‘Up Ladder!’
Nothing Like a Good Maritime Raid
(See K. Albaugh and J. Carriker, pp. 58–62, January 2012; R. Salta, p. 8, and B. Armstrong, pp. 40–45, February 2012 Proceedings)
Lieutenant Kurt Albaugh, U.S. Navy—Mr. Salta proposes a seemingly attractive solution to man ship-boarding teams with Marines. Lieutenant Commander Armstrong’s article expresses a similar idea. Certainly, no one would argue that the Marine Corps isn’t up to the task; Marines have proven time and again that they can excel at any mission, and both Mr. Salta and Lieutnenant Commander Armstrong rightfully point to the Marine Corps’ rich heritage of combat actions at sea.
Their respective proposals, however, do not come without risks. The table of organization for a Marine rifle company indicates that half of a rifle platoon is adequate to furnish a ship detachment. By dividing a company (six detachments), a strike group could man each ship with a team of Marines—this aligns with Lieutenant Commander Armstrong’s discussion of a “Company Landing Team” (CoLT). But neither he nor Mr. Salta discusses the source of those Marines.
If CoLTs are detached from Marines deployed in amphibious ready groups (ARGs) and dispersed—possibly over hundreds of miles—the ARG would be less flexible to conduct missions requiring concentrated forces. This increases operational risk for combatant commanders.
If we alternatively deploy CoLTs in addition to the Marines we deploy in ARGs, what effect will Marines experience on their deployment tempo? A one-CoLT-per-strike-group plan would require an aggregate deployment of one-half to two-thirds of an infantry battalion just to man the ships deployed to the Fifth Fleet. How will this allocation affect a shrinking Marine Corps?
Finally, if the Navy abdicates its role in boarding operations completely, what happens when global events require Marines to return to sands and jungles to fight, as they have in the previous decade? What risk are we accepting by using Marines when the enemy’s vote might strip the Navy of these detachments, leaving it struggling to reconstitute naval boarding teams?
Shortly after our article’s publication in the January issue, we saw the highly publicized rescue of Iranian mariners from Somali pirates by the boarding team from the USS Kidd (DDG-100). In addition to fulfilling a core Navy mission of protecting seaborne commerce, the rescue shaped public opinion during a time of escalating tension between Iran and the United States. This strategic value underscores our article’s point that boardings are critical missions and therefore deserve significant resources. Tapping Marines to fulfill the boarding mission doesn’t solve all of the problems of the current system, but rather transfers some of those problems to another service.
There are many ways to rethink manning, training, and equipping boarding teams, and proposals like those of Mr. Salta and Lieutenant Commander Armstrong are viable options. But military leaders and policymakers considering this issue should not consider Marine boarding teams a quick, cheap, risk-free fix compared to further developing the Navy’s capacity.
Commander Tyrone G. Martin, U.S. Navy (Retired)—In using Commodore Silas Talbot’s cutting-out of the French privateer ex-Sandwich in 1800 as an example of a successful raid, Lieutenant Commander Armstrong neglected to mention that the raid was an invasion of the sovereign territory of a nation with which we were not at war—even “quasi.” Perhaps the inactivity of the Spanish forces ashore was due to that commander’s reluctance to start a war on his own recognizance. In any event, the act was disavowed by the U.S. government and the privateer returned to her French masters.
So Much Strategy, So Little Strategic Direction
(See M. Junge, pp. 46–50, February 2012 Proceedings)
Colonel Mark Cancian, U.S. Marine Corps Reserve (Retired)—Commander Junge makes a fair point that budgeteers tend to make short-term, ad hoc decisions whereas strategists would (ideally) make long term, integrated decisions. But as the old saying goes, when you point an accusing finger, one points at the target but four point back at you. The reason that budgeteers make key decisions about forces and weapons is that strategists have been unable to do so. Consider the Navy’s current strategy document, A Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower. There are lot of nice words about goals, threats, and capabilities, but nothing that would seriously shape a budget. How many ships does the Navy need? Should the Navy buy more DDG-1000s or DDG-51s? What mix of fourth- and fifth-generation aircraft would be viable? The strategy does not even begin to answer these questions, so budgeteers make those decisions by default. If strategists really want to shape the naval services, they must come down out of the clouds of theory and be willing to make the tough choices.
The Emerging Arctic Frontier
(See R. J. Papp Jr., pp.16–21, February 2012 Proceedings)
Harold N. Boyer—Admiral Papp makes a cogent and persuasive argument for an increased U.S. presence in the Arctic. However, I feel that he did not argue strongly enough for an increase in the number of dedicated U.S. Coast Guard heavy icebreakers to support existing and future Arctic missions. At present, the Coast Guard only has the USCGC Healy (WAGB-20) as a purpose-designed heavy icebreaker. The USCGC Polar Star (WAGB-10) is undergoing maintenance and will return to sea in 2013. The USCGC Polar Sea (WAGB-11) was decommissioned in 2010. Both the Polar Sea and Polar Star were commissioned in the mid-1970s.
That leaves the Coast Guard with one heavy icebreaker. This situation is intolerable and is the result of poor decision-making on the part of a Congress that funded unnecessary and unwinnable wars instead of domestic security concerns. Both nature and geopolitics abhor a vacuum. Unless the United States establishes a viable, strong, and visible presence in the Arctic, both Russia and China will do so to our detriment. The Royal Canadian Navy is incapable of patrolling and policing its vast Arctic frontier, so the United States will have to fill this vacuum to the benefit of both nations.
What is to be done? The Healy and eventually the Polar Star will have to fill the short-term gap. Additionally, the Polar Sea should undergo an immediate and intensive maintenance program to get her back to sea. Admittedly, the Polar Sea and the Polar Star have served more than 30 years and are showing their age. Yet, as I have written on these pages before, old does not mean useless when it comes to ships. Properly maintained, there is no reason why ships can not serve 40 or 50 years. Is putting millions of dollars into vessels this old a poor allocation of scarce resources? Not when the alternative is having only one heavy icebreaker available for the foreseeable future. Ideally, money should be put into newly designed and constructed icebreakers. Unfortunately, this is not going to happen soon, so it becomes a case of perfect being the enemy of good. Spend some money now and have three heavy icebreakers at sea, or wait a decade or two with only one at sea.
Another issue is the arming of these icebreakers. As Admiral Papp notes, the Healy is often the only federal presence in the Arctic. Do we want a ship going into harm’s way unarmed? The USNS Lewis and Clark (T-AKE-1) found herself in this situation on 6 May 2009 when she was steaming alone and was attacked by Somali criminals. Being unarmed, her only defense was her 20-knot speed. Let’s not put the Healy, Polar Star, and Polar Sea in this situation. Both the latter can be fitted with the OtoBreda 76/62 Super Rapid gun and two 25-mm Bushmaster guns while undergoing maintenance. The Healy can be similiarly fitted during her next scheduled maintenance.
Admiral Papp has identified Arctic missions for today and tomorrow. Let’s give him the tools necessary to begin to get the job done while planning a comprehensive fleet of heavy icebreakers for the future.
Sailors Need to Learn Navy History
(See T. D. Tavolazzi, p.12, January 2012 Proceedings)
Vice Admiral Robert F. Dunn, U.S. Navy (Retired); President, Naval Historical Foundation—Lieutenant Commander Tavolazzi describes a problem that has waxed hot and cold for years; today would seem to be a cold period. A few years ago, at the behest of concerned chief petty officers and supported by the Chief of Naval Education and Training, the Naval Historical Foundation (NHF) funded and arranged for the production of a series of 16 “U.S. Navy Heritage” videos. Each five-minute video described with appropriate pictures, diagrams, and narration an important event in Navy history. The video series was donated to the Navy, with the intent that it be shown in recruit training and at the start of periods of general military training (GMT). Some examples of the video topics include: Pearl Harbor, the Battle of the Atlantic, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Battle of Midway, the Battle of Hampton Roads, and more. One can see them on the NHF website: www.navyhistory.org/programs, Navy Heritage Miniseries Videos.
As so often happens, when the press of other business took priority, the regular showing of the videos fell by the wayside—though they may still be in use at individual commands. That should not have happened, but a wonderful opportunity to begin to correct the problem cited by Lieutenant Commander Tavolazzi is still available, at no cost to individual units or to the Navy. Today, those DVDs sit gathering dust on the shelves of the Naval History and Heritage Command and the NHF. How wonderful it would be, and what a boon to the understanding of why our Navy’s history is important, were they to be used in GMT or some similar venue once again.
China is Protecting North Korea’s Nukes
(See J. A. Bosco, p. 10, December 2011, and E. A. McVadon and D. Yoon, pp. 9, 84, February 2012 Proceedings)
Joseph A. Bosco—Rear Admiral McVadon and Mr. Yoon employ colorful language in stating their unhappiness with my article. They characterize it as “fall[ing] both to the stroke of Occam’s razor and to the laws of logic, as he substitutes novel constructs for credible explanations.”
What are the facts that need explaining? (1) North Korea has built nuclear weapons and a missile-delivery system at least initially with direct and indirect Chinese support. (2) China has consistently used its diplomatic clout and U.N. Security Council seat to protect North Korea from meaningful international condemnation and sanctions. (3) The Pyongyang regime would collapse without Chinese material support.
Henry Kissinger has long stated authoritatively that “China is the only country that possesses the necessary leverage to rein in North Korea’s ominous nuclear weapons program.” That fact becomes all the more salient in light of another Kissinger observation: “Actually, North Korea is a bigger threat to China than to us.”
In recent years, Kissinger and others in the West have begun to ask what would seem to have been the obvious question all along: Why has China not used its decisive, existential leverage over North Korea to persuade or compel it to give up its nuclear weapons?
The conventional answer begins with the assumption that China shares Western concerns about North Korea’s arsenal. Building on that assumption is another: that Beijing fears that if North Korea’s leaders were presented with a choice of continuing the nuclear program and losing Chinese support, or ending it and assuaging China while also gaining a massive infusion of Western aid and technical assistance, they would opt for regime suicide.
Of course, there is no evidence that China has ever presented Pyongyang with anything like such an ultimatum. Nor has the West ever pressed China to do so, preferring willfully to suspend its disbelief that China might have other motives.
Kissinger has himself struggled to explain China’s indulgence of North Korea’s nuclear program. In a 1994 interview, he offered conflicting rationales: China is: (a) ambivalent, (b) afraid North Korea would attack South Korea, (c) waiting until Kim Il-sung dies, and (d) hoping the United States “will take care of the problem.” A few months later, he added another explanation: China “prefer[s] a divided Korea and might see in a modest North Korean nuclear capability a means to guarantee it.”
Rear Admiral McVadon and Mr. Yoon state that “Beijing admits early inadequate concern about North Korean nuclear programs and may acknowledge a recent lessened intensity on the matter.” We’re not told what China was doing about the problem during the undefined middle period. Like the writers, I have heard no Chinese scholar or official admit Beijing’s collusion with North Korea’s nuclear program.
“Is China’s lead in the Six-Party Talks a huge hoax?” The question answers itself. Kissinger and others complain that 15 years have produced no results as the West has repeatedly bought and paid for the same promises. The letter writers do not address my compilation of the strategic benefits China has accrued during that period.
Hope springs eternal. So does Pyongyang’s nuclear-weapons capacity.
Maximizing Minimum Manning
(See J. Schonberg, pp. 52–57, January 2012, and P. L. Dragone, pp. 8–9, February 2012 Proceedings)
Captain Ralph Poore, U.S. Navy (Retired)—To my knowledge, the last time the Navy’s Enlisted Occupational Classification System (NEOCS) was reviewed with an intent to “modernize” it was 1973. I was privileged to be a part of that review, which was led by Rear Admiral Roland Freeman, well known for his talents in Navy logistics.
The draft had just ended, and one fear was that the Navy could not maintain a high percentage of upper-mental-group recruits. Moreover, the classification system was becoming very complex, not with just the various enlisted ratings, but with hundreds of sub-specialization codes (NECs). As a result, the Chief of Naval Personnel chartered a study group to see what might be done to simplify the system and at the same time prepare for the future.Admiral Freeman organized this body of officer and enlisted personnel into two teams wherein we all listened to multiple individuals in executive positions from every walk of life.This immersion into the world outside the Navy lasted several months during which we sat and listened five days a week and absorbed all these various inputs.
At the end of these sessions each team was independently tasked to review the Enlisted Occupational System and suggest changes. More input came from senior individuals Admiral Freeman had contacted concerning this study. Bias began to appear and special interests were not afraid to insure their specific communities would benefit from study-group recommendations.Each team generated a long list of recommendations that were compiled and presented to Admiral Freeman. The team I led produced what was titled “The Forward Plan,” which was selected as the end-product of the overall study. It was briefed to all senior flag officers in the Navy and their various staff members, prior to presenting it to the Chief of Naval Personnel and the Chief of Naval Operations. The plan had more than 75 recommendations, each backed by logic and common sense, and had other findings as well which were intended to be implemented to avoid problems downstream.
Most of those recommendations were never accepted, but some were, including the disestablishment of the steward rating and the creation of the legalman rating and the chaplain’s assistant. (The latter two were included to appease those Navy communities.)It was clear that bias in just about every corner of the Navy combined to reject all the other suggestions. One that sticks in my memory was the fact that in 1973, the Navy ranks were 7 percent female. The combination of demographics, educational structure, birth rates and death rates, and the need to maintain high-level mental groups in our recruiting indicated the Navy must plan for a 20-percent female population. To accommodate this impact, many changes would be required downstream. These were cited as legal, physical, educational, and moral issues that should be addressed.Perhaps it is time once again to review the Enlisted Occupational System with an eye toward real modernization with the goal of minimum manning.
Captain George P. Woodward Jr., U.S. Navy Reserve (Retired)—I guess I’m really out of touch and over the hill, but what is the uniform those sailors are wearing on page 54 of the January issue? I understand the desert-camouflage uniform where you are trying to blend in with the sand, or the jungle uniform blending in with the greenery. But what are these folks supposed to blend into—a bow wave or sea spray? I proudly wore a “sailor suit”—blues, whites, dungarees, white hat, blue flat hat—for eight years. Why do they always have to mess with a good thing?