A Bigger Navy and the Spirit of 2007
Don't look back to 2014, 2010, or 1916 for cues on how big the U.S. Navy should be. Read why American navalists should focus on 2007.
Debates about naval force structure are in the news again, as a number of Republican presidential candidates are calling for a larger fleet, just as Mitt Romney did in 2012. As in 2012, references to having a Navy that is as small as it has been since 1916 are greeted with healthy skepticism, as today’s ships are considerably more capable than those of a century ago. Such skepticism is then countered with the undeniable truth that a ship cannot be in two places at one time, and that our position of world leadership demands naval presence in more places to more effect than was the case in 1916. Both sides have good points.
A more effective justification for a larger Navy — the one Romney used in 2012 and which is being relied upon to some extent by 2016 candidates (Christie, Kasich, Graham, and Rubio, among others) — comes from the report of the National Defense Panel (NDP), a congressionally mandated body constituted to review and provide independent judgment on the work of the Quadrennial Defense Review. Romney highlighted the work of the 2010 NDP, and today’s candidates point to the 2014 NDP. Neither of these panels relied on comparisons to the 1916 fleet as a guide to the future. Rather, both looked back to the Clinton-era Bottom-Up Review (BUR) as a logical tent pole for their recommendations. The logic they applied was fairly simple: The BUR force of 346 ships represented the best judgement available about the fleet size required for our national security at what was arguably the least threatening time in our recent history. In their view, today’s world is at least as dangerous as it was then, and therefore, our current fleet of 273 ships is woefully deficient, as is our planned fleet of 308.
This logic falls flat with some, as they believe the baseline predates most of the precision-guided weapons revolution, and so it provides an inappropriate measure against which to compare today’s fleet. Perhaps, and so as to take this criticism seriously, I offer a similar line of logic extending from a more recent baseline — the year 2007.
Why 2007? Three reasons: First, the 2007 National Defense Authorization Act altered Title X to require 11 aircraft carriers, rather than the previously required 12. Second, the Navy’s 2008 30-Year Shipbuilding plan was submitted to Congress in February 2007, a document that called for a 313-ship Navy. Finally, in October 2007, the sea services released a maritime strategy known as “The Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower”, a document that specified two “hubs” for forward deployed credible combat power, one in the Western Pacific and one in the Arabian Gulf/Indian Ocean (I led the writing team that produced this document).
Aggregated, these three pieces of evidence provide a guide for the sort of Navy the United States needs to advance its national interests in the post-Cold War world.
Let us compare that to the fleet of today, and the planned fleet. We currently have 10 aircraft carriers in service, which will remain the case until USS FORD (CVN 78) is commissioned next year (the Navy received a waiver from Congress to temporarily deviate from 11). As stated before, the size of the fleet is 273 ships and the latest Navy 30-Year Shipbuilding Plan (meticulously analyzed here) submitted in March 2015, has a goal of a 308-ship Navy.
Meanwhile, since the baseline year of 2007, we have seen a continuation of the instability and Islamic radicalism upon which that fleet analysis was based, and added to it, accelerating great power competition with both China and Russia, and increasing instability from Mesopotamia to North Africa. Yet the fleet of today is five ships smaller than the Navy of 2007, and the planned Navy of the future retains that five-ship deficit. Those who point to the possibility of relief from Middle Eastern commitments stemming from the nuclear deal with Iran likely misread the impact of an economically unbound Iran and its capacity to agitate its neighbors.
Quite simply, it is difficult to argue that the Navy of today is better resourced or planned for the 2007 security environment than the 2007 Navy was, let alone for the environment we face today and in the foreseeable future. The Navy continues to respond to demands in the forward combat power hubs articulated in the 2007 strategy, even as the need to return in force to the Mediterranean goes largely unfilled. More to the point, even without a strong Mediterranean presence, average deployment lengths have increased to between eight and nine months — wearing out both ships and crew — and the CENTCOM carrier presence will be gapped for several months this fall.
In summary, presidential candidates of either party who advocate for a larger Navy need not harken back to 1916 or 1993 for relevant comparisons and analytical baselines. The year 2007 works nicely, and supports a straightforward argument for a larger Navy.
Bryan McGrath is the Managing Director of The FerryBridge Group LLC and is the assistant director of Hudson Institute’s Center for American Seapower.
Photo credit: Official U.S. Navy Imagery
Kurt Spears 
Ed Johnson 
applesauce 
JPJ Rules 
CBCalif 
Jeff 
CHRISTOPHER BOWEN 
John King 
Today’s situation is far different from 2007 in that China’s area denial systems and growing navy present a far greater maritime challenge than was apparent then (nor can we forget Russia). We have all the same issues as then plus a lot more. Which is all complicated by the long lead time to design, build, and deploy warships.
Even worse, we cannot simply throw money at the situation for the same reason that the Navy has shrunken to dangerous levels. Our parlous fiscal shape and the growing burden of entitlement spending is the true villain here, and without solving those issues, even were we to try to build more ships now, we would only be facing another situation such as this shortly thereafter.
Navy has NOT “Shrunken down to dangerous levels”. Present levels are more than adequate to deal with present threats, and will extend US Naval superiority 20 years into the future. Let me know when ISIS gets a Navy, OK? Let me know when Putin gets a Navy, and when the PRC has a working Carrier Group that is not made of plywood and cardboard..
the russian navy may be a shadow of is former self but that doesnt mean its not there, the newest subs(yasen, borei) are as good as any operated by the U.S, and its current ships, while aging, still pack a deadly punch in the form of asm’s. and china’s carrier is not plywood and cardboard, youre thinking of iran. the chinese carrier may be second hand and smaller than american ones but it still works well enough, theyre still working on getting full operations underway, but all the components are there, escorts, subs, carrier jets etc. and like many have said, the US isnt just planning for the adversaries today, but also 10, 20 years down the line. china has already started construction on its second overall, first domestically made carrier, and by all accounts will have 6 or more carrier groups in the medium term and most of that is concentrated in a small area, certainly not globally like the USN, thus their concentration of firepower is likely to be greater
The speeches of the candidates advocating for a bigger Navy are empty unless they contain a direct connection to a set of geo-political policies that requires the fleet. As yet, none have done so, and I suspect none will. They don’t want to look like Romney up on the debate stage and get shelled for discussing force structure with no context supporting his argument.
There is no passion in the dry mathematical force-vs-force analytical methodologies of any/all of our force-sizing processes (like QDR). Nobody outside Washington really cares about historical size or relative capability.
It is time to unlimber some historical comparisons and tie them to the future. The navalist community must explain the “why” behind the necessity for naval force in a more coherent fashion that is understandable outside of the Beltway.
It is accurately stated that “the undeniable truth [is] that a ship cannot be in two places at one time, and that our position of world leadership demands naval presence in more places to more effect than was the case” during the past 10 years. Logically, it should be obvious that need cannot be offset by a small number of ships with more accurate weapons systems.
Granted, it is the Nation’s executive which determines the political / strategic goals they desire to achieve and it is certainly up to the country’s President as to whether they wish to have the appearance of force or even to use force in a given conflict of interests around the world. It is also a given, however, that the number of ships — combatants and Auxiliary Vessels and Squadrons, in our current Fleet are insufficient in number (or armament) to enable us to maintain a viable presence in multiple theaters on a continuing basis. As a result, when needed the U.S. did have a Carrier Task Group and an Amphibious Ready Group in the Mediterranean Sea when the U.S. facilities were attacked. If those Task Groups and Marines had been available a, “willing” President could have taken the forceful actions needed to have saved at least some of the American personnel that lost their lives in Benghazi.
Sending three Destroyer Escort size LCS’s into the South China Sea to make our presence there known to the Chinese is simply laughable. It informs them we lack the Naval Strength to enforce the claims by the U.S. Secretary of State to our rights of freedom of seas in that area. That is not my personal belief, but it has been repeatedly publicly asserted by Secretary Clinton (HRC) and her successor Secretary Kerry. If the U.S. is going to back up its claims in that area, we need to maintain a much larger Naval Task Force in that area with elements of it continually patrolling at sea. In addition, logic demands that we also need a large Air Force presence in that area stationed on the unsinkable carrier – the Philippine Islands, as well as an Army anti-missile and A2AD presence in that land.
In addition to the above, if the U.S. wishes to attempt to influence the North Koreans through the presence of an American military force, than we should have a large Task Force with numerous Aegis Missile System Ships, a substantial number of ASW capable ships, and VP aircraft in that area. The latter two due to the number of Submarines possessed by the North Koreans. In addition we should maintain multiple Aircraft Carriers in that area to provide CAP style protection for the surface ships.
Logic notes that the U.S. should maintain the same type of capability in both the Persian Gulf and the surrounding waters outside of that body of water to deter any Iranian threat. It also appears that the U.S. will need to / should contribute Destroyer / LCS type vessels to the anti-piracy efforts of the coast of Africa and we should back up that effort with both a Carrier Task Group and an Amphibious Task Group carrying a Battalion plus size Marine Expeditionary Group.
Also, the Navy needs ships to support any effort it provides in the Caribbean for anti-drug smuggling and other tasks, and the Navy needs the number of Submarines required to support their deployments for both strategic (nuclear response) reasons and for their tactical missions.
A 271 or so ship Navy cannot possibly provide for those on-going deployments, and having once been a Navy Officer, in my estimation we would have difficulty adequately providing the needed number of vessels (combatants, submarines, and auxiliary combined) for those efforts with a 400 ship Navy. Numbers have a quality of their own when attempting to position oneself to give the appearance of control or dominance of the seas. No other nation or group will be impressed by the alleged targeting superiority of weapons systems carried on today’s ships – especially given that the firing tubes for many of these systems are not visible to the public; but thy will be impressed by the presence of many ships which will make them think twice or more before acting contrary to America’s interests around the world.
This is a great report. Not much about DDG-1000 ships & Cruiser replacement.
The best investment of federal funds since 1940 is our military. And parenthetically, mandatory service plus the GI Bill provided the greatest educational system we have had: many otherwise unprovided-for learned their trades through military service. Apart from size and quantity, our military personnel have been in constant battle for decades, thereby gaining face time experience and testing of equipment and tactics that neither Russia nor China can approximate. Boots, anchors, and wings are essential and a fully stack deck for the Navy a duty for Congress and the President. Playing with defense as though it were equivalent in national importance to entitlements and same sex marriage is irresponsible. This is a game we dare not lose.
Many goods points by the commentators. The Fleet size needs to be justified in comparison to the real threats. Which is why my version of a strategic QDR assessment (which should be done by an independent panel with less than half military and military-related civilians) would focus on a matrix that consists of list of threats (category) and capabilities (subcategory) down the left column, with geographic regions across the top of the columns. Unlike the current QDR process to populate ALL the cells with American flags, the individual cells would be populated with a combination of American, NATO, other, no flags. That would characterize each cell as being a real threat, against which forces would be assigned. We’d acknowledge international responsibility and participation by including their flags in some cells. Acknowledgment of a potential threat with no/low current risk would be no flags in a cell. Additionally, an acknowledged risk that didn’t require a full-time presence would include a “shadow” or “ghost” flag. This matrix would clearly highlight that the U.S. can’t and shouldn’t try to do it all. We have neither the responsibilities nor the resources. Lacking such an accurate assessment from a strategic point, NONE of the current U.S. “strategy” documents are accurate. And, in my opinion, the U.S. Fleet size is adequate for its real missions. After all, why do we need to send American warships into “Chinese” waters to guarantee freedom of the sea, when it’s Chinese ships, carrying Chinese goods, to their “Chinese customers” (meaning WalMart, et al). Let them build a navy to do it! Time to end our subsidy for protecting their commercial shipping industry.