The timely Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower outlines innovative uses of maritime power to better support national diplomatic missions.1 Very soon the Obama Administration will publish a national security strategy that will doubtless assimilate the Navy's new strategy. As the U.S. military adjusts to a new commander-in-chief, the Navy has an opportunity to play a major role in developing new national philosophies that will be reflected both at home and abroad.
Endorsed, encouraged, and supported by Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, the State Department's certain growth will carry significant weight in our country's global foreign policy.2 The Navy's impressive former close history with the Department of State could now emerge as a renewed and enhanced source of capabilities.
Soft Power
In June 2008, six months after the Navy's new strategy was introduced, Secretary Gates published a new National Defense Strategy using rhetoric similar to the Navy's. Stability and security through diplomacy—soft power—is an important concept in both documents in discussions of the country's way ahead. This speaks volumes of the Navy's foresight, and of the potential leadership role the service could play nationally. President Obama will bring changes to national strategies. While other government agencies scramble to rewrite theirs, ours is already delineated in the newest guidance of the Navy and Defense Department.
The Navy's strategy highlights the vital role of maritime services at a time when ground forces have remained at the forefront of the public view of the military. From alliance building to humanitarian relief and campaigns to continue protection of sea lines of communication, our capabilities need the support of those who determine the division of resources. For this to occur, we must have greater visibility.
Abroad, naval diplomacy used to influence events ashore remains one of our most valuable national resources. It is grossly underused, and we need to reintroduce it. Soft power backed by muscle to represent our nation's interests is a solid foundation for progress.
The Navy has thrust itself ahead of the power curve. Now we need to remain there and move ahead from this position of strength, nationally and internationally.
At Home
It's Charleston, South Carolina—Not Yemen: The cooperative strategy was introduced with a road show of select senior flag officers talking to business leaders, maritime security's primary audience. This strategic-communications approach was a good first step. But it needs follow-through. Educating Americans about the role of maritime security is a necessary campaign that will certainly provide return on the investment.
However, the public has less access to its Navy than at any other time in recent history. The Navy sells itself, if only people are allowed to meet the Sailors. We need to get the public to visit the weekly tour ship again—unfortunately, that ship went away with the expansion of force-protection requirements.
During a recent trip to Charleston, South Carolina, to support the Citadel's NROTC program, the ship under my command, the USS Vicksburg (CG-69), attempted to arrange mooring downtown to facilitate both public visitation and improved quality of life for the crew, just returned from a six-month deployment.
Instead, we were moored up the Cooper River, hidden between retired cargo ships. Nevertheless, we took advantage of the opportunity and hosted a captain's lunch for representatives of the mayor's office, chamber of commerce, and Republican Senator Lindsey Graham's office. During coffee and dessert, I presented a slideshow of the ship's recent deployment, with references to theater security cooperation and the cooperative strategy.
The audience's favorable reception of this was beyond our expectations. Clearly communities are starved for access to and familiarity with the Navy and its mission—which in the strategy is specifically identified as a goal.
Charleston staffers asked why the ship had not moored downtown, and we laid the groundwork for future visits to be conducted while moored at Market Street in this great, proud city. In addition to force-protection requirements, we learned, the port authority believed that a Navy ship would not bring the city as much revenue as a cruise ship moored downtown. But what of the people of Charleston? They may feel differently, and elected officials need to find out.
Nobody wants to say "enough" to force protection, which has done a great job of protecting Navy assets in a threatening environment overseas. But at home, requirements remain similar to those overseas. As we saw in Charleston, the cost is waning knowledge—and, therefore, support for the Navy. We must work to achieve a better balance between protection and strategic communication.
Rebuilding Relationships: The Navy's strong diplomatic roots remain a key resource to the nation and its rediscovery of our role. In 1943, General George C. Marshall brought together the War and Navy departments, eventually leading to the National Security Act of 1947. This unified the military under a single Department of Defense and created an additional service, the Air Force. This is also when the Navy lost its direct partnership with the Department of State.
Forty years later, the Goldwater-Nichols DOD Reorganization Act of 1986 was signed into law as the first step in jointness, forcing the services to better coordinate operations. In 1991, Commander of Central Command General H. Norman Schwarzkopf sealed the joint deal during Operation Desert Storm. He centralized control of air operations under a joint force air component commander.
This represented a doctrinal setback for the Navy, which did not fully participate in air-campaign planning for employment of air assets.3 The air component commander's combined air operations center is now the strongest joint entity in any theater.
The Navy has a unique capability to conduct humanitarian missions, provide a show of force, and team with Coalition forces to execute a variety of missions. However, this valuable national option is limited by theater DOD relationships. We must rally joint participants behind our new strategy so that we can truly integrate joint assets in pending maritime plans. Without joint buy-in, we will not be able to execute the new strategy.
Abroad
Diplomatic Opportunities Missed: From late 2007 through early 2009, U.S. Navy and Russian Federation Navy warships operated in the Mediterranean Sea while each nation's presidents visited coastal countries. The Russian aircraft carrier Kuznetsov had not deployed out of home waters in more than ten years.
Even though both our presidents were visiting during the same period in the same vicinity, no formal engagements were conducted.
Diplomatic uses of sea power are more common in the Pacific, where PACOM has traditionally been commanded by a Navy admiral. Similarly, with SOUTHCOM now under Admiral James G. Stavridis, Navy ships have more frequently been used to assist in humanitarian-relief efforts. All this suggests that a combatant commander who wears a Navy uniform will better employ maritime forces for diplomatic missions.
Immediately following the attacks of 9/11, the U.S. government launched a campaign to repair strained relationships in an effort to reunite in the war against terrorism. As a direct result of a conversation between the President of the United States and the Chairman of China, a U.S. Navy destroyer was tasked to proceed to Qingdao for a diplomatic mission, the first since the EP-3 midair collision off China in April 2001.
On the morning of 24 November 2002, the USS Paul F. Foster (DD-964) rendezvoused with the Chinese destroyer Qingdao to enter Qingdao harbor as diplomats. Also during that period, the Paul F. Foster and USS Chancellorsville (CG-62) entered Cochin, India, to reestablish the series of Malabar bilateral naval exercises that had ceased after India's 1996 violation of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty.
In September 2008 Secretary of State Condolezza Rice visited Libya, signifying a new chapter in our relations with that country. She was the first in her office to travel there since 1953, when John Foster Dulles visited.4 A U.S. warship should now also visit Libya, as diplomatic representatives of our country.
Globalization: The international market has brought unprecedented changes to communications, transportation, and computer technology. New markets and greater access to wealth have resulted. Even though this phenomenon has introduced near-instant global communications for transactions, the goods purchased must arrive to the buyer for the transaction to close. Maritime trade accounts for 75 percent of all international trade, and the United States conducts 95 percent of its commercial trade via maritime conveyance.5
Rear Admiral Alfred Thayer Mahan assessed: "Sea power determined which nations rose and which ones fell, which ones got richer, and which ones got poorer."6 It is important that the international business community understand its reliance on the free flow of commerce. This strategic communications mission needs reviving.
Piracy: The call has gone out for like-minded countries to confront the lawlessness in the Gulf of Aden. This should be a no-brainer. The piracy crisis offers the opportunity for a diplomatic union of warships from China, India, and other nations with maritime interests at stake, such as Iran. Is this not the spirit of the maritime strategy supporting a renewed diplomatic emphasis in foreign policy?
Through this crisis, we have the opportunity to operate with adversaries for a common good. The ability for countries' warships to come together in a disciplined and controlled environment remains a valuable stepping-off point for follow-on diplomatic progress.
A picket line of a significant number of countries' warships off the coast in the Gulf of Aden, separated by radar-range coverage, would put a significant dent in the piracy plague. A big win for U.S. foreign policy leadership facilitated by the Navy's strategy, this would also be parallel to the new national security strategy.
Recommendations for Change
The Navy is in a unique position to expand the knowledge and support of the new maritime strategy, through insightful and mature leadership. The new administration's impending national security strategy and the State Department's anticipated expansion will usher in opportunities for the Navy to enhance influence ashore. DOD budget cuts will demand big changes in interservice and interagency interoperability. Capability overlaps between services must be matched with doctrine and leadership.
On the home front, the targeted briefing audience of the coperative strategy needs to be expanded to include Army and Air Force, as well as Department of State leadership. Navy leadership should prepare the Joint Force maritime component commanders to brief and educate their combatant commanders using the Navy's strategic communications plan.
We must foster renewed partnerships with the State Department—with DOD support. As author of the new strategy, the Navy should pave the way by educating other agencies and departments. This should be fun but needs to be done right. We should be the lead service in engagement and diplomacy, in the same way that Special Forces lead global efforts against terrorism and the Air Force leads space operations.
The Navy needs once again to engage the American people. They should know how maritime security impacts the global economy, and they should have access to their Navy. Mid-grade Navy leadership should be prepared to carry such a message when our ships sail into Charleston and other American harbors, with proud Navy hardware as our backdrop.
Similarly, overseas we must exploit diplomatic opportunities to advance the U.S. foreign-policy mission. That is our history as naval officers, and it will be a natural extension of our revitalized relationship with the State Department.
At the same time and along similar lines, we must continue to offer assistance with local problems such as natural disasters. These are times of unprecedented opportunities that need to be exploited. The country needs the Navy's insight, experience, and leadership to get it done. Sometimes opportunity knocks with a sledgehammer.
1. Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower, October 2007, Office of the Chief of Naval Operations.
2. "Clinton Moves to Widen Role of State Department," New York Times, 23 December 2008,
3. Rick Atkinson, Crusade: The Untold Story of the Perisan Gulf War (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1993), p. 217.
4. "Rice Seeks to Develop Strategic Ties With Libya," Wall Street Journal, 6 September 2008, p. 6.
5. General Victor Renuart, USAF. "Closing the Capability Gap," Naval War College Review, spring 2008.
6. Admiral Alfred Thayer Mahan, Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1660-1783 (Boston: Little, Brown, 1918).