New Guy 101: Your First Tour of Duty
Lieutenant Commander Fred W. Kacher, U.S. Navy
As migratory as the private sector has become, few professions outside the military average ten or more new starts in a 20-year period. Service members play the role of new guy more times than we care to remember. (In today's Navy, new guy refers to both men and women.) Nearly every wardroom, chief's mess, and division has stories or traditions that focus on the new arrivals to the command. Over the past decade, the Navy has emphasized that the new guy is not someone to nickname or needle, but a new teammate to lead. Mentor programs, well-orchestrated check-in procedures, and strong training systems have been designed to help arrivals new to commands.
The process of building new naval leaders is a partnership between the command and the new guy. While leaders should make sure their new guy has the opportunity to succeed, there are things you—as the new guy—can do to accelerate your learning curve. These suggestions will never substitute for hard work and a warrior ethic, but they address some of the successes and pitfalls experienced in the first commands of the numerous people who have gone before you. While many of these tips are tailored to new ensigns reporting to their first ships, most are universal and should help everyone who is new to the Navy-Marine Corps community.
* Write it down. Whether you are a division officer or a petty officer, the tasking you receive in the service is often far more complex than what you experienced in civilian life, and forgetting a task affects many more people than yourself. Life is too busy and your shipmates' dependence on you is too great for you to not write down taskings.
* Read the instructions. Reading the instructions and knowing the rules go a long way to ensuring success. As you manage programs such as hearing protection or heat stress that guard your sailors' health, or plan for a missile shoot, you will benefit from finding out what the reference directs. It will be one of the first questions a good boss will ask you when he or she reviews your plan or program.
* Remember that respect and humility go a long way. One of the key ingredients in today's Navy is respect regardless of rank. Knowledge, expertise, and talent are not always commensurate with rank. When sailors, chiefs, or department heads sense you are serious about what you are learning and who you are learning from, they will be eager to share their knowledge with you.
* Focus on your sailors. Although you are new, one job that starts right away is your duty to properly manage and care for those in your division. You will not be able to approve every request chit that crosses your desk, but it is your job to take care of your sailors so they can take care of the mission. Everything from pay to professional development is part of your portfolio as a division officer-or as a work center supervisor. Learn each sailor's face, rank, and last name, along with his or her family situation and goals.
* Gauge your command's problem-solving culture. Every ship or squadron is a little different. Some use briefings and "chalk talks" to hash out issues and differences, while others expect that all but the most emergent issues will be arranged ahead of the final brief. While no command ever wants a question to go unasked that will improve performance or ensure safety, your command may expect most of the details to be resolved prior to, and outside of, the briefing room. Well ahead of time, ask mentors or bosses for their views of the expectations for the tasks at hand.
* Look for multiple mentors. Your ship will assign a mentor to you, but you have many mentors at your disposal. New ensigns' predecessors, the officers they work for, their chiefs, and their command master chiefs, among others, may play mentoring roles. Good leaders, who may see things from different levels, will provide a more complete perspective than just one advisor.
* seek professional training opportunities. Most commands will have a number of formal training opportunities as you begin your training program on board, and informal opportunities will abound that can help you improve your professional competency. An extra hour on the bridge, in the engineering plant, in the combat information center, or on a duty night with the right mentor could equal an entire day's learning elsewhere.
* Ask how you can help. Dell Computers' CEO Michael Dell once remarked that the person who asks, "How can I help?" versus, "How do I get promoted?" always had a place in his organization. The same goes for those reporting to their first commands. Whether it is calling out ranges during an underway replenishment detail or helping to proofread a memo, looking for ways to make a contribution will quickly make you part of the team.
* Build professional friendships off the ship. Make an effort to get to know peers from other commands. Having friends outside the ship's lifelines will allow you to trade best practices and perspectives differently from how you might with shipmates from your new command. The officers, chiefs, and petty officers with strong peer relationships outside the lifelines often are the best problem solvers in a pinch.
* Phrases to watch out for. The vast majority of the people you will serve with in the Navy and Marine Corps will be tremendous professionals, but even the best people and organizations can slip into complacency. Here are some phrases to look out for: "It's always been that way." Don't bet on it—if something does not look like it has been done properly, it probably has not. "We don't really have a written plan. We just make it happen." With sailors and Marines routinely performing complex and potentially dangerous tasks, few evolutions occur without being well planned. "Most of our training is on the job." Some of the most exciting and rewarding training you will do may happen on the job; however, the best training plans combine instruction with on-the-job training opportunities. Whether the trainee is you or your newest sailor, make sure training is deliberate and well thought out.
* Allow plenty of time. From the first day of boot camp or officer's training, we learn that punctuality is next to godliness in the Navy and Marine Corps. The lesser known corollary is that almost every task or challenge will take longer than you think. Make a habit of early arrivals and preparation.
* Run a good meeting. Even as the new person, you will quickly find yourself running or, at the very least, significantly participating in, numerous meetings. One of them, divisional quarters, will afford you an opportunity to address your troops from the first day you assume duties as a division officer. Never take for granted this opportunity to communicate with your sailors. For more traditional meetings, simple things like an agenda promulgated ahead of time, letting participants know what is expected of them ahead of time, and preestablished goals make meetings count. If you do not think you can drive this process, ask your department head or chief for help. Once the meeting is complete, send out a memo or e-mail to ensure everyone understands what has been decided and what followup actions are required.
* Practice, practice, practice. Dry runs save lives. Briefs for special evolutions that are your division's primary responsibility may be the first "public" briefing to fall on your shoulders, so make this opportunity count. One way is to rehearse your presentation, preferably with your department head or a mentor who is a particularly good briefer. Remember the brief is not the end product, but the start of a process that should include safety briefs, rehearsals, and training before your team performs its duties at full speed.
* be yourself. Demonstrate the positive qualities that ensured your success prior to entering the Navy. Hard work, brains, and a desire to succeed will never go out of style on our ships, squadrons, and submarines. Strategically approaching your role as the new arrival will allow you to quickly use your talents to better serve the command, your division, and yourself.
* Remember you are committed to a higher calling. Although most of these pointers might apply to managing a successful debut in any type of organization, never forget the bottom line of our "business" is the national defense. Take your profession seriously-your sailors, Marines, and the nation deserve it.
Commander Kacher is executive officer of the Barry (DDG-52).
Train Together—Fly Together—Fight Together
Lieutenant Colonel Arthur Tomassetti, U.S. Marine Corps
"Train like you fight" is the long-standing mantra of the services. At lower levels, it is put in practice with equipment and tactics in scenarios that closely represent expected battlefield conditions. At higher levels-and on far broader scales—this approach is reflected in combined or joint exercises. In all cases, the primary focus in large exercises usually is on command and control.
Applying the train-like-you-fight motto to aviation has been accomplished in comparable fashion. Individual pilot training is conducted in as realistic an environment as peacetime safety and risk management principles permit. Large exercises are conducted with a variety of aircraft and command-and-control functions, and often include ground maneuver and support units.
The goal of training is success in combat. In that regard, given the conflicts since Operation Desert Storm, it is hard to envision that any future air campaign will be undertaken by a single service. The most likely scenario will be a joint air campaign or, more likely, a coalition air campaign. The air component commander will strive to employ all air power at his or her disposal to accomplish desired results-and joint aviation training would measurably improve their ability to do so.
Joint and Combined Training
Individual services understand the need for joint and combined training. One of the greatest strengths of the Marine Corps is its evolving concept of the Marine air-ground task force. A key element of the Corps' air-ground team is the fact that all Marine officers undergo the same introductory training. Aviation, logistics, and ground combat officers spend the first six months of their Marine training together at The Basic School, Quantico, Virginia, where they undergo a common syllabus that emphasizes small-unit leadership and basic infantry tactics. This same technique should be used for initial training in combat aircraft, especially aircraft such as the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF).
The JSF is under development as a common aircraft for the U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps and eight allied nations. Its variants provide capabilities tailored to the requirements of various customers: for example, the short takeoff and vertical landing (STOVL) capabilities of the Marines' F-35B and the aircraft carrier capabilities of the Navy's F-35C. Although the F-35 variants provide unique capabilities, they are similar in appearance and in operation overall; commonality-for example, identical cockpits-is one of the pillars of the JSF program.
Numerous advantages derive from a common aircraft, the most obvious being manufacturing and logistic supportability. Another key benefit is the potential for joint training. Lockheed Martin has proposed a JSF integrated training center (ITC) at one geographic location. This kind of flight facility would provide training for U.S. F-35 pilots and maintenance personnel. Initially, some allied participation is expected. As with the common airframe, the greatest advantage of a single-site ITC would be the cost savings achieved by centralization of service resources.
Training Like You Fight
Yet another benefit of the ITC goes back to the philosophy of "train like you fight." The single center would provide an environment where the notion of training, flying, and fighting together could be established firmly. Joint air operations would benefit from joint initial training in much the same way the Marine Corps benefits from The Basic School. The F-35 crews and support personnel would gain more insight into the roles and missions of other services, thus fostering a healthier interchange of service training, tactics, and techniques.
It is easy to estimate the cost savings of establishing joint ISF training at one ITC. The effect on peace- and wartime joint operations is more difficult to quantify. It can be assumed safely, however, that pilots and ground personnel who have trained together will find it easier to work together. And they should be more comfortable together in combat situations. Imparting the joint training, flying, and fighting philosophy at this early stage would give aviators and ground crews an invaluable initiation into joint operations.
Another aspect of joint training that is not easily quantifiable is the future benefit of the friendships and contacts developed in a joint environment. This aspect is evident in service schools, staff colleges, and top-level schools. At two such formal schools, I certainly put a high value on the contacts I made with other-service and allied officers—a view shared by all my contemporaries who attended.
A high degree of interoperability is being designed into the F-35. This notable advance over the capabilities of legacy aircraft will enable it to communicate and share information with other JSFs and a variety of external platforms from all services, including satellites. Training young aviators of the Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps together, early in their careers, is the best way to realize the full potential of F-35 interoperability.
Challenges of Integrated Training
Putting the integrated training concept into action will pose significant challenges. At the initial operational capability stage, the finished F-35 products must be common enough to fit integrated aviation and support syllabi at an ITC. Moreover, the unique aspects of each variant and employment concepts of each service have to be taken into account and added late in the training cycle. all pilots would go through a common syllabus on the fundamental tasks of strike aircraft missions. At the end of a common curriculum, STOVL and carrier pilots would enter a short syllabus to learn the fundamentals of those unique capabilities.
Probably the main obstacle to establishing a JSF integrated training center is its substantial difference from current training methods. Stationing Air Force, Navy, and Marine aviation personnel together at a single flight training facility will require a significant paradigm shift from traditional service programs.
Navy-Marine Corps F/A-18 training provides only a mild example of integrated training because naval aviators start their training together at Naval Air Station Pensacola, Florida. The JSF training regime would be implemented on a much larger scale. Organizational details, training methodologies, and the variousmanuals for students and instructors to live by would have to be developed in advance and agreed to by the three services. Resolution of these complex issues will bring substantive and emotionally charged debates-but they are by no means insurmountable.
Establishment of an ITC would be only the first step in maximizing the potential the JSF offers to the U.S. armed forces. Subsequent integration of advanced aviation training—such as the services' advanced fighter weapons and tactics schools—would be the next logical step. Finally, continuing to emphasize and increase joint peacetime training exercises would allow the graduates of these joint training schools to exercise the skills they learned.
Conclusions
The merits of taking a integrated training approach to the Joint Strike Fighter are numerous and easily identifiable. The cost savings are clear; overall benefits to the conduct of joint and combined operations are harder to quantify, but obvious nonetheless.
It is early enough in the JSF program to tackle the many challenges and overcome any obstacles. The critical step that must be taken now is to reach Air Force-Navy-Marine Corps agreement that the concept of integrated joint training for the F-35 is the best approach to training pilots and paving the way for improved joint operations. The positive effect of adopting this dramatic change in aviation training-train together, fly together, fight together-is far more important than the dollars that would be saved.
Colonel Tomassetti was a test pilot for the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) Concept Demonstrator. This month, he takes over as the chief test pilot for Test Squadron 23 at Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Maryland.
It Is a Daunting Time to be a Soldier
Colonel Robert B. Killebrew, U.S. Army (Retired)
Today, nearly all the Army’s combat forces are in worldwide motion: units deploying to war zones in Iraq and Afghanistan, returning to home stations in the United States and Europe, mobilizing in National Guard armories, and training at the National Training Centers. Units just back from deployment are “re-cocking” for further deployments in 12-18 months. Concurrently, as the units that retrain acquire new recruits and release veterans for discharge, transfer, and retirement, they are reorganizing into new kinds of formations according to plans so new that the ink is still wet on the blueprints. It is indeed a daunting time for the Army.
Transformation
While combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan continue with no end in sight, the Army begins a transformation more profound than any in the past 50 years, since a largely bolt-action infantry force of 190,000 soldiers in 1939 was transformed to the multimillion-soldier armored juggernaut of 1945. In part, the extraordinary changes are in response to Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld’s prodding for almost four years. Driven by new technologies and previous visions of future combat, some changes were under way before transformation became a Department of Defense (DoD) buzzword. But the most transformational influence on the Army today is war itself, which has accelerated change in ways that DoD theoreticians could not imagine. The battlefield is a tough place for theory.
Many of the innovative weapons and electronics familiar to television viewers—such as M4 carbines, laser sights, and improved communications—began when the Army underwent a wave of technological change in the aftermath of Operation Desert Storm. Fundamental to the process was the Battle Lab system of experimentation and fielding that was designed to short-circuit laborious development procedures and put innovative gear in the hands of soldiers faster. The system worked: new equipment and weapons are reaching operational units at a much faster pace.
From the soldier’s point of view, the big news is that many priorities for funding and resources have been diverted from big-ticket projects to support the individual soldier and his immediate gear. Procurement of body armor, armored high-mobility multipurpose wheeled vehicles, new weapons, and myriad other items has accelerated measurably from peacetime rates.
Major programs are being tailored or dropped. The Army’s prewar program for radical change by way of an interim force leading to an objective force is being modified to a program of incremental change more in keeping with the Army’s long experience and lessons gathered from battlefields. Army planners recognize, for example, that the current armored force of M1A2 Abrams tanks and Bradley Fighting Vehicles will remain effective until 2050. Plenty of mobile armored units have proved again to be essential, especially in urban combat.
Force Structure Changes
Although fielding of the Stryker combat vehicle is on schedule, Stryker brigades armed with the most advanced doctrines and electronics suites will not be expanded beyond the six brigades planned currently. They will fill a niche in the total force between light and heavy ground combat forces while units continue to test new warfighting doctrine and techniques. The Army remains committed to revolutionary production and employment of internetted combat intelligence and to expanding the role of unmanned sensors. Cancellation of the Comanche scout helicopter recognized newly evolving concepts and budget realities.
The Army’s drive to increase the global mobility and agility of its forces led Army Chief of Staff General Peter Schoomaker to order force structuring experiments inside combat divisions that modularize the brigade and division headquarters and develop smaller brigade organizations. Plans call for fielding four brigades in a division instead of today’s three. The leading experimentation force in development of the new modular brigades is the 3d Infantry Division at Fort Stewart, Georgia, recently returned from the capture of Baghdad and its aftermath. The division is training for its return to Iraq in February 2005, but events there may shorten the schedule.
Other recently returned divisions, notably the 101st Airborne (Air Assault), will start reorganizing soon. If the tempo of combat operations in Iraq continues to increase, combat units may well be redeployed before their reorganizations are completed. Because Army doctrine stresses the task organization of brigades, operations at battalion level and below are unlikely to be affected seriously. As always, the thrust of operational effectiveness remains on rigorous training for the basic combat units that carry the battle in Iraq: companies and platoons.
Army brigades historically have been designed as task-organized, temporary groupings of battalions and combat support formations under a colonel. The new design will be toward the smaller, more self-contained and permanent brigade combat team (BCT), a title evocative of the regimental combat team of World War II. The division headquarters will become smaller and more deployable, which derives from recent division experience as the base force for increasingly varied joint, interagency, and multinational operations. In the transition to fiscal year (FY) 2007, the Army plans to increase the number of combat brigades from 33 to 43 (possibly 48), and increase reserve component enhanced brigades for rapid mobilization from 15 to 22.
To raise more combat manpower, Army end strength will increase from more than 480,000 to about 510,000 by FY 2007. To find more manpower and to move strength where it is needed, the Army will stand down more than 70 field artillery, air defense, engineer, and armor battalions to provide larger numbers of military police, transportation, psychological operations, and other combat support units more relevant to projected operations against terrorism. The effect is to increase forces for stability and support operations while increasing firepower and maneuver units.
Effect of Combat Operations
Other prime transforming forces on today’s Army are the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Some tactical aspects of warfare in those countries would be familiar to any World War II veteran—the closeness of small-unit operations, the sense of danger in tight alleys, and the way squads maneuver in contact. Overall, however, war evolves in fundamental ways that no military leader or armchair strategist entirely expected. Overwhelming U.S. superiority in land, air, and sea operations means we can expect to win every battle against conventional forces. Despite Secretary Rumsfeld’s concept of winning future wars in 30 days, potential enemies are far more likely to concede victory in conventional battles to win wars on the edges of the conflict spectrum—at the high end, by the threat or use of weapons of mass destruction; at the low end, by bogging down U.S. forces in the kind of murderous, long-term war ongoing in Iraq and Afghanistan.
With no end in sight to deployments to two combat theaters, and ongoing commitments to other theaters around the world, the Army has broken with its historic cycle of mobilizing, fighting, and retraining after each war. There is no after war today. For the foreseeable future, there will be no standdown in rotations in and out of combat zones. This will have enormous effects on how the Army recruits, trains, and educates, and on fiscal policies and the industrial base. It will touch every aspect of service life. Plans are in place to base BCT manning and training and rotation schedules on cycles similar to those used to man, train, and deploy Marine expeditionary units: keep units together during preparatory training and deployment; on return, release personnel to schools, transfers, and discharges. Whenever possible, the National Training Centers will put the finishing touches on deploying BCTs.
To minimize the effects of repetitive deployments on individual soldiers and retain unit cohesion and training, planners intend to move the Army toward stabilized unit assignments for as many as seven years. This will give soldiers and their families a sense of community and stability. Current rotations, with entire divisions moving simultaneously, reflect the key decision to implement unit rotations—as opposed to the individual replacement policies that prevailed from World War II until recently and filled combat units with strangers.
Of course, an Army that constantly rotates stabilized units in and out of active service has created other problems. The rotational, stabilized units change everything else in the Army: for example, schooling cycles, transfers to isolated assignments, skill balances, and training policies. Supporting the Army’s institutional base and its training and educational programs remains a major concern. The Army’s Training and Doctrine Command at Fort Monroe, Virginia, plays a central role in training, educating, and developing doctrine. It was undermanned before the war started; now contractors fill many key doctrinal and instructional slots that were occupied previously by the Army’s best and brightest.
The lessons-learned infrastructure on the staffs of the key Army unit training centers at Fort Irwin, California, Fort Polk, Louisiana, and in Germany, is under extreme pressure. It will be difficult for the Army to maintain progressive career schooling programs, which are the secret to highly professional commissioned and noncommissioned officer corps. Short-tour equity (sharing the deployment burden) among military occupational specialties will be an issue as deployments continue. These issues and more must be resolved. But war drives the Army now. Long-term, large-scale deployments are here to stay for a service that, under current circumstances, will have to strain to give troops even a year at home for every year deployed. And given ongoing reorganizations, the year at home will be spent under pressure, either in the field or in staff jobs where the lights burn late.
The Way Ahead
The greatest challenge to the Army’s transformation comes from the nature of battles in which soldiers can win tactical victories, but ultimate strategic victory appears to be beyond a military solution. Fighting terrorism is a new challenge for today’s ground forces because decisive strokes are out of reach. Strategist Anthony Cordesman observed that, because al Qaeda is an ideological movement, destroying base areas or capturing leaders may serve only to disperse the movement and make it harder to eradicate. After a previous conflict that featured major U.S. counterinsurgency efforts, retired Army Colonel Harry Summers told a high-ranking North Vietnamese officer, “Remember, you never defeated us on the battlefield.” “That is so,” said the North Vietnamese after a moment of reflection, “but it is also irrelevant.”
For an Army bred to believe in decisive combat, the idea that battlefield victory may be, at best, a holding action runs counter to deeply held institutional values. While both the Army and Marine Corps are battle oriented, the Army is charged with winning land wars as well as campaigns and battles. Consequently, it has various types of forces trained and equipped for decisive combat on land and also must maintain the huge trains of theater and strategic logistics—from forward maintenance units to industrial-base arsenals—required for prolonged, large-scale combat. When the nation commits to war, Army leaders know their job is to be there as long as it takes. Thus, Army doctrine, training, and organization historically have stressed decisive battles that win wars: the knockout punch (or series of punches) that destroys the enemy’s will to resist and delivers strategic victory.
When battlefield success does not add up to winning the war, as in Vietnam, the Army is shaken to its core. In Vietnam and earlier conflicts, frustration with indecisive combat manifested itself in several ways. The first reaction was to keep doing tactically what it had been doing, but harder, or more frequently, or in new ways. As the Vietnam War went on and on, the demands on front-line troops for higher and higher body counts reflected to a degree the frustration of higher commanders’ sense of doing the right things but without decisive results. Second came denial: after Vietnam, the Army buried its counterinsurgency experience, downsized Special Forces, and returned to the business of planning for armored warfare in Europe. The third reaction was to go back to school on warfare, as did a small and dedicated band of military intellectuals at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, in the mid-1980s. From their efforts—sheltered and supported by successive Army chiefs of staff—came operational art, which led in turn to campaign planning and much of what passes today for high-level Army and joint doctrine.
Even before the current war, however, the reforms of the 1980s were worn ragged by repetition and misuse. The original definition of the operational level of war—a process that focuses tactical objectives toward achievement of a strategic task—has become shorthand for a level of command, and most war plans feature multiple “centers of gravity” instead of a single center that provides a common focus. This is not niggling over words: armies must have a clear idea of what they are doing when they set out to win wars.
Conclusions
In the midst of rebuilding its force structures and redeploying forces to Iraq, the Army’s main task is to reinvent the rules for decisive land warfare in the 21st century and reorient an Army trained and equipped for decisive conventional warfare to one that can do whatever is necessary for strategic victory in rapidly expanding scenarios ranging from nuclear war to terrorism. Whether an army designed to win a war in 30 days can also play a decisive role in a war such as the United States is committed to in Iraq is a critical question.
Perhaps new operational art will lead to forces that mix the best characteristics of precisely tailored special operations units and firepower-intensive maneuver forces. Certainly the joint doctrinal community will play a key role. Nonetheless, the Army retains the unique responsibility for deciding how land forces will win decisively.
Most Army leaders know and relish the business of rebuilding forces: deciding the composition of units and how to organize an expeditionary divisional headquarters. With firm leadership, the dedication and professional spirit of troops in the field will bear up under repeated deployments. But the Army’s most daunting challenges are to nurture and protect the institutions and people needed for the next revolution in the military art, and to solve the puzzle of battlefield decision in an age of inconclusive war.
Colonel Killebrew, a former infantry officer, is an independent defense consultant in Newport News, Virginia.
Ask Questions about Our Ability to Conduct Antisubmarine Warfare
Vice Admiral Albert H. Konetzni Jr., U.S. Navy
The U.S. Navy's ability to project power to influence the outcome of future conflicts depends on our ability to ensure access. Establishing undersea superiority and maintaining it are essential element in assured access. The uncontested undersea superiority experienced during recent conflicts is not likely to be repeated against determined and capable adversaries. Submarines, especially when encountered in significant numbers that include modern designs, could effectively contest access to regions where power projection may be needed to preserve stability, deter conflict, or prevail should events turn hostile.
Undersea superiority requires robust antisubmarine warfare (ASW) capabilities tailored to the most likely threat and environment. Extensive debate has surrounded development of a concept of operations (ConOps) that can guarantee access and the appropriate force structure to execute these operations.
We know how to do antisubmarine warfare. Coordinated ASW is able to deal effectively with modern submarine threats. When practiced with current platforms and their sensor capabilities, however, ASW is a platform-intensive force-on-force proposition. This requires a large and expensive force structure.
Numerous studies have addressed topics such as the introduction of new sensor technologies, the benefits of netted sensors, the advantage of shared maritime domain awareness, and basing strategies that increase forward presence and the timeliness of crisis response. The bottom lines for many of these studies are reduced force structures that relieve budgetary pressures. Because nuclear-powered attack submarines (SSNs) are a major part of the current ASW force, they have been in the crosshairs of proposed force reductions. Before we risk traditional ASW on the promises of new technology yet to be developed, we must ask the right questions to judge the degree of risk we are willing to take with the nation's security.
1. When the importance of speed is discussed, ask: Why is speed so important? Are you talking about sprint speed or sustainable speed in transit?
Remember: There are few platforms that are faster than an SSN. There is nothing that can reposition over thousands of miles to a new theater or within the same theater faster than an SSN. An SSN requires no underway replenishment speeds of escorts, and bad weather impose no limitations; an SSN does not need rerouting to avoid detection.
2. When you hear discussion about the need for sprint speed to reposition away from a threat, ask: Why does the platform need to sprint away? Is it not defended potently enough to stand and fight? What is the importance of an extra 10-15 knots when the enemy is attacking with missiles or airplanes? Who is going to perform the mission or tend the off-board vehicles after the platform has sprinted away?
Remember: An undetected submarine does not need speed for safety, is not vulnerable to missiles or airplanes, and is enough of a force to be able to defend itself without risking other Navy assets.
3. When you hear about "distributed systems" as replacements for platform-based systems such as hull-mounted sonars, towed sonar arrays, radars, and so on, ask:
* How do we detect, track, and avoid submarines during the prehostility phase when we have not yet committed the resources to deploy the distributed systems?
* Does this make the decision to deploy distributed systems an escalatory step?
* What is the level of persistence of distributed systems? Could an adversary easily disable them precisely at the time they are most needed?
* How can we be sure these communications-intensive systems will perform in a hostile environment? Who has done the "Red Team" analysis to make sure this kind of complex network cannot easily be jammed, decoyed, or exploited with disinformation? How hard is it for an adversary to disable this system?
* Does not a future dependence on distributed systems invite an opportunity for adversaries to strike by surprise to exploit the window prior to their deployment?
Remember: It is important to invest in the research and development to develop concepts such as distributed systems and add them to our capability, but it is not reasonable to commit to them as the way ahead without proven performance and military utility.
4. When Navy leaders talk about the importance of off-board vehicles and suggest that unmanned undersea vehicles (UUVs) will be able to gather intelligence, ask:
* How will the UUV transmit the intelligence it collects? Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) make aggressive use of radios and do not employ stealth-how can the same aggressive radio use and overt posture be employed by a covert UUV?
* How is the UUV going to be inserted and extracted? If an overt surface platform is used, can the UUV still collect information with the same value?
* Can the UUV analyze, act, or reposition based on the information it collects?
Remember. The SSN gathers intelligence in peacetime and during times of elevated tensions. Then, during conflict, it can act on that intelligence. No unmanned platform can gather, analyze, reposition, and act on intelligence in peace or war. The UUV might best be employed as an extension of the sensors of an SSN. The SSN crew can analyze UUV data and act on it (including using the data to cue attacks in wartime).
5. When Navy officials talk about being able to reduce the number of submarines if we base more of them in Guam, ask:
* Is it not true that the same analysis shows that if we have 5 or fewer SSNs in Guam, then we still need 48-58 submarines in our force-essentially the same number that has been found by 12 other analyses in the past ten years?
* If the Navy put almost half of the Pacific's submarines in Guam (9 of 21 in one analysis), an island much closer to the threat, would not that invite preemptive or unconventional attacks against the island? How would the Navy defend it?
* Because Guam is subject to annual typhoons and frequent earthquakes, is it prudent to consolidate such a large part of our submarine force there? It may be a reasonable risk for 3 boats (a small part of Pacific Fleet's 26 submarines) but an unreasonable risk for 9.
* What assumptions underlie the analyses that show a submarine force structure below 55 will be acceptable? Is it reasonable to presume all of these assumptions will prove true?
* Are we confusing peacetime presence with warfighting capacity?
Remember. Forward basing provides greater peacetime presence and speedier crisis response. Ultimately, however, warfighting capacity depends on numbers.
6. When future ASW capabilities that include an increased role for aircraft or helicopters are discussed, ask:
* What would be the impact on the future plan if the adversary developed a submarine-launched surface-to-air missile? Can you show an ASW scheme that would not require an aircraft to overfly the possible submarine to confirm it and refine the target closely enough to allow attack?
* How would aircraft execute their mission if the U.S. Navy does not have air superiority? Without undersea superiority and access, how do carriers provide air superiority?
Remember: Future technologies should be pursued and whenever practical incorporated into our forces; however, we must maintain enough mixture to prevent a single vulnerability from defeating the entire force.
7. When Littoral Combat Ships (LCS) or other platforms performing missions currently done by submarines (such as littoral ASW or ISR) are discussed, ask:
* How many redundant assets are needed to provide one equivalent SSN's worth of capability? A single SSN can stay on station 24 hours a day for several months of uninterrupted operations; how many airframes or surface ships or UUVs would be needed to provide the same coverage across the same spectrum?
* What logistical support is required to support that alternative force?
* What force protection and defensive support is required to protect that alternative force? How will ships such as LCS protect themselves from submarines when they are in transit or conducting mine countermeasures or surface warfare (no ASW systems deployed), in bad weather (when ASW offboard vehicles cannot be deployed), or have mechanical problems preventing their aircraft from getting airborne (and helos or vertical-takeoff UAVs are the only envisioned way of delivering ASW ordnance.)
* How these platforms' overt nature affect their ability to perform the mission?
* How will weather or sea slate affect these alternative assets?
Remember: The SSN is clandestine, is nonprovocative, and can perform its mission for months at a time, 24 hours a day, in all weather. SSNs do not require refueling or resupply, do not require defensive force protection, and are not vulnerable to asymmetric attack (small boats, etc). Other assets can operate for hours or days at a time, not in all weather; have sea-state limitations for launch, operation, or recovery; provide tip-off to the adversary; and are vulnerable to conventional or unconventional attack.
8. When the high cost of submarines is discussed, ask:
* How do cost comparisons account for the fact that the price of a submarine includes all the fuel it will ever need?
* How do cost comparisons account for the fact that submarines do not need oil ers, store ships, or ammunition ships or the defensive effort to protect them?
* How do cost comparisons account for the fact that submarines do not need defensive ships in company, do not dedicate magazine space to defensive weapons, and do not require air cover?
* How do cost comparisons account for the fact that submarines can be moved one at a time without the need to orchestrate a large logistic and defensive train?
* How do cost comparisons account for the fact that a submarine's stealth prevents an adversary from effectively planning or coordinating operations in areas where submarines may be operating?
Remember: Only the submarine can be in theater early and nonprovocatively when warning is still ambiguous, increasing our ability to respond without the escalatory effect of large-scale overt asset deployment. Only the submarine is invulnerable to low-end unconventional attack. Only the submarine can, without help, sink virtually any surface ship or submarine in any navy in the world.
9. When the limited sensor range of submarines is discussed, ask:
* Why has the Navy reduced investment in research and development into systems that will extend the reach of submarines?
* Why has the Navy delayed procurement of advanced sensor systems such as the Conformai Acoustic Velocity Sensor (CAVES) and Lightweight ConformaL Array and advanced processing systems such as the advanced rapid commercial off-the-shelf insertion (ARCI) that have shown the ability to dramatically increase acoustic detection ranges?
* Why has the Navy limited its investment in small UAVs from submarines that would allow a significantly improved sensor range for clandestine submarines?
* Why isn't the Navy investing aggressively in technologies that will exploit the tremendous advantages of the submarine?
Considering these questions carefully, it would seem the SSNs' future is bright.
Vice Admirai Konetzni, a submariner, is Deputy, Fleef Forces Command.