Then it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that an' "Tommy,
'ow's yer soul?"
But it's "Thin red line of 'eroes" when the drums begin
to roll—"
Although Kipling's famous poem is about the British soldier in the late 1800s, it might well describe the U.S. Coast Guard today. A current Department of Defense (DoD) study on restructuring the U.S. armed forces has engulfed the service in controversy over wartime roles. The controversy centers on Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's suggestion that the Coast Guard be removed from war plans for forward combat operations. The recent acknowledgment that foreign military assistance is needed badly in Iraq should give pause to any such decision.
The long history of the service in time of war is instructive and impressive. For example, it earned distinction as the only U.S. naval force in the War of 1812. During World War II, the service posed a major threat to German subs and ran landing craft in the Normandy landings. Further, it provided more than 30% of the naval interdiction forces in the Vietnam War and contributed to Operations Desert Storm and Iraqi Freedom. These actions obviously are not sufficient reason to establish a wartime role for the Coast Guard. But the DoD study should not be guided by the perennial competition for budget dollars or roles-and-missions rivalry. The Secretary of Defense must be the honest broker in these interservice battles and not stir up fights among cabinet-level secretaries.
In the late 1980s, Secretary of the Navy James Webb discussed removing all Coast Guard high-endurance cutters from Navy war plans because they had women on board. With a 600-ship Navy still on his drawing board, he believed he could do without them. The Coast Guard's strong stand against his proposal quickly caused its demise.
In pre-Desert Storm maneuvering, the decision was made to reflag a number of Kuwaiti tankers to the United States and protect them in the Persian Gulf. The U.S. Central Command asked for seven Coast Guard 110-foot patrol boats to secure the channels after they were cleared by Navy mine sweepers. The Coast Guard was eager to comply, but the Navy did not support the request and it went unfulfilled. Later mine damage to a tanker set off policy alarms that led the Navy to put patrol boats in its next budget cycle. The losers in this game were the armed forces and the nation. (In 2003, eight of the 110-foot patrol boats were requested and sent to Iraq—in the same cradles built for Desert Storm.)
In the late 1980s, Hamilton (WHEC-715)-class high-endurance cutters underwent mid-life overhauls. They had speed and endurance comparable to Navy destroyers and were the first U.S. ships to be fitted with gas-turbine propulsion systems. The Coast Guard and Navy agreed to save weight and space in these overhauls for the Harpoon missile system and Phalanx close-in weapon system. The first ship to complete the overhaul was armed with the Harpoon system. In the early 1990s, however, Coast Guard and Navy budgetary difficulties caused these programs to be canceled and the one Harpoon installation to be removed.
In each of these instances, competition for dollars and missions—and bureaucratic infighting—proved detrimental to the nation. In the current controversy, the DoD does not need to duplicate a force in being and paint it gray. Can the nation afford to buy both white ships and gray ships? Is it not best to employ, whenever feasible, a force with the warrior mentality that has answered the call successfully since 1790?
Semper Paratus (Always Ready) is more than a motto—it is the heart of a force of 45,000. Eliminating the Coast Guard's forward combat role will destroy something that cannot be replaced easily. As with removing the Harpoon and Phalanx systems from the service's cutters, we still will have to fund the weapon plus the ship and crew to deploy it. Equally devastating will be the damage to the vital warrior mentality and morale that underpin the Coast Guard's missions, from homeland security to search and rescue.
To eliminate or reduce the Coast Guard's forward-deployed military role makes no sense. Let us hope the ongoing force structure study is informed by the past while looking at the future.
Admiral Yost, a combat veteran of the Vietnam War and graduate of the Naval War College, served as Commandant of the Coast Guard from 1986 to 1990.