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Strategic Command
Seizing the Strategic Baton
By VADM R. F. Bacon, USN
The opportunity for peace and global stability is now clearly within reach. Along the route, however, are a number of rocks and shoals. The triumph of democracy within the former Soviet Union is far from assured. The new Commonwealth of Independent States continues to maintain thousands of nuclear weapons—on intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) and in ballistic-missile submarines (SSBNs)—aimed at the United States. And these weapons are not being dismantled rapidly. The potential of other countries or splinter groups to obtain nuclear weapons or nuclear weapon knowledge is another serious consideration.
The difficulty facing our nation in the strategic nuclear arena is the requirement to keep our options open: We must continue to deter the commonwealth and/or the various republics from considering employment of strategic nuclear weapons. We must also deter any country in the world from taking aggressive action, especially those countries that have or intend to have their own nuclear weapons. At the same time, there are compelling reasons to reduce our nuclear forces and shift scarce resources into other areas of the military and the national economy. We can reduce our strategic nuclear forces. How much is the big question.
The Navy’s strategic force—the SSBNs—has always occupied a crucial and unique place in the nation’s deterrent Triad. Today, because of the changes in the world and the uncertain future, SSBNs play an even more critical role.
The SSBN force has guaranteed retaliation in the event of an enemy nuclear attack. Strategic submarines on patrol have always been highly survivable, and this will not change. The intelligence community continues to be unanimous in its opinion that SSBNs on patrol will remain invulnerable for the foreseeable future.
Patrolling SSBNs have robust communication links with the National Command Authority, allowing them to receive a missile launch message, if necessary. And with the introduction of the D-5 missile into the fleet in 1990, the newest Trident SSBNs have missiles with the accuracy and yield to be true “hard-target killers.”
Thus, the Navy’s strategic submarines have the survivability, capability, and flexibility to provide effective strategic deterrence for the country in the coming decades. The standup of the United States Strategic Command in Omaha, Nebraska, on 1 June 1992, will be a major improvement in the Department of Defense’s ability to deal with the complex strategic nuclear weapons issues of the future. We will have a unified commander-in-chief (CinC) who can integrate strategic nuclear policy, requirements, and operations across service lines.
Although a joint organization (the Joint Strategic Target Planning Staff) has conducted nuclear weapon targeting in the past, all other aspects of the strategic nuclear mission have been fragmented. For example, the individual services have historically developed weapon delivery systems, such as SSBNs, bombers, and ICBMs. Each leg of the Triad developed and improved on its own. The tight budget environment we face for the foreseeable future makes such duplication unaffordable.
Other examples of fragmentation abound. Operational responsibility for the strategic forces has been split between Commander-in-Chief, Strategic Air Command, for the Air Force and Commanders-in-Chief Atlantic and Pacific for the Navy. Strategic communications responsibility has been split among the Joint Staff, the services, and various CinCs. Coordination of employment policy and arms-control aspects of strategic nuclear weapons has involved the office of the Secretary of Defense, the Joint Staff, the services, and other activities.
The Strategic Command should become the key orga-
nization for improving efficiency and eliminating duplication within the strategic nuclear weapons mission. It should also be a compelling voice in setting requirements lor strategic weapons and delivery systems and their modernization. Setting priorities in this area, across service lines, will become increasingly important as the overall defense budget shrinks.
Similarly, the Strategic Command should be a strong
Strategic Command
voice in developing and implementing strategic policy, including arms-control issues. It will have significant assets, in experienced personnel and computer power, to assist the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the Joint Staff in policy matters.
It should also play a role in improving the efficiency of strategic force and strategic support force operations. This task will become even more challenging as flexibility decreases because of smaller SSBN, bomber, and ICBM forces.
The CinC of the Strategic Command (CinCStrat), as spokesman for all U.S. strategic nuclear forces, will be very effective in communicating with Congress, the Secretary of Defense, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff, and the American people. It will become increasingly important to articulate clearly the evolving missions of the strategic forces, the necessary policies for the new missions, and the requirements for systems to conduct these missions.
The Strategic Command is standing up at the right time in our nation’s history—the transition beyond the Cold War—through the vision of Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Colin L. Powell, U.S. Army; Commander-in-Chief, Strategic Air Command, General Lee Butler, U.S. Air Force; and Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Frank B. Kelso II, U.S. Navy. A single, coherent voice for the strategic nuclear forces will serve us well in the 1990s.
Just as the entire Department of Defense will benefit by standing up the Strategic Command, the Navy will also profit from this initiative. The Navy has a superlative record in building highly capable SSBNs and missiles and in competently operating these systems. However, it has historically had limited interest in carving out a major role in strategic nuclear policy and related areas. Compared to the Air Force, the Navy has placed few officers in billets associated with nuclear weapons targeting and policy. The stand-up of the Strategic Command now thrusts the Navy into full participation.
The Navy will make important contributions to strategic nuclear requirements, operations, and policy through the officers assigned to the Strategic Command in Omaha. They will be making important plans and decisions at a particularly crucial point in history. While world events unfold, Navy, Air Force, Army, and Marine Corps officers at the Strategic Command, through their joint planning, will be defining and refining roles and missions for nuclear deterrence.
Naval officers at the Strategic Command will also face a unique situation, as the Navy’s SSBNs assume a larger share of the nation’s strategic nuclear deterrent mission. Presently, SSBNs carry about half of the strategic nuclear warheads, a share expected to grow considerably.
On an individual basis, the naval officers assigned to the Strategic Command will gain experience on a large, joint staff, and they will profit by their exposure to officers and procedures of the other services. They will also be on the ground floor of a select group of officers who will become the “strategic nuclear experts” of the Navy, with alternating assignments at the Strategic Command in Washington, D.C., and with the operating forces.
Our nation faces a greater opportunity for peace and global stability than we have seen for 40 years. At the same time, we must continue to deter the Commonwealth of Independent States and any other country from even thinking about use of nuclear weapons.
I see the new Strategic Command playing a key role in defining and executing the strategic nuclear deterrent mission of our nuclear forces. The Navy’s SSBN force has not decreased in importance in relation to recent world events. If anything, more reliance on this sea-based, sur- vivable, strategic deterrent force will occur. The officers and enlisted personnel who man our SSBNs on those long, isolated deterrent patrols can take great pride in knowing that they are key people performing a tough job of strategic deterrence—and doing it well.
I am particularly excited for the naval officers who will be assigned to the Strategic Command during the next few years. Like the crews of our SSBNs, these officers will know that they are doing important work in strategic nuclear requirements, targeting, and policy development. These officers face an exciting and challenging future.
Vice Admiral Bacon is Assistant Chief of Naval Operations for Undersea Warfare (OP-02). He has commanded an SSBN and served as the Director of Strategic and Theater Nuclear Warfare Division from 1983 to 1986. As Commander, Submarine Force Atlantic, he was responsible for the maintenance, training, and operation of 35 SSBNs and the introduction of Trident II (D-5) deployments in the Atlantic Ocean.