMD. In other words, despite being given a new national strategic mission in ballistic missile defense, the US Navy has put up 7 surface combatants capable of performing the BMD mission up for early retirement when in fact the Navy has 7 surface combatants not capable of performing that BMD mission. Why would the Navy do this?

It is fairly obvious to this observer that the Navy put these cruisers on the chopping block precisely because they expected Congress to swoop in and save the 6 cruisers the Navy wants to save, and allow the Navy to dump the amphibious ships and no one will care. Cruisers are shiny toys that represent power projection, and these specific cruisers have a significant future ahead of them if the money was to be found and made available for the US Navy to keep them. To big Navy, amphibious ships are dull and boring, and all they do is all the hard, unsexy stuff.

I believe it is fairly obvious Congress is doing exactly what the Navy and the Obama administration wants them to do - saving the 6 cruisers and allowing the Navy to retire USS Port Royal (CG 73), and in fact the House Republicans are saving the cruisers in exactly the way the Navy and Obama administration (by that I mean SECNAV and CNO) wants them to do it - by making it an issue the House Republicans feel ownership of and thus are able to find funding for when budgets everywhere are tight. The Obama administration is basically using Rep. Forbes and Rep. McKeon to find money and pay for the administrations ballistic missile defense policy that is otherwise neglected and unfunded by the administration. It is part of a political game, and the Republicans seem perfectly willing to be played like a political fiddle in this political game.

Meanwhile big Navy is getting exactly what they want out the game. When it came time to make budget adjustments to the FY13 FYDP, to pay for more surface combatants the Navy is moving amphibious ships to the right, and by putting up the cruisers for early decommissioning the Navy insures Congress will save them, and discard the amphibious ships (which are listed, and nobody is talking about). Whether the issue is new shipbuilding or early retirements, big Navy has framed the argument perfectly in a way that Congress focuses on saving the surface combatants while the amphibious force suffers. Meanwhile, it is the amphibious ships that are making record length deployments being further worn out, while the replacements for the ships being worn out faster are being pushed further and further to the right in the shipbuilding plan.

Apparently Congress doesn't think the short dwell time of amphibious ship sailors is a big deal, so why should the CNO care? Congress is trying to draw a line in the sand on the early retirement of the cruisers, which is exactly what the Navy and the Obama administration wants Congress to do. In my opinion, Congress needs to think for themselves and not get sucked into the political game they are being manhandled in. If the House Republicans were playing this smart politically, they would target the LSDs for saving and save USS Cowpens (CG-63) - which is the cruiser in the best condition of those listed, and let the Obama administration hang themselves with their political shenanigans. If Congress doesn't save the cruisers, it is the Obama administration that has to answer questions why they are now neglecting their own ballistic missile defense strategy. Nobody cares of course, except Congress - which is why it is a solid plan by the Obama administration.

Make no mistake, the Obama administration not only expects the House Republicans to save the cruisers, they are in full support of it - because Congress saving the cruisers is actually the Obama administrations plan. By the time the voting comes around, I fully expect broad bi-partisan support to save the cruisers, but I do not believe there would be bi-partisan support to save the amphibious ships. Why? Because that isn't the administrations plan.

The administration doesn't care how the cruisers are saved when there is no money to pay for them, because if they did they wouldn't have given that problem to the House Republicans to figure out.

I find it all fascinating. I also truly believe that if the Congress doesn't save the cruisers set for early retirement in the FY13 budget, those three cruisers set for early retirement in FY14 will suddenly find the money to survive early retirement. The Navy is only gambling as many as six cruisers because it is a safe bet that some of them will be saved. I still wonder to myself what the number of cruisers is the Navy expects to get back from Congress - in a worse case scenario - and if that number can be achieved while saving the amphibious ships.

If Congress wants to draw a line in the sand on early retirements, I hope they draw that line around the amphibious ships. The Navy will find a way to fund their major surface combatant force - and the FY13 budget itself is proof they always do. Come hell or high water, before a single cut is made to surface combatants in either shipbuilding or early retirement, observe that first the amphibious ships will be thrown overboard by big Navy until and only if/when Congress says otherwise.

In Search of a Shipbuilding Plan

Dated March 21, 2024

Dear Secretary Panetta:

As you are aware, Chapter 9, Section 231 of Title 10 United States Code, requires the Secretary of Defense to submit with the President's Budget each year a long-range plan for the construction, delivery, and decommissioning of naval vessels. As of this dated letter, we have not yet received this report and the committee has been told that it is uncertain as to the date we will actually receive it.

I bring this to your attention for a few reasons. First, this report is crucial to our subcommittee as it related to the oversight of naval shipbuilding programs and our understanding of how the Department plans to develop sufficient force structure to meet geographical combatant commander warfighting requirements, as well as, our understanding related to any force structure capability gaps or shortfalls that may exist in meeting the National Military Strategy. Second, the subcommittee on Seapower and Projection Forces has a hearing scheduled for March 29, 2012, to discuss with requirements and acquisition officials from the Department of the Navy regarding many aspects of the information that is contained within the long-range shipbuilding report. Without having this report in hand prior to our hearing date, our oversight is hampered because many of the topics discussed in our hearing stem from information contained in this report. Third, and just as concerning, this is the fourth consecutive year that this report has been submitted late to the congressional defense committees.

I respectfully request your support in addressing my concerns at your earliest convenience and, if at all possible, make arrangements for the subcommittee to have access to the report prior to our scheduled hearing date next week. As always, thank you for your service to the Department of Defense and I look forward to working with you to resolve this matter.

Sincerely,

Todd Akin
Chairman, Seapower and Projection Forces Subcommittee

It really doesn't make any sense that the Navy cannot simply submit the last plan, and when they are ready (whenever that might be), simply change it. It has become an accurate statement to claim the Navy doesn't have a shipbuilding plan for the future because they actually don't have a plan, much less one that is consistent year to year, and when they finally come up with one it is never delivered on time as per statute.

How is it possible that an organization like the Department of the Navy that is constantly making plans can't produce a shipbuilding plan? The Navy undermines their own maritime strategy better than anyone else possibly could because they cannot formulate a plan that includes the resources necessary to execute their own strategy.

The responsibility falls squarely on top uniformed and civilian leadership in the Navy, but it is in fact Congress that does not enforce their own laws, so hard to place all the fault on the Navy when Congress tolerates this type of behavior every year.

Thought of the Day

In many ways, the role Russia is playing in Syria today is very similar to the role the US played in Bahrain last year. In many ways, the role Iran is playing in Syria today is not unlike the role Saudi Arabia played in Bahrain last year, just less overt.

Sunday Book Review: Age of Airpower

Martin Van Creveld's Age of Airpower is a survey of airpower theory and practice since the 19th century. Van Creveld ranges widely in his discussion, from the military employment of balloons prior to the advent of aircraft through World War II and the jet age.   His approach is more or less chronological, although a long section on airpower in counter-insurgency follows the main historical discussion (it's possible that this was added in the course of revisions).Van Creveld doesn't exactly have a paragraph long argument,  but a sense of skepticism of airpower pervades the work. From my point of view this puts Van Creveld solidly on the side of the angels, but it would have been more helpful from a policy standpoint if he had clarified his argument.

I'm most interested in the institutional implications of the observation that airpower advocates habitually overestimate the decisiveness of their tool, and Van Creveld does have some thoughts on this point. He traces the early history of the US air forces and the RAF, and surveys institutional structures across the major states in the interwar and post-war periods.   Of most interest are the discussions of German and Russian air power, where the doctrinal and force structure decisions varied greatly from the US and the UK.  The Royal Air Force won its independence earliest, and talked vigorously about strategic bombing for pretty much its entire interwar existence.  The need to maintain relevance and independence during the war, however, pushed the RAF into colonial policing missions that detracted from either air defense or strategic bombing, leaving the service unprepared (especially for the latter) when war came.  The Luftwaffe won independence  in 1935, but never displayed much interest in strategic bombing of the kind popularized in the Anglophone countries, concentrating instead on tactical tasks.  The Russian story is much the same, except that the Soviet air forces remained part of the Red Army. The USAAF was extremely well prepared to undertake a strategic campaign in 1942, largely because airpower advocates in the interwar period had obsessed about independence and saw strategic bombing as the easiest way to achieve it.  In short, the story isn't as simple as "institutions dictate," but rather "institutional decisions play out against a complex political background."

Van Creveld's delineation of airpower tasks is useful.  He notes the omnipresence of reconnaissance duties since the 19th century, then discusses the other missions as they became technically feasible. Van Crevald includes air superiority, anti-submarine warfare (perhaps putting too much emphasis on World War I and not enough on World War II), close air support, interdiction, countersea operations, strategic bombing, and air mobility.  Van Creveld supplies the strategic logic for all these missions, although the relegation of counter-insurgency ops to a late section makes the timeline less coherent.  Counter-insurgency isn't just a "lesser included" mission for airpower; the great colonial powers all envisioned airpower as a way of managing their holdings, with colonial ops playing a major role in the early history of the RAF. Van Creveld seems to believe that the genuinely useful missions for airpower involve establishing air superiority and undertaking the interdiction of enemy movement and logistics, with close air support playing a less important role.

Van Creveld covers most of the major airpower debates of the twentieth century, lingering on the bomber vs. missile competition in the USAF in the 1950s, the use and utility of airpower in the Vietnam War, and the Boyd and Warden driven debates of the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s.  Unfortunately, he seems frustratingly reluctant to take a clear stand on some of these arguments.  For example, Van Crevald expresses some skepticism about the  "Combined Bomber Offensive defeated the Luftwaffe" story, when he could and should have simply destroyed it. The story, oft told by frustrated airpower advocates who can't point to any other concrete effects of the Combined Bomber Offensive, runs like this: British and American bombers drew German tactical fighters away from the Russian front and from the Western front, effectively granting the Russians and the Western Allies air supremacy over the battlefield.  This story sounds reasonable, until you start thinking about it.  First, sending four engine bombers deep into Germany as a lure for German fighters was a startlingly inefficient way of bringing the Luftwaffe to battle.  Allied aircraft and crew damaged or shot down over Germany remained in Germany, just as damaged German aircraft and crew remained in Germany.  This got better as the Allies adopted long range escorts, but even then the Luftwaffe could easily seize the tactical initiative,  choosing where and when to fight,  concentrating on some bomber formations while ignoring others.  The second and larger issue is that Germany was incapable of seriously contesting the air on any front past 1943. The Allied tactical and air superiority advantages would have been even larger if Britain and the United States hadn't concentrated on 4 engine bombers. Unfortunately, Van Creveld passed up the opportunity to drive a stake through this particular myth.

In one area Van Creveld takes a stand that I found clearly unwarranted; his chapter "The Twilight of Naval Aviation" certainly sells naval aviation short. He observes, unhelpfully, that aircraft carriers have played an insignificant role in peer naval conflict between great powers since 1945, and instead has been relegated only to "limited wars." He does extensively discuss the Falklands War, but lets his conclusion get in the way of the evidence he presents; the discussion of the role of the British carriers clearly indicates that they played a decisive role, but Van Creveld struggles to avoid openly coming to that conclusion, concentrating instead on the length of the campaign, the importance of the sinking of the General Belgrano, and the technical insufficiency of the British Harriers.  It may well be true that the United States and other countries have wasted time and money on naval aviation, but Van Creveld declares this more emphatically than he demonstrates it.

There are a few unnecessary errors. For example, Van Creveld misstates the timing of Hugh Trenchard's shift to strategic bombing advocacy; while Trenchard eventually became an enthusiastic supporter of strategic bombing (largely in service of RAF institutional aims), he was distinctly lukewarm regarding prospects for strategic bombing during World War I.   Van Creveld's section on interwar carrier aviation is misleading, and seems to misunderstand the impact of the naval limitation treaties on carrier design and construction.

And so Age of Airpower is a good book, but not a great book.  Van Creveld passes up a number of opportunities to make  fresh arguments about airpower, instead just hinting at a variety of interesting potential cases.  The only area in which he really grapples with controversy is the question of naval aviation, which I think he gets essentially wrong. However, his general stance on airpower seems to me largely indisputable; airpower is more limited than its military advocates have historically claimed, and civilians in Western democracies tend to habitually overestimate the effectiveness of air campaigns.  General readers new to the subject will quite likely enjoy this book, and it has points for specialists to wrestle with, although the latter will often find the volume frustrating.

More Tea Leaves

The Navy is moving a substantial amount of equipment to the Persian Gulf that if used, would be done specific in combat against the capabilities fielded by Iran. I am simply highlighting that fact about the MIW shift to the Gulf or other recent military orders reported in media this week; not trying to start a conspiracy theory.

So maybe this other relevant activity is just a coincidence, but even as a coincidence it is very interesting. Lets start with China.

The government on Tuesday raised retail prices for gasoline and diesel fuel for the second time in less than six weeks in an attempt to keep pace with soaring crude oil prices.

Chinese motorists are now paying $4.43 a gallon for 90-octane fuel — nearly equal to the $4.45-a-gallon average for mid-grade fuel in California, according to AAA.

The reason provided is found later in the article.

The increase should ease pressure on China's two main refiners, the state-owned China Petroleum & Chemical Corp. and PetroChina Co., which are not allowed to pass costs on to consumers. The two have reported losing billions of dollars already because of soaring crude prices.

In other words, China is not having a supply or a demand problem right now, what they are having is a 'losing money' problem because of the current high costs - and because China price fixes their fuel, they must price fix it relative to the global market.

Long term I think everyone recognizes that China's demand is going to go up, but right now supply and demand isn't the issue - there are no supply problems with China even with Iranian sanctions. Raising the cost of gas and diesel will insure that supply will go up because by any measurement - this is a fairly significant cost increase for fuel for the average Chinese citizen. Also worth noting, China has not cut back any orders for fuel from any of their import sources, so despite less demand in the near term China will be stockpiling rather than reducing supply.

So if China is reducing demand, why is Saudi Arabia ramping up supply?

Saudi Arabia’s state shipping company, Vela, is set to send 11 supertankers, totalling up 22 million barrels of crude oil, to the U.S. this month and next, an abnormally high number, shipbrokers and analysts said Friday.

“This is the first time in several years for Vela to hit the market with such volume-and in such a short timeframe,” Omar Nokta, managing director at Dahlman Rose & Co., told Dow Jones Newswires. “In 2011, Vela fixed 1 VLCC to the U.S. every other month.”

Vela wasn’t immediately available to comment.

According to the International Energy Agency, Saudi Arabia’s oil production rose to 10 million barrels a day in February, its highest in 30 years. The Kingdom is expected to continue to increase output in the coming months, the IEA said in its monthly oil market report published Wednesday.

I know what you are thinking... this is an effort to bring fuel prices down and pick up the slack for Iranian oil cut off by sanctions and problems in South Sudan, but that simply isn't true. OPEC data shows that those problems were previously absorbed with other measures and they consistently claim the price for crude is artificially high. A lot of analysts continue to say that as well, and Bryan Walsh mentioned that specific point in his TIME column the other day.

Right now much of the recent price spike is due to tensions with Iran, a major oil producer. War with Iran is a real possibility, albeit an uncertain one, and if the missiles were to fly, we could easily see a price spike of $50 a barrel or more. So traders and major oil consumers are stockpiling crude now as a hedge against that very situation, which in turn drives the price up now by artificially inflating demand.

Emphasis mine. There is no supply problem. Because while margins are legitimately tight (they always are these days), it has been noted in several places including the Financial Times that there is a lot of hoarding of crude right now taking place globally, in particular Europe. Now we are seeing a "wall of ships" heading for the United States. It is being said that this is part of an Obama administration plan to bring the price of oil down, but that is hard to believe, because the Obama administration knows that isn't going to work. Shipping in more crude to the US isn't for the purpose of increasing supply on the market - rather increasing the supply in reserve.

Why does the Obama know that won't work? Because for the last few weeks politicians have had more than a few open discussions with experts on the topic and it has been specifically asked whether more crude in the US would reduce prices - and every expert has agreed it would not. The problem in the US isn't the supply of crude, it is the capacity of refineries.

With the East Coast poised to lose 50 percent of its oil refining capacity, three members of Congress on Monday worried that while the country is producing more of its own crude oil, it might grow more dependent on other countries for gasoline and diesel fuel.

Pennsylvania Congressman Pat Meehan hosted a panel of energy experts for a field meeting in Aston, Pennsylvania, of the Committee on Homeland Security.

Meehan and two other legislators, Congressmen John Carney from neighboring Delaware and Mike Fitzpatrick from Bucks County, Pennsylvania, peppered the experts with questions about fuel prices and logistics as well as national security.

Two refineries in the Philadelphia area have closed in recent years, and a third is scheduled to close this summer.

A massive delivery of crude from Saudi Arabia to the US - which is about to happen - is not going to impact fuel prices at all. All it does is add increased supply as a reserve, because refinery capacity is full and cannot actually use all this extra crude coming to the US. Said another way, we are hoarding supply, not for use to bring prices down (which is impossible without more refineries), rather to have in case of delivery disruption.

Then you have the rumors that the Obama administration is going to release from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to help address fuel prices. I don't believe it, rather I think the idea is being floated to calm investors. Every time they are asked, the International Energy Agency (IEA) says there is not need to release stockpiles because there is no supply crunch.

So why are the big energy importers in Asia, Europe, and the US hoarding crude supply? Why is the US suddenly shifting naval resources to the Persian Gulf specific to capabilities of Iran? Isn't a massive delivery of Saudi Arabian supertankers to the US at a time we lack the refinery capacity to actually use all that crude quickly exactly what stockpiling for war looks like?

I think it is a frightening thought what is going on, only because of what I believe these events are telling me as an observer. The sanctions on Iranian oil are in place. It will take a bit of time, likely 3-6 months, to get a feel whether they are working or not. During that 3-6 months period, it is extremely unlikely anything is going to happen, except that production is going to get very high and everyone is going to stockpile around the world.

So tell me this. What is the intelligence assessment of major oil importers telling those nations political leaders in the US, China, and Europe about what Israel is likely to do if it becomes clear the oil sanctions against Iran - said to be the most potent type of sanctions - aren't working?

I don't care what the folks in Tehran are saying publicly, there is no way they are oblivious to what the tea leaves are suggesting is going on. The Obama administrations diplomatic moves have begun ahead of negotiations with Iran, because the precautionary actions the US would need to take ahead of war with Iran are being taken and written daily in plain sight of major newspapers for all of us to see.

The media can claim this is the Obama administrations grand plan to bring down gas prices, but since the Obama folks know they can't actually saturate the market due to lack of refinery capacity - I reject the popular media rhetoric that this is just Obama administration politics. At no point in the last 3+ years has the Obama administration demonstrated their plans are stupid and are designed knowing that failure is the result. If the Obama administration is involved in hoarding supply on supertankers from Saudi Arabia, it is being done so they are damn sure they have that stockpile when they need it.

Keep in mind, the only legitimate reasons the US would need that extra supply is if the economy suddenly shoots off like a rocket over the next 6 months (very unlikely) thus demand increases significantly, or if the supply chain is disrupted. Which do you think is more likely?

If I'm off base here, I'm very happy to be wrong. Hard to ignore what's happening though.

DoD Cyber Capabilities Get Offensive

General Kieth Alexander testified yesterday before the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities discussing Fiscal Year 2013 Budget Request for Information Technology and Cyber Operations Programs.

Defense News covered the hearing and has a very interesting article on the hearing and discussions.

Once entirely controlled by the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA), offensive cyber weapons are making their way into the hands of the U.S. military’s geographic combatant commanders.

The effort was alluded to by the NSA and the U.S. Cyber Command (CYBERCOM) chief, Army Gen. Keith Alexander, as part of congressional testimony March 20, and confirmed by sources. It means that combatant commanders will be able to employ the weapons as part of overall mission planning, pairing traditional kinetic attacks with newly developed cyber capabilities.

The Defense News article goes on to cover and important point related to DoD Cyber Operations, that the DoD is now fielding offensive capabilities into the hands of the Combatant Commanders. Historically offensive Cyber operations were exclusive to the National Security Agency, but the shift towards giving the DoD those offensive tools appears to be underway. The Defense News article has more details, and is worth reading in full.

The oral testimony of the hearing did not cover this topic, and General Alexander avoided using terms such as offensive and defensive in his oral testimony, but this section in his written testimony covers the topic.

Concept for Operating in Cyberspace: Every domain, by definition, has unique features that compel military operations in it to conform to its physical or relational demands. Doctrine, tactics, techniques, and procedures have been under development for millennia in the land and maritime domains, for a century in the air domain, and for decades in space. In the cyber domain, however, we are just beginning to craft new doctrine and tactics, techniques, and procedures. At the strategic level, we are building our organizational structures to ensure we can deliver integrated cyber effects to support national and Combatant Commander requirements; we are developing doctrine for a pro-active, agile cyber force that can “maneuver” in cyberspace at the speed of the internet; and we are looking at the ways in which adversaries might seek to exploit our weaknesses. At the operational level, our objectives are to establish a single, integrated process to align Combatant Commanders’ requirements with cyber capabilities; to develop functional emphases in the Service cyber components; and to draft a field manual or joint publication on cyber operations and demonstrate proof of concept for it. Finally, rapid deconfliction of operations is required, and that is garnering leadership attention as well. We are currently working closely with two of the geographic combatant commanders. Our goal is to ensure that a commander with a mission to execute has a full suite of cyber-assisted options from which to choose, and that he can understand what effects they will produce for him. Though we can only work such an intensive process with two of the combatant commanders at this time, we will be able to reach out eventually to all of the combatant commands.

I do agree that the transition of offensive Cyber capabilities from the NSA to the DoD is a logical and appropriate evolution of national Cyber capabilities, but I have to also say that with 19 years of experience dealing with very difficult security challenges in multiple Enterprise environments, I think it is important experts in the field make it clear to political and military leaders as often and as loud as possible that in offensive Cyber - the potential for collateral damage and unintended consequences is at least as high in Cyber operations as it is in kinetic operations.

Many basic services taken for granted in the daily lives of civilian populations rely heavily on code and data, and the manipulation of code and/or data can disrupt these services for large groups of people, and create legitimate health concerns well beyond the scope of any specific, intended target. If you remember, the smartest smart Cyber bomb in history - stuxnet - reportedly had several unintended consequences taking down other services across Asia inadvertently - including potentially satellite services in India.

I am not suggesting the DoD should not have nor use these capabilities, but it would be wise to remember that Cyber is still in its infancy relative to other types of mdern warfare. One analogy would be to think of Cyber as an air campaign more similar to carpet bombing with unguided bombs from a B-52 rather than conducting a precision JDAM strike with a B-2.

How in God's Name Do the Marines Do This?

Genius.  Pure genius.

Politics and The Uniform

There's a story breaking of a Marine who has gotten himself in trouble with speaking out against the President, apparently on a Facebook site.  We've been through this before, and the answer is always the same.  Not a good idea, unless you're looking for a General Discharge.  Here's how I responded to a similar situation thirteen years ago; it was an editorial featured in the November 13, 2024 edition of the Washington Times, in response to an editorial written a few days earlier.the link is dead, but you can get the gist of what he wrote from context.

My retirement in April 2008 removed the restrictions I speak of below from my own writing.

Bryan McGrath

--------


Injecting military into politics

---

By Bryan McGrath

---

hen the American people say their prayers at night or when they take the time to reflect upon the many advantages they enjoy as a birthright, protection from a politicized military is probably not on their minds -- and with good reason. Military aloofness from the political milieu -- based on tradition and regulation -- is one of the fundamental contributions the military makes to maintaining the critical covenant of trust that exists between it and the people it serves. When men and women in uniform publicly air their political viewpoints, it is more than just a violation of service regulations; it is a threat to the very fabric of this covenant. Without the trust of the American people, the military will lose its way and may ultimately become a threat to the way of life that it is designed to protect.
. . . . The last 50 years notwithstanding, the American Republic has demonstrated an historic discomfort with large standing armies. The pre-Revolution experience with quartering British troops left a bad taste in the mouths of the framers, and this unease manifests itself in several basic constitutional ways. The president was invested with the power of the commander in chief both to facilitate emergency response and to codify civilian control of the military. By placing the war-declaring function in the Congress, the framers sought to ensure that the decision to fight would represent the will of the people, and not the military or even its commander in chief. Finally, the Constitution prohibits military appropriations in excess of two years, a move specifically designed to frustrate the growth of a military establishment.
. . . . For 150 years, a cycle of mobilization and demobilization was sufficient to suit the security needs of the United States. Yet, the emergence of this country as a superpower and the global security requirements of the Cold War left us with little choice but to maintain a large, peacetime military. Consequently, military political neutrality came to represent not some quaint vestige of a day gone by, but an absolute necessity for the national support such a military would need for its maintenance.
. . . . The tacit agreement into which the American people entered states that they will do what is necessary to provide for a military second to none, all the time knowing that should that military develop a political agenda of its own, no force could oppose it. The American people trust their military not to assert itself in the political process because they know that if the military did get involved, this country would cease to exist as we know it. Neutrality is the military's end of the bargain.
. . . . This is why articles such as Maj. Daniel J. Rabil's (Nov. 9, 1998) (Note: dead link)  are so damaging. That he holds strident political opinions is irrefutable; that he can lawfully air them remains to be seen; that he has crossed the line into an area of dangerous conduct is without question. By publicly calling for impeachment of the president, he has injected himself -- not as a private citizen, but as a United States Marine -- into the political process.
. . . . What if such conduct were to become the norm? What if the military were to follow Maj. Rabil's prescribed course and simply ignore the orders and directives of its civilian leadership? The answer is a military junta, and the answer is anarchy. What if the Congress decides not to impeach the president? What would Maj. Rabil have us do then -- ignore both the Congress and the executive because neither would uphold his personal political values?
. . . . Military service does not disqualify one from participation in the political process. In fact, the Department of Defense is aggressive in seeing to it that its members and their families have every opportunity to register and vote, irrespective of the unit's location or operational tasking. Service members are also guaranteed the right to correspond with their elected representatives without reprisal, and often do so to report situations that they deem unfair, unsafe or contrary to good order and discipline. A service member's decision to air his opinions is not the issue; each member has every right to convey his or her views to our representatives on Capitol Hill. The mistake is in airing them publicly. In doing so, service members bring discredit upon the entire military.
. . . . The American public places considerable trust in its armed services; survey after survey reveals this truth, and it is something of which the military should be both justifiably proud and zealously protective. Essays such as Maj. Rabil's are detrimental to this relationship, and service members should view with grave concern these threats to our place in the public's confidence.

Lt. Cdr. Bryan McGrath is a Surface Warfare Officer on duty at the Pentagon.

Foreign Entanglements: Chinese Aerospace Power

On Foreign Entanglements, Andrew Erickson and I chat aircraft carriers and ASBMs:



This conversation was spurred, of course, by Erickson's latest edited volume, Chinese Aerospace Power.

Filling in the Gaps

CENTCOM has asked for and will be getting some money for increased capabilities specific to Iran.

In a “couple of cases,” Iran improved capabilities “faster than we anticipated,” he said.

The Command requested the additional funds because “our growing reliance on our maritime forces requires an ability to project power against asymmetric threats, particularly in the confined and crowded sea lanes” of the Strait of Hormuz and the Persian Gulf, Major David Nevers, spokesman for the Central Command, said in an e-mailed statement.

Funds were shifted from Pentagon biological and chemical weapons defensive programs and Navy and Air Force shipbuilding, satellite and aircraft programs deemed to have excess funds or experiencing delays.

Congress approved a $28 million shift to provide six U-2 spy planes with upgraded satellite links that increase their capability to “provide real-time, high bandwidth video feeds to ships, ground forces and command and control centers,” according to the reprogramming documents.

The article goes on to cover many, many of the reprogramming changes. Here are a few more.

Congress also backed the shift of $10 million to increase funding for a joint Navy-National Reconnaissance Office program to equip the service’s new anti-radar missile -- the Advanced Anti-Radiation Guided Missile made by Alliant Techsystems Inc. (ATK) - - with a “Special Target Engagement” capability that includes a broadcast receiver...

An additional $4.8 million was approved for integrating new sensors on a Navy underwater vehicle “for very shallow water- mine countermeasures missions,” according to the documents.

The Central Command also won congressional approval to shift $3.7 million to developing a defense against drone attacks. The system will cover “vulnerable areas below typical air-defense radar coverage areas,” according to the documents...

Congress also approved plans to accelerate installation on coastal patrol craft of the “MK 38 Mod 2” system, which includes the laser-tracker for precision aiming of machine guns. Lawmakers rejected the planned source of $4 million in funds so the Comptroller is looking to other sources, a document said.

As described by BAE Systems Plc (BA/) and subcontractor Boeing Co. (BA), the tactical laser system “brings high precision accuracy against surface and air targets such as small boats and unmanned aerial systems. The system also provides the ability to deliver different levels of laser energy, depending on the target and mission objectives.”

Interesting stuff. The Iranian Navy fights with a mix of low tech and high tech, and uses their low tech capabilities to hopefully disorient and distract US naval forces so that their high tech capabilities have a chance of success. The US Navy is trained and equipped to fight both, but US Navy warships are better optimized to fight the high tech threats than the low tech.

It is not difficult to interpret what the CENTCOM folks are thinking with each request. The U-2 modifications are intended to give the best information for strike packages. The Anti-Radiation missiles are to knock out radar systems that would be used from Iranian truck mounted and other mobile missile systems against ships within range from the Iranian coast (or islands). The Gatling Guns and other point defense system modifications like laser pointers are intended to increase capabilities dealing with low flying drones or small boat swarm attacks.

The swarm attacks are particularly challenging, because fighting them is much easier said than done. Iranian swarm tactics are designed to negate the LOS defensive weapon systems used on US Navy ships, which would allow the swarm to close to target rapidly at high speed - how high of speed depending upon sea state and other factors. From about 8 miles out, the Iranians use 107mm rockets to create LOS obstructions between their target and the swarm - essentially a wall of water - that makes it very difficult for precision targeting the obstructed small boats of the swarm - largely because speed and distance become difficult to track.

Once within very close range - say less than a mile - many of the larger defensive weapons have difficulty hitting very fast boats on the water due to their close range, which is exactly what the small boat swarm wants - an old fashion gunfight. The laser targeting systems on US Navy guns should help US Navy sailors target more efficiently in that close range gunfight where boats could potentially be moving around the ship at speeds of up to 60 mph.

Finding the swarms and preventing them from getting too close to US Navy warships is the desired course of action in any naval war against Iran, but it is much easier said than done. In many cases even today, US Navy ships may not even small, fast smugglers in the confined waters of the strait or other locations in the Gulf until they are already within that 8 mile zone. The small boats are stealthy and fast, and all kinds of various environmental or geographic conditions can make them very difficult to pick up on radar.

Even during the recent high profile transit of the USS Carl Vinson into the Persian Gulf earlier this year, reporters noted that small boat smugglers were able to get remarkably close to the US Navy ships. It can be a tough problem, particularly if the warships are dealing with anti-ship missile attack from more high tech capabilities fielded by Iran at the same time.

I don't know about you, but if I was the CO of a destroyer in the Persian Gulf when war breaks out, I'd want to have as many Marines on the ship as I could safely berth (including extra corpsman) with as many big guns as they can operate (and a few spares). When at sea my DDG would have the silhouette of a WWII destroyer with as many muzzles as possible sticking out of the ship. It might create more work for the safety officer, but based on all tactical writing I have seen related to Iranian low tech naval tactics, one can never have too many guns when fighting the Iranians.

Leaking, By Design

The sophisticated readers of this blog already know that leaks in Washington are sometimes controlled and vetted at the highest levels.  I think we have one of those right here, delivered unto the New York Times' crack military reporters and picked up by the wires (as was clearly hoped).  The Administration appears to be trying to foster a serious sense of foreboding, perhaps in order to isolate Israel.  I wonder which is more likely to strike Iran--an isolated Israel, or an Israel that feels secure? 

Bryan McGrath

Keepers

And this is why the Navy picked the cruisers for decommissioning.

House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon wants the Navy to keep seven Ticonderoga-class cruisers the service planned to retire to meet congressionally mandated budget cuts.

McKeon, R-Calif., said in a March 14 speech at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, Calif., that the ships are needed to secure U.S. interests in the Pacific, the focal point of the Obama administration’s new national security strategy. His plan would call for funding needed upgrades to keep the ships — all of which were commissioned in the 1990s — for their full 35-year service lives.

“Though the administration says we’re shifting to Asia, they’re actually reducing the number of ships and planes we have available to respond to contingencies anywhere,” McKeon said. “We will try to hold back cuts to the Navy’s cruiser force, finding the money for our cruisers to undergo proper upgrades, instead of mothballing vital ships needed to sustain the shift to Asia.”

The question I have been asking myself since the beginning is how many cruisers the Navy expects Congress to save. 100%? 75%? 50%? Both the House and the Senate has several members that would prefer to keep these vessels. It isn't just the capabilities of the ships, it is the workload for the yards and industrial base support that needs these ships to stay around.

The thing is though, I don't think the Navy will keep all 7. The USS Port Royal (CG 73) is a perfect example, ever since hitting the reef off Hawaii to become the first AEGIS ashore asset for the United States, that ship has reportedly not been right. Cracks in the hull are just the beginning, the bottom line is the SPY radar is built into the superstructure of these ships - a little damage from grounding can go a long way towards causing serious combat related problems.

So my guess is Congress will find a way to keep at least 2 and as many as 6 of the cruisers. It really isn't as much money as you think, and if modernization is fully funded for each of these cruisers, most of them should be able to serve 40 years with expectations of being viable and competitive naval assets.

Comparisons You Don't Want to Hear

The 4 cruisers being retired this year carry 520 VLS cells between them all. If each was loaded with half Tomahawks and half Standard missiles, and all 260 Tomahawks were fired at targets 750 nautical miles away from the ships and all 260 Standard missiles were fired against enemy aircraft 100 nautical miles away from the ships...

How many DAYS would it take for a single CVN with a modern CVW of 44 Super Hornets or Joint Strike Fighters to fire 260 AA missiles at targets 100 nautical miles away from the aircraft carrier and deliver 260 1000 lb bombs 750 nautical miles away from the aircraft carrier?

There actually is a right answer, with some margin of error in estimation. Don't forget logistics, reload times, and buddy tanking. The sortie rate for a CVW at range is a joke, because one has to pull in USAF tanking to make the numbers look even less uncompetitive.

I had to break out my little Harpoon 3.7 ANW simulator to do the math, keeping in mind CVNs only fly 14 hours a day - which is why the US Navy actually requires 2 CVNs for continuous 24 hour operations... for no more than 72 hours under optimal conditions. It is amazing how little people actually know about modern carrier operations, unless you have served on a carrier. Why SWOs concede the carrier as a dominant naval platform in the 21st century based on what I see today is a mystery to me, aircraft carriers aren't just expensive, they are on a steady flank speed course to irrelevance thanks primarily to the naval aviation community that has made land attack their primary capability - despite the fact it cannot even be done at long range by a carrier without land based tanker support.

People may look at the retirement of 4 CGs and think the worst possible case scenario is that the US Navy is retiring old battleships before Japan attacks Pearl Harbor, but if you do the math and compare value in terms of cost and capability, given the way war has changed at sea in the 21st century - there is a good argument for an analogy that the retirement of the 4 CGs in 2012 is akin to retiring Enterprise, Ranger, Yorktown, and Saratoga on December 8th, 1941.

Luckily we are holding tight to the Nimitz class - the proverbial Oklahoma, Arizona, Pennsylvania, and Tennessee of 1941.

If it was even possible there is truth that CGs are a more critical, relevant asset to the 21st century fleet today than the big deck aircraft carrier, would you even admit it was true?

Is anyone able to accept that aircraft carriers in 2012 might be a wasted asset for the cost? Aircraft carriers come with a proven track record since WWII against major naval powers like North Korea, Vietnam, Grenada, Iran, Iraq twice, Afghanistan, Argentina, and hot spots like Somalia - the historical record clearly articulates the infallibility of the modern aircraft carrier.

I dunno about you, but unless I am fighting small time military power with limited capabilities and training like Syria or Iran, I would rather have the cruisers than the aircraft carrier. It isn't the platform so much as it is the CVW we somehow pretend can field a magical mass of aircraft quickly - thus utilize the size and space of a big deck aircraft carrier when we need it. Where is the evidence that is possible? Where is even a single data point the procurement system could do it? MRAP is the biggest success in modern procurement history - and we think that kind of model can quickly populate carrier decks?

Until I see a US Navy CVW with a fixed wing ASW platform or a legitimate carrier based tanker capability tested and fielded, I am going to find it very difficult to take the naval aviation community seriously when all threat analysis from every corner of the globe highlights submarines as the fastest growing threat to the maritime domain, and the tyranny of range as the greatest threat to naval forces in the Pacific. The Navy is spending about $50 million more on the JSF than the F-18 to get less range with a moderate increase in stealth. And the CVW will still be left with no fixed wing ASW and no organic tanking.

And btw, you'll still need the 4 major surface combatants to protect the carrier, just so the Navy can hit targets at greater cost and at a slower pace. Some people say that because the Navy has a tighter budget the aircraft carrier needs to be cut. I don't think that's a valid reason at all, what I would rather see is a better debate between communities of the Navy why the aircraft carrier is a better investment than other aspects of the fleet - or a better investment than similar capabilities provided by other services. Show me that debate, and I'll show you an organization that is thinking. Until then, pass the hippy pipe so I can keep smoking the wacky tabacky that argues the infallibility of the modern big deck aircraft carrier in modern naval warfare.

More Littoral Combat Ships

Interesting this was released by the Navy on their website, but nothing from the Defense contracts page? Curious, I do not know why. Here is the official Navy release.

The Navy issued contract modifications to Lockheed Martin Corporation and Austal USA under their respective littoral combat ship (LCS) block buy contracts to add funding for construction of two fiscal year 2012 littoral combat ships each, March 16.

This is the third funding increment for each contractor under their previously awarded, fixed-price incentive "block buy" contracts for the design and construction of up to 10 LCS Flight 0+ ships. The two block buy contracts provide for the acquisition of a total of up to 20 littoral combat ships from fiscal year 2010 through fiscal year 2015, subject to availability of appropriations.

Under the block buy contract with Lockheed Martin Corporation, $715,000,351 was added for construction of two fiscal year 2012 LCS ships. Under the block buy contract with Austal USA, $691,599,014 was added for construction of two fiscal year 2012 LCS ships. These ships will be built at Marinette Marine Corporation in Marinette, Wis., and Austal USA in Mobile, Ala., respectively.

The prices for the fiscal year 2012 ships were determined based on the competitive, LCS dual block buy contracts awarded Dec. 29, 2010, and also includes values associated with the incorporation of approved change orders funded for the fiscal year 2010 and fiscal year 2011 ships previously awarded in the block buy contracts.

"The Navy is successfully driving down costs in the Littoral Combat Ship program," said Rear Adm. James Murdoch, program executive officer for Littoral Combat Ships. "We are continuing to execute the dual award strategy for these ships. Efforts to stabilize design, improve production planning, invest in shipbuilder improvements and leverage long-term vendor agreements all within the framework of a competitive fixed-price contract have returned this program to the level of affordability necessary for the Navy to move forward with construction at efficient rates in support of the 55-ship LCS requirement."

The funding obligated is for the ninth through the twelfth ships in the LCS class.

Worth noting, back on March 14th (last Wednesday) these two contracts moved through the DoD.

Lockheed Martin Corp, Baltimore, Md., is being awarded a $33,649,198 modification to previously awarded contract (N00024-11-C-2300) to exercise options for special studies, analyses, review and Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) class services. This effort will assess engineering and production challenges and evaluate the cost and schedule risks from affordability efforts to reduce LCS acquisition and lifecycle costs. Work will be performed in Hampton, Va. (32 percent); Marinette, Wis. (27 percent); Moorestown, N.J. (22 percent); and Washington, D.C. (19 percent). Work is expected to be complete by March 2013. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. The Naval Sea Systems Command, Washington, D.C., is the contracting activity.

Austal USA, Mobile, Ala., is being awarded a $19,692,295 modification to previously awarded contract (N00024-11-C-2301) to exercise options for special studies, analyses, review and class service efforts for the Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) program. This effort will assess engineering and production challenges and evaluate the cost and schedule risks from affordability efforts to reduce LCS acquisition and lifecycle costs. Work will be performed in Mobile, Ala. (72 percent) and Pittsfield, Mass. (28 percent). Work is expected to be complete by March 2013. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. The Naval Sea Systems Command, Washington, D.C., is the contracting activity.

If you scroll down to March 14th on Tim Colton's website, he asks some interesting questions with a bit of commentary:

The funds are to be used to assess engineering and production challenges and evaluate the cost and schedule risks from affordability efforts to reduce LCS acquisition and lifecycle costs. Oh, goody. How about just not spending the money? That would save $50 million right there. Hey guys, these are fixed-price contracts: the contractors should be doing everything they can to reduce costs and schedule at their own expense. It's in their interests. This way the Government pays them to reduce costs and the contractors keep the savings. Sometimes one wonders if there's anyone in NAVSEA with even half a brain.

It is a fair question, the Navy is spending $50 million on LCS production changes, and expects to save how much money as a result?

A little math. The unit cost of the Lockheed Martin ships would be $357.5 million apiece. The unit cost for the Austal ships would be $345.8 million apiece. The combined total for both contracts is $1,406,599,365. There was $79.5 million in prior-year advanced procurement funding for each one of these four ships. According to the FY2012 budget, the estimated procurement cost including prior-year advanced funding was $1,881,600,000. That leaves $395,500,635 which I presume is government furnished equipment. While those costs aren't equal between the two ship classes, divided by four that averages out to $98,875,158.75 in government furnished equipment cost per ship.

So... for the Lockheed Martin version of the Littoral Combat Ship, we are talking about $357.5M + $19.9M advanced prior year + $98,875,158.75 for a final total cost of $475,375,158.75 per ship in FY12 dollars.

For the Austal version of the Littoral Combat Ship, we are talking about $345.8M + $19.9M advanced prior year + $98,875,158.75 for a final total cost of $464,575,158.75 per ship in FY12 dollars.

If my notes on how Section 121(c) and (d) of the FY2010 defense authorization act (H.R. 2647/P.L. 111-84 of October 28, 2024) worked for the Littoral Combat Ship cost cap, it was agreed in that the $480 million cost cap in FY2005 dollars was something like $538 million in FY11 dollars.

With the latest set of contracts, the Navy appears to be at least $60 million under the cost cap with the Lockheed Martin version and at least $70 million under the cost cap with the Austal version. Combined, for the four ships, that is some $260+ million under the cost cap for the fiscal year. My point is simple - that $260 million needs to be putting out at least 4 quality Littoral Combat Ship modules - at least 1 for each ship - or the Navy is wasting taxpayer money.

All of this suggests the shipbuilding side of the Littoral Combat Ship seems to be getting on track. It is past time to start seeing something interesting, useful, productive, and noteworthy on the module side. Without high quality modules to field, the ships are worthless.

PS: USS Little Rock (LCS 9)? Go hogs! WPS!