U.S. Naval War College U.S. Naval War College Digital Commons Newport Papers Special Collections 2-2014 Writing to Think Robert C. Rubel Follow this and additional works at: https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/usnwc-newport-papers Recommended Citation Rubel, Robert C., "Writing to Think" (2014). Newport Papers. 41. https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/usnwc-newport-papers/41 This Book is brought to you for free and open access by the Special Collections at U.S. Naval War College Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Newport Papers by an authorized administrator of U.S. Naval War College Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. NAVAL WAR COLLEGE NEWPORT PAPERS 41 NAVAL WAR COLLEGE WAR NAVAL Writing to Think The Intellectual Journey of a Naval Career NEWPORT PAPERS NEWPORT 41 Robert C. Rubel Cover This perspective aerial view of Newport, Rhode Island, drawn and published by Galt & Hoy of New York, circa 1878, is found in the American Memory Online Map Collections: 1500–2003, of the Library of Congress Geography and Map Division, Washington, D.C. The map may be viewed at http://hdl.loc.gov/ loc.gmd/g3774n.pm008790. Writing to Think The Intellectual Journey of a Naval Career Robert C. Rubel NAVAL WAR COLLEGE PRESS Newport, Rhode Island meyers$:___WIPfrom C 032812:_Newport Papers:_NP_41 Rubel:_InDesign:000 NP_41 Rubel-FrontMatter.indd January 31, 2014 10:06 AM Naval War College The Newport Papers are extended research projects that Newport, Rhode Island the Director, the Dean of Naval Warfare Studies, and the Center for Naval Warfare Studies President of the Naval War College consider of particular Newport Paper Forty-One interest to policy makers, scholars, and analysts. February 2014 The views expressed in the Newport Papers are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of President, Naval War College the Naval War College or the Department of the Navy. Rear Adm. Walter E. Carter, Jr., USN Correspondence concerning the Newport Papers may be Provost addressed to the Director of the Naval War College Press. Amb. Mary Ann Peters To request additional copies, back copies, or subscriptions Dean of Naval Warfare Studies to the series, please either write the President (Code 32S), Robert C. Rubel Naval War College, 686 Cushing Road, Newport, RI 02841-1207, or contact the Press staff at the telephone, fax, Naval War College Press or e-mail addresses given. Director: Dr. Carnes Lord Reproduction and printing are subject to the Copyright Managing Editor: Pelham G. Boyer Act of 1976 and applicable treaties of the United States. This document may be freely reproduced for academic or Telephone: 401.841.2236 other noncommercial use; however, it is requested that Fax: 401.841.1071 reproductions credit the author and Newport Papers series DSN exchange: 841 and that the Press editorial office be informed. To obtain E-mail: [email protected] permission to reproduce this publication for commercial Web: www.usnwc.edu/press purposes, contact the Press editorial office. Twitter: http://twitter.com/NavalWarCollege ISSN 1544-6824 Printed in the United States of America ISBN 978-1-935352-27-3 meyers$:___WIPfrom C 032812:_Newport Papers:_NP_41 Rubel:_InDesign:000 NP_41 Rubel-FrontMatter.indd January 31, 2014 10:06 AM Contents Foreword, by Carnes Lord v Introduction, by Robert C. Rubel 1 PART ONE: NAVAL STRATEGY CHAPTER ONE The New Maritime Strategy: The Rest of the Story 9 CHAPTER TWO The Navy’s Changing Force Paradigm 19 CHAPTER THREE Talking about Sea Control 31 CHAPTER FOUR Command of the Sea: An Old Concept Resurfaces in a New Form 41 CHAPTER FIVE Navies and Economic Prosperity: The New Logic of Sea Power 55 CHAPTER SIX Defense of the System: Changing the Geometry of Great Power Competition 71 PART TWO: NAVAL AVIATION CHAPTER SEVEN The U.S. Navy’s Transition to Jets 93 CHAPTER EIGHT The Future of Aircraft Carriers 103 CHAPTER NINE Pigeonholes and Paradigm Shifts: Getting the Most Out of Unmanned Aircraft 117 CHAPTER TEN Tales from the Platform 125 meyers$:___WIPfrom C 032812:_Newport Papers:_NP_41 Rubel:_InDesign:000 NP_41 Rubel-FrontMatter.indd January 31, 2014 10:06 AM iv the newport papers PART THREE: JOINT OPERATIONS CHAPTER ELEVEN Gettysburg and Midway: Historical Parallels in Operational Command 135 CHAPTER TWELVE Principles of Jointness 151 CHAPTER THIRTEEN Slicing the Onion Differently: Seapower and the Levels of War 159 CHAPTER FOURTEEN Getting a Grip on Tailored Deterrence: The World of Conflict Management 171 PART FOUR: WAR GAMING CHAPTER FIFTEEN The Forms of Warfare: Integrating Ethos and Warfighting 189 CHAPTER SIXTEEN War-Gaming Network-centric Warfare 207 CHAPTER SEVENTEEN The Epistemology of War Gaming 221 About the Author 241 The Newport Papers 243 meyers$:___WIPfrom C 032812:_Newport Papers:_NP_41 Rubel:_InDesign:000 NP_41 Rubel-FrontMatter.indd January 31, 2014 10:06 AM Foreword The purpose of this volume is to honor the work and thought of Robert C. Rubel, Captain, U.S. Navy (Ret.). Since his retirement from the Navy, Robert (a.k.a. “Barney”) Rubel has held senior positions in the Center for Naval Warfare Studies (CNWS), in the Naval War College, in Newport, Rhode Island—first as deputy dean, then as chairman of the War Gaming Department, and finally (since 2006) as dean. During this period, not only has he presided effectively over a complex (and in many ways anomalous) institution, but he has found the time to create a substantial body of published writings about naval warfare and war, or strategy generally. In the process, he has quietly established himself as one of the Navy’s most innovative and wide-ranging thinkers. This volume brings together a selection of Rubel’s short papers from over the last decade and a half. Many of these have appeared in the Naval War College Review, but others are scattered and less accessible. Viewed as a single body of thought (Rubel himself indicates in his introduc- tion that his basic views have not appreciably altered over these years), they gain in weight from being read and considered together. It is hoped, therefore, that this volume will provide a basis for a better and more enduring appreciation of Rubel’s contribution to the intellectual capital of today’s Navy. Perhaps the key characteristic of Rubel’s writings is their self-conscious return to the classical naval strategists—especially the American Alfred Thayer Mahan and the Briton Julian Corbett—as guides to the concerns of military analysts of the present and near future. While he nowhere directly addresses methodological issues, Rubel clearly intends to distinguish his own approach from the only too prevalent tendencies of analysts to follow fads of the moment, to overrate the importance of technology, and to embark on futuristic speculations detached from political and historical context. Mahan—though widely regarded as obsolete and today little read, even (or especially) by naval officers—is particularly valuable for Rubel, in two respects. First, he offers a sophisticated understanding of the political and economic dimensions of naval strat- egy. Mahan wrote toward the end of the nineteenth century, in what may be called the first era of globalization, extending to the outbreak of World War I. Since the end of the Cold War, we are living in a second age of globalization, and Mahan provides impor- tant guidance to reordering naval or maritime strategy in this geoeconomic context (see especially chapters 5 and 6). Second, Mahan and Corbett are essential in helping us rediscover concepts that have withered, if not vanished, in American naval strate- gic thought since the disappearance of a peer naval adversary following World War II. meyers$:___WIPfrom C 032812:_Newport Papers:_NP_41 Rubel:_InDesign:000 NP_41 Rubel-FrontMatter.indd January 31, 2014 10:06 AM vi the newport papers The recent emergence of the People’s Republic of China as a formidable challenger to the United States in the maritime domain makes it imperative, according to Rubel, to rethink the meaning of command or control of the sea under contemporary geographi- cal and operational conditions (see chapters 3 and 4). To consider all this an exercise in backward-looking, navalist nostalgia would be to make a serious mistake. Rubel is careful to give due weight to what is different or unique in our contemporary strategic environment. Nor can he be accused of any kind of paro- chial advocacy. A former aviator himself, Rubel is so far from championing the aircraft carrier as the Navy’s capital ship in the traditional manner that he has been one of the most influential voices in calling for a rethinking of its core missions and a lessen- ing over time of our reliance on it (see chapters 8 and 9). Indeed, one of his persistent themes is the continuing problem of the Navy’s community-centrism and the need to develop a more sophisticated “combined arms” approach to naval operational art and tactics. Further, he is fully in tune with the need for the Navy to work in harmony with and support of the other services (chapter 12). The last eight years have seen major transformations at the Naval War College. Many of these have involved a strengthening of the institution’s ties with the fleet and the Navy Staff. Rubel has had a key role in this respect. As he indicates, the high point of his tenure as dean of CNWS was its support of the development of the document that was eventually published in 2007 under the signature of the chiefs of the Navy, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard, entitled “A Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower.” Since that time, Rubel has been tireless in his explication of this text (see especially chapters 1 and 2).