Remembering a Time When CNO's Championed Maritime Strategy...

When I designed the logo for Information Dissemination, the graphic above was my inspiration. Many probably could have guessed that. Originally, I tried to write Sea Control, Naval Presence, and Projection of Power on the arrows in the Information Dissemination logo. It was ugly, and in the end I went a different direction. For those who don't know, this graphic was first produced (or at least the only place I have ever seen it) in Missions of the U.S. Navy written by Stansfield Turner in the Mar-Apr 1974 edition of the Naval War College Review (PDF). Missions of the U.S. Navy is my favorite article published by the Naval War College Review during the cold war, and if you have never read it I highly encourage you to do so.

It is so good in fact that you can download it in three different places on the Naval War College website. The link above is a copy of the original full Mar-Apr 1974 edition of the Naval War College Review. It was reprinted in full again in the Winter 1998 edition of the Naval War College Review (PDF). Finally, even though the link is broken in the Newport Papers section of their website, John Hattendor's brilliant assembly of 1970s publications in Newport Paper #30 related to the work of Peter Swartz can be downloaded by direct link: U.S. Naval Strategy in the 1970s, Selected Documents (PDF).

But before Stansfield Turner wrote Missions of the U.S. Navy in 1974, Admiral Elmo Zumwalt became CNO in 1970 and went right to work, and within three months he had personally been heavily involved in producing the first of 5 major documents we will look at: Project SIXTY.

Whenever I study naval history of a time period, as I did with this particular Capstone Strategies examination when putting together the content for this month, I always start with people first. The 1970s, to me, is about 5 very strong leaders who came from the greatest generation. All five had a unique style of leadership, were well spoken in public, were leaders both in thought and deed within their own communities in the Navy, and what makes them completely foreign to naval leaders today - they competed with each other publicly - respectful of one another in disagreement - to the benefit of the Navy. None of them were afraid to speak their mind, and that did bring controversy, but it was always personal controversy as opposed to the kind of controversy that was detrimental to the Navy as an organization.

I am speaking specifically about Admiral Elmo Zumwalt, Vice Admiral Stansfield Turner, Admiral James Holloway, Admiral Thomas Hayward, and Admiral Hyman Rickover. The most remarkable thing to me though is that Zumwalt, Holloway, and Hayward were CNOs, leading from the front with the best ideas of the day.

These were hugely influential debates and discussions often framed in competition with one another in public even though they were complimentary capabilities of naval power. CNO Elmo Zumwalt is the champion of naval presence and sea control. His Vice CNO - who also became the next CNO - James Holloway is the champion of power projection. Hymen Rickover is the champion of strategic deterrence in his role as nuclear power czar. Stansfield Turner is President of the Naval War College and ties Sea Control, Naval Presence, Strategic Deterrence, and Power Projection together in a strategic concept that aligns policy with strategy with tactics.

At the end of the decade, at the end of CNO Holloway's time as CNO, the Navy has built up a collection of study groups engaged in the development of Sea Plan 2000 and various other force structure studies. These groups have people you may have heard of, Captain John McCain, a young Marine LT named Bing West, oh and there was this 32 year old Navy consultant, LCDR in the Navy Reserve, or Corporation President - however you'd like to describe him - named John Lehman designing the future force structure of the Navy. These activities were being developed with Admiral Hayward, who subsequently followed Holloway as CNO in July 1978.

CNO Hayward organized the concepts of CNO Zumwalt and CNO Holloway, the efforts of ADM Rickover, and the conceptual framework of VADM Turner, then rebranded those ideas with a new typology for the Navy a strategic document called The Future of U.S. Sea Power (1979), which was described at the time as the "Fundamental principles of naval strategy." That document formed the strategic foundation for the concept of maritime supremacy evolving the strategy of the US Navy towards the 1980s 600-ship force goal.

Three very smart, very stubborn CNOs publicly arguing and writing about strategy, plus Rickover which is a redundant way of saying smart and stubborn, plus Stansfield Turner - also a very smart and stubborn leader in his own right; all competing the best and brightest strategic concepts in their own words; all doing so publicly and privately; all competing the priority of Sea Control and Power Projection in defensive and offensive force postures against one another; all while linking policy to strategy to doctrine and tactics...

All three CNOs led the debates and discussion publicly and privately on the most important strategic issues of their era. The Navy benefited greatly from it.

Lets compare then and now. CNO Greenert is championing the issue of electronic warfare today, CNO Roughead championed what was new in the Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower - namely maritime security and humanitarian response/disaster recovery, while Admiral Mullen was the champion of Maritime Domain Awareness.

Hmm.

Insert facepalm