China Naivete

If China’s annexation of the South and East China Seas wasn’t such a serious issue, ComNavOps would have to chuckle at the naiveté of the US political and military leaders.  Not being a political blog, I’m going to address this only to the extent that it impacts the Navy’s actions.  Here’s Secretary of Defense, Ashton Carter’s latest comment on the subject (1).

“We also oppose any further militarization of disputed features. We all know there is no military solution to the South China Sea disputes. Right now, at this critical juncture, is the time for renewed diplomacy, focused on a finding a lasting solution that protects the rights and the interests of all.”

That’s hilarious!  No military solution??!  I’ve got news for Sec. Carter, the Chinese are militarily annexing the area and quite successfully!  There certainly is a military solution – China is applying it and we’re watching it.  We can continue to issue statements from now until the annexation is complete but that won’t change what’s happening. 

I’ve said it before, if we don’t want China to claim the South and East China Seas as their own sovereign territory we need to act now and that means the Navy needs to get into the fight.  Among other actions,

• we need to stop honoring the completely illegal 12 mile territorial claim China is making on the manufactured islands

• we need to aggressively exercise our rights of passage

• we need to harass illegal Chinese reclamation efforts

• we need to start providing combat escorts to our surveillance aircraft and ships

More humor …  We need to find a solution that “protects the rights and interest of all”??!  Again, that’s funny because, you know, China is all about the protecting the rights and interests of all.  China cares about one set of interests, only, and that’s theirs.  They’ve made that as abundantly clear as possible.  They’ve thumbed their nose at international adjudication of territorial disputes and engaged in systematic illegal annexation.  What could possibly make American leaders think that China has any interest in the rights of other parties?

Not absurd enough for you yet?  How about this one reported by USNI website,

“Instead Rear Adm. Jeff Harley, the Assistant Deputy Chief of Naval Operations (Operations, Plans and Strategy), said that a rapidly modernizing People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) could assist U.S. efforts to bolster maritime security in the Pacific and Indian Ocean regions.” (2)

So, according to this Navy Admiral, not only is China not a threat but China may help us to bolster Pacific security.  If we really believed that we’d be sending them aid instead of conducting a Pacific Pivot.  This is just idiotic fantasy at its best!

The reality is that China is continuing to build 3km long air and naval bases at Subi and Mischief Reefs to add to the completed base on Woody Island.  And what will the Chinese do with these bases?  According to Michael Green (senior vice-president at CSIS and former senior director for Asian affairs at the National Security Council under President George W Bush),

“Green said Chinese officials have told him in private they intend to militarize the reefs and islands with planes, anti-aircraft weapons and naval vessels. He said that would allow their air force to have ‘overlapping air control over the South China Sea, not just from one airfield but from three.’ “(3)

What was that at the start of the post about “no military solution”?  Again, China sees a military solution and is well along in applying it.  If there’s no military solution for us, it’s only because we lack the will to apply one.  The entire South and East China Seas now belong to China and it’s only a matter of time until they look to expand beyond those.  In the meantime, though, we’ll continue to pursue peace, goodwill, and respect for all.  Someone let me know how that works out.

(1)Breaking Defense, “Carter Calls For ‘Immediate & Complete Halt’ To South China Sea Island Building”, Colin Clark, September 16, 2015,

http://breakingdefense.com/2015/09/carter-calls-for-immediate-complete-halt-to-south-china-sea-island-building/

(2)USNI News, “DSEI: Chinese Expansionism No Threat to U.S., Says Admiral”, Jon Rosamond, September 15, 2015,

http://news.usni.org/2015/09/15/dsei-chinese-expansionism-no-threat-to-u-s-says-admiral

(3)The Guardian, “China’s new reef bases add an edge to Xi Jinping’s forthcoming US visit”, Steven Mufson, 15-Sep-2015,

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/15/south-china-sea-xi-jinping-obama

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.

This Is How We Want To Wage War?

Through the course of many posts, we’ve discussed naval force structure, strategy, combat doctrine, etc.  In other words, we’ve discussed how to wage a war. 

Defense News website has an article about airpower usage in the current anti-ISIS campaign (1).  While this is Air Force centric, the concepts apply equally to the Navy which is why we’ll look at this.  This is how we fight wars today.  This is how we envision fighting wars in the future.

First, just a bit of perspective on the entire anti-ISIS endeavor.  It’s been a year or so since the US began the fight against ISIS.  The president promised to degrade and destroy ISIS, you’ll recall.  How’s that working out?  Marginal, at best, right? 

On a related note, those who argue that the US is militarily stronger than the next X countries combined would do well to note the stunning lack of success against a handful of militarily bereft thugs.  To be fair to the military, the military is probably being tightly handcuffed by the President and his political goals.  Still, I haven’t heard anything worthwhile from the military regarding a viable strategy (assuming it’s even in our national interest to be involved in this).  To be further fair, we have no way of knowing what strategies the military has proposed to the President in private.

Anyway, back to the topic.  How do we want to wage war?  As reported,

“As of Oct. 6, the US and partner nations had conducted 7,323 strikes against ISIS: 4,701 in Iraq and 2,622 in Syria, according to a Pentagon report on OIR.  …  that averages out to about 13 strikes in Iraq and seven strikes in Syria each day.

By comparison, during the 42-day Desert Storm air campaign against Saddam Hussein in 1991, coalition fighters and bombers flew 48,224 strike sorties, or 1,100 a day. Twelve years later, the 31-day Iraqi Freedom air campaign averaged more than 800 offensive sorties a day.

We see, then, a focus on limited, precision attacks.  Unfortunately, the result of limited attacks is limited results – a key lesson that the President and military seem to be ignoring.

We also see a key characteristic of modern warfare as conducted by the US and summed up in the following.

“Since Desert Storm and Iraqi Freedom, the US has made great strides in precision-guided munitions, Lt. Gen. Robert Otto, deputy chief of staff for ISR, pointed out in an interview with Defense News. Today, the US is deploying primarily precision-guided bombs in the region to avoid collateral damage, he stressed.”

We’ve discussed this before.  Arguably, the US’ main goal in modern conflicts is avoidance of collateral damage even at the cost of increased risk to US personnel and decreased likelihood of operational success.  We have forgotten that war is destruction.  We are trying to conduct clean, surgical wars where equipment gets destroyed but no one on either side gets hurt.  The reality is that this is a recipe for long, drawn out conflicts that ultimately result in many more people getting hurt because the enemy has no qualms at all about hurting innocents.

There are some who recognize this but too few.  For example,

“What is the logic of a policy that limits the application of force to get rid of the evil that is the Islamic State while allowing them to kill innocent men, women and children?” Deptula [Lt. Gen. Dave Deptula, Ret., former deputy chief of staff for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance] said. “It’s laudatory that Operation Inherent Resolve has resulted in zero civilian casualties ... but how many innocent men, women and children have been killed in that same time?”

So, by trying to avoid collateral damage we ensure on-going civilian deaths on a much greater scale over a much longer time frame.

What other problems do we see in the anti-ISIS campaign?  Intel and targeting.  As Defense News notes,

“One frustration for the Air Force is a lack of assets and intelligence on the ground, Otto [Lt. Gen. Robert Otto, deputy chief of staff for ISR] noted. US agencies and coalition forces need to do a better job using intelligence, particularly human intelligence, to discern targets the Air Force can then strike from the air, he stressed.”

“I think we need to do a better job at holistically using our intelligence to create the targets. So it’s using signals intelligence, what we hear with geospatial intelligence, what we can discern from pictures with moving target indicators,” Otto said. “That’s hard work, but work that we need to improve.”

We see in these statements both the recognition that targeting is difficult and the failure to recognize that more technology is not the answer.  All the explosive capability in the world is useless unless you have a target to use it against.  Typically, though, the Air Force’s solution to targeting is more technology rather than eyes and boots on the ground.  Another approach to targeting is to accept that less precise targeting is acceptable.  If a sniper is in a building, our approach is to initiate a gazillion dollar program to develop a UAV that can enter the building, find the sniper, and disable his rifle.  The alternative is to drop a mortar shell on the building and move on.  This goes back to the avoidance of collateral damage issue.  If we are more concerned with avoidance of collateral damage than elimination of the threat, we shouldn’t be involved in the first place.  War is hell and the only good aspect to it is ending it quickly and decisively.  Fewer people will die in the long run.

Can the US fight a war with simpe, basic weapons?  No!  Consider this,

“We won’t send airplanes into certain areas if they don’t have F-22s with them because they make everybody better, they provide a capability that allows those fourth-generation airplanes to be even better than they would be on their own.” [Gen. Hawk Carlisle, commander of Air Combat Command]

Really?  We’re plinking pickup trucks.  Gen. Carlisle is suggesting that a fourth generation aircraft can’t do that sufficiently well?  How does an F-22 make that better?  Hey, how many F-22’s does it take to change a light bulb?  How many F-22’s does it take to plink a pickup truck?  It doesn’t matter.  We’re going to use technology for its own sake.

“The stealthy F-22 is a game-changing air dominance platform, according to Col. Larry Broadwell, commander of the 1st Operations Group. Broadwell emphasized the Raptor’s enhanced ability to identify and destroy targets on the ground, adding that the plane’s integrated sensors have improved battlefield awareness for both US and coalition aircraft. Raptors from the 1st Wing were the first to deploy with a new air-to-ground capability upgrade, Broadwell noted.”

Well, how can anyone argue with that?  Using our most advanced jet to plink $30,000 pickup trucks doesn’t seem like overkill, does it?  Risking our most advanced jet to plink $30,000 pickup trucks doesn’t seem unwise, does it?

But for all its new technology, the F-22 has some limits. While the Raptor is able to communicate back and forth with other F-22s, the plane does not yet have the ability to send information to fourth-generation aircraft, Broadwell acknowledged. The plane can import information across traditional data links, but can’t export data, he said.”

Wait a minute!  Put the afterburner in reverse.  Didn’t we just read that Gen. Carlisle said the F-22 makes every other aircraft better?  How does it do that if it can’t communicate with them?  Could it be that the F-22 doesn’t really enhance every other aircraft and that the Air Force is just engaged in the same kind of exaggeration that the Navy routinely does?

Moving on, what about all those expensive surveillance toys the Air Force has?

“The Air Force’s ISR platforms are also performing well in the region, Otto said. For high-altitude surveillance missions, commanders are using Lockheed Martin’s U-2 spy plane and Northrop Grumman’s unmanned RQ-4 Global Hawk to gather intelligence.

For medium-altitude ISR operations, the Air Force deploys General Atomics’ MQ-1 Predator and MQ-9 Reaper drones. These platforms use full motion video to provide a clearer understanding of the battlefield, Otto said.

“The technology is incredible,” Otto said. “We’re able to do the Global Hawk or the MQ-1s and MQ-9s and fly those from back in the United States, which is when you think about that from a technological standpoint, very very advanced.”

Our UAV surveillance capability is incredible, the Air Force tells us, but didn’t we read earlier that targeting is a “frustration” for the Air Force?  So, all that incredible UAV surveillance technology is still not producing actionable targets.  Hmm …

One last aspect of the anti-ISIS effort that is noteworthy is our refusal to use ground combat power.  We want to fight this using only airpower.  This is, undoubtedly, due to our goal of fighting a war without casualties.  It’s a tossup which is our main goal:  avoidance of collateral damage or avoidance of casualties.  Regardless, those are one and two on the objectives list.  Certainly, winning is not in the top two (it may not even be a top ten goal).

Let’s look at the overall picture.  We’re fighting the ideal war, as we conceive it.  We have total domination of the air.  We have unlimited and unimpeded UAV surveillance.  There is no electromagnetic countermeasure interference.  There is almost no air-to-ground threat.  We have the most advanced aircraft in the world working the problem.      ………  And yet, in a year of combat, we’ve made no progress and may have lost ground.  How do we explain that?

We explain that by recognizing that our modern concept of warfare is fundamentally flawed. 

• Our main goal is avoidance of collateral damage. 
• We have no commitment to ending the conflict quickly and decisively. 
• Our solution to every military challenge is technology. 
• Our targeting capability is insufficient relative to our goal of avoidance of collateral damage. 
• Our cost effectiveness (ratio of resources expended to results produced) is completely out of whack. 
• We believe that airpower alone can win a war. 

Let me repeat.  Our concept of how we want to wage war is fundamentally flawed and almost guaranteed not to produce a decisive military victory.

I’ve criticized what we’re doing.  Criticism is easy, solutions are hard.  What is ComNavOp’s solution?  Well, there are two alternatives. 

First, we need to ask whether we should even be involved.  I’m not going to get into the politics of this beyond noting that a very strong case can be made that none of the people involved in the fighting are true friends of the US and that allowing them to kill each other off at no cost to us is not a bad scenario.  Of course, there are many other factors that could make involvement worthwhile.  I’ll leave it at that.

Second, assuming we have good reason to be involved, the only rational objective is a quick and decisive end.  Defeating ISIS would be nothing more than a short, trivial live fire exercise for a WWII armored division, if allowed to do the job without being subjected to overly restrictive rules of engagement.  In other words, if a sniper is in a building, blow it up and move on.  If we aren’t that serious, we shouldn’t be there and if we are that serious, it’s a trivial combat exercise.  Yes, there would be collateral damage but far less than if the conflict is allowed to drag out for years.  How many people has ISIS executed because we won’t do what’s needed to quickly and decisively end them?

We need to seriously re-examine our concept of modern war.  Russia and China have a concept and it isn’t even remotely like ours.  When it comes to how to wage a war, I like their concepts far more than ours.

Sidenote:  No, this isn't turning into an Air Force blog.  These concepts apply equally to the Navy/Marines and, thus, are worth consideration.

(1)Defense News, “Fighting ISIS: Is Pentagon Using Air Power's Full Potential?”, Lara Seligman, October 11, 2015,

http://www.defensenews.com/story/defense/air-space/strike/2015/10/11/fighting-isis-pentagon-using-air-powers-full-potential/73667346/

LCS MCM Independent Review Panel?

You’ve probably heard by now that the Navy is setting up an independent panel to review the LCS’ remote minehunting system.  As you know, the LCS MCM module is plagued by performance and reliability failures and the Navy has pushed the next system evaluation back by several months.

Why would the Navy need an independent review panel?  For starters, the independent review organization, the DOT&E, has already told them, in great detail, what the problems with the MCM module are.  Further, does the Navy not have people who can evaluate the MCM module internally?  If not, they shouldn't be in the warfighting business.  

So, why do they need this panel?  Well, they're trying to get approval and funding from Congress to buy more of these modules despite the horrific reliability and performance problems that the independent review organization, the DOT&E, have documented.  You want more, even though it doesn't work??!  Well, that's what an "independent review panel" will do if you can get the panel to say that all is well - the "stamp of approval" will give you the cover to buy more modules that don't work.

So, now we know why the Navy wants an "independent review panel".

But wait, you say, won't an independent review panel find the same problems the Navy has already seen for itself and that the DOT&E has thoroughly documented?  How will the Navy get an independent review panel to go along with their desire to buy more non-functional modules?

You can see what's coming, can't you?

So, what does an “independent” review panel suggest to you?  A panel made up of people outside the direct chain of command?  I mean, it would have to be outside the chain of command or else it wouldn’t be independent, would it? 

Well, the Navy has thus far refused to describe the panel or its specific tasking other than to say it will be headed by Rear Adm. David Johnson, program executive officer - submarines (PEO - Submarines). Navy Times noted that Johnson is nominated for a third star and is slated to be the next deputy to the Navy’s acquisition directorate. 

Does that sound at all independent to you?  The guy is in the chain of command, nominated for a another star, and slated for a cushy new job.  Does that sound like an independent person or does that sound like someone totally beholden to the Navy and dependent on pleasing his Navy superiors?

Seemingly unrelated side note:  Does PEO - Submarines not have enough to do that he needs to be spending time rubber stamping a non-functional LCS MCM module?

With all that said, I am now going to amaze and astound you by fearlessly predicting the result of the panel’s review:  it will find that everything is just fine and the Navy should proceed full speed with further module acquisitions!!!!!

What?  Wait!  No way.  Who could know the future like that?  How can I possibly make that prediction without even knowing the panel’s tasking or remaining members?  Because the head of the panel is in the chain of command that wants the MCM module approved.  Seriously, what do you think this guy will conclude?

Independent panel?  Not even remotely independent!

The Death of Modularity

The Death of Modularity

Modularity was always an impractical fantasy for combat platforms and the LCS in particular.  A cursory thought exercise makes clear that the concept is fundamentally flawed.  The odds that a given LCS would happen to have the correct module for a given tactical situation are poor – 33% to be exact.  Further, requiring the vessel to retire from the combat zone for a couple of weeks to get its module changed not only weakens the overall naval force for that period of time but presupposes that the tactical situation and need will have remained unchanged until the LCS returns.  That’s a degree of situational rigidity that naval warfare has rarely or never exhibited.  Further, the Navy’s concept that modules would be warehoused and available in only three locations around the world was another flaw which could only serve to increase the transit times for ships wanting to change modules.  Worse, these warehouses would have presented lucrative and vulnerable targets.

This blog has also debunked the modularity myth from a combat performance standpoint.  I won’t bother repeating the analysis.

Despite all those easily seen flaws in the concept the Navy was adamant that modularity was the way of the future.  Come hell or high water the LCS would be modular.  So, how has that worked out?

Well, due to cost overruns in the LCS program and general budget concerns, the Navy quickly dropped the idea of purchasing extra modules and limited the module buy to just about a 1:1 module to ship ratio.  There would be no extra modules to swap out.  Of course, there were other problems like the instability of the Freedom variant that was unable to move module weights around without very careful and time consuming weight compensation efforts so as to avoid exceeding the vessel’s incline limits.  The swap which was envisioned to occur in hours was found to require several days.  So much for quick swaps!

Regardless, even though the Navy eventually acknowledged that LCS would rarely, if ever, change their modules, modularity was still touted as proper approach.  The fact that budgets and a few unlucky physical characteristics of the ship precluded implementing modularity didn’t sway the Navy’s opinion about the benefits of modularity.

That brings us to the present day.  The new LCS’s will be built with no modularity whatsoever.  As USNI website reports (1), the new LCS will be a conventional, non-modular, multi-mission ship capable of performing surface and anti-submarine warfare simultaneously.

The Navy must be disappointed, huh?  Their vaunted vision of future combat platforms has been completely abandoned.  I’ll bet they still believe modularity is the right approach, don’t you think?  I mean, they were so adamant that it was the only way to design a ship, they must still wish they could implement it.

Or, maybe not  ………….

Huh?

According to the USNI report the Navy now claims that multi-mission is superior.

“Instead, he [Capt. Dan Brintzinghoffer, frigate program manager] said the frigate will be more lethal, more survivable, and will be able to conduct surface warfare and ant-submarine warfare simultaneously, whereas the LCS had to choose only one mission package to work with at any given time.”

So now the multi-mission capability of the frigate version of the LCS is a benefit?  Ah, wasn’t that what the LCS critics said years ago?  It’s certainly what ComNavOps has always said.

The Navy’s ability to positively spin either side of an issue is awe-inspiring to behold.  Really, though, what’s the alternative – to admit that modularity was an abject failure?  That would lead to some rather awkward questions about the continuing construction of modular LCS’s.  Say, now that I mention it, why are we continuing to build modular LCS’s when we’ve abandoned the modular swap concept and are now claiming that multi-mission is superior?  Only the Navy knows the answer to that.  Well, the Navy and ComNavOps.  The answer is that the Navy’s goal is not to build ships that are operationally and tactically useful.  No, the Navy’s goal is simply to get as many hulls in the water as possible in order to preserve their slice of the budget pie.  The fact that we’re continuing to build a ship whose operational premise has been abandoned and discredited does not matter to the Navy.  The only thing that matters is that the budget monies continue to flow.

You know, we should look at saving some money by seeing whether the LCS manufacturers would be willing to scrap the vessels as soon as they’re built.  That would be way more efficient and cost effective than having to wait 15 years or so and then find a company to scrap them.  It’s not like the LCS’s will do anything worthwhile while we wait.  But, I digress …

The Navy now officially recognizes what the rest of us have known all along – modularity in combat platforms is a bad idea.  Modularity is dead.

(1)USNI, “Navy’s Future Frigate Will Be Optimized For Lethality, Survivability; Will Not Retain LCS’s Speed”, Megan Eckstein, October 15, 2015,

http://news.usni.org/2015/10/15/navys-future-frigate-will-be-optimized-for-lethality-survivability-will-not-retain-lcss-speed

LCS as FF - What Does That Do To Crew Size?

You all know that the Navy is going to build the next batch of LCS’s as “frigates”.  They aren’t even remotely capable of performing as a frigate but that’s not the point of this post.  Instead, consider what the changes mean.

It means that the ships will now carry all the equipment needed to conduct ASuW and ASW simultaneously.  OK.  So, …?

So, that means a significantly larger crew.  Think about it.  The ship will carry the equivalent of two modules instead of one.  Each module would have had a module specialist crew of 15-30 depending on what the final modules consisted of.  Now, they’ll have to carry 30-60 module specialists.  There will be more consoles to man, more weapon and electronics maintenance to perform (I haven’t heard whether the Navy will attempt to stick with the no-maintenance concept or not), a larger CIC watchstanding requirement, and so on.  Of course, there’s also the more mundane needs.  A larger crew will require more cooks and personnel to handle the ship’s hotel services.

So what are we looking at in terms of crew size?  Well, assuming a “core” crew of 50 (remember the Navy has already increased the core crew size and added 20 extra berths), plus 30-60 specialists, plus a helo detachment of around 24 and we’re looking at a crew of 104-134.  Now, bear in mind, this is just speculation and analysis on my part.  The Navy hasn’t shared their idea of crew size with me, yet.  Also, remember that if the Navy abandons the no-shipboard-maintenance concept, the crew size will have to increase greatly in order to perform all the maintenance on board the ship.  At that point, we’ll be right back to the Perry crew size.

The problem is that the LCS was not sized and designed to accommodate that much crew.  The ship does not have the berthing, galley space, food storage, refrigerated storage, water storage, heads, and all the other hotel services required to support that size crew.  Given the weight issues the class already faces, trying to add more of all those things will be a challenge.  It’s a zero sum game regarding weight.  If we add more hotel services, we need to remove something else to compensate.  What will be removed?  We’ll have to wait and see.  We already know that the modules are under weight constraints to the detriment of performance.  Calling the LCS a frigate does not suddenly make the LCS a good ship.

The original LCS concept has been pretty much abandoned, hasn’t it?

A Simple Upgrade?

Here’s a contract item for software upgrades to the F-35 that just stuns me.

Lockheed has been given a $17.6M contract to upgrade TWO F-35s to software Block 3F.  Work is to be completed by Sep 2021.

Are you kidding me??!  Almost $18M to upgrade software?  For two aircraft?  You plug in a jump drive and click on Copy or whatever the equivalent is in a military computer.  Ten minutes and you’re done.  The programming costs are already covered by the main F-35 contracts.  This is just the upgrade when the new block is ready.  Maybe they need a new hard drive or chip or something but those cost hundreds of dollars not millions.

Here’s the actual quote from the government website.

“Lockheed Martin Corp. …is being awarded a $17,599,996 not-to-exceed delivery order (550302) against a previously issued basic ordering agreement (N00019-14-G-0020).  This order provides for the procurement of retrofit modification kits and associated engineering installation services in support of the Block 3F upgrade of two F-35A aircraft for non-Department of Defense (DoD) participants.  Work will be performed in Fort Worth, Texas (90 percent); and Baltimore, Maryland (10 percent), and is expected to be completed in September 2021.”

The other baffling aspect of this is the completion date.  Sep 2021?  Why is a contract being issued six years prior to the need?  Couldn’t the government hold onto the money and earn some interest?

We’re just spraying Lockheed with the money hose!