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A Very "Joint" Air Sea Battle (from 2013) |
The
Pentagon’s 08 January choice to rename the Air/Sea Battle concept is a poor
choice that will negatively affect the ability of the Navy and Air Force to
modernize their forces for 21st century combat. It is an
attempt by the U.S. Army to insert itself into an operational construct for
which it is neither equipped nor trained in which to participate. Finally, this decision demonstrates
a compelling need to reform the aging Defense Department organization created
by the Goldwater Nichols Act in 1986. This reform legislation was designed to
empower joint military institutions to make the best decisions for national
security outside parochial service concerns. This name change illustrates that
service-driven parochialism is alive and well and well in the Pentagon, and is
aided and abetted by joint bureaucrats intent on shaping all problems with the
same joint tools, whether appropriate or not.
The U.S. Navy and Air Force are desperately
in need of new equipment to wage war in difficult 21st century
anti-access/area denial (A2/AD) environments. Both services need new aircraft,
(manned or unmanned), to replace aging Cold War platforms. The Navy needs new
missiles in order to engage opponents outside A2/AD envelopes. The naval
service has conducted an active information campaign to inform members of
Congress and the general public as to the importance of seapower in ensuring
U.S. economic and physical security. The Chief of Naval Operations’ “SailingDirections” and later "Navigation Plans" specifically identified a need to “communicate our intent and
expectations both within and outside the Navy,” and "strengthen alliance relationships and partnerships." The Air/Sea Battle term is one
that easily explains service intentions to a wide global audience. Renaming this
concept with the awkward joint term “Joint Concept for Access and Maneuver in
the Global Commons” (JAM GC) will not resonate with the average U.S. citizen, whose
support is vital for continued military funding. Such terms make joint
bureaucrats in the deep warrens of the Pentagon’s mezzanine level happy, but
will not draw the vital public support necessary for strong legislative action.
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The Air and Naval Power behind the Concept |
The joint moniker and apparent Army
intrusion in an otherwise Naval and Air Force activity represents an unneeded
diversion of U.S. Army efforts. The ground force again appears ready to abandon
vital lessons learned from a long, hard counterinsurgency campaign in order to preserve
its funding relative to the other services. After the Vietnam War the Army
quickly disbanded its counterinsurgency (COIN) forces in favor of a return to
conventional expeditionary warfare as represented by the Soviet and Warsaw Pact
threat on the plains of Germany. Counterinsurgency lessons learned were left in
the dustbin of Army history as the service embraced Air/Land battle for both
operational relevance and funding concerns. While this doctrinal change was
useful in many ways toward developing present, effective expeditionary warfare concepts,
its failure to make COIN an institutional part of the Army handicapped the service
for wars since 2003. When the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq degenerated
into insurgencies, the Army was forced to re-learn lessons very similar to
those painfully gained over the course of the Vietnam War. The Army would best
serve the nation’s interests in the wake of the Southwest Asian conflicts by
solving the 50 year old problem of how to have both effective expeditionary and
COIN capabilities in its organizational structure rather than attempting to
couple itself to Air/Sea battle.
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Noted defense reformers Senator Goldwater and General Jones |
Finally, the name change illustrates the
increasing need to reform the aging, Cold War- era provisions of the Goldwater
Nichols Act. This reform legislation was designed to empower joint
organizations to make national security decisions independent of parochial
service needs. Now, the need to maintain a “joint” face on all military
operations has created its own ossified, parochial structure. The efforts of one or more services to create
solutions to national security needs are stifled and suppressed by joint
bureaucrats seeking to preserve their own institutional authority. This
situation of “joint uber alles” is just one of the problems with the
quarter-century old Goldwater Nichols structure. Its transfer of the business
of strategy from central, service-based systems that produced successful
products like Air/Land Battle and the 1980’s-era Navy Maritime Strategy to
regional Combatant Commanders (COCOMs) may have been permissible in a post Cold
War environment free of peer competitors with global reach. This decentralized system is no longer possible in the 2nd decade of the 21st century. The global impact of post 9/11 terrorism; the
rise of China; and the return of a revanchist Russia (among many concerns);
make this 1986-era construct a prime candidate for significant Congressional
reform.
Renaming the well-known
Air/Sea Battle concept with an awkward, unfamiliar joint term serves no one
well. It forces the Navy and Air Force to change their public modernization campaigns.
It is a distraction for an Army that should be preparing for its next
expeditionary and COIN operations rather than trying to re-enter the coastal
defense business. Finally, it shows that both service and joint bureaucratic parochialism
persist within the Department of Defense despite the provisions of Goldwater
Nichols. Congress should take action to restore easily identifiable names to
military concepts in need of public support. It should direct the Army to
concentrate on its traditional service requirements rather than compete with
the Navy and Air Force in an operational arena for which it is not equipped.
Finally, Congress should look at potential reforms to the dated Goldwater
Nichols Act of 1986. It should restore the abilities of services to create
strategic and operational solutions to global military needs beyond the purview
of individual regional commanders.
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