We’ve had repeated discussions about the defense of Guam (or
any forward base) and everyone except the military seems to recognize that
requires a layered defense which includes ships, planes, missiles, mines, etc.
However, there’s another layer to defense that never gets
mentioned and that is offense.
The best defense is a good offense.
This means that if you can destroy the source of attacks
before they even launch, there’s nothing to defend and your defense is
perfect. Rather than shoot down
missiles, find and destroyer the launchers (shoot archers not arrows). Rather than try to intercept aircraft,
destroy the aircraft’s bases. Rather
than search for submarines, destroy them pierside and destroy their shore
support facilities. And so on.
Offense is the first, best, defensive layer.
We just noted that the military is making little or no
serious effort to build up Guam’s defenses and, indeed, may be reducing those
defenses in response to environmental concerns (see, “BaseDefense is a Joke”). As bad as
that is, there has not even been the slightest thought given to incorporating
an offensive layer into Guam’s defense.
The Air Force is not planning to conduct strikes against Chinese
ballistic missile launch sites, airbases, or naval ports. The Navy has no plans to launch cruise
missiles at Chinese airbases and naval ports.
The Navy has no plan to attack Chinese submarines in their home ports or
destroy their support facilities.
Some might attempt to make the argument, purely on faith,
that the military does have plans but they just haven’t made them public. That might seem like a reasonable
proposition, on the face of it, but in our society there’s no such thing as a
secret. Further, if we did have such
plans, we’d be practicing them and there have been no such exercises conducted
… ever. Recall the WWII War Plan
Orange? We had plans for fighting Japan
and we conducted practice exercises in the form of Fleet Problems for years
prior to the start of war. There were no
secrets even back then. Besides, at
least in a general sense, you’d like your potential enemy to know that you have
plans to defeat them and that you’re diligently practicing so … no need to be
overly concerned about secrecy.
The obvious conclusion is that we have no offensive plans to
support Guam’s defensive efforts. This
must change. We desperately need to get
serious about the war with China and start planning, practicing, and
engaging … offensively.
This article includes a nice summary of recent efforts and challenges related to Guam:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.cnn.com/2025/01/31/asia/trump-iron-dome-ballistic-missile-defense-guam-intl-hnk-ml/index.html
There’s a quote that adds fiscal considerations to your point: “offense is cheaper than defense”
All that being said, we’re likely to be in a situation where we take the first punch in a war with china. So even if the plan is to go for the shooters, Guam and other bases need to be able to successfully defend at least one initial determined strike.
The article was largely a puff piece with no new information or in-depth analysis. That aside, the decade long (and that's ridiculously optimistic under current acquisition practices and challenges) time line to implement a defense highlights one of the key weaknesses in the concept. Whatever we begin developing for a defense today will be long obsolete a decade or so from now when it comes on line. This implies we need to do two things:
Delete1. Begin QUICKLY fielding immediate defenses even if they are piecemeal and less than perfect.
2. Design and develop the future defense.
Striving for that single, perfect, future defense is a guaranteed way to fail completely.
Yes, we need to be able to absorb a first strike and that includes not just defenses but also RECOVERY/REPAIR capabilities which the military has given little or no thought to. Okay, we just lost our fuel storage. How do we recover from that and get back to operational status?
Remember successful defense can take two forms:
1. Stop the attack and suffer no damage (seems highly unlikely).
2. Absorb the damage and recover so quickly that the attack was a mostly wasted effort on the enemy's part.
For example, instead of one central fuel storage, build an extensive system of smaller, disbursed fuel storages serviced by a unit of engineers who can quickly reroute fuel transfers and repair destroyed piping. Yes, that's expensive and inefficient from an operating perspective (business case) but it helps ensure survival. We need to stop treating war as a business case and start treating it as death and survival and cost be damned.
Query: within living memory, the US and other NATO armed forces were prepared for an attack by the USSR and its Warsaw Pact allies. What preparations, and specifically what naval preparations, did they make for an attack-is-the-best-form-of-defence strike on the USSR and its allies?
ReplyDeleteI do realise that a detailed response to this might require penetrating several layers of understandable secrecy.But if there were none ...
"specifically what naval preparations, did they make for an attack-is-the-best-form-of-defence strike on the USSR and its allies?"
DeleteMost of that is still classified, I'm sure. However, it's public knowledge that the US intended to strike the Soviet missile bastions, destroy Pacific/Eastern naval bases, seal the Atlantic Ocean via the Greenland gap, and so forth. Those measures would, if successful, greatly reduce the submarine threat to convoys, eliminate any Pacific campaign, and neutralize the Soviet submarine launched missile threat. A very offensive defense, indeed!
Giving China can now detect US nuclear submarines, offense becomes more and more difficult:
Deletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PqJKngV_-j8
That’s a pure propaganda video about a theoretical capability that does not exist in any practical form. China does not have any submarine detection capability that everyone else doesn’t have.
DeleteThere is no conflict. Defense Guam doesn't mean give up offense. Today's missiles can hit far beyond. Through decades R&D, China's high-tech weapons have blurred front line. They have missiles can hit Guam in pinpoint accuracy (DF-26, etc.) thus add missile defense is necessary. For the two new fighter/bomber jets released right after Christmas, it is very likely that the Chengdu version can attack Guam.
ReplyDeleteOffense capabilities depend on high tech weapons. People's will, national value, ... are not important. Who has high tech weapons can surpass the other can conduct offenses. It is time to rebuild American military R&D than draw a blue print to ask incompetent people to deliver.
"missile defense is necessary."
DeleteDid someone say otherwise?
I don’t see any way the US can hope to win a blow-for-blow war against a technological peer (which China is) in their own backyard. Certainly not with our current resources, and frankly not with any increase one could imagine. We would need, in theater, somewhere between a 3:1 to 10:1 advantage in forces to offset home field advantage sufficient to be comfortable of victory. In no universe can we get remotely close to that, even in our wildest shipbuilding (and aircraft and ordnance procurement) dreams. China has caught up in technology and can out-build us. We will never out-build China, so unless we make a generational leap in technology that completely changes the playing field, that’s the ballgame.
ReplyDeleteSo, with the odds of winning any shooting war with China over Taiwan being essentially zero, what’s our next best option? Deterrence? We might not win a war, but conflict could still be very costly to China in many ways (military, economic, social?) Can we deter China by making the cost too high? If so, what force level does that look like? Maybe that’s how we need to evaluating things. .
Pentagon is withdrawing troops from Japan. Whether to pursue hegemony or not is a political decision thus I will not discuss further. Militarily, now, China can strike every part of Japan with high tech weapons thus station US troops is danger.
Deletehttps://www.voanews.com/a/us-marines-start-partial-transfer-from-japan-s-okinawa-to-guam/7901262.html
Withdraw US troop has one additional problem - lose control on Japan. Japan has no match to China militarily, even if they double their defense spending, still no match. They may decide to make term with China is a better solution. If they think China will win, they will even ask China to protect them from US invasion.
"I don’t see any way the US can hope to win a blow-for-blow war against a technological peer"
DeleteHistory would emphatically disagree with you! Germany had superior technology in WWII and lost. Japan had superior technology at least at the outset of WWII and lost. The US had superior technology in Vietnam and lost. The US had superior technology in Afghanistan and lost. The Soviets had superior technology in Afghanistan and lost. And the list goes on.
Technology is a factor - history suggests it's almost a minor factor - but other factors count for more. You need to rethink your view.
"Pentagon is withdrawing troops from Japan."
DeleteTo be clear, this movement started decades ago and has been slowly taking place since.
"lose control on Japan"
????? In what possible way did our stationing of a handful of troops in Japan exert 'control on Japan'?
Afghanistan and Vietnam were asymmetrical, counterinsurgency operations, so are not analogies to what we would face with China. I wholeheartedly agree that my observation would not apply to those conflicts. I wasn't making a universal comment applicable to all wars, it was specific to what we might face in the near future with China.
DeleteYou mention Japan and Germany in WW2 and I agree this is a closer historical example. This actually supports my point, in that while both countries had a technological advantage in many critical areas, the US was able to dramatically "out-build" them. Over time, our vast superiority in numbers ended up more than compensating for any technological disadvantage.
That's why I pointed out two factors: China is basically a technological peer (if not already, the trend line is clear) AND they can out build us. That's not a good combination. You say other factors count more than technology. I agree. I'm suggesting one of those is quantity, and we're not leading there either.
I'm positing a situation where the US/allies and China can both can field an OOB in Taiwan where - best case - we are roughly equal in numbers and technology. I think in that case, there is an excellent change we don't win. I think the war games the US has done confirms this.
Legit question: what's the X factor that gives us the win? Is it tactics? strategy? political? special black programs?
"asymmetrical"
DeleteLet's start by dispensing with the silly notion that asymmetric war is somehow a different kind of war. It's not. War is war. Asymmetric simply means the enemy used different tactics than you did and, more often then not, asymmetric is used to try to explain away how you managed to lose to an inferior force.
So, recognizing that war is war, we now note that technology is not only NOT a guarantee of victory, it is often a detriment. For example, Germany's focus on ever more exquisite tanks to the detriment of just plain good tanks produced in large quantities cost them valuable time and resources. Thus, Vietnam and Afghanistan are not some kind of special war for whom the constants of war do not apply. They are war and the enemy conducted their war better than we did.
Clearly, factors other than technology are more important in determining who wins a war. You've identified industrial capacity as one of those factors although, again, I would point out that the US industrial capacity dwarfed Vietnam, NKorea, and Afghanistan and yet we failed to achieve victory.
Additional, more important factors include:
-national will (Vietnam and Afghanistan simply out-willed us)
-commitment to the brutality of war (the US has been far too squeamish about war since WWII and, thus, unable to wage war efficiently, meaning brutally)
-realistic and achievable victory conditions
-commitment to total victory (related to national will)
-training (we have hollow forces, currently; China's level of training is unknown)(a properly trained man with a knife can beat a man with a machine gun)
-simplicity of equipment and tactics (simplicity reigns in the confusion of battle)
-decentralized command and control
And so on.
You might benefit from reviewing Vietnam, Korea, Desert Storm, Afghanistan, and more and try to identify which factors were truly deciding in the outcomes. You'll be surprised. You're clearly a product of the Western way of thinking about war (technology supreme). Ours is not the only way to wage war and, arguably, the least effective! Figure out why.
Japanese leaders understand if a war breaks out between US and Japan, their nation will become battlefields. To put Japan first is to avoid this war fighting in their territory. Best is that US and China fight to destroy both so Japan can be great again. If this is not achievable, then, second best is a big brother to push the war far from them. It is stupid for them to die for someone else's "value".
DeleteUS troops in Japan is a strong grip to prevent this nation moving toward China. As Chinese military become stronger daily, as US is closing its market to Japan (tariff), moving toward China now becomes an option, especially Japan see China will win with their high tech weapons. They see China is likely to enlarge its defence circle to beyond Japan thus a war between US and China will be in mid Pacific. Of course heir best wish is still a war destroy both US and China.
" as US is closing its market to Japan (tariff), moving toward China now becomes an option"
DeleteYour comment is devoid of any understanding of historical relations and animosities between Japan and China, understanding of global trade and linked economies, current Chinese geopolitical objectives, etc. As such, it is not even worth refuting.
"Afghanistan and Vietnam were asymmetrical, counterinsurgency operations, so are not analogies to what we would face with China."
DeleteWell, that's certainly a one-sided, close minded view of things! For the sake of discussion, let's say that your view of China's strengths relative to the US are all true and that China has overwhelming superiority in technology, numbers, and industry. The US has no hope, whatsoever, according to you. I guess that would be sort of like Vietnam facing the US, right? Or any of the other examples I cited. So, let's say you're right. What does that suggest for a US strategy? A student of warfare, such as yourself, might look to history and postulate that the US could and should fight exactly the kind of asymmetric war that you dismissed as not being applicable to a China-US war! Perhaps the US should identify asymmetric operations and tactics that would enable it to succeed despite being hopelessly outclassed in every conceivable way?
How could the US do this? What kinds of asymmetric tactics could the US use that might succeed? Well, for example, instead of attempting a toe-to-toe slugfest of army against army, perhaps the US could emphasize the use of small, special forces units to destroy Chinese oil and gas pipelines in Russia (*gasp* we can't put troops inside Russia! that would violate international law! ... well, that's why they call it asymmetric; you'll recall that the NVietnamese used Laos?) thereby imposing a total sea AND LAND blockade of a critical resource.
Another example might be that instead of going toe-to-toe with the magnificent, all-powerful, Chinese navy, perhaps we could emphasize our still formidable advantage in submarines to destroy their fleet and systematically launch cruise missile attacks on every Chinese port, airfield, and base on the Chinese mainland - basically, guerilla warfare using sub-launched cruise missiles! Done correctly, undetectable and unstoppable.
And so on.
Off this topic, but don't know how else to get this into the discussion. Apparently the USN successfully used non-kinetic means to defeat some drone attacks in the Red Sea:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.yahoo.com/news/us-destroyers-red-sea-conflict-203325011.html
This is heartening as I think we've all had concerns with the many issues associated with using multimillion $ missiles to handle low-cost drone attacks and the like. (Yes, I know this is a soft summary with limited info and we don't have the primary source documents; I will be on the lookout for those or other confirmation of the same.)
This is not new information. Low technology drones are quite susceptible to comm disruptions and other electronic counter-methods.
DeleteIn his book, Hughes clearly documented that electronic methods were far and away the most successful anti-missile method. Again, not new information.
The Russians now use mostly fiber optic guided drones that can't be jammed.
Delete"fiber optic guided drones that can't be jammed."
DeleteAs I vaguely understand it, such a drone is limited to a few miles range due to the cable. This makes it a niche piece of equipment.
Hughes book, is it the Hughes Electrical & Electronic Technology 2001?
DeleteNo, the book is Hughes Fleet Tactics and Coastal Combat. In it, he presents data on active and passive defenses against missiles.
DeleteThanks
DeleteAs I vaguely understand it, the Russian fibre-optic guided drones trail out behind them cables that lie on the ground. That may create problems if used against ships at sea.
DeleteThe fiber cables are a maximum of around 2-3 miles in length, as I understand it, which means that, if used at sea, the launch platform would have to be within 2-3 miles of the target. It seems impossible that anyone would allow a launch platform (presumably another ship) to sail up to within 2-3 miles of them in a combat situation.
DeleteThis is not a viable at-sea capability.
Agreed, entirely
DeleteA slightly different aspect that ComNavOps might appreciate: in 1940 the Germans were placing transports in Cherbourg harbour, in preparation for a possible invasion of England. The RN sent a WWI battleship, HMS Revenge, to lie off Cherbourg in the night, and she fired 120 14-inch shells into the harbour and docks. The Germans abandoned all hope of using the surviving facilities, such as they were.
Best form of defence, indeed,
15” guns on the Revenge class.
Delete"HMS Revenge, to lie off Cherbourg in the night, and she fired 120 14-inch shells into the harbour and docks."
DeleteAn excellent example of offense being used for defense. Also, an excellent example of the wisdom of retaining older ships for emergency duty; something the US Navy has completely abandoned.
Germany developed the Polyphem missile with a range up to 60km. The fiber mostly floats in the air behind the missile, but its just light so hitting the water doesn't matter.
Deletehttps://www.army-technology.com/projects/polyphem/?cf-view
Look at this simple coastal fiber opitic system that South Korea deployed a decade ago.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTUxjGxIfzU
Ships can stay clear, but will the Marines really send three dozen expensive ACVs slowly chugging toward shore as a system like this blasts them like ducks in a pond.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTUxjGxIfzU
That's why LSTs are far superior. They can absorb such hits and keep chugging to shore.
"Polyphem missile with a range up to 60km"
DeleteI was not familiar with that. That's absolutely astounding if it's wire guided the entire way. Is the cable length equal to the missile range or just part of the range? For example, the US Mk48 torpedo has a claimed range of 50+ km and is wire guided but the wire extends only 26 km.
"will the Marines really send three dozen expensive ACVs slowly chugging toward shore as a system like this blasts them like ducks in a pond."
DeleteBe cautious not to get caught up in the one-on-one way of thinking. Would ACVs (or any landing craft) survive against unhindered missile systems that attack them the entire (slow) way into the beach? Not likely!
However, would ACVs (or any landing craft) survive against missile systems that are being actively suppressed with massive naval bombardment? Certainly they would! It's how we got slow, unarmored, wooden landing craft ashore in every amphibious assault of WWII.
We don't fight one-on-one, we fight as a combined force.
Of course, we don't have large caliber naval guns anymore so one has to question the wisdom of even contemplating an amphibious assault without massive naval suppressive fire.
Just thinking about missile defense of naval bases here in CONUS and Guam/Pearl. The Navy is in such a hurry to get rid of the Tico's, why not upgrade the radars/vls only for ballistic missile defense, keep them remotely stationed pier side for launch purposes in a active reserve status. Half the crew would be reserves. One ship per base, north island in SD, last D&S pier in Norfolk ect. If they have to get underway they can, otherwise they run off shore power. Would be a cheap way to use an older asset to get missile defense for critical bases.
ReplyDeleteThat would be a better use for retired Ticos than throwing them away which is what the Navy is doing. Here's a few related thoughts for you:
Delete1. Do you see attacks on US mainland facilities as being a realistic threat? The only way that could happen is with intercontinental ballistic missiles which would be indistinguishable from nuclear ICBMs. Would China do that?
2. If you believe ICBM attacks on the US mainland are a realistic threat then I assume you're okay with the US conducting conventional ICBM attacks against the Chinese mainland?
3. Which facilities do you select to protect? Military bases? Naval ports? Dry docks (far more important than any port or base!)? Washington DC? Manufacturing sites? Major cities? There are literally hundreds/thousands of worthwhile targets and we've got around a dozen retiring ships. What do you choose to protect? And that's without considering overseas facilities!
Just stuff to think about.
1. thinking more of a sneak attack scenario using container based weapons systems on civilian ships with military crews on us bases. 2. Firm believer in MAD. I would be okay with a first strike if it would lessen the amount of damage done to us. ( you're going to suffer some losses). Use it or lose it. 3. Military and command and industrial sites. Norfolk ( Cheasapeake Bay ) for example has the bulk of east coast shipyards and main naval base in the Atlantic, those are all mutually tied together for defense purposes. Ideally I would like to see something akin to AEGIS ashore to defend other area's not covered by shipborne assets. (ie. ICBM sites, industrial sites, DC, ect.)
Delete"sneak attack scenario using container based weapons systems on civilian ships"
DeleteI keep shooting this concept down and it keeps coming up. I may have to do a post on it. There are two major flaws in this scenario.
1. Can't get close enough. In EVERY war, there is a very obvious and visible run up to war. During that period, only an idiot would allow unidentified commercial ships anywhere near a potential target. Seriously, if you're the supreme military commander and you know war is inevitable in a matter of days or weeks, are you going to allow any unidentified or unverified vessel anywhere near any friendly base or facility? Of course not!
2. Only works one time. Even if, somehow, an enemy ship managed to fire off some missiles, it's a one-time effort that can never be repeated. The damage would be annoying but not catastrophic and would never be repeated.
3. Too little damage. Related to #2, a handful of missiles can only do a small amount of damage compared to the defender's overall war machine. Annoying but not critical. For example, the Japanese used orders of magnitude more force against Pearl Harbor but even that turned out to be annoying but in no way critically damaging to our war effort. Now, there are some targets that would be critically damaging, like dry docks, but those aren't the targets you're talking about and those could be far more easily sabotaged by a single enemy agent.
Tico cannot generate enough electricity to power new radars and other sensors critical for modern warfare. It is more cost effective to build a new ship than upgrade a Tico with very old hull.
Delete"more cost effective to build a new ship"
DeleteThat's not at all what the original commenter was suggesting. In fact, just the opposite. Reread the comments.
"Tico cannot generate enough electricity to power new radars and other sensors critical for modern warfare. "
ReplyDeleteWhile most of the cruisers use older versions and variants, and have a variety of issues with their computing and sensing, most having to do with maintenance, they're still quite capable, "modern warfare" didn't just happen recently. Those ships are the originators of "modern warfare" at sea. The newest Chinese cruisers might be the only thing that dethrones them as the most powerful surface ships afloat.
As we learned at the beginning of WWII, every forward military base in the Pacific is just a group of soldiers & sailors who will become POWs after the war starts.
ReplyDeleteBetter to keep them relatively primitive & skeleton-crewed during peacetime and have a plan to retake them & use them in time of war.
In other words: War Plan Orange 2.0