What
about the in between times? Did every
ship, on both sides, always and only operate under total friendly air
cover? Well, no. For example, the entire Guadalcanal naval
campaign was fought under uncontrolled skies where, at any given moment, either
side might have localized and immediate control of the air. Despite this aerial uncertainty, both sides
continued to operate naval forces. Yes,
they made allowances and adjustments, such as operating at night to avoid
aerial detection and attack but the point is that they routinely operated
without assured aerial supremacy and did so with varying degrees of success.
We
should probably ask ourselves why neither side was able to obtain aerial
supremacy? The answer is simple – at
that point in the war, it was still an even match. In other words, it was a peer war (before it
evolved into a completely one-sided, lop-sided affair) and both sides were
evenly matched. Neither could gain a
permanent advantage.
Adding
to the inability to obtain aerial supremacy was the long ranges involved. Both sides had to fly long distances in order
to engage which made ‘time on station’ short.
Yes, Henderson Field on Guadalcanal was on scene but, until the end,
there were never enough aircraft available at the field to establish
uncontested control of the air.
Replacement aircraft for the US had to come from thousands of miles
away. Japanese aircraft were largely
based at Rabaul which was around 500 miles from Guadalcanal – a very long
flight in those days.
There
are lessons to be learned from this which are applicable today to a peer war
with China.
Air Control
In
a peer war, aerial control of a given operational area will, by definition, be
sporadic and will flip back and forth at a moment’s notice as groups of
aircraft arrive, or depart, the immediate area.
There may well be times when there are no aircraft in the area, at
all. The reality is that if we want to
accomplish anything we’ll need to figure out how to operate our naval forces
without the absolute control of the air that we’ve become accustomed to, and
dependent on.
The Tyranny of
Distance
Simply
having aircraft available at bases near the operational area isn’t enough. Aircraft on the ground are useless. They have to be in the air in the operational
area to matter. For the US, even our
nearby bases are going to be hundreds to thousands of miles from likely
operational areas. Aircraft from Guam,
for example, will have to fly several hours just to get to an operational area
and will then only have brief moments of loiter time. This is the Tyranny of Distance. Distance will render even the aircraft we
have in theatre only marginally available and useful.
Aircraft Resupply
Both
sides will begin the war with large inventories of aircraft. The challenge will be to get the aircraft to
the operational area. In the Guadalcanal
example, both sides were operating at the end of enormously long supply
trains. In a conflict with China the US
will, again, have to supply aircraft at the end of an enormously long supply
train. This resupply challenge will be
exacerbated by the very long time it takes to build modern aircraft as opposed
to, say, a WWII Hellcat which could be built in a matter of days. To some extent, manufacturing time will also
be a problem for China although the delivery distance will, of course, not be a
factor.
Dispersion
The
distance challenge is complicated by dispersion. In the Guadalcanal example, both sides were
attempting to spread supplies (aircraft, in this case) across many operational
areas over the entire Asian and Pacific regions. For the US, it was even worse as we were
having to provide aircraft to operations spanning the entire world!
We
see that all of the above factors can be combined into one broad issue:
- placing
aircraft, in the air, in the operational area.
This
supply challenge will remain an issue in a modern war with China. The US will, again, have to supply aircraft
at the end of an enormous supply train while maintaining ready aircraft around
the world to cover all our other commitments (an argument for weaning Europe
off our support?). China will be
fighting at the short end of the supply train and will have an inherent
advantage in that it can focus all its military might on the immediate fight
since it has no worldwide military commitments.
Unless
the US pulls back and refuses to engage (a win for China), it is quite likely
that we will have to operate under skies that we do not control. How do we do that? Isn’t it now conventional wisdom that ships
that operate without air cover are doomed?
How can we operate under skies we do not control?
At
this point we have to recognize the boundaries of the problem. When we ask how we can operate under skies we
do not control, that is not the same as asking how we can operate under skies
the enemy owns. Operating in areas where
the enemy has established aerial supremacy is, indeed, foolish and
suicidal. What we are really asking is
how can we operate under skies that neither side owns?
Let’s
make sure we understand what ‘neither side owns’ means. It means what it says. Neither side will have continuous control of
the air but either side may, at any given moment, have momentary control. The key characteristics of such contested
control are:
Limited numbers – neither side will
have enough aircraft to establish continuous control so even the momentary
control will be established by limited numbers.
This means we won’t have to fight off a thousand aircraft but, instead,
maybe just a flight or two of aircraft at a time. Perhaps the enemy will manage to fight an
attack group of half a dozen to a couple of dozen aircraft into the area. This is a radically different situation than
having to fight off never-ending waves of saturation attacks as so many people
seem to argue when attempting to make their points.
Limited time – given the
distances and the need to fight their way into the operating area, neither side
will have a great deal of loiter time in the area. Thus, attacks from aircraft will be brief. Chinese aircraft will, of course, have a
longer loiter time.
Our
concept of operating under skies we do not control is beginning to take shape,
isn’t it? We see that we’re talking
about contested skies that will feature fairly small groups of enemy aircraft that
come and go. This is a completely doable
concept. Aegis, for example, was
designed to handle much more than this.
Several Aegis ships should be able to survive and operate in such a
scenario. Thus, we can operate under
skies we don’t own.
I’ve
already addressed it but it’s necessary to repeat it: China and the US will be contesting many
operational areas simultaneously. That’s
what war is – it’s combat along a broad front with many, many points of
contention. Both sides will be splitting
their resources and assets many times over.
Too many people want to look at utterly ridiculous situations in
isolation. I know that despite this
paragraph someone is still going to comment that our ships can’t fight off the
thousands of aircraft that the Chinese have.
Well, those thousands of aircraft are going to split across a hundred
operational areas plus they’ll be fighting their own battles for survival as we
attack their bases with cruise missiles, bombers, etc.
So,
recognizing the need to operate under skies we don’t control, is there anything
we can do to enhance our ability to do so?
Yes, there is.
Carriers
Building
more carriers is the obvious answer. A
mobile air base provides the ability to tip the aerial balance of power in a
localized operational area. What we have
to do, however, is stop building $20B Fords that we won’t risk in combat, can’t
afford to lose, and can’t build enough of and start building smaller, simpler
Midway/Forrestal size carriers in large numbers with larger air wings.
Purpose Built Ships
We
need to design a class(es) of ship that is intended to fight under uncontrolled
skies. We need an independent operations
cruiser that is optimized for the kind of combat we’ve just described. I’ve described one such class of ship, the independent
cruiser (see, “Independent Cruiser”)
Tactics
We
need to adjust our thinking about how we will conduct naval missions. Too many people have the idiotic notion that
we’ll conduct a war just like peace – that we’ll deploy ships to the area for
months at a time and that they’ll cruise around the area, back and forth,
fighting continuously. This is
absurd. We’ll need to conduct quick
missions, as navies have always done: in
and out without lingering. This is actually
the standard for wartime naval operations, anyway. We’ve just forgotten that’s how naval
missions are conducted. We need to
remember and start training for such missions.
It’s been so long since we’ve had actual missions that we’ve forgotten
what a mission is and how to conduct one.
A mission has a specific goal, the forces are assembled, the group makes
a high speed run to the operational area, executes the mission, and retires at
high speed. We need to start training
Admirals and Captains to conduct such missions.
Today’s Admirals and Captains are just glorified cruise directors
shepherding around a bunch of tourist/sailors for several months at a time.
UAVs
One
of the main benefits of aerial control is the situational awareness
(surveillance) that the aircraft provide.
Without aerial control our situational awareness will be severely
limited. Therefore, we need large
numbers of shorter range, cheap, expendable UAVs to provide area situational
awareness. I’ve suggested that all ships
should carry large numbers of such aircraft (in place of helos, if necessary)
and that we should build small UAV carriers.
Toughness
Ships
conducting missions under uncontrolled skies are at greater risk of
damage. We need to stop building one-hit
ships and start building tough ships that can take damage, conduct repairs at
sea, and keep fighting until the mission is over. Armor is a good start towards building
tougher ships along with greater redundancy and separation of key systems and
equipment. We can’t build Burkes that
have two of their three illuminators located within about ten feet of each
other. A single hit can eliminate
two-thirds of a Burke’s AAW capability!
Manpower
Increased
manpower is another vital aspect of toughness and independent operations. Ships need to be able to absorb casualties
and keep functioning and the only way to do that is with larger crews. Larger crews are also absolutely vital to
damage control efforts and are generally considered to be the single most
important aspect of damage control.
It
is clear that we will need to conduct naval operations under skies we do not
control and it is also clear that doing so is quite viable. We will, however, have to begin designing and
building ships intended for those conditions and we have to begin developing
doctrine and tactics for such missions.
As I’ve said so many times, peacetime is the precious time to prepare
for war and we’re squandering it on idiotic concepts like distributed
lethality, distractions like gender sensitivity training, and worthless
deployments and humanitarian missions.
We
need to figure out what future war will look like (hey, Navy, I’m telling you
what it will look like, since you haven’t got a clue and can’t seem to figure
it out for yourself – you’re welcome!) and begin preparing for it. Everything we buy, build, or do must run
through the filter of combat. How will
[fill in the blank] enhance our combat capability? If the answer is it won’t, we shouldn’t do
it. That, alone, would eliminate all the
sensitivity sessions, green energy initiatives, new uniform of the year
programs, humanitarian missions, etc.
Accept
that we won’t control the skies. Embrace
the concept and begin preparing for it.
We
need to focus. Combat, combat,
combat. Nothing else matters.
