We Need More Carriers and More Marines

Recent developments in the Middle East have driven home two points that members of the Navy/Marine Corps team have known for decades: The U.S. needs more aircraft carriers and more Marines to man Amphibious Ready Groups.

The early stages of Operation Enduring Freedom were complicated by the refusal of several key Middle East "allies" to allow U.S. forces to stage out of U.S. facilities within their borders.

The key example has been Saudi Arabia. Not only did Saudi Arabia not allow U.S. aircraft to strike Afghanistan during Enduring Freedom, they have, until very recently, steadfastly refused us basing rights in any campaign to rid the world and the region of Saddam Hussein's regime and Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.

Saudi Arabia has been anything but a reliable ally, however, even well-meaning allies in the region are subject to internal and external pressures that could limit American military flexibility in a variety of military operations. In Muslim and Arab nations in particular, America is often unpopular among the masses and regimes in the area are often in untenable positions. The Saudi regime is particularly unstable with an unhappy populous and Wahabbi Jihadists waiting in the wings--even within the royal family.

Now we find that even our NATO ally Turkey is waffling on the use of Turkish soil to go after Iraq, sending mixed signals over whether to allow U.S. aircraft to fly from Turkish bases and refusing outright to allow U.S. ground forces to invade Iraq through Turkey.

The problem is nothing new. In April of 1986, France refused to allow U.S. F-111s to fly from England over France to raid Libya in response to a terrorist attack.

Many of these problems will be ironed out...this time. But they make prior planning very difficult. How can a U.S. commander plan operations not knowing for sure where his forces can stage and fly from? And in future operations necessitated by the war on terrorism or other nations with weapons of mass destruction in the region (notably Iran), who knows what allied support we would have?

Moreover, outside the region, there are other hot spots that could present similar problems: the Korean peninsula, the Taiwan strait to name two. Would Japan and South Korea allow U.S. aircraft to raid Kim Jong il's nuclear complexes? If we had to defend Taiwan, where would we stage from?

All of this points in one direction. In order to defend our own national security, we must have the capability to bring powerful forces to bear which are independent of allies often fettered by domestic political considerations, weakness and outright fear.

The most flexible and realistic means are naval forces: the Navy-Marine Corps team. The key forces in that team are the Carrier Battle Groups (CVBGs) and Amphibious Ready Groups (ARGs).

Carrier battle groups are obviously task forces centered around aircraft carriers. They usually include one carrier and 4 to 5 cruisers, destroyers and frigates as escorts--along with a nuclear powered submarine.

Amphibious Ready Groups are task forces containing amphibious transport vessels such as LHDs, LHAs, LPDs and LSDs. These ARGs usually consist of one LHA or LHD accompanied by a pair of LSDs or LPDs. Embarked on board is a Marine Expeditionary Unit (Special Operations Capable) (MEU(SOC)). That unit is a Marine Air-Ground Task Force (MAGTF) consisting of a reinforced rifle battalion with armor, artillery, helicopter and fixed wing aviation support. It consists of about 2,000 Marines. Larger MAGTFs are the Marine Expeditionary Brigade (MEB) and the Marine Expeditionary Force (MEF). These units are unique in the world in that they are self-contained warfighting units with everything needed--including the beans, bullets and band-aids to keep fighting for at least 30 days.

These forces can steam anywhere that we choose in international waters, provide a visible deterent force, and strike quickly to defend American lives and security around the world. They are America's 911 force. They are not designed to fight extended, fixed-piece campaigns. They are strike forces designed to "kick in the door" or punish an adversary and get out. In other words, they are exactly what we need in today's world: flexible forces unfettered by allied intransigence with enough firepower and staying power to take on any foe short of a superpower confrontation.

The problem is this: we don't have enough CVBGs or ARGs any more. And the ones we have are overused and overworked.

Today we have 12 carriers in service, with as many as 3 or 4 in long-term maintenance or overhaul at any point in time. Twelve simply is not enough.

In the late 1970s and 1980s, the Navy created a program called SLEP (Service Life Extension Program). This program was a modernization program that was designed to extend the service life of each aircraft carrier from 30 to 45 years. Had the Navy been allowed to follow through with that program, we would have at our disposal, right now, as many as 17 aircraft carriers. (Of course we would not have the airplanes or personnel that make aircraft carriers what they are, but that is a different subject.)

The USS Forrestal went through a SLEP and was decommissioned after only 38 years of service. The USS Saratoga went through a SLEP and was decommissioned after 38 years of service. Neither ship is even available for recommissioning any more.

The USS Ranger went through a SLEP and was decommissioned after 36 years of service. The USS Independence lasted 39 years.

Not one of these ships stayed in service for the 45 years they were designed to last simply because the Clinton administration was intent on cutting the military. But it gets worse.

The USS America was decommissioned after only 31 years of service and never even went through the SLEP program. Her sisters USS Kitty Hawk and USS Constellation, both now headed to the Persian Gulf will never go through a SLEP and will be decommissioned soon---after a SLEP in the early 1990s--with nearly the full 45 years service.

We need more aircraft carriers. As part of his defense build-up, President Bush needs to establish a plan to increase America's carrier might. The same goes for the ships and equipment of the Amphibious Ready Groups.

In the early stages of Enduring Freedom, it was carrier based aircraft that provided almost all of the air support. And when U.S. ground forces deployed into Afghanistan, they were led by a Marine Expeditionary Unit which was deployed inland from the sea--further inland in fact that any Marine unit in history.

In the future, we will need these forces more and more to bring the war home to the Jihadists in places like Iran and the Bekaa Valley and to prevent rogue regimes such as those in Iran and Libya from obtaining or using weapons of mass destruction. Without a properly funded and equipped Navy-Marine Corps team, the issue will be in doubt.

All your carrier are belong to us.

The Sunburn combines a Mach 2.5 speed with a very low-level flight pattern that uses violent end maneuvers to throw off defenses. After detecting the Sunburn, the U.S. Navy Phalanx point defense system may have only 2.5 seconds to calculate a fire solution - not enough time before the devastating impact of a 750 lb. warhead. Besides Russia, the PRC and Iran are known to posess Sunburn.

The Corsair could allow the Navy to operate in coastal waters, within range of shore-base anti-shipping cruise missiles, according to proponents of the concept.

Mike, are you sure these guys are on *our* side?

Build a ship sized so that a single missile hit will be totally crippling. Pack it with expensive aircraft, so overloaded that there will be very little tonnage to devote to fire control and point defence. Give it a crew so small that damage control capability will be non-existant. Send it into harms way of shore-based missile systems.

Yep, that's a plan.

Mike, are you sure these guys are on *our* side? Build a ship sized so that a single missile hit will be totally crippling. Pack it with expensive aircraft, so overloaded that there will be very little tonnage to devote to fire control and point defence. Give it a crew so small that damage control capability will be non-existant. Send it into harms way of shore-based missile systems. Yep, that's a plan.

During World War II, Escort Carriers were designated CVE's. They included the Casablanca Class at 6,730 tons which carried 28 aircraft and the Commencement Bay Class at 12,000 tons which carried 34 aircraft.

The CVE crews joked that what "CVE" really stood for was "Combustible, Vulnerable and Expendable".

If you can't fight 2 wars simultaniously, you cannot afford to fight any war, since you will be vulnerable.

And you can't afford to fight two wars simultaneously because you will be vulnerable, unless you can fight THREE wars simultaneously...but then you might have to fight three, so you'd better have enough forces to fight four...no, five...

Are you beginning to see that we have a wee bit of a problem with your theory?

The "two-war strategy" was far less about actually the military being able to perform its mission in the post-Cold War era and far more about protecting its budgetary turf. And in the name of protecting its budget, the Army allowed itself to be used as an international meals-on-wheels force.

It also wouldn't be as vulnerable to nukes as surface ships, provided we could get it to go a little deeper, no?

Only in shallow water--the Van Dorn effect. But you'd have to FIND the sucker first, and that is nontrivial.

Gosh, in a non-CEC world, that's a formidable weapon.

In a CEC world, that thing's dead before it clears the launch rail.

While the JDAM has lessened the acuteness of the need for battleships, I have yet to see an aircraft that can remain on station for a long period of time, and take the abuse a battleship can - and then still accomplish its mission.

As Sergei Gorshkov put it: "You Americans do not realize what formidable warships you have in these four battleships. We have concluded after careful analysis that these magnificent ships are in fact the most to be feared in your entire naval arsenal. When engaged in combat we could throw everything we have at those ships and all our firepower would bounce off or be of little effect. Then when we are exhausted, we will detect you coming over the horizon and then you will sink us."

As Sergei Gorshkov put it: "You Americans do not realize what formidable warships you have in these four battleships. We have concluded after careful analysis that these magnificent ships are in fact the most to be feared in your entire naval arsenal. When engaged in combat we could throw everything we have at those ships and all our firepower would bounce off or be of little effect. Then when we are exhausted, we will detect you coming over the horizon and then you will sink us."

First, I sincerely doubt Gorshkov ever said that. The capital ship of the Soviet Navy was the submarine, and (a) submarines are not vulnerable to being sunk by a battleship, and (b) the Soviet Navy could very well sink a battleship without unduly straining themselves. 4 Type 65 wake-homing torpedoes would be enough to mission-kill a battleship--one nuclear torpedo would be enough to sink it outright.

Second, the battleship is simply not logistically supportable in this day and age, and reconstituting the logisitic support infrastructure would probably cost less than providing same for a new-build fire support vessel with the latest technology.

According to what I've read, the Iranians have Sunburn, which they acquired from the Chinese. Sunburn can be launched from land, small patrol boats, or larger 'wessels. When the US Navy sails through the Stait of Hormuz, the Iranians like to move their stuff south in response and watch. As crazy as those mullahs are over there, I'm sure no-one underestimates the danger. Remember how deadly the subsonic Exocets were in the 80s? If Sunburn has a range of 80 miles, you can probably counter it by making sure nothing survives within that radius. You would have to strike first, which raises the stakes politically.

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