Keeping an Eye on the Long Game: Part LXXV

We have been doing the "Long Game" series for what, a dozen years?

Well, we are pretty damn close to the event horizon where this is becoming a short game.

It is still gobsmacking that we have yet to design a surface combatant of any utility since the passage of Goldwater-Nichols at the height of the Cold War.

It is a clear case of systemic institutional failure that we blew up CG(X) because we had zero ability to control our worst tendencies, and that we seem happy to slug along with our glorious but crotchety stretch-SPRUANCE CG's as the guardians of our CVNs.

DDG(X) is still vapor ware. If FFG(X) winds up just being a stretched LCS, then we just need to fire everyone and nuke the accretion-saddled acquisition system from orbit. Just have the Australians design our fleet architecture for a decade until we can train up a new generation. They seem to get it.

Besides our friends Down Under, you want to see a serious surface force who is serious about building a fleet and getting ready to go to war at sea?

BEHOLD!

Three Type-52C (a very adequate 7,000 ton displacement DDG) and two Type-55 CG (it ain't a DDG at a displacement of 12,500 and 112 VLS on FLT-I). All right off the production line. I can smell the fresh paint from here.

Look at that picture in detail. The Chinese are dead serious about dominating their half of the Pacific and as much of the Indian Ocean as they can.

Meanwhile, we are still struggling to figure out how to train our officers in basic seamanship.

If this does not make you angry and motivated, then for the sake of our Navy and the nation is serves, go away. Retire. Go home. Find a hobby. Let others step in to the breach who actually give a damn.

H/t TS.

The Slow March to FITZGERALD & MCCAIN, with J. C. Harvey Jr., on Midrats

The conditions that brought us to the series of events in WESTPAC in 2017 did not happen over night. They did not happen in one PCS cycle, or under one command climate. Layer by layer from many sources, it took time to get to where we found it.

Our guest for the full hour Sunday from 5-6pm Eastern
to discuss his views of the latent causes of what is now generally accepted as a systemic failure of a "new normal" will be J.C. Harvey, Jr., Admiral USN (Ret.).

Admiral Harvey retired from the Navy in November, 2012 after serving as the Commander, U.S. Fleet Forces Command, in Norfolk, Virginia.

In his 39 year Navy career, he specialized in naval nuclear propulsion, surface ship & Carrier strike-group operations & Navy-wide manpower management/personnel policy development. He served in a variety of operational command positions at sea, as the Navy’s Chief of Naval Personnel (the senior uniformed human resources official in the Navy) & as the Director, Navy Staff immediately prior to commanding U.S. Fleet Forces.

Since his retirement, Admiral Harvey has joined the Board of Directors of the Navy Memorial Foundation, where he currently serves as Chairman of the Board, & serves as an Outside Director of AT Kearney, PSDS.

On 12 January, 2014, he was sworn in as a member of Governor McAuliffe’s cabinet where he served as the Commonwealth’s Secretary of Veteran & Defense Affairs until 31 August, 2017.

A few months later, he joined the Institute of Defense Analyses as the Director, Strategy, Forces & Resources Division.

Born and raised in Baltimore, MD, Admiral Harvey is a graduate of the Phillips Exeter Academy, the US Naval Academy & the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University.

Join us live if you can, but if you miss the show you can always listen to the archive at blogtalkradio or Stitcher. 

If you use iTunes, you can add Midrats to your podcast list simply by clicking the iTunes button at the main showpage - or you can just click here.

Fullbore Friday

As we celebrate a bit of our own martial flintyness this week, it is a good time to remember the history of other independent minded folk. 

If you so wish, do a little reading up on the history of the Zaporozhian Cossacks of Ukraine; but let's keep this FbF clean and to the point.

As everyone is hip to "cultural sensitivity" let's try to get some insight in to the cultural foundation and references of the Ukrainian people (and the Russians too). This took place, roughly, in 1676. 100 years before our Declaration of Independence, and the same year we first recognized by proclamation the very American holiday of Thanksgiving. So, yea ... it works.

First of all, we have a letter from the Ottoman Sultan Mahmud IV.

Sultan Mahmud IV to the Zaporozhian Cossacks:

As the Sultan; son of Muhammad; brother of the sun and moon; grandson and viceroy of God; ruler of the kingdoms of Macedonia, Babylon, Jerusalem, Upper and Lower Egypt; emperor of emperors; sovereign of sovereigns; extraordinary knight, never defeated; steadfast guardian of the tomb of Jesus Christ; trustee chosen by God Himself; the hope and comfort of Muslims; confounder and great defender of Christians -- I command you, the Zaporogian Cossacks, to submit to me voluntarily and without any resistance, and to desist from troubling me with your attacks.

--Turkish Sultan Mahmud IV

... and the Ukrainians pondered a response ...

... and then you have a bit of poetry (potty-mouth warning);

Zaporozhian Cossacks to the Turkish Sultan! 

O sultan, Turkish devil and damned devil's kith and kin, secretary to Lucifer himself. What the devil kind of knight are you, that can't slay a hedgehog with your naked arse? The devil excretes, and your army eats. You will not, you son of a bitch, make subjects of Christian sons; we've no fear of your army, by land and by sea we will battle with thee, fuck your mother. 

You Babylonian scullion, Macedonian wheelwright, brewer of Jerusalem, goat-fucker of Alexandria, swineherd of Greater and Lesser Egypt, pig of Armenia, Podolian thief, catamite of Tartary, hangman of Kamyanets, and fool of all the world and underworld, an idiot before God, grandson of the Serpent, and the crick in our dick. Pig's snout, mare's arse, slaughterhouse cur, unchristened brow, screw your own mother!

So the Zaporozhians declare, you lowlife. You won't even be herding pigs for the Christians. Now we'll conclude, for we don't know the date and don't own a calendar; the moon's in the sky, the year with the Lord, the day's the same over here as it is over there; for this kiss our arse!

Fullbore. An American would have simply said, "Nuts" - but we are a simple folk.

First posted March 2014.

So, how did we find ourselves in this pickle?

How is that record from the defense industry been over the last quarter century when it comes to delivering product?

Well, one way or another, it started with a dinner.

Come on over to USNIBlog and give it a read.

...and a Good 4th to You

Remember, we are a republic of idea - ideas put together in a unique way that has lasted longer than any other existing republic.

Remember that, honor that - and ponder the words that got the whole thing moving forward.

They Syrian End Game

And so, we reach the last couple of chapters in the bloody Syrian Civil War - that place where Game of Thrones intersects on the ground with a Monty Python sketch on the diplomatic scene.

The more interesting, and potentially most deadly, part of this chapter is in the tri-border region where Israel, Jordan, and Syria come together. Not to diminish the impacted sh1t-show the Turks created in the northwest or the throbbing presence of the Kurdish held east ... but you have the hammer of the Syrian coalition against the Israeli anvil and the weak spot at the Jordanian border.

A bit more than a year ago, I issued the D&G for Rev. 1 to PLAN SALAMANDER, and so far it appears the commanders on the ground are successfully executing the plan. Once again, here it is bulletized for ease of reading.

1. Let the Iranians and Russians kill Sunni Arab Islamists in the west of Syria while we kill them in the east. (no change)

2. We'll kill them east of the Euphrates to include those portions west of the Euphrates in the Raqqa Governorate. and south of road from Nassib in the southwest, through Damascus to Deir ez-Zur on the Euphrates.

3. The Russians, Syrians, and Iranian proxies can kill them in the rest. (no change)

4. We will continue to support Kurdish and allied forces inside the area defined in #2 using airpower and advisory liaison forces as needed. Once they are done in the north and west, we can just do CAS for the Kurds on the front lines of their frontier as we all push IS forces in to the Iraqi desert.

As always, SyriaCivilWarMap gives you much of what you need to know.

This is what you need to watch; many of the non-ISIS rebels may be able to negotiate their way in to some kind of end. ISIS though, no. No chance. They will either be killed in place or will have to find a way to drift in to Jordan. Are the Jordanians ready to keep them out? Can they keep them out?

This is all very interesting to watch. 

Once that pocket it taken care of, forces can move to get rid of that pocket in on the Iraqi border. After that, Iblid next. 

The Kurds will continue to nibble away at the other ISIS remnants. 

Here is when things will get fuzzy. How will the Syrians deal with the Kurds? What about the Turkish enclave west of Manbij?

With all these known-unknowns, there we have American and Russian forces, keeping an eye on each other when they're not giving the Turks side-eye and the finger to the Iranians.

So much that must be done right, so many places for things to go wrong.

https://syriancivilwarmap.com/

A Fleet in a Parallel Universe

The fleet a nation builds is not predestined; it develops over time based on the perceived security needs of a nation, its economic carrying capacity, combined with the will and vision of its leaders.

After those basic ingredients are set, then you have to have the right people with the right ideas to implement it. The fleet that results is not the result of a simple 1+1+1=3. Like three different chefs can come up with three very different dishes from the same basic ingredients, so too can different leaders build very different fleets to meet what they perceived best meets a nation’s requirements.

If you had different leaders at a point in time, you would have a very different fleet.

We have the fleet we have because of those in positions of power, uniformed and civilian, at important decision points.

There were alternatives to today’s present. There are alternative futures. The “what if” matrix is as complex as the personalities and philosophies that chose one path over another; one platform over another.

Navalists know most of the more recent decision points that led to the fleet we have today. We know those who led one school of thought or another – who won the argument, and who did not. Who got 80% of what they saw the future needed, who got 20%.

When you look at people with alternative designs from what we have today, one of the first people who comes to mind is Wayne Hughes, CAPT USN (Ret.). In June’s issue of Proceedings, he has an article, “Build a Green Water Fleet” that again raises the issue of what fleet we need as an alternative to the one we continue to build.

The article builds off the concepts I wrote about in JAN 2010 embedded in the decade old “New Navy Fighting Machine". It may be a decade old, but it is still fresh.

In my 2010 post, Reforming the Confederate Navy, I outlined the issue as I saw it,

The Confederate Navy … she threw her lot in with transformationalism. VIRGINIA and HUNLEY were wonderful ground breaking designs and concepts - built against tremendous odds - but in the end they were like the nation they served - beautiful losers destroyed by their own fatal conceits.

What was their conceit? They thought that a few high technological breakthroughs thrown into a few hulls and applied with a bit of tactical verve could triumph over the many primarily pushing sound fundamentals.

Yep, the South did win - it won the post Goldwater-Nichols Navy.

Let’s get back to Hughes’s latest;

The New Navy Fighting Machine Study described an affordable yet more numerous and complete U. S. fleet for the 21st century. By distinguishing smaller, single-purpose, green-water (coastal and littoral) combatants from the large, multipurpose, expensive, heavily manned blue-water (open-ocean) fleet, the study was able to restore a Navy of more than 600 vessels that could be sustained with an annual Ship Construction New (SCN) budget of $15 billion. [3] The fleet’s composition was tested by war games and studies conducted by faculty and students. Their efforts explored the value and limitations of the NNFM force against two first-class enemies, irregular warfare opponents, and for peacetime engagement with friendly states.

What kind of fleet for Green Water ops would he like?

The Navy needs small, lethal, fast, green-water ships and submarines to take the fight to the enemy in the littorals. The Mark VI patrol boat (top) and this HOSS X-1 concept submarine (designed by and copyright J. Scott Shipman of B.B. Hoss, Inc.) are examples of vessels recommended by the New Navy Fighting Machine Study.
…“Minuteman” class of missile combatants to comply with surface navy specifications that included eight antiship cruise missiles, a gun, a combat crew of 12, bunks for 30, and a cruising radius of 3,000 nm.

To get it, he is willing to trade some Blue Water capital;

… the existing 280-ship fleet its 11 nuclear-powered aircraft carriers (CVNs) took 46 percent of sea-going billets. By reducing the number of CVNs to six or seven and distributing the sea-based air capability more widely, the NNFM freed enough people to operate the new fighting fleet.

There are some who are questioning the math here, but even if you adjust 25%, the argument should not be dismissed out of hand.

…a light aircraft carrier (CVL), displacing 28,000 tons, that could carry 20 F-35B aircraft plus assorted helicopters and unmanned air vehicles (UAVs) for scouting and auxiliary functions. Weisser showed that in most scenarios two or three CVLs working together, or one operating in concert with a CVN, would be more adaptable and could deliver firepower more efficiently than sea-based air power operating from CVNs alone.
…16 non-nuclear submarines because littoral waters are where they will be most effective.

Of course, this does not fully address the Blue Water changes, but as the author mentioned, that can be addressed SEPCOR.

One final note from me, for any meaningful change to take place, we need to pull up Goldwater-Nichols root and branch and replace with a new construct. We need a wholesale, highly disruptive change in the bureaucratic structure and the accretions build up around it in the last 3+ decades. Better now in peace by choice, than at war when the decks are slick with blood and we are grasping for something more effective.

It is not a coincidence that we have not been able to field a successful surface combatant since Goldwater-Nichols. Remember, the money to cut steel on DDG-51 Hull-1 was in 1985, a year prior to Goldwater-Nichols.

Since then, we have put forward LCS & DDG-1000, aborted CG(X), cannot stop picking our belly button with DDG(X), and have a fairly good chance of having FFG(X) just be a reconfigured (spit) LCS.

When will the last Arleigh Burke DDG be commissioned, 2030? 2035? Heck, 2040? There is a pretty good chance that a DDG envisioned and first built at the height of the Cold War will almost see service in to the 22nd Century. 2085 at a minimum.

100 years. Almost like we were about to decommission the last of our TENNESSEE Class BB, designed and built after and during WWI.