by Kurt Albaugh
Download The Full Article: Six Frigates and the Future of Gunboat Diplomacy
March was a busy month for the Navy. It supported the war against extremism in Afghanistan, led the vanguard of strikes in Libya, boarded suspicious vessels off the Somali coast, and saved life and property in Japan. A month's events couldn't augur more strongly why we need to maintain a global, flexible, versatile Navy. Even with excellent intelligence, we can't know when the Navy will be called to fight, to protect, or to save. By maintaining a widespread presence, the Navy was able to respond to the government's foreign policy objectives with gunboat diplomacy in Libya and aid to the thousands suffering in Japan.
While the Navy was doing the nation's work, congressional testimony described a bleak future. The fiscal reality of today will have a lasting effect on the Department of Defense, and the Navy, of tomorrow. Congressional Budget Office analysis shows that shipbuilding costs are expected to far outpace inflation. Demand for naval forces is high, but as costs to provide those forces grow rapidly, the federal budget is stretched thin, and some are calling to cut the defense budget by as much as one sixth. Even if the Navy can articulate its value to the nation and gain a higher proportion of the defense budget, the larger slice will likely come from a smaller pie. With defense budget cuts looming, the Navy should look to its own history: as our ships once more go to the shores of Tripoli, the philosophy behind the Navy's first ships offers appropriate and instructive lessons on forging American resources into the sword and shield of our republic. The original six frigates of the United States exemplify the qualities the Navy should advocate in its plan to provide the capabilities America expects in a way America can afford.
Download The Full Article: Six Frigates and the Future of Gunboat Diplomacy
Kurt Albaugh currently teaches at the U.S. Naval Academy. A surface warfare officer, he has experience in frigates and destroyers. He is a 2010 recipient of the Surface Navy Association's Arleigh Burke Award for Operational Excellence. The views expressed are his alone.
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I agree, the need for specialized handling and design depends on the size of the USV/UUVs.
What about using large davits like those built for landing craft? A well deck has fewer sizing constraints, but davits don't require ballasting and multiple U*Vs can be launched or recovered at a time.
Another option I've wondered about is using self-deployable but optionally manned vessels. My initial thought is to use something like a small offshore patrol vessel with a low-frequency active towed array. These ships are fairly inexpensive to buy, and have small crews to begin with.
They could be manned during transit periods, or when the SSK threat is low. When it has to go in harm's way, the crew could be helo'd off and the ship could be operated remotely or autonomously.
The need for a well deck is dependant on what scale of UUV and USV ops you want to do. UUVs in particular, to have any chops, are going to be big. Possibly on the order of 100 tons.
http://sitelife.aviationweek.com/ver1.0/Content/images/store/15/14/bfc1…
Its tough (but not impossible) to crane things that big on and off. Or can just satify youseof with UUV/USVs that are just local extensions of the host platform and don't go very far away.
There has been no lack of proposals for alternative future force structures, (The NPS study ref'd above for one) but apparently Navy Leadership is comfortable with the notion that nothing much realy needs to change over the next 40-50 years and we can wait until the 2030s to start seriously considering such proposals.
Given the change in naval capabilities between the 1980s and 2000, this seems to be a plan tht "accepts significnat risk"...
Paul,
I drew this up a while back.
https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0ByVQu4lA4SjvM2Y1MDJhNTctN2Q5Zi00NTM3LT…
It starts with the Gibbs and Cox entrant into the Australian Air Warfare Destroyer program (essentially a baby Burke), modifies it with an Absalon-like bay aft and raises the flight deck and hangar one level. I also added port and starboard mission deck doors with launch and recovery davits behind them as an additional way in and out.
No well deck though. I'm not convinced well decks on warships make sense. Ballasting down and up is a time consuming process. Not good for a warship that might need to maneuver quickly.
Clearly this is just a Photoshop adjustment. No attempt has been made to do any naval engineering analysis.
I kept the forward 32-cell VLS and switched out SPY-1D for the smaller and lighter SPY-3 from DDG-1000.
Kurt, Jim,
Just as the CSG is a distributed collection of platforms for "combat credible" seapower, te low end needs a similar collection of platforms to do the low end half of SC21.
The NPS TSSE "Crossbow" concept gets to this http://www.nps.edu/Academics/GSEAS/TSSE/subPages/2001Project.html
The Navy needs to dramatically overhaul the 30 year shipbuilding plan and harmonize it with SC21, or acknowedge that we have no desire for a "high-low" mix Fleet and address the low end with a cadre of "area experts" that we embed with partner navy's as our means of engagement.
Having done multi-month crossdeck tours on Canadian and RN surface ships back in my Cold Warrior days, I think engagement through crew integration, rather "sending a ship" is an under appreciated option.
If we are going to do the high low thing, then a vessel something like:
http://www.baesystems.com/Newsroom/Newsreleases/autoGen_107810163127.ht…
The key problem with the LCS as far as this goes is the tiny little access from the "warehouse" out to the water. When I toured Indy, I was shocked at how small the "back door" and "elevator up" were compared to the space, and the issue of playing "the sliding number puzzle game" to rearrange things back there to get what you need where you need it.
To me you need a modest size VLS maazine forward, a well-deck aft, and a decent sized hanger and fllight deck. Other countries are deplying combat systems of this type in ships costing around what LCS was originally going to cost. The HME for well decks is well understood.
We need to take SC21 and design a Fleet around it that we want in 2050, and then work back from it. How many CSGs, ARGs and "whatever you call a "cooperative presence and engagement group" Groups.
In order to afford it, we will have to give up several of the fromer, to get any of hte latter.
Thank you all for the comments. If interested, there is a discussion regarding my piece at Raymond Pritchett's blog, <a href="http://www.informationdissemination.net/2011/04/on-modern-heavy-frigate… Dissemination</a>.
The unarticulated centerpiece of my paper is that both CVNs and the LCS program are, as Paul Vebber says, tactically unstable.
The aircraft carrier is simply too valuable to risk in a contested sea environment - something more and more common with asymmetric threats like shore based cruise missiles, ballistic missiles, mines, and cheap, quiet diesel submarines.
Similarly, the LCS is too lightly armed for littoral warfare and the minimally manned crew drastically inhibits the platform's survivability with respect to damage control.
DDGs are expensive, but may be less expensive than other alternatives. They can also defend themselves easily and provide signifcant strike capability. There are other ways to pursue a viable acqusition strategy, and I would direct everyone to a 2009 Naval Postgraduate School <a href="https://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0B8Rk_52AMEzwM2U4OGEyMWEtZTJjNi00OT…; which describes other methods to distribute our naval force more broadly given a constrained budget. In particular, this study advocates (as some have mentioned here) small "pocket carriers" (or modified amphibious ships dedicated to VSTOL aviaton) to conduct small wars in the littoral. Other possible alternatives might look like the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hy%C5%ABga_class_helicopter_destroyer">Hyu… Class Helicopter Destroyer</a>.
Again, thank you all for the comments.
Paul,
With a hybrid concept, are you thinking something like this...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haruna_class_destroyer
or something like this...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absalon_class_flexible_support_ship
?
Our current naval force structure is so high end that we don't really have much in the way of auxiliaries (JHSVs and LCS as they come on line) or patrol vessels (5 not committed to the Persian Gulf and Coast Guard). Amphibs are expensive and require protection.
We have DDGs, and things that require DDGs to protect them. This means that the CS-21 strategic dichotomy of "regionally concentrated, combat credible" force and "globally distributed, mission-tailored" force is really a false one, as any significant degree of risk requires the former to protect the latter.
For now, we are willing to accept that risk. As high end ASCMs, submarines and ballistic missiles proliferate, that may change. There is a not insignificant possibility that a "Cheonan" incident may change that calculus significantly.
To me, the "real" answer is something like the front half of a DDG, and the back half of an LSD. Able to act as a "mothership" for UxVs while being able to defend itself and a modest surrounding area. A pair of such ships could provide a "seabase" for a force of JHSV, LCS, perhaps a hosptial ship, or even another amphib or two, or at least a credible deterrent to an enemy attack.
Paul Vebber,
I agree with you, more Burkes are not the answer.
While they can be independently deployed, they are far more vulnerable than when they are a part of a CVBG.
I'm luke-warm on the idea of buying small, multi-mission frigates though. Shaping and presence missions can be better and more cheaply performed by amphibious ships, naval auxiliaries or offshore patrol vessels.
If we need more punch, we have a number of LHDs and LHAs which can swing-role as light carriers (assuming the F-35B survives). They can form the centerpiece of a minor battle group, as they are off the coast of Libya today.
I am in favor of moving away from the two LCS designs. They just sacrifice too much at the altar of speed. To what, I'm not sure though. Littoral ASW and MIW are very important missions. Recent reports that passive sonar systems (including those on the Virginia-class SSN) may be ineffective against modern SSKs may force a complete re-evaluation of our ASW CONOPS. We may have to shift to unmanned vessels (see ACTUV) with active sonars, or something else entirely.
The premise of the piece, to look for a hybrid between "ship of the line" and "constabulary vessel" is a good one. Where the idea runs into trouble is to equate the CVN with "ship of the line" putting the Burke class in the "tweener" role. LCS is indeed the new "low end" which some argue is lower than others, but it will be a handful of years until its true role will either pan out, require another design stab. The DDG is, in terms of surface combatant, the equivalent of Royal Navy 74s. One cant really compare a CVN with a 74 gun Ship of the Line, as its power projection role is substantially different from the latters role in "Fleet Battle". Our lack of blue water "Fleet Battle" adversarys calls the entire analogy into question. DDGs, like CGs are designed as defensive platforms to fend of attacks on CVNs from air, surface and submarine threats. The investment in the "main battery" to do this has already resulted in what critics argue is too many eggs in too few baskets (see Wayne Hughes "Fleet Tactics" and discussion of 'tactical instability).
While the problem and solution are articulated well, the implementation - to in effect use Ships of the Line to do "sea shaping" and constabulary duties taking them away from defense of aircraft carriers would require a significant increase in the number procured in a 30 year shipbuilding plan that is already dramatically underfunded (See CBO Analysis of the FY 2011 30 year shipbuilding plan). Where the historical role envisioned is for a "5th rate" combatant, the solution offered by the author increases the cost of our "ship of the Line" to enable it to be a Jack of all trades AND Master of all. A solution that is simply unaffordable in the likely budget environment of at least the next 5-10 years.
The 2011 plan currently builds no more than 2 DDGs per year, and only a single one in many years, leading to a CG/DDG force that numbers in the 90s until a precarious drop off to the mid 60s by the mid 2030s. From 2016 to 2034 the current plan will build about 30 Flight III DDGs which will be our front line BMD ships, CVN escorts, and ASW platforms. To suggest that these ships could these missions AND the historical 'heavy frigate missions, in DDG force 2/3 of what we have today is to either leave an even significantly reduced CVN force dangerously under protected, or assume that these low end missions will trump BMD defense in an era when BMD proliferation is projected to be significant.
The argument is the right one, but the answer is not making a 2 billion dollar ship of the line cost 2.5 billion, but to introduce a true modern "heavy frigate" that is likely to look something like a cross between an LCS and the current multi-mission frigates like Singapores Formidable class or Indias Shivalik Class
Bob:
Agree, nicely put.
I think one can make the same argument for the Army too, that if it can do its core competencies well it can shift to other directions and other missions fairly easily. But like Mr Albaugh argues in this piece, to go from an "IW" built force to high intensity combat, the transition would not be easy and likely to cost a lot of blood and treasure.
gian
I enjoyed "Six Frigates" when I read it a couple years ago, and I enjoyed this piece as well.
The argument makes sense to me, and I frankly never did understand the push for the LCS. Sure, most populaces are along the littoral regions, but the primary, no-fail mission of our navy to maintain freedom of seas is accomplished in blue waters, rather than brown.
IMO we need a navy that is trained, organized, missioned and equipped to focus on that vital, historic, strategic mission for our nation. Freeing them of ill-conceived IW concepts, as well as from many residual Cold War missions that need a hard review, will allow them that focus without breaking the bank.