Current Operations

Where is the Naval Expeditionary Combat Command?

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The following article originally appeared in the Marine Corps Gazette and is republished with permission. Read it in its original form here.

By Capt. Walker D. Mills, USMC

In recent years, the Marine Corps has become obsessed with naval integration, and that’s a good thing. Former Commandant Gen. Robert B. Neller called for greater efforts at naval integration, calling it “Green in support of Blue.”1 In his Commandant’s Planning Guidance, Gen. David Berger echoed that call and labeled naval integration “an imperative.”2 The new Chief of Naval Operations, Adm. Michael Gilday, in his confirmation hearing, said that “there is no daylight between us,” referring to himself and Commandant Berger in response to a question about the Marines’ push for closer integration with the Navy. So, with all the calls for integration, where is the Naval Expeditionary Combat Command (NECC)? After all, the Marine Corps itself is a naval expeditionary force according to the Commandant.

You might be asking, “What is the NECC?,” precisely because it is missing from most Marine Corps commentary and thinking. If you were to Google it, you would find it below Northern Essex Community College in the search results. Despite the relative lack of renown, the NECC is and will be essential for emerging and future Marine Corps concepts like Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations (EABO). NECC, established in 2006, is the type command on which the Navy puts the responsibilities to man, train, and equip most of its functions that are not performed on ships, submarines, or airplanes. It is operationally controlled in combined task forces that consolidate the Navy expeditionary combat force (NECF) under a singular command in each theater.

These forces include the Seabees: naval construction units that are similar to but distinct from the Marine Corps’ engineer community and have more capability. The Seabees are the go-to naval unit for building and maintaining runway and port infrastructure, hardening bases, and constructing expeditionary facilities.

The Navy Expeditionary Logistics Support Group is also part of the NECC. Responsible for “providing expeditionary logistics capabilities for the Navy, primarily within the maritime domain of the littorals,” it is a key part of any maritime fight that needs fuel, ordnance, or cargo sustainment.3 It is also responsible for expeditionary communications.

The NECC also contains the Coastal Riverine Force, which is responsible for port and harbor security—defending high-value assets like amphibs and aircraft carriers during strait transits and maritime security. In addition, the NECC has cognizance over explosive ordnance disposal units, which play a critical role in both mine countermeasures and dive and salvage operations. They are optimized for inshore and offshore littoral operations—operations in the very zone that the Marine Corps has identified as an essential part of its future. The NECC is rounded out by the Navy Expeditionary Intelligence Command and training and support elements. All told, it includes some 20,000 personnel, many of whom are currently deployed supporting operations around the globe.

Despite its capability, the NECC has largely been missing from commentary and discussion in and about the Marine Corps. The NECC has not been the focus of a feature article in Proceedings for years and perhaps ever in the Marine Corps Gazette. Most Marines do not know what it is or, more importantly, how it could support them. It has also been missing from published concepts and comments by senior leaders. It was defined in the appendix of “Littoral Operations in a Contested Environment” but never used, and in the 32 pages of the 2016 Marine Corps Operating Concept, it was mentioned once as part of a simple bullet without explanation: “Leverage the NECC.” Gen. Neller’s guidance was a short fragmentary order, but it also did not mention the NECC. Gen. Berger’s planning guidance, while never specifically using the terms NECC or NECF, openly asks the question of:

“whether it is prudent to absorb [some of the NECF] functions, forces, and capabilities to create a single naval expeditionary force whereby the Commandant could better ensure their readiness and resourcing.”

This question about potential contributions of the NECC to EABO should be front and center; the ignorance of what the NECC can do is a loss for the Marine Corps.

In the 2017 Littoral Operations in a Contested Environment concept, the Marine Corps identifies a list of “proposed capabilities.” Many of these capabilities are resident within the NECC, even though the command itself is not mentioned in the document, such as the abilities to:

  • “Establish expeditionary advance bases.”
  • “Conduct littoral mine detection, avoidance, and clearance.”
  • “Sustain distributed naval forces with precision munitions and sufficient fuel in high-intensity combat.”
  • “Rapidly establish mobile, clandestine expeditionary logistics bases to provide sustainment to afloat and expeditionary operating forces.”
  • “Conduct casualty and medical treatment and evacuation.

According to the Navy and Marine Corps’ new concept, EABO will involve employing “forward arming and refueling points (FARPs) and other expedient expeditionary operating sites for aircraft such as the F-35, critical munitions reloading teams for ships and submarines, or … expeditionary basing for surface screening/scouting platforms” in “austere, temporary locations.”4 In brief, that is a lot of what the NECC does. Seabees can build and repair the runways and facilities at FARPs and build expeditionary basing. Naval Expeditionary Logistics Groups transport (and are developing the internal capability to reload) munitions on planes, ships, mobile land-based launchers, and submarines. But to leverage the capabilities of the NECC, Marines first need to understand it and account for it in new plans and concepts.

There has been some progress. Marine engineers and Seabees have been working together to repair and refurbish the “Airport in the Sky” on Catalina Island as part of the DOD’s Innovative Readiness Training Program—a task not unlike what they might be expected to perform on other islands in the Pacific in wartime.5 More recently, exercise PACIFIC BLITZ, which was held across Southern California, included multiple units from the NECC and I MEF, though not necessarily integrated.6 The East Coast planning efforts for the upcoming Large-Scale Exercise 2020 features an “expeditionary syndicate” led by Expeditionary Strike Group 2, II MEF, and NECC co-leads.

During my own time in the Corps, I have spent significantly more time training with partner militaries than I have with the sailors or soldiers in our own military. I cannot remember a training event where I ever worked with sailors from the NECC. This results in myopia across the force at a time when naval integration is becoming increasingly central to our core responsibilities and future vision. Our lack of engagement with the NECC might be the worst example of this myopia, but it extends to the other services as well. Until I attended the Defense Language Institute on an Army installation, I had never met an officer in the Army or Air Force in a professional setting. Sometimes I wonder if there are Marines who think we can defend the Pacific by ourselves, ignoring that the Army alone has more than 80,000 soldiers based in the Pacific and continues to expand their roles.7 I am not arguing that Marine Corps leadership is unaware of the NECC or our sister services, but it is important that the whole force, from top to bottom, has a strong understanding of the NECC’s role and capabilities. The NECC is perhaps the organization that the Marines will work closest with when executing EABO; the NECC will help enable EABO. It is also not the only organization Marines should expect to fight beside. The Army possesses over 100 seagoing vessels that will likely be used for intratheater transport in the littorals and be key to any future Pacific campaign because the Marine Corps and the Navy do not have the same capability. New Army multi-domain task forces will also be present in theater, and the Air Force will likely deploy small units built around its “Rapid Raptor” concept. Marines need to understand these capabilities and train with them in a joint way.

In his paper, “On Littoral Warfare,” Naval War College professor Milan Vego writes that “littoral warfare requires the closest cooperation among the services, or ‘jointness.’”8 That cooperation is rooted in understanding and fostered by joint training. If Marines do not understand or discuss the NECC, it is because they have not been adequately exposed to it. The NECC, by name and definition, is, like the Marine Corps, a naval expeditionary force. The command has the capability to support EABO in everything from running decoy FARPs to maintaining and building fuel sites and repairing port facilities. In order to validate and implement future and emerging concepts, the Corps needs to seek out more opportunities to expose itself to and train with specific partner forces and units. The Marine Corps must increasingly seek joint training opportunities with the units in other services it is most likely to work with and must work to highlight that training and increase Marines’ exposure to the NECC.

Walker D. Mills is a Marine infantry officer currently serving as an exchange officer in Cartagena, Colombia. He has previously authored commentary for CIMSEC, the Marine Corps Gazette, Proceedings, West Point’s Modern War Institute and Defense News.

Notes

1. U.S. Congress, Statement of General Robert B. Neller, Commandant of the Marine Corps, before the House Appropriations Committee, Subcommittee on Defense, Concerning the Posture of the United States Marine Corps on April 30, 2019, (Washington, DC: April 2019).

2. Headquarters Marine Corps, Commandant’s Planning Guidance: 38th Commandant of the Marine Corps, (Washington, DC: July 2019).

3. Naval Expeditionary Logistics Support Group, (U.S. Navy Expeditionary Combat Command), available at https://www.public.navy.mil.

4. Headquarters Marine Corps, “EABO,” available at https://www.candp.marines.mil.

5. Luis Sahagun, “Marines Invade Catalina Island to Fix Crumbling Airstrip at Airport in the Sky,” LA Times, (Los Angeles, CA: January 2019).

6. Gidget Fuentes, “Pacific Blitz Tests How Navy, Marines Could Fight the Next Island Campaign,” USNI News, (Annapolis, MD: March 2019).

7. Jen Judson, “Pacific Pathways in 2020 Lead to Oceania,” Defense News, (Washington, DC: October 2019).

8. Milan Vego, “On Littoral Warfare,” Naval War College Review, (Newport, RI: Spring 2015).

Featured Image: 180419-N-NT795-642 SAN DIEGO (April 19, 2018) Electronic Technician 3rd Class Juan Britomora, assigned to Coastal Riverine Squadron (CRS) manned the .50-caliber machine gun aboard MKVI patrol boat during unit level training conducted by Coastal Riverine Group (CRG) 1 Training and Evaluation Unit. (U.S. Navy photo by Chief Boatswain’s Mate Nelson Doromal Jr/Released)

Podcast

Sea Control 162 – Redesigning the Marine Corps with Jon Frerichs and Mark Nostro

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By Jared Samuelson

A two-parter! Maj. Jon Frerichs (@hoplitemarine) was one of my first interview subjects after he wrote an article for Marine Corps Gazette entitled “Reinvigorating the Fleet Marine Force.” During the interview, he mentioned he had a second piece in-progress with War On The Rocks. We managed to corral one of his co-authors for that article, Maj. Mark Nostro, to discuss “To Be Most Ready When the Nation Is Least Ready, the Marines Need a New Headquarters.” Tune in to hear Jon name-check multiple doctrinal publications from memory while proposing some radical changes to the structure of the Marine Corps structure. If you’d like to skip forward to the second interview, it kicks off at 20:05. Enjoy!

Download Sea Control 162 – Redesigning the Marine Corps with Jon Frerichs and Mark Nostro

Links

4. To Be Most Ready When the Nation is Least Ready, the Marines Need a New Headquarters

Jared Samuelson is the Senior Producer of the Sea Control podcast. Contact him at Seacontrol@cimsec.org.
Capability Analysis

The Number of Mines is Less Than Infinity

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By Dr. Michael M. Rosenthal, Naval Surface Warfare Center, Panama City Division

“I would be very surprised if professionals engaged full time in [Mine countermeasures] MCM who speak routinely with other professionals in the same field had no genuine prior knowledge.”–Fred Huffer, Professor of Statistics, Florida State University

Mine countermeasures are actions intended to reduce the risk that mines pose to transiting vessels. Risk is defined as the probability that a transiting vessel will incur mission abort damage from a mine detonation if it travels along a predetermined route through the potentially mined area. The purpose of an MCM operation is to lower the risk so it is safer to transit. The estimation of risk is critically important to determine if the level of risk to a transiting vessel is acceptable and if the applied effort is effectively lowering the risk.

Some of the traditional MCM tactics are founded on Bayesian risk metrics that utilize a non-informative prior distribution for the number of mines. Some statisticians prefer to use non-informative priors because they feel it is more objective. The non-informative prior reduces the amount of required inputs from the tactician so there is less error introduced from the human operator, but it also defeats the entire purpose of using a Bayesian paradigm because the prior distribution does not utilize any information. It assumes that any number of mines is equally likely. In most cases, it is far more likely that there are just a few mines and it is very unlikely there are millions of mines.

Bayesian methods are ideal for the development of MCM risk metrics because they facilitate learning as information is acquired. This is good for MCM because new information and new decisions are frequently acquired throughout the operation. New events often occur which provide critical information and appropriate responses are promptly needed. These events vary greatly in detail. Bayesian analysis centers on utilizing Baye’s theorem to formally combine prior information with newly gathered information. This provides more freedom to create information synergy. 

Bayesian calculations utilize a prior distribution to incorporate information about parameters of interest before conducting a trial. In the context of MCM, the total number of mines is an unknown parameter of interest and a search or sweep of the mines is a trial. The choice in prior distribution is less critical when data is plentiful as long as the prior is not too restrictive. When there is an abundance of data, a reasonable prior will have a weaker impact on the final analysis because the posterior distribution will be primarily influenced by the data. However, data is usually limited in MCM operations, so the prior distribution will have a stronger impact on the analysis. In this case, it is critical to scrutinize the choice of prior in order for the risk metric to be meaningful.

Some of the traditional risk models actually use an improper prior for the total number of mines. An improper prior is sometimes used as an uninformative prior with the interpretation that any value is equally likely. However, many statisticians caution against using them since they are known to complicate interpretation and this usually does not provide an appropriate Bayesian update. The improper prior is formed by taking a limit of uniform distributions as the maximum number of possible mines goes to infinity. This does not converge to a probability distribution, so there is no meaningful interpretation of the prior belief for the number of mines.

Having an appropriate Bayesian update is important to MCM because if the result of a single pass of an MCM clearance does not reduce the posterior risk to an acceptable level, then the MCM staff will need to re-plan and execute a second clearance operation in the same area to further reduce the risk. This process will iterate until the risk is lowered to the threshold level.

As Fred Huffer stated, “It would be very surprising if professionals engaged full time in [Mine countermeasures] MCM who speak routinely with other professionals in the same field had no genuine prior knowledge.” If the user cannot reliably provide any information, then a large value for the expected number of mines and a corresponding large variance can be chosen because there is less certainty in that estimate. The user should be able to reliably provide some basic information that can be utilized in the prior belief by answering two simple questions:

  • How many mines could be in the region (few or many)?
    • (Few) i. e. the enemy has a small inventory or just a few can fit in the region
    • (Many) i. e. the enemy has a large inventory or they could lay thousands in the region
  • How certain are you in the amount above (low or high)?
    • (Low) a subjective guess based on limited intelligence information
      • i. e. if I were a minelayer, what would I do?
    • (High) a more objective belief based on concrete observations.
      • e. g. vessel with room for 10 mines was sighted laying mines.

The negative binomial distribution is one possible prior distribution that can be used for the mine risk Bayesian framework. Analytical expressions for the required clearance and the risk from remaining mines are easily derived. Not only is the mathematics cleaner and easier to interpret, but it also provides a sensible approach to incorporate prior intelligence information (information known before applying effort) into the analysis.

How does using the negative binomial distribution compare with the popular (uninformative) improper prior? There is no significant difference between calculations derived using the improper prior and using a negative binomial distribution with mean of 10^15 and a variance of 10^30+10^15 as the prior distribution. This default distribution implies that on average we expect there to be one quadrillion mines in the region with an unthinkably enormous variance (one nonillion + one quadrillion) to adequately accommodate our complete uncertainty in the possible number of mines prior to applying effort. To put these numbers into perspective, the surface of the ocean has an area of roughly 360 million square kilometers. That is 3.6×10^14 square meters. If you could place one quadrillion mines over a 360 million square kilometer area, the mines could be spaced on a rectangular grid roughly 0.6 meters meters apart. This setting of the prior goes as far as to say that we think it is reasonably possible that there could more than two quadrillion mines in the region.

If there is genuine concern that the end user cannot do better than this assumption, then after applying mine countermeasures a simple hypothesis test can be done to validate the user selected prior mean and variance against the default. In this way, if the end user significantly mis-specified the prior, then a flag can be automatically raised to warn the commander that the user is unable to translate the prior intelligence information into a reasonable prior belief for this operation. In this case, the command will have significant evidence to reject the assumption that a more reasonable prior belief can be derived by the end user, and return to the default condition. It is important to note that such a flag raise would not imply an outrageous deficiency in judgement by the end user. However, a flag-raise should initiate a discussion of caution toward objectively and consistently arriving at a reasonable prior distribution. Following this protocol should effectively insulate the MCM mission from this type of human error.

We generally prefer to make decisions based on an analysis that utilizes more information over a similar analysis which utilizes less information. An analysis that relies on a non-informative prior can most often be improved with an informative prior. With a non-informative prior, no prior information is being specified, so it is easy to come up with a distribution that utilizes some additional information. An informative prior often improves the interpretation and practicality of the analysis because more realistic assumptions can be made.

The updated theory in this work gently bridges more traditional doctrine into a broader realm of possibilities so that some basic information that has not been utilized can now be incorporated to improve the decision quality for the Navy.

Dr. Michael Rosenthal received his doctorate degree in Mathematical Statistics from the Florida State University in 2014. He received his bachelor’s degree in Mathematics with a minor in Statistics from the University of Florida in 2009. For five years, Dr. Rosenthal has worked at the Naval Surface Warfare Center, Panama City Division, developing basic research topics with academic colleges and assessing warfighter needs for updating and transitioning actionable tactics in the field of mine warfare.

Featured Image: BALTIC SEA (June 18, 2019) HDMS MSF-1 assigned to Standing NATO Mine Countermeasures Group One (SNMCMG1) conducts side scan sonar exercises while transiting the Baltic Sea during exercise Baltic Operations (BALTOPS) 2019. (U.S. Navy photo courtesy of NATO by CPO Brian Djurslev/Released)

Capability Analysis

Ignorance of China is Not Bliss

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By Capt. Brent Ramsey (ret.)

China Rising

China is modernizing every element of its military. It has announced plans to field a world-class military by 2035 and a dominant military by mid-century.1 Consistent with its goal of regional hegemony, China is building Navy, Coast Guard, and merchant ships faster than any other nation. Its Navy now directly commands China’s Coast Guard, adding hundreds of ships to its fleet. China’s fleet of warships now outnumbers U.S. warships in the Indo-Pacific by about 10 to 1. With this new capability, China constantly intimidates its neighbors through its increasingly aggressive maritime behavior.2

China intends to control the international waters off its shores.3 It has invested heavily in long-range anti-access area denial (A2/AD) missiles. These missiles represent a serious threat to warships, since considerable uncertainty exists about the effectiveness of the defenses against them.4 A strategic benefit of robust A2/AD missiles is increasing the stand-off distance from China that warships must maintain to avoid attack. By pushing navies further away from shores, these weapons look to turn the China Seas into Chinese territorial waters. According to the Commander of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, Admiral Phil Davidson, “China is now capable of controlling the South China Sea in all scenarios short of war with the United States.”5

In the past few years, China has illegally constructed, and subsequently militarized, multiple artificial islands using various features like reefs, shoals, and atolls in the South China Sea in international waters. Most of these sites have conflicting claims of ownership between China and other countries including Malaysia, Taiwan, the Philippines and Vietnam. Construction has occurred at seven sites in the Spratly Islands, 20 sites in the Paracel Islands, and at Scarborough Shoal, totaling more than 3200 acres of reclaimed ocean upon which China has built high-tech military facilities including airfields and missile batteries.6 The UN Permanent Court of Arbitration ruled in favor of the Philippines and against China in July 2016, expressly rejecting China’s claims in the area near the Philippines in the South China Sea.7 The tribunal ruled that China’s claims to sovereignty over 90 percent of the South China Sea, particularly with regard to the Spratly Islands, part of which the Philippines claim, was invalid. It specifically found that “China had violated the Philippines sovereign rights in its exclusive economic zone in the South China Sea.”8 Virtually every other nation in the region rejects China’s claims.

China, ignoring the UN ruling,9 continues to militarize the area. Chinese aircraft and ships continue to harass many ships and aircraft of other countries venturing near.10 China has now largely gained the ability to manage and interfere with the commerce passing through the South China Sea if it so chooses. The U.S. and other countries continue to conduct Freedom of Navigation Operations (FONOPS) near these features and through the Taiwan Strait, but China vigorously protests these FONOPS and orders U.S. or allied ships out of its “sovereign waters.” After a recent FONOP near the Paracels, the Chinese government boldly issued the following statement, “We again stress that China has irrefutable sovereignty over the islands of the South China Sea and their nearby waters.”11

In order to counter this emergent capability and China’s increasing aggression, deploying a much larger number of warships to the region is urgent.

The U.S. Navy and China’s Threat

Alfred Thayer Mahan’s The Influence of Sea Power on History12 was a seminal military planning and strategy framework that shaped maritime defense and international trade policy in the 19th and 20th centuries. Mahan’s theories concerning the extraordinary importance of sea power to defend national sovereignty and economy still apply today.13 Given how 71 percent of the Earth’s surface is ocean, having a powerful Navy is essential for protecting vital commerce, defending coastlines, and defeating almost any enemy. Throughout American history, time and time again, the use of the U. S. Navy at critical junctures has been the key to its defense and the implementation of national policy. Whether it was fighting the Barbary Pirates, sending the Great White Fleet around the world, the Battle of the Atlantic during WWII, the invasion of Normandy with thousands of ships, or turning the Japanese back at Midway, the U.S. Navy has always played a vital role in war and peace. It must do so again in the Indo-Pacific by resisting China’s goals.

With an adequately sized fleet, the Navy’s ability to control the sea using nuclear-powered carriers with embarked air wings, sophisticated attack and guided missile submarines, Aegis cruisers and destroyers, coupled with unparalleled forward logistics support, would be unmatched. Virtually no one contemplates a land war with China, making the Army’s role in containing China in the Indo-Pacific somewhat limited. The Air Force can project power in Asia but its capability is much more limited than the Navy’s given its dependence on a finite number of fixed launch points and an extremely long logistics tail. With the vastness of the Indo-Pacific area of responsibility, much of it covered by oceans, only the Navy can be effective at countering China’s influences in place and prevent China from becoming a regional hegemon.

But despite the importance of having a robust Navy of sufficient size and capability to defend U.S. national interests, it is acknowledged by most defense experts that the Navy is no longer large enough to ensure freedom of navigation and to limit China’s aggressive behavior in international waters. The Navy’s technical superiority will make a difference only if there are enough ships in the right places. If the U.S. does not retain supremacy in the Indo-Pacific, China will inevitably step in to fill the vacuum.

The current administration and Congress have recognized the need for 355 ships,14 but the Navy currently has only 295 warships in commission,15 and a recent Congressional Research Service report on shipbuilding estimates that with current budget profiles the only way the Navy will reach the goal of 355 is by extending the life of existing ships to 40 and 45 years for various ship types and with increasing maintenance costs.16 With the increasing threat from China and others, the requirement is most likely much higher. The Heritage Foundation documented a need for 400 warships.17 With the inadequately sized force and with approximately one third of the current fleet already deployed at any one time, it is hardly surprising that the Navy cannot effectively keep up with China’s actions in the vital Indo-Pacific. The Navy is already so over-tasked in Asia that many ships have been forced to neglect basic navigation training and overwork it sailors with 100+ hour workweeks, resulting in multiple tragic accidents costing many lives.18

In any conflict, the best strategy would be to project power away from the U.S. and toward the adversary. But China is a long ways away as it takes weeks to traverse the 6000-plus miles from the West Coast to China. The Navy must already have a significant proportion of the fleet in place when needed. Only the Navy can loiter indefinitely near China, supported by the most capable logistics systems. Only the Navy’s power projection assets can freely exercise the American sovereign will for the U.S. and its allies, even to blockade China if necessary. The need is urgent not only for more warships, but also for more advanced warships like the Ford-class CVN and the next generation of attack and ballistic missile submarines and surface combatants that can challenge China’s A2/AD weaponry.

However, modern warships are tremendously complicated and take a lengthy time to build. The newest U.S. carrier, the USS Gerald Ford (CVN-78), took 12 years to build. It was commissioned in July 2017, but is still not certified for combat.19 Other ship classes take less time to build, but none less than 6 years. Because it takes so long to construct warships, the next war will almost certainly be fought with the ships already on hand today, unlike in WWII where the industrial base was a decisive factor. But since the fall of the Soviet Union, the U.S. shipbuilding industry has experienced a tremendous decline. Today there are only seven shipyards in the U.S. capable of building Navy warships.20 The complex nature of Navy combatants requires the retention of a robust, state-of-the-art shipbuilding industry that is capable of building the world’s most advanced warships. According to the Congressional Research Service, the industry has unparalleled capability but limited capacity as it can only build a handful of ships at a time and would have to add considerable numbers to the workforce and make major plant investments before being able to build more ships faster.21 But it is urgent to build more ships now while there is still time.  

Conclusion

While the average U.S. citizen is not aware of the dire threat that China represents, that is not the case for Navy stakeholders and supporters. The U. S. Naval Institute, the Navy League of the United States, the Association of the United States Navy, the Center for International Maritime Security, key Congressional leaders, shipbuilders, and defense think tanks are all too aware of China’s rise and the extreme risks that will dawn in the coming years. These stakeholders wield considerable influence in how the nation plots its maritime course through troubled waters. What seems to be lacking among them is effective coordination that would lead to a shared vision and unified plan for a response to the China threat, with an emphasis on increasing naval power. These organizations must strive to work together to establish common goals in support of the Navy, and inform citizens about the risks and potential consequences at hand.

Will history give a postmortem of a vanquished America that squandered preeminence because it neglected its own defense? The real question is whether the U.S. can afford not to spend adequately on defense and its Navy. We must urgently build far more warships to defend the nation against China, or else entertain the possibility of a more dangerously uncertain future.

Captain Brent Ramsey (ret.) served 30 years in the Navy and 23 years in the Navy Civil Service. He commanded Cargo Handling Battalion TWELVE, was Operations Officer/Business Manager, CBC Gulfport, and was Navy Emergency Preparedness Liaison Officer to Mississippi. He currently serves as Senior Advisor, Center for International Maritime Security, and Member/Secretary of the Meadows Military Advisory Group.

References

1. David Ignatius, “China has a plan to rule the world,” The Washington Post, 17 November 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/china-has-a-plan-to-rule-the-world/2017/11/28/ and US-China Economic and Security Review Commission, (US-China Economic and Security Commission Report, November 2018, 25.

2. Lyle Morris, “China Welcomes its newest Armed Force:  The Coast Guard,” War on the Rocks, 4 April 2018, https://warontherocks.com/2018/04/china-welcomes-its-newest-armed-force-the-coast-guard/

3. Christopher Cowan, “A2/AD-Anti-access/area denial,” Real Clear Defense, 12 September 2016,   https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2016/09/13/

4. Ronald O’Rourke, “China Naval Modernization:  Implications for U. S. Navy Capabilities – Background and Issues for Congress,” Congressional Research Service Report, 1 August 2018, 8-10.

5. Steven Lee Myers, “With Ships and Missiles, China is Ready to Challenge US Navy in Pacific,” New York Times, 29 August 2018. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/29/world/asia/china-navy-aircraft-carrier-pacific.html/

6. Asia Maritime Transparency Institute, https://amti.csis.org/island-tracker/china/

7. Katie Hunt, “South China Sea:  Court Rules in Favor of Philippines over China,” 12 July 2016. https://www.cnn.com/2016/07/12/asia/china-philippines-south-china-sea/index.html/

8. Tom Mitchell and Geoff Dyer, “Tribunal rules against Beijing in South China Sea dispute”, Financial Times,12 July 2016, https://www.ft.com/content/3cdcbf42-4814-11e6-8d68-72e9211e86ab/

9. Tom Phillips, Oliver Holmes, Owen Bowcott, “Beijing rejects tribunal’s ruling in South China Sea case,” The Guardian, 12 July  2016, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jul/12/philippines-wins-south-china-sea-case-against-china/

10. Ben Werner, “Destroyer USS Decatur Has Close Encounter with Chinese Warship,” USNI News, 1 October 2018, https://news.usni.org/2018/10/01/37006/

11. Spratly Islands Confidential, South China Sea: US Navy Warship Conducts Freedom of Navigation Operation Near Paracel Islands, 15 September 2019. http://spratlyislandsconfidential.com/south-china-sea-us-navy-warship-conducts-freedom-of-navigation-operation-near-paracel-islands/

12. Little Brown and Company, 1890.

13. Dr. John H. Mauer, “The Influence of Thinkers and ideas on History, the Case of Alfred Thayer Mahan,” Foreign Policy Research Institute, 11 August 2016, https://www.fpri.org/article/2016/08/influence-thinkers-ideas-history-case-alfred-thayer-mahan/

14. “2016 Navy Force Structure Assessment,” 16 December 2016, https://www.navy.mil/submit/display.asp?story_id=98160/

15. “Status of the Navy,” 24 July 2019, https://www.navy.mil/navydata/nav_legacy.asp?id=146

16. Ronald O’Roarke, “Navy Force Structure and Shipbuilding Plans: Background and Issues for Congress,” Congressional Research Service Report, 10 June 2019, 22.

17. “2019 Index of Military Strength” edited by Dakota Wood, The Heritage Foundation, October 2018, 8

18. Alex Norton and Thomas Gibbons-Neff, “Deadly Navy Accidents in the Pacific raise Questions over a Force Stretched too Thin,” The Washington Post, 20 August 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/checkpoint/wp/2017/08/26/deadly-navy-accidents-in-the-pacific-raise-questions-over-a-force-stretched-too-thin/

19. Navy Fact File, USS Gerald R. Ford, https://www.navy.mil/navydata/fact/; Allen Cone, “Ford-class combat system completes test, first carrier further delayed, UPI, 13 June 2019, https://www.upi.com/Defense-News/2019/06/04/Ford-class-combat-system-completes-test-first-carrier-further-delayed/9161559662262/

20. Huntington-Ingalls, Newport News, VA and Pascagoula, MS, General Dynamics, Bath, ME, Groton, CT, and San Diego, Austal USA, Mobile, AL, and Marinette Marine, Marinette, WI.

21. Ronald O’Rourke, “Navy Force Structure and Shipbuilding Plans: Issues for Congress,” Congressional Research Service Report, 19 October 2018, 45.

Featured Image: PACIFIC OCEAN (Feb. 5, 2020) The Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS John Paul Jones (DDG 53) prepares to pull alongside the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz (CVN 68) in preparation for a replenishment-at-sea. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Kyle Merritt)

Fostering the Discussion on Securing the Seas.