I recently had the privilege of being a part of the delivery of the first two new 85 foot MK VI Patrol Boats to the US Navy’s 5th Fleet Command in Al Manama, Bahrain. These new patrol boats, manufactured by SAFE Boats International, may phase out the Cyclone class Patrol Boat which has proven itself far too costly in maintenance and upgrades. The new MK VI is less expensive with a purchase and lifetime maintenance cost of approximately $15 million. The MK VI is a far superior craft in every way giving the US Navy an unbelievable superiority on the water when performing Coastal Warfare and Interdiction operations.
The MK VI can fit a crew of 10 with eight passengers, each with their own gas shock seats. The MK VI is armed with 6 crew-served weapons stations that can fit anything from a M2 .50 Cal to M134 mini-guns. The new craft has two remote operated MK38 MOD 2 25MM weapon systems. There is also talk of mounting a guided missile weapons systems as well. In addition to its weapons compliment, it has the capability of stern launching RHIBs, AUVs, or land Marines on a beach when the mission calls for using the boat’s shallow draft capabilities and stern drop ramp. It is built to withstand a 7.62 round over certain critical points.
Several MKVI Patrol boats at a Safe Boats International facility. Source: Navy league.
It should also be noted that this vessel has more than just weapons and payload capabilities. After an extensive walkthrough of the interior it is worth noting that this is a truly modern vessel equipped with a command, control, communication and computing, surveillance and intelligence (C4SI) suite to work through any situation at sea. The vessel is equipped with VHF, MF, UHF, and internal communications through integrated headsets. The communications system is neatly arranged in a server tray inside the cabin which provides access for troubleshooting while underway. The navigator has a real time electronic chart plotter on a flat screen mounted in front of them, and the coxswain gets a futuristic chair with throttles and multipurpose joysticks integrated into the armrests.
Interior of MKVI Patrol Boat. Source: Navy League.
The engine compartment is a modern space that provides ease of access to dual MTU diesel power plants, HVAC systems, and generators. The engineer also has their own seat with a complete console system that provides real time information through a mounted flat screen. There is a bench seat in the main cabin that is used as a medical triage station for the on board medic.
The new MK VI boats will operate as pairs, increasing both available firepower and mission support. Top speed can be in excess of 35 knots but it should be noted that while this can be achieved in unfavorable sea conditions, it has proven to be a safety issue while conducting sea trials. The patrol boat can conduct duration operations of around 24 hours or 600nm in a stretch as prescribed by the overseeing command, but my tour guide did inform me that with coordinated UNREP’s and working alongside a larger vessel such as the Littoral Combat Ship it can do well beyond the 24 hour mark without issue. For those missions that push the 24 hour mark, the patrol craft comes outfitted with a head, shower, and a galley with an integrated coffee maker for increased morale.
As exciting as it was to learn about the new MK VI’s specifications & capabilities, the most important subject surrounding this new patrol boat is what it is going to do operationally. My guided tour of the vessel was led by not only a technician of the MK VI but an actual boat team leader that will be working aboard the new patrol boat. Understanding this and the individual’s background, I candidly asked him what kind of work he thought he might be getting into. My guide provided me with the standard response of contingency op plans, South China Sea operations, Persian Gulf operations, Navy VBSS operations, and Marine MEU deployments. He did also mention that this craft would not be conducting HVA escorts, but stated that we shouldn’t hold our breath on that one. As we dove a little deeper in dialogue we started hashing out some great ideas on how to increase the patrol boats interdiction game and how to stop the ever increasing maritime human, weapon, and drug trafficking throughout the globe. We also sought ideas of how to quell the issues with pirates throughout the Gulf of Guinea and Malacca Straits. With all these interdiction opportunities we looked at teams that could carry out the mission successfully. The initial idea of having a Navy VBSS or USMC MEU team aboard could work but their overall capabilities are not as specialized for countering the problems stated above. The employment of SEALs, Marine Recon, or MARSOC teams could provide that specialized approach needed to subdue our enemies on the water. Often times these teams are being underutilized for interdiction operations since there is still plenty of work to be done on land.
After running a complete analysis on possible teams that could provide the type of interdiction capabilities needed to suppress various issues on the water, I mentioned using the US Coast Guard. Shortly after, we walked ourselves into the idea of using US Coast Guard personnel aboard the MK VI for interdiction operations because of their explicit maritime law enforcement capability that entail broad authority and jurisdiction. The US Coast Guard working alongside the US Navy is nothing new and has a proven track record of success. US Coast Guard LEDET’s have been leading the way in this type of interdiction operations for more than 30 years, using mostly larger platforms. The new MK VI is fast, maneuverable, and can stern launch a RHIB which can be operated by US Coast Guard Maritime Security & Response Team (MSRT) Tactical Delivery Team (TDT) Coxswain.
MKVI Patrol boat: Photo from Safe Boats International.
With ever increasing illicit trafficking on the waters and unchallenged piracy in places other than the Horn of Africa, the US Coast Guard has a chance to shine by using its best maritime interdiction capabilities through their Deployable Specialized Forces (DSF) teams. When it comes to the US Coast Guard DSF teams, two in particular come to mind that excel in this type of mission. These teams can operate either integrated or alone to achieve the best end results for the mission. First are the USCG Tactical Law Enforcement (TACLET) Law Enforcement Detachments (LEDETS) who are masters of their craft when it comes to interdiction operations. They can manage an entire interdiction operation from analyzing pertinent intelligence all the way through transferring detainees and seized vessels with a case package that can either aid local authorities in prosecution or our own federal prosecutors. They have proven themselves time and again while working the counter drug mission in SOUTHCOM, VBSS missions in Persian Gulf, and Anti-Piracy operations around the Horn of Africa.
A USCG MSRT Operator climbs aboard a vessel.
The second team that comes to mind are the USCG MSRT Direct Action Section (DAS) Teams. DAS Teams are perhaps the most tactically proficient operators the USCG has to offer. DAS Teams can effortlessly board and take control of a vessel in minutes. Alone, DAS teams can work to take down the most dangerous trafficking vessels. Alongside a LEDET, DAS Teams operate with an excellent level of law enforcement experience and capability to ensure every mission is conducted with the most stringent legal standards. If these new patrol boats were to host a CG team aboard, we could see a new relationship be forged between the US Navy and the US Coast Guard which would come at time when it most needed to be continued since the exit of the frigates.
These patrol boats are the next generation littoral combatants for the Navy. Once the fleet get its allotment of MK VI’s and employs them alongside a Littoral Combat Ship, the naval force will be able to actively stem problems from where they begin. If these new boats are to make an impact on the world through their capabilities, they have to be used and tested in ways that might have not otherwise been conceived when designing the craft. For the Navy to understand these craft, they must put them to work, push the limits, and listen to feedback from the operators on the frontline. The US Navy has a great chance to enhance its capability by diversifying its originally conceived missions with the new MK VI.
Lawrence A. Hajek is a Managing Partner at Condition One USA, a private security & training firm in Virginia. Previously he served active duty with the US Coast Guard’s Deployable Specialized Forces as a Tactical Law Enforcement Team South LEDET Boarding Officer & later as a Sector Boarding Officer conducting Homeland Security Operations. He is a subject matter expert on Maritime Interdiction Operations and the International Ship & Port Security Code.
The following article is the first in CIMSEC’s first regular column: The Red Queen’s Navy. Written by Vidya Sagar Reddy, The Red Queen’s Navy will discuss the influence of emerging naval platforms and technologies in the geostrategic contours of the Indo-Pacific region. The column will also identify relevant historical precedents, forming the basis for various maritime development and security related projects in the region.
“Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place.”- The Red Queen, Through the Looking Glass, Lexi’s Carroll.
By Vidya Sagar Reddy
During his recent visit to the Philippines, the United States Secretary of Defense promised delivery of a variety of sensors and communications equipment worth $42 million to the host nation. One of the critical sensors in this suite is an observation blimp that can peer across the South China Sea (SCS), providing maritime domain awareness to the Philippines.
The Philippines is one of several claimants to sovereign rights over few SCS islands; they are faced with a coercive China claiming such rights over 80 percent of the sea. China has forcefully seized control of maritime features in the SCS from both Vietnam and the Philippines. In addition, the PRC has started land reclamation projects and built artificial islands. Radars and missile batteries have been installed on some of the features, and military planes operate and land there routinely.
In 2012, China overwhelmed Philippine forces in a two month long conflict, resulting in China’s defacto control of Scarborough Shoal, located barely 140 miles off Manila. The Philippines filed a case against China before the UN’s Permanent Court of Arbitration, challenging 15 claims from China’s so-called nine-dash line to Scarborough Shoal. The tribunal is likely to find China’s activities around the Shoal illegal.
In spite of this, China has refuted the authority of the arbitration tribunal to rule on these claims. It is reported that China is now considering construction of outposts on Scarborough Shoal. Military installations on this Shoal would allow China to control the Luzon Strait, a gateway to the Pacific and tremendously busy trade artery, therefore further consolidating its control over the SCS. The proximity of the Shoal to Manila would also allow China to monitor military installations and maneuvers on the Philippine islands, of particular interest as the US visiting forces begin to deploy.
The primary concern is the expansion of China’s coast guard and maritime militias around the Shoal to erode the Philippine legal rights like fishing, maritime trade, and exploitation of natural resources in these waters. Establishing new facts on the ground will defeat Philippines’ legal standing. Continuous monitoring of China’s actions is required for validating these assumptions and in order to respond proactively to new security threats.
A network of sensors established in and over the SCS would enable monitoring of land reclamation activities, build up of military assets on the islands, transits of coast guard and maritime militia units, oil exploration rigs, and any other object that can potentially fly or sail as China has become innovative in asserting its claims. The communications equipment offered to the Philippines will enable secure transmission of data from these sensors for faster and more transparent decision-making.
One of the critical sensor nodes in this suite is an observation blimp that can peer across the SCS using onboard radar. Theblimp is a powered, gas filled lighter-that-the-air airship. It does not have a rigid structure like that of a balloon, but can instead be steered while floating in the air. Hindenburg is a famous example of these airships, which had a rigid structure.
Historically, airships have been used for both commercial and military activities, including ferrying passengers across the Atlantic, the American Civil War, bombing raids during World War I, polar exploration, advertisement campaigns, etc. The US Navy developed the airships USS Akron and USS Macon for ocean surveillance with the ability to launch and recover aircraft, dubbed flying aircraft carriers. Most of these airships crashed, but public interest truly faded with the Hindenburg disaster. The simultaneous advent of airplanes ferrying passengers far more efficiently across the oceans sealed their fate completely.
The potential of airships to provide constant mass area surveillance renewed military interest in them. Airships were useful to coalition forces in Afghanistan, forces along the US-Mexico border, and by Israel over Gaza, just to name a few.
The US Army initiated a $2.8 billion project called the Joint Land Attack Cruise Missile Defense Elevated Netted Sensor System (JLENS) that uses a blimp-duo hovering about 10,000 feet and covering an area the size of Texas. One blimp is capable of providing high resolution 360 degree radar coverage while the other is used for focusing on specific targets including fixed or rotary-wing aircraft, cruise missiles, unmanned air vehicles, tactical ballistic missiles etc. JLENS is designed to connect to the nation’s air defense networks for faster response to incoming threats.
Last October, one of the prototype JLENS blimps broke loose from the mooring station. Without the steering controls in place, the blimp dragged part of its tether across Pennsylvania causing power outages and damages to private property. Two F-16s were scrambled to monitor the movement of the blimp until it deflated and crashed into the trees.
Already looked upon unfavorably for cost overruns, the US Congress awarded a mere $2.5 million instead of the $45 million sought by the Pentagon, a measure supposedly aimed at killing the program.
Although details are yet to emerge regarding the size and observational scope of the blimp promised to the Philippines, this set of incidents and accidents points to knowledge gaps about the inherent risks of airships that contain highly inflammable gases and are prone to various atmospheric phenomena. Given this tenuous history of blimps, a loose one free floating over the SCS would invite further aggression from the PRC. It is in the interest of all parties to avoid such a situation. How can the US prove the blimp platform has been rigorously tested, despite Congress having killed the program? This is a critical question for the Philippines. It may be wiser to avoid creating, even accidentally, another tense situation in an already contested environment. Therefore the Philippines should explore additional options to improve its maritime domain awareness and security. Such options include acquiring patrol boats and light aircraft that can not only provide the Philippines maritime domain awareness, but also enhance the security of its territory and possessions.
Vidya Sagar Reddy is a researcher at the Observer Research Foundation, New Delhi.
Featured Image: U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Office of Air and Marine, Tethered Aerostat Radar System (TARS) Deming New Mexico. Photographer: Donna Burton
CIMSEC sat down with Captain Mark Vandroff to solicit his expert insight into the complex world of acquisition and the future of the U.S. Navy’s destroyers. CAPT Vandroff is the Program Manager of the U.S. Navy’s DDG 51 program, the Arleigh Burke-class destroyer, which is the most numerous warship in the U.S. Navy. In the first part of this two part interview series, CAPT Vandroff discusses the capability offered by the SPY-6 Air and Missile Defense Radar, the differences in warship design between the currently serving Flight IIA and upcoming Flight III variants, and the U.S. Navy’s ongoing Future Surface Combatant Study.
This is a big year for your program. It is the fiscal year where you begin procuring the new Flight III destroyers. Can you talk about the differences from the Flight IIA to the Flight III?
The raison d’etre of Flight III is fielding AMDR. SPY 6 is the designation for that radar as it goes on a DDG 51. That radar program may yield other radar technologies because it is very exciting technology. The Flight III gets the AMDR SPY-6 radar onto a DDG 51 platform, replacing the SPY-1 radar currently in use. That radar is a significant, multi-generational leap forward in radar technology. In the same space and roughly twice as much power, it produces over 35 times as much power out. Between the power efficiency and sensitivity of the radar, it is a huge step forward. It also includes other very desirable radar features such as a much improved resistance to advanced counter-radar jamming techniques and the ability to integrate seamlessly through a radar system controller, not only the S-Band SPY-6, but also an additional separate frequency input. It can use the multi-frequency input for better targeting, and a lot of good things happen for targeting and your reaction time by synthesizing multi-band input. We hook up the SPY-6 AMDR, which is a S-BAND radar, with the existing and already planned for DDG 51 X-Band emitter AN/SPQ-9B to get the full radar suite for the Flight III.
Primary Flight III changes.
If it were all that simple I would tell you to talk to my colleague, CAPT Seiko Okano, she’s the SPY-6 program manager. I would not have to do very much and she would just deliver me a different radar. But the radar requires us to do things to the ship to be able to accommodate it.
The radar takes about twice as much power. We had to take the ship from three, 3 megawatt (MW) generators to three, 4 MW generators because we never have three on at one time for purposes of redundancy. We always calculate what would happen if you had to run on two of the three. When we calculate what our battle loads are and can we handle them, we always calculate to whether we can handle them with two of the three generators if one of them is down for whatever reason. That’s how you design a redundant warship.
So when we up the power out of our generators to four megawatts we run into our first physics challenge. When we up the power we have to do one of two things, either increase the voltage or increase the current. At a certain level of current, it becomes difficult and at times unsafe to run a certain amount of current through the kind of wiring we would put on a ship. With what we currently have, if we had to up the power anymore we would be hitting those limits. So we have to up the voltage, which is easily done. We’ve got 4160 volt power on aircraft carriers, on DDG-1000, so we had to implement that for Flight III. There’s a separate 4160 bus for powering the radar, and then we stepped down with transformers for our 450 loads that exist. That allows us to power the radar, and at the same time power the rest of the ship the way it is powered in a Flight IIA. That was the first change and we’ve done a lot of work to make sure that electric plant design will be safe, stable, redundant, and survivable in battle. That’s been the work of the last two or three years, and a lot of work is put into splitting those loads out.We have a 4160 distribution system with the existing 450 distribution system that we could do that with. That was the first ship side technical challenge that I would say now we’re pretty much through. The new generators, the four MW generators, have gone through their critical design review and they’re just now starting production.
Flight III Electric Plant Concept.
The next thing we needed to look at was actually powering the radar. The radar runs off 4160 converted 1000 volt DC to AC. The equipment to convert that and condition it was similar to what DDG-1000 uses, they use that power conversion module on their SPY-3 radar. We competed, it was a full and open competition, we got many bids, and DRS (Diagnostic/Retrieval Systems, Inc) won the work. They came to us with a box that was based on their DDG-1000 design, but had a couple of generations of power monitoring and power conditioning improvement on top of that incorporating lessons learned from the commercial world. That’s been through its preliminary and critical design review and its gone into production now. That gets us power to the radar, and power to the electric grid.
If you think about power what else does the radar need? The radar needs more cooling. A more powerful radar produces more heat. For reference, a refrigerating ton is the amount of cooling I would have if I rolled a ton of ice into this room and let it melt for 24 hours. A DDG 51 today has about 1000 tons of cooling. Once you install the SPY-6 you really need 1400-1500 tons of cooling. When we were starting the early preliminary design, NAVSEA already had an energy saving initiative. It was a plan to take the Navy standard 200 ton plants and equip them with a more fuel efficient compressor, and some other design improvements. All of that’s made by York Navy Systems in Pennsylvania that makes that standard 200 ton plant. NAVSEA works with them, and they are actually in the process now, and there’s a working prototype of the improved 200 ton plant that is putting out over 325 tons of cooling and it is just going through its equipment qualification to make sure the new machine will pass all the Navy standards for shock survivability. We are getting ready to put the initial orders for those to deliver to the Flight III because when you put five of those you get an excess of 1500, and that will give us more than enough cooling to accommodate the new cooling loads. So those have been the key components in changing the ship for the Flight III.
Prototype HES/C 300 rton A/C chiller.
In terms of weight, if you put everything that a SPY-6 uses and everything a SPY-1 uses on a scale they roughly balance. However, SPY-1 forms the signal in a signal generator and then transfers that up to the array, so that signal generator is lower in the ship. Because SPY-6 is an active array, the signal is generated on-array, so that means the arrays are heavier. Arrays go up high so that means the weight goes up high. If you are on a ship you are not crazy about high weight. You want to be like a running back, you want your weight low so it is hard to knock you over. The last thing we did is move some weight around in the ship. We thickened up the hull and the scantlings, which are the ribs of the hull. That offsets the high weight by putting extra weight low, and moves your center of gravity back down. The center of gravity of a Flight III will be roughly where the Flight IIA’s center of gravity is now. We are still concerned about things like performance for flight ops and maneuvering, and what that means for the pitch and roll in different sea states. We have the advantage of Naval Surface Warfare Center Carderock’s great new MASK tank where they can do all sorts of different sea states all in one tank. We have the scale model of the Flight III being built out at Carderock and that will go through all its tank testing with an idea to make sure that as we are designing the ship we know where we are for maneuvering the ship.
Those are the big shipboard changes that facilitate the introduction of the radar. It is cool for me as the ship guy to talk about moving weight around to get good center of gravity, or getting the new electrical plant, but all that has to mean something to the warfighter. What the warfighter gets out of the Flight III is that improved radar performance from the new SPY-6 radar tied into the existing AN/SPQ-9 radar and those synthesized together for better performance in the atmospheric regime and the ballistic missile defense regime. It offers tremendous improvement in capability in both of those regimes.
Because AMDR is such a tremendous increase in capability, how does this affect the DDG 51’s growth margins?
That is one of the reasons we looked at things like the extra cooling and the extra power. If you look at where the Flight IIA is, the Flight IIA has about one and a half MW of service life power growth, and about 200 tons of cooling growth. If you added up every load on a Flight IIA today you would get something just over 4 MW of load, and if you put two 3 megawatt generators on the load together to power those four megawatts. You pay an efficiency penalty when you parallel two generators together, so two 3 megawatt generators gives about 5.8 MW of usable power and about 200 KW of the generators fighting themselves at peak. That is about one and a half MW to one and two thirds MW of margin on a IIA today. The Flight III will have a heavier load. A full battle load will be up over 5.5 MW, but we will be well over 7.5 MW when we put two four MW machines online together. We will have another two MW of power. The total cooling reserve will be about 200 refrigeration tons to 300 refrigeration tons.
AMDR system overview.
At this point some people usually ask is 2 MW enough when you look at directed energy weapons and railguns. I can tell you the Navy is reevaluating its historical standards for electrical growth in its future ship design. Will those historical standards be adequate for a future that includes railguns and directed energy? The Flight III will have as great or greater an ability to accommodate that as the Flight IIAs today. Whether or not we need to do something to make that more, and how that would affect ship design in the next ten years, is a question of ongoing discussion, both in the requirements side in OPNAV, and the ship design side in NAVSEA. What are we really going to need, and what does that mean for ship design? That’s the next step.
The Flight III tasking was to get AMDR on and give it the same cooling and power growth potential. Don’t take a step back from the Flight IIA today. I could have put AMDR on Flight III and eaten all the growth, and you would have had a ship with no growth margin. We looked at that extensively because it was the lowest cost option, and discarded that as not responsible. We are going to want to keep these ships around, so keep what we have today as far as margins, and that gave us a certain design and philosophy. I think you will see CNO staff and NAVSEA work together on other concepts of what will we do to grow that some more. But that is the next generation after this Flight III. That will be my relief’s concern to tackle.
What can you tell us about the process behind the Future Surface Combatant Study?
If you look at the way the DoD formulates future requirements, it is called the JCIDS process, the joint capabilities integration and development system, it starts with an analysis, an FCA, a future capabilities analysis. The organization that thinks they might have a future gap, must first analyze what capabilities in a given time frame does a given force structure need to be able to address. From the result of that you write an initial capabilities document and you address an analysis of alternatives. Where we are in that process now is that N96 is running that future capabilities analysis, that is going on now. That is really a requirements evolution, it is not really a technical or acquisition evolution so that is not mine to run.
N96 wanted to be very participative so they have got a team doing it. The team has regular meetings with a couple of oversight councils, one at the captain’s level and one at the flag level. N96 invited a slew of practitioners across the spectrum of operators, acquisition, technical, and budget to get regular briefings on what the teams were doing and get feedback. They thought I was one of the practitioners and I have sat in those meetings. I have seen the work they are doing, and they are doing good work. They are looking out into the future and asking what kind of capabilities will the surface Navy need to contribute to the force in the 2030s, 2040s, and what are we doing today and what modifications do we think we need to make in order to meet those future needs. Those are the questions they are trying to answer.
The question that comes after is more of an acquisition question of which I would expect, both the PEOs (Program Executive Officers) and NAVSEA to be more involved in, and that is the analysis of alternatives. Now that you have told us these are the things you need us to do, what are some of the different ways of doing it, and let’s determine which of those ways might do it best, which ways can do it most affordably. But the future capabilities analysis is where they are at now.
What best practices and lessons learned from the DDG 51 program should inform the Future Surface Combatant Study?
I would put those into two different categories. The DDG 51 program has been successful from a technical standpoint and from an acquisition standpoint. From a technical standpoint, the DDG 51, from its inception, was designed to be flexible, redundant, and survivable. We have proven this, look at the Cole. The ships have taken battle damage and lived to fight another day. The ships have been flexible enough that they were designed in the 1980s and with modification, and sometimes significant modification, could be made combat relevant in the 2020s. The systems engineering of both the design of the ship, and especially the systems engineering that went into the design of the combat system, is good solid systems engineering discipline. Know your requirements, break them down, formulate them, and integrate the pieces back together to provide an end-to-end capability.
To give you an idea, I want to be able to shoot down an air target at a certain distance that is moving a certain speed with a certain level of maneuver. The systems engineer asks how do I design that kill chain? How do I break that down? What capability do I want in the missile, radar, and illuminator? What parts of that kill chain are going to produce which effects in order to get the end effect that you want? From its earliest days back when Wayne E. Meyer had the Aegis program, that has always been a disciplined engineering process. Whether you are talking about the ship’s survivability, mobility, or the ship’s combat capability, that has been a disciplined technical process. That is good for anyone building ships, or anyone building anything, that mind and that process.
On the acquisition side, there are several things I would want a future shipbuilding program to look back at the DDG 51 program and extract. The first one is a real careful, facts-based decision on what parts of the ship were we going to have the shipbuilder do, and what parts would we contract separately where the government contracts GFE (government furnished equipment) and delivers separately to the ship. There have been times when it has been thought advantageous to go one way or another with that pendulum.
Because there is a certain attractiveness, we could have the Navy buy everything and just have the shipbuilder assemble everything. That’s got problems. You can give the shipbuilder the performance spec for the ship and let the shipbuilder buy everything. That’s got problems. You have different problems both ways. The Aegis program, and especially DDG 51, has always been a point in the middle, and very carefully thought out. What do we want the shipbuilder to buy because we want them to be responsible for it, because it is within their wheelhouse and capability. This could be an engine, generator, or a fire pump. Alternatively, this is not in their wheelhouse, it is not within their capability, and frankly I want control over it like a sonar, radar, or a missile launcher.
Those were thought out decisions in the DDG 51 and I have changed some of them during my time as Program Manager in both directions. Times change, industry changes, but we don’t make those changes lightly, and we make them only after a very long analysis of thinking about the capability we are trying to get, and what is the best way to materialize it. We carefully think through what makes sense to contract directly for, what makes sense to contract out, that is called a make-buy, or the GFE/CFE divide. That is one thing I would have a future program look at DDG 51, and the way they made their decisions. Not that a future program would make all the same decisions, ten years from now industry might change and the requirements might change. They might make a different decision, but the process we used to make that decision was fundamentally sound.
The other thing that has always been key in our program is maximizing competition between the shipbuilders, using profit-related offer, at the sub-tier vendors, and using competition wherever it was possible and practical to get competition. Competition gives you good results in acquisition. From between having a good make-buy plan, and using competition as much as you practically can, marry those together and that provides a good foundation for any future acquisition program.
In Part Two, CAPT Vandroff goes into depth on his publications Confessions of a Major Program Manager published in U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings, and an Acquisition System to Enable American Seapower, published on USNI News and coauthored with Bryan McGrath. He finishes with his thoughts on building acquisition expertise in the military and his reading recommendations. Read Part Two here.
Captain Vandroff is a 1989 graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy. With 10 years as a surface warfare officer and 16 years as an engineering duty officer, he is currently the major program manager for Arleigh Burke – class destroyers.
Dmitry Filipoff is CIMSEC’s Director of Online Content. Contact him at [email protected].
Featured Image: CRYSTAL CITY, Va. (Jan. 12, 2012) Capt. Mark Vandroff, program manager for the DDG 51-Class Shipbuilding at PEO SHIPS, discusses new technology with guests and media during the 24th Annual Surface Navy Association Symposium. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Todd Frantom/Released).
At the Surface Navy Association (SNA) conference in 2015, Navy leadership announced the new concept of Distributed Lethality, and, in early January after a year of discussion and research, they further fleshed out the concept at this year’s SNA. According to ADM Peter Fanta, the Director of Surface Warfare (N96), one impetus for the concept was increasing the lethality of today’s ships under the current budget constraints. A year later, this is still relevant.[i] This year’s sound bite was “if it floats, it fights,”[ii] focusing on fighting in anti-access and area denial environments and “hunter-killer surface action groups,” which can “cause the adversary to shift his own defenses to counter our thrusts.”[iii]
Initially, my opinion of Distributed Lethality was that it was the current ‘flavor of the month,’ and I would pay more attention if it were still being discussed when I started Department Head School. This opinion changed dramatically when I participated as a Red Team member in an N96-sponsored game being developed by US Army, Air Force, and Indonesian Naval officers at the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) to test various Adaptive Force Packages (AFPs) designed to optimize the Distributed Lethality concept. The Red Team was a mix of Indonesian and US naval officers familiar with the DL concept and given a large amount of latitude in how to employ our more varied forces (which included the full range of CRUDES and AMPHIB combat capability, as well as irregular forces). The AFPs used consisted of a mixture of LCS and DDG with notional 120nm Anti-Surface Weapons for the first scenario and an even broader high-low spread of DDGs and PCGs for the second. Our goal was to invade and conquer an island currently claimed by country yellow while also evading blue forces. The game was designed to force Phase 0 or 1 considerations and would end if a full-scale war developed – in which case both sides had lost.
The game was eye-opening on both the strategic value and execution challenges of Distributed Lethality. As one Red Team player described it, in this particular region and the given scenarios, Distributed Lethality was “operational deterrence with strategic ambiguity.” The game successfully showcased how the different AFPs give Distributed Lethality a greater level of flexibility and increase the options available to COCOMs across the range of military operations. The use of smaller ships also has implications for diplomatic as well as military engagement with partners, friends, and allies, possibly serving as an operational or strategic force multiplier. When I put myself in the adversaries’ shoes, the concept presented me with a level of ambiguity that gave me pause, not necessarily due to Red force’s intended actions against country yellow, but due to my unwillingness to overtly sink Blue forces. The AFPs perhaps offered less traditional deterrence in comparison with some of the other capabilities in the US Fleet, specifically the CSG. The AFPs provided an increased degree of logistical complexity, but the advantage of having multiple, smaller ships meant that the adversary would spend more time and resources on ISR. In the particular scenario presented, the additional ISR requirements were less of a strategic deterrent and more of an operational or tactical burden that introduced a level of ambiguity not otherwise present.
The value of Distributed Lethality, as tested in this particular war game, was of operational value; however, it also added complexity to the planning for the Blue team. Not only are the logistical challenges greater with a more dispersed force, but in the scenario given, the blurring between Red combatants and fishing vessels, as well as the use of disabling unconventional tactics [iv]was effective and were more difficult for the operational commanders to counter due to the political or tactical ramifications of any given reaction. While increased strategic ambiguity and disaggregated forces are strengths of the concept, they are also a potential weak point. As we give greater responsibility to and increase opportunities for early command commanders to operate in highly ambiguous situations, they need to have been exposed to and have trained to several different types of hybrid warfare specific to their area of operations before taking command.
Red Team Members Plot Their Next Move (photo: MAJ Reza Achwandi, Indonesian Navy).
As the Red Team, we increasingly fell back on hybrid warfare to counter Blue forces, and in doing so, prevented escalation beyond Phase 1 and allowed off-ramps for either Blue or Red in which either country could back down. Of significant import was that all country Red members reacted more rationally and were less inclined to escalate disproportionately when faced with an AFP. During one scenario, when testing the reaction of Red Team to an AFP versus their reaction to a CSG, the presence of a US CVN immediately escalated tensions and at one point, the White Cell had to arbitrate against strong initial reactions that may have resulted in escalation to war. When the CVN was used instead of an action group, even well outside contested waters, the gut reaction of the Red Team was escalatory, provocative, and defensive.
In a world of shrinking military budgets and shifting ideas among political leadership about levels of engagement in various regions around the world, Distributed Lethality is more than window dressing. It is a way to affirm that while the US Navy may only add a few more ships every year, those ships will continue to punch above their weight class and pose an operational and even strategic challenge to opponents. It may also provide a way for better engagement with other nations using the smaller ships of an AFP rather than those of a traditional CSG. Distributed Lethality in the near term and at the operational level sounds like a modest shuffling of the current deck, but the longer term and particularly strategic implementations sold me on the concept as a whole. I hope that Distributed Lethality will continue to be developed to its fullest potential at all levels.
LT Megan McCulloch is a surface warfare officer and recent Naval Postgraduate School, Regional Security Studies graduate. The opinions and views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and are presented in her personal capacity. They do not necessarily represent the views of U.S. Department of Defense, the U.S. Navy, or any other agency.
Endnotes
[i] “SNA: Navy Surface Leaders Pitch More Lethal Ships, Surface Action Groups,” USNI News, January 14, 2015, http://news.usni.org/2015/01/14/sna-navy-surface-leaders-pitch-lethal-ships-surface-action-groups.
[ii] “A Year Into Distributed Lethality, Navy Nears Fielding Improved Weapons, Deploying Surface Action Group,” USNI News, January 13, 2016, http://news.usni.org/2016/01/13/a-year-into-distributed-lethality-navy-nears-fielding-improved-weapons-deploying-surface-action-group.
[iii]“‘Distributed Lethality’ | U.S. Naval Institute,” accessed February 11, 2016, http://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/2015-01/distributed-lethality.
[iv]“China’s Non-Kinetic Three Warfares Against America,” The Huffington Post, accessed April 8, 2016, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/peter-navarro-and-greg-autry/chinas-nonkinetic-three-w_b_8914156.html.
Featured Image: The NPS Fall Quarter Joint Wargaming Class looks at Distributed Lethality (photo: MAJ Reza Achwandi, Indonesian Navy)
influence of emerging naval platforms and technologies in the geostrategic contours of the Indo-Pacific region. The column will also identify relevant historical precedents, forming the basis for various maritime development and security related projects in the region.
