The 2022 National Defense Strategy encouraged defense policymaker and the services to organize their efforts in the form of campaigns. These more long-term and integrated efforts aim to enhance competitiveness and unity of effort. For navies, there are abundant opportunities to structure efforts into campaigns. From competing with undersea gray zone activity in the Indo-Pacific, to leveraging unmanned systems to change a competitor’s risk calculus, navies can adopt more integrated and long-term methods of competition through campaigning. But navies must also understand their limits, whether it be force generation or other resource factors, to better understand the extent to which they can realistically pursue campaigns. Navies must carefully weigh these considerations are they structure their many efforts into concerted campaigns.
The featured authors are listed below, and we thank them for their excellent contributions.
Looking at both sides of these resourcing strategies, the Navy needs to answer the hard questions of both campaigning capacity and effectiveness, allowing the department to evaluate campaigning with a budget lens. This could provide a different strategy for future defense budgets and resourcing.
The geostrategic situation in the Bay of Bengal reflects the need for a concept of integrated naval campaigning in support of a rules-based Indo-Pacific. The significance of this maritime zone is looming larger in the strategic calculus of the Indo-Pacific region and has become a central arena for gray zone competition, especially between Indian and Chinese maritime forces.
The Navy needs to consider how else it can leverage unmanned systems in campaigns, and how these systems can open up unique options for enhancing naval campaigns in pursuit of deterrence.
Dmitry Filipoff is CIMSEC’s Director of Online Content. Contact him at Content@cimsec.org.
Featured Image: PACIFIC OCEAN (June 12, 2023) – An MH-60S Sea Hawk helicopter from the “Screamin’ Indians” of Helicopter Sea Combat Squadron (HSC) 6 flies near the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Decatur (DDG 73) as it approaches the flight deck of the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz (CVN 68). (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Hannah Kantner)
Will unmanned forces transform naval campaigning? Given recent events following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, maritime transformation appears to be well underway. Autonomous and semi-autonomous aircraft and surface vessels have damaged or destroyed Russian surface combatants, air defense systems, and supply depots. Land warfare also has seen its share of innovative applications of autonomous and semi-autonomous technology, from swarming drone attacks against urban areas to single hand grenades precisely dropped on lone soldiers in slit trenches dug into the Ukrainian steppe. One could also point to recent press reports about a flurry of drone activity across the U.S. Navy. In September 2023, two unmanned surface vessels sailed from Hawaii to participate in exercises with Carrier Strike Group 1 in the Western Pacific, while the Navy’s Task Force 59 based in Bahrain has become the de facto U.S. Navy drone innovation center with its ongoing experimentation with small autonomous vessels as intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) platforms.1 The Navy needs to consider how else it can leverage unmanned systems in campaigns, and how these systems can open up unique options for enhancing naval campaigns in pursuit of deterrence.
Doubts About Drones
Despite mounting evidence drawn from recent battlefield experience and enthusiastic recognition of the growing effectiveness of these systems, Navy officers are still expressing reservations about the impact of drones in the maritime domain, especially in the western Pacific.2 They note, for instance, that the Navy is already stretched to the breaking point by the effort to maintain and supply its existing manned surface fleet and that it cannot create the infrastructure needed to support hundreds of medium sized and large autonomous surface vessels in the relatively short time envisioned by current shipbuilding plans. Others suggest that the weapons payload carried by most drones is too small to create more than a nuisance. Instead of a five-pound warhead, a one-thousand-pound warhead would be more appropriate when it comes to disabling a major surface combatant. Unmanned systems also need a range of thousands, not hundreds, of miles to operate in the Pacific. Drones may have requirements that make them more of a liability than an asset in a contested Pacific, such as drones with limited battery life, or that have to be transported and deployed within reach of sophisticated adversary systems, or drones that require weeks of lead time to be moved into operational areas, or that create windows of vulnerability when they need to be retrieved or serviced in the battlespace. A semi-autonomous drone armed with a Hellfire missile might in fact be the perfect weapon to end Ayman al-Zawahiri’s retirement in downtown Kabul, but using an autonomous weapon to hit a modern multi-mission warship on the high seas is another matter.3
Who has it right, the optimists or the pessimists? They both are correct, which creates an “innovation paradox” that was recently addressed by a survey of past efforts at maritime innovation. Vincent O’Hara and Leonard Heinz looked at the operational history surrounding the introduction of mines, the automobile torpedo, radio, radar, submarines, and aircraft from about the turn of the 19th century to World War II.4 Their analysis suggests that the process of innovation and weaponization is a moving target that is shaped by the maturity of the technology involved, tactical and operational considerations, strategy, doctrine, organizational acceptance of new weapons and platforms, and the countermeasures possessed by the opponent. Innovation also is slowed by the fact that significant warfare at sea is mercifully rare.
Without the only test that really matters – battle itself – it is difficult for visionaries to assess the capabilities created by their new weapons against likely opponents and countermeasures. What O’Hara and Heinz discovered is that myriad considerations, which are often circumstantial, transitory, or linked to shortcomings in ancillary systems or doctrine, can limit the performance and impact of new weapons. “Successful” innovations do not spring forth spontaneously, but involve a process of refinement and maturation that can take decades to produce an effective weapon, regardless of the enthusiasm surrounding the new technology or system.
O’Hara and Heinze suggest that the assessment of the future role and impact of autonomous and semi-autonomous systems has more to do with psychology than technology. There is a shared collective bias in viewing technology as a “full up round,” so to speak, not a work in progress.5 There is a tendency to extrapolate from successful evolutions observed in the skies above Kabul or the waters off Crimea and to expect the same results in the western Pacific. There also is a tendency to treat technology as a weapon, and to treat new weapons as silver bullets – a one-size-fits-all solution to whatever the opponent might bring to bear.6 Or in the words of Hiliare Belloc, “whatever happens, we have got the Maxim, and they do not.”7
By contrast, to be effective, technology must be subjected to a process of weaponization, where it is integrated into an existing strategy, force structure, doctrine, and logistical scheme. It also is helpful if the officers charged with operating these new weapons understand the science behind them, how they work, and the limits of their performance, instead of first confronting their knowledge deficit at the worst possible time – in battle. Recent descriptions of the night naval battles off Guadalcanal, for example, paint a disturbing picture of officers who did not understand the limits of their radar or how to exploit its advantages. Some of them did not even understand the nature of the information that was being collected and displayed by their new sensors.8 It cannot be assumed that naval forces will always know how to fight with the technology they are equipped with, and that includes capability that has existed in fleets for much longer than drones.
Overcoming the Innovation Paradox: Integrating the Sea Hunter into a Naval Campaign
Treating innovation as a component of campaigning – the conduct and sequencing of logically linked military initiatives aimed at advancing well-defined strategy-aligned priorities over time – offers a promising way of taming the innovation paradox. It increases the likelihood that new weapons can be used to meet operational and strategic objectives. To be more specific, how can the Sea-Hunter unmanned surface vessel be integrated into campaigns in the Western Pacific?
The campaign would begin by acknowledging that the U.S. has adopted a strategy of deterrence based on denial, where in the event of deterrence failure, U.S. forces will focus on preventing the opponent from achieving their objectives. The goal of a deterrence strategy is not to engage in conflict, but to preserve the peace, prevent some unwanted fait accompli, and to ensure that change occurs through democratic and rules-based processes. Indeed, the outbreak of hostilities would represent a failure of strategy, a complete failure of the U.S. military to deter conflict, and a political and humanitarian catastrophe, forcing the nation to engage in an unwanted war. So how can a campaign using Sea Hunter strengthen deterrence, and in the unfortunate event of deterrence failure, how can the campaign be used to deny the opponent their objectives?
The Sea Hunter could be quickly integrated into the fleet by creating many hybrid (crewed and uncrewed) surface action groups. The Sea Hunters might serve several roles – as decoys, as ISR platforms, or as carriers of containerized weapons as a cost-effective way to increase firepower. The precise mission force mix is a technical or operational matter, best left to operators to resolve after they are informed by analysis. Organizing a campaign around such deployments would strengthen deterrence in several ways. First, as they are deployed and undergo the process of integration into the fleet, they will create a dynamic problem for the opponent. Instead of a static force posture that barely changes year to year, operations that feature experimentation with Sea Hunter can complicate an opponent’s planning, reducing their confidence in various schemes to use surprise or novel military evolutions to earn a fait accompli.9 Efforts to bolster deterrence create a “reveal-conceal” issue, that is, how much capability should be revealed to bolster deterrence and how much capability should be concealed to bolster warfighting effectiveness in the wake of deterrence failure. Resolving this issue could even be undertaken with a campaign philosophy – new capabilities might be revealed from time to time to keep the opponent off balance or during a crisis to reduce the opponent’s confidence in their existing military preparations.
Second, the Sea Hunter can bolster the credibility of the maritime deterrent threat by increasing the survivability of the fleet’s second-strike capability, a force that takes on especially outsized importance if U.S. strategy fails in the Pacific.10 Because conventional deterrent threats are “contestable,” that is, the opponent has a say when it comes to their execution, steps must be taken to win the battle of the opening salvo.11 In other words, because the United States embraces a deterrence strategy, it is unlikely it will fire the first shot in a conflict, which would bring about the war Washington wants to avoid in the first place. A deterrence strategy must envision a way to defeat or misdirect an opponent’s effort to fire effectively first.
Here the Sea Hunter’s ability to act as a decoy provides an important, even strategic capability to the fleet. A decoy could exhibit the signatures of larger combatants and posture itself in such a way that it complicates the opponent’s planning and misdirects its opening salvo. Decisions about concealing or revealing capabilities become crucial in this regard. The ability to lead the opponent to activate sensors, fire, reveal their position, and miss will constitute a significant tactical success if deterrence fails. It can also make for a strategic success if aggressive designs are revealed by an opening strike on unmanned systems that the adversary believed were warships filled with thousands of sailors. Instilling in the opponent’s mind the idea that the previous sequence of events is a distinct possibility would also do much to increase the survivability of conventional second-strike forces, thereby increasing the overall credibility and effectiveness of U.S. deterrence strategy.
Conclusion
The way forward is clear. Strategists and tacticians cannot simply take existing autonomous and semi-autonomous systems and operations that were successful in past battles, transfer them to a new geo-strategic setting, and expect to achieve the same results. Instead, the process of weaponization must continue by developing new applications of autonomous and semi-autonomous technologies to solve specific problems at hand. Solving this force development problem and devising war winning strategies is especially difficult when it comes to new technology.12 In other words, the chances of successful innovation increase if new weapons are integrated into a campaign to achieve tactical and operational goals that contribute to overall strategic and political objectives. There is no doubt that the promise of new autonomous technologies is growing. Nevertheless, their successful application requires the active participation of those who will have to employ new systems and weapons at sea. Planners also must abandon the perennial quest to produce war-winning “silver bullets” and instead focus on developing systems that provide modest advantages and cost-effectiveness at the margins, such as autonomous weapons that cost less than their intended targets or possible counters.
With these criteria in mind, several missions could be quickly undertaken by drones in the Western Pacific. For instance, the resilient and expendable ISR platforms under development by Task Force 59 could be adapted to monitor areas of interest across the Western Pacific. Data collected would help improve maritime domain awareness, enriching the information available to improve indications and warning intelligence. Better warning could increase the survivability of U.S. forces while decreasing the prospects that the opponent might be able to launch a successful fait accompli by providing the time necessary for U.S. units to posture toward some point of contention.
None of the applications mentioned are especially creative. They constitute little challenge to the state of the technological art. None hold out the prospect of becoming a silver bullet. Nevertheless, they all can bolster deterrence in the Western Pacific, but only if Navy officers embrace the process of weaponizing unmanned systems seriously by devising novel campaigns to overcome challenges and achieve strategic objectives in the Western Pacific.
James J. Wirtz is a professor of national security affairs at the Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, California. He is the co-author of The US Navy and the Rise of Great Power Competition (Routledge 2024) and War, Peace and International Relations 3rd edition (Routledge 2024).
References
1. Sam LaGrone, 2 Navy Ghost Fleet Unmanned Ships Now in the Western Pacific,” USNI News September 21, 2023 https://news.usni.org/2023/09/21/2-navy-ghost-fleet-unmanned-ships-now-in-the-western-pacific; Sam Dagher, “US Planning More ‘Robots at Sea’ in Middle East to Combat Iran,” PMN Business May 5, 2023. https://financialpost.com/pmn/business-pmn/us-planning-more-robots-at-sea-in-middle-east-to-combat-iran
2. As Colin Gray repeatedly noted, recent battlefield experience provides evidence that is ignored at great peril because battle “is the only test that counts.” Nevertheless, observers have to still asses if recent experience is relevant in a future setting. See Colin S. Gray, War, Peace and International Relations: An Introduction to Strategic History (London: Routledge, 2012), p. 19.
3. Jim Garamone, “U.S. Drone Strike Kills al-Qaida Leader in Kabul,” DOD News August 22, 2022. https://www.defense.gov/News/News-Stories/Article/Article/3114362/us-drone-strike-kills-al-qaida-leader-in-kabul/
4. Vincent P. O’Hara and Leonard R. Heinz, Innovating Victory: Naval Technology in Three Wars (Annapolis: US Naval Institute Press, 2022).
5. Jeffrey E. Kline, James A. Russell, and James J. Wirtz, “The US Navy’s Generational Challenge,” Survival Vol. 64, Issue 4, 2022, pp. 123-136.
6. James J. Wirtz, “A Strategists Guide to Disruptive Innovation,” Military Strategy Magazine Vol. 8, Iss.4 Spring 2023, pp. 4-9/
7. Hilaire Belloc, The Modern Traveller (London: EArnold, 1998). N.p.
8. Vincent P. O’Hara and Trent Hone, Fighting in the Dark: Naval Combat at Night 1904-1944 (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2023).
9. James J. Wirtz, “Theory of Surprise” in Richard K. Betts and Thomas Mahnken, Paradoxes of Strategic Intelligence: Essays in Honor of Michael Handel (London: Routledge, 2003), pp. 101-116.
10. Albert Wohlstetter, “The Delicate Balance of Terror,” Foreign Affairs Vol. 37, No. 2 (January 1959), pp. 211-234.
11. James J. Wirtz, “How Does Nuclear Deterrence differ from Conventional Deterrence,” Strategic Studies Quarterly, Winter 2018, pp. 58-75.
12. James J. Wirtz, “Winning Left of Battle: The Role of Analysis,” Military Strategy Magazine Vol. 7, Issue 4, Winter 2022, pp. 4-8.
Featured Image: (Oct. 31, 2018) Sea Hunter drone pictured in Pearl Harbor. (U.S. Navy photo)
Integrated naval campaigning refers to a series of operations aiming to achieve strategic and operational objectives through military, diplomatic, and non-military activities.1 Such a naval campaign encompasses multiple domains and the integrated approach features joint and interagency partners of the U.S. government.2 As emphasized in the U.S. National Defense Strategy of 2022, there is a requirement for an integrated approach to gain military advantage, enhance deterrence, and address gray zone challenge.
The demand for U.S Navy engagement in the Indo-Pacific region is stronger than at any time in the preceding three decades.3 Such urgency is well-understood upon the assumption that that the naval dominance of the U.S. Navy paves the ability of the U.S. to project joint power globally. As integrated naval campaigning in the Indo-Pacific region gains traction, the U.S. Navy’s role in deterrence by denial encourages it to focus on countering gray zone operations. Therefore to achieve national objectives, the U.S. Navy requires new fleet-wide operational and campaigning concepts to compete with the gray zone activity of competitors.
The geostrategic situation in the Bay of Bengal reflects the need for a concept of integrated naval campaigning in support of a rules-based Indo-Pacific. The significance of this maritime zone is looming larger in the strategic calculus of the Indo-Pacific region and has become a central arena for gray zone competition, especially between Indian and Chinese maritime forces.4 The gray zone competition entrenched in the Bay of Bengal has long preceded the recent calls for integrated campaigning from U.S. forces.
The Bay of Bengal is a key maritime zone of interest and influence for the U.S. Navy to promote regional security and rules-based order through campaigning. The Bay is a key geographic crossroads between the Indian Ocean and the Pacific Ocean through which extensive maritime traffic transits, making the competition over rules-based order especially salient. The gray zone activities in the Bay of Bengal demand specific attention from the U.S. Navy, and will demand operational innovation and partnership-building specifically tailored to the complexities of the local gray zone competition. These efforts will serve the U.S Navy well in informing its broader campaigning throughout the Indo-Pacific region.
China’s Gray Zone Campaign in the Bay of Bengal: Appraising the Situation
The term ‘gray zone’ first started to appear in the policy documents of Japan and the United States.5 Gray zone situations can refer to almost anything below the threshold of high-intensity military conflict, or a large variety of non-military means of competition. It is fundamental to any gray zone situation that the adversary country deliberately extends its gray zone efforts to achieve enough coercive power to undermine the target state’s sovereign control. In the case of targeting littoral states, this can include impeding rightful economic exploitation, hampering the use of maritime zones for safe passage, and other unfair manipulations of norms in the maritime domain.6 In other words, the adversary country utilizes gray zone activities to assert their maritime interests at the expense of other states and the broader norms of the maritime system.7 In comparison to high-end military operations, any gray zone situation naturally belongs to the low-end spectrum of warfare.8 Gray zone campaigns can also seek to inflict long-term political and military costs, facilitate a favorable reinterpretation of the situation with respect to public opinion, and a gradual change of circumstances and behavior in favor of the adversary country’s policy preferences.9
The significance of the Bay of Bengal is looming larger in the maritime calculus of the Indo-Pacific region.10 The geostrategic importance of the Bay of Bengal11 as a critical maritime crossroads between the Indian Ocean and the Pacific Ocean has serious implications12 for China’s multi-pronged ambitions towards shaping global governance.13 Mainly from the 1980s, China has been deepening relationships with the Bay’s littoral states and pulling those countries into economic and military partnerships.14
China’s ceaseless endeavor to penetrate into the Bay of Bengal through Bangladesh, Myanmar, and Sri Lanka has been a maritime security challenge to rules-based order in the Indo-Pacific region. Over recent decades, these littoral states have depended on China for economic, military, and infrastructure development. China has constructed ports, roads, pipelines, and railway tracts in these littoral states. Developing maritime infrastructure and facilitating economic dependencies in littoral states function as critical enablers for China’s gray zone campaign in the Bay of Bengal.
China’s economic relations with these littoral states have raised two concerns, namely the potential use of infrastructure for enhancing China’s military access in the region, and China earning significant political leverage over the decision-making of those countries, to the detriment of democracy and the rule of law. In recent years, such hegemonic influence has acquired a more virulent form. For example, when ASEAN announced its outlook policy on the Indo-Pacific, some littoral states in the Bay of Bengal opted for a cautionary reaction, likely reflecting how China would prefer they receive the policy declaration. The littoral states of this region are also reluctant to clarify their observations towards integrated deterrence in the Bay of Bengal.15 For example, in Bangladesh’s outlook on the Indo-Pacific strategy, there lacks any integrated deterrence measures and maritime security objectives in the Bay of Bengal.16
For many littoral states of the Bay of Bengal, China is the major supplier of military hardware.17 A key example is Bangladesh’s recent operationalization of the country’s only submarine base, BNS Sheikh Hasina, constructed with Chinese financial and technical assistance. Bangladesh also acquired China’s modern VT5 light tank. Thailand has signed deals with China to acquire surface warships and submarines for its navies.18 Myanmar’s airstrip extensions and construction of aviation hangers on the Great Coco Island suggests Chinese involvement and potential uses for maritime surveillance.19 Furthermore, China’s involvement in developing infrastructure in these countries points to a strategy of facilitating a long-term presence in the Bay of Bengal, as well as laying steppingstones for blue water activities in the broader Indian Ocean.20
Chinese Survey Vessels in the Gray Zone Campaign: Pruning Hooks into Spears
There are three broad categories of Chinese gray zone operations in the Bay of Bengal. These include its development of maritime infrastructure, oceanographic survey vessel activity, and undersea operations. In particular, the frequent activity of Chinese oceanographic survey vessels over the past few years are a key indicator that China is seeking a better understanding of the undersea environment in the Bay of Bengal. These activities pave the way for submarine operations, which encourage a comprehensive understanding of water currents, seabed topography, and seasonal variation of the maritime environment.21,22 This data on undersea conditions is also useful for understanding how submarine stealth will fare in the area.23 With respect to gray zone campaigns, submarine and subsurface assets provide multiple advantages, including creeping coercion and operational uncertainty for targeted states.24
Several Chinese oceanographic vessels have been at the forefront of this effort. The Shi Yan 1 was used in the Indian exclusive economic zone adjacent to the Andaman Nicobar Islands.25 The Xiang Yang Hong 06 conducted joint scientific surveys in the territorial sea of Myanmar in February 2020.26 This same oceanographic survey vessel, prior to the Myanmar visit, conducted research on the seabed of Sri Lanka’s territorial sea.27 In select offshore zones of Bangladesh, Chinese survey ships conducted 2D seismic survey projects.28
In pursuing gray zone activities in the Bay of Bengal, these Chinese survey vessels repeat common operational patterns. First, these maritime research vessels, some of which have ballistic missile and satellite tracking capability, seek clearance for replenishment purposes, to be conducted at littoral state infrastructure.29 These survey vessels also often switch off their automatic identification system (AIS) transponders, which makes it difficult to track their locations and activities.30 After coming under international pressure Sri Lanka sought to delay a port visit by China’s Yuan Wang 5 ballistic missile and satellite tracking ship, but China applied pressure and was able to get the decision reversed. Sri Lanka allowed the ship to dock with certain stipulations, including having the ship keep its AIS transponder on.31, 32, 33
Workers wave the Chinese and Sri Lankan national flags upon the arrival of China’s research and survey vessel, the Yuanwang-5 at Hambantota port, Sri Lanka on August 16, 2022. (Photo via VCG)
It is worth drawing particular attention to the Indian Navy’s efforts at maritime domain awareness in the Bay of Bengal, since it is complementary to the U.S. Navy’s goals and the integrated campaign approach required for U.S. Indo-Pacific strategy. The Indian Navy’s Information Fusion Center for the Indian Ocean Region exchanges information and facilitates communication with select partners.34 The littoral states of Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Myanmar are among the partners in this security collaboration structure.35 The Indian Navy’s deployment of coastal surveillance radar systems in Bangladesh,36 Sri Lanka, and Myanmar highlights not only its proactive efforts37 in addressing gray zone situations,38 but also its concern about the growing competitiveness of Chinese gray zone operations. A salient feature of the surveillance system is that the system can quickly detect, locate, and monitor movements of dhows and vessels in any given surveilled area.39
Because of these surveillance assets in particular, the Indian Navy would be a useful partner for the U.S. Navy in a Bay of Bengal integrated naval campaign to counter China’s gray zone activity.40 To compete with China’s gray zone operations, it is vital for the U.S. Navy to form regional partnership with the navies and coast guards of littoral states and improve their capabilities.41 But the U.S. Navy mostly focuses its operations in the vicinity of East Asian littoral states, leaving much to be desired in the waters west of Malacca.42
China’s Undersea Strategy in the Bay of Bengal
The frequent operations of Chinese submarines and oceanographic survey vessels in the Bay of Bengal, the increased detection and protests by the Indian Navy, and Sri Lanka’s replenishment of Chinese vessels highlight a complex gray zone situation in the Bay of Bengal. The situation may be even more complex than previously thought due to the hidden nature of Chinese submarine operations in the area.
Prior to 2010, there was little evidence of Chinese submarine operations in the Bay of Bengal. However, the situation appeared to change in 2014 when a Type 039 Song-class diesel-electric attack submarine berthed at the Sri Lankan port of Colombo twice: from September 7-14 and from October 31- November 6.43 The Song class is much quieter than its predecessors due to its seven-bladed propeller, and the combat and command systems of the submarine are upgraded versions of the systems aboard the Type 035 Ming-class submarine.44
Considering the similarity between Type 039 and Type 035 classes, it is noteworthy that China sold two Type 035 G Ming-class submarines to Bangladesh45 in 2016, and a B-variant Ming-class submarine to Myanmar46 in 2021. China’s submarine deals with Bangladesh and Myanmar have paved the way for Chinese submarine crews to be posted to these nations for training purposes.47 These deals allow the Chinese Navy to gradually increase the presence of its personnel and Chinese-sourced hardware in the Bay of Bengal’s littoral states, which increase the competitiveness of its gray zone strategy.
These developments should be a source of concern for the U.S. Navy’s integrated naval campaign against gray zone operations. China’s undersea operations challenge the maritime domain awareness architecture covering the Bay of Bengal, and the littoral states have relatively little in the way of anti-submarine warfare capabilities. Chinese submarine presence is therefore acutely felt in this region, even if it cannot be precisely perceived. The U.S. Navy could provide vital expertise in enhancing awareness of the undersea domain and conducting anti-submarine warfare operations.
How the U.S. Navy can Lead an Integrated Campaign against Gray Zone Challenges
The present-day top leadership of the U.S. Navy views this decade as a decisive one and requires that the Navy improve itself as a self-assessing, self-correcting, and always learning organization to deliver warfighting advantage.48 The leadership of the U.S. Navy understands the importance of changing skillsets and culture in relation to the competition.49 The U.S Navy, in many of its warfighting skillsets and operations, focuses on competing in the low-end spectrum of operations.50 This reflects an appropriate calculation of risk when it comes to allocating focus toward more likely challenges to be encountered in the operating environment, when the competition is staying below the threshold of war.51,52
The U.S. Navy needs to focus on effective gray zone counters that emphasize prompt and precise responses. However, the challenges to gray zone competitiveness are multifaceted and include the cost of providing physical naval presence, as well as managing the competition over regional narratives that frequently accompany gray zone campaigns. Therefore the U.S Navy cannot confront gray zone operations alone. It must integrate with the partner navies of the littoral states of the Indo-Pacific region.53 These partner navies must also take the initiative themselves to understand the U.S. Navy’s perspectives and capacities to influence the gray zone competition in the Bay of Bengal, and develop options for working together through an integrated campaign.
In the post-Cold War decades, the U.S. Navy partnered with the littoral states of the Bay of Bengal for the purposes of promoting shared interests and engaging in naval capacity building, including through bilateral and multilateral exercises. Through the Joint Combined Exercise Training (JCET), the Cooperation Afloat Readiness and Training (CARAT) and the Malabar Exercise, the U.S. Navy has helped regional navies support maritime security and maritime domain awareness in the Bay of Bengal. Given this history of cooperation, the U.S. Navy is poised to take the lead on formulating an integrated naval campaign for the Bay of Bengal. The substance of these exercises and their focus areas can be adjusted to better fit the gray zone challenges these partner nations are facing from China.
Bay of Bengal (April 14, 2012) The Indian navy guided-missile corvette INS Kulish (P63), top, and the Indian navy frigate INS Satpura (F48), bottom, and the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson (CVN 70) are underway in formation during Exercise Malabar 2012. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class James R. Evans/Released)
The Joint Combined Exercise Training (JCET) event is a four-week long exercise where U.S. Naval Special Warfare and the U.S. Special Forces units train regional littoral navies to enhance their combat readiness and maritime crisis response tactics.54 The CARAT event is a military-to-military bilateral exercise designed to highlight the ability of both the U.S. Navy and the regional littoral navy (e.g., Bangladesh) to reiterate shared concepts on maritime security, stability, and prosperity. The collaborative initiative of CARAT is conducted at two phases: ashore and at sea.55 The sea phase of the CARAT includes at least three exercises suitable to gray zone situations.56 First, the cooperative ability to track and pursue targets together through the coordinated deployment of surface ships and maritime patrol aircraft (i.e., navigation and tactical maneuvers). Second, bridge simulations designed to practice navigation maneuvering within proximity to other vessels.57 Third, screening proficiency exercises to defend ships from potential threats.
The Malabar exercise is an Indo-Pacific military interoperability exercise which encompasses two phases.58 The first phase includes air defense, anti-submarine warfare, and replenishment-at-sea between ships, whereas the second phase of Malabar involves mobile anti-submarine training target exercise, cross-deck helicopter operations, and surface gunnery exercises.59 Each of these skillsets are relevant to gray zone operations, particularly kinetic exchanges at the low-end spectrum of warfare, and monitoring undersea activity. In 2021, the U.S. Navy hosted the second phase of Malabar in the Bay of Bengal. It is also relevant to mention that the Malabar exercise was first conducted in 1992 as a bilateral exercise between the U.S. Navy and the Indian Navy, with more than 27 iterations since then.60 As the exercise series continues, it can consistently update its content to ensure it enhances capabilities that are most relevant to the nature of the regional competition.
Conclusion
The presence of the U.S. Navy is waning in comparison to a Chinese navy, coast guard, and maritime militia that is rapidly growing and becoming more aggressive.61 Therefore an effective integrated naval campaign is not something that can be implemented solely by the U.S. Navy or a partner fleet. Rather, integrated campaigning demands the active participation of all Indo-Pacific stakeholders that are interested in enhancing rules-based order in the maritime domain.
The strategic visions of the U.S Navy envision greater cooperation with international partner navies.62 The U.S. Navy should identify how to increase collaboration to bolster deterrence and effectively compete below the threshold of war. It is imperative to formulate a shared framework for early diagnosis and prompt reaction to any prospective gray zone activities.63 Operational cooperation between the U.S Navy and the regional navies of the Bay of Bengal can be a regular matter of discussion to sort out shared maritime security challenges, and develop an integrated campaign that can competitively advance rules-based order.64
Mohammad Rubaiyat Rahman is a Teaching Assistant at the University of Texas at El Paso. He is a subject matter expert in maritime security, irregular migration, counterinsurgency (COIN), and border disputes with a concentration in the Indo-Pacific region. He contributed as a reviewer at the Journal of Indo-Pacific Affairs, a professional journal of the U.S. Department of Air Force, andCoastal Management (Taylor & Francis, 2022). He has published in the Journal of the Indian Ocean Region, Journal of Territorial & Maritime Studies, and the Diplomat. He has presented papers at the Asian Society of International Law, National University of Singapore, Jawaharlal Nehru University, and Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology.
References
[1] Jeffrey E. Kline. ‘Revamping Fleet Design and Maritime Strategy: An Integrated Naval Campaign for Advantage.’ CIMSEC. September 18, 2023. URL: https://cimsec.org/revamping-fleet-design-and-maritime-strategy-an-integrated-naval-campaign-for-advantage/ (accessed on October 25, 2023).
[2] Ibid.
[3] Simon Reich and Peter Dombrowski. ‘The End of Grand Strategy: US Maritime Operations in the 21st Century’ (NY: Cornell University Press, 2017).
[4] C. Raja Mohan. Samudra Manthan: Sino-Indian Rivalry in the Indo-Pacific. (Washington: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2012).
[5] Yatsuzuka Masaaki and Yamaguchi Shinji. ‘China’s Maritime Gray Zone Situations’. Chapter 3. Eds. Yamaguchi Shinji, Yatsuzuka Masaki and Momma Rira, NIDS China Security Report 2023: China’s Quest for Control of the Cognitive Domain and Gray Zone Situations. (Tokyo: National Institute of Defense Studies, 2022)
[6] James Goldrick. ‘Grey zone operations and the maritime domain’. The Strategist. October 30, 2018. URL: https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/grey-zone-operations-and-the-maritime-domain/ (accessed on October 26, 2023).
[7] Masaaki and Shinji, ‘China’s Maritime Gray Zone Situations’, p. 54.
[8] Ibid, p. 55.
[9] Ibid.
[10] C. Raja Mohan. Samudra Manthan: Sino-Indian Rivalry in the Indo-Pacific. (Washington: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2012).
[11] Mohammad Rubaiyat Rahman. ‘Appraising Integrated Deterrence Challenges in Bangladesh’s Indo-Pacific Outlook’. The Geopolitics. May 17, 2023. URL: Appraising Integrated Deterrence Challenges in Bangladesh’s Indo-Pacific Outlook – The Geopolitics (accessed on October 28, 2023).
[12] Hal Brands and Michael Beckley. ‘What does China want? Beijing’s ambitions are about to crash into its problems’. Foreign Policy. August 13, 2022. URL: China’s Global Goals Are Stoppable (foreignpolicy.com) (accessed on October 28, 2023)
[13] ‘China’s Approach to Global Governance’. Council on Foreign Relations. URL: China’s Approach to Global Governance | Council on Foreign Relations (cfr.org) (accessed on October 23, 2023).
[14] C. Raja Mohan. Samudra Manthan: Sino-Indian Rivalry in the Indo-Pacific. (Washington: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2012).
[15] E. John Teichert. ‘The US and China: Deterrence in the Danger Zone’. The Diplomat. January 14, 2023. URL: The US and China: Deterrence in the Danger Zone – The Diplomat (accessed on October 28, 2023)
[16] Rahman, ‘Appraising Integrated Deterrence Challenge in Bangladesh’s Indo-Pacific Outlook.’
[17] Mohammad Rubaiyat Rahman. ‘Kilo impact in the Bay of Bengal’. The Diplomat. September 17, 2019. URL: https://thediplomat.com/2019/09/kilo-impact-in-the-bay-of-bengal/ (accessed on September 28, 2023).
[18] Manish Jung Pulami. ‘China’s increasing forays into the Bay of Bengal’. November 30, 2020. URL: China’s Increasing Forays into the Bay of Bengal – South Asian Voices (accessed on October 23, 2023)
[19] Sribala Subramanian. ‘An Airstrip on Myanmar’s Great Coco Island’. The Diplomat. May 04, 2023. URL: An Airstrip on Myanmar’s Great Coco Island – The Diplomat (accessed on October 25, 2023).
[20] Saji Abraham. China’s Role in Indian Ocean: Its Implication on India’s National Security. (New Delhi: Vij Books India, 2015).
[21] Geoffrey Till. Seapower: A Guide for the Twenty-First Century. (New York: Routledge 2009), pp. 94-95.
[22] Xinhao Zhao, Yuchao Yuan and Wonyong Tang. ‘A practical optimization method of submarine base considering vibration reduction, light-weight, and shock resistance’. Ships and Offshore Structures. Vol. 17, Issue: 11, pp. 2416-2427.
[23] Ibid.
[24] Iskander Rehman. ‘The Subsurface dimension of Sino-Indian Maritime Rivalry’. In India and China at Sea: Competition for Naval Dominance in the Indian Ocean. Ed. David Brewster (New Delhi: Oxford University Press 2018) pp. 137-162, at 137.
[25] Ankit Panda. ‘Report: Indian Navy ejected Chinese research ship from Indian Exclusive Economic Zone’. The Diplomat. December 09, 209. URL: https://thediplomat.com/2019/12/report-indian-navy-ejected-chinese-research-ship-from-indian-exclusive-economic-zone/ (Accessed on November 6, 2023).
[26] Zhu Feng and Cheng Hanping. ‘Myanmar’s support amid epidemic solidifies its deep Chinese ties’ Global Times, February 16, 2020. URL: https://www.globaltimes.cn/content/1179733.shtml (Accessed on November 3, 2023).
[27] News.LK. ‘Chinese research vessel ‘Xiang Yang Hong 06’ arrives at the port of Colombo’. January 18, 2020. URL: https://www.news.lk/news/political-current-affairs/item/29205-chinese-research-vessel-xiang-yang-hong-06-arrives-at-the-port-of-colombo (Accessed on November 6, 2023).
[28] The Dhaka Tribune. ‘India Unhappy over survey by Chinese ship in the Bay of Bengal’. February 09, 2023. URL: https://www.dhakatribune.com/world/asia/304584/india-unhappy-over-survey-by-chinese-ship-in-bay (Accessed on November 2, 2023).
[29] Rajeswari Pillai Rajagopalan, ‘India-China Tango Continues in Sri Lanka.’ The ORF Development, October 10, 2023. URL: https://www.orfonline.org/research/india-china-tango-continues-in-sri-lanka/ (accessed on October 26, 2023).
[30] Hoang Do. ‘How to help ASEAN address South China Sea ‘Gray-Zone’ challenges’. United States Institute of Peace. September 25, 2023. URL: https://www.usip.org/publications/2023/09/how-help-asean-address-south-china-sea-gray-zone-challenges (accessed on October 27, 2023).
[31] Hoang Do. ‘How to help ASEAN address South China Sea ‘Gray-Zone’ challenges’. United States Institute of Peace. September 25, 2023. URL: https://www.usip.org/publications/2023/09/how-help-asean-address-south-china-sea-gray-zone-challenges (accessed on October 27, 2023).
[32] Nick Danby. ‘China’s ‘spy ship’ vist to Sri Lanka symbolises looming Sino-Indian maritime competition’. The Strategist. September 28, 2022. URL: https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/chinas-spy-ship-visit-to-sri-lanka-symbolises-looming-sino-indian-maritime-competition/ (accessed on October 26, 2023).
[33] Masaaki Yatsuzuka. ‘How China’s maritime militia takes advantage of the grey zone’. The Strategist. January 16, 2023. URL: https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/how-chinas-maritime-militia-takes-advantage-of-the-grey-zone/ (accessed on October 25, 2023).
[34] Christian Wagner. ‘Searching common security in the Bay of Bengal’. Australian Journal of Maritime and Ocean Affairs. October 17, 2023. URL: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/18366503.2023.2270313 (Accessed on November 2, 2023).
[35] Indian Navy. Information Fusion Centre- Indian Ocean Region Annual Report 2022. URL: https://www.indiannavy.nic.in/ifc-ior/static/data/reports/annual/3.%20IFC-IOR%20Annual%20Report%202022.pdf (Accessed on November 3, 2023).
[36] Anirban Bhaumik, ‘India’s radars in Bangladesh to monitor Bay of Bengal’ The Deccan Herald. October 5, 2019. URL: https://www.deccanherald.com/india/indias-radars-in-bangladesh-to-monitor-bay-of-bengal-766567.html (Accessed on November 1, 2023).
[37] Indian Navy. Initiatives to Strengthen Coastal Security. Press Release. URL: https://www.indiannavy.nic.in/content/initiatives-strengthen-coastal-security (Accessed on November 6, 2023)
[38] Ankit Panda. ‘India Unveils new Coastal Surveillance Radar Network’. The Diplomat. March 26. 2015. URL: https://thediplomat.com/2015/03/india-unveils-new-coastal-surveillance-radar-network/ (Accessed on October 30, 2023).
[39] Defence Research and Development Organization. Integrated Coastal Surveillance System (ICSS), URL: https://www.drdo.gov.in/integrated-coastal-surveillance-system-icss (Accessed on November 3, 2023).
[40] Lawrence Freedman. Command: The Politics of Military Operations from Korea to Ukraine. (New York: Oxford University Press 2022).
[41] Cameron Smith. 2022. ‘Countering China’s Grey-Zone Diplomacy’. Australian Institute of International Affairs. 08 February 2022. Available at URL: https://www.internationalaffairs.org.au/australianoutlook/countering-chinas-grey-zone-diplomacy/ (accessed on 25 October 2023).
[42] Abhijit Singh. ‘The U.S. Navy in the Indian Ocean: India’s ‘Gridlocks’ Dilemma’. War on the Rocks. May 11, 2021. URL: The U.S. Navy in the Indian Ocean: India’s ‘Goldilocks’ Dilemma – War on the Rocks (accessed on 27 October, 2023).
[43] Sam LaGrone. ‘Chinese Submarine Headed to Gulf of Aden for Counter Piracy Operations’. USNI News. September 30, 2014. URL: https://news.usni.org/2014/09/30/chinese-submarine-headed-gulf-aden-counter-piracy-operations (Accessed on November 3, 2023).
[44] Military Today. Song Class: Patrol Submarine. URL: https://www.militarytoday.com/navy/song_class.htm (Accessed on November 1, 2023).
[45] Rahman, ‘Kilo Impact in the Bay of Bengal’.
[46] Xavier Vavasseur. ‘Myanmar Commissions Type 035 B Ming-Class Submarine from China’. Naval News. December 27, 2021. URL: https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2021/12/myanmar-commissions-type-35b-ming-class-submarine-from-china/ (Accessed on November 2, 2023).
[47] Captain Ariful Haque. ‘Next-Generation ISR Dominance: Accelerate Change or Lose Bangladesh’ Wild Blue Yonder. October 27, 2022. URL: https://www.airuniversity.af.edu/Wild-Blue-Yonder/Article-Display/Article/3198619/next-generation-isr-dominance-accelerate-change-or-lose-bangladesh/#_edn16 (Accessed on November 6, 2023).
[48] Admiral Lisa Franchetti, ‘Message to the fleet’, August 23, 2023, url: https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23917551/nav23188.pdf (accessed on October 25, 2023).
[49] Ibid.
[50] Dmitry Filipoff, ‘A fleet adrift: The mounting risking of the U.S. Navy’s Force Development’. CIMSEC, February 13, 2023. URL: https://cimsec.org/a-fleet-adrift-the-mounting-risks-of-the-u-s-navys-force-development/ (accessed on October 22, 2023).
[51] Dmitry Filipoff, ‘Organizing for training and experimentation’ in Learning to Win: Using operational innovation to regain the advantage at sea against China (Washington: Hudson Institute, 2022), p. 21.
[52] Ibid, p. 32.
[53] Lt Commanders Andrew Kramer and Martin Schroeder, U.S. Navy. 2020. “The Navy Needs a Gray-Zone Strategy”. The U.S. Naval Institute, Vol. 146/6/1, 408; available at url: https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/2020/june/navy-needs-gray-zone-strategy (accessed on 25 October 2023).
[54] U.S. Embassy in Bangladesh. ‘U.S. Navy Concludes training with Bangladesh Navy’. News & Events. November 10, 2022. URL: https://bd.usembassy.gov/28790/ (Accessed on: November 5, 2023).
[55] U.S. Embassy in Bangladesh. ‘U.S.-Bangladesh Navy Commence CARAT Exercise’. News & Event. November 5, 2018. URL: https://bd.usembassy.gov/u-s-bangladesh-navy-commence-24th-carat-exercise/ (Accessed on November 6, 2023).
[56] Ibid.
[57] U.S. 7th Fleet Public Affairs. ‘U.S., Philippine Navies Conduct Bilateral Sail to Enhance Interoperability’. Press Office: America’s Navy. Sept. 4, 2023. URL: https://www.navy.mil/Press-Office/News-Stories/Article/3514805/us-philippine-navies-conduct-bilateral-sail-to-enhance-interoperability/ (Accessed on November 4, 2023).
[58] Ministry of Defense: Australian Government. ‘Australia to host exercise Malabar for the first time’. Media Release. August 11, 2023. URL: https://www.minister.defence.gov.au/media-releases/2023-08-11/australia-host-exercise-malabar-first-time (Accessed on November 1, 2023).
[59] Carrier Strike Group 1 Public Affairs. ‘Australia, India, Japan, and U.S. Kick-off Phase II: MALABAR 2021’. Press Office: America’s Navy. October 13, 2021. URL: https://www.navy.mil/Press-Office/News-Stories/Article/2808152/australia-india-japan-and-us-kick-off-phase-ii-malabar-2021/ (Accessed on November 6, 2023).
[60] Jennifer Parker. ‘Not just another naval exercise: Malabar’s vital messaging’ The Strategist. August 10, 2023. URL: https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/not-just-another-naval-exercise-malabars-vital-messaging/ (Accessed on November 2, 2023).
[61] Blake Herzinger. ‘The Navy should take more academics to sea’. American Enterprise Institute. January 6, 2023. URL: https://www.aei.org/op-eds/the-navy-should-take-more-academics-to-sea/ (accessed on October 25, 2023).
[62] Kevin Delamer, ‘Analysis: The U.S. Navy’s High-Low Mix’. USNI News, June 10, 2013. URL: https://news.usni.org/2013/06/10/analysis-the-u-s-navys-high-low-mix (accessed October 21, 2023).
[63] Anastasia Kapetas. ‘Challenges for the US and Australia in the grey zone’. The Strategist. May 6, 2021. URL: https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/challenges-for-australia-and-us-in-the-grey-zone/ (accessed on October 27, 2023)
[64] Karambir Singh and Blake Herzinger. ‘Partnership, not threats: How to Deepen U.S.-Indian Naval Cooperation’. War on the Rocks. January 12, 2023. URL: https://warontherocks.com/2023/01/partnership-not-threats-how-to-deepen-u-s-indian-naval-cooperation/ (accessed on October 22, 2023).
Featured Image: A submarine attached to a submarine flotilla with the navy under the PLA Northern Theater Command steams in the sea during a maritime drill on torpedo attack and defense, submarine control, etc. on October 25, 2022. (eng.chinamil.com.cn/Photo by Shi Jialong)
Since the release of the latest National Defense Strategy in October 2022, the Department of Defense has been struggling to define, resource, and measure the effectiveness of campaigning. This struggle to adequately resource campaigning can be oversimplified into a questions – how much can the Navy campaign afford to campaign within its force generation constructs? This question is difficult to answer in practice, which has often led to the department focusing its resourcing decision on the basis of warfighting plans vice day-to-day campaigning below the threshold of war.
This running analytic tradeoff between resourcing to campaign to deter conflict or resourcing to win the conflict has been focused on the latter, despite fleet operations being focused on the former. It is much easier to measure the effect of resourcing additional weapons and platforms towards a conflict model, such as asking what is the effect of 100 additional Long Range Anti-Ship Missiles (LRASMs) on a wartime contingency. The other side of the resourcing coin is trying to measure the effect of 100 additional ship-days of steady-state campaigning. Looking at both sides of these resourcing strategies, the Navy needs to answer the hard questions of both campaigning capacity and effectiveness, allowing the department to evaluate campaigning with a budget lens. This could provide a different strategy for future defense budgets and resourcing.
Campaigning Capacity
The campaigning capacity question might be the easiest for the Navy-Marine Corps Team since the Navy has the most predictable force generation model. Force generation models help force planners predict the number of ready forces that can be provided to the Joint Force, both for steady-state campaigning and for warfighting surge capacity. These models attempt to plan for a sustainable amount of maintenance, modernization, training, and surge capacity to maintain routine deployments for the force.
In theory, the Navy’s model, the Optimized Fleet Response Plan (OFRP), provides an understandable construct of how the Navy can provide around 110 ships to campaigning from the total inventory of about 290 ships. In practice however, OFRP is not simple, and requires a significant amount of effort from the entire enterprise for timely execution. But from a budget and force generation perspective it provides a planning tool to generate forces for campaigning, port capacity, and a measure of the ready reserve forces in case of conflict. The Navy’s description of how a ship goes from deployment to deployment with specific training and maintenance entitlements based on the age of the ship creates a predictable model for campaign and budget planners. While it is almost impossible to predict what the world will look like in the future, the OFRP provides a reasonable baseline of options to generate and budget forces for campaigning and conflict.
The great unknown within the OFRP is the “Sustainment” Phase. As the Navy describes this phase:
“This OFRP period is attained after a deployment certification is achieved and readiness for employment sustained. Regularly scheduled rotational deployments happen during this time. Additionally, forces in a dedicated sustainment phase will sustain their deployment readiness levels to maintain combat proficiency and be prepared to deploy at any time.”1
The Navy routinely has about one-third of the fleet in this phase, but it not fully utilized in campaigning for a variety of reasons, from budget constraints to personnel tempo. This additional capacity within the OFRP could be used to augment campaigning efforts if the department chooses to resource more targeted operations from these ready forces in a surge capacity. OFRP does create this capacity, but after digging deeper, this capacity might be difficult to employ. A full utilization of forces in the sustainment phase will add stress to the fleet and the enterprises supporting the operating forces.
There are a few complications with the sustainment phase that should give pause to the planner. First, the length of the sustainment phase, which needs to incorporate a routine deployment (per OFRP guidance) and the additional surge capacity depend significantly on the planned and executed maintenance phase. Future maintenance planning is critical, but longer maintenance execution often results in compressed training or complete re-phasing of forces, which adds pressure to the system.
Looking at a pure maintenance planning scenario, an Arleigh Burke-class destroyer has a nominal 36 month or 1,080-day cycle under OFRP. Within this cycle, the full training entitlement (individual and group) is around 330 days, which leaves around 700 days to complete maintenance and modernization, with the remaining time left for campaigning. For just destroyers, the maintenance cycle can vary from a less intrusive availability of 150 days, all the way to a major modernization of more than 400 days, based on the age of the ship, the modernization plan, port loading, and a variety of other factors considered by the type commands. And this assumes the actual material needs of the ship conforms to what can be achieved within the planned availability. This planning construct quickly eats into the campaigning potential of the fleet as each ship has its own maintenance and modernization requirements, not including the forward deployed ships operating under a different planning construct.
The Navy has made strides in the optimization of these maintenance periods to support strike group deployments and sustainment over the last 20 years with innovations like the Surface Master Plan, Plan-to-Plan (P2P), Integrated Aviation and Surface planning conferences, and others, all of which have sought to improve the predictability and timeliness of force generation. Still, none of these efforts have added significantly more days to the sustainment phase, instead focusing on the better execution of the maintenance phase and providing ready-to-train assets with the latest modernization efforts.
For example, one force element with significant pressure in this cycle is the amphibious ready group, as its available campaigning time is circumscribed by the force generation models of the ships as well as the embarked Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU). The experience of the ARGs are a good example of how “sustainment phase” capacity is often quickly cut as the ships must return to their maintenance phase not only due to material condition, but also to meet their next integrated training events with MEU force generation requirements. These competing factors are driven by the routine deployment needs of acting as a joint, combined-arms force package, not just the ships’ maintenance and modernization needs. This frequently reduces the available sustainment time of the ships and complicates planning.
These factors and pressures are managed within the OFRP with great difficulty and very little room for error. Yes ready ships can be generated in sustainment in predictable fashion, but preparing these assets often require significant engagement across the phases from various lower echelon staffs. If the OFRP pressures compress things further, it is often the excess time in sustainment that is reduced. Sustainment time is not adequately exploited, so the forces become slaves to the “next deployment,” instead of ready for the most opportune times for presence and deterrence. The sustainment phase is therefore more of a cushion to absorb disruptions to the sensitive OFRP force generation cycle, rather than a meaningfully resourced phase that can surge ready forces as intended. Campaign planners must factor in the reality of how the Navy actually manages the sustainment phase, rather than assume the phase will rise to meet its theoretical promise in a time of crisis.
One other issue compounding the ability to use forces in sustainment is balancing operations tempo with overall readiness. It is not a secret that there is more demand for naval forces than can be generated, but it is often self-imposed requirements that limit full utilization in practice. A good example of a readiness metric is the deploy-to-dwell standard which recommends the services maintain a 1:3 ratio of deployed time to home station time, with the redline set at 1:2. This means for every one month of deployment, a unit or sailor should have a minimum of 2 months in their home station. This requirement further complicates the sustainment phase as now the nominal DDG has gone from a 1,080-day cycle with 275 days of maintenance, 330 days of training, and 475 days of time for both deployment and sustainment.2 Within those 475 days, the Navy sends the ship on a nominal 210-day (7-month) deployment, leaving only 265 days remaining in sustainment, which are likely only used for personnel tempo reset.
This schedule leaves planners with two options – end sustainment early to reset the cycle with the maintenance phase, or extend sustainment through the personnel tempo reset and a second deployment. Most Navy sailors have experienced two deployments on a single training cycle (which is much more common with carrier fleet). This is often seen as excess hardship and likely atrophies key skills and morale in the process. This extension of sustainment to complete two routine deployments is easy to plan and calculate with readiness metrics, but it only considers presence forward without effectiveness. With better effective campaign evaluation, smaller extensions of sustainment to reset personnel tempo and execute targeted campaigning presents a different option to make better use of routine deployments and targeted sustainment execution windows.
A final issue is the funding of the fleet in practice. The OFRP sets the budget guidance for the operational planners on the OPNAV staff. For the FY2024 budget request, about one-third of the Navy’s total budget was in Operations and Maintenance (O&M) spending at $74 billion. Breaking this down further, about $22 billion of this figure is spent on the surface operations and over half the ship operations budget (at about $14 billion) is reserved for depot maintenance, including operating the four public shipyards and private yard maintenance for the non-nuclear forces. The Navy programs 24 days underway for non-deployed units and 58 days for deploying units, with the vast amount of cost difference in fuel and food, which is very little in the grand scheme of O&M budgets. This ability to add underway days to the ships in sustainment is where the opportunity lies for increased campaigning at a relative low cost in the broader budgetary context, given how fuel and sustainment is far cheaper than the manpower or procurement cost of the ship. The money is therefore the least complicating issue compared to the pressures of maintenance planning and operations tempo.
The next step is measuring campaigning impacts. If in fact constant presence of naval forces does not meet campaign objectives, then the Navy needs to think differently on how to execute the sustainment phase of OFRP. In a statement to Congress, Admiral Aquilino, commander U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, defined the intent of campainging:
“Persistent and synchronized coalition and joint operations linked over time and space in the western Pacific [that] contributes to our ability to deter conflict. A coordinated campaign of all domain operations, activities, and investments (OAIs) reassures our allies and partners, builds partner capacity, increases interoperability, and normalizes our operations throughout the AOR. Additionally, these consistent and persistent OAI’s better familiarize our forces with the challenges associated with the current operating environment.”
Unfortunately, measuring deterrence has proven difficult. One measure, “the enemy hasn’t attacked…” is easy to measure, but does not accurately reflect the complexity of deterrence initiatives balanced against the competitor’s own strategy of campaigning. This is especially the case when it comes to campaigning below the threshold of war. But a whole of government approach to measure the effect of campaigning below the threshold of war and across the spectrum of operations is difficult to manage and synthesize into a usable or actionable tool. There have been and are efforts underway to attempt this type of analysis, but most are in the early stages and the actual effectiveness and timeliness is still not well-understood.
A Different Model
There needs to be more focus on devising campaign effectiveness tools and criteria to better understand the effect of operations on strategy and the behavior of other actors. The Navy’s OFRP force generation model presents force planners and key leaders flexibility to understand the ready forces available. Combined with a campaign effectiveness framework, the Navy can best apply the fleet’s readiness, presence, and deterrence value to greater strategy.
The Navy, along with the Defense Department, needs to re-think routine heel-to-toe deployments in order meet presence demands, such as having certain areas of responsibility needing a constant 1.0 Carrier Strike Group presence. In the world of many threats and limited budgets, the Navy needs to sharpen its ready forces in the high-end environments and ranges only available near CONUS. Assets are then mainly deployed forward for opportune events, for example major force exercises, key seasonal events, or in response to strategic intelligence. This ability to sharpen forces near CONUS toward ever higher levels of warfighting readiness would allow more flexibility in deterrence while improving the overall readiness of the force. This change in thinking from constantly rotating 5–7-month deployments to more targeted presence operations could vastly improve the force and its deterrence value.
Consider a destroyer with 300 days of deployment and sustainment time. Current practice would utilize about 200 days in a routine, planned deployment and the rest would be home-station reset. With a more effective framework for campaigning effectiveness, planners could use two key 90-day surge operations to coincide with intelligence predictions for provocative competitor activity, key seasonal events in the region, or notable events associated with allied or joint forces.
The home-station reset now is an opportunity for fully-trained forces to conduct CONUS-based high-end exercises on training ranges in Live, Virtual, and Constructive environments to sharpen tactics, trial warfighting concepts, and refine operational plans. These efforts are a vital campaign in their own right, a campaign to build the combat credibility of the fleet. Compared to typical presence operations, these activities greatly enhance the ability of the force to meet the demands of high-end conflict, and allow the Navy to more rapidly reconstitute warfighting skills that atrophied during 20 years of campaigning in the Middle East. The sustainment phase affords the Navy an opportunity to conduct more service-retained deployments and apply ready forces toward its service-specific force development efforts, rather have its ready forces solely be applied to the demands of combatant commands. These forces still have the capacity for at least a second 90-day operation within their cycle for a second planned or unplanned force utilization.
This model still meets the intent of shaping the environment and allows planners more flexibility. This is just one possible outcome of many possibilities, but it represents a change in utilization without significantly affecting the underlying maintenance or training establishment. It could represent a more effective use of forces in a resource constrained environment.
Conclusion
Moving forward, the Navy needs to continue to improve its force generation within its existing model and decide how best to use its forces in the sustainment period. In tandem with these efforts, the Navy needs to reconsider what constitutes the effective use of forces in the context of campaigning while it competes with many demands for its forces. Current processes are limited, but if the limits are understood in more precise detail, then the fleet can plan and resource more effective utilization of forces to support campaigning and strategy. Resources will always be constrained, but utilization and effectiveness within these resources can be improved to best address the evolving threat environment.
CDR Brett LeFever is a career Surface Warfare Officer with a degree in Operations Research from the Naval Postgraduate School. At sea, he served on two destroyers and various afloat staffs. Ashore he was an analyst for the N81 division of the OPNAV staff and on Surface Forces, Pacific staff. He is currently an analyst in the Readiness and Force Employment Division for the Office of the Secretary for Defense Cost Analysis and Program Evaluation. These views are presented in a personal capacity and do not necessarily reflect the views of any U.S. government department or agency.
2. A simple average of 150 days min maintenance with 400 days long maintenance.
Featured Image: Norfolk Naval Shipyard, Portsmouth, Va. USS George H.W. Bush (CVN 77) at Norfolk Naval Shipyard undergoing a Drydocking Planned Incremental Availability. (U.S. Navy photo)
