Tag Archives: Navy

Bradley Manning and a History of Intelligence Leaks

November 28, 2012 3:49 PM

U.S. Army Pfc. Bradley E. Manning, the soldier accused of the largest leak of state secrets in U.S. history, plans to speak in a pretrial hearing this week. It will be his first opportunity to speak publicly since his arrest in May 2010.

Pfc. Bradley Manning, U.S. Army Photo

Manning is accused of giving the anti-secrecy organization WikiLeaks thousands of documents related to the ongoing war in Afghanistan.

While Manning’s case is the most prolific leak in U.S. history, he is far from the first.

Close Air Support: The Pioneering Years

By: Col. Joseph H. Alexander, USMC (Retired)

November 19, 2012 3:24 PM

Naval History, December 2012
Marine aviators’ commitment to deliver support to ground forces—a tactic once deemed too dangerous—grew into a hallowed hallmark of the Corps.

Modern Marine Corps aviation is a powerful combat arm, organized and equipped to perform its primary functions of assault support, antiaircraft warfare, offensive air support, electronic warfare, control of aircraft and missiles, and reconnaissance. ¹The integration of those roles enables the air-combat component to fully support the ground-combat campaign. Mastery of those functions also allows Marine aviation to achieve its most distinctive competence—the ability to deliver close air support (CAS) to Marines on the ground.

Close air support is defined as “air action by fixed- and rotary-wing aircraft against hostile targets that are in close proximity to friendly forces and require detailed integration of each air mission with the fire and movement of those forces.” ²Inherently dangerous to airmen and infantry alike, this extreme form of fire support requires extraordinary coordination to deliver safely. Marine riflemen take a personal interest in the proximity of close air. “Close” to them means damned close, and they know it when they see it.

Book Review: The Generals by Tom Ricks

By: John Nagl

November 8, 2012 2:45 PM

Thomas E. Ricks, The Generals: American Military Command from World War II to Today. New York: Penguin, 2012. 558 pp. $32.95.

When Tom Ricks published Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq in the summer of 2006, the impact was immediate and extraordinary. The book shredded any pretense that the Bush administration knew what it was doing in Iraq and also brought to light myriad failures of the American military establishment in the war. A Naval Academy graduate and a senior U.S. senator told me that he could only read a few pages before having to take a walk around the block to cool down so that he could see straight enough to continue reading. He was not the only reader to react strongly to Fiasco; the book became a number one New York Times bestseller and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize.

Fiasco contributed to a reassessment of military strategy in Iraq and focused attention on the failures of American military leadership in that war. One of the most pointed indictments came from inside the Army when my friend Lt. Col. Paul Yingling published an essay titled “A Failure of Generalship.” Yingling noted the Army’s failures to prepare for the Iraq war and to adapt to its requirements during the course of the conflict; his most damning line noted that “As matters stand now, a private who loses a rifle suffers far greater consequences than a general who loses a war.”

Submarine Stormtroops

By: Maj. Scott Cuomo, USMC and Billy Birdzell

November 7, 2012 2:39 PM

Proceedings, November 2012
An unconventional spin on the Marine tradition of forcible amphibious entry could counter modern A2/AD threats—at little expense and with minimal training.

The year is 2020. A country has attacked a U.S. ally and seized multiple islands. Simultaneously, it has flooded the area with guided rockets, artillery, mortars and missiles (G-RAMMs). Intelligence has identified three separate anti-ship cruise missile (ASCM) and anti-air (AA) locations on one island that must be destroyed before a U.S. aircraft carrier battle group or amphibious ready group (ARG) can aid our ally. Intelligence also suggests the enemy has hidden mobile ASCM and AA capabilities. All assets are protected by a dispersed, company-size enemy force. Through commercial and proprietary satellite coverage, the aggressor can locate and target U.S. Navy ships. That country does not know, however, where U.S. submarines are.

The President convenes the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) and asks what can be done.

Marines operate from the USS Hawaii U.S. Marine Corps photo

“We can execute precision-guided munition (PGM) strikes,” the chairman responds, “but that cannot guarantee the destruction of all sites, nor can the destruction of sites we hit be confirmed. Nor can we guarantee destruction of the enemy’s mobile weapons using PGMs alone.”The Chief of Naval Operations observes: “Until the ASCM and AA threat are destroyed, we can’t move our $14 billion aircraft carrier (USS Gerald R. Ford) or $4 billion amphibious assault ship (USS America) within 300 miles of that island.”

“Mr. President,” notes the commander, Special Operations Command, “we have some ability to confirm the destruction of the sites, but limited manpower prevents us from securing terrain or destroying enemy garrisons.”

History of the USS Enterprise

By: Cid Standifer

November 6, 2012 2:37 PM

On Sunday USS Enterprise, the first nuclear powered aircraft carrier, arrived at Naval Station Norfolk, Va. after its final deployment. For 50 years Enterprise was involved in every major U.S. conflict and is now scheduled for decommissioning.

Cid Standifer is a freelance reporter, web designer and translator based in Arlington, Va. She has written for Military Times, Inside Washington Publishers and the Roswell Daily Record.

Both Obama and Romney Proposals Don’t Meet Navy Requirements

By: Ryan M. McKeon

November 2, 2012 2:29 PM

In the run-up to Election Day, both campaigns have put an increased focus on national security, foreign policy and defense spending. President Barack Obama has touted, among other things, the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq, a strategic pivot to the Asian-Pacific and the killing of Osama bin Laden. Republican nominee Mitt Romney has criticized the President for his policies in the Middle East, decried defense-spending cuts from the Department of Defense efficiency push and the congressionally mandated sequestration process, and said he plans to pump more money into the Pentagon budget.

Most recently, Obama and Romney have clashed over Navy force structure. The President’s plan invests in nearly ten new ships a year, bringing the aggregate to 307 vessels by 2042. The Romney camp is advocating a 350-ship Navy based on a procurement rate of 15 ships per year.

Both Obama and Romney want to buy more submarines, destroyers and aircraft carriers, but Romney also wants a new frigate and a dedicated missile-defense ship. Both the President and his challenger are advocating more tactical fighter aircraft, including a mix of F/A-18s and F-35s. Romney advisers have said they want more of the legacy Hornets, in addition to the new joint-service platform and want to add an 11th carrier air wing, to match air units to each of the Navy’s eleven aircraft carriers.

The two also differ on the total number of ships the Navy needs. At the 19 October foreign policy debate, Romney stuck by his call for a 350-ship fleet. “Our Navy is smaller now than any time since 1917,” Romney said. “I want to make sure we have the ships that are required by our Navy.”

The stand prompted one of the more terse exchanges between the two candidates during this cycle.

Ohio-class Replacement Details

By: Sam LaGrone

November 1, 2012 12:37 PM

The Ohio-class Replacement nuclear powered ballistic missile submarine (SSBN) is the Navy’s planned sea-based strategic nuclear deterrent. U.S. Navy officials outlined the capabilities of the boat this month.

“The Ohio Replacement is not, is not, a multi-mission platform,” Capt. William Brougham, US Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA) Ohio-class Replacement Program Manager, said at the 2012 Naval Submarine League Symposium in Falls Church, Va. on Oct. 18.
“We don’t turn into a multi-mission platform that’s going to go off and do things that you see on television,” he said.

The Ohio Replacement is scaled back from the initial Analysis of Alternatives (AoA) for the program, then dubbed SSBN(X), conducted by NAVSEA in 2009. The initial AoA called for a boat that would have cost $6 to 7 billion but with the reduction in capability the Ohio Replacement drove costs down to $5.6 billion a copy. The eventual goal of the reductions is to produce the boats at $4.9 billion a copy.

Timeline of the Polaris Missile

By: Cid Standifer

October 31, 2012 12:33 PM

On late October 1963, USS Andrew Jackson launched first Polaris A-3 missile from a submerged submarine, off Cape Canaveral, Florida. The Polaris program served as the template for the current Trident missile program which forms the backbone of the US strategic sea-based deterrent.

Cid Standifer is a freelance reporter, web designer and translator based in Arlington, Va. She has written for Military Times, Inside Washington Publishers and the Roswell Daily Record.

Shifting Targets

By: Capt. Gerard D. Roncolato, USN (Retired)

October 30, 2012 12:31 PM

Proceedings, October 2012
We must reconsider our strategic perspective and organizational culture amid an emerging naval revolution.

Today’s U.S. Navy faces trying times in every dimension. Accelerating technological trends are stressing naval development and adaptability, while the Army and Marine Corps contend with costly rebuilding after the long wars in southwest Asia. Yet domestic economic and infrastructure demands and the growing national deficit are cutting into defense resources. After a half-century of U.S. maritime dominance, rival naval powers are emerging. While technological developments threaten accelerated depreciation of the Navy’s capital assets, growing international competition, rising costs, and declining resources all pose severe challenges.

The rules of the game are changing in fundamental ways. Is the Navy organizationally and culturally prepared? Specifically, will the systems currently under development help expand or reduce the range of scenarios in which the service can be effective? What balance should be struck between investing in legacy systems rather than emerging technologies? These are questions we should be investigating.

Naval support for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq has been critical for a decade, but the Navy has been unable to focus on sea control and naval warfare at the same time. Marines and sailors with Regimental Combat Team 8 conducted Operation Eastern Seal in Helmand province in November 2011. U.S. Marine Corps Photo

During the past ten years, naval support for the land wars in Afghanistan and Iraq has been substantial and critical, even if largely unnoticed by the American public and political leadership. But this effort has come with a cost: the Navy has been unable to concentrate on its broader missions of sea control and naval warfare. Future strategic perspective will have to shift from one of small wars to the full range of naval warfare. In this process, history can play a productive role. Scholars believe history helps us empathize with the past and see it on its own terms, while decision-makers often look to it for lessons that shape solutions to real-time problems. Even though that approach runs the risk of superficial and inappropriate analogies, properly conducted case studies can broaden perspectives, illuminate issues, and structure questions that are key to informed and creative problem-solving.

Man of War

By: Alan Rems

October 29, 2012 12:27 PM

On Oct. 29, 1814 The U.S. Navy launched its first steam powered warship, designed by Robert Fulton.

Naval History Magazine, August 2011
After inventing weapons for foreign powers, Robert Fulton built the world’s first steam warship for America, a vessel that might have transformed naval warfare if fate had allowed.

The outpouring of public mourning when Robert Fulton died, on 23 February 1815 at age 49, was unprecedented for an American private citizen. The passing of a mind that was considered a major national asset caused The New York Evening Post to lament, “His is the only loss for which the public has no indemnity.”

Fulton’s best-known achievement, the development of steamboat travel, largely centered in his last decade after he had spent nearly 20 years in Europe. Leading a sometime unconventional life overseas, Fulton developed and employed naval armaments for France and Britain at a time both countries posed threats to the new nation. Fortunately for his reputation and ambitions, it was an age when private lives of the famous mostly stayed private and citizens could negotiate deals with foreign nations that now might be considered treasonous. Redeeming himself during the War of 1812, Fulton built the world’s first steam warship to defend New York City. However, events prevented a demonstration of the vessel’s unique qualities in battle and an opportunity for Fulton to revolutionize naval warfare as he did transportation.

Influenced by his father’s bankruptcy and family hardship after the father’s early death, Fulton avidly pursued material success all his life. An early ambition was to win fame and fortune as an artist. To obtain training and exposure at the center of the art world, Fulton journeyed to London in 1787 armed with a letter of introduction to noted American artist Benjamin West. Generous in his support of young American artists, West was just one in a succession of influential people who, charmed by the handsome, diligent, and self-assured Fulton, helped to advance his career. Commissioned to paint the portrait of Viscount William Courtenay, a flamboyant young homosexual, Fulton stayed with him a year and a half, winning further commissions from Courtenay’s companions. Although little else is known about that time, Fulton probably participated in his host’s activities to some extent, which might help to explain his unconventional lifestyle later.

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