Mine Warfare Needs a New Concept of Operations
(See R. Alkonis, pp. 56–61, October 2020)
Lieutenant Alkonis’s award-winning essay states the obvious: Mine warfare (he actually meant mine countermeasures) certainly does need a new concept of operations. However, he unfortunately accepts the Navy’s current bumper sticker—“removing the man from the minefield”—as the basis and measure of effectiveness.
The Navy has lost its way in this warfare area. To me, the purpose of mine countermeasures is to get the men and women on ships safely through the minefield. Any concept of operations, any tactics, any equipment, any training that does not focus on getting safely through the minefield misses the real measure of effectiveness.
—CAPT Robert B. O’Donnell, USN (Ret.)
Basic Principles for a Complex Nuclear Environment
(See A. Howard, pp. 32–37, October 2020)
Lieutenant Howard’s analysis is a valuable contribution on nuclear policy. However, Basic Principles of State Policy of the Russian Federation on Nuclear Forces is of such import that it is unfortunate that Proceedings did not include the full text as a sidebar.
A word of caution concerning translation is appropriate. We do not know who translated the Russian version of this document into English—a human translator with near-native competency in the language, culture, and schools of military thought of both sides (the best case) or a machine trained from limited nonspecialist sources (the worst case)—nor do we have more than the conjecture of Western policy analysts on why it was issued and its significance. It would be prudent to obtain the original Russian text and carefully scrutinize the translation.
It is notoriously difficult to translate accurately from Russian into English using either method. The novelist Vladimir Nabokov opined on “the sins of translation” regarding Russian literature at great length in his 4 August 1941 article in The New Republic, “The Art of Translation.” More recent authors have elaborated on the technical reasons for these difficulties. Key differences include word ordering, range of vocabulary, verb tenses, superlatives, active/passive voice, diminutives, and punctuation. In some cases, linguistic concepts that exist in one language do not exist in the other. Even with the best of intentions, the lens of translation is fraught with opportunities for inadvertent distortion/misunderstanding. There is an anecdote concerning the consternation of Cold War analysts on finding the Russian word translated as “prevent” with regard to nuclear exchanges, and understood in the context of the English translation as having a passive voice along the lines of “avoid,” actually had an active voice with a more bellicose meaning in the context of the original text.
Beyond the perils of mistranslation, we must remember the Russian military art of maskirovka. In the 1980s, an unpublished analysis of approximately a decade’s worth of Foreign Broadcast Information Service daily reports on Soviet broadcasts was conducted at the Naval Postgraduate School. It showed the Soviets tailoring the themes of commentary in their broadcasts depending on the target audience and language of address. It was not uncommon to encounter different emphases or contradictory messages on the same subject. The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs today publishes material in at least eight languages. In addition to careful scrutiny of the quality of the English language translation of Basic Principles, it would be prudent to perform similar analyses on other translations and to compare the translations for consistency. Should questionable renderings or inconsistencies between translations emerge, analysts should consider those differences before ways in which the Navy may need to adapt to Russia’s Basic Principles.
—CDR Phillip J. Keuhlen, USN (Ret.)
The author responds:
Commander Keuhlen rightly underscores the importance of translation—both the literal deciphering of words and the larger, more subjective decoding of the message for the audience. I acknowledge in the article’s introduction that Basic Principles is aimed at foreign readership and close by highlighting myriad unanswered questions about the document. While I agree that Basic Principles alone should not inform policy decisions in the Navy, the document serves as a useful data point within the broader conversation on undue risk with low-yield nuclear weapons; value remains in drafting a response to the translation Russia has presented.
Major Cutters Need Civilian Chief Engineers
(See K. Barrion, pp. 67–71, October 2020, and C. Webb, pp. 88–89, November 2020)
Lieutenant Commander Barrion proposes a novel solution to a critical issue that continues to erode the fleet’s readiness and morale. However, I think her solution may be misaimed.
Her premise is that the engineer officer (EO) does not have the skills or experience to meet expectations, a shortcoming she would address by adding a civilian chief engineer to each ship. While the EO is expected to have a thorough engineering background, the Coast Guard assigns chief warrant officers (CWOs) as main propulsion assistants (MPAs) on all major cutters. These members often have 20 or more years of experience, and I believe the intent of this billet structure was to provide a technical backstop for the department.
Making a comparison between the MPA or the senior enlisted members of the engineering department and a civilian chief engineer might better highlight the growing problem with the fleet. It is reasonable to expect these service members to be experts on the equipment for which they are responsible. Unfortunately, our training, qualification, advancement, and even assignment systems fail to prepare our highly motivated crews to meet this expectation.
This is both a readiness and a retention issue. For example, on a national security cutter, the main propulsion division includes a CWO MPA, a senior chief machinery technician, and a first-class machinery technician. This very expensive group of senior technicians will likely have more than 40 years of combined experience, and yet, thanks to a lack of training and a wide range of disconnected assignments throughout their careers, they will probably lack the expertise necessary to properly maintain and repair the complex equipment on our newest cutters.
I was executive officer on one of these ships; I recall seeing our extremely sharp main propulsion division leading petty officer sitting on the mess deck one day, looking as if his pet rock had died. When I asked him what was wrong, he lamented that we were paying a contractor to work on his engines, which he was forbidden from touching. He retired approximately one year later.
In that one in-port period, the Coast Guard spent almost $2 million just on main engine contract work. Two million dollars can pay for a lot of training and professional development. While Lieutenant Commander Barrion implores us to add another member to the crew, I recommend instead investing in current members to build the expertise they need and deserve. At a minimum, I hope the staffs evaluating retention read Malcolm Gladwell’s Drive before deciding to cut bonus checks to entice members to remain in our service.
—CAPT Mike Cilenti, USCG
Navy Awards Medium Unmanned Ship Contract
(See E. Walsh, p. 90, October 2020)
Is there a CONOPS for unmanned ships? What happens when something fails? What security is there for any cryptographic or other technology? Will they have any self-defense capability?
Unmanned sounds wonderful, but has it really been thought out?
—CAPT Jerry Hodge, USN (Ret.)
Asked & Answered
(See p. 96, October 2020)
C. E. Keating praised the Momsen Lung. This complicated apparatus was used in one submarine disaster. In October 1944, the USS Tang (SS-306) was sunk. Five crewmen survived through the forward escape trunk. But we do not know how many of these involved proper use of the lung, nor how many failed escapes involved the lung. It is misleading to say the Momsen Lung “has saved many lives.”
—C. W. Dueker
Naming the Future Barb (SSN-804)
(See R. Decesari, p. 9, August 2020)
It would seem our request has been heard and granted by Secretary of the Navy Kenneth J. Braithwaite. A Virginia-class Block V nuclear-powered attack submarine will be named Barb (SSN-804). An excellent choice by the secretary. The first USS Barb (SS-220) ranked third in tonnage sunk during World War II, with 96,628 confirmed tons sunk. She ranked 12th by ships sunk, with 17. Eugene B. “Lucky” Fluckey received the Medal of Honor while serving as her commanding officer.
The Barb went on to serve with Italy’s navy as the Enrico Tazzoli in 1954, making her one of the longest-serving Gato--class boats. The second Barb (SSN-596) also saw fame when she rescued the crew of a crashed B-52 off Guam during Typhoon Rita on 9 July 1972. So, Bravo Zulu to Secretary Braithwaite for this choice, and thank you very much from all of us old diesel boat sailors!
—CPO John Hummel, USN (Ret.)
Reflections on the Loss of the Thresher
(See J. Geurts, pp. 54–55, September 2020, and N. Thunman, p. 9, November 2020)
The article brought back sad memories. I was on board the USS Enterprise (CVN-65) in the Mediterranean Sea when the USS Thresher (SSN-593) went down, but I remember it as if it were yesterday. I, too, lost two people I knew. One had been my division officer; the other was a sailor I had trained and my friend.
I got out of the Navy in February 1964 and went to work as a reactor plant test engineer with Newport News Shipbuilding, where we were implementing the SubSafe program. The author left out a few things about the program. Until all SubSafe items were incorporated, no boat was allowed to operate below 700 feet. Also, the high-pressure air system increased from 3,000 pounds per square-inch (psi) to 4,500. We also had to test maximum blowdown to make sure the lines did not freeze up, as the author describes.
The USS Lewis and Clark (SSBN-644) was the first boat at Newport News to complete the SubSafe program and be permitted to go back to test depth. I went on Alpha sea trials. As a shipbuilder, my attitude was: Why should anyone in the Navy go to sea on a boat I built if I would not go to sea with her? As it happened, we had a fire on board when the boat was at 700 feet, so an emergency blow was conducted. That 4,500-psi air system had us on the surface very quickly.
Another important change was putting canvas boots around cable entrances to switchboards and changing switchboard cooling louvers so that water could not enter the switchboard from any direction. Water entering the round shape of the submarine hull under high sea pressure tends to follow the hull shape (Coandă effect). But once friction overcomes velocity, or an obstruction blocks the path, water can then move at any angle. It appears to have been shorting of the main switchgear that caused the reactor pumps to stop and the reactor to scram. A hard lesson learned.
—Bob Gabbert, Life Member
Admiral Thunman’s comment gives the impression that the wreckage of the Thresher, lost in April 1963, was first examined by Bob Ballard in a submersible in 1985. In fact, the Thresher’s wreckage had been closely examined, and pieces recovered, during the summer of 1963 by the U.S. Navy bathyscaph Trieste. That craft made several more dives on the Thresher over the next few years.
—Norman Polmar, author, Death of the
USS Thresher
Putting the NCO in PO: Enhancing Petty Officers as NCOs
(See J. Minor, pp. 16–17, July 2020)
There is much in Petty Officer Minor`s prize-winning essay, “Putting the NCO in PO: Enhancing Petty Officers as NCOs” that I agree with. But on one aspect I beg leave to differ.
In some ways, the Navy’s rate/rating style might be a contributing problem. I submit that a subtle but important change be made to the system. (I appreciate that a bigger change attempt several years ago ran into almost universal resistance. Perhaps my proposal might receive a better reception.) My intent is to indicate the leadership level of an individual, therefore, in my particular case, as a corpsman and senior chief, I would be identified as SCPO(HM).
In this way, the authority of the individual would be paramount, but, at the same time, specialty information would be preserved and communicated.
—SCPO Paul H. Sayles, USN (Ret.)
Buy the AT-6 Wolverine for the TacAir Community
(See I. Heinemann, pp. 20–21, September 2020)
Ensign Heinemann makes a positive case for realistic close-air support for our troops. I do not have to repeat any of his thinking; he is stating what I have espoused for years. Many of us feel huge frustration that the Navy and Air Force hierarchy are mostly interested in high-tech, high-flying “Top Gun” aircraft, and if you are flying low and slow and doing the job the ground-pounders need, you aren’t worthy of your silk scarf.
Ensign Heinemann has it right: We need practical aircraft that can fly on and off the big-deck amphibious assault ships and CVNs, land on unimproved air strips, loiter for hours over the battle, and have the utility/flexibility to do double and triple duty for ground troops.
Now, the AT-6 is a fine trainer and might even make a good attack aircraft in some places, but it is a tricycle-gear aircraft that will require major modifications to land on an aircraft carrier, let alone an amphib.
If the Navy and Marine Corps really want to get serious about close-air support, they will rethink last year’s Air Force fly-off, in which the service picked the closest airplane to a wild-blue-yonder jet, with little or no consideration for what the ground troops need.
The Air Tractor AT-802U, a taildragger, can flair and land on a postage stamp and, most important, can land in rough field situations. Air Tractor builds its planes in Texas and has a strong history. It deserves to be purchased and stood up with Marine units.
—CAPT Thomas Pinard, USN (Ret.)
The Flawed Minimalism of MCDP-1
(See J. Zammit, pp. 15–16, October 2020, and D. Chappell, pp. 86–88, November 2020)
The author made several valid and interesting points, but I do not agree with the core premise that MCDP-1 is not directive enough. MCDP-1 is not a “how to” manual. Doctrine is designed to be prescriptive and not directive. It intentionally is not overly specific so it can be applied to engagements along the continuum of competition and conflict.
Directive doctrine stifles creativity and initiative on the battlefield. History is full of examples of well-crafted and well-intentioned directive doctrine used by losing armies. Admiral Chuichi Nagumo adhered to the Imperial Japanese Navy’s directive doctrine at Midway and lost four irreplaceable big-deck carriers.
Writing doctrine is a hazardous undertaking, because it is often expected to have all the answers for all possible scenarios. It does not. That task is left to the practitioner, using the “most important six inches on the battlefield.”
—Bill Strup
Surviving the Shipyard Requires Grit and Grind
(See P. Kotlikoff, pp. 72–76, October 2020)
Lieutenant Kotlikoff has my sympathy for her 30-month ordeal at Puget Sound Naval Shipyard (PSNS). I am a retired Shop 38 mechanic and ex-test director at PSNS. Several mistakes appear to have been made. First, at the six-month stage, when the overhaul became a major maintenance project, the testing should have been handed over to the Test Directorate at PSNS and Bangor. Second, at the same time, the logging of ship’s conditions should have been handed over to the shipyard.
Third, all maintenance tasks on the machinery should likewise have been handed over to the shipyard. I was once directed to relock-wire the zincs on a cooling coil on a ship in the yard. The sailors had cut them off the previous day to do their maintenance—replacing the zincs that we had put in 15 days before! Shipyard rules said zincs should be lock-wired, but the ship’s rules said that they should not. The Solomon-like decision was that PSNS was responsible for all maintenance until the ship left the shipyard.
Fourth, clear rules have to be established as to how testing is to be accomplished. As a test director, I was required to log the amperage readings for each phase of a three-phase motor. The only way to do this was to take the cap off the box where the leads from the motor were connected to the power supply. This was forbidden by the ship’s rules.
—Alan Battenburg
We Don’t Need Conversations, We Need Systemic Change
(See J. Johnson, pp. 15–18, September 2020; L. Hughes, p. 87, October 2020; P. Gregory, pp. 87–88, October 2020; and M. Prose, pp. 89–90, November 2020)
White Officers: Maybe Oblivious But Not Innocent
(See W. Melbourne, pp. 12–14,
September 2020)
It is truly fitting for 2020 that naval professionals are weighing in on the state of our own Navy’s structural ability to achieve equality of opportunity. The intense political rhetoric from all sides demands we ask ourselves these hard questions and offer even harder solutions. I thank the authors and letter writers for offering this. The strength of our profession and Proceedings is the ability to offer all reasoned viewpoints to be collectively discussed and offered to our leadership.
I am a white male who served 35 years as both enlisted and officer in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, and I can say I saw multiple incidents of prejudice, even at the khaki level. I tell myself I did my best to prevent or rectify this behavior. My worst realization today, thanks to the current national discourse, is that I participated in institutional discrimination in some forms that were not intuitively obvious to me at the time.
As for Commander Gregory’s suggestion that Commanders Johnson and Melbourne are compelled to resign their commissions because they are calling out the Navy’s less than 100 percent adherence to stated core values: First, we do not fire people or ask for resignations for thoughtful input and observations that are intended to benefit the whole, even if the observations do not align with our own personal beliefs or official policy statements. We do not shoot the messenger. That is politicization of the force structure, something the Armed Forces as a whole is defending against in these turbulent domestic times.
Second, given they are commanders, I am going to give the benefit of the doubt that they are enjoying successful careers and have upheld the highest traditions of the Navy and its values. I do not see their viewpoints as violating that premise.
—CDR W. J. Blacklidge, USN (Ret.)
Commander Johnson laments that our officer corps has a “structural nature of racism” and an “extant power imbalance” because it consists of 77 percent white and 8 percent black citizens, whereas the U.S. population is
60 percent non-Hispanic white and 13 percent black. But she fails to consider that we source officers not from the general population but from a pool of college graduates. A look at college graduation rates and officer accessions shows that there is virtually no “racism” in that process.
She also overlooks incentives black college graduates have to choose a career path other than the military or to leave the military before achieving field-grade and flag officer ranks. Because of affirmative action programs and diversity initiatives, businesses and corporations aggressively pursue top-performing African Americans. Given the choice of a six-figure starting salary in a prominent business or signing away four to six years of your life, deploying around the world (often to combat), moving your family every two to three years, and a starting salary around $70,000 per year, which option will most choose?
Those who choose the military quickly gain critical leadership and technical skills that are in high demand in the civilian sector. Once these individuals complete initial service commitments, many are again enticed to move into better paying jobs in the business world. As such, the pool of black officers available to promote to higher ranks dwindles.
—Maj. Patrick McGinn, USMC (Ret.)
The October Proceedings
The issue, “Beneath the Waves,” assures me that we have the best submarine force.
The problem that concerns me is an invasion of Taiwan. If the People’s Republic attempts an invasion, it will probably do so with an armada of thousands of ships. A few attack submarines with 20-some torpedoes each are just not going to stop such a force. I don’t see in Proceedings any discussion on how to combat such large numbers of ships.
Beyond defeating such an armada is the question of how to deter it. Obviously, you would not want to give away your secrets, but silence simply is not going to bring deterrence. One logical approach is to use thousands of mines. To deter, it might be worthwhile to carry out a large-scale mine-laying operation exercise with dummy surface mines, to get the idea of deterrence across.
—William Thayer
Shortfalls in the Marine Corps’ EABO Concept
(See B. W. B. Ho, p. 30, July 2020, and
J. Stout, pp. 88–89, October 2020)
The author says, “It is anybody’s guess when the light amphibious warship will fully come on board, given the travails of recent Navy programs—consider the Gerald R. Ford–class carrier, Zumwalt-class destroyer, and the littoral combat ship [LCS].” Well, why not use one of those troubled programs as a light amphibious warship?
Perhaps the larger of the two LCS types, the Independence class, could be used as the light amphibious warship. It can carry two MH-60 helicopters and has a stern ramp near the waterline to allow launch and recovery of small boats, excellent speed, and a relatively shallow draft for inshore work. True, its range—especially in the Pacific—could be a problem, but these ships would presumably be part of a task force that would have escorts and an oiler/support ship nearby.
—Remo Salta
Marines Will Help Fight Submarines
(See D. Berger, pp. 18–23, November 2020)
Expanding the expeditionary advanced based operations (EABO) concept to include ASW capabilities is a good example of innovative concepts that impose costs on adversaries and keep them on their toes. Now the Navy–Marine Corps team needs to take that theory and make it a real warfighting capability. The Marine Corps can join the integrated antisubmarine warfare (ASW) team by adding just a few compact, portable, expeditionary ASW capabilities to their EAB war-fighting pack-up kits.
This transition should start as quickly as possible. It can begin by integrating existing, low-cost, compact, deployable ASW capabilities—packaged ASW spoofers and countermeasures, over-the-horizon cross-domain communication buoys, sonobuoys and receivers, and small unmanned undersea vessels that can deploy acoustic arrays and other sensors. The combination of these capabilities with a forward-based Marine unit would extend the Navy’s sense-and-response ASW network and add immediate impact to General Berger’s concept. The operational environment is rapidly changing while our competitors grow and improve their capabilities. Now is the time for U.S. operating forces to embrace concepts and capabilities that enable lethality from nontraditional approaches.
—CAPT James R. Wyatt, USN (Ret.)
Editor’s note: Captain Wyatt is vice president for business development of Sparton Corp., a sonobuoy supplier to the Navy.
Empower Naval Intelligence with Data Analytics
(See H. Lange, online, September 2020)
The author suggests that an 80/20 ratio of data exploration to data discovery inhibits the timely production of useful intelligence. However, sifting through volumes of data is what allows an analyst to become empirically sound. Further, the cultivated creativity of analysts is an underrated tool for finding “what we didn’t know that we didn’t know.”
Overreliance on technology to invert this paradigm portends an intelligence community of less creative, less informed, and more technology-dependent analysts. Most of us understand that there is an element of urgency that intelligence analysts contend with that other analysts do not. Nevertheless, we cannot focus on technical tools while ignoring the fundamentals of what make a great analyst: quality of research.
The words “analysis” and “predictive” together should be a warning to the reader that epistemological trouble awaits. While I appreciate the former Pacific Fleet commander’s allusion to the uncertainty and art of warfare, prediction is a poor objective for any analyst. The real discipline of analysis is research-informed hedging; that is, evaluating the likelihood of enemy intent and capability along an array of possibilities to help blue forces shape their options against a range of threats. Hedging demands a more robust understanding of the enemy but reduces epistemological pitfalls when carried out properly.
I work closely with analysts in the field of campaign analysis, where we confront similar cognitive risks; everyone wants to know what the model says rather than what the analyst learned. We face a constant battle to remind people that the model is not gospel; the analyst conducts exhaustive research of the problem before populating a model or even designing the study methodology. The analysts’ understanding of the problem and their articulation of it to decision-makers, not the model results, are what constitute the value of campaign analysis.
—Adam Evans
