Praise the Gods of Acquisition!

In a totally unexpected development, Lockheed has announced that it is dropping out of the competition to build the Navy’s frigate.(1)  That leaves Huntington Ingalls Industries, Austal, Fincantieri, and General Dynamics Bath Iron Works.

The decision to drop out of the competition is quite surprising because ComNavOps had believed that the competition was heavily slanted to favor the Lockheed Freedom class LCS ‘frigate’ and that the LCS ‘frigate’ was a lock to be selected. 

One can only speculate on the reason for the decision but a hint comes from the USNI News article.

…the company told the service it felt the Freedom design would be stretched too far to accommodate all the capabilities required, one source told USNI News. (1)

This suggests and sort of confirms what we have been saying all along, that the Freedom LCS variant has severe, inherent limitations as a ship that can’t be fixed even by stretching the design in length.  Issues such as non-existent weight growth margins, weak structural construction, excessive vibration due to the weak structural design, self-noise issues, compartmentation issues, badly designed internal layouts, aluminum structure cracking, meta-centric height deficiencies (stability problems), etc. are ‘baked in’ to the design and can’t be corrected by lengthening the ship or adding a few extra weapons.

With all the LCS problems in mind, this is tremendous news and can only be considered a good thing as it removes a very poor option from the frigate candidate pool.  That leaves one exceptionally poor competitor, the Austal ‘frigate’ which, like the Lockheed, is just a version of the Independence variant LCS.  Like the Lockheed Freedom variant ‘frigate’, the Austal Independence LCS ‘frigate’ has built in flaws and weaknesses that simply adding a few more weapons can’t overcome.  We need to get the Austal entry removed, now.  The remaining three options are, at least, acceptable frigates although ComNavOps still sees no need for a frigate, at all.

This is some of the best news ComNavOps has seen in recent times.  Praise the Gods of Acquisition!

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(1)USNI News website, “Lockheed Martin Won’t Submit Freedom LCS Design for FFG(X) Contest”, Sam LaGrone, 29-May-2019,

https://news.usni.org/2019/05/28/lockheed-martin-wont-submit-freedom-lcs-design-for-ffgx-contest

New CNO Approved

Adm. Bill Moran has been confirmed by the Senate as the next Chief of Naval Operations (CNO).  Here’s a bit of background.

He assumed duties as the Navy’s 57th chief of naval personnel, Aug. 2, 2013. Serving concurrently as the deputy chief of naval operations (Manpower, Personnel, Training and Education) (N1), he is responsible for the planning and programming of all manpower, personnel, training and education resources for the U.S. Navy. …  His responsibilities include overseeing Navy Recruiting Command, Navy Personnel Command, and Naval Education and Training Command. (2)

Here’s some bio information per the official Navy website.

As a flag officer, he has served as commander, Patrol and Reconnaissance Group; director, Air Warfare (N98) on the staff of the Chief of Naval Operations; and most recently as the 57th chief of naval personnel.

His operational tours spanned both coasts, commanding Patrol Squadron (VP) 46 and Patrol and Reconnaissance Wing 2. He served as an instructor pilot in two tours with VP-30 and as a staff member for Commander, Carrier Group 6 aboard USS Forrestal (CVA 59).

Ashore, he served as executive assistant to the chief of naval operations; executive assistant to Commander, U.S. Pacific Command; deputy director, Navy staff; and assistant Washington placement officer and assistant flag officer detailer in the Bureau of Naval Personnel.

Moran assumed duties as the Navy’s 39th vice chief of naval operations, May 31, 2016. (1)

Patrol squadron, staff, personnel, executive assistant, recruiting, education, placement officer, detailer …  What about this resume screams warrior?  Where’s the strategic and tactical expertise?  Where’s the hands on command of ships, carriers, and combat aircraft? 

He sounds like a staff guy with a heavy emphasis in personnel organizations.

Now, I don’t, for a moment believe that the only way a coach can be good is if he was a former player – but it’s gotta help! – and I don’t believe that a good CNO must have been a fighter pilot or ship commander – but it’s gotta help!  The thing is, out of the entire Navy, is this the best we could come up with?  What about him jumps out to make someone say this is the guy to be CNO of a warfighting organization?  This is the guy to lead a combat organization?  I’m not seeing it.

We couldn’t find a warrior?

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(1)https://www.navy.mil/navydata/bios/navybio.asp?bioID=483

(2)https://docs.house.gov/meetings/AS/AS02/20140325/101943/HHRG-113-AS02-Bio-MoranW-20140325.pdf

A Useful Amphibious Exercise

The Marines/Navy conduct virtually worthless amphibious exercises.  Neat rows of AAVs swim to shore from a ship perched just offshore (what happened to the 25-50 mile standoff that doctrine calls for?).  With parade like precision they leave the water and proceed, unimpeded (other than by cameramen for photo ops), to an assembly point for more photos and then, perhaps, simulate a humanitarian mission or, possibly, a raid on a small village to rescue hostages.  Does that sound like a realistic exercise?  It sounds about as worthless as it gets.

Does This Look Like A Realistic, Useful Exercise?

Here’s what a useful amphibious exercise should be …

The exercise should start only if significant, adverse weather is present.  That’s probably how it will be in a real war so let’s start dealing with waves, rain, and wind.

An actual and significant opposing force (OpFor) should contest every second of the exercise including the approach into the area.  Let’s involve the Air Force and give them free reign to try to stop the amphibious force using any tactics they can think of.  Interservice rivalry and pride should provide all the realism and creativity we need.  Let’s include manned aircraft simulating cruise missiles (since we don’t have enough drones to do anything worthwhile).  Let’s give them free reign to begin attacking as far out to sea as they can detect the amphibious force (there’s your 25-50 mile stand off !).  Let’s have them conduct attacks on any forces that land and see how we perform anti-air defense (hint: we don’t have anti-air capability!).

Let’s include an opposing submarine force and see if they can penetrate and sink the amphibious ships.

Then, let’s set up a division size OpFor (yeah, good practice for the defenders, too, in commanding and controlling a large unit – something we don’t practice at all, anymore) to defend the beach and, again, give them free reign to devise their own tactics.  Let’s give them engineering units to construct obstacles, trenches to be crossed, and fortifications (good practice for combat applications of engineering instead of building schools in third world countries) and see how the amphibious force deals with them (I bet they won’t have a clue).

Let’s emplace extensive simulated minefields and make the assaulting force deal with them (what a cluster* that will be!).

Let’s give the defending force a full complement of electronic warfare capabilities.  Let them jam, decoy, disable GPS, cyber attack, and any other tactic they can think of and make the assaulting force operate in a degraded electronic environment.  Let’s see what (and who!) can work under those conditions and what can’t.

Let’s have referees permanently remove ‘dead’ ships, aircraft, and personnel from the exercise – no ‘reanimations’.  We can, and should, repeat the exercise, in its entirety, as often as necessary to ensure that all units can participate start to finish.  Those that keep getting killed and can’t participate are either trying to execute flawed tactics or they have incompetent commanders.  Either way, it’s something we should identify as opposed to our current practice of reanimating dead units over and over again with no penalty.  If they’re consistently dying, that’s telling us something!

With the above defensive efforts, we should have a lot of induced confusion (What do you mean, my MLP sea base is sunk?!  I’ve only got one!  What am I supposed to do now??) but let’s not stop there.  Let’s add additional layers of confusion and chaos.

Let’s apply lots of smoke.  There will be lots of smoke from explosions and burning equipment in a real war so let’s get used to our vision and our sensors being degraded.

Let’s use lots of flash-bang explosives.  A real war is going to be incredibly noisy so let’s start learning how to communicate when you have to scream into the radio.

Let’s have referees arbitrarily misdirect landing vehicles to the wrong areas – you know, just like will happen in a real assault – and see how units recover and reorient.

Let’s have ‘dead’ vehicles and equipment get left where they are, constituting additional obstacles for subsequent units.

Let’s have referees arbitrarily insert incorrect orders into communications - you know, just like will happen in a real assault – and see whether the receiving units can figure out for themselves what to do.

Let’s remove half of all the supplies delivered to the beach to simulate actual combat usage which is always 2x-5x the predicted rate and see how we deal with ammo and supply shortages.

All right, that’s enough to get us started.  Seriously, what do you think would happen if we did this?  I know exactly what would happen.  We’d immediately find out that most of our doctrine is unexecutable.  Most of our tactics will be seen as flawed.  None of our plans will work.  We’ll have great difficulty loading, launching, and coordinating AAVs due to the weather.  Most of our equipment will be found susceptible to electronic warfare effects.  Our communications will be compromised.  All of our commanders will be confused and begin issuing contradictory orders.  We’ll find that we lack all kinds of useful equipment.  None of our equipment will work as advertised – some will be useless and some will be less effective but still somewhat useful.  

This Is What We Should Be Simulating

In short, the exercise would be a total debacle … exactly what we want!  That’s how you find out what really works and what doesn’t.  That’s how you learn.

Let’s do it, let’s fail, and let’s get better.

V-280 Low Speed Agility Demonstration

I just watched a YouTube video of the Bell V-280 tiltrotor conducting some kind of low speed agility demonstration.  The V-280 is being developed as a possibility for the Army’s Future Vertical Lift program and is sized to carry 14 infantry troops.  This is of interest because the Marines may latch on to this, as well.  Like the V-22 Osprey, the V-280 is capable of both level and vertical flight.

Take a look at the video of the agility test.

The aircraft can rock back and forth and roll side to side.  That’s nice, I guess.  However, what I want to see is combat related flight and maneuvers.  Like the old Vietnam era Hueys that came plummeting out of the sky, flaring just before crashing into the ground, disgorged their troops in seconds, and popped off the ground to vanish again, all in about 30 seconds or less, I want to see a V-22 or V-280 perform a similar combat-useful maneuver.  Then, and only then, will I be impressed.  Until then, the V-22 or V-280 is just a technological curiosity, not a combat asset.

That’s the problem with the V-22.  It’s a technological wonder – so say its supporters – that has little combat capability.  I’ve seen videos of V-22s conducting ‘combat’ landings and they are a total farce.  They hover, high and exposed, very slowly settle down, and seem to take forever to unload troops.  For those of us who witnessed Vietnam helicopter assaults, this is a recipe for disaster.

Here's a video of a Vietnam helo assault.

Note how the first helo never even completely touches down.  Note how the helo is popping back into the air before the last troop hits the ground.  Note how the troops unload in seconds.  Note the flare and touch maneuver.  By comparison, watching a V-22 landing exercise is like watching in slow motion with a lot of still shots thrown in!

Hey, I get it … Bell is trying to sell aircraft, not develop a combat aircraft.  They’re hoping the technology, itself, will sufficiently impress the military to result in sales – and they may be right given that we’ve substituted technology for strategy.  I’m sorry but slowly rocking back and forth might be a technological achievement – I have no idea – but it’s not, by itself, a combat useful capability. Hovering in one spot and rocking is not going to accomplish anything in combat.  It won’t dodge a rocket, missile, or gunfire.  It won’t put troops on the ground more efficiently.  It won’t do anything useful.  We've become enamored with the technology and forgotten the combat.  

Bell, do you want to sell me on the V-280?  Then show me combat maneuvers.  Translate that little rocking demonstration into an actual, useful combat maneuver.  Show me a vertical assault maneuver that will work in combat.

We buy too much stuff on the lure and glitz of technology without considering the combat usefulness (Ford CVN, I’m looking at you).  We perform too many tests that are completely divorced from any combat reality.

Show me combat!

The Great White Elephant

President Theodore Roosevelt sent a Navy fleet on an around-the-world tour during 1908 as a public relations tour and a sort of coming-out announcement and celebration for the nation and the Navy on to the world stage.  The fleet, and the event, was dubbed the Great White Fleet.

Now, something similar is happening on a smaller scale.  The USS Zumwalt is on its first operational voyage which appears to be a public relations tour and an attempt to introduce the Zumwalt to the world.

Here’s the Zumwalt’s mini-tour, thus far.

8-Mar-2019        Departed San Diego

11-Mar-2019      Esquimalt, British Columbia, Canada
23-Mar-2019      Ketchikan, Alaska
4-Apr-2019        Pearl Harbor

Zumwalt is, presumably, conducting live fire exercises at the naval range in Hawaii.

As a reminder, the total Zumwalt program cost is $8.4B per ship and continuing to climb as the remaining two ships work to complete construction and fitting out of combat systems.  The ship’s reason for being, the Advanced Gun System (AGS), has been rendered non-functional due to the Navy cancelling the Long Range Land Attack Projectile (LRLAP), the only munition the gun is capable of firing.  Absent the AGS, the only other significant weapon system on the ship is the 80x Mk57 VLS which can launch ESSM, Tomahawk, Standards, and the like.

The problem is that the 16,000 t, $8.4B ship, without the AGS, brings very little to the fleet in terms of combat capability.  Despite these problems, the Navy seems determined to operate the ship as if it were a useful asset.  The reality, though, is that the ship has no Concept of Operations (CONOPS), offers little combat capability, and contributes little to the fleet.  That being the case, one has to wonder why the Navy wants to operate the ship.  Why not park the ships and leave them idle pending the onset of a major war?  The Navy is constantly whining about the cost of operating ships and yet they’re pouring budget money into these marginally useful vessels that appear to be an evolutionary dead end.  Park the ships and save operating budget as well as wear and tear on the ships.

From Wiki, a white elephant is a possession which its owner cannot dispose of and whose cost, particularly that of maintenance, is out of proportion to its usefulness. In modern usage, it is an object, building project, scheme, business venture, facility, etc., considered expensive but without use or value.

Zumwalt’s publicity tour isn’t the Great White Fleet, it’s the Great White Elephant.

Threat Surrogate Status

We’ve often discussed the Navy’s myopic focus on new, shiny, sexy ships like carriers at the expense of logistic vessels, drydocks, depot maintenance, shipyard improvements, testing facilities and equipment, etc. – you know, all the things that actually make a navy function and contribute to readiness. 

One of the specific problem areas is threat surrogates.  While we’d like to test Aegis against a Chinese or Russian missile, we usually don’t have any available to us.  Thus, we have to use threat surrogates – another, similar, asset that can mimic the real threat to a sufficient degree as to allow meaningful and useful testing. 

This seems simple enough.  If we don’t have a particular Chinese missile, we should be able to modify and mock up some existing missiles to simulate the Chinese missile’s flight profile, on-board ECM, speed, terminal maneuvers, seeker/sensor radiations, etc.  While the one-off, hand modified nature of such a threat surrogate will result in a high cost compared to the cost of the base production missile, the cost is virtually free compared to the Navy’s overall budget or the cost of the acquisition program it is intended to be used in.

For example, if we want to develop and deploy a new submarine sonar, a program that would cost billions to research, develop, and install, the cost of a diesel sub surrogate – a modified torpedo, in essence – would likely be a few million dollars which is round off error in the math of the billion(s) dollar sonar program.  We’d have to be idiots to try to scrimp and forego acquiring the needed threat surrogates to thoroughly test our systems just to save some fraction of a fraction of a percent of the cost of the parent program, right?

Well, sadly and unbelievably, that’s exactly what the Navy is doing.  They’re routinely refusing to acquire the threat surrogates needed to test our shiny new systems.  Here’s some quotes on the subject from the 2017 DOT&E Annual Report.  I’ve included the page numbers with the quotes so you can read them yourself because I’m pretty sure you’re not going to believe the degree of stupidity these shortcomings demonstrate.

What’s one of the major threats to the Navy?  Why it’s shallow water non-nuclear submarines (SSK), of course!  Obviously we must have threat surrogates for those, right?  Wrong.

No assessment can be made against operationally relevant midget and coastal diesel submarine threats because the Navy does not have any test surrogates that accurately represent these platforms. (p. 152)

Continuing with submarines and sonar, the undersea warfare combat software needs torpedo threat surrogates to test against.  We’ve got hundreds (thousands?) of torpedoes.  How hard could it be to tweak some into enemy torpedo threat surrogates for something as important as testing the main undersea combat control software?  I’m sure we must have torpedo threat surrogates, right?  Wrong.

A representative threat torpedo surrogate is needed to adequately assess future AN/SQQ-89A(V)15 variants.  (p. 152)

Along the same lines, the LCS ASW module has various pieces of equipment intended to detect and defeat submarines and torpedoes.  We must have torpedo threat surrogates for use in testing the LCS ASW module, right?  Wrong.

Current test surrogates have significant limitations representing threat torpedoes.  (p. 191)

Aegis is the foundation of our entire naval defense capability.  We don’t even need to ask whether the Navy has provided for an Aegis surrogate test bed ship, right?  Wrong.

To adequately assess the Probability of Raid Annihilation requirement for the self-defense mission for Flight III DDG 51 destroyers/ACB-20, the Navy must provide … an Aegis-equipped Self-Defense Test Ship (SDTS) where the ship’s full self-defense kill chain can be tested.  (p. 139)

Our close range air defense is the Rolling Airframe Missile (RAM).  I’ll bet we must have an adequate anti-ship missile surrogate because I know we have drones, including a supersonic one, right?  Wrong.

The Navy has not completed the following previous recommendations:

Develop a Multi-Stage Supersonic Target adequate for use in a phase of RAM Block 2 FOT&E.  (p. 209)

Develop an improved steerable antenna system for its ASCM surrogates. (p. 209)

The America class LHA uses the standard Ship Self-Defense System (SSDS) installed on all amphibious ships.  The SSDS is the standard for all amphibious ships and has been around for quite some time so we must have fully developed threat surrogates, right?  Wrong.

… the Navy has not resolved the following previous recommendations related to LHA 6 ship self-defense:

Develop an open-loop seeker subsonic ASCM surrogate target for ship self-defense combat system operational tests.  (p. 212)

Develop an adequate Multi-Stage Supersonic Target (MSST) and electronic warfare target surrogates for operational testing.  (p. 213)

You’ll recall that the Navy fielded a torpedo defense system on carriers in response to an Urgent Operational Need (UON) requirement.  If any system would have adequate threat surrogates it would have to be a carrier protection system developed for a UON, right?  Wrong.

The Navy has not accredited the surrogate torpedo targets used for testing as representative of any real-world threat torpedo.  (p. 225)

I can go on listing the threat surrogate deficiencies but you get the idea.  For reasons that totally elude me, the Navy steadfastly, adamantly, stubbornly, and stupidly refuses to fund and acquire the requisite threat surrogates to allow adequate testing.  There’s simply no excuse.  Compared to the cost of the parent acquisition programs, the surrogates are free.  This is just inexplicable stupidity on a scale that defies belief (geez, I seem to say that in a lot of posts, don’t I?).

Up Close And Personal

We’ve discussed and noted many times that the Navy/Marine doctrine of conducting amphibious assaults from 25-50 miles off the beach is not feasible and is completely at odds with the need for naval fire support given that the Navy’s only gun is the 5” which has an effective range of 9-15 miles, depending on version.

We need to recognize that  the 5” gun’s limited range means that a fire support ship would have to be within a mile of shore to have any useful range beyond the immediate beach area.  That’s close!  That puts the ship within range of enemy artillery, rockets, and mortars as well as anti-ship missiles.

So, how will the Navy provide fire support?  The short and bitter answer is they can’t.  Even if the Navy wanted to bring its 5” guns (meaning Burkes) into range, they’d be risking high-tech, multi-billion dollar, capital, AAW ships to conduct low tech fire support – not a reasonable risk.  We’ve discussed the need for dedicated fire support ships of both larger caliber (8” – 16”) and small (5”).  Assuming the Navy won’t build such a ship, is there anything they can do to modify a Burke to allow it to operate near shore and give it a better chance of survival and success?

As it happens, there are a couple of simple modifications that would enhance the Burke’s chances.

C-RAM – The Army has adapted the naval Phalanx CIWS to the C-RAM (Counter Rocket, Artillery, and Mortar) function, apparently successfully.  The addition of three or four C-RAM units to a Burke would enhance its near shore survivability.  Given that the CIWS is a self-contained unit, requiring only ship’s utility hookups, installation of multiple units should be reasonably easy.  This would provide the ship with a degree of protection from artillery, rockets, and mortars.

Counterbattery – Aegis is, theoretically, capable of counterbattery sensing and computing with appropriate software modifications.  This would provide the Burkes with the ability to conduct counterbattery fire against both artillery, rockets, mortars, and anti-ship missiles.

The major near-shore threats to a ship are artillery and small anti-ship missiles and the modifications noted above would go a long way towards providing enhanced protection from both artillery and anti-ship missiles.  Thus, it would be possible to operate Burkes near shore with an enhanced chance of surviving.

Burke DDG - $2B and 1 Gun, Not Exactly Fire Support

Now, this doesn’t mean that this is a good idea.  Risking multi-billion dollar ships that constitute our main AAW defense is still a bad idea but, since the Navy adamantly refuses to build a dedicated, simple, cheap fire support ship, this at least offers a viable, if still unwise, option.

Failing this approach, any Marine assault will be operating without any fire support whatsoever which is one of many reasons why I say that our amphibious assault doctrine is non-executable and pure fantasy.