Notes to the New Administration Week
By Commander Ander S. Heiles, USN
The United States is unprepared to face its greatest maritime challenge since World War II. For the first time since 1945, a peer competitor threatens America’s naval supremacy and dominance in global trade. China now commands the world’s largest combat fleet and a merchant marine with over 7,000 vessels that dominate international shipping lanes. Naval theorist Alfred Thayer Mahan warned of this scenario in 1890, arguing that national power rests on sea power – the integration of combat and commercial maritime strength to secure a nation’s interests.1 Yet today, the U.S. lacks a comprehensive maritime strategy.
Despite this growing threat, the current tri-service maritime strategy, Advantage at Sea (2020), focuses narrowly on combat capabilities only, emphasizing “sea control” without mentioning “sea power” or commercial maritime activity.2 Similarly, the Chief of Naval Operations’ 2024 Navigation Plan prioritizes sea control but ignores the broader foundation of maritime power.3 These documents reflect a fundamental departure from Mahan’s vision that national maritime power requires both combat and commercial capabilities to work in concert.
This conceptual blindspot has created not just a maritime crisis but a national security crisis. While America has focused solely on maintaining naval superiority, China has pursued Mahan’s comprehensive approach to national power through sea power. Since 2004, as the PLA Navy grew by 71 percent, China’s merchant fleet expanded by an astounding 372 percent, following Mahan’s principle that commercial strengths form the foundation of national power.
Neglecting commercial maritime capabilities has dire consequences. The U.S. Merchant Marine has declined by 93 percent, from 2,900 vessels in 1960 to under 200 today. Once handling 60 percent of global trade, U.S.-flagged ships now carry just two percent of the nation’s own overseas commerce. This collapse has led to a shortage of 1,800 credentialed mariners, creating a critical personnel gap. Strategically, the implications are severe. Controlling key maritime chokepoints like the Panama Canal is marginally useful if America lacks the merchant ships to leverage them.
The incoming administration must prioritize three key actions to restore U.S. sea power. The first is to develop a comprehensive National Maritime Strategy, which would treat the Merchant Marine as vital to national security, equal to naval power, and embrace Mahan’s principle that commercial maritime strength underpins naval capability. Second, revitalize U.S. shipbuilding and invest and incentivize U.S. shipyards. Only five U.S. yards can build large commercial vessels, while a single Chinese yard surpasses all U.S. capacity combined. Finally, the mariner shortage can be addressed by expanding training programs and introducing incentives to attract and retain civilian mariners.
The administration faces an urgent choice – continue America’s narrow focus on naval power or comprehensively rebuild the commercial capability Mahan identified as essential to national power. By restoring the balance between combat and commercial maritime capabilities, the U.S. can secure its position in the era of great power competition.
Commander Ander Heiles is a student at the Joint Advanced Warfighting School in Norfolk, VA. He commanded USS Monsoon (PC 4) and is the Prospective Executive Officer (P-XO) for the Naval Talent Acquisition Groups (NTAG) Empire State.
The views expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the official positions or opinions of the U.S. Navy, the Department of Defense, or any part of the U.S. government.
References
1. Alfred Thayer Mahan, The Influence of Sea Power Upon History 1660-1783 (New York: Dover Publications 1987).
2. U.S. Department of the Navy, U.S. Marine Corps, and U.S. Coast Guard, Advantage at Sea: Prevailing with Integrated All-Domain Naval Power (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Publishing Office, 2020), https://media.defense.gov/2020/dec/16/2002553074/-1/-1/0/triservicestrategy.pdf.
3. U.S. Department of the Navy, CNO NAVPLAN 2024 (Washington, DC: U.S. Department of the Navy, 2024), https://www.navy.mil/Portals/1/CNO/NAVPLAN2024/Files/CNO-NAVPLAN-2024.pdf.
Featured Image: A container ship passes under the Golden Gate Bridge. (Photo via Wikimedia Commons)