Distributed Lethality - Leyte Gulf

A recent Anonymous comment suggested that the WWII radar picket lines around Okinawa were an example of distributed lethality.  That’s a fascinating example that I hadn’t thought of and it prompted this post.

The radar pickets weren’t exactly distributed lethality as envisioned by the Navy.  The ships were mutually supporting, to a degree, and had air cover although leakers were, obviously, commonplace.  Further, the ships were tied to a known, fixed location.  Finally, the picket mission was completely defensive in nature versus the offensive nature of distributed lethality.  Still, it’s an example of what happens when individual (distributed) ships are expected to survive in enemy waters under enemy air cover.  The ships accomplished their purpose but paid a very heavy price doing so.

Another, possibly more relevant, example of WWII distributed lethality is the Japanese actions at Leyte Gulf which actually were a combination of multiple battles.  I won’t bore you with the details of the actions – they’re readily available on-line.

Here’s the interpretation of what occurred from a distributed lethality perspective.

The US had established a large and powerful anti-access/area denial (A2/AD) zone around the Philippine islands of Leyte, Samar, and Luzon in October of 1944.  The A2/AD defensive forces consisted of submarines, PT boats, fleet carrier task forces, battleships, and all manner of escorts along with total air supremacy.  Into this powerful A2/AD zone, the Japanese sent three independent (distributed) forces to search for and attack US forces.  The Japanese plan was complex, convoluted, and depended on a degree of command coordination (networking) that was simply unachievable (the self-imposed radio silence and the fog of war being the equivalent of attempting to operate in today’s electromagnetically challenged environment).  As a result, the three Japanese forces wound up operating independently and largely ineffectively.  The overall action resulted in heavy Japanese losses and the end of Japanese naval power.

Japanese Battleship Musashi Under Attack At Leyte

As you ponder that, now consider that the US Navy plans to send individual ships, or small groups of small ships, into China’s A2/AD zone (defined by the East/South China Seas and the first island chain) which is defended by overwhelming numbers of aircraft, submarines, missile boats, frigates, destroyers, land based anti-ship cruise missiles, anti-ship ballistic missiles, and all manner of sensors.  Is this beginning to sound a lot like Letye in reverse? 

The US forces will depend on complex, real time data sharing and command coordination to enable the distributed ships to conduct massed attacks on Chinese targets.  Does this sound a lot like the wishful command and control thinking that the Japanese planners depended on?

According to the Navy, this highly questionable concept will succeed because it will “complicate” the Chinese tactical picture.  The only complication for the Chinese will be deciding which of many assets should be given the honor of destroying which Navy ships. 

The historically inclined among you may note that the Japanese plan actually succeeded, to an extent, in that it did decoy the US fleet carriers away from the intended main action.  You may consider that a “complication” of the American tactical picture.  In the end, though, the lack of effective command and control and the operational stupidity embodied in the attempt to make inferior forces penetrate a heavily defended A2/AD zone led to the almost complete annihilation of the Japanese forces and any complications that arose were more than compensated by overwhelming A2/AD numbers and firepower.

Why we think our attempt at distributed lethality, using vessels that are far less powerful on a relative basis than the Japanese battleships and heavy cruisers, will be more successful is a mystery that no one has yet been able to explain to me.

Believing that distributed lethality will be successful because it will complicate the enemy tactical picture is tantamount to believing in victory because God is on our side.  It may be comforting but it is tactically and operationally lacking.

Marine's "Littoral Operations in a Contested Environment" Document

The Marine Corps has just released the 2017 unclassified version of “Littoral Operations in a Contested Environment”.  I began reading this with great interest, hoping to have many heretofore puzzling and contradictory doctrinal conundrums explained.  For example, I’ve been reading statements by Marine leadership that in order to effect a landing, they must first land and secure the landing area.  That’s a Catch-22 if I’ve ever heard one!

Unfortunately, I was absolutely stunned by a sentence in the opening paragraphs defining the scope of the document.  From section 2. (Scope), 2.b.1/2 describes the range of operations that the document applies to.  At the low end are what are described in 2.b.1 as “Crisis Response Operations in Uncertain Environments” which include humanitarian assistance, evacuations, and embassy reinforcements – generally non-combat or occasionally very low end combat scenarios.  At the other end of the range, 2.b.2 describes “Contingency Operations in Hostile Environments. 

The latter, presumably describes actual combat … war.  However, the following statement casts severe doubt on how much combat/war this entire concept applies to.

“…major combat operations (MCO) and campaigns versus peer competitors are beyond the scope of this concept.”

What???  Major combat operations and peer combat are not covered by this concept?  Are the Marines really saying that their capabilities and this concept are not useful in a peer war?  That’s what it seems to be saying – that none of the littoral capabilities described in this document apply to actual war?!

Did the Marines really just develop an entire concept that has no applicability to peer war?  Did they really just acknowledge that they have no role in peer combat? 

I can’t believe that’s what was intended but I see no other way to interpret it.  All I can hope is that it was just a very poorly worded sentence but given the Corps’ trend towards lightness, they may be acknowledging that they are no longer a serious warfighting organization.  I’ve got to get a clarification on this.

I’m not going to go any further in analyzing this document for two reasons. 

1. Until I understand the actual scope of the document, I can’t perform a valid assessment.
2. The rest of the document is garbage that reads like a generic sales brochure to Congress.

Cracking the Line

Today we are honored to have a guest post from regular reader and contributor, Mr. Bustamante, who discusses the role of guided missile submarines in A2/AD scenarios.  You may recall his previous post, "Myth of the Unopposed Landing".  Read and enjoy!

_______________________

Cracking the Line

The Case for Guided Missile Submarines in Anti-Access and Area Denial (A2/AD) Scenarios

“But things have changed… the resurgence of Russia and the ascendance of China, both of which are producing numerous submarines, and in particular in Russia’s part, extremely capable submarines… we’re facing challenges of both quantity and quality from our competitors (1).

- Rear Admiral Michael Jabaley

War is a numbers game, even the peacetime deployments obey the rules of math; the challenge is that our submarine force numbers are inadequate and will further decline to approximately 41 boats by 2029 (2).  Projected wartime demands of submarine force call for approximately 35 operationally ready SSNs, in turn requiring 48 boats simply to ensure that 35 will be available (3).  Exacerbating the numerical shortfall is the proliferation of sophisticated anti-access and area denial (A2/AD) defenses, which present a lethal zone of land based maritime strike (aircraft, cruise, and ballistic missiles), sophisticated air defenses, and mines.  These A2/AD defenses can extend from 1,000 to 1,500nm offshore and the most viable naval counter is the submarine launched cruise missile.  However, our navy also faces loss of submarine cruise missile delivery capacity due to the retirement of the four Ohio-class guided missile submarines (SSGNs) without replacement (4).  It is worth noting that our submarines are expected to shoulder the high priority ASW mission, and also enable USAF bomber and naval strikes with cruise and missile strikes to defeat sophisticated anti-access and area denial (A2/AD) defenses.  Nor does this represent the full scope of submarine missions (5). 

There are several potential solutions if we desire a larger submarine force:

1.  Build more submarines.  Current shipyard capacity appears to be limited to at most three nuclear-powered submarines a year.  Even if budgets permit; there are only two shipyards in the country capable of building nuclear-powered ships and it is unlikely that construction rates can be increased without significant capitol infrastructure investment (6).  Nuclear submarine production capacity is also constrained by the requirement to build replacement SSBNs for our strategic forces to replace the aging Ohio class, as well as nuclear powered aircraft carriers.  Finally, a new construction SSGN, while highly desirable, is likely to be secondary in priority to the replacement SSBNs, 12 of which will be built before any new construction could start.

2.  Service Life Extension (SLEP) existing SSNs, if possible.  This alternative is a huge unknown and will require analysis of each SSN to determine the engineering and economic feasibility.

3.  Augment our SSN force with advanced Air-Independent Propulsion (AIP) submarines (SSKs) converted into SSGs by installing a hull section with at least 12 (or more) vertically launched missile cells (VLS) to address the land attack mission (7).  This could be done by purchasing the building rights (or outright buy) submarines from our allies.  

To be clear, the SSG is not a replacement for the SSN.  Furthermore, the U.S. should build SSNs at maximum shipyard capacity for the foreseeable future.  SSNs retain vital endurance and high submerged speed operational capabilities vital for open ocean operations.  These advantages allowed, diesel electric SSKs have always been the stealthiest of submarines within the constraints of battery power, making them highly survivable.  Modern SSKs have maximum submerged speeds exceeding 20 knots, and the ability to travel very long distances using fuel efficient diesels.  With the advent of Air-Independent Propulsion (AIP), SSKs now possess optimal survivability, submerged endurance, and speed to penetrate sophisticated anti-access and area denial (A2/AD) defenses owing to the research going into AIP technologies including: fuel cells, Stirling cycle engines, and Module d'Energie Sous-Marine Autonome (MESMA) (8).  Table 1. Follows and includes pertinent open source information comparing a modern SSN with competing SSKs:

Table 1. Submarine Characteristics Compared

Source: survey of current defense literature.

Further points in favor of the SSG are a comparatively low procurement cost of ~$600 million per boat (before installation of a Vertical Launch System), and reduced manning roughly 33% to 50% of the SSN crew requirements. Critically, AIP submarines can be massed produced: ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems GmbH (Howaldtswerke-Deutsche Werft GmbH) claimed to have nine submarines under construction or being upgraded at its Kiel facility, a vital capability in war (9).

Penetrating an A2/AD defense to launch strikes will require that our SSG get to a firing position within 750 nautical miles or so of an enemy coast.  We must assume that AIP propulsion must be used within the A2/AD zone, as a snorkeling SSK is vulnerable to detection and destruction by Maritime Patrol Aircraft (MPA); this will reduce submerged transit speeds to 6-8 knots.  At 6.5 knots, a modern AIP submarine can travel about 156 nautical miles submerged each day, so it will take five days for an SSG to travel from a position outside a 1,500 nautical mile A2/AD zone to a cruise missile launch point within 750 nautical miles of the coast (10). 

In the end, the argument in favor of the SSG is not about optimum capability, but instead on procuring sufficient numbers of viable boats to round out the submarine force in the strike warfare mission.  Further improvements in batteries and AIP seem likely to improve the capability of submarines.  The AIP equipped submarine, operated by many potential adversaries, also makes an incredibly useful training asset for our navy to train against. Configured with VLS, the SSG is now an absolutely credible solution for strike warfare (land attack), commerce raiding, offensive mining, and ASW. 

___________________________

(1)Congressional Research Service report RL32418, Navy Virginia (SSN-774) Class Attack Submarine Procurement: Background and Issues for Congress, April 14, 2016, by Ronald O'Rourke, pg. 14.

(2)“The Navy’s FY2017 30-year SSN procurement plan, if implemented, would not be sufficient to maintain a force of 48 SSNs consistently over the long run.  The Navy projects under that plan the SSN force would fall below 48 boats starting in FY2025, reach a minimum of 41 boats in FY2029, and remain below 48 boats through FY2036.” Congressional Research Service report RL32418, Navy Virginia (SSN-774) Class Attack Submarine Procurement: Background and Issues for Congress, April 14, 2016, by Ronald O'Rourke, summary page. 

(3)“The peak projected wartime demand of about 35 SSNs deployed within a certain amount of time … is an internal Navy figure that reflects several studies of potential wartime requirements for SSNs.”  Congressional Research Service report RL32418, Navy Virginia (SSN-774) Class Attack Submarine Procurement: Background and Issues for Congress, April 14, 2016, by Ronald O'Rourke, pg. 11.

(4)“From FY2026 through FY2028 the Navy will retire its four Ohio-class guided missile submarines (SSGNs).  Each SSGN can carry a maximum of 154 vertically launched BGM-109 Tomahawk cruise missiles per boat, seven (7) Tomahawk cruise missiles in 22 large-diameter vertical launch tubes (two (2) of the 24 tubes cannot carry the missiles).  The four SSGNs can carry a combined total of 616 vertically launched Tomahawks.  The navy plan is to build Twenty-two Virginia-class boats built with Virginia Payload Modules (VPM) to carry a combined total of 616 Tomahawk missiles.  This plan better distributes the cruise missile across the submarine force, but these same submarines will have many competing tasking’s and the impact of VPM on operational characteristics of SSNs cannot be stated due to classification.”

(5)Additional missions include: Intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR); offensive and defensive mine warfare; anti-submarine warfare (ASW); and anti-surface ship warfare.

(6)Virginia-class boats are built jointly by General Dynamics’ Electric Boat Division of Groton, CT, and Quonset Point, RI, and Huntington Ingalls Industries’ Newport News Shipbuilding, of Newport News, VA.

(7)For comparison, the SSN 688 and 774 class nuclear-powered attack submarines (SSNs) employ a 12-cell VLS for Tomahawk missiles.  Additionally, the Navy is planning to add Virginia Payload Modules (VPM) to the SSN 774 block 5 SSNs - the additional launch tubes in the VPM could carry a total of 28 additional Tomahawk cruise missiles (7 per VPM), which would increase the total number of torpedo-sized weapons (such as Tomahawks) from 37 to about 65.

(8)Manufacturer claims must be taken with great skepticism, but German, Japanese, and Swedish firms are now claiming submerged endurances exceeding 10 days at sustained submerged speeds in excess of 6.5 knots using Air-Independent Propulsion!

(9)‘Why German company ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems wants Australia’s Future Submarines contract’, by Ian McPhedran May 21, 2015.

(10)This figure is somewhat arbitrary and it is based upon a cruise missile with approximately 1,000 nm range (e.g. the UGM-109 Tomahawk variants).  The 750 nm, allows for deep inland strikes.  Wayne Hughes, Capitan USN (RET) presents additional tactical scenarios in his book: “Fleet Tactics and Coastal Combat.”  Andrew F. Krepinevich, Jr. of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments has also written numerous papers with useful scenarios.

_____________________________

Mr. Bustamante is a retired naval officer who served the majority of his career as a Naval Special Warfare Officer and also served as a Surface Warfare Officer and Foreign Area Officer.  He is a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy with a degree in Systems Engineering.  He also holds a Master of Science degree in Defense Analysis (Operations Research) from the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California. After retiring from the Navy, Mr. Bustamante worked for the legislative branch as an auditor and analyst, as a civil servant with the United States Department of State, and also in the private sector as an analyst in information technology project management.

Myth Of The Unopposed Landing

We have a treat today in the form of a guest post from a long time reader with a career's worth of experience.  Please check out his bio at the end of the post.

_______________________

The Myth of the Unopposed Amphibious Landing

Implications of Anti-access/Area-denial Weapons

G. Bustamante

In 1943 Major General Alexander A. Vandergrift, United States Marine Corps stated: “… that landings should not be attempted in the face of organized resistance if, by any combination of march or maneuver, it is possible to land unopposed within striking distance of the objective.”

- Joint Publication 3-18 Joint Forcible Entry Operations

Current military thinking and doctrine assumes that opposed forcible entry operations (amphibious landings and vertical envelopment) can be avoided; yet the laudable intent to minimize casualties flies in the face of historical record, and the inability to conduct forcible entry operations not only simplifies enemy’s planning, it may lead to a protracted campaign with even greater friendly force casualties. Historians will confirm that with the exception of the landings at Inchon, commanders have done precisely as General Vandergrift suggested: major amphibious operations since Gallipoli were directed against the weakest sections of enemy defenses, although even “weak sectors” could prove to be very challenging. Note that allied losses in the WWII landings at the five Normandy invasion beaches were insignificant compared to the casualties incurred in subsequent combat operations (1).

Perfection of Anti-access/Area-denial technologies (submarines, mines, long range strike aircraft, ballistic and anti-ship cruise missiles) are the principal threat to forcible entry operations; but what is seldom appreciated is that these defenses can be applied not only to the enemy’s territory, but projected across border to the harbors and airports in neighboring nations, calling into question the idea that these defenses can be bypassed.

Consider a friendly defensive scenario from the point of view of India. Using its Agni I ballistic missiles (2), India can strike potential invaders not only along its coastline, but also any forces attempting to use airfields or harbors in neighboring Pakistan or Bangladesh. India also has the ability to deliver sea or land mines by aircraft or rocket, as well as a submarine force. Any potential invader must consider the implications of Anti-access/Area-denial, as demonstrated in the following graphic.

Map of India: Defensive Implications of the Medium Range Agni I Missile

Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA): http://www.eia.gov/beta/international/analysis.cfm?iso=IND, annotations by author

This should serve as a reminder that a competent enemy will not oblige us by fighting according to our theorems, timetables, and wishes, but will seek to prevent us to build up substantial forces ashore. It is naïve to assume that there will always be a neighboring friendly ally willing to allow the use of their ports, and airports. Even if sympathetic, an ally may be unwilling to risk the political, economic, and military consequences of allowing the use of its harbors and airspace. The “so what” implication of this is that mines, long range strike aircraft, ballistic and anti-ship cruise missiles and supporting ISR networks will have to be destroyed, neutralized, or suppressed prior to the introduction, or reinforcement of forces into theater.

____________________

(1) The Normandy landings cost the allies an estimated 10,000 casualties; the Normandy campaign, 5 June 1944 through 1 September 1944, cost the allies approximately 225,000 casualties. German casualty estimates range from 400,000 to 530,000 men, most lost in the breakout and encirclement of the German Army Group B in the Falaise Pocket leading the collapse of German defenses in France.

(2) The Agni-I is capable of delivering a conventional payload of one (1) metric ton to a distance of approximately 600 nautical miles. India has further developed its ballistic missile forces.

_______________________

"Mr. Bustamante is a retired naval officer who served the majority of his career as a Naval Special Warfare Officer and also is held Surface Warfare Officer and Foreign Area Officer designators.  He is a graduate of the  U.S. Naval Academy with a degree in Systems Engineering.  He also holds a Master of Science degree in Defense Analysis (Operations Research) from the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California and numerous service schools. After retiring from the Navy, Mr. Bustamante worked for the legislative branch, as a civil servant with the United States Depart of State, and in the private sector as an analyst in information technology project management."

P-8 and PBY

ComNavOps has long had doubts about the wartime role of the P-8 Poseidon patrol aircraft.  The doubts arise from the combination of the aircraft’s slow and defenseless nature plus the necessity that it broadcast its presence (operating its radar) when performing the maritime patrol function (MPA).  Thus, the enemy is given a free location fix against a high value, slow, defenseless asset.  In other words, the P-8 is a sitting duck in combat if used as envisioned. 

“Used as envisioned”, of course, brings up the subject of the concept of operations (CONOPS).  How will the P-8 be used?  What will its main function be – ASW, MPA, both?  Will it perform its searches actively or passively?  Will it be defended by fighter aircraft or used independently? 

Most importantly, how close to the contested air/water space will it be used?  Certainly, the further back from the front line, the safer.  Of course, the flip side of that is that the further back from the front line, the less useful and effective it is.

The next question is where is the front line?  Well, that’s a nebulous concept that depends on the weapons being considered.  Considering an enemy rifleman, the front line is a hundred yards or so.  Considering enemy surface to air missiles which would be targeted at a P-8 aircraft, the front line is the range of the SAM systems which is 250 -300+ miles.  Here’s some range data on Russian SAM systems for consideration.

S-200 (SA-5)             190 miles

S-300 (SA-10)           121 miles

S-400 (SA-21)           250 miles

S-500 (?)                   250 – 300+ miles

Of course, the reported Russian SAM ranges are, undoubtedly, maximum theoretical ranges.  Effective ranges are probably half that.

Now, compare the SAM engagement ranges to the P-8’s detection range which is reportedly up to 200 miles for large targets with low resolution.  An effective range is probably more on the order of 100 miles. 

Comparing the SAM ranges and the P-8 detection range, it’s clear that the P-8 will have to enter the SAM’s engagement range to see anything assuming the SAM systems are on the front line.  The point is that unless we’re willing to consider P-8s as expendable, they’ll have to be held well back from the front line.  With that in mind, what will the P-8s be looking for? 

So far, this is considering only SAM ranges.  If thousand mile fighters and UAVs are considered, the P-8’s will be pushed even further back from the front line.

Knowledge of the location and movement of enemy units behind the front lines is immensely useful.  Knowledge of the location and movement of enemy units many hundreds of miles on our side of the front line is useful (certainly!!!) but highly unlikely other than the odd submarine.  In simple terms, the P-8 will offer us no intelligence about what’s happening inside the Chinese first island chain which is exactly the kind of intel we’d like to have.

P-8 Poseidon - Useful in War?

Let’s switch gears, momentarily.  ComNavOps is ever one to study and learn from history and it occurs that the WWII PBY Catalina is a relevant comparison to the P-8.  The PBY was designed as the MPA aircraft of its time and, indeed, functioned in that role for the first couple of years of the war before being superseded by long ranged, land based aircraft.  Like the P-8, the PBY was large, slow, and defenseless.  Data is difficult to come by but here’s the best summary of the early PBY loss rates that I could assemble, divided into the two main operational areas.  The operating area is followed by the number of PBY’s deployed and then the number of PBY’s lost.

Location                     Deployed       Lost

Pearl Harbor                   68               56

Philippines                      28               26

The loss rates are staggering.  Admittedly, many of the aircraft were destroyed on the ground but the loss rates in the air were also appalling.  On the other hand, the aircraft performed its function.  For example, the 30 PBY’s based on Midway found the Japanese fleet and set the stage for the battle that followed.  Thus, as a cheap, plentiful, expendable detection system the PBY was effective.  We had lots of PBYs and could afford to send them deep into potential enemy waters as expendable detection devices.  Locating an enemy fleet was deemed worth the loss of the aircraft.  Does this hold true today?  Are we willing to send $200M P-8’s on one-way missions?  Even if we are, we’ll likely only have around 80 P-8’s after the production run is done.  Note that we lost 82 PBY’s in the first couple years of WWII in just two relatively localized theaters.

PBY Catalina - WWII's P-8 Poseidon

Also note that the preceding discussion is focused on the MPA role, using radar for long distance surveillance.  The situation becomes far worse for the ASW role.  ASW detection does not occur at 100-200 mile radar ranges – it occurs at sonobuoy range.  How will P-8’s possibly penetrate far enough into the battlespace to perform useful ASW without being shot down?  I have no answer for that and, indeed, the answer would seem to be that it can’t.

This suggests a disturbing scenario – that we have spent the last few decades building a military force optimized for uncontested operations and one ill-suited for contested operations.  How will we perform ASW inside the first island chain?  Our own submarines can perform ASW and that is, of course, one of their main functions but that then brings the looming submarine shortfall into much sharper focus.  If submarines are to be our main ASW platform why are we allowing such a shortfall in numbers?.  Far from a shortfall, perhaps we should be increasing our submarine numbers?

All of the preceding also leads to the inevitable question, why do we even have P-8’s if they won’t be effective in war?  Why did we ever begin building P-3/8’s?  That answer lies with the nature of the enemy when long range patrol aircraft were developed.  During WWII, with only very short range surveillance systems available, enemy fleets could be anywhere in the Pacific.  Thus, PBY’s were needed to cover the entire ocean (or, at least, the areas of more immediate concern).  In more modern times, the Soviet Union was also a world-ranging naval force (submarines, in particular).  Thus, again, a patrol aircraft was needed to cover the entire world.  The plus side of this was that while the Soviet Union had far ranging submarines that needed to be detected their SAM systems and fighter aircraft were not present world wide.  Thus, the P-3’s were free to roam the world, hunting for submarines and conducting area surveillance, secure in the knowledge that they were relatively safe.

Today, however, our enemy of interest, China, is not a world ranging naval force (though they are moving in that direction) and is, for the foreseeable future, content to operate largely behind the first island chain.  Thus, we need to go into the anti-access/area denial (A2/AD) zone thus created if we hope to generate useful intel.  This means that our primary ocean surveillance platforms, the P-8 and BAMS (Broad Area Maritime Surveillance) UAVs are particularly ill-suited for the mission.

We essentially replaced the P-3 with a duplicate, the P-8 – upgraded a bit, to be sure, but for all practical operational and tactical purposes, the same aircraft.  Over the life of the P-3, the operational and tactical landscape changed immensely from world wide surveillance to relatively small, focused surveillance on A2/AD zones and the threat to the aircraft changed from almost non-existent to very long ranged and lethal.  Despite those immense changes, we simply replaced the P-3 with its duplicate.  Perhaps we should have examined the CONOPS a bit closer and come up with a better means to accomplish the mission – a means that might have been something other than the P-8 or other than an aircraft, at all.

Some will say that the F-35 is how we will obtain our deep penetration intel.  This ignores the reality that the F-35 has neither the flight range nor the radar/sensor range to cover the entire East/South China Seas.  The F-35 might be useful for looking at a specific, tiny spot but it is not a maritime patrol aircraft.  Add to that the likelihood that every available F-35 will be fully occupied trying to establish air superiority and none will be available for generic surveillance work.

Thus, we are left with the conclusion that the P-8 and BAMS will not be particularly useful in high end combat and the question, how will we gather useful A2/AD zone surveillance information?

Accept the Threat

A couple of decades of fighting incredibly lopsided conflicts has led to the development of skewed priorities for America’s armed forces.  Mission (the big mission) accomplishment has given way to avoidance of casualties and collateral damage.  We would rather lose a battle than lose a man/ship/plane or inflict collateral damage.  This unwillingness to accept losses has, in turn, led to avoidance of threats as our doctrinal (dare I say, strategic?) and operational default imperative. 

For example, avoidance of the A2/AD threat has led the Navy to abandon any attempt to operate surface ships in contested waters.  Our carriers will remain well outside an A2/AD zone until it becomes “safe” to enter.  Isn’t that a contradiction in terms?  The job of a carrier is to enter the A2/AD zone and make it safe, not wait for it to somehow, magically, become safe.

Consider the Navy’s new doctrine of 25-50 mile standoffs while conducting amphibious assaults.  The standoff is to avoid the threat of land launched anti-ship missiles.  The fact that that kind of standoff distance dooms any assault from the start (meaning we no longer have a viable amphibious assault capability against a peer-defended objective) is now deemed less important than avoidance of the threat and, hence, risk to any ship.

We have built a fleet of mainly defensive ships in an attempt to avoid the anti-ship missile threat.  We have poured huge amounts of money into ever bigger and longer ranged Standard missiles and, now, ballistic missile defense systems.  At the same time, how much money have we put into offensive weapons and systems?  On a relative basis, very little.  We’ve become so frightened of the threat that we’ve forgotten why the Navy exists.  It exists to wage offensive war.  To attack.  To defeat.

Hey, there’s nothing wrong with recognizing and protecting against threats.  We’d be idiots if we didn’t.  But when our focus shifts from dealing with threats so as to enable our offensive actions to strictly avoiding threats because we’re unwilling to risk losing ships and aircraft than we’ve forgotten why the Navy exists.

What does all this mean?  It means that we need to change our thinking from avoidance of threats at all costs to accepting threats and the inevitable losses so that we can accomplish our mission.  We need to accept the threat of the A2/AD zone, sail into the heart of it, attacking the whole way, and fight to carry out our offensive mission.  We need to accept the threat of land based anti-ship missiles and move up to the shore so that an amphibious assault stands a chance of success and we can move one step closer to accomplishing our mission.  We need to accept the threat of the Chinese carrier killer missile so that we can get our carriers in range to conduct offensive operations.

So, am I suggesting that our current fleet should sail right into an A2/AD zone?  Not at all.  Our current fleet is not built to accept the threat.

What does it mean to accept the threat? 

Well, it means that we start by acknowledging that losses will occur.  And with that, we immediately see our first problem.  We have fallen into a spiral pattern of ever-increasing costs of ships and planes which result in ever-decreasing numbers.  In simpler terms, we’re on a path of putting our eggs in fewer and more expensive baskets.  No wonder we don’t want to risk them!  Losing a $14B Ford class carrier along with its $6B air wing would be catastrophic.  If it were up to me, I’d park that carrier in a cornfield in the middle of Nebraska and leave it so nothing could threaten it.  That’s the only sane thing to do with that much treasure tied up in one ship.

We need to reverse the trend of fewer and more expensive ships and planes.  We need to begin building smaller, cheaper, and more numerous assets.  Attrition must become a recognized feature of high end combat and its impact must be factored into our acquisition plans.  Instead of building Fords, we need to be building downsized Nimitzes.  Downsized?!  Yes, downsized.  Something about 2/3 the size of a Nimitz would probably be about right.  It would be big enough to carry a full air wing of 40 combat aircraft plus the various support aircraft and yet cheap enough that its loss wouldn’t cripple us.  Being cheaper (yes, that’s an enormous assumption), we could get carrier numbers back up to 15-18 which greatly reduces the impact of any single loss.

The same reasoning can be applied to aircraft.  We’d be better off with ten Hornets than one F-35.  Sure, we’ll lose aircraft in combat but individual losses won’t be nearly as devastating and sufficient numbers will ensure that we can complete our missions even in the face of losses.

Accepting the threat also means recognizing that we will have to stand and fight rather than run away.  This suggests that we need to re-evaluate how we build ships.  We need to build ships that can stand and fight.  We need ships with armor, great point defenses, more robust passive defenses, greater redundancy, and simpler systems that can be maintained and repaired at sea.

Accept the threat.  Deal with the threat.  Destroy the threat.  That’s what a Navy does.

The threats won’t go away and neither should the Navy.

Offensive Carriers

We’ve had previous discussions about the future of the Navy’s supercarriers and their role in major combat operations.  ComNavOps has opined that the role of the carrier has devolved to become that of an escort for the “shooters”, meaning the Burkes/Ticos with their load of Tomahawks, and an escort for the Air Force’s long range bombers, meaning that the carrier’s air wing will establish local air superiority to allow the AF bombers to carry out their penetration missions.

We’ve also discussed the migration of the Navy from an offensive force to a largely defensive one.  A purely defensive force, of course, becomes the epitome of the self-licking ice cream cone – existing solely to protect itself.  Unfortunately, that is pretty much what the Navy has become.  The Burke class is a defensive platform.  The carrier is largely defensive.  Our focus is on ballistic missile defense for its own sake rather than as an adjunct to offensive operations.  We have allowed our offensive mine warfare capability to atrophy.  Our amphibious fleet is doctrine-less.  And so on.

Tying these two thoughts together is this article from Breaking Defense website which touches on the origin of the supercarrier and suggests a future based on a return to the past (1).  The article notes the A-3 Sky Warrior as the justification for the supercarrier and the offensive nature of carrier air power during that time.

“ ‘The A-3 came online in the early to mid 1950s, and for most of the next fifty years the Navy was able to do long-range deep strike,’ said retired Navy captain Jerry Hendrix, who moderated today’s discussion with Rep. Forbes. Most of those old strike aircraft had an unrefueled range of 1,000 to 1,2000 miles, he told me after the event, but the A-3 itself ‘had a range of 1,800 nautical miles — unrefueled — and could carry a 12,000-pound atomic bomb.’

‘If you look at the A-3 Sky Warrior….that plane was the reason why we developed theForrestal-class, the first super-carrier, [in the first place],’ said Hendrix, who’s writing a study of carrier air wing evolution at the Center for a New American Security. The 1,000-foot flight deck of a modern carrier was originally designed to give large, long-ranged jet aircraft room to take off. Its massive maintenance spaces and ordnance storage were originally intended to support heavy bombers, not just strike fighters. As anti-aircraft and anti-ship missiles get more threatening, it may be time to use the super-carrier for its original purpose again.”

The article suggests, correctly, that the carrier is, or should be, an offensive weapon.  If not, its reason for existence becomes highly questionable.  Today’s short range aircraft and shrinking air wings are severely limiting the offensive capability of our carriers.  Sure, today’s carrier is still a formidable threat against a third rate opponent but so is a prop driven aircraft launched from a barge and at a fraction of the cost.  The carrier justifies its price tag in combat against a peer and that’s where today’s air wing comes up short – literally, when you look at its combat range.

I stated that the role of the carrier is to escort the “shooters”.  That statement is based on the current (Hornet) and near future (Hornet + F-35) air wing composition and the recognition that the air wing composition will not significantly change from that mix for the next few decades.  However, if the Navy would acknowledge its offensive responsibilities, drop or severely curtail the F-35, and develop a truly long range, penetration strike aircraft, my opinion would change.

A-3 Skywarrior - Offensive Threat

Of course, hand in hand with a long range, penetrating strike aircraft must be a long range air superiority fighter.  Modern surveillance has advanced too far for an unescorted, defenseless aircraft to have a hope of penetrating an enemy defense zone.  The path of the multi-role strike/ECM/AEW/surveillance fighter is a false one.  It produces a mediocre aircraft for any specific role.  We need to return to optimized, single function aircraft (yes, a pure air superiority fighter can have a secondary role as a strike aircraft as long as it doesn’t detract from its primary role). 

I’m not going to discuss the single versus multi-role aircraft debate any further.  That’s not the point of this post.  The point is the offensive nature of the carrier and how to restore it.  If a multi-role aircraft can fill that requirement (it can’t) then I’m fine with it.

We must return to offensive carrier groups and an offensive Navy, in general.  As we’ve discussed in the past couple of posts about A2/AD combat, the Navy desperately needs new, very long range strike missiles, IRBMs, very long range aircraft, long range tactical targeting, and other ships and weapons that recognize the reality of the vast distances of modern A2/AD zones.  Of course, to play the broken record, we also need a viable strategy and operational concept for combatting an A2/AD zone.  The strategy and operation concept will serve as the guide for the specific developments and acquisitions required.

We had all of this figured out, once upon a time, but have since wandered far afield in the name of transformation, cost efficiency, or whatever other misguided fad-ish notion ruled the day and led us astray.  We need to look to the future with one eye firmly on the past and solid grip on history.  The Gods of the Copybook Headings will allow no less.

_________________________________

(1)Breaking Defense, “From Sky Warrior To UCLASS: Back To The Future Of Carrier-Based Strike?”, Sydney Freedberg Jr., June 11, 2015,

http://breakingdefense.com/2015/06/from-sky-warrior-to-uclass-back-to-the-future-of-carrier-based-strike/

IRBMs in the A2/AD Scenario

In the previous post, a reader brought up the possibility of Intermediate Range Ballistic Missiles (IRBM) as an A2/AD weapon.  I had considered mentioning them, specifically, in the post but opted not to because I feared they would bog the discussion down and obscure the more general topic.  However, now that it’s been brought up, let’s look a bit closer at IRBMs in the context of A2/AD.

The Chinese, of course, have developed IRBMs for various uses including the so called “carrier killer”, the DF-21.  This IRBM has generated much press coverage due to its combination of lethality and survivability.  A ballistic missile is a difficult weapon to counter.  Indeed, the USN is expending a great deal of money and effort in the attempt to defend against these weapons.  The entire Burke class is being modified to counter ballistic missiles.  Lethality and survivability are two of the characteristics that would be highly useful in an A2/AD penetration scenario.  Thus, a US IRBM would seem to meet the needs for a weapon with extremely long range, massive destructive ability, and survivability.

Of course, this immediately brings up the first objection to the use of IRBMs and that is the possibility of misinterpreting a conventional ballistic missile as a nuclear strike missile.  I’ll pause a moment, now, to allow some of you to finish wailing, gnashing your teeth, and wringing your hands in hysteria.  I can hear you saying we can’t use an IRBM – the Chinese would assume we were launching a nuclear attack and it would mean instant nuclear Armageddon.

Take a deep breath … 

OK, you did note the previous paragraph where we noted that the Chinese have already developed their own IRBMs and, apparently, have every intention of using them.  They, clearly, aren’t worried about us misinterpreting their usage so why should we worry about their reaction?  Well, some would answer that their missiles are incapable of reaching the US and so could not be a nuclear threat to us whereas ours could reach their soil and could constitute a nuclear threat.  Hogwash!  First, their missiles can reach US carriers which are sovereign US territory and they can reach bases such as Guam which, again, are US territories.  Second, if the Chinese are that concerned about nuclear misinterpretation, all they have to do is enter into an agreement with the US to ban IRBMs – clearly they have no concerns.  So, there is no problem with using IRBMs.

Moving on …

What platform would launch an IRBM?  Two candidates come to mind.  One is the submarine with it’s attendant benefits of survivability and stealth and the other is a surface ship with either the newer and larger Mk57 VLS (currently only installed on the Zumwalt, as I recall) or a new, purpose built launch system, presumably a VLS variant similar to an SSBN launch tube. 

The Mk57 VLS is a larger version of the venerable Mk41 and is intended to accommodate future, larger missiles.  The canister is around 23 ft long and 28 inches in diameter and can support around a 9000 pound load.  Whether this is sufficient to house an IRBM developed for the A2/AD scenario, I don’t know.  Remember, a 1000-2000 mile conventional IRBM is probably a significantly different beast from an ICBM.  Can we build one to fit existing VLS systems?  I don’t know.

Cost is an issue and I have no idea what the cost of a suitable tactical IRBM would be and, thus, what the cost-value relationship would be.

Numbers are also an issue and are closely related to cost.  Can we build enough missiles to be effective?  Presumably, these missiles would be tasked with destruction of fixed, high value targets.  How many such targets are there and how many missiles would be required for their destruction?  Again, I don’t know.

It would seem that IRBMs offer a partial solution to the A2/AD penetration requirement, at least in theory.  Whether we could build them in sufficient numbers and come up with a suitable launch system is an open question although nothing I’ve read suggests we couldn’t.  Certainly, the very characteristics of lethality and survivability that make defending against an IRBM such a headache for the Navy suggest that they would make an effective offensive weapon against an A2/AD zone.

A2/AD Combat

The May issue of Proceedings has an interesting article about using an Arsenal Ship as a means of breaching an A2/AD zone (1).  The author’s contention is that an Arsenal Ship represents a survivable concentration of firepower which is necessary to breach an A2/AD zone.  One of the author’s underlying premises is the need to,

“… provide a precise, persistent, and continuous volume of fire directed at the enemy’s command-and-control (C2), communications nodes, and long- and mid-range weapon systems.”

This is a reasonable requirement and ties in with other, related philosophies such as the best defense is a good offense (attack the launch sites and weapons rather than defend against the launched weapons), attack the supporting bases, etc.  The key in any of these related concepts is the need for very long range, survivable weapons or, conversely, the means to deliver shorter range weapons in a survivable manner.

Setting aside actual strategies and operational plans, let’s look a bit closer at the Navy’s ability to deliver weapons through or across a sizable A2/AD zone (a thousand miles or so).

Currently, the Tomahawk missile is the only Navy weapon with sufficient range for A2/AD penetration.

The Navy surface force has the ability to launch Tomahawk missiles with thousand mile range from surface ships.  Burke and Ticonderoga class vessels can carry around 100 vertical launch missiles (VLS cells).  That’s potentially a lot of strike power.  Given the Navy’s current practice of three Burke/Tico escorts per carrier strike group, that equates to 300 missiles.  However, the Navy’s top priority will always be defense of the carrier so the escort ships will be heavily weighted towards AAW missiles rather than strike.  For sake of discussion, let’s speculate that an escort ship would contain 80% AAW and 20% strike.  That means that the 300 missiles carried by the escorts would be 240 AAW and 60 strike.  While not an insignificant amount, 60 missiles from an entire carrier group is not much of an impact against the entire mainland “target” of an enemy with a sizable A2/AD zone (oh come on, we’re talking about China, right?).  Attacking China with 60 missiles won’t make much of a dent in their defenses.

Surface ship strikes are also problematic in that they carry a higher degree of risk to the launching vessel and the launch locations are reasonably predictable.

The subsurface force also has Tomahawk launch capability.  Virginia class SSNs carry 12 or 40 Tomahawk vertical launch missiles, depending on version.  In addition, the legacy SSGNs carry 154 Tomahawks and the later Los Angeles class SSNs carry 12.

Submarine launched missiles offer the greatest degree of stealth.  Subs are very difficult to detect even after having announced their presence via the “flaming data point” of launch.  Unless the sub launches in the close vicinity of ASW forces, by the time appropriate forces can arrive at the launch location the sub will be sufficiently far away to make detection an enormous challenge.  Of course, the first island chain geography dictates somewhat predictable points of entry into the area and offers the possibility of sub traps and enemy SOSUS-like detection arrays.  Still, subs are a very survivable means of delivering volumes of missiles.

The drawback to both surface and sub launched missiles is that, once expended, the ships must return to port to reload.  Thus, a sizable pulse of firepower could be generated but a high volume sustained attack scenario would be extremely challenging or impossible.

Of course, we fight jointly and the Air Force can offer long range, deep penetrating strike capabilities on a regular and frequent basis though at great risk and attrition will likely render such a contribution ineffective in fairly short order.  A force of 19 or 20 B-2 bombers simply cannot operate for long.  Combat attrition combined with simple mechanical failure would render the force too small to be operationally effective in a fairly short period.  The 100 B-1 bombers offer a more robust capability numerically but their ability to conduct and survive deep penetration A2/AD missions is questionable.

We see then that the Navy’s ability to apply large volume firepower across a sizable A2/AD zone is marginal.  This leads to several conclusions.  The most obvious conclusion is that the Navy needs more, and preferably longer ranged, missiles.  In addition, the Navy needs to examine its strategy and operational planning for A2/AD combat.  If we can’t effectively generate much more than a single pulse of firepower then we need to ensure that we have plans to take maximum advantage of that pulse.  Finally, we need to closely examine the potential for complementary actions between the Air Force and Navy.  We’ve covered this in previous posts.  It may be that the best use of the carrier strike group is to establish corridors of local aerial superiority for the Air Force bombers to use.  This, in turn, dictates the development of a certain type of naval fighter – one not exemplified by the F-35, unfortunately.

Returning to the article, the author advocates the development and use of the Arsenal Ship as a means of increasing the long range firepower of the Navy.  That's certainly an option and I leave it to the reader to check out the article and evaluate the author's proposal.

In summary, it is clear that we currently lack the required weapons and platforms to counter a sizable and effective A2/AD zone and operate within it.  The Navy needs to look much closer at how to attack an A2/AD zone, develop operational plans, acquire more and longer ranged weapons, and begin developing and training the required tactics (multi-carrier strike groups, for instance).

(1)USNI Proceedings, “Breaking the Anti-Access Wall”, Capt. Sam Tangredi, USN(Ret.), May 2015