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Le Redoubtable, which became operational in 1971, has since been joined by tivo other nuclear-powered, ballistic missile-armed submarines and, before the decade is over, two more will be completed, thus giving the French Navy a bright new future wherein it will possess the means to support the prudent but active political role France is determined to play in the world.
If we ignore those few rare periods such as that particularly brilliant one marked by the decisive intervention of a French Squadron in the American War of Independence, French maritime policy can be characterized by a prevailing "continental way of thinking,” refusing to consider the privileged geo-strategic position of France which, as the French historian Pierre Gaxotte observed: "being half-maritime and halfcontinental” will always be "solicited on all sides by conflicting ambitions and necessities.” Consequently, there has been no overall strategic concept to give our Navy the place it deserves.
Our country’s accession to a "nuclear retaliation capability” undoubtedly constitutes, in the military field, a milestone of our contemporary history. The study of the development of a new French defense concept, of its fundamental characteristics, and of the new perspectives which seem to derive from it for our Navy, might enable us to discern whether our country has at last proved herself capable of solving the internal contradictions which have always afflicted her destiny and weighed so heavily on the development and the action of our Maritime Forces.
It all began in 1952 when a small group of officers attached to the Ministry of Defense "Special Weapons” Bureau, studied the possibilities of providing our country with nuclear weapons.
In this project, the proponents’ intentions did not go further than providing France with a limited number of atomic bombs. In their opinion, these weapons’ exceptional power would guarantee the effectiveness of this comparatively small arsenal considering the "limited stake” a country like France represents on the world chessboard. General Charles Ailleret, a leader in the enterprise, wrote:
"My reasoning about the interest for France of possessing some nuclear weapons . . . was restricted to the acknowledgment that for a given effort by the nation in money and men, corresponding to a certain percentage of GNP assigned to defense, she would get better returns and considerably higher efficiency, assigning part of her available resources to create a nuclear armament rather than equipping a number of "conventional” units for the same amount.”
At the time, the French Army was fully engaged in the final phase of its severe campaign in Indochina. It could already discern, and would soon face, the problems connected with disengagement from North Africa. The least one can say is that the time was not propitious to question traditional concepts.
The first opponents of the project were the scientists who, having studied the use of atomic energy fof peaceful goals, were afraid this military venture would divert the funds they were coveting. Next, overly cautious military men were afraid to see the Armed Forces diverted from their existing missions. The third group of dissenters were the politicians who, as always, had little interest in defense problems and were further
paralyzed in their activities by a political system no longer adapted to the world’s realities.
Therefore, it was not until 1958 that Felix Gail- lard’s government, one of the last of the Fourth Republic, officially decided to "implement the first series of experimental atomic explosions.” The way this decision was formulated shows the discretion and circumspection with which our future "nuclear strike force” was brought into existence. The first series took place early in I960.
What were the Navy’s concerns and what influence did it have during this preliminary period?
In 1955, in his book, Towards an Atomic-age Navy, Admiral Pierre Barjot, considering the lessons learned from World War II, had brought to light the decisive part played by aircraft carriers in implementing naval power and had emphasized the striking power the atomic weapons gave to carrier-based aviation. He also noted the increased mobility and range made possible by nuclear propulsion and, finally, noted the capability for submarines to act as "discreet advanced launching bases” and to make up for the comparatively short range of the missiles then under study.
The same year, the Armed Forces Council stated that the Navy’s "ultimate objective,” to be reached by 1963, was to constitute a "Battle Fleet” with three aircraft carriers as the main body. Atomic weapons were not mentioned because the Council could not encroach on the political decision. Nevertheless, it recommended building one or two nuclear-powered submarines during the same period.
The next year, in a lecture delivered at the Ecole Superiure de Guerre Navale (Naval War College), Rear Admiral Monaque, after voicing the opinion that conventional forces were outdated, requested for the Navy:
"The strike capability based on nuclear weapons, the only one which could provide us again with relative political freedom of action and which constitutes, in any case, the best deterrent against a potential aggressor.”
Later, in a series of articles published in 1957 and 1958 in specialized publications, including the prestigious Bulletin de la Marine, he studied "strike reliability” by comparing the respective capabilities of the carrier versus the nuclear-powered submarine armed with missiles. He concluded that the latter had the distinct advantage on account of its secrecy and its ability to take evasive action.
Furthermore, he pointed out that the "relative political freedom of action” thus regained should be used to develop a capability for "external defense of our lines of communication” and for "naval operations in support of our interests” because "It is obvious for the impartial and bona fide observer that, without any doubt, the surface and depths of the oceans will very soon become the favorite theater for nations to test their strength.”
Thus, in the field of ideas, the Navy had not been napping. In the scientific and technical areas, its activity was perhaps less successful. When it learned of the Army Staff’s atomic project, the Navy thought the time had probably come to try and obtain approval for its nuclear submarine project. At the time France did not have any enriched uranium at her disposal. (The project and the completion of the isotopic-fission factory at Pierrelatte came into being later.) In order to remain independent of foreign sources, our technicians decided to develop a generator using natural uranium. It turned out to be impossible to build such a generator for a submarine, and the project had to be cancelled, though the funds were already committed.
The first government of the Fifth Republic was soon to clearly state its determination to see France retain, as far as possible, her own freedom of decision and action and thus to assume her own destiny. This objeo tive could only be reached if France had the capability to assume her own defense. Considering her resources, particularly in the demographic field, she could only resort to a nuclear armament.
As General Charles de Gaulle stated in 1959: "We know, as civilization proceeds, how, at a given moment, some new element suddenly becomes es' sential to the Armed Forces. . . . Such is the case today, since atomic weapons exist. Unquestionably it is impossible to forecast accurately what an atom>c war would be, as the effect of such an armament is beyond one’s imagination. But one thing is certain: there is no valid defense without some atorWc armament. Therefore, today, the French forces must before anything else, I mean before anything else, possess a nuclear capability and this element will become the most important one, as soon as it exists.
As early as 1958, when he was President of the Cabinet he laid down his directives in this field: "T° deter—To intervene—To defend.” The first revealed out intention to deter any potential aggressor by means o* a nuclear deterrent force. The second showed that We meant to assume our responsibilities mainly in Af and our obligations to the former "French Union known later as "The Communaute,” by means of * limited but efficient combined services intervention force' The last asserted our determination to fulfil our engage' ment towards European Defense in the event genet* deterrence failed in this part of the world.
The implementation of such a defense policy which required, among other things, the creation of a scientific, technical, and industrial infrastructure adapted to fhe characteristics of the new armament was inconceivable within the framework of annual budgets. Therefore the government, adopting the Navy’s longstanding system, decided to prepare and submit to Parliament a "Program Law” to be implemented over a period of five years.
The Program Law made it possible to look ahead, t0 determine priorities, and to meet commitments. It ^as a guarantee of continuity in policies and efforts.
A study of Program Laws and the follow-on "long term plans” (five years) is valuable for various reasons. It gives an opportunity to follow the actual development of the armament policy. It also affords opportu- mties for better understanding of the evolution of our concepts when studying the perceptible variations be- C'veen two successive laws and the controversies arising during the parliamentary debates preceding the approval of those bills.
We will now follow this evolution in the sufficiently S1gnificative framework of the Navy.
The first Program Law was adopted on 8 December t0 cover the period 1961-1965. It reflected faithfully °ur initial defense concept and ratified the priority g>ven to nuclear armament. For the Navy, in particular, lt: prescribed the building of a nuclear-powered submarine and research and development for a naval ballistic missile. In 1962, after completion of preliminary studies, the government decided to arm this nuclear- powered submarine with nuclear ballistic missiles.
Furthermore, and in order to fulfil its intervention mission, which included in particular an ability to land and support an amphibious assault group of approximately 2,000 men, the Navy programmed the required number of ships.
The second Program Law was adopted towards the end of 1964; from certain points of view it appeared to bear the mark of continuity, from others it already showed a noticeable evolution in our military policy.
The absolute priority assigned to the deterrent force was maintained. A new system of forces appeared in lieu of the combined services intervention force. One was the Forces of Maneuver whose mission was to be defined as follows:
"The Forces of Maneuver are to engage and hold back any enemy attacking our country or our Allies, in a nuclear or conventional war; they must have an ability to operate either in or out of Europe, in the context of the North Atlantic Treaty or outside this Treaty.”
The aim of the Navy component of these Forces of Maneuver was defined as follows:
"The Navy participates essentially with its naval and naval air units in the direct defense of the National Territory. Besides, it ensures the protection of shipping, the sea transport of army intervention forces, the amphibious assault, the operational and logistic support of units put ashore.”
For anyone reading between the lines it was clear that the "overseas mission of intervention” traditionally so highly prized by the Navy, was overshadowed by that "direct defense of the territory.” And the Navy was directly and immediately concerned about the reduction of the "conventional forces” announced by the Second Program Law.
To understand the situation better, we must study the controversies which arose within the governmental majority as soon as the Second Program Law came up for discussion.
The initial French deterrence concept included some of the ideas put forward by the small group of "promoters,” or some of the ideas General P. Gallois put forward in his book Strategy of the Nuclear Age in I960.
It’s jist was that the medium-size nation will never possess the means to reach parity with the major nation, consequently it must endeavor to:
Between the time the Clemenceau was laid down in 1955 and completed in 1961, influential voices within and outside the French Navy had compared the strike reliability” of the carrier against the SSBN and found the carrier wanting.
► determine the destruction level the potential enemy would, in the context of his general strategy (i.e. competition with another major power for world domination), consider prohibitive in comparison with the limited objective at stake. And of course, the medium-size nation will take the necessary measures to reach that level through appropriate nuclear weapons.
► avoid giving the enemy the impression it might let itself be implicated in any type of escalation. Because of the disparity in means, it would very rapidly find itself unable to follow suit, and such an attitude would directly affect its deterrence credibility.
But, in fact, the official wording proposed by the government to define the "Forces of Maneuver’s mission” made it very clear that these forces were also meant to oppose any direct attack, classical or nuclear, conducted against Europe or the national territory. In fact, it was accepting the process, if not the principle, of escalation. As C.V.Laure said in a lecture delivered in 1968 at The Naval War College:
"To agree to our Forces of Maneuver accepting the type of combat and the battleground imposed by the opponent, while our strategic nuclear force would be held in abeyance and not be allowed to strike the enemy’s sanctuary before the escalation spiral was started by the enemy would remove any notion of deterrence linked to these forces.”
And in Parliament, Antoine Sanguinetti, the leader of the "contending party” and Vice President of the National Defense Committee, after protesting against this so-called "conventional” battle, which is "the type of battle we cannot win in Europe, with or without Allies” concluded his address by saying: "The moment has come to let the nuclear opponent know that we shall not accept any form of combat other than global use of our nuclear weapons if our national territory and our people are at stake. That, and nothing less, is deterrence.”
The government did not agree with this rather harsh conception, but everything points to the belief that, considering the budget reductions which coincided with the conclusions expressed by their own majority, they would have agreed to a "general shrinking” of the force. The controversy was to flare up again, in a minor way, when an effort was made to reconsider the problem; it led, in the following years, to a concept free from internal contradictions.
The Prospective and Evaluation Center (PEC) can be largely credited for clarification of the concept. This is an organization for reflection placed directly at the disposal of the Defense Minister. It is made up of officers from the three services, military engineers, and civilians from a great many fields. It is in the studies carried out by the PEC that one can find the precise formulation of what may be considered as "the French specific deterrence concept.” In a series of conferences, started in 1967 at the Naval War College and given every year since, Colonel Poirier of the PEC has described what he calls "the specific logic of absolute deterrence.”
The "absolute deterrence” is characterized by the absolute deterrence threshold (level of unacceptable destruction). However, the actual credibility of our physical nuclear bombing capability necessary to reach this absolute deterrence threshold, implies that our military system possess a "security capability;” this to be accomplished by our "security forces.” Refusing the escalation does not in itself imply a massive nuclear counteraction launched without discrimination. Such a concept would not be credible. Hence the notion of "critical aggressivity threshold” defined by Colonel Poirier as: "A limit of violence the aggressor could not exceed without revealing ambitions incompatible with the assaulted nation’s survival and without bringing about a massive nuclear counteraction from the latter.”
This threshold must be made well known, and it rests with the government to do so through its official statements. Then having made this critical threshold known . . . "the assaulted nation may expect her potential enemies to take her word for it when she declares that she will automatically launch her massive counteraction as soon as she is informed that the threshold has been trespassed.” This threshold must be materialized by a "capability to test the adversary’s intentions.” It is the mission of the "test forces” who will keep the government constantly informed of the aggressor’s position in relation to the above mentioned threshold.1
As early as the end of 1967, it was clear that, while still called "Forces of Maneuver,” these forces, in their "Defense in Europe” duty, had totally identified themselves with the "Security Forces” and the "Test Forces,’ whose maneuver was thus tightly linked to our dissuasion maneuver.2
As far as the Navy is concerned, the role of these forces will be described in the following study of the deterrence mission assigned to the "maritime forces.’
The naval forces’ specific deterrence mission obviously derives from the general concept formulated.
In accordance with the "specific logic of absolute
1Thc threshold may be raised fairly high, for example, in making use of tactical atomic weapons. This upgrading will have a tendency to back up the credibility of our absolute deterrence. It should not be interpreted 2$ a step back towards the principle of escalation.
2The resulting effect is that those forces are less than ever susceptible t0 be "integrated” in an allied dispositive, as in such a system we could fl°c be absolutely certain to retain the control over those forces.
deterrence,” the notion of actual implementation leads t0 the notion of "permanent capacity to achieve one’s definite objectives.” The Naval Forces must have a capacity for massive nuclear retaliation, a "security” capacity, and a capacity for assessing the enemy’s aggressiveness and keeping the government informed.
Our Strategic Nuclear Force (SNF) was initially conceived as successive generations of weapons becoming available in turn and replacing each other, i.e., strategic bombers, surface-to-surface ballistic missiles (SSM), and nuclear ballistic missile submarines (SSBN). Soon those various means appeared complementary, and w°tth keeping together in readiness, in order to make our deterrence and our strike capability even more
reliable.
Our SSBNs constitute the naval component of the Strategic Nuclear Force. Their mobility, secrecy and evading abilities are the best guarantee of their nuclear strike capability. This capability also requires reliable communications and a high degree of training. To Maintain this capability in the years to come implies continual research in technical improvements, particularly to preserve the security margin the "weapons system” still possesses in the field of penetration over possible countermeasures.
In its patrol area, the SSBN will possess a high degree of invulnerability for many years to come. But it is a different matter during the transit period, especially as the SSBN reaches its base’s proximity. That an attempt could be made to destroy an SSBN at sea is all the more possible as it could be performed by a third party, wishing to upset the normal effect of deterrence, and whose identification could prove impossible.
It will be the Navy’s responsibility to ensure the security of the SSBN in these particular circumstances and to reinforce it in times of increased threat during
Without having to resort to arms, the mere presence of such modern naval units as the destroyer Tourville can "show the flag” and thereby demonstrate France’s international interests and her will to defend them.
ALL PHOTOGRAPHS COURTESY E.C.P.ARMIES
crisis. The enemy’s favorite weapons, mines and submarines, will be very difficult to defeat since no protective system is 100% foolproof, in particular in coastal waters of shallow or average depths. Reentering, or sailing from, the home port requires secrecy, jamming, and deceptive measures, as well as classical means of protection.
The problem is made even more difficult by the fact that destroying the future intruder could only be
considered in case of aggression and this will always be difficult to characterize. Consequently, it will often be necessary to resort to other methods to neutralize the intruder.
In this field, the naval forces’ mission is more specifically to "keep the government informed and to assess the enemy’s aggressiveness on our maritime fronts and their approaches.” The main difficulty in carrying out this mission derives from the fact that maritime fronts have little in common with land frontiers, and that their approaches can even less be compared to a glacis where the enemy’s movements are easily detected. Furthermore, established maritime trading axes and traffic focusing points such as the English Channel or the Straits of Dover are rather incompatible with a permanent control which, anyway, would require considerable means. Consequently, the mission will take on different forms depending on prevailing circumstances, whether peacetime or period of crisis.
From a peacetime policy of unobtrusive overall surveillance demonstrating our vigilance, our naval organization will be required, in times of crisis, to switch to a capability for informing, assessing, warning, and retaliating in order to show the future intruder out determination to allow no one to "get ’round” °Lir deterrence. It will also keep the government constantly informed about the aggression level reached, in order to provide it with the required freedom of decision.
Speaking of present times, Gaston Bouthoul, the philosopher, said in his Elements de Polemologie, are living in a period of great mutation. The efficiency of weapons has never reached such a level. The traditional notions are questioned and for the first time the lessons of the past are of no use.” The soundness o this statement appears very clearly when one considers the mutation occurring in the French Navy which wi perhaps prove of a larger scale than the changeovet from sail to steam navigation during the second paft of the last century. When completed, this mutatio11 will give the French Navy a firepower beyond anythin
Hut, while proving its efficiency, deterrence also regaled its limitations. They are usually ascribed to the clear balance laid down by the two main nuclear Powers soon after the loss of the U.S. "nuclear monop- °V’ in the 1952-1953 period.
^ In The Uncertain Trumpet, General Maxwell D.
j.aylor stated that "We would recognize and accept the
nutation of our nuclear retaliatory forces. Under the
mtegic) conditions which we must anticipate in the
°ming years, it is incredible to ourselves, to our allies3
to our enemies . . . that we would use such forces ror
any purpose other than to ensure our national mrvivai»
attained previously. In contradiction with lessons drawn from history, its major aim will have become the defense of national territory within the framework of deterrence. Finally, in the field of naval operations, the traditional notions will have been questioned to a degree Wc have not yet fully appreciated.
The setting up of a nuclear deterrence force and implementing the necessary military "environment” to make it credible, are objectives large enough to use UP most of the effort a nation like France can devote t0 national defense. It would then be very tempting to abide by a defense policy which appears to ensure dre national territory’s integrity. But this would imply that France has no liability to any ally and no external 0r overseas interests to protect. It would also imply that this very deterrence could not be jeopardized by s°me future technical development, which one must always expect, or by unexpected enemy maneuvers.
It is then appropriate to consider these eventualities ar>d, as a first step, to reconsider the fundamental principle of deterrence, or rather the resulting effects already experienced by major powers which have based their National security on this doctrine.
Deterrence can indisputably be credited with check- ln8 U.S.S.R. expansion in Europe, but on the other ar>d, it can be debited with the spreading of overseas c°nflicts, in size and in seriousness, to the point where jTese conflicts, even though usually described as "lim- *ted” may, one day, be at the root of a general con- ^gration.
he ensuing evolution and the balance, strength- j e<a hy the opponents’ mutual desire to protect t ’ Cannot but reinforce the firm belief that deter- eCe undoubtedly protects the national territory, teCte<^ as a "sanctuary” (in the recognized sense of the can^ ^ c^e natl0n implementing it. But its credibility n he challenged in areas where the notion of "vital
3,
In st)'
jga- ’ltc; the fact that General Taylor considered a large scale attack syjJ15' Western Europe as one of the actions which might affect U. S. Vaf France was encouraged to draw her own conclusions.
interest” is questionable, even if defined as such.4 Finally it will have no effect in areas where this notion cannot be reasonably evoked.
Another important fact is attached to deterrence: the territorial protection provided gives back to the nation concerned a freedom of action which, in some ways, it had lost because of its anxiety over its own security. Nevertheless, this restored capacity can only be exercised in areas outside the field of action of the opponent’s deterrence. Having regained its freedom of action, the nation may be tempted to use it in one way or another. Naval expansion could be one of them.
In 1969, the German journalist Wolfgang Hopker observed in Admiral Gorshkov’s Red Armada that: "The disappointment caused by their withdrawal in front of the U. S. Fleet (in the "Cuban venture”—1962) clearly demonstrated to the Soviets the full value of a maritime fighting capability. . . . The Kremlin decided on a vigorous naval armaments race ... it was a most important strategic decision, the magnitude of which the Western nations are not yet fully aware.”
When studying the Soviet expansion in the Mediterranean Sea, this "most important strategic decision” appears to have two benefits for the Russians:
► It is a direct threat to NATO’s "South flank” and, as such, is identical in character to the threat the Warsaw Pact’s conventional forces constitute in Europe, in the context of a deterrence strategy.
► It also aims at a reinforcement of Soviet supremacy in Arabic countries, as demonstrated in conflicts occur- ing in the Middle-East and, as such, is an indirect threat to the Western Nations’ interests in the Mediterranean and in Africa, interests which, if not vital, are nevertheless essential.
In this second instance the method used is one of "indirect strategy,” which is akin to the "indirect approach” brilliantly demonstrated by Liddel Hart in Strategy. I will take General Andre Beaufre’s statement from Introduction to Strategy as an appropriate conclusion to these preliminary considerations:
"The indirect strategy was resorted to at all times . . . (but) its modern aspects and its renewed vogue derive from the fact that a 'Global war’ is no longer reasonably practicable . . . The more 'nuclear strategy’ grows and tends through its precarious balance, to reinforce the global deterrence, the more 'indirect strategy’ will be resorted to.”
And he concludes with this threefold exhortation:
Let us learn to survive in peace . . . Let us learn to control crises . . . Let us learn indirect strategy.”
4The "Flexible Response” strategy is the unavoidable consequence of these factual circumstances.
In France, as a result of the controversy on Forces of Maneuver, in-depth studies were carried out to seek a strategy equally applicable outside the limited field of action of our deterrence.[1]
In 1967, at the Prospective and Evaluation Center Colonel Poirier stressed the importance of the requirement for a second component for our military strategy: An "external action military strategy” appears beside the "absolute deterrence” one, which will support the former. The external action strategy will be implemented in support of our economic and cultural strategies, taking advantage of the deterrence climate established in Europe. It will demonstrate the dynamism of our policy and France’s right to have a say in world matters.
In his report to Parliament at the end of 1967, M. Bousquet, chairman of the committee for the deterrence strategy and naval problems, stated:
"The deterrence strategy which stabilized the situation in Europe and the United States, had no effect on the unbalanced situation overseas. . . . Consequently, considering that revolutionary wars and limited conflicts are spreading more and more, only one conclusion can be drawn: Besides the deterrence strategy, covering efficiently but exclusively our 'national sanctuary,’ an 'external action’ strategy indispensable to ensure the protection of our maritime and overseas interests. It should give us the capability to efficiently participate in preventing °r controlling crises created exploited or suffered by the Great Powers.”
In a statement during debates in Parliament in 19^ he demonstrated the risks inherent in a "policy 0 abstention:”
"If France were to adopt a policy of abstention, she would soon become a tool in world politics. political, economic, and cultural interests wou soon become the prey of rival nations: small powefS
wishing to extend their territory or great powers playing their part in the worldwide game of chess.”
To be the tool or the victim of world politics seems, ln fact, to be the alternative. As far back as 1967, the War Minister, Pierre Messmer, revealed the government’s choice in stating:
"Our new national defense concept is based on deterrence and on external actions, furthered in the last resort by the defense of the territory.”6 And towards the end of the same year, he drew the inferences in connection with the Armed Forces and prescribed that each Service was to study what he described as the "conceivable missions.”
t _ is on purpose that, up to now, the old term ^intervention” has been avoided.7 As the study of external action” missions will show later on, an interVention is, in fact, the extreme measure. The Armed
C1
0rces’ action will not necessarily take the shape of violent aggressiveness.
Clausewitz defined war as the continuation of polices by other means. Today, in the context of external cti°n, military capacity becomes the permanent support of the other forms of politics.8
Threatened in its very substance by the questioning ®f its "Overseas intervention mission,” and having yarned from past history what reverting to "National erritory’s Defense” meant for it, the Navy welcomed and helped bring about the new concept.
. The study prescribed by the War Minister concern- ln8 the Navy’s "conceivable missions” was a timely °Pportunity to rejuvenate its "traditional missions,” and to bring them up to date.
It was to endeavor, on the one hand, to bring out e motivations for the required external action naval strategy) ancj on the other hand, to develop the mari- tlrrie forces’ capabilities in that field.
Cardinal de Richelieu, Prime Minister of King Louis II and the founder of our Navy, stated in the early Part of the 17th century: "Of all inheritances, the Sea the legacy on which Sovereigns claim the largest are; yet it is the one on which the rights of any antl everybody are the least clearly defined. The real e to sea domination is Power and not Right.”
Some three and a half centuries later, this opinion
Coj^C ^avy’s contribution to the "Territory’s operational defense” being ^eb^arat*VC^ ^m‘tec^ is not mentioned in this study. But recently, Michel tj,e 'e' National Defense Minister, stressed this third component which, in Orn Uture’ ten<i to better integrate the citizens in the Defense overall bsof'2atIOn' "PoPular deterrence” will support the nuclear deterrence, J’jli3r 38 ir wdl persuade the enemy of the resistances he will have to quell.
term was unhappily used again in the 3rd Program Law; the mission 8^ Crila^ action” became "external intervention.”
“%Ure 1968, E.S.G.N. (Naval War College).
appears to have regained its full value:
In a prospective study conducted in 1968 with the Naval General Staff’s participation, and directed by the Prospective and Evaluation Center, naval officers at the Naval War College course looked at the Navy’s future up to 1968 and stressed in particular:
► The increased importance recently acquired by the Oceans, both as a stake and as a field of maneuver. As a "stake,” because their already considerable economic potential will increase in view of the part they play in commercial exchanges9 and because of the world-wide exploitation of the continental shelf substratum.10 As a field of maneuver because for the unworkable Geneva Agreements of 1958 will be substituted a jurisprudence based on actual deeds, including the use of military power. It will also be a field of maneuver because geophysics enable maritime forces to use the whole range of weapons, including the most powerful ones, everywhere in the world and possibly even in the heart of continents.11
► The range of external interests France is bound to protect include: sealanes vital to her commercial exchanges and her supplies of raw material (petroleum, uranium, etc. . . .); fishing areas, areas earmarked for scientific, technical, and military experiments (e.g., the experimental nuclear center in the Pacific, the Landes Experimental Launching Center, the French West Indies Aerospace Center); areas earmarked for sea and substratum exploitation; actual overseas interests (e.g., French Overseas Departments and Territories), responsibilities to defend and maintain law and order in certain African nations bound to France by various bilateral agreements.
Therefore, France has a number of reasons to participate actively in world affairs.
The Navy does not lay sole claim to "external action” military missions. The other services play their parts in accordance with their specific characteristics.12 The external military action” will be part of a joint services action. Nevertheless, the navy is by nature 9' 1° 1988, the tonnage of commercial exchanges will be five times the present tonnage and will require a larger number of seagoing vessels. "The sea lanes will be modified in order to get supplies from new areas and to satisfy new requirements. . . . "A single tanker will carry as much as two or three convoys of World War II, and twice as fast.” Augure, 1968.
In another 20 years, 40% of the petroleum production will be extracted from the bottom of seas.
11The considerable development of the Soviet mercantile and military fleet since 1960 is apt to upset the strategic data pertaining to the East-West confrontation. Augure 1968. One could say the same, in a lesser degree, of the Japanese mercantile fleet.
12 Air Marshal Jaques Mitterand emphasized the role of "Air/Land” means, in the Revue de la Defense Nationale of June 1970 in "The role of External Military Action in France’s Strategy.”
world
the stature of a nation and the part it can play in
ch
duatc
ich
where :d t°
particularly well adapted to some of the required missions. In line with the terminology used in the study of "nuclear deterrence missions,” the Navy’s possibilities will be termed "capacities.”
► Capacity to be "present” and "ready at band.” Without resorting to arms, the sheer presence of naval units may show our interests and our will to defend. It will also provide the government with the necessary information. This capacity to "inform” will be of particular interest in the context of a "prevention of crisis strategy,” where the detection of any "crisis premonitory indication” will play a fundamental part.
► Capacity to assess the opponent’s intentions. One well may have to take the risk of an armed confrontation in transgressing one of the enemy’s points of no return.
► Safety capacity. It is out of the question to try to protect everything, but certain particularly vital areas or a number of "valuable ships” will require direct protection.
► Intervention capacity. The range, mobility and strike capability, either conventional or nuclear, of maritime forces make them particularly suitable for intervention, especially as a naval intervention force. The ability to stay offshore may postpone the intended action and thus combine other capacities, such as being on the spot, assessing, or intimidating.
► Intimidating capacity. Dispatching a naval force, or reinforcing units already detached may dissuade the enemy from carrying out its intended action.
► Retaliatory capacity. Aggression must always be penalized. The retaliatory capacity takes on even more importance as, short of being able to protect everything, we must dissuade the aggressor from risking an "apparently riskless” aggression. The gift of "omnipresence” pertaining to naval forces will allow them to strike the enemy wherever he is weakest.
Finally, considering our naval forces’ mobility, their strike power, their ability to threaten the enemy as long as necessary before actually engaging him, their reliable communications (allowing for a permanent control whatever the distance or the level), they are particularly well suited, as the Augure study concluded in 1968, to "react with accuracy to the Political Power’s varied impulses with their appropriate nuances.”
So, besides its "nuclear deterrence mission,” and in view of the protection it ensures, our Navy was assigned an "external action mission” meant to support, wherever needed, the prudent but active politics our country is determined to carry out. The Navy will fulfill this mission with all the more satisfaction as, by its intrinsic character, it is akin to the "traditional missions which were thought lost or, at least, put on the shelf.
An exhaustive study of our new defense policy should also take into account the numerous problems set by the realization of a new concept and the severe constraints it has to face. To mention them however would lead me to digress from the subject of this article in which I endeavored to analyze the fundamental components of our new concept of defense and draw the essential consequences for our Navy.
Today, France is drawing the logical conclusions o the new balance of power in the world resulting from the upheavals of two successive world wars and the birth of nuclear weapons. In support of a policy based on a reasonable evaluation of realities and characterize by the will to protect her national territorial integrity and her own freedom of action, she has conceived an developed a military system adapted to her means an which she considers the most satisfactory. (
Either for "nuclear deterrence” or "external action missions, the Navy has been entrusted for the firSt time in our history, with a privileged duty which win guarantee its harmonious and balanced development- At a time when sea power demonstrates more than ever politics, it rests with out country to build up an maintain a Navy symbolizing the moderate ambitionS she owes herself to assert.
Commander Brezet joined the Navy in 1950 and served on board Fren< ships duririg combat in Indochina, Suez, and Algeria. He is a 1958 gra< of the Detection and ASW Weapons School, and a graduate of the Fren* Naval War College and the German Naval War College in Hamburg, he did the report on which he based this article. He is now assignC' the headquarters of the Admiral, Commander-in-Chief of the Atl*ntl Squadron, as the ASW officer.
[1]The "French deterrence force” is not large enough to cover the whole of Europe. Such an ambition would not be "credible”. In his book, Strategy and Deterrence, Gen. Beaufre points out how it could reinforce the U. S. deterrence in Europe (Part 1 Chap. Ill—The Multilateral Deterrence).