What could be the trend lines for 2015 in the Indian Ocean? A quick survey of events, incidents and trends in the Indian Ocean during 2014 suggests that the region witnessed cooperation, competition and inclusiveness among the littoral states.
Three baskets could be identified: geopolitical, geostrategic and geo-economic, to help forecast trends in 2015. However, a caveat is in order i.e. these baskets can spring a number of surprises, given that ‘prediction is a risky business’.
IORA: Moving from Australia to Indonesia In the geopolitical domain, the region remained peaceful and pan-Indian Ocean multilateral organizations such as the Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA) and Indian Ocean Naval Symposium (IONS) were proactive and provided the platform and leadership to address issues of common interest among the partner states. The Perth Communiqué released in September 2014 reinforced the Association’s commitment to ‘building a more stable, secure and prosperous Indian Ocean region’ and promote the IORA’s six priority areas of cooperation. The regional navies met under the IONS banner and addressed a number of common security issues confronting the region.
Later in 2015, the IORA baton will pass from Australia to Indonesia who would continue to carry the great work done by the earlier Chair – India. The new government in Jakarta led by President Joko Widodo has endorsed the importance of maritime matters through the establishment of a new Coordinating Ministry for Maritime Affairs and announced the doctrine of ‘global maritime axis’ (poros maritim dunia). In addition, South Africa, the next Vice Chair of IORA, will prepare to take the leadership role in 2017. These provide ‘continuity and purpose’ to the IORA.
China and the Maritime Silk Road: Increasing footprints in the Indian Ocean China would continue to make attractive offers to Indian Ocean states and seek support for the MSR. Its forays in the Indian Ocean can potentially sharpen difference between China and India and may even lead to these powers becoming more assertive.
During 2014, the Indian Ocean geostrategic environment, though peaceful, was a bit tenuous. The presence of Chinese submarines in the Indian Ocean created unease in New Delhi. Though predicted, it surprised the Indian strategic community and the Indian Navy is beefing up capabilities to respond to the Chinese forays in the Indian Ocean.
India was also ruffled by the Chinese Maritime Silk Road (MSR) initiative and its growing popularity among a number of Indian Ocean states particularly Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Maldives. New Delhi believes that the MSR can potentially help China consolidate its naval / maritime strategy of access and basing in the Indian Ocean in support of PLA Navy’s future operations.
Continuing US Anchor The US will continue to be the strategic anchor and security provider in the Indian Ocean and its role welcomed by the regional countries to ‘correct security imbalances, challenge the hegemony of any dominant power and ensure regional stability’.
Likewise, the UK decision to permanently position a number of power projection platforms in the Persian Gulf prompted New Delhi to recall the idea of Indian Ocean ‘Zone of Peace’ and withdrawal of extra regional naval powers from the Indian Ocean.
2015: End of Piracy, Attractiveness of Drug smuggling and Re-emergence of Maritime Terrorism in the Indian Ocean One of the important positive developments in the Indian Ocean was the near total suppression of piracy in the Gulf of Aden / Somali coast. It took eight years for the naval forces from nearly two dozen countries including a number of UN Security Council resolutions, to send pirates back home.
However, another ugly face of illegal activities at sea i.e. drug smuggling appears to have caught the attention of the Indian Ocean countries. During 2014, the multinational forces operating in the Indian Ocean intercepted a number of dhows/boats carrying narcotics from South Asia bound for destinations in East Africa. Perhaps what is more disturbing is that east coast of Africa emerged popular among drug smugglers from Colombia. Kenyan President Kenyatta’s initiative to oversee the destruction of a vessel carrying about 370 Kilograms of heroin worth US $ 11.4 million in international market exhibited Indian Ocean countries resolve to counter global trade in narcotics.
The rise of the Al Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS), the new wing of the Al Qaeda, has already raised a new threat whether Pakistan will become a haven for maritime terrorism.
Will 2015 see the idea of “Blue Economy” leaping forward? The geo-economic environment in the Indian Ocean witnessed the emergence of a new concept ‘Blue Economy’ led by Seychelles and Mauritius. The idea is resonating among a number of Indian Ocean littorals including Australia, Indonesia, Bangladesh, South Africa to name a few. The leaders are committed to the sustainable development of living and non-living marine resources to enhance food and energy security.
Will 2015 ensure better Search and Rescue Coordination? Perhaps the most traumatic and heartrending events in 2014 were the tragic loss of Malaysian Airlines flight MH 370 in the southern Indian Ocean, which still remains a mystery, and the more recent loss of Air Asia flight QZ 8501 in the Java Sea. These were stark reminders of the need to develop robust search and rescue (SAR) mechanism in the Indian Ocean. Yet, these incidents exhibited the Indian Ocean countries’ commitment to provide ‘public goods at sea’ and a number of navies deployed their navies for SAR.
Dr Vijay Sakhuja is the Director, National Maritime Foundation, New Delhi. The views expressed are those of the author and do not reflect the official policy or position of the National Maritime Foundation. He can be reached at [email protected].
Recent months have found uniformed officers and naval strategists writing and speaking about regaining the ability of U.S. Navy (USN) ships to conduct offensive anti-surface warfare (ASuW). The discussion has been lively and featured many authors and many different approaches. Some solutions are incremental, such as fielding more capable long-range weapons in existing launch systems.[i] Others are more radical, such as trading large long-range missile defense interceptors for small point defense missiles and building a new generation of multi-role cruise missiles.[ii]
A P-8A test launches an AGM-84D BLK IC Harpoon Missile. (U.S. Navy photo)
Missing from the discussion of future acquisitions and new weapons is how the USN can leverage existing land-based airpower to seize the offensive in ASuW. The P-8 Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft is deployed today, with the range, persistence, sensors, and network architecture to serve as a self-contained “kill chain.” It is able to disperse and operate in an expeditionary environment during peacetime or contingency operations. If equipped with more suitable long-range anti-ship weapons, this aircraft will provide greatly increased capability for the combatant commander. This will allow more flexibility for USN forces to operate in an A2/AD environment when a carrier is not nearby or in the interim until more capable surface-based ASuW weapons are fielded.
Framing the Challenge
During the last three decades, the USN has divested its surface forces of offensive anti-ship firepower as operations shifted to littoral environments with permissive threat profiles. With the retirement of the Tomahawk Anti-Ship Missile, the service has been left without a weapon that can engage targets at a range beyond that of threat anti-ship cruise missiles (ASCM’s).[iii] Our ships now go to sea armed only with the sub-sonic, medium range Harpoon missile. The removal of Harpoon from Flight IIA DDG-51’s after DDG-79 and proposed cuts to funding for cruisers have exacerbated this glaring deficiency.[iv] The onus for conducting maritime strike has shifted from our surface ships to the aircraft of the Carrier Strike Group (CSG).
As the reach and number of U.S. ASCM’s have decreased, threat systems have proliferated and improved in range, speed and sophistication. China, Russia, and India all possess advanced supersonic long-range ASCM’s. Foreign militaries are equipping themselves not only with the weapons needed to strike, but also the C4ISR capabilities needed to detect and accurately target adversary forces.[v]
Commanders, legislators, and the defense industry have responded with a variety of initiatives, including the development of an Offensive Anti-Surface Weapon (OASuW.) This program is aimed at fielding an advanced cruise missile with sufficient range to allow USN ships to employ outside the reach of threat weapons systems. OASuW Increment 1 will begin fielding the Lockheed Martin Long Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM) in FY17 for carriage on the F/A-18 Super Hornet and USAF B-1 bombers. OASuW Increment 2 will provide for integration of a long-range anti-surface capability onboard surface ships.[vi] By equipping the F/A-18 and B-1 with the ability to carry LRASM, the Department of Defense has signaled that regardless of eventual integration of OASuW onboard surface ships, carrier and land-based airpower will remain a key component of the U.S. anti-surface strategy.
Missing from this conversation on OASuW capabilities is the USN’s Maritime Patrol and Reconnaissance (MPR) force. The MPR community is recapitalizing with the P-8 Poseidon aircraft. The sensors, datalink capabilities, and expeditionary nature of this aircraft make it a natural choice to augment the lack of anti-surface punch. The P-8 and RQ-4C UAS are envisioned to play targeting roles in long-range ASuW engagements, so arming P-8 with upgraded weapons is a logical next step. The Poseidon can allow the fleet to seize the initiative in anti-surface employment, especially in situations where the threat makes the reality of deploying the CSG forward politically unpalatable or disadvantageous.
The Solution
The P-8 Poseidon is derived from the Boeing 737 aircraft. It features long-range, high transit speed, solid persistence, and will soon incorporate the ability to perform air-to-air refueling. The open architecture mission systems are easily reconfigurable and allow for rapid improvement of sensor and weapon capabilities. The P-8 features a Mobile Tactical Operations Center (MTOC), which aids in processing data collected during and after mission flights. The MTOC is fully expeditionary, allowing an MPR detachment to quickly relocate in peacetime or disperse away from main operating airfields and continue to fight in wartime.
The ability to disperse is especially critical in an A2/AD environment. The proliferation of theater ballistic missiles (TBM’s) and cruise missiles has allowed previously weak nations to hold an opponent’s forward bases at risk. By deploying aircraft to auxiliary fields away from large military installations, adversary commanders are faced with a much more challenging targeting problem. The increased cost of building more TBM’s may be daunting to a particular military, and the uncertainty of being able to destroy forward forces is a stabilizing influence. P-8’s ability to deploy to medium sized airfields and sustain itself during combat operations is a force multiplier.
P-8 will also carry the Raytheon Advanced Aerial Sensor (AAS) to provide standoff detection and targeting of maritime and land targets. Descended from the highly-classified APS-149 Littoral Surveillance Radar System, AAS will provide Poseidon crews with the ability to detect, classify, and provide targeting solutions of threats even in highly congested littoral areas.[vii] In A2/AD environments with highly advanced surface to air missile systems, this ability to accurately detect threats from long-range and provide targeting updates to net-enabled weapons isn’t just beneficial, it’s critical.[viii] A MPR squadron equipped with AAS and appropriate weapons becomes its own self-contained targeting and strike force.
In short, P-8 offers a weapons platform that is uniquely suited to maritime strikes. Its crews are far more familiar with operating in the ASuW role than USAF bomber crews and culturally more pre-disposed to emphasize this mission set. The ability to act as an armed sensor platform allows the Poseidon to close the kill-chain itself. P-8 armed with suitable standoff weapons has the ability to detect and attrite adversary surface ships, preserving the ability for our surface forces to deploy forward in wartime, and decreasing the need for our carriers to surge forward into extremely high-risk areas to eliminate surface threats with the air wing. This provides increased flexibility to the combatant commander.
Needed Changes
The MPR force has the potential to act as a powerful ASuW strike force, however this capability can grow stronger with upgrades and training. P-8 should be equipped with an OASuW capability, ideally allowing it to carry the LRASM rounds that will enter production in FY17. The largest roadblock will not be carriage capability or weapons system engineering, rather finding the funding to provide integration and testing for this weapon onboard P-8.
The P-8 currently carries the Harpoon Block IC, which is insufficient for high-end ASuW. The Block IC is not net-enabled, meaning it cannot receive in-flight updates from targeting platforms via a datalink. This makes the weapon less flexible and precise in congested environments. The aircraft is slated to receive the Harpoon Block II, which is net-enabled, but is still constrained by its short range.[ix] This lack of reach prevents it from engaging high-end air defense warships without putting the P-8 and its crew at serious risk.
It is best to utilize the synergy that exists in MPR squadrons and equip these aircraft with both the sensors and the weapons required for standoff targeting and strike. Since AAS equipped P-8’s may be required to provide targeting support to OASuW in a complex surface environment, equipping the targeting aircraft with weapons is the logical next step to close the kill chain. Once P-8 is equipped with LRASM, crews must be required to train frequently with AAS equipped targeting aircraft and LRASM equipped shooter aircraft against representative threat pictures. Maritime targeting is a very dynamic and challenging game, and requires practice to execute properly.[x]
Summary
Equipping the MPR force with a long-range strike capability will capitalize on existing sensors, platforms, and aircrew skills. The ability to call on an existing force structure with incremental upgrades provides a solution to a glaring deficiency in the Navy’s ASuW capabilities. The ability to task highly mobile aircraft rather than SSN’s or carriers to provide ASuW firepower provides a commander with increased options and flexibility. This can reduce risk while raising the enemy’s uncertainty about U.S. operational intentions.
American patrol crews gained fame during World War II for their nighttime raids on Japanese shipping. Operating alone and independent of the carrier they provided a critical force to weaken enemy logistics capability and to disrupt sea lines of control. It is fitting that almost three quarters of a century later we consider the role of our current MPR force. The P-8 can add to our ASuW capability if we make the decision now to properly equip it and provide training to aircrews.
Lieutenant Michael Glynn is an active-duty naval aviator and graduate of the University of Pennsylvania. He most recently served as a P-8 instructor pilot and mission commander with Patrol Squadron (VP) 16. He currently serves as an instructor flying the T-45 with the ‘Fighting Redhawks’ of Training Squadron (VT) 21. The views expressed in this article are entirely his own.
[i] Robert Crumplar and Peter Morrison, “Beware the Anti-Ship Cruise Missile,” U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings, vol. 140, no. 1 (January 2014), http://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/2014-01/beware-antiship-cruise-missile.
[ii] Bryan Clark, Commanding the Seas: A Plan to Reinvigorate U.S. Navy Surface Warfare, (Washington, D.C.: Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, 2014), http://www.csbaonline.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/A-Plan-To-Reinvigorate-US-Navy-Surface-Warfare.pdf.
[iv] “LRASM Missiles: Reaching for a Long-Range Punch,” Defense Industry Daily, October 15, 2014, http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/lrasm-missiles-reaching-for-a-long-reach-punch-06752/.
[v] Congressional Research Service, China Naval Modernization: Implications for U.S. Navy Capabilities – Background and Issues for Congress, by Ronald O’Rourke, (Washington, D.C., 2014), 34.
[ix] Richard R. Burgess, “A ‘Year of Transition’ for the P-8A Poseidon,” Seapower, April 9, 2013, http://seapowermagazine.org/sas/stories/20130409-p-8a.html.
[x] Maksim Y. Tokarev, “Kamikazes: The Soviet Legacy,” Naval War College Review, vol. 67, no. 1, (Winter 2014), 61-84. It should be noted that Soviet Tu-95RT “Bear-D” reconnaissance and targeting aircraft were equipped with Uspekh-1 “Big Bulge” maritime search and targeting radar. This system did not feature Inverse Synthetic Aperture Radar (ISAR) capabilities for standoff imaging and identification. The P-8 AAS system and APY-10 search radar both feature ISAR capabilities, simplifying long-range identification challenges. Modern employment scenarios would find ISR aircraft much better able to identify a contact once it had been located and would not be as chaotic as the Soviet experience that Tokarev describes. Maritime targeting still remains an arena that is inherently dynamic and therefore requires proper training to execute reliably and efficiently.
A Geographic Rebalance, Technology, and Diplomacy Must Be Used Together
The challenges of the 2nd decade of the 21st century call for another phase in “strategic asymmetry” in order to preserve the security of the United States’ global strategic interests. The two versions of the successful Cold War Containment strategy; the “New Look” and “Flexible Response” appear on the surface to be completely different approaches. The first advocated reliance on the threat of nuclear war to deter aggressive action by the Soviet Union. The second advanced a graduated series of steps to meet the global Communist threat of which nuclear war was one component and precision-guided munitions one supporting pillar. Both however were committed to deterring nuclear war, maintaining global U.S. strategic interests, and preventing the further spread of the Communist ideology. Each too was relatively well-endowed with financial support from a U.S. government that stood at the military, political, and economic apex of a world otherwise devastated by the effects of two massive global conflicts and associated revolutions and chaos.
Unlike the Cold War period, the present United States cannot exercise the same dominance in all three disciplines of global power. The nation is in a period of relative decline. Many Eurasian nations have recovered from the effects of the conflicts of the 20th century and have assumed positions of global economic, political and in some cases military power. It is a situation similar to the situation challenging the last great liberal democratic power at the dawn of the 20th century.
British Empire 1903
The present U.S. situation is very similar to that of Great Britain at the end of the 19th century. The British faced many challenges to their economic and maritime supremacy. France recovered from multiple Napoleonic disasters and built a rival colonial empire; Japan emerged from centuries of isolation to compete for dominance of the Western Pacific; Germany and Russia tried to develop “webbed feet” and associated maritime ambitions; and the United States turned its energies from “winning the west” to winning the game of global economic competition. Furthermore, the “moral authority” the British had enjoyed relative to much of the rest of the world had been sullied to a degree by atrocities committed by British forces during the 1899-1901 Boer War against Dutch settlers in South Africa. That conflict also had significant financial costs that competed against those of the Royal Navy (RN), the British nation’s traditional strategic guardian, as well as those of a rising welfare state.
The United States confronts a similar scenario. Its traditional Eurasian allies have recovered from the effects of World War II and the Cold War and are now sometimes economic and political rivals. The Russian state born from the wreckage of the Soviet Union now maneuvers to regain lost territory and advantage. China has emerged as the principal U.S. economic competitor and also has maritime ambitions. The moral authority of the United States is now in question, like post-Boer War Britain, after questionable counter-insurgency conflicts in Southwest Asia and a global internet monitoring effort conducted by the National Security Agency (NSA). The wars of the last decade drew money away from efforts to maintain and improve U.S. naval and air forces. The U.S. military also competes with an expanding U.S. welfare state.
The British Grand Fleet
The British solution to their own period of relative decline (well detailed in Aaron Freidberg’s book The Weary Titan) is best described in three steps. British statesmen and military leaders first examined the strategic geography of the British Empire in detail and made a frank assessment of the relative importance of its physical, economic, political, and military components. They conducted a global reduction and re-balance of British naval and military assets that reflected the updated strategic geographic assessment and their own financial limitations. Finally, the British sought accords (both official and unspoken) with a number of nations to implement the new strategic geography. They came to agreements with the French and the Russians on a series of long-simmering colonial competitions, and they signed an alliance with the Japanese in order to secure their Pacific trade lines and possessions. They also accepted the peaceful rise of the United States, a “daughter” liberal democratic power, to its eventual position of leading economic power by 1914 to buttress their own economic system. The end product was a British Empire and associated armed forces better prepared to confront the changing and more volatile 20th century. Britain survived two devastating world wars and although much of its physical empire and supporting military and naval forces declined, that change was demanded and conducted by the British public under far better circumstances than would have occurred in the wake of a military defeat.
There are of course significant risks involved in such a radical re-balancing of forces. Britain’s physical retreat from the Americas and the Pacific in the face of rising American and Japanese power likely pushed the dominions of Canada, Australia, and New Zealand away from direct British influence. British leaders in the late 1920’s, allowed the strength of the British armed forces, especially the Royal Navy to significantly degrade to the point that Britain could no longer provide an effective defense of its Asian possessions. The loss of Singapore and the sinking of HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Repulse was the culmination of 25 years of poor strategic planning. It also wrecked British prestige and was a significant tipping point in the drive for Indian independence and the end of the physical British Empire.
The United States should undertake a similar realistic assessment of its global strategic position. Such a review would include not only land and maritime physical spaces, but also air, space and cyberspace “geography” which equally impact U.S. interests. This review must not be confined to mere budgetary and defense program appraisal, but must carefully examine the nation’s long-term interests. It must determine the most significant threats to the republic, and re-balance naval and military forces within budgetary limits to better confront those perils. Those forces must be both suitable for the geographic areas they defend, highly mobile and able to operationally and strategically re-position as circumstances dictate. While the present threat from both national and non-state actors is complex, some positive changes have taken place in recent years. For the first time since 1942, the United States does not face the threat of an immediate ground war other than on the Korean peninsula. The United States however cannot execute overly draconian cuts and still expect to exercise significant global influence. Some balance must be struck between the needs of the expanding U.S. welfare state, and the military forces that guard its very existence.
Finally, the United States should seek solutions to disagreements with nations and/or non-state actors whose intents and actions do not directly threaten U.S. global interest. The United States should also seek close association with present and rising states that share similar interests, since there is no “heir apparent” waiting to support and perhaps supersede the United States in its role as the defender of traditional liberal values as it was for Great Britain. One potential liberal democratic understudy is India, but other candidates may emerge. Although a rising power with aspirations toward greatness, China cannot be considered as a candidate to replace the United States as guarantor and support of the liberal capitalist system that sustains the global economy. Although perhaps no longer a full-fledged communist nation, China remains an authoritarian corporate state that continues to stifle free speech and expression. China, despite a generally warm welcome in the world economic community has instead chosen to bully its economic partners by needlessly antagonizing its neighbors and contributing to rising instability in East Asia.
US Surface Combatants At Sea
Like Great Britain, the United States can confront challenges to its global interests through an aggressive self-assessment of its strategic goals and means to which they can be accomplished. Unmanned systems, organized in support of traditional manned combat formations in a “Manned and Unmanned” battle concept, offer the United States and Western powers an offensive edge against robust Anti Access/Area Denial (A2/AD) systems. Unmanned systems, however, represent only one component of a greater post-Post Cold War U.S. grand strategy. A technological “offset” alone is insufficient given the expanding threat level that presently confronts U.S. decision-makers. Technological solutions will likely come from civilian industrial sources and be readily duplicated by potential adversaries. Framing the concept of a future grand strategy through unmanned systems, geographic military rebalance, prioritization of threats and movement to accommodate non-threatening, but distracting disputes with others represent the conditions for a successful response to the emerging strategic environment. The United States can still field a capable military force with global reach for a reasonable cost by undertaking such a broad strategic review.
Steve Wills is a retired surface warfare officer and a PhD student in military history at Ohio University. His focus areas are modern U.S. naval and military reorganization efforts and British naval strategy and policy from 1889-1941. He posts here at CIMSEC, sailorbob.com and at informationdissemination.org under the pen name of “Lazarus”.
Join our DC Chapter for its October DC-area informal meet-up/happy hour. We will be meeting at the Hotel Tabard Inn’s Lounge and Bar near the Dupont Circle / Farragut North and West Metro stops to discuss the events of the day (see below) and meet new folk.
Time: Tuesday, 14 October 5:30-9pm Place: 1739 N Street NW
Washington D.C. 20036
For a starter, many of us will be heading to CSIS, 2 blocks away, for the launch of their Maritime Security Dialogue in partnership with the U.S. Naval Institute
All are welcome – RSVPs not required, but appreciated: [email protected]
