Studying the oceans has repeatedly benefited the United States, from helping the Navy track and destroy German U-boats to assisting American energy companies in locating offshore oil deposits. Benjamin Franklin's 1785 description of the Gulf Stream helped to increase the speed and safety of transatlantic shipping and stimulated the fragile post-Revolutionary U.S. economy. "A vessel from Europe to North-America may shorten her passage by avoiding to stem the stream in which the thermometer will be very useful," said Franklin, "and a vessel from America to Europe may do the same by the same means of keeping in it."1
Not only has oceanography helped us in the past, it promises to do so in the future. As-yet undiscovered undersea microbes may one day lead to cures for our worst diseases. A better understanding of the oceans could help address the problems associated with global climate change. Will we be able to sequester greenhouse gases at the bottom of the ocean, as many now hope? Only additional undersea research will answer this question. Furthermore, future oceanographic discoveries will be required to help the Navy develop new weapons and tactics. But all this will be directly limited by how much we support oceanographic research today.
Troubles in the Ocean
The U.S. oceanography community is in the midst of difficult times. Our fleet of manned deep-sea research submersibles has been allowed to dwindle to the point of near-extinction. Just as troubling, our fleet of major oceanographic surface vessels (those over 40 meters long) will soon begin to shrink due to underinvestment. As science writer David Malakoff notes, "Over the next decade, a combination of aging vessels and scant funds for replacements could dramatically shrink the number of ships available for marine science."2
If this looming contraction is allowed to occur, American oceanographers will have fewer platforms from which to conduct experiments at sea. Recognizing this, the Navy must consider augmenting its support for new oceanographic-vessel construction. We have much to gain from such an increase in investment-and an enormous amount to lose without it.
The Oceanographic Fleet: A Collaboration
The federal government owns nearly all our major oceanographic vessels. According to the most recent Federal Oceanographic Fleet Status Report, the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) owns 16 of these ships, the Navy owns 13, the National Science Foundation (NSF) 5, the U.S. Coast Guard 3, and the Environmental Protection Agency 2. This makes for a total of 39 vessels. About a dozen of these (including 6 from the Navy) are operated by academic institutions such as the University of Washington and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, which use the federally owned vessels to conduct scientific research in a variety of disciplines, ranging from molecular biochemistry to geophysics.
Much of our oceanographic research involves interagency efforts. For example, research done on board NOAA vessels is often Navy-funded, just as it is often NSF-funded on board Navy vessels. Moreover, most oceanographic discoveries benefit all users of this information. Ocean temperature data gathered on board NOAA and NSF ships are almost always useful to Navy researchers, while NOAA and NSF scientists benefit from those collected by Navy ships.
Looming Danger
Thus, this fleet represents a single national asset-but it is on the verge of decline. Over the next decade, a large number of America's major oceanographic vessels are set to reach the end of their service lives. And the government has no plans to replace many of these retiring platforms.
Consequently, as is noted in the most recent Federal Oceanographic Fleet Status Report, even accounting for expected future acquisitions (vessels that have been appropriated or are otherwise planned), this fleet will begin to shrink markedly by 2015, dwindling to two-thirds of its current size by 2020. "Unless we start building some new ships soon," concludes Robert Knox, associate director of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, "the fleet will wither away."3
Anyone who doubts that the United States could let such a degeneration occur should consider the fate of our manned deep-sea research submersible fleet. This also is almost entirely dependent on government support. In 1980 the government-specifically, the Navy-owned four operational human-occupied deep-sea research submersibles; today only the Alvin (DSV-2), launched in 1964, remains in use.
The United States no longer claims the distinction of operating the world's deepest-diving submersible. The Japanese and the French both have submersibles capable of reaching depths that no manned U.S. vessel-the Alvin included-can equal. The Russians have two such vessels, the Mir submersibles, one of which infamously left a Russian flag on the seafloor at the North Pole in 2007. And the Chinese are preparing to launch the world's deepest-diving submersible, which will have the ability to reach a depth of 7,000 meters. This is a 55 percent improvement on the Alvin's limit of 4,500 meters. An American submersible was the first to carry people to the deepest part of the ocean. Today, Americans cannot even send humans halfway down.
Step Up, Navy!
The U.S. Navy should take active steps to prevent the looming shrinkage of our oceanographic surface fleet. In particular, the service should fund the construction of new research vessels to replace those Navy (and other federally owned) oceanographic ships that will retire in the coming years. Additionally, the Navy should take aggressive steps to restore the size and capability of our manned deep-sea-research submersible contingent.
The continued success of the U.S. Navy depends on our knowledge of the oceans. As one NOAA report highlights, "The ocean and marine environment affect all aspects of naval warfare."4 The Navy must understand the nature of the seas-it needs to accurately "characterize the battle space" if it hopes to be successful.5 Former CNO Admiral James Watkins emphasizes, "The impact of the ocean environment upon tactical and strategic forces and their operations and system performance must be understood and accounted for to most effectively employ our Navy."6
While the U.S. Navy is dominant today, it has ample room to improve. Future oceanographic discoveries promise to help us enhance mine countermeasures techniques, torpedo technology, and sonar capabilities, for example. These future discoveries will be necessary to help the Navy maintain an edge over potential rivals. If the United States allows other countries to eclipse it in even a single oceanographic subdiscipline, the Navy will become increasingly vulnerable to scientific and technological surprise. Updating our oceanographic fleet is central to preventing such surprises, as Admiral Watkins stresses: "Oceanography is an area where we must set the standard if we are to maintain dominance."7
In addition, Americans appreciate research. They realize that science is fundamental not only to U.S. military primacy but to our economic vitality and general prosperity. Supporting oceanographic research enhances the Navy's public image. By providing more resources for this fleet (and continuing to loan a large percentage of oceanographic vessels to universities, which make them available to academics), the service will rightly earn public acclaim. This will especially be the case if the Navy wisely combines an increase in investment with a related public-relations campaign.
Imagine the potential headlines: "Navy Steps Up to Save U.S. Oceanography," "New Navy Ship Helps Predict Hurricanes," or "Navy Deep-Diving Sub Helps in Cancer Research." Such stories would not only win the Navy friends, they would also garner crucial support in Congress at a time when the service is struggling to justify its budget.
It is also easy to envision a strengthened Navy program playing a major role in a successful stream of fresh recruiting ads, such as deep-sea submariners making a dive in a revolutionary high-tech submersible to a previously unexplored place. Such ads could go a long way. Remember when it wasn't just a job, it was an adventure?
A Long History
An increase in funding for construction of these vessels would be in accordance with the service's finest traditions. Dr. Geoff Wheat, a deep-sea geophysicist who has gone on multiple oceanographic expeditions on board Navy-owned ships, summarizes, "The history of oceanography is intimately connected with the history of the Navy."8
One of the country's first major scientific undertakings, the United States Exploring Expedition of 1838-42 (the "Ex. Ex."), was a Navy operation that performed an enormous amount of oceanographic work. The brave men of the Ex. Ex. are often forgotten today, but among their remarkable achievements, they were the first to prove that Antarctica was a separate continent. They created 180 new nautical charts, "some of which," as historian Nathaniel Philbrick notes in the preface to his superb account of the expedition, Sea of Glory, "were still being used as late as World War II."9 In addition, Philbrook notes, "The thousands of specimens and artifacts amassed by the Expedition's scientists would become the foundation of the collections of the Smithsonian Institution. Indeed, without the Ex. Ex., there might never have been a national museum in Washington, D.C."10
Not only did the Ex. Ex. help the Navy collect a plethora of scientific data, it also established the tradition of the service volunteering the use of its vessels as a platform for civilian scientists. This tradition continues with today's six Navy-owned, university-operated oceanographic research ships.
Luckily, the Navy's relationship with oceanography did not end with the Ex. Ex. A little over a decade later, Navy Lieutenant Matthew Fontaine Maury wrote The Physical Geography of the Seas (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1885), the world's first comprehensive textbook on oceanography. Today, Maury is widely regarded as the "father of oceanography."11
But many of the Navy's most noteworthy contributions to the field have taken place over the past several decades. In the 1960s, the service funded and managed the first successful descent to the bottom of the Marianas Trench, the deepest point in the ocean. "It was an all-Navy operation," explains Don Walsh, who as a young lieutenant was one of the two men who made the record-setting dive in the bathyscaph Trieste. "We owned the Trieste and did all the planning and execution of the expedition with a combined group that never exceeded 14 people."12
The expedition had a serious scientific purpose as well: "This work was not done to set records," Walsh says, "but to demonstrate that we had a research platform capable of working at any place in the World Ocean. What better demonstration of its safety than to make the ultimate test?"13 Unfortunately, since this achievement no human has returned to "Challenger Deep," as the bottom of the Marianas Trench is called. And now the United States has no means to send people back there.
Other modern successes also relied on Navy support. Commander Robert Ballard was a Navy Reserve officer at the time he discovered the sunken Titanic in 1985, during a mission paid for with Navy funds. Interestingly, exploration of the liner was actually a tangent to-and cover for-a highly classified mission. Ballard's primary Navy task was to investigate the wrecks of the sunken nuclear-powered submarines USS Scorpion (SSN-589) and USS Thresher (SSN-593), with special underwater imaging devices to help Navy engineers determine the cause for the loss of the vessels. Some suspected the Soviets had sunk them, but Ballard's work put all the conspiracy theories into question.
The story of the discovery of the Titanic and related surveying of the Scorpion and Thresher highlights an important point: The Navy has not only expended time and resources on oceanography, it has also benefited from it. Most obviously, the Navy has profited from applied oceanography-marine research done in pursuit of a specific practical goal. For example, recent work by Woods Hole scientists has helped the Navy refine techniques for locating buried mines.
But basic oceanography (exploratory research carried out initially with no specific goal other than the pursuit of knowledge) has also helped the Navy. For example, in the 1930s and 1940s such work led to the description of thermoclines, which has helped U.S. submariners avoid detection since World War II.
The Navy has benefited from oceanography in other unexpected ways. Perhaps the best example of this dates from 1966, when the service used the DSV Alvin to recover a nuclear bomb that had been lost when a B-52 crashed into the Mediterranean. The Alvin had been built for scientific purposes, not to recover a lost nuclear weapon, but the Navy was able to use the sub for this purpose. Had it not been Navy-owned and at the service's immediate disposal, the recovery of the lost atom bomb would likely have proved to be far more difficult.
In all, oceanography has been a central Navy mission for generations, and the service has profited substantially from its investment in the field.
A Matter of Urgency
Troublingly, we do not have much time to act. The year 2015-when our oceanographic surface fleet will begin to shrink-is not far in the future. But many years will be required for new oceanographic ships to be designed, built, launched, tested, and made operational. As the most recent Federal Oceanographic Fleet Status Report notes, the probable acquisition time for a new ocean-class research vessel is seven years. Consequently, we must act swiftly-and even more swiftly to save America's deep-sea-research submersible fleet, which is already nearly gone.
Some may ask why the Navy should bear the bulk of the burden for this. Indeed, it would be wise for NSF, NOAA, EPA, and the Coast Guard to pay for additional oceanographic vessels. But the difficult truth is that none of these federal agencies has chosen to put forth the money needed to maintain the size of the U.S. oceanographic fleet. As long as these small federal entities do not make the necessary investment, the responsibility by default falls on the Navy.
Rather than seeing this as unfair, we should use it as an opportunity: The greater the percentage of the fleet the Navy owns, the greater the control we will have over the course of American oceanography. And the greater the benefit the Navy will derive from the research.
Former Chief of U.S. Naval Research Vice Admiral Paul G. Gaffney Jr. once commented: "The Navy and ONR have a leadership responsibility in the U.S. for oceanography. It is a core science, it is, of all sciences, the naval science."14 Thus, Vice Admiral Gaffney concluded, "It is important for us to do whatever we can to keep the general ocean scientific area strong and healthy."15 He was right. And to do so, we must ensure that the Navy builds more oceanographic vessels. In a hurry.
1. Benjamin Franklin, "A Letter from Dr. Benjamin Franklin, to Mr. Alphonsus le Roy, Member of several Academies, at Paris. Containing sundry Maritime Observations." Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 2 (1786): 316-17."
2. David Malakoff, "Grim Forecast for a Fading Fleet," Science 307 (21 January 2005): 38.
3. Ibid.
4. "1998 Year of the Ocean: The Oceans and National Security," NOAA, http://www.yoto98.noaa.gov/yoto/meeting/nat_sec_316.html (accessed 10 March 2009).
5. "History of Oceanography: Modern Naval Oceanography," About.com: Inventors, http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/bloceanography3.htm (accessed 8 March 2009).
6. "2002 Almanac: Oceanography," Navy League of the United States: http://www.navyleague.org/sea_power/almanac_jan_02_15.php (accessed 8 March 2009).
7. "History of Oceanography."
8. Geoff Wheat, personal communication, 14 February 2009.
9. Nathaniel Philbrick, Sea of Glory: America's Voyage of Discovery, the U.S. Exploring Expedition, 1838-1942 (New York: Penguin Group, 2003), 5.
10. Ibid.
11. "The Physical Geography of the Sea: 1st Edition," NOAA, http://celebrating200years.noaa.gov/rarebooks/sea/welcome.html (accessed 8 November 2006).
12. Don Walsh, e-mail message to author, 11 March 2009.
13. Ibid.
14. Richard Spinrad, "Interview with the Chief of Naval Research," Oceanography 11, no. 2 (1998): 1-4.
15. Ibid.