Training and Readiness on the Cheap
By Commander David Dees and Lieutenant John Horn, U.S. Navy
Scheduled training exercises, while valuable, are a luxury only offered to those who have an upcoming deployment, and they often fall short of meeting all of the training and readiness (T&R) requirements for squadrons. They tend to focus on one aspect of training, thus requiring additional weapon-system trainer events or flights to achieve full readiness status. Furthermore, the cost of these detachments are increasingly under scrutiny due to ongoing budgetary challenges.
Many T&R qualifications in the E-2 Hawkeye community, for example, require the use of multiple aircraft and ships, but it’s not reasonable—much less, feasible—to have real exercises occur in order for squadrons to attain these qualifications. As a result, outside of the work-up cycle, the majority of T&R events come from a simulator. While there is no perfect solution to this problem, off-the-shelf exercises, or exercises built by individual units, provide a cost-effective option for gaining an extraordinary amount of T&R while building solid working relationships with other platforms inside the strike group and the joint community. The deployment of these low overhead exercises can serve as a model of how to maintain readiness during the next decade.
Exercise Grizzly Tempest
Using these ideas, before deploying in 2014, Carrier Airborne Early Warning Squadron 124 (VAW-124) designed a low-cost and scalable exercise that augmented the T&R gained during simulator events. While it is easy to view this as simply another “strike of the month,” this concept greatly exceeded the carrier air wing (CVW) strike in complexity and resulted in a joint exercise featuring both CVW and non-CVW aircraft. It encompassed land and surface targets and incorporated special-operations forces assets. The initial six-hour event as well as subsequent proceedings facilitated training in suppression of enemy air defense, maritime strike, air operations in maritime surface warfare, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) integration, tactical command and control, and special operations forces integration. In terms of the logistical footprint and non-flight-hour related costs, the event had low-overhead costs, with most units operating out of their home bases of Oceana Naval Air Station (NAS), Cherry Point Marine Corps Air Station, Jacksonville NAS, and Langley Air Force Base; VAW-124 was responsible for the overall planning.
In regards to the design and layout, VAW-124 used an open construct that allowed the exercise to be scaled up and down based on amount of participants and the desired mission set. To do this, the exercise was designed with the tenets of an open systems mindset—namely to be robust (able to function properly despite environmental changes), modular (using products that can be used in different ways), and mutable (able to be reshaped in response to changing requirements).1 Several of these aspects were tested during Grizzly Tempest 13-1 and 13-2 as well as Sharpen Shogun.
Many exercises rely on a defined scenario that requires a great deal of effort to tailor to a specific event, participating units and audiences, and the desired training objectives. They tend to have several cost-intensive aspects: a large staff to plan and facilitate the exercise, a hefty temporary additional duty bill, a defined schedule of events, and a significant footprint in terms of exercise participants. Exercise Grizzly Tempest and the family of similar exercises it has borne approached this problem in a different manner.2
To make the exercise robust, modular, and mutable, the focus was not on a defined scenario but a theater-based set of special instructions, governing documents, and airspace-control orders that could be used in a wide range of events. The required mission sets fit within the construct of the “theater” and allowed the actual scenario to be defined based on the participants.
While VAW-124 was able to independently coordinate Grizzly Tempest, shore-based institutions are better suited to serve as the facilitators of similar events. The open structure makes off-the-shelf exercises easy to plan, but they would benefit from regular scheduling and continuity among the people running them. Shore-based weapon schools are ideal candidates because they can maintain contact with prior participants and have the time and resources necessary for developing these types of events. This affords off-the-shelf exercises continuity and on sight expertise.
The construct built by VAW-124 was used three times in different environments. Despite the changes, the exercise construct was successful each time. While the three exercises had unique training foci, the structure’s robustness allowed for the exercise to be reshaped for the changing environment (both fiscal and terrestrial), diverse participants, and different focus areas that were desired. The model’s success in doing this demonstrates its ability to be applied to a broad spectrum of training environments.
Modular Construct
Grizzly Tempest 13-1 and 13-2 focused on different mission sets and threat simulations. VAW-124 designed a baseline set of special instructions and airspace-control orders that allowed the host unit to focus on the required mission sets for T&R. Each mission set was treated as a module that could be added or subtracted from the larger exercise. To do this, VAW-124 did not create unique modules for each mission set; instead it left the overall construct open enough to apply the needed mission sets. The overall construct served as a “standardized interface” that allowed for a new mission to be added without causing a ripple effect throughout the entire exercise. This meant that some missions were added fairly easily, while some (such as a long-range strike) were not. With an open structure, the number of events that can be supported and the T&R gained far exceeds the drawbacks of not being able to support certain mission sets.
The diverse environment is the key to successful off-the-shelf exercises. As units explore this construct, one of the most critical tasks is picking an environment that increases the chance of success. Understanding the opportunities and limitations offered by certain warning areas and ranges when developing the construct helps to build realistic expectations.
The specific training requirements, which primarily depend on the participants and the desired focus area, changed for each exercise. All three exercises saw an array of participants with the CVW being the primary customer. U.S Air Force fighters, special operations forces, or maritime-patrol aircraft, however, could just as easily have been the primary focus.
The scalable nature of the exercise allows any unit to be the primary focus. For example, additional “lanes” could be added under a helicopter maritime air control controller, or additional aircraft could be added to the close-air support stack under the control of an air wing forward air controller (airborne). Building the exercise in this manner allows it to adapt to the needs and participants, as well as uncontrollable weather contingencies.
The environment must also be fully utilized to add realism to the exercise. To have realistic training factors, military vessels at sea and commercial-automatic identification system (AIS) feeds were pulled from the Internet the morning of the exercise and built into target packs. As such, a training environment was developed where the aircrew was handed real target packets of ships in the area. Using AIS instead of a dedicated opposing force allowed the presentation to be changed to what was needed rather than attempt to move the entire exercise around an opposing force ship that did not reach the intended location for an event. The target of opportunity still required the aircrew to solve positive identification, collateral damage estimation, and other real-world issues, but had the confusion of forcing the aircrew to decipher one “target” cargo ship among numerous vessels.
Not Construct Alone
The success of an off-the-shelf exercise is not just based on its construct. While the idea of “Build it and they will come” works sometimes, it may result in poorly coordinated training that simply rehashes the same low-level training offered at the unit. Several key ideas that prevented Grizzly Tempest from becoming a “one and done” event were:
Building relationships early. VAW-124’s success in amassing joint assets was due to a historical relationship with many of the organizations and their key players. Moving the coordination of events such as this to a shore-based unit, such as a weapons training unit, prevents these relationships from atrophying during deployments. Events should occur regularly, as external assets are more likely to participate if they know they will get training that will actually happen. Failure to achieve either will quickly sour participants on the event.
Making it a valuable event for all participants. Events are often centered on the host unit. However, if T&R is not gained by every external asset, interest may be lost. Early communication with units about their training requests and structuring the exercise around these needs increases the value for everyone.
Coordinating with warfare commanders. Every carrier air wing squadron relies on the coordination with the strike warfare commander, but reaching out early to the destroyer squadron (DESRON) can greatly increase the training value. Early coordination with DESRON can allow surface vessels that are steaming during the exercise to participate. Additionally, using a white cell in the Tactical Combat Training System range with embedded DESRON watchstanders increases the realism of the exercise. (This same principle can be used during air defense exercises by employing the alternative air defense warfare commander or during any other exercise by utilizing the appropriate tactical-level commanders.) This can be a valuable and unique training opportunity for DESRON watchstanders prior to large group sails such as COMPTUEX (C2X).
Using the environment. Ships at sea and aircraft training in the warning area can serve as valuable assets to add realism to the event. While safety factors must be maintained, using non-players to add depth to the picture results in a more realistic presentation. VAW-124 did this during Grizzly Tempest 13-2 when a real-world AIS feed was used prior to and during the event to provide the exercise participants with information on particular ships that were currently sailing in the area instead of merely picking any ship sailing in the area. The same could be done by using aircraft operating in close proximity to simulate a non-factor combat air patrol. The key factor for success is to use all aspects of the environment and make last-minute adjustments using the real-world situation (military aircraft flying in the warning area, military or commercial ships at sea, etc.) to inject “intel” into the scenario.
The Department of Defense will not become any less fiscally conservative over the next decade. While dedicated training events such as Razor Talon, C2X, and others will continue, these events will increasingly be reserved to near-deployers. Off-the-shelf exercises can serve as a crucial method of employing flexible and tailor-able training at a fraction of the cost. By using local and joint assets that can provide support during a single flight as well as ships already at sea, these exercises can be shaped to meet the training and readiness deficiencies experienced by many units. Most important, it can be done in a sustainable manner that can be adapted to numerous training environments.
1. Timothy W. Simpson, Uwe Lautenschlager, and Farrokh Mistree, “Mass Customization in the Age of Information: The Case for Open Engineering Systems,” in W. H. Read, and A. L. Porter, eds., The Information Revolution: Present and Future (Greenwich, CT: Ablex, Spring 1998), www.srl.gatech.edu/library/corepapers/SIMPSON_INFOREV_BOOK.pdf, 49–71.
2. LT (j.g.) Brian Seymour, USN, “VAW-112 hosts admiral for air exercise,” Ventura County Star, 13 November 2013, www.vcstar.com/the-lighthouse/vaw-112-hosts-admiral-for-air-exercise.
Correcting Course
By Lieutenant Mike McLaughlin and Lieutenant Keal Harter, U.S. Navy
The primary objective of military intelligence is to arm commanders with immediate and accurate threat analysis in a complex range of environments. Nowhere is this more necessary than on board a U.S. aircraft carrier. However, while these leviathans of power projection simultaneously combat multiple threats and conduct humanitarian relief with limited fiscal resources, naval intelligence support has lagged behind due to the misallocation of personnel and resources. But these shortfalls can easily be corrected by leveraging advancements in naval communication and transferring analysts from deployed units to focused intelligence centers (FICs), thereby cutting personnel costs while equipping them with enhanced connectivity, longer tours, and the ability to become subject matter experts.
Current Paradigm
The current architecture of naval intelligence on board an aircraft carrier was contrived when communication with national agencies was technologically infeasible. With the advent of personal computers and national classified networks, the infinite amount of information in the hands of analysts has greatly streamlined and enhanced the intelligence cycle by including myriad national assets and allowing for collaboration across the entire intelligence community (IC). But afloat units have become their own worst enemy. With the vast improvement and increased availability of information, limited bandwidth inhibits shipboard analysts from pulling information resident on these classified networks, conducting in-depth analysis, and providing a complete and timely operational picture. The overwhelming majority of an afloat analyst’s day is spent downloading information, which results in very little actual analysis. The ultimate outcome is the regurgitation of other agencies’ analyses, which adds little to the IC for the extremely high price paid for intelligence personnel embarked on board.
However, even if bandwidth were increased such that the pace of information collection was commensurate with the analytical capability of the embarked intelligence team, the fluid nature of carrier operations precludes expertise. While deployed, intelligence teams devote their attention to the threat not only in the waters through which they sail, but also to that of their ultimate operating area. Currently, over the course of a seven-month deployment, a West Coast carrier spends nearly equal time supporting both U.S. Pacific Command (PACOM) and U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM). The intelligence team on board, having their focus thus divided, is so hindered that for them to become subject matter experts in either area of responsibility (AOR) is impossible. This fact, coupled with the limited bandwidth, leaves commanders to rely on recommendations from a team that has the capacity to provide neither timely nor expert analysis. Additionally, with the current carrier turnover rate in the CENTCOM AOR, just as the incumbent intelligence team is truly mastering its craft, the torch is passed to a fresh carrier that has spent the previous seven weeks focusing entirely on the PACOM problem set. This turnover results in severe peaks and valleys of overall intelligence support.
Furthermore, under the current structure, analysts attached to carrier strike groups (CSGs) are ineffectively utilized. There are, on average, 70 personnel across all intelligence centers embarked with each CSG. At most, there are three carriers underway at any given time, allowing for less than a third of the total number actively engaging in their respective theater’s problem set from their deployed work center. Meanwhile, the majority of the non-deployed intelligence workforce is consumed by collateral duties, which in no way provide intelligence support to the operator or professionally prepare analysts for deployment. In sum, this underutilization of personnel, inhibited access to information, and lack of intelligence expertise brought on by CSG schedules is unsustainable if the U.S. Navy is to remain strategically engaged in multiple theaters in the current fiscal environment.
The Way Ahead
The Fleet Intelligence Detachment (FID) concept currently in place allows for certain personnel to be assigned to shore-based intelligence centers: the Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI) in Suitland, Maryland; Naval Strike and Air Warfare Center (NSAWC) in Fallon, Nevada; and various Navy information operations centers (NIOCs). These sailors fall under the administrative control of Navy Cyber Forces and are used to augment deployable units. Being stationed at shore-based intelligence centers enables analysts to hone their trade in an environment focused on their respective problem set. FID personnel comprise the backbone of corporate knowledge for deployable units. Unimpeded by bandwidth limitations and collateral duty requirements while ashore, FID personnel arrive on board fully prepared to support the entire work-up cycle and deployment, after which they return to their respective intelligence centers. And while the FID concept is a positive step, it still does not allow naval intelligence to fully meet the requirements necessitated by the current threat environment.
To overcome these limitations, the paradigm of large intelligence teams on board carriers must be broken. By expanding on the current FID concept, naval intelligence can establish permanent shore-based support to deployable units that will cut personnel costs, provide vastly improved analytical capability, and increase overall maritime domain awareness. The Navy must create a contingent of specialized personnel with the ability to focus on a particular threat without the limitations faced by deployable units: focused intelligence centers (FICs).
An FIC is a stateside watch floor with the ability to provide unimpeded battle space (air, surface, subsurface) and theater-specific support to deployable units. Reassigning deployable analysts from CSGs and COCOM watch floors to FICs will allow analysts to focus not only on a specific AOR’s problem set, but also to provide expert analysis of threats in a particular battle space. For ease of implementation, FICs can be established at the current FID sites.
At each individual FIC, analysts will be divided into teams based on the AOR, who will man 24-hour watch floors analyzing their FIC’s threat. The ONI FIC, for instance, will be chartered to specialize in surface, subsurface, and coastal-defense cruise-missile threats, while the NSAWC teams will specialize in threat aircraft and surface-to-air missiles within their respective AORs. Due to the specialization of each team, analysts will have the ability to truly become subject matter experts, providing greatly enhanced situational awareness. For example, the ONI FIC’s PACOM surface team will focus on the Chinese and North Korean surface threat—their capabilities, tactics and deployment cycles, even tendencies of specific commanders—without being forced to divert their attention and look ahead at the impending Iranian threat. Instead, as the carrier chops from PACOM to CENTCOM, intelligence support to that unit will also transfer to the CENTCOM team at each FIC. In this way, the intelligence picture is never degraded, effectively eliminating peaks and valleys of expertise.
Additionally, the analysis and production being undertaken at FICs relieves deployable units of the burden of completing the intelligence cycle with partial information resulting from limited bandwidth. CSGs will receive finished products from their AOR-specific watch floor at each FIC. This shift will transform CSG intelligence collection from a “pull” architecture, whereby analysts are undertaking bandwidth intensive research to create finished products onboard, to a “push” construct, whereby finished products are created with greater ease by experts at the FICs and sent directly to the embarked unit.
The FIC construct is not advocating total removal of intelligence personnel from CSGs, but rather eliminating the analysis being done onboard. Embarked on the carrier will be the CSG intelligence officer, cryptologic resource coordinator, air wing intelligence officer, ship’s intelligence officer, and destroyer squadron intelligence officer. These personnel will act as primary interlocutors between their respective commanders and the FICs, maintaining the personal relationships so necessary in intelligence support to operations. This is already a proven concept, as senior intelligence officers on board act as the sole intermediaries between more junior intelligence personnel and the commanders, and further proven by independent-duty intelligence specialists (IDISs) embarked on board cruisers and destroyers. IDISs are the lone intelligence representative on board their respective ships, relying almost entirely on the CSG or shore-based commands for analytical support.
Aside from the improved intelligence support to deployed units, there are inherent economic benefits to the FIC construct. Each watch floor will require a fraction of the analysts currently required to man ten CSGs, while allowing for analysts to have longer orders to their assigned shore command. Currently, analysts assigned to Naval Forces Central Command, for instance, are on one-year unaccompanied orders to Bahrain. Typically these types of tours are viewed by analysts as steppingstones to better follow-on tours, which yields less than desired motivation for quality analysis. FICs, conversely, would allow for analysts to be on three to five year-long shore tours, during which they are able to truly hone their skills in an environment that demands their very best. Additionally, by staggering orders within FIC AOR teams, the differing levels of intelligence expertise endemic to the current paradigm will be replaced by an ever-improving baseline of excellence.
Nothing short of excellence will suffice if naval intelligence is to meet the requirements of the 21st-century Navy. The FIC concept is, in essence, a redistribution of analysts from deployable units to shore-based intelligence centers, arming them with the capability to combat the dynamic threats faced by the Navy in an ever tightening fiscal environment. It is a concept that naval intelligence cannot afford to ignore.
Lieutenant Harter was a targeting officer for Carrier Air Wing 7. He is a graduate of the University of Michigan and the London School of Economics.
Less than the Sum of Their Parts
By Captain Tom Negus, U.S. Navy (Retired)
Recent naval policy illuminates the lack of coherence and continuity regarding the definition, composition, command-and-control, and capabilities of expeditionary strike groups (ESGs). Nine years after the “ESG experiment” officially concluded, there remains too much confusion about what ESGs are, their mission sets, and the balance of operational and administrative utility that they serve. The absence of focus and vision in the development of ESGs suggests a lack of seriousness in the Navy about amphibious warfare in general. With the dawning introduction of incredible new amphibious ships, aircraft, and connectors, we must reevaluate what the nation needs from its amphibious force and how it should be organized to meet that demand.
In this era of dwindling dollars, the Navy can no longer afford to waste manpower, intellect, and money on confusing organizational constructs such as the ESG that serve no significant warfighting purpose.
Taking a Fix
ESGs were officially created on 31 March 2006 when then-Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Mike Mullen and then-Commandant of the Marine Corps General Mike Hagee met and agreed that the multi-year ESG trial “was over” and the concept of the ESG was “accepted.”1 However, within the first three years of official inception, the ESG concept morphed from being defined by “stuff” to being defined by “staff”; its mission changed from rotational deployment to crisis response; and administrative-control duties transformed from a divestiture “of the preponderance of non-operational functions” to a resumption of traditional amphibious group functions through the additional duty assignment to type commanders (TYCOMs) for the material readiness of amphibious ships and units.2 The one thing that did not change during the redefinition of composition, purpose, and function of an ESG was the stripped-down staff-manning structure of the continental United States (CONUS)-based ESGs, despite published direction to revisit manning levels after one year of operational experience.3
Recent exercises have added to the confusion. The Bold Alligator series of amphibious exercises, focused on ESG command during Marine Expeditionary Brigade (MEB) assault operations, purports an intrinsic ESG warfighting capability that is not found in Navy policy or doctrine, nor is it a resourced mission set. These exercises have further clouded Navy thinking on how to organize and command amphibious warfare.
The result of this unfocused amalgamation of policy and practice has been a Galapagos-like evolution of each of the three permanent ESGs, influenced uniquely by local staff structure and manning, Concept of Operations Plan requirements, and personalities of local leaders.
Land the Landing Force
How can the Navy correct this failure of vision and demonstrate a seriousness of purpose befitting the efforts of the thousands of sailors and Marines who have pledged their sweat, effort, and potentially lives to this global capability? First, the term “ESG” is used in a variety of settings and has both operational and administrative connotations. This should cease. Three separate organizations are confusingly referred to as ESGs: Expeditionary Strike Groups 2, 3, and 7 are permanent Navy administrative commands listed in the standard naval distribution list series as Echelon 4 commands beneath their respective fleet commander. (ESG 2 is the exception as an Echelon 3 command reporting directly to the Commander of U.S. Fleet Forces Command.)
These ESGs are commanded, obviously, by a Navy flag officer and have both administrative and operational responsibilities. Inherent within the permanent commands of ESGs 2, 3, and 7 is the ability to create a temporary “afloat ESG,” an operational organization that is a separate and distinct entity from the Navy’s permanent ESGs in that it can be commanded by either a flag or general officer. In fact, the Required Operational Capability/Potential Operational Environment (ROC/POE) document further specifies that if the ESG commander deploys, the ESG chief of staff will then “exercise command authority over the RE [Rear Echelon] and assigned units” and that “the ESG RE shall be manned to carry out the CONUS missions of the ESG regardless of the deployed CE staff.”4 Even in the event of a temporary afloat ESG deployment, the permanent commands of ESG 2/3/7 remain in place. The ROC/POE also differentiates between the permanent commands of ESG 2/3/7 and that of a temporary afloat ESG when it specifies that the deputy afloat ESG commander ought to be from the alternate service as the commander.5
Naval policy ought to better articulate the differences between these two organizations by renaming the operational command an “afloat ESG”—a temporary operational command-and-control organization that is given a task force designator and named after the flagship on which it embarks (e.g., “USS Bataan [LHD-5] ESG”). Further, MEB-capable task organizations need to be separated from these other two discrete organizations. A permanent ESG does not equal an “afloat ESG,” and neither equals a MEB-capable task organization. On a related note, Navy leaders ought to be more careful in avoiding the term “ESG” when they really mean “ARG/MEU”—the use of “ESG” as a deployment force was eliminated nearly six years ago, but embarrassingly still finds its way into speeches, war games, and general conversation.
Second, Navy participation in MEB-level exercises should be curtailed until the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations (OPNAV) assigns missions of this size to an ESG and codifies the staff structure required to conduct them. This would force cogent conversation about what the Navy really wants for our amphibious forces. Continuing exercise series such as Bold Alligator without that corporate buy-in (in the form of a funded OPNAV mission requirement) is disingenuous, leads to widespread “handwaving” just to get through the exercise, and is internally and externally misleading about our true amphibious capabilities and expectations of an ESG. A series of lower-cost, lower-impact war games could instead complement the discussions about how the Navy can support MEB operations to determine appropriate command structures, resources required, and an intellectually honest level of corporate commitment.
If MEB operations are required by a combatant commander, there is certainly no doubt as to whom they would turn. The ESG commander is clearly and personally assigned a role in MEB-level operations; the current ROC/POE states, “For MEB-level amphibious operations, ESG Commanders act as commander, amphibious task force and shall be a co-equal planner with an MEB Commanding General.”6 However, permanent ESG staffs are not manned to support such operations; MEB-capable ESG operations or requirements are not defined in Navy policy, nor are MEB operations listed in ESG staff required operational capabilities beyond that of “creating and controlling communication plans for Integrated Group Communications among Naval, Combined, or Joint Forces to include MEB sized amphibious task group operations.”7 If there is a determined commitment to supporting MEB operations, fleet commanders should maintain a manning document (by billet and name) to draw on from local staffs.
Third, the current ROC/POE should be rewritten to specifically address the requirements of a temporary afloat ESG as defined by OPNAV while clearly articulating the differences between temporary contingency afloat ESGs and shore-based, permanent ESGs.8 Depending on Navy deliberations about the level of support for MEB-level operations (the second recommendation), OPNAV ought to promulgate a separate ROC/POE articulating specific staffing requirements, roles, and responsibilities for a MEB-level-capable staff organization.
By policy, afloat ESGs provide planning capability beyond that inherent within an amphibious squadron staff, and in practice, provide the flag leadership oftentimes necessary to get a seat at the joint task force table during contingencies. The ROC/POE should be as unambiguous as the policy to eliminate confusion about the capabilities of these temporary contingency constructs.
Fourth, the Navy should reassign permanent ESGs back to type commanders. The Navy can best enhance our nation’s amphibious warfighting capability by reassigning ESGs’ administrative-control responsibilities in support of the appropriate type commander. Remember, ARG/MEUs are already commanded by Navy and Marine Corps major commanders. There is no shortage of operational amphibious expertise to lead these potent amphibious arsenals. Meanwhile, the fundamental product of our CONUS-based staffs is the readiness of our warfighting units, yet the TYCOMs that man, train, and equip them have been significantly pared down in recent years. ESGs can help.
ESG staffs ought to be realigned under the TYCOM as amphibious readiness and training experts, familiar with amphibious missions, and with their assigned ships and people. As an added benefit, through increased deckplate familiarity with their units, ESG commanders and their staffs would be best prepared to embark an ARG/MEU if called on to form an afloat ESG during contingency or crisis.
Additionally, there remains conflicting guidance among Standard Navy Distribution List, ROC/POE, and Commander, U.S. Fleet Forces Command and Commander, U.S. Pacific Fleet (FFC/CPF) guidance regarding fitness reports and limits of operational and administrative ownership/authority that is worked out within each fleet based upon the personalities of the local players. Reassigning permanent ESGs back to the TYCOM will eliminate much of that confusion.
Fifth, the Navy should restructure ESG manning to support the administrative control needs of assigned amphibious units. CONUS-based ESG manning remains frozen by an out-of- date deployment model that fails to adequately address the current needs of our amphibious force or the Navy’s amphibious mission. ESG staffs are disproportionally filled with intelligence, information, and operational specialists—taking up 38 of 63 assigned billets. These personnel ought to be permanently assigned elsewhere, and be made available to form an afloat ESG, should circumstances require. A more traditional manning model based upon the administrative needs of the force should be put in place. ESGs do not deploy, yet they are manned as if they do. This is a waste.
At Best, Inattention
It can be concluded from the incoherent history of ESGs that there was no clear vision or sustainable purpose in driving the Navy to the present situation in the amphibious community. Clearly no systemic warfighting capability has been gained, as evidenced by the continual corporate redefinition about the role and missions of ESGs. Periodic proclamations about ESG utility fall apart when viewed against inconsistent warfighting and administrative aspirations.
We cannot approach the future of amphibious warfare with the same lack of vision evidenced by the bedeviled development of ESGs in the past. As the Navy–Marine Corps team employs an increasingly dazzling array of platforms and capabilities, determining how best to organize, command and control, man, train, equip, maintain, and employ tomorrow’s amphibious forces has never had higher import. A rigorous reassessment of the purpose and utility of the ESG will help refine a sustainable vision for amphibious warfare and will touch upon all of these issues.
It is time to get serious about amphibious warfare, and the Navy can best start by fixing the ESGs.
1. Office of the Chief of Naval Operations, N3/N5 P-4 031032Z, 3 May 2006.
2. Joint message from Commander, U.S. Fleet Forces Command/Commander, U.S. Pacific Fleet/Commander, Marine Forces Command/Commander, Marine Corps Forces, Pacific 132118Z, “ESG Way Ahead Message Number 1,” 13 January 2009. Commander, U.S. Fleet Forces Command/Commander, U.S. Pacific Fleet/Commander, Marine Forces Command/Commander, Marine Corps Forces, Pacific 131845Z, “ESG Way Ahead Message Number 3,” 13 November 2009. Commander, U.S. Fleet Forces Command/Commander, U.S. Pacific Fleet/Commander, Marine Forces Command/Commander, Marine Corps Forces, Pacific 131845Z, “ESG Way Ahead Message Number 3,” 13 November 2009. Commander, U.S. Fleet Forces Command/Commander, U.S. Pacific Fleet, 050915Z, “Strike Group and Type Commander Relationships,” 5 August 2010.
3. Commander, U.S. Fleet Forces Command, 121307Z, “Standardization of Permanent Manning Billets for CONUS Based ESGs,” 12 January 2007.
4. OPNAV Instruction F3501.319B, “Required Operational Capabilities and Projected Operational Environments for Expeditionary Strike Group Staffs,” 9 September 2009.
5. Ibid.
6. Ibid.
7. Ibid.
8. OPNAVINST 3501.316B, “Policy for Baseline Composition and Basic Mission Capabilities of Major Afloat Navy and Naval Groups,” 21 October 2010, http://doni.daps.dla.mil/Directives/03000%20Naval%20Operations%20and%20Readiness/03-500%20Training%20and%20Readiness%20Services/3501.316B.pdf.