(The lead ship of the Zumwalt class Guided missile destroyers, a death star that is light on the death part of the equation).

Our pal Arrias stirred up some controversy in his essay “Lattes for Peace” over the weekend. The retired Naval community can actually say what they think, rather than cower at the feet of their political masters and mistresses. One of my favorite comments was from a retired Bos’n Master Chief and Merchant Marine Master whose comments follow:

“Somehow lost in these discussions is that old long standing debate that existed so long in the pages of the Naval Institute’s PROCEEDINGS the “High / Low Debate”. For years, if not a decade, there was a periodic debate in the pages of the PROCEEDINGS over what was the proper mix of “super ships” and “cheap ships” in the U.S. Fleet;”high” referring to high costs and capabilities, and low referring to low cost and limited capabilities.

In the debate, no “low school” advocating a high ship count low cost / capability fleet ever emerged. The debate was always on the “mix”, the proportion of low cost to high cost weapons platforms. As I recall some time ago the “mix school ” lost out to the super ship school, Navy ship building budgets ever since have been committed to the high cost, globe circling, hyper capable “Death Stars” as one “Mix” advocate described them.

The “Super Ship School” always focused on global commitments, shifting hot zones and the need for range and lethality. The “mix school” liked to remind the “super ship school” that “the lesson of the BISMARK is that a bunch of cheap platforms can gang up on a “Death Star” and take it out. Big or little every ship has only so many arrows in its quiver.”

Cheap and simple little ships that aren’t easy to move out of a limited area can none the less be very lethal. Our global commitments include many areas that we must maintain a constant and capable presence in regardless of what is going on elsewhere. We won’t be able to do that with a 350 ship fleet of super ships.

The key is to separate lethality from range, size, and crew size for “constabulary forces”. A constabulary force is a fleet that maintains presence and combat capability in a limited area near a secure source of logistic support. Its ships don’t need to have trans Atlantic range. Patrols don’t have to be long. Crews could sometimes even be 2 section watches of 12 hours per day similar to the system in use in the US offshore oil industry logistics fleet.

Additional crews (watch sections) could be at the ready in the Naval Reserve if things heated up and more prolonged operations were anticipated. These constabulary vessels aren’t meant to be moved about in response to every crisis. They are meant as deterrents and first responders in areas of constant interest but sporadic threats.

This would include many areas now “protected” by our so called “Sixth Fleet” now made up of mostly visiting warships from the Atlantic Fleet.

How effective can a small ship of limited range be? Individually, that depends on how much on scene endurance and lethality you build into it. In fact many commercial “work boats” that the US offshore oil and mineral industry is virtually having a fire sale on now could easily be made very lethal with some bolt-on weaponry.

These offshore service vessels, small low free-board ships of 165′ to 250′ are built for high on scene endurance to serve as “Stand By Vessels” for offshore rigs. They are twin screw, highly maneuverable, made of mild steel with a lot of compartmentalization due to a design that anticipates occasional service carrying liquid cargoes (drilling mud).

Thus, for some constabulary forces “Craft of Opportunity” (originally designed for other purposes ending by accident in parallel capabilities related to combat). Suppose, the “Death Star Fleet has to leave a constabulary fleet on its own and the constabulary fleets’ AOR is invaded by enemy “death stars.”

Now tactics come into play. First consider the effects of networked fires just to name one smaller ship tactic, and again the the lesson of the BISMARK. Properly planned and organized a constabulary force can hold out a long time and seriously damage a fleet of big expensive war ships.

What the flag officers actually know is that we really need a 600 ship navy for our global commitments, but the High / Low debate ended before most of them graduated from the Academy. Some don’t even have words like “Craft of Opportunity” or “Constabulary Forces” in their vocabularies.

If we can teach a new generation of Flag and Senior officers the skills of craft of opportunity operations and constabulary forces and to get over their fixation on super ship weapons platforms and re-concentrate on how to apply massive amounts of kinetic energy on an enemy cheaply, we could emerge with a serious 600 ship navy for the price of about 375 death stars, not an impossible goal.

Everyone knows today’s politicians are never going to fund a 600 super ship fleet. Unfortunately, not even the Coast Guard has much in the way of officers who remember these skill sets and doctrines. The CG is now focused on its “Deep Water Project,” its first crack at a real purpose built fleet of their own design and they resist any return, even if only in part, to craft of opportunity vessels.

Probably the last people experienced in such things are elderly Merchant Marine Officers like myself, but big Navy never listened to us anyway and we’re so old as a group we are liable to suffer dementia at any moment.

Hell, I might be bonkers even as I’m writing this. But if not I hope someone in authority is listening.”

“Boats”

Having been to this movie before (a couple times) I am inclined to doubt it. But a strong Navy is an important component of the Nation’s defense. I think we ought to talk about it. And then do something.

Vic

Copyright 2017 Vic Socotra and AAB
www.vicsocotra.com