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The Ticonderoga’.v bumper-sticker message to Admiral Gorshkov—“Standby . . . Aegis Is At Sea”—could be deflated by a Soviet sticker asking “How long did it take, comrade?” The head of the Soviet Navy who has outlasted seven of our CNOs knows as well as we that almost 20 years will have passed between the mid-1960s conception of Aegis and its putting to sea next year.
The Navy has always been a technically oriented service, playing a leading role in the development and application of virtually all the new technologies of the past century. In the face of a seemingly endless acceleration in the rate of technological growth, it will be increasingly difficult for the Navy to retain its historic position as leader and innovator in the use and application of science and technology. The reasons for this prospect are twofold.
First, largely as a result of the enormous advances in data processing, new technological opportunities are presenting themselves at an accelerating pace. The Navy is well past the point where all technically feasible and operationally useful research and development (R&D) options can be funded to the point of feasibility demonstration. Yet, in a competitive world, the Navy must choose wisely from a glittering array of offerings. We have a staggering prioritization problem in undertaking R&D starts.
Second, it has become increasingly difficult to develop a clear picture of the operational need for new systems—the traditional means for establishing priorities. The lead time from initiation of advanced development of critical components to widespread fleet introduction of the new system or platform has grown, typically, to 20 years. Therefore, the environment in which they will be used will be more difficult to visualize. Aegis, for example, was conceptualized in the mid-1960s, but the first Aegis cruiser will not join the fleet until January 1983, and there will not be enough Aegis ships at sea to provide protection to all of the carriers until the end of the 1980s. There are exceptions, of course—of which Polaris is a shining example—but the costs of the redundancy necessary for that sort of time compression are enormous. The Navy cannot afford many such programs. Most of the development programs commonly perceived as going from concept to deployment in shorter periods of time began with previously developed components. Basic point defense, for instance, exploited a missile and illuminator which had been operational in fleet aircraft for years. NATO Sea Sparrow was essentially an engineering effort involving off-the-shelf components. However, to avoid being overtaken by technology, a larger share of our future systems will have to embody new and therefore unfamiliar concepts. Their relationship to future operational needs will be more difficult to identify.
When relating unfamiliar systems to an uncertain future environment, the conventional method of basing operational requirements on known deficiencies in the existing Navy just won’t work. That Navy won’t be around 20 years from now. Significant changes will be made in many of its components; some of its operational concepts will change, and the threat will change. All of these factors will affect one another, creating a new state of balance, a new environment in which the projected new platforms and systems need to be assessed. That future en-
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vironment will not resemble the status quo regardless of how R&D programs are directed.
Operations analysis tends to focus on the marginal utility of improvements in particular systems or platforms within a relatively narrow context and in settings not dissimilar from today. This is acceptable when those improvements will be used in the near future, but inadequate when the time frame is several decades hence. When we view the Navy in a status quo setting, we see one set of requirements for future growth—greater speed and range in strike and fighter aircraft, for example, or higher firepower antiship missile defense systems. But if a different cluster of operational concepts and components is under consideration, as will occur in the more distant future, the requirements themselves will change. Perhaps aircraft speed will no longer be important, but much greater endurance will be. Conceivably, whole operational concepts or capabilities could become moot, and others now of little consequence might become of overriding importance.
It is therefore essential to examine whole future navies in order to judge the long-term value of individual R&D programs. Unfortunately, the plethora of R&D options complicates the task. Different sets of R&D initiatives will, if successful, lead to different navies later on. Prudent choices will lead to strong forces; poor choices to weak ones. But the uncertainties associated with predicting the performance of future platforms and systems are numerous enough that there are likely to be a variety of paths leading to a variety of equally attractive, but quite different, future navies. Thus, at the outset, it is necessary to think in terms of an array of alternative future navies, each achievable if the corresponding set of R&D options leading to that Navy is pursued. One of those alternatives, of course, would be an extrapolation of our existing and programmed force as amended by the existing and planned R&D programs. However, to avoid being caught unaware by great changes, the other alternatives should incorporate between them all that is technically and fiscally achievable and functionally desirable.
The components of any force (i.e., platforms, systems, and tactics) must fit together in mutually enhancing combinations if the assemblage is to be effective. When new components are involved, they will often come together in new ways. Hence, major changes in the complexion of a future force can change completely the performance requirements for individual components of that force. Once we depart from the status quo environment, it is hopeless to try to identify operational requirements for future systems in a narrow context. We must assess total forces and work backward from there.
History provides numerous examples of the importance of broad scope analysis and its sensitivity to assumed performance. In the early 1900s, there was great controversy between the need for larger caliber naval guns that would provide greater range and smaller guns with higher rates of fire that could be mounted on battleships in larger numbers. The principal argument against larger, longer range guns was that no means existed for accurately controlling their fire at the longer ranges; therefore, the shorter range guns with higher rates of fire were regarded as superior. Within the narrowest context of gun range versus rate of fire in an otherwise unchanged environment (no long-range fire control), this view made sense. However, when the scope of comparison was broadened to include the projected improvements in fire control—notably, the advent of director control—a different conclusion could be reached and was ultimately arrived at by the General Board in its approval of the Nevada (BB-36) in 1911 - the first U. S. battleship designed to incorporate director fire.
The linkage between director control and the utility of major caliber guns is relatively straightforward, or so it seems in retrospect. However, there are, and always have been, more far-reaching linkages that operate across the whole span of naval warfare and technology. These are more difficult to identify, but they are the key to forecasting the future shape of the Navy.
The importance of these linkages in shaping force structure can be illustrated by comparing the form of the 1945 Navy as projected in the late 1930s to that which actually came into being as a result of the lessons learned early in the war. Table 1 shows the major combatants in the projected and realized fleets (combat losses not taken out).
The dominant change in force structure between the prewar projection and actual construction was the dramatic increase in sea-based aviation and concomitant decrease in major caliber surface gunnery
Table 1 Projected and Realized Major Surface Combatants—1945
Type | Prewar Projection | Wartime Reality |
New BB | 17 | 10 |
CB | 6 | 2 |
CA | 26 | 38 |
CL | 49 | 51 |
CV | 15 | 27 |
CVB | 0 | 1' |
CVL | 0 | 92 |
CVE | 5 | 85 |
Old BB | 53 | 154 |
'Two more under construction. 2Laid down as CLs. 'BBs-43-48; BB-47 never completed and expended as a target in 1924. JBBs-33-48: Note 3 applies.
f
’ Platforms. Seven proposed fast battleships and four
i attle cruisers were cancelled or delayed and sub
Sequently scrapped to provide the industrial capac- i 11V to build the additional carriers required. There
> i ^ere many reasons for this shift, but the following - demonstrate how changes between predicted and
/ actual performance can change force composition.
Prior to the war, many officers believed that the Carriage of radar and director-controlled antiaircraft (AA) gunnery would prevent aircraft from get- l|ng close enough to a maneuvering warship to hit ’ ”er with either bombs or torpedoes. They were proven
C'rong. Few people expected that fighers would per- ‘°rm as effectively as they did in defeating attacking dive-bombers and torpedo planes, principally because they did not anticipate the effectiveness of shipboard air search radars in the fighter direction r°le. The consequence of the changes in view early lr> the war was to accelerate the carrier programs ar>d cut back on battleships and battle cruiser construction. The battleships basically did everything that was expected of them, but because of the range advantage of carrier aircraft, the battleships’ primary role became moot. Those in service found use- ttil employment as shore bombardment ships, but lri the broader operational scheme, this did not serve
to reserve the trend toward reliance on carrier-based aircraft.
In the delicate balance of interactions, it is noteworthy that the greatest swing factor in the battleship versus carrier issue may have been the actual performance of the newly introduced technology of radar. If it had proven more effective in directing heavy AA guns on both sides, the effectiveness of tactical strike aircraft might have been largely neutralized. If it had been markedly less effective for early warning and fighter direction, carrier vulnerability might have been too great to bear. In either case, the fleet would have been dramatically different in 1945.
Finally, throughout the 1930s, both the British and U. S. navies placed inordinate faith in active sonar as a defense against submarines. Events proved this faith to be misplaced. The sonar worked, but, like director-controlled AA gunfire, it did not provide the anticipated leak-proof defense. The solution was to employ carrier-based aircraft to move the defensive zone further from the formation.
The principal function of the aircraft in antisubmarine warfare (ASW) was, initially, to force the attacking submarines to abandon their favored tactic of approaching on the surface. For the submarines
of that period, this severely curtailed their approach options. The linkage here involves threat tactics as well as technology. The result was not to curtail the use of surface escorts, which were still essential, but to place a major share of the ASW burden on aircraft.
This shift in force composition, which has survived to the present day, laid the foundation for wide-area, offensive ASW in most of its past and current forms. The immediate effect in 1940-41 was to place a heavy load on the shipbuilding industry to produce badly needed escort carriers. Within the constraints of available industrial capacity, the end result was a further cut in heavy surface gunnery ships, but not because the inadequacies of sonar made them more vulnerable. This and other changes in force structure resulted both directly and indirectly from modifications in projected equipment performance across the spectrum of naval warfare.
The balanced Navy of the 1940 authorizations was the product of sensible guesses, but no one could have accurately predicted the combat performance of all of the systems involved. Fortunately, in those days the cost of holding open a greater variety of technology options was less than it is now, and the time lapse between program initiation and fleet capability was less. The shorter time lapse can be attributed not only to the urgency of the wartime environment, but also to the relative simplicity of the systems in use. The enormous increase in the complexity of high-technology systems marks the greatest change in military hardware since the 1940s. It has irrevocably driven up the cost and stretched out the acquisition times, so that we can no longer wait for combat experience to point to needed changes.
If one is to project, it is necessary to acquire a feel for how the indirect effects of changes in all the components of the force operate, working through a network of linkages or interactions that bind the elements of a total force together. Once these linkages are understood, it becomes possible to identify optimal clusters of platforms, systems, and tactics which, taken together, constitute the total force. The existing Navy is such a cluster, although the linkages are not well understood in all cases, and much of the improvement came about by trial and error. What must be done in designing future alternative forces is to substitute analytical processes for the trial-and-error methods of the past.
In analyzing whole force alternatives, some reasonable, but often disregarded, constraints that have enormous influence on the analytical outcome are encountered. These constraints include:
► The forces (navies) under comparison must be of equal life-cycle cost, including sunk costs, since the available funds for modernizing and operating them will be fixed by factors exterior to the composition of the force.
►The forces must perform all the functions that they perform today, although perhaps in different ways. They must be able to sustain a politically useful peacetime presence and serve as symbols of national resolve in a crisis, influence events ashore by force if necessary in limited wars, deter or, if necessary, prevail over Soviet military action in a general war, and be able to at least inject the necessary element of uncertainty into the outcome of a nuclear war.
►Since the analysis looks one acquisition cycle (ap' proximately 20 years) into the future, reasonable technological growth must be ascribed to all components, not just those that embody new concepts- Still, there can be no technological surprises, which would negate the validity of the forecasts. For a 20- year span, this requires that any new systems be based on demonstrated technology—that which is ready for or already in advanced development.
►The forces will be opposed by a reactive threat which will, within similar constraints, amend its tactics and force structure to most effectively counter changes in the U. S. force.
►Finally, a large share of any force projected for two decades hence will consist of units already in the fleet or on order. Thus, all force alternatives will embody a combination of existing and new conceptual elements.
Where might this lead us? The following is conjecture, based on reasonable assumptions about the environment of the early 21st century. It is presented to show how the linkages between elements operate and does not presume to be a prediction of the most likely future Navy.
Recently, there has been a great deal of interest in a more distributed sea-basing of tactical aviation- Assuming that the existing basing structure for carrier aviation has served us well thus far, any change in that force structure must presume changes in the environment, which would make more distributed sea-basing of aircraft both technically practicable and operationally desirable.
What might those changes be? First, it is necessary to understand the effects of the economies ot scale, which in the context of modern tactical aircraft and their carriers generally provide greater capability per dollar invested as one builds larger units. Within a fiscally constrained force, this means fewer carriers overall. Hence, restraints must be placed on economical “bigness” in order to afford enough carriers to be able to station them in all desired locations at any time. This numerical requirement directly relates to the political environment—notably, peacetime presence commitments—and to survivability in a nuclear war.
Some believe that it is desirable to press for more distributed sea-basing, building smaller replacement carriers in larger numbers for equal cost. This can
0n|y be achieved at some penalty to overall conventional combat capability, which is at least as important as a better presence posture and, in some conditions, is immeasurably more important. What ’oss in aggregate conventional combat capability would accompany a shift to larger numbers of much smaller carriers in place of some of the large ones?
If we attempt to operate all types of today’s fleet aircraft from smaller carriers, many of those aircraft Wlfl simply not be able to perform as designed, and some may not be capable of operating from the smaller smps. Clearly, overall combat capability will drop sharply. However, it may be that less capable aircraft (in terms of range, payloads, speed, etc.) can be paired with new long-range, ship-launched mis- j*lles to achieve a combat capability equivalent to or better than that of today. In this capacity, the role plary alternative force, the requirements for missile propulsion and guidance, command and control, and airframe, propulsion, and avionics for new aircraft are formidable. If these performance requirements could be met, would the new mix of systems and platforms leave us better off, or would it have been better to improve on the more traditional model? Certainly, it would be foolish to develop only parts of that new mix, without regard to how they would fit into the whole. For example, a new V/STOL targeting aircraft developed to mate with a new long- range missile that was not developed would be wasteful. Finally, even if all of the components were developed but their performances were not up to expectations, the new force could represent a net loss of capability. For this reason, the effectiveness of future force options and the identification of the
U. S. Navy (John Francaviilo
°f the aircraft would change—they could be smaller, Perhaps employ short or vertical takeoff capabili- tles, and hence operate from even smaller ships— and thereby satisfy the small carrier requirement Without loss of force-wide combat capability.
. A new conceptual force such as this, however, involves a host of performance and operational conCePt uncertainties, most of which can only be resolved by extended R&D programs. In this exem-
Tlie question of whether we need the Nimitz (CVN-68) and an undetermined number of her sisters to be carrying our aircraft 20 years down the road has been agonized over, mostly, from the standpoint of the size of carrier we want and need. The answer to the question must be based at least as much on the kind of aircraft and long-range, ship-launched missiles we want and need.
best alternative are sensitive to the performances of all of their components and the ways in which those performances interact.
To stay on top of a rapidly changing technology base, we must accomplish the following:
► Establish a mechanism for comparing alternative forces and, using assumed performance where firm data are lacking, exercise the intercomponent linkages to identify a set of refined force alternatives that covers the attractive technology options within the bounds of performance uncertainties.
►From that analysis, identify the system performance uncertainties to which the relative performance of the force options is most sensitive.
►Focus (limited) R&D resources on the resolution of those critical uncertainties.
►Following the demonstration of actual performance by the end products of the R&D efforts, rerun the analysis again using demonstrated performance inputs to identify the best force options in realistic situations.
►Implement the best of the alternative force structures so identified.
Attempting to forecast the future piecemeal, in terms of isolated components, is futile. Although a successful analytical approach must treat whole forces, even that analysis, based on conjecture without demonstrated performance inputs, is useful only as a shaper of R&D programs. It can never provide a solid basis for near-term changes in force structure. However, R&D programs initiated without a reasonable idea of their impact on the whole Navy of the future are certainly an inefficient use of scarce R&D funds.
Who can doubt the inevitability of change? Reviewing the examples given earlier, we see that, in 1911, the Navy’s greatest concern was with the nature of surface-to-surface gunnery, with scarcely a thought given to the pending revolutionary changes in naval warfare soon to be brought about by submarines and aircraft. By 1940, aviation was a major arm of the Navy, although there was great uncertainty whether bombing aircraft or battleship guns would be the dominant weapon. More significantly in the context of this paper, many believed that submarines had had their day, having been rendered ineffective by the promised performance of ASDIC (active sonar). The year 1970 saw the Navy again transformed by change in ways not foreseen in 1940, with sea-based tactical aviation supreme, submarines reemergent as our gravest threat, and an enormous concomitant investment in wide-area, offensive ASW systems of types not even dreamed of in 1940.
Since 1945, the Navy has reformed itself to accommodate the lessons of World War II, with little subsequent change in overall emphasis excepting the creation of the SSBN force. Technological growth has been plentiful, but it has been generally channeled to improve upon trusted, proven operational concepts and generic ship or aircraft types in traditional roles. If one regards surface-to-air missiles as an improvement on antiaircraft guns, the only new concept other than submarine-launched ballistic missiles has been the emergence of antiship cruise missiles and Tomahawk in its land-attack form. Perhaps these herald the next great change. If they do. it is unlikely that they will make their maximum contribution in an otherwise unchanged Navy. New systems and platforms bring new tactics and, occasionally, new strategies. If we are to understand their real net worth in that future environment 20 years hence, we must examine them in the broadest possible context.
Nothing is so certain as change, and nothing so uncertain as its nature and the time of its coming- If we are to maintain our technological advantage over our adversaries, we must continue to examine the widest possible array of technical alternatives, not in systems alone, but in terms of whole alternative navies. The world is too complex, and the choices too important to do otherwise.
Captain Allen graduated from Yale University and was commissioned in the Navy in 1946. He commanded the USS Goldsbo- rough (DDG-20), USS Norfolk (DL-1). and USS Belknap (CG- 26) and served three tours ashore in guided missile R&D billets with Polaris, Terrier, and Point Defense. He is a graduate of the Armed Forces Staff College (1963) and National War College (1969). He retired from active duty in 1974 and is currently a corporate senior vice president and manager of Delex Systems Advanced Concepts Division. He has written on a variety of naval subjects, most recently authoring "The Uses of Navies in Peacetime” (American Enterprise Institute, 1980).
________________________________________________ Getting Pegged___________________________________
Back in the 1960s, departing submarine skippers were presented with "happy kits” by their crews, consisting of commissioning pennants flown during their command, cruise boxes, etc. The happy kit for our skipper, an avid cribbage player, included a cribbage board made from one of the teak slats from the ship's deck. As engineer, I wrote the tender work request for deck replacement, listing “excessive age/storm damage” as the cause.
The tender repair officer was a crusty mustang submariner. He was no one’s fool. Back came the work request, approved, with the handwritten question, “Do you want peg holes pre-drilled?”
Captain Thomas L. Jacobs, USN
(The Naval Institute will pay $25.00 for each anecdote published in the Proceedings.)