EVENTS

Date:	Monday, June 20, 2005
Time:	8:45 AM -- 3:30 PM
Location:	Wohlstetter Conference Center, Twelfth Floor, AEI 1150 Seventeenth Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20036

June 2005

The Future of the United States Navy

No branch of the armed forces better epitomizes both the promise and the peril of American superpower than the United States Navy. On June 20, AEI scholars Dan Blumenthal, Tom Donnelly, and Fred Kagan, and keynote speaker Admiral Vern Clark, chief of naval operations, discussed the following questions: What is the role of sea power in the post-9/11 world? How should the navy transform--in its strategy, doctrine, posture, and procurement--to ensure its relevance in the global war on terror? How large should the U.S. fleet be, and what should it look like? How should the U.S. Navy respond to China's naval modernization and the shifting balance of maritime power in the Asia-Pacific region?

Panel I: Strategy and Missions of the Future Navy

Thomas Mahnken
Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies

The navy will play a major, albeit not decisive, role in the global war on terror.  Overall, the navy makes six fundamental contributions to the war on terror. On the level of grand strategy, the navy affects the way that other states and actors regard the United States and shapes the activities of both friends and enemies.  Regarding strategy, the navy’s objectives include assuming control of the seas, protecting and disrupting shipping lanes, establishing platforms from which to launch strikes, and acting in response to the needs of the United States military.

The United States Navy must be recognized for the important yet unconventional role that it has played in both Iraq and Afghanistan. For example, the navy provided air power at the beginning of Operation Enduring Freedom, projecting its power inland. Navy Seals played a vital role in seizing Iraqi oil infrastructure and protecting it from insurgent attacks. Last but not least, navy interrogators have worked professionally and effectively to gather vital intelligence.

What will the United States Navy look like in the future? We must remind ourselves that we have the most powerful navy in the world and have allies who also have able naval capabilities. Our defense capabilities may dissuade potential adversaries from challenging us. Although a strong and large navy will never guarantee that other states or actors will not pose a threat, the United States does have a significant military advantage over its enemies.

The mission required by the global war on terror will require the navy to look to its rich historical tradition for guidance. To fight Islamic jihadists, we must exert control over the seas, interdict lines of communication, and be able to launch missiles and raids from the sea--all of which could be required for any conventional war exercise.  The global war on terror may poses new threats to America’s security, but it will require that the navy rediscover its heritage in order to provide for America’s defense.

Rear Admiral (Sel.) Michael K. Mahon
Deep Blue, U.S. Navy
 
Three principle factors are driving the navy’s increasingly important role as a force in the United States military. First, with the country at war, the navy must support joint coalition forces.  Second, because the United States is now a global power with regional interests, it must prepare to intervene in regional or small-scale conflicts. Third, the navy is limited by fiscal constraints and must therefore use every bit of capability that it can per dollar received.

The Pentagon is in the midst of examining its strategy as it writes the Quadrennial Defense Review. With the writing of a new National Security Strategy, we have the opportunity to defend freedom and influence events before they become overwhelmingly dangerous and less manageable. We must ask ourselves the following question when evaluating our nation’s security and the role of the military: how do we deal with challenges that we are likely to confront?

The navy does not make strategy but rather implements the strategy developed by the Department of Defense and the National Security Council. Because sailors are offensive warriors by nature, the navy will defend the national interest by implementing an offensive strategy and taking the fight to the enemy. Admiral Vern Clark, chief of naval operations, has cited three main priorities: to win the war on terror, to increase the operational availability of the navy, and to provide for the homeland defense and the homeland security. Prior to 9/11, the navy assumed that if it could fight two theater wars, it would be capable of assuming lesser tasks, such as counterterrorism and humanitarian assistance, and thereby defending the national security. Since the 2001 attacks, however, Admiral John Morgan has developed the 3 to 1 strategy, which argues that the capabilities required for stability operations, the global war on terror, and homeland defense and security, are not wholly captured by the requirements of major theater conflicts. Because there are missions and tasks unique to stability operations, the navy must adopt a transformative strategy.
 
As a consequence, the navy has developed the flexible deployment concept. We need to be able to achieve the following in order to confront the challenges of the twenty-first century: we must build a flexible construct that delivers a mix of present and surgeable forces; we must posture deployed naval forces for the global war on terror and for purposes of deterrence; we must be able to surge naval forces on short notice for crisis response; we must pulse for joint/coalition coalition exercises and theatre security cooperation; and we must enable strike force training, operations, and experimentation to enhance combat readiness.

Robert Work
Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments
 
As the United States Navy evaluates its strategy, it must ask itself several questions as the number one global naval power: Where is the navy in the competition? Is its lead shrinking or widening? Is the navy behind or ahead? All of this information helps guide us as we formulate naval transformation.

The 2005 Quadrennial Defense Review will be the first true defense review of the new national security era. September 11 has indicated that we must change our strategic prescription. Although we will remain concerned by traditional threats, we will pay increasing attention to irregular challenges. In particular, the 10-30-30 metric must be retired. This metric, which argues that the navy must be able to seize the initiative in ten days, win a war in thirty days, and win another war in the same way in another thirty days, overemphasizes the value of speed. Although speed is extremely important, the short war scenario has a mixed record at the strategic level.

The navy must also concentrate on building a national fleet. Although the Coast Guard will remain under the authority of the Department of Homeland Security, the navy will need to draw on the small cutter capability of the Coast Guard. In particular, the ability to conduct a distributive blockade will be fundamental to continuing American control of the seas. Only with the help of the Coast Guard will the navy be able to adapt to the irregular challenges of the twenty-first century.

Ideally, the navy would like to build four fleets: a strategic deterrent fleet, a dissuasion fleet with nuclear attack capabilities, an irregular fleet to fight the global war on terror, and an anti-access area denial fleet. However, due to fiscal constraints, the United States cannot realistically build four fleets. Thus, more likely, the navy may very well resort to building a modular network fleet, refiguring its components so as to best shift to the new era. The navy would be well advised to consider the strategy of the second move, adopting new technology only when such technology is implemented by the adversary so as to stay within budget.

Rear Admiral Mike McDevitt, U.S. Navy (Ret.)
Center for Naval Analyses

To properly assess the manner in which the United States Navy must assess its strategy, you must place yourself in Beijing and look out at China’s strategic circumstances. Beijing’s strategic reality demands that the Chinese direct their attention primarily to maritime issues: for example, disputes over Taiwan and the Spratly Islands, conflicts with Japan and the United States, and trade in the Pacific and the South China Sea are strategic issues which are all maritime in nature.  The latest white paper published in December 2004 proclaimed that the PLA needed to shift its focus from the army to the navy and the Air Force so as to win command of the sea and air.

If the Chinese were to build a navy, what would it look like? Would the Chinese Navy be identical to the imperial Japanese Navy? The Japanese had produced a competent and amphibious navy, equipped with carriers and effective anti-submarine capacity. The Chinese are unlikely to reproduce the Japanese naval structure, however, for it is difficult and expensive to create a navy in such a fashion.

On the other hand, the Chinese will probably be more likely to build a navy according to the Soviet Union’s sea denial strategy. This navy will mate land-based air power with cruise missiles, a PLA air force, and the offensive use of submarines. What will make Chinese naval strategy novel, however, will be the implementation of conventionally tipped missiles which may be capable of striking moving targets. 

What will a Chinese sea denial strategy mean for the United States Navy? As long as the United States has a defense obligation to Taiwan, we must recognize that the maintenance of air superiority over the Taiwan Strait will be our best bet against any Chinese threat. We must be able to defeat the Chinese maneuverable warheads by shooting them down or employing decoys to scramble the Chinese systems. Furthermore, we must improve our anti-submarine capability and maintain adequate number of submarines in the Pacific.

The Chinese have defined for themselves an ambitious agenda, but they clearly have a long way to go in order to create a navy that can compete with that of the United States. Modernization will happen, as the PLA is dedicated to improvement, but it is not going to happen overnight. If we pay attention to what the Chinese are doing, we will be able to take appropriate action and rise on the same tide.

Panel II: Sizing, Shaping, and Posturing the Fleet

Terry J. Pudas
Office of Force Transformation, U.S. Department of Defense

Due to the broad array of challenges that are increasingly facing the United States, the navy is concerned about rising costs. How will the navy acquire new and necessary technologies? How long will it take the navy to adjust to this new environment? Most specifically, the United States Navy must be prepared to face four particular types of challenges: irregular, catastrophic, traditional, and disruptive. In this context, what will be the balance of capabilities which will allow us to reach the domain of political victory? We might find some answers to these questions, thinking in the context of “connectedness” rather than “containment.”

In this environment of fiscal contradictions, we must focus on designing an alternative fleet. Our goal must be to preserve the United States’ strategic advantage--we must maintain American innovation, depth, and diversity. The navy must be concerned with achieving coherence in force building and operations, building a larger and more capable navy, and seizing technical opportunities early.

Captain Karl Hasslinger, U.S. Navy (Ret.)
General Dynamics Electric Boat

When one examines the United States Navy’s thirty-year shipbuilding program, one cannot help but feel that the present budget will not support this program. In particular, the DDX program continues to build fewer ships at a higher price tag. The DDX is the centerpiece of a family of ships that will operate within the construct of the surface combatant navy to deliver a vast range of war fighting capabilities that will maximize and revolutionize the combat capability of the fleet. Yet, the DDX may have been the navy’s attempt to fit too many technologies into one platform. Although all of these technologies are necessary to naval strategy, the sheer number of them may be too great for one single ship.

One of the navy’s greatest concerns is cost stability: the navy must keep costs under control. Relevant to cost control is the question of whether the navy should install nuclear propulsion in surface ships. Nuclear propulsion may be an expensive technology but, with rising oil costs, the navy must consider the manner in which nuclear propulsion enhances the speed and quality of war fighting. 

We cannot allow the shipbuilding/industrial base to atrophy. We must be concerned about not only our sailors but also the designers and engineers who create the ships which we sail. We are facing a situation in which over 80 percent of the products that we use to build our ships are procured from sole-source suppliers. If we do not take care to cultivate the skills of our engineers, we could very well lose our expertise. It will not be unreasonable to predict that engineers will seek out other means of employment. Thus, the navy must not only think about its global strategy; it must also consider how it will maintain its shipbuilding/industrial base.

Robert Work
Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments

When the nation shifts its national security strategy, there always follows a lengthy period of strategic uncertainty with regard to military strategy. In the present budgetary environment, there is little chance that the navy will be allocated more than $9 to $11 billion. Thus, there are some major fiscal constraints in an environment of increasing strategic demand.

The Navy should size the fleet for the 1-1-1 task--that is, to prepare for a WMD attack, an irregular threat, and a major power projection. Each one of these three events could involve a nuclear weapon. However, we must keep in mind that many of the ships designed during the 1980s were built for a dirty, or radioactive, environment.

When we consider the size of the navy, we should not just count the number of ships in the fleet but rather discuss the organization of the army’s network. The navy is now part of a joint- and multi-dimensional world which contributes, along with the other forces of the American military, to the defense of the nation.

As we modify the number of ships and change which ships we use in what locations, we should also bring back the fleet stations. In particular, we should station our navy in important locations in the Mediterranean, the Indian Ocean, and, even more specifically, in Diego Garcia off the west coast of Africa and in Palau, East Asia. By posturing the fleet in such locations, the Navy will be able to simultaneously fight the persistent irregular war and support a major joint power project operation.

Keynote Address

Admiral Vern Clark
Chief of Naval Operations, U.S. Navy

We must understand that the navy is a high-capital investment system and thus cannot change overnight. We estimate that we will have 70 percent of today’s navy fifteen years from now. However, we believe that the navy of the future will and should look different from today’s navy so as to be prepared for the challenges facing the twenty-first century. 

The United States has been a maritime nation since its birth. Thus, we will be misguided if we focus on event like the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and use them as the basis to design future structures and wars. We must assume that we will be dependant on the seas in the future, independent of the changing nature of our strategy. Our economy, global security, and national security all depend on the security of the oceans.

Although we should discuss how the military force will shape the security environment of the future, we must correspondingly address how the military will be shaped by the global security environment in which we exist. As articulated in the pillars of “Sea Power 21,” the navy’s architecture for the strategy of the future, we must optimize and maximize our ability to exploit the sea, our area of maneuver.  In this changing environment, the navy must also embrace jointness. Because the navy must deal with the world we have rather than the world that we wish we had, we must build the navy that we need. We will have to enable land forces, such as the army and the marines, with precision capabilities. Naval understanding of land warfare is essential and absolutely necessary for the progression of warfare.

Last but not least, the navy must recognize that its human capital must also be a fundamental part of its twenty-first century strategy. At present, the navy simply does not have one. Because human capital is fundamental to providing capability, the navy must move immediately to remedy this problem.

Panel III: Budgeting, Transformation, and the Defense Industrial Base

The Honorable John J. Young
Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Research, Development, and Acquisition

When addressing the navy’s shipbuilding strategy, budgeting must be coupled to requirements. First, budget accuracy is critical. The Department of Defense has an important opportunity to build a five-year plan that is stable and offers both stability planning and efficient execution. In some cases, the budget has not been precisely or accurately calculated. We must redouble our efforts to make sure that our estimates are on target.

To deal with rising budgetary pressures, we must make sure that we do not needlessly add to the cost estimates. The minimum shipbuilding plan was defined by the requirements and high quality analysis of the chief naval officer (CNO). The navy and the Office of the CNO undertook a high quality analysis which produced a report setting forth what the navy needs, not what the navy wants. Nevertheless, Congress rejected the navy’s budgetary request. The navy will, therefore, be forced to look for a different way to do business and accomplish its mission.

It is important to address the issue of the shipping-industrial base and program stability. Stability has improved, and the shipyards are kept busy. A number of new programs have created robust demand. Nevertheless, the navy’s job is to purchase on behalf of the needs of the fleet regardless of industrial issues. It cannot run private shipyards or control private industry on its own behalf. If it were to do so, it would never be able to control costs.

Rear Admiral Paul Robinson, U.S. Navy (Ret.)
Northrup Grumman Ship Systems
 
The navy and the shipbuilding industry are in a constant state of flux--both are adjusting to changing budgetary and acquisition strategies. While both respond to pressures to reduce overall costs, they must still produce superb ships.

In order to evaluate where the navy must go, the navy must address where it has been. During the 1980s for example, the navy had a vision of a 600-ship fleet, complete with the CG47 and the effective Aegis system.

With the end of the Cold War, however, came the downsizing of budgets and fleets. This phenomenon continues into this very day. By the mid-1990s, the navy turned to the development of a new transformational ship which captured the very best of technology: the DDX.  To develop the DDX, the navy invested significant research to deliver transformational capacity, investing in new radar, dual band, and gun systems. The DDX national team and navy office have successfully fulfilled contractual scheduling requirements on time and according to budget. Furthermore, engineering models passed preliminary reviews. With regard to the development of the DDX, we are where we want to be as we test full and small scale articles.

Ronald O’Rourke
Congressional Research Service, Library of Congress

Although the budget may impede transformation because it limits the amount of money to be spent on development and procurement, it may force the navy to consider new ways to do business. Thus, fiscal limitations do not always negatively impact the navy’s procurement strategy.

How will the navy transform in an environment in which it must prepare to fight both the global war on terror and counter Chinese maritime forces? Do these challenges overlap? The navy must consider ways to balance investments in the first set of capabilities against that of the second. Although it has been argued that the defense budget may shift resources to the army and the Marines, this same budget may very well supply additional funds to the navy to challenge the potential Chinese threat. Thus, as the armed forces transform, the size of the navy’s slice of the budget pie may not change overall.

When examining the bottom line, we must realize that funding for naval acquisition will be constrained. This year, the navy submitted to Congress a plan which requested a fleet of 260 to 325 ships. This fleet would cost an estimated $12 to $115 billion. This request envisioned a fleet that was far more costly than the historically $9 to $10 billion fleet. As a consequence, this navy will be forced to make discriminatory choices.  First, with regard to amphibious and pre-positioned ships, the Navy is currently moving to reduce scope and cost. Second, the navy intends to maintain a production rate of two attack submarines per year in order to maintain a fleet of forty boats. Third, there is little doubt that the navy will be able to afford to build more than one DDX per year due to rising procurement costs.

Andrew L. Ross
Naval War College

What will naval transformation mean for the defense industry? A study conducted for Admiral Cebrowski examined transformation’s impact on three different sectors: the shipbuilding industry, unmanned vehicles, and systems integration.

The shipping industry will most likely be disrupted by naval transformation. This sector offers the most opportunities to non-traditional firms to enter the market and take advantage of new opportunities, thus seizing the roles of traditional players. In fact, firms which are active in the oil industry may be able to enter the shipbuilding sector. Although firms such as Northrup Grumman, General Dynamics, and Lockheed Martin have continued to play a role, other companies such as BAE Systems and Bollinger Shipyards have also seized the initiative.

Naval transformation will have a mixed impact on the unmanned vehicles sector, particularly Unmanned Aerial Vehicles. The metrics of this sector are being developed and defined for the first time. This study indicates that there is the potential for powerful firms such as Boeing and Northrup Grumman to dominate the field in addition to mid-level suppliers such as General Atomics. Even more surprisingly, smaller start-up firms have an interest in this market. Start-ups hope to team up with larger contractors and to ultimately be bought out by these larger firms.

This study predicts that naval transformation will have little impact on systems integration. Many firms have positioned themselves to enter this market, particularly Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, Northrup Grumman, and General Dynamics. These firms will most likely be the systems integrators of the future, not the commercial IT firms, due to their acquisitions strategy.

This summary was prepared by AEI research assistant Melissa Ann Wisner.