Professional Notes

Listen to the Lieutenants and Sailors
By Captain Mark Nesselrode, U.S. Navy (Retired)

The use of simulation in the surface force has exploded in the last several years. By exploiting this technology even further, we can enhance readiness and lower training costs. Fleet Synthetic Training events incorporate ships, multiple strike groups. Joint and Coalition partners, thus enriching our perspective. But the application of simulation is not uniform force-wide. From the deckplates to senior leadership, every Fleet operator needs to understand what it can achieve and how that can be repeated. The surface force must find more innovative ways to train, certify, and maintain proficiency using simulation - and this has to involve the Fleet lieutenants and their computer-savvy Sailors.

Put the Exercises to Work

In the Battle Force Tactical Training system (BFTT), Fleet Synthetic Training (FST) series exercises introduce greater complexity and far more sensor inputs. Recognizing this, the Navy has extended BFTT funding. But if the FST exercises' potential is to be realized, BFTT must be installed on all Aegis-equipped ships. Further challenges include the inherent track limitations of the system, the lack of ability to use fully all current Aegis baseline capabilities, and the need for continued upgrading of BFTT-ASW systems interaction.

But the greatest change that we need is not hardware-oriented; it is philosophical. Because the scenario - along with all supporting Link, communications, intelligence, even passive sensor data - is generated off the ship, FST permits the entire crew to participate. Thus it is possible to have CIC while under way, which means the limit to the scenario's sophistication is purely a function of the ship company's ability to handle it. If combat systems training teams were oriented to maximize use of this invaluable capability, their efforts at assessing performance would be greatly enhanced. Such a change in outlook would affect everyone on the ship - and improve readiness exponentially.

Among the areas still not ready for certification or proficiency training are naval surface fire support (NSFS) and helicopter operations. The next generation of naval guns will be capable of engaging targets well beyond the horizon, which will severely limit the possible locations where sea and air space can be made available for routine training.

The issue for NSFS simulators is purely one of physics and a valid representation of shell trajectory and impact. This is certainly challenging, but is already being done ashore and is nearly possible with Integrated Maritime Portable Acoustic Scoring and Simulation. Our goal should be to acquire a laptop system that can be used on board ship. Pre-action calibration fires, correctly done, are proof of gun and fire-control system operability, so team performance should be treated no differently than cruise-missile-team training and certification.

Another "low-hanging fruit" is the ability to use H-60 simulators, rapidly developing additions to the Mission Rehearsal Tactical Team Trainer 3 suite (P3C, H-60B. etc.). When shipboard aircraft controllers can talk to aircrew (which is becoming rarer in an era of severely constrained flying hours), hours of lost aircraft time are replaced. When aircraft are finally ready to operate with the ship, just figuring out how to communicate at a basic level takes up too much aircraft on-station time. Aircraft procedures and systems, tactical implementation in a given scenario, all this is unfamiliar. If we could practice such skills pierside. we could save money and significantly enhance mission readiness.

Damage control (DC) simulation is perhaps the most difficult to achieve, because of the dynamics involved in casualty response. The large manpower requirement for implementation, safety monitoring, and evaluation of DC training, especially because simulations are made as realistic as possible, is among our most daunting challenges. The development of Total Ship Training System should help, but imbedded monitoring of shipboard parametric data will be needed to free trainers for evaluating actions and not just counting event occurrences. After that, the incorporation of some sort of DC capability should be pursued next.

Shiphandling

Most naval officers are aware of Captain S. Landersman's recent Proceedings article "Where Have All the Shiphandlers Gone" (August 2006, 54-58). Captain Landersman believes that few naval officers are capable mariners, and that junior officers have less opportunity to drive their ships. He notes that the simulators available in the major homeports and at SWOS in Newport are excellent, manned by staffs with many years of shiphandling experience - and that the contracts to maintain these facilities are being discontinued. He voices serious concern that the devices being introduced to till the gap are inadequate, calling them "homemade arcade-type games."

Certainly nothing can replace shiphandling at sea, especially in situations like underway replenishment or plane guard duties, skills in which all naval officers must be proficient. But greater training is needed, and for this we need more simulation devices.

Landersman's primary concern is verification and validation (V and V), a problem that can be overcome with software, ship models, and scenarios. Maintenance can also be covered in a rigorous V and V process. (For an illustration of this, see O. Balci, "Quality Assessment, Verification, and Validation of Modeling and Simulation Applications," 2004 Winter Simulation Conference.)

If V and V were part of implementing readily available and portable shiphandling simulation systems, the inadequate training that ship's company might receive with an inferior system would be avoided. Therefore, the solution is clearly to capture in a more portable venue all the capabilities of the excellent models used in existing trainers.

V and V issues have plagued other systems that the Navy already uses widely for distributed synthetic training. We need strict stipulations for V and V processes associated with the more portable systems that the Navy is now acquiring; otherwise. Captain Landersman's concerns may be all too valid.

The Fleet Readiness Plan clearly mandates the ability - in fact, the necessity - to use simulation for unit certification and maintaining proficiency. We can achieve this, but we need bold, innovative thinking from training establishments and force leadership.

Listen to the Lieutenants

Let the lieutenants tell us what they believe will work. They and their enlisted counterparts are the generation capable of maintaining four or five chat rooms while searching the Internet and playing a game, all simultaneously. We need their insights. To move forward, we also need senior operator experience and commonsense with costing.

The cardinal rule of human systems integration. Know Thy User, is the key (see J. Nielsen and P. Coyne, "A Useful Investment: Usability Testing Costs - But It Pays for Itself in the Long Run," CIO magazine, 15 February 2001, http://www. cio.com/archive/021501/et_pundits.html). The users are the Fleet lieutenants and their computer-savvy Sailors, not those who are past the 20-year point in their careers. Getting the real users involved at the front end will save money and permit introduction of new capabilities faster. If ships use all that is available and integrate every aspect of simulation possible, there is no doubt that they will attain greater readiness and sustain it.

 

Sea Fighter Can Help Special Ops Right Now
By Rear Admiral George Worthington, U.S. Navy (Retired)

Designed and built under the aegis of the Office of Naval Research, the 262-foot catamaran Sea Fighter has been considered a research and development test bed for technology to be used later in the littoral combat ship program. This is short-sighted. Sea Fighter offers an immediate operational platform for U.S. Special Operations Forces (SOF), primarily Navy SEAL teams and U.S. Marine Corps Special Operations Command (MARSOC) units of battalion and company size.

The ship achieved speeds greater than 50 knots during sea trials, hosts an extending stern ramp for launching raiding craft, is stabilized, can operate at 40 knots in state 4 sea, and spots two HH-60 (variant) helicopters. Built by Seattle's Nichols Brothers, Sea Fighter was christened in February 2005 and assigned the following August to Commander, U.S. Surface Force, Pacific Fleet, San Diego. She underwent Fleet testing for nearly a year and then deployed in Exercise RIMPAC 2006.

Normally the primary forces operating from Sea Fighter will be Navy SEAL, SEAL delivery vehicle (SDV), and Special Boat Teams and MARSOC. But SOF is joint; therefore, Sea Fighter must be ready to support other service units: U.S. Army Rangers, Special Forces (Green Berets), and Civic Affairs units - and, possibly, U.S. Air Force Combat Control Teams. In addition to these, Navy Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) teams may be expected to operate from Sea Fighter.

The lack of dedicated maritime platforms available to Naval Special Warfare has been longstanding, and piecemeal support has put unrealistic restrictions on the development of all capabilities. For example, current practice is to assign amphibious ships on as-available basis for deploying SEAL platoons. SEAL personnel have little specific workup with the ship as they mount out equipment before sailing. Sea Fighter can change this, if it is available full-time to Southern Command and the Naval Special Warfare Command.

The following types of operations illustrate the myriad techniques in SOF missions and capabilities. Already conducted from other Navy ships, they are manpower-intensive and generally hazardous, compounded by the maritime environment in which they are carried out. Sea Fighter facilitates operations because of its catamaran configuration, which affords ample stowage in the mission bay for staging people and equipment. The use of the Australian Joint Venture in the past two years highlights the utility of a catamaran design.

Amphibious Task Force

Reconnaissance of near-shore approaches to the landing site and demolition of obstacles support the Marine Corps. This has been a primary mission since the 1943 founding of Combat Demolition Units, later Underwater Demolition Teams, forerunners of today's Navy SEAL teams. Post-landing combat support continues as required by the ashore Marine commander. The newly commissioned MARSOC can also embark to conduct battalion-size amphibious strikes against littoral targets.

General Special Operations

Sea Fighter can embark SOCOM teams and support embarked personnel, staff, and equipment. SOF will deploy with organic "vanized" systems including mobile communications team, weapons and demolitions, diving systems, portable diving recompression chamber, and organic table of equipment. Sea Fighter, not configured to berth people beyond immediate crew, can set up mission bay quarters.

SEAL and SDV Teams

* Direct action attacks against hinterland enemy targets include hard target destruction of bridges, tunnels, and sundry construction sites with manpack demolitions. This may involve unmanned air vehicles. hostage/POW recovery, prisoner capture, anti-enemy leadership infrastructure attack, hinterland reconnaissance, interdiction of weapons of mass destruction (WMD), and demolition raids.

* Sea Fighter can support submerged SEAL and SDV team reconnaissance using SDV MK VIII, a free-flooding submersible. Divers use a combination of onboard compressed gas and pure oxygen SCUBA. Foreseeable operations would have the SDV launch from Sea Fighter. proceed to littoral target area, conduct operations, and return to ship.

In addition, administrative SEAL team missions include harbor clearance of submerged obstacles and leveling of sandbars, bottom searches, foreign ordnance exploitation (with attached EOD support), and general underwater demolition operations. Sea Fighter can support SEAL team foreign internal defense operations, providing hotel services for embarked foreign counterparts and security and supporting medical, communications, and administrative requirements as the host country requests.

* SOF and Sea Fighter can conduct noncombatant evacuation operations (NEO), which often include evacuation of foreign men, women, and children from combat zones, in addition to U.S. nationals. Sea Fighter must be ready to receive NEO evacuees by providing secure hotel accommodations and health and medical services as necessary for women and children. In 1996, SOF conducted a major NEO from the Liberian civil war.

Navy SEALs assigned to the Special Operations Command, Europe, conducted a successful rescue of American and foreign national diplomats from Monrovia to neighboring Senegal. U.S. Air Force aircraft were used in the civilian extraction, but helicopters could have lifted them to offshore Navy ships such as Sea Fighter.

Special Boat Teams (SBT)

In SBT missions, a mobile support team handles technical and logistical support of assigned combatant craft. Sea Fighter can provide bed-down space for personnel and staff and be prepared to nest combatant craft alongside, including U.S. and foreign riverine craft. SBT operations involve inserting and extracting SEAL detachments over-the-beach. Offshore movement to the insertion point is normally conducted with rigid-hull inflatable boats, from which SEAL elements pass through the surf zone in combat rubber raiding craft (CRRC). In riverine environments, insertion/extraction are via SOC-R or CRRC.

Sea Fighter can support and conduct offshore patrols with SBT assets and embarked helicopters configured for interdiction operations. In Operation Desert Storm, suspected merchantmen were interdicted at sea. This continues today. Counter-drug and interdiction of suspected WMD are viable roles for Sea Fighter and SBT/SEALs. Sea Fighter can intercept suspected merchantmen days before they enter U.S. territorial waters. SBTs launch and board the ship, interrogate crew, and inspect for WMD.

Explosive Ordnance Disposal

EOD operations are specialized and inherently hazardous. In addition to dealing with domestic weaponry in emergency situations, locating and rendering safe enemy ordnance is a principal function of these teams. It is exacting and precise work. During anti-terrorist operations and hostage rescue, the "second man through the door" is an EOD operator tasked to disarm booby traps or other demolition material in the hands of terrorists.

Green Berets and Rangers

U.S. Army Special Forces (Green Berets) and Rangers will make up the predominant force from another service operating from Sea Fighter. Aside from direct action. Special Forces are most effective in unconventional warfare wherein they train allied foreign militia and ground forces. They are considered force multipliers: they magnify the battlefield capability of the host country by providing combat expertise and, where required and authorized, hands-on leadership. Rangers are the finest light infantry forces in the world, capable of amphibious operations and maneuvering especially well at night. Fully trained in special operations, they are often the first elements on the ground.

Marines

The new U.S. Marine Corps Special Operations Command (MARSOC) will operate from Sea Fighter up to battalion level as determined by the U.S. Special Operations Command, perhaps becoming part of the Joint Special Operations Task Force. Marines will continue to provide a first response to emergent combat situations and other emergency contingencies; clearly MARSOC flexibility could be enhanced with Sea Fighter.

Planning Sea Fighter's Future

SOF will be continually engaged in efforts against terrorism and should play a significant role. Sea Fighter affords a modern platform for combat operations in the littoral, a first-ever capability. This new ship should be considered for inclusion in the operating force and assigned to the U.S. Special Operations Command.

Follow-on upgrades should be investigated. For example. Sea Fighter is currently short on troop berthing. Extending the ship 50 or 60 feet would provide the needed space. A 300-foot catamaran design for SOF would be a welcome asset to the nation's maritime arsenal.

 

Putting the Fight Back into Our Warships
By Captain Daniel S. Appleton, U.S. Navy (Retired)

Our warship crews face a new world of stress and intensive combat - with no command or agency in the U.S. Navy that is charged with analyzing how to strengthen their fighting abilities. The Navy must do all it can to give these crews the tools for protection, organization, training, and leadership - and make sure all the tools fit together. At stake are the crews' lives and the nation's safety.

Modern fighting ships represent ultimate sophistication of weapons, structure, machinery, electronics, operational doctrines, and technically competent crews. Developers of these resources focus on ability to cope with extremes likely to be encountered in waters near hostile territories. In such a littoral conflict, every ship's hard assets depend on expert human performance under heightened stress and violence - that is, on human ability to fight.

Unless her crew is organized, trained to fight, and protected against stress and violence, a naval warship may not survive and prevail under the violent conditions of littoral warfare. In such environments, people are not only the most indispensable but also the most vulnerable resource. They must be capable of performing all designed functions under conditions of severe stress, extreme violence, and/or attempted enemy surprise.

How can we maximize our most critical of resources? We need to address battle training, shipboard organization, and human protection. Each of these affects the other two.

Battle Training

Among the many problems we face, expert fighting ability is no longer a major leadership goal. In fact, relating leadership to violence is officially perceived as likely to inhibit recruiting. The Navy's leadership indoctrination programs address social and working environments - rarely combat situations.

Compounding this weakness in outlook, the shipboard time required to complete administrative and collateral duties is so overwhelming that battle drills are rare, brief, and unplanned. Consequently they are nearly useless, averaging just 30 minutes per week.

Shipboard Organization

Aside from issues pertaining to our overall approach, the standard ship's organization does not provide for an integrated team structure or establish clear chains of responsibility for fighting ability. Primary duties in senior personnel rosters are specified only for maintenance and administration functions. Crewmembers have no way to monitor what battle skills they are expected to achieve.

Human Protection

Other than damage-control teams, shipboard wartighters do not wear protective combat uniforms. There are no freshwater outlets near manned stations for first-aid care of burns.

Few compartments are equipped to support triage or first aid, especially under radical conditions of ship movement, and there are less than minimal resources to care for wounded female erewmembers. No means exist to move laden stretchers from one deck to another. Among the other shortcomings:

* Bedding is not protected against fire (and burning mattresses can emit toxic fumes).

* Flammable paints are still used in interior spaces.

* Emergency toileting facilities are not available near manned stations.

* ID tags may no longer be required for facially disfigured Sailors.

Why All This Matters Now

American warriors headed for littoral combat face a convergence of two increasing challenges. The U.S. Fleet is shrinking - which means more ships will deploy to combat areas before having completed full preparatory training of their crews. In littoral areas such as the South China Sea, crews will face unprecedented demands on mental acuity and physical strength and dexterity, for longer periods than ever before. These demands will increase as crew sizes continue to diminish with the introduction of optimal manning, anticipated to extend into future ship designs.

With proliferating enemy attacks always a possibility, challenges to crews are changing and intensified. Physical stamina, mental toughness, and team-based fighting skills will be pushed past their limits under prolonged periods of alertness.

The cumulative dangers to shipboard personnel in littoral areas will substantially exceed those of high-seas combat environments. Most will come from increasingly sophisticated and available weaponry. High-performance cruise missiles are already capable of launching from land bases, land vehicles, aircraft, submarines, small craft, commercial ships, and fishing craft.

Large numbers of ballistic missiles can target units whose movements are constrained or predictable, for instance during replenishment or flight operations; amphibious assaults; and passages within straits, canals, channels, and ports. Current threats also include nuclear, biological, and chemical munitions; rising mines in limitless numbers; wake following and very high speed (200-knot) torpedoes: boarding and terrorism (even at sea); and escalating numbers of air-independent submarines difficult to track in shallow waters. Potentially devastating weapons may be launched against U.S. ships from unidentifiable points of origin spread across thousands of square miles on land and sea, an unprecedented level of threat to naval forces at sea.

The primary shipboard organization for battle may no longer be general quarters but sustained high-alert condition watches. Warship crews in littoral waters may operate for weeks or months in alert readiness conditions, imposing sustained high stresses that can cause physical and mental exhaustion exacerbated by sleep deprivation. Initial massive damage and multiple casualties will likely occur from hits received during these condition watches.

We will need battle training of unmatched depth and difficulty. External resources may be available on board for short periods before or during a surge deployment (as during Iraqi Freedom), but these are now being depleted because of decreased budgets for Afloat Training Groups and planned reductions in crew sizes and exchange initiatives (Sea Swap).

Should the U.S. Navy have to operate against a major adversary in the littoral waters of the South China Sea or Persian Gulf, the consequence for our warships could well include an incalculable loss of life followed by forced withdrawal of the U.S. Fleet - because our modern warship crews could, conceivably, be rendered unfit to fight.

Solutions

We need to address all three areas simultaneously:

* Make battle training goals and progress toward them visible to all hands - continuously and readily. Monitor and minimize administrative demands and collateral duty assignments. Define expert ability to fight as a central leadership goal.

8 Design and implement standard onboard organizational chains of responsibility for overall battle readiness.

* Strengthen shipboard human-protection systems.