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2013-09-04 Out of Sight, Out of Mind: The United States Navy and Mine Warfare in the 21st Century
Choi, Timothy Hiu-Tung
Choi, T. H. (2013). Out of Sight, Out of Mind: The United States Navy and Mine Warfare in the 21st Century (Unpublished master's thesis). University of Calgary, Calgary, AB. doi:10.11575/PRISM/27240 http://hdl.handle.net/11023/906 master thesis
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Out of Sight, Out of Mind:
The United States Navy and Mine Warfare in the 21st Century
by
Timothy Hiu-Tung Choi
A THESIS
SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES
IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE
DEGREE OF MASTER OF STRATEGIC STUDIES
CENTRE FOR MILITARY AND STRATEGIC STUDIES
CALGARY, ALBERTA
SEPTEMBER, 2013
© Timothy Hiu-Tung Choi 2013 ii
Abstract
This thesis analyzes the adequacy of the United States Navy (USN) when facing an enemy employing naval mines in a narrow waterway in the 21st century. Recent threats by the Islamic Republic of Iran to “close” the Strait of Hormuz and its oil traffic make the issue of mine warfare especially poignant, given the significant role mines have played in that region over the last thirty years. This thesis argues the USN’s technological efforts at improving its mine countermeasures (MCM) capabilities since the end of the Cold War have been insufficient. An examination of MCM development efforts seeks to explain why such a crucial warfare capability remains lacking, and a historical comparative approach with the Dardanelles campaign in the First World War is used to illustrate the strategic significance of naval mines, as well as challenges the USN may face in attempting to reopen a mined Strait of Hormuz.
iii
Acknowledgements
Many thanks to my supervisor, Dr. Rob Huebert, for his patience and expertise in bringing this thesis to completion. His astute observations of what elements are truly necessary to include were invaluable. The historical sources vital to the use of history in this paper would not have been possible without Dr. Holger Herwig at the University of
Calgary and Dr. Ian Speller at the National University of Ireland, Maynooth. I would also like to thank Drs. Terry Terriff and John Ferris for challenging some of my assumptions in earlier drafts of the thesis, which have been addressed (hopefully to their satisfaction).
Finally, many thanks to Dr. David Taras at Mount Royal University and Dr. James
Keeley for being a part of my examination committee. The Centre for Military and
Strategic Studies and the University of Calgary also deserve a great deal of gratitude for their generous funding opportunities which made research for this thesis possible.
And of course, where would this be without some close support? To my parents, Betty and Chuen Yee: the debts I owe you go beyond the loans I’ve taken from the “bank of mom and dad”. Maria, thank you for being there from the get-go and my go-to source for all things relating to orthography and grammar, as well as providing some much-needed board game relief! Shaiel, your ceaseless yet jovial criticisms were and continue to be an inspiration, pushing this thesis towards its end. Bill and Marshall, as the other naval guys in my cohort, it’s good to know there will be some people who will appreciate this work!
To the cohort of my second year - especially Brock, Steph, and Anastassia - thank you for making it all that much more bearable! And last but definitely not least, endless gratitude to Sveta, for your ceaseless confidence, faith, and unwavering friendship. iv
Contents
Abstract ...... ii
Acknowledgements ...... iii
Table of Contents ...... iv
Chapter 1: Introduction ...... 1
1.1: The Threat and the Question ...... 1
1.2: Methodology and Outline ...... 4
Chapter 2: United States Naval Strategy and Mine Countermeasures ...... 8
2.1: Core Tenets of CS-21 ...... 9
2.1.1: Continuity with Previous Strategies ...... 12
2.2: Core Capabilities and NOC 10...... 14
2.2.1: Sea Control ...... 17
2.3: MCM Capabilities: Post-Cold War to Present ...... 24
2.4: Conclusion ...... 34
Chapter 3: Obstacles to the Development of Next-Generation MCM ...... 36
3.1: Part One: Upcoming Tactical Solutions to the MCM Problem ...... 37
3.2: Part Two: Obstacles in MCM Mission Package Development...... 40
3.2.1: Remote Minehunting System ...... 41
3.2.2: Airborne Minehunting Systems ...... 44
3.3: Part Three: Littoral Combat Ship Procurement ...... 49
3.3.1: Applicability of the RAND Analysis to the LCS Program ...... 53
3.4: Conclusion ...... 61
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Chapter 4: Learning from the Past ...... 65
4.1: Part One: An Historical Overview of the Dardanelles Experience, 1915 .... 67
4.1.1: The Ottoman Steam Navy ...... 67
4.1.2: The Dardanelles Campaign ...... 71
4.1.3: A Brief Note on Mine Warfare in the Black Sea ...... 87
4.2: Part Two: Applying Lessons ...... 88
4.2.1: Currents ...... 91
4.2.2: Airborne Reconnaissance ...... 94
4.2.3: Beyond MCM ...... 96
4.2.4: Other Lessons to be Learned ...... 98
4.2.5: Amphibious Lessons ...... 102
4.3: Caveats ...... 105
4.4: Conclusion ...... 107
Chapter 5: Conclusion...... 111
Bibliography ...... 118
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Chapter 1: Introduction 1.1: The Threat and the Question Metres below the surface it waits, Patient and vigilant, dark and cold. Decades pass, black skin to orange-red, Tethering chain weakening its hold. Long forgotten, Out of sight and out of mind, Until washing on sun-gilded beaches, A relic from a past age, perhaps, But no less deadly.
Nearly one hundred years since the First World War, naval mines from that period continue to wash up on beaches around the world or entangle themselves in fishermen’s nets.1 Despite the best mine-clearing efforts by the world’s foremost navies2, these deadly weapons remain elusive, threatening seaborne and coastal traffic long past the conflicts for which they were deployed. If these ancient devices are so difficult to locate and neutralize during peacetime, then one can claim that it certainly would not be any easier in times of war.
1 Examples include the following: Erkan Güvenç, “Güllük Körfezi’nde mayın,” Posta.com.tr, February 10, 2011, http://www.posta.com.tr/turkiye/HaberDetay/Gulluk_Korfezi_nde_mayin.htm?ArticleID=60952. “Rafet Reis’in ağına 100 yıllık mayın takıldı,” NTVMSNBC, February 24, 2012, http://www.ntvmsnbc.com/id/25325168/. “Sea mine found in Altinkum,” Didim Today, June 3, 2012, http://www.didimtoday.com/news/1651- sea-mine-found-in-altinkum.html. Reshad Suleymanov, “World War I-era mine found on Turkish coast of Black Sea,” APA, August 3, 2013, http://en.apa.az/news/197206. “Pembrokeshire seaweed forager finds ‘World War I mines’,” BBC News, February 3, 2013, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-south-west-wales-21307108.
2 For example, the annual Historical Ordnance Disposal exercises conducted by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s Standing NATO Mine Countermeasure Groups in the Mediterranean, Black, and Baltic Seas. See: “NATO countermeasures groups making seas safer,” Admiral Danish Fleet, March 20, 2009, http://forsvaret.dk/SOK/eng/International/SNMCMG/News/Pages/2009-03-20.aspx. 2
The recent and repeated threats by the Islamic Republic of Iran to “close” the
Strait of Hormuz (SOH) provide a real-world impetus for examining the adequacy of modern mine countermeasures.3 By some estimates, only 300 mines are required to close the SOH, and Iran has as many as 5,000 in its inventory.4 While recent discussion regarding an Iranian closure of the SOH often emphasize “swarm attacks” by numerous lightly-armed fast boats5, mines have historically had the greatest success in harming the warships of modern navies: since the end of the Second World War, nearly 80% of all
United States naval ship casualties have been the result of mines6 – victims include not just simple wooden minesweepers, but also advanced combat units like the missile cruiser USS Princeton, damaged in the 1991 Gulf War.7 This effectiveness makes mining an attractive option in any attempt to close off the Strait of Hormuz and emphasizes the importance of quick, safe, and reliable mine-clearing capabilities in a potential opposition force.
Whether such capabilities exist in the potential opposition force is thus an extremely crucial question and is the main subject of this thesis, which examines the ability of the United States Navy (USN) to conduct mine countermeasure (MCM)
3 Yeganeh Torbati, “Iran renews Hormuz closure threats,” Reuters, July 15, 2012, http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/07/15/us-iran-hormuz-idUSBRE86E0CN20120715.
4 Sabahat Khan, “Iranian Mining of the Strait of Hormuz – Plausibility and Key Considerations,” INEGMA Special Report No. 4, January 2010, 1.
5 Thom Shanker, “Iran Encounter Grimly Echoes ’02 War Game,” The New York Times, January 12, 2008, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/12/washington/12navy.html; Jon Stock, “Little boat, big danger: how a British-made speedboat has become a weapon in Iran’s standoff with the US,” The Telegraph, August 20, 2012, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iran/9486815/Little-boat-big-danger-how-a- British-made-speedboat-has-become-a-weapon-in-Irans-standoff-with-the-US.html.
6 U.S. Navy, “21st Century U.S. Navy Mine Warfare: Ensuring Global Access and Commerce,” U.S. Navy (PDF primer, June 2009), http://www.navy.mil/n85/miw_primer-june2009.pdf, 8.
7 U.S. Navy, “21st Century U.S. Navy Mine Warfare,” 6. 3
activities. The primary research question is as follows: To what extent will the USN be constrained by an adversary’s use of mines in the coming years? Answering this will require addressing three other questions: How may mines hinder the United States’ ability to carry out its strategic and operational visions? Is current MCM technology sufficient for speedy, safe, and reliable clearance of mines and if not, why? What challenges and obstacles would an American force encounter in an attempt to clear mine- infested waters during times of war?
The decision to examine the United States Navy stems from the fact that they are a consistent and major presence in and around the Strait of Hormuz – not just in the form of the 5th Fleet headquartered in Bahrain, but also by the rotating presence of its aircraft carrier strike groups. In the event that mines should again threaten international seaborne traffic, it is a reasonable assumption that the United States will contribute its forces to ending or mitigating that threat, such as it did during the Tanker Wars between Iran and
Iraq in the 1980s.8 Furthermore, the USN is generally considered the largest and most powerful naval force in the world.9 Should its MCM capabilities be found wanting, then there is little hope for other navies around the world and mines would continue to be the bane of naval forces for years to come. Conversely, if American MCM capabilities are found to be adequate, then it is highly likely it would be proliferated to the fleets of allied countries, decreasing the utility of mines. Either way, choosing the USN as the object of
8 Anthony H. Cordesman and Abraham Wagner, “XIV: The Tanker War and the Lessons of Naval Conflict,” in Lessons of Modern War – Volume II: The Iran-Iraq War (Digital Version: September 26, 2003), 2, http://csis.org/files/media/csis/pubs/9005lessonsiraniraqii-chap14.pdf.
9 Definitional problems admittedly exist with such measures, but “ship for ship, plane for plane”, the USN is certainly at the forefront. James Holmes, “The Top 5 Navies of the Indo-Pacific,” The Diplomat, January 21, 2013, http://thediplomat.com/the-naval-diplomat/2013/01/21/the-top-5-navies-of-the-indo- pacific/comment-page-2/?all=true 4
study will provide results that best represent the broadest technical trend regarding the continued relevance of the mine threat.
However, the technology at one’s disposal is just as important as how one uses it.
In this regard, history can provide some vital lessons. This introductory chapter began with references to naval mining in the First World War. Mines played a central role in that conflict, particularly in the Ottoman Empire’s littoral regions. As will be discussed later in this thesis, there are many lessons to be learned from the Ottoman defence of the
Dardanelles that can apply to a counter-mining operation by the USN in the Strait of
Hormuz. It is often debated within the field of strategic studies as to whether technological change can render strategic concepts obsolete: Chapter Four puts one hundred years of technological change to the test against not just strategic concepts, but operational and tactical as well.
1:2: Methodology and Outline
In terms of geography, this thesis is constrained to narrow waterways. Also called maritime “chokepoints”, they are defined for the purposes of this thesis as limited- capacity waterbodies through which seaborne traffic must travel between the producer and consumer of particular commodities/resources.10 There are three reasons for limiting the thesis’ scope to this geographic feature. Firstly, some such waterways are home to a significant portion of the global waterborne traffic. The Strait of Hormuz sees 20% of the
10 For a more detailed discussion on possible defining characteristics of chokepoints, see Jean-Paul Rodrigue, “Straits, Passages and Chokepoints: A Maritime Geostrategy of Petroleum Distribution,” Cahiers de Géographie du Québec 48(135), 2004, 359-360. 5
world’s oil traffic11 – any disruption would likely have disastrous consequences on the global economy. Maritime chokepoints, as one scholar termed it, “truly are the geographical Achilles heel of the global economy.”12 A second reason is that maritime chokepoints are optimal for the use of mines: favourable characteristics include limited maneuvering room for an intruding navy in the area and fewer amounts of mines necessary for a comprehensive closure. Finally, the choice of narrow waterways allows for a historical cross-comparison. A closure of the Strait of Hormuz via mines would not be the first time such a situation has occurred in history – the Ottoman defence of the
Dardanelles Strait in the First World War bears marked similarities (e.g. a small navy defending against a larger navy within a relatively narrow waterway) that can provide many lessons for what to expect in the SOH scenario. The thesis’ emphasis on narrow waterways should not be interpreted as its inapplicability to other types of waterbodies, however – just that they are not within the scope of this study.
The body of this thesis begins with Chapter Two, which analyses how mine countermeasures fit into the overall US naval strategy. It starts by summarizing A
Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Sea Power and Naval Operations Concept 2010.
These two documents form the core of current American maritime and naval strategy, laying the groundwork for how mines can impede US sea power, and thereby the importance of activities to counter the threat. Key themes from these two documents will be drawn out and assessed in terms of how much importance the US naval establishment has placed upon the themes. This assessment will be based primarily upon an
11 “World Oil Transit Chokepoints,” U.S. Energy Information Administration, August 12, 2012, http://www.eia.gov/countries/regions-topics.cfm?fips=wotc&trk=p3.
12 Rodrigue, “Straits, Passages and Chokepoints”, 365. 6
examination of capabilities development. The chapter will establish the state of USN
MCM to date and its direction towards the future and how they have developed vis-à-vis other capabilities in the USN – i.e. where USN research, development, and operational priorities truly lay. The main sources for this information will come from Ronald
O’Rourke’s Congressional Research Service (CRS) reports.13
Chapter Three’s discussion centres upon the problems faced by MCM development – and problems there are, as a detailed overview of the platforms and equipment involved will reveal at the beginning of the chapter. The basic question posed is why these setbacks are being experienced. Essentially, are the delays and difficulties due to technological or financial constraints, or some combination of both? To conduct this investigation, RAND Corporation’s 2006 monograph that looks into the question of
Why has the Cost of Navy Ships Risen? will be used to provide a blueprint for why the next generation of MCM vessels have been so expensive. To assess why individual pieces of equipment have been difficult to bring into service, their research and development (R&D) period will be examined in depth – it aims to find correlations between technical difficulties and the continuation or cessation of funding for a particular program. The primary sources for this will be the yearly DOT&E, or Office of the
Director, Operational Test and Evaluation, reports on equipment and platform development progress.
13 Mr. O’Rourke is the resident Specialist in Naval Affairs at the CRS and whose reports on the latest US naval development issues are arguably the most authoritative and comprehensive available to the public.
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Finally, Chapter Four employs a comparison of two scenarios in which mines and mine countermeasures feature prominently: the Ottoman defence of the Dardanelles in
1915 and a potential Iranian closure of the Strait of Hormuz in the near future. The chapter seeks to uncover strategic, operational, and tactical lessons from the former that can be applied to the latter. The chapter argues that similarities between the two situations go beyond that of mines, and in fact the past example can provide a very wide set of lessons for the near future. The analysis will draw from the elements found in the first two chapters, bringing them together into a cohesive policy-relevant compilation of findings. The first half of the chapter will be an historical overview of the Dardanelles campaign, viewed primarily as a function of the Allied fleet’s inability to pass through the Dardanelles and that fleet’s eventual demise on March 18th, 1915. The second half of the chapter identifies several key factors that prevented the Allies’ success in 1915, and applies those factors to the modern near-future scenario in the Strait of Hormuz. It finishes with some key lessons that the United States will have to keep in mind during its planning stages in order to minimize its chances of failure as well as offer a criticism of current US naval strategy in the context of mine countermeasures. Concluding the thesis,
Chapter Five brings together the key findings of Chapters Two through Four, integrating them to provide a concise answer to the research question.
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Chapter 2: United States Naval Strategy and Mine Countermeasures
To truly appreciate the role of naval mines in modern warfare, and therefore the role of mine countermeasures, it is necessary to situate them in the modern strategic context. This chapter seeks to provide that linkage by detailing current United States naval strategy and mine countermeasure capabilities. The former will be examined through a comprehensive overview of the core ideas espoused in A Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower (CS-21) and Naval Operations Concept 2010 (NOC 10), which form the nucleus of current US naval strategic thought. However, other documents and historical strategic patterns will also be discussed to assess just how different (or similar) these newer strategic guides are, which will provide some suggestions for how substantive the current strategy actually is. As will be made clear in the coming paragraphs, CS-21 and NOC 10 are mutually-supporting, and therefore they share common themes, or strategic components. One of these themes – Sea Control – will form the analytical core and context for the chapter. Within Sea Control, there are several elements involved, of which one heavily involves mine warfare. To provide a comparative perspective of how much the United States Navy actually emphasizes each of these elements, hardware investment will be main factor examined. Because this thesis is about mine warfare, and mine countermeasures in particular, forces and equipment dedicated to that aspect will be examined with greater detail than those specializing in other areas of naval warfare. This chapter will conclude with observations on mine countermeasure’s role within the US Navy, both its strategic importance and its state of competency.
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2.1: Core Tenets of CS-21
In October 2007, the United States published its first new major maritime strategy since the Cold War: A Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower.14 As another
“first”, CS-21 is a unified creation by all three US maritime services: the Navy, Marine
Corps, and Coast Guard. The basic premise of the piece is that “preventing wars is as important as winning wars.”15 The title’s “cooperative” refers to not only synergy between the three sea branches, but also between the United States and other countries around the world. In essence, the stipulation is that while the sea services, particularly the
Navy and Marine Corps, need to have the hard power needed to defeat a potential enemy through violent force, it is equally important that the three services utilize their assets for soft power actions. The overarching strategy is referred to as the Maritime Strategic
Concept (MSC) and consists of six strategic imperatives split into two categories.16
The first category is “Regionally Concentrated, Credible Combat Power”. To show the United States’ “commitment to security and stability”17 or be present where
“tensions are high”, a strategy echoing Alfred Thayer Mahan’s endorsement of a concentrated combat fleet was declared. As the category title suggests, this aspect of strategy will employ powerful combat-ready naval forces in high quantities within a specific geographical region. These forces would then be used to conduct three strategic imperatives: Limit regional conflict with forward deployed, decisive maritime power;
14 Andrew Erickson, “New U.S. Maritime Strategy: Initial Chinese Responses,” China Security 4 (2007): 42.
15 U.S. Chief of Naval Operations and the Commandants of the U.S. Marine Corps and U.S. Coast Guard, “A Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower,” October 2007, 4.
16 U.S. CNO, CMC, and CCG, “A Cooperative Strategy,” 8-12.
17 Ibid., 8. 10
deter major power war; and win our Nation’s wars.18 In some ways, these three imperatives can be considered stages of escalation: each imperative takes hold when the preceding one fails. They focus on minimizing conflict and what the maritime services must be ready to do when significant conflict does occur. The relevance here to mine warfare is fairly straightforward – MCM capabilities must be available in forward locations, must be sufficient to deter an enemy from using mines, and should deterrence fail, must be able to win in a countermining operation.
In contrast, the second category, Globally Distributed, Mission-Tailored Maritime
Forces, emphasizes the soft power aspect of CS-21, which is something that is fairly novel in US naval strategy. Although similar to the first category in terms of its escalatory nature, the imperatives here are focused on cooperation in the pre-conflict period: Contribute to homeland defense in depth, Foster and maintain relationships with more international partners, and Prevent or contain local disruptions before they impact the global system.19 In essence, CS-21 appears to encourage increase engagement in partnerships abroad so as to better protect the United States: it is a strategy that emphasizes people-to-people and organization-to-organization relationships, rather than one based around America’s platforms, weapons, and other material elements of power.
While this second section of the Maritime Strategic Concept appears to have little direct relevance to the issue of mine warfare, it is actually quite salient. Perhaps the most important is the fostering and sustainment of positive relationships with allied and partner countries. As will be demonstrated in Chapter Four, knowledge of local geographical
18 Ibid., 9-10.
19 Ibid., 10-12. 11
conditions can be absolutely vital to the conduct of successful mine-clearing operations.
Such knowledge requires long-term familiarity and is likely most extensively held by local forces, making high levels of mutual understanding and cooperation between those and American forces paramount. As well, the idea of homeland defence in depth can relate to defending American ports and coastal regions from the threat of unconventional mine laying methods. It is conceivable that an enemy may load mines onto civilian cargo vessels destined for the US homeland, intending to deploy the mines upon entering US waters. One way to prevent this from happening would be to ensure personnel at foreign ports are on the lookout for such attempts to load suspicious items onboard US-bound vessels.
Another major section in CS-21 is that of Implementation Priorities, which sets out three important areas of improvement that are necessary for implementing the above strategic components: improving integration and interoperability, enhancing awareness, and preparing our people. The first of these is premised upon the increasingly diverse roles that the maritime forces have and will adopt. It requires the Navy, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard to increase their skills in working in each other’s presence and environments.20 This would provide commanders with a greater variety of tools to use in possible future scenarios that may require a combination of each service’s skills. The second area of improvement revolves around increasing “maritime domain awareness”
(MDA) and expanding “intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance” (ISR) capabilities.21 This is especially poignant in the realm of mine countermeasures, as part of
20 Ibid., 15.
21 Ibid., 16. 12
the challenge is to identify where and when mines are deployed so that they can be more easily found; furthermore, increased MDA and ISR capabilities will assist with identifying what ships are minelayers, as will be discussed in Chapter Four. Finally, preparing our people is centred upon giving junior officers greater command responsibilities and authority, allowing them to make crucial decisions in the absence of higher-ranking officers.22 This is again poignant in MCM, the platforms for which are commanded by fairly low-ranking officers. But as Chapter Four will also suggest, preparing our people should involve not just responsibility and decision-making, but also the more visceral aspect of self-discipline in the face of enemy fire.
2.1.1: Continuity with Previous Strategies
The strategy outlined in CS-21 is at the same time both familiar and novel. The first half, that of Regionally Concentrated, Credible Combat Power, shares much of the same elements as previous US naval strategic documents and approaches. In particular, forward presence, deterrence, and war-winning were already present in the previous strategy, the 1992 From the Sea and 1994 Forward…From the Sea documents. The 1994 document best reflects the continuity in hard power naval strategy through the post-Cold
War period: “forward-deployed naval forces – manned, equipped, and trained for combat
– play a significant role in…defending shared interests…[and] if deterrence fails during a crisis and conflict erupts, naval forces provide the means for immediate sea-based reaction.”23
22 Ibid., 17.
23 U.S. Chief of Naval Operations and Commandant of the Marine Corps, “Forward…From the Sea,” November 1994, 2. 13
But this approach to naval power for the United States was not new even in 1992.
In fact, much of it was already articulated during the late 1960s and early 1970s as the
North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) moved away from a strategy that focused almost solely on nuclear deterrence to one that had to be prepared for “flexible response”
– i.e. non-nuclear armed conflicts. Being prepared for flexible response meant, essentially, conventional deterrence capability.24 This new strategic approach had severe implications for NATO’s maritime forces configuration as it meant a shift from simply maintaining sufficient control of the sea for the launch of nuclear strikes to a much more temporally and spatially extensive control over the oceans and littorals.25 As this thesis is not an essay on NATO’s Cold War maritime strategy, it will dispense with further details.
It suffices to state that the shift in strategy appeared to have a long-term effect, altering
Allied (including American) attitudes towards the purpose of forward-deployed maritime forces and how they could be used, despite the apparent primacy of nuclear weapons.
Maritime forces would not be used as simply launchers for nuclear warheads, but would have to be prepared for a sustained war effort exploiting and defending key sea lines of communications while being ready to support forces and project (non-nuclear) firepower onto land.
Essentially, then, the forward presence, deterrence-oriented, and war-winning aspects of CS-21 are entirely in keeping with pre-existing US naval strategic approaches.
24 Joel J. Sokolsky, “Anglo-American Maritime Strategy in the Era of Flexible Response, 1960-1980,” in Maritime Strategy and the Balance of Power: Britain and America in the Twentieth Century, ed. John B. Hattendorf and Robert S. Jordan (London: The Macmillan Press LTD, 1989), 305.
25 Sokolsky, “Anglo-American Maritime Strategy,” 308. 14
The other three strategic imperatives of CS-21 – homeland defence in depth, greater cooperative relationships with more international partners, and preventing local disruptions – however, are much more novel. Although previous strategic documents and approaches have mentioned partnerships and coalition cooperation, those were limited to the military aspect. For example, in Forward…From the Sea, partnerships are mentioned only in the context of being prepared to respond to emergency situations and crises.26 In contrast, CS-21 advocates for such partnerships and cooperative engagements to improve security outside of military crises situations. Most notably, CS-21 recognizes that the conditions potentially leading to violent conflict often start with localized insecurity.
Referencing the need for “enforcing the rule of law in the maritime domain”, the imperative is to focus on “capacity-building, humanitarian assistance…[and] improving maritime governance” amongst international partner states.27 By reducing local insecurity, the odds of a large-scale violent escalation potentially leading to interstate war is, in theory, reduced. Thus, CS-21differs significantly from previous maritime strategies in that it seeks to proactively improve security long before it has a chance to escalate into large-scale kinetic violence.
2.2: Core Capabilities and NOC 10
To enable to strategic imperatives outlined above, CS-21 called for six “core capabilities” that the US maritime services had to possess or develop. They are, in order of appearance in CS-21, as follows: Forward Presence, Deterrence, Sea Control, Power
26 U.S. CNO and CMC, “Forward…From the Sea,” 3.
27 U.S. CNO, CMC, and CCG, “A Cooperative Strategy,” 11. 15
Projection, Maritime Security, and Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Response. One can make the observation that there appears to be no particular rationale for the way these capabilities are listed – the relationship between them is not clear.
This is “fixed” in Naval Operations Concept 2010, however. In that document, they are relisted as follows: Forward Presence, Maritime Security, Humanitarian
Assistance and Disaster Response, Sea Control, Power Projection, and Deterrence. This revised order represents how these core capabilities, or operational activities, are building blocks that all “contribute to expanded Deterrence.” 28
In essence, all six of these capabilities work towards the end goal of preventing war, which is why deterrence is set as the “last”, or ultimate, capability. Within the context of mine warfare, the most obvious capability for setting the discussion would be sea control. However, it can be argued that all six capabilities relate to mine warfare in some way. It was mentioned earlier that one possible method of transporting and deploying mines would be via innocuous civilian-flagged commercial vessels that would deploy the mines once in US waters. One method for countering this would be to encourage international partners to increase security checks at the ports of origin. This, in turn, means increased local law enforcement capacity in the maritime context – i.e. increasing maritime security, one of the six core capabilities. Thus, even though maritime security is explicitly discussed in NOC 10 as dealing with such issues as drug and human smuggling, it is also applicable to mine warfare, and mine countermeasures specifically.
28 U.S. Chief of Naval Operations and the Commandants of the U.S. Marine Corps and U.S. Coast Guard, “Naval Operations Concept 2010,” 2010, 3, 73. 16
Mine countermeasures is also an element that is relevant when establishing the
Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief (HA/DR) capability. Often, humanitarian assistance is delivered through naval assets, as demonstrated by Operation Tomadachi in the aftermath of the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami off Japan.29 But natural disasters aren’t the only sources of pain and suffering that merit HA/DR operations – wars and violence is another. As illustrated in the introductory chapter, mines laid during the course of a conflict remain a threat even after the cessation, temporary or otherwise, of hostilities. Should the US maritime services be called upon to deliver humanitarian assistance in such a context, they would need to be able to locate and avoid or neutralize mines left from the conflict in order to safely approach the shore and deliver assistance.
Even in peaceful situations, natural disasters may result in the accidental deployment of mines – a flood that hits a storage area for the weapons may wash them out towards the ocean, requiring mine countermeasure forces before HA/DR activities can be conducted.
But mine warfare has a more direct and conventional relationship with the rest of the core capabilities, which are much more combat-oriented. The foundation of it all is, of course, Forward Presence, which allows US maritime assets to be in place when and where they are needed without having to wait for the long transit time from the continental US. This has been especially important for MCM assets, such as the current
MCM-1 Avenger class vessels, which do not have the range necessary for transoceanic journeys. Therefore, the forward prepositioning of these ships (in Manama, Bahrain, and
Sasebo, Japan) is absolutely crucial to providing the next core capability: Sea Control.
29 U.S. 7th Fleet Public Affairs, “Japanese Family Thanks U.S. 7th Fleet,” U.S. Navy, http://www.navy.mil/submit/display.asp?story_id=65182. 17
2.2.1: Sea Control
Sea Control is the first hard power capability mentioned in NOC 10 and the one of greatest concern to the topic of mine warfare. In terms of challenges that the maritime services are expected to face, there are four of particular concern: increasingly capable blue water adversaries, theatre anti-access weapons, area denial weapons in the littoral, and technologies that disrupt space and cyberspace capabilities.30 For the purposes of this thesis, however, the primary focus will be on the third challenge, though the first two will also be briefly covered to provide the appropriate context.
An enemy’s exploitation of those challenges can occur at three different stages: opposed transit, anti-access, and area denial. In the first, the main concern is an enemy employing a naval strategy based on Sir Julian Corbett’s advocacy for attacking the enemy’s supply and trade elements, rather than main battle force. The NOC takes as its basis that there are very few opponents, if any, that can “effectively challenge U.S. combatants in the open ocean” – thus, they are likely to conduct operations that would seek to destroy the United States’ lesser or undefended maritime transportation assets.
These assets are needed for carrying large amounts of troops and equipment that are needed for extended land operations. To address this threat, the NOC suggests the time- honoured method of employing convoys with USN escorts and/or sea routes that grant the vessel land-based cover. Allies and partners’ knowledge of their local waters and conditions would also be leveraged to reduce the risk to vulnerable transports.31
However, procurement trends do not appear to reflect any serious considerations of this
30 U.S. CNO, CMC, and CCG, “Naval Operations 2010,” 52-53.
31 Ibid., 54-55. 18
concern. While the FFG 7 Oliver Hazard Perry class frigates were designed and built for ocean convoy work, they are rapidly entering retirement.32 There are no planned replacements that would numerously (necessary for convoy systems) and adequately fulfill the deep-water anti-submarine warfare role. While the Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) is a replacement in theory, only sixteen ASW mission packages are to be bought for them, far fewer than the dozens of FFG 7s that have been in the fleet.33 The alternative choice for ocean escort work would be the Arleigh Burke class destroyers, but they are high-end combatants with an emphasis on anti-air warfare – it would not be economical or practical to employ them in the numbers necessary for convoy escort given the roles they would play in other areas of the conflict. As it exists, then, there appears no serious consideration by the US maritime services to actually counter threats during the opposed transit stage.
Closer to the area of conflict, anti-access challenges are the combination of capabilities the enemy can bring to bear upon American naval forces to prevent them from entering the area of operations. Such weapons are generally long-ranged or can be deployed far from the shore, including short-to-medium-ranged ballistic missiles, anti- ship cruise missiles, and diesel-electric submarines. To counter these threats, the Navy is
“aggressively enhancing” existing systems and platforms while developing new ones so
32 William Browning, “Retiring frigates leave stamp on Mayport,” NavyTimes, October 27, 2012, http://www.navytimes.com/article/20121027/NEWS/210270313/Retiring-frigates-leave-stamp-Mayport.
33 U.S. Navy, “Littoral Combat Ships – Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) Mission Package,” U.S. Navy, October 25, 2012, http://www.navy.mil/navydata/fact_display.asp?cid=2100&tid=412&ct=2. 19
as to be able to defend against them.34 Unlike the opposed transit phase, anti-access has indeed been receiving significant attention.
The two anti-access threats about which the NOC are most concerned are anti- ship ballistic missiles (ASBMs) and advanced diesel submarines (SSKs).35 The threat of the latter is, though serious, well-acknowledged by the US naval establishment. The multi-mission capabilities of all USN surface combatants (provided the LCSs are equipped with the ASW package) ensure that they have the best possible chances for countering this threat. The combination of various sonar systems on surface warships and their organic MH-60R helicopters should be a fairly potent opponent for any enemy submarine.36 Whether these individual systems themselves, or together, are qualitatively sufficient to find and destroy enemy SSKs is up for debate; while SSKs are very quiet and can be difficult to detect in the littoral area due to various acoustic complications37, the relatively open waters of the anti-access stage removes some of that protection for the
SSK, making it easier for ASW operations. But regardless, the important point is that
ASW is seen by Navy planners as something that all surface combatants will face and for which they should be equipped. In this regard, the future surface force is “as adequate as possible” for countering the ASW threat to USN sea control capability.
The other major anti-access threat perceived by NOC 10 is the anti-ship ballistic missile. Most prominently discussed in the context of China’s DF-21D recent
34 U.S. CNO, CMC, and CCG, “Naval Operations 2010,” 55.
35 Ibid., 53.
36 Adam J. Thomas, “Tri-Level Optimization for Anti-Submarine Warfare Mission Planning,” (Master’s Thesis, Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, 2008), 4.
37 Milan Vego, “The Right Submarine for Lurking in the Littorals,” Naval Institute Proceedings 6 (2010), 17-18. 20
deployments, this is a concern that is relatively new to USN planners. Up to now, the main aerial threats were either long-range cruise missiles or aircraft. The introduction of the DF-21D ASBM threatens the ability of American forces, especially aircraft carriers, to enter a potential operational area near Chinese shores. While it is uncertain as to what exact capabilities this missile will have (or indeed if it will “work as advertised”, so to speak), a relatively simple quantitative analysis of the number of ASBMs available to the
Chinese and anti-ballistic missiles (ABMs) to the Americans can serve as a baseline for deducing the adequacy of the future force structure in overcoming the ASBM threat.
Marshall Hoyler runs through a logical and comprehensive assessment in a Naval War
College Review article on this very issue. He goes into not only how many ballistic missile defence (BMD)-capable ships that the USN has, but also how many SM-3 interceptor missiles will be in the US inventory. He uses 2015 as the date of a hypothetical Sino-American conflict involving ASBMs versus a BMD-equipped aircraft carrier strike group (CSG). Each BMD AEGIS combatant would carry only a maximum of twenty-five SM-3s as a result of limited numbers of total missiles and the need to distribute them between all the AEGIS vessels. Firing two SM-3s per ASBM target and assuming a 100% hit rate, each BMD warship could only handle twelve or thirteen
ASBMs. With as many as eighty DF-21Ds available by 2015, China can thus easily overwhelm the ability of an AEGIS BMD system by saturation alone.38 DF-21Ds are fired from mobile erector-launchers39, and thus can be redeployed closer to the target
CVN as necessary, meaning all eighty of those DF-21Ds can be, in theory, brought to
38 Marshall Hoyler, “China’s ‘Antiaccess’ Ballistic Missiles and U.S. Active Defense,” Naval War College Review 4 (2010), 89-91
39 Hoyler, “China’s ‘Antiaccess’ Ballistic Missiles and U.S. Active Defense,” 98. 21
bear on a single aircraft carrier. However, Hoyler does not mention the almost-certain possibility of multiple BMD escorts in the CSG. Given that CSGs usually consist of four or more surface combatants, it is not impossible that two or more of them are BMD capable. This will be especially likely in the subsequent decades as more Arleigh Burke and Ticonderoga class ships are upgraded with BMD ability.40 Of course, the advantage that the CSG gains in the amount of ABMs available in the future is counteracted by both increased numbers of ASBMs and improved counter-ABM systems on the ASBMs, such as decoys to waylay interceptor missiles and heat shielding to reduce signatures.41 Given this “race”, it seems possible that Hoyler’s pessimistic view of USN BMD defence against Chinese ASBMs will continue into the 2020s. Carrier vulnerability to ASBMs would only be increased if the adversary were to employ discreet intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) resources and integrating them with ASBM guidance; Hoyler notes that the challenge for ASBM users is the change in location of the
CSG in the time between the ASBM is fired and the time that it “looks down” to search for the CSG with the missile’s onboard radar. Multiple missiles may be needed to comprehensively cover all possible locations to which the carrier may have sailed in that period of time.42 One way in which this problem can be resolved is if an SSK within passive sonar detection range of the CSG were to transmit the CSG’s location to the
ASBM in flight; this would increase the latter’s probability of finding and hitting the
CSG. Of course, all of this depends on the ASBM’s ability to out-range a CSG’s ability
40 Missile Defense Agency, “AEGIS Ballistic Missile Defense,” Missile Defense Agency, July 30, 2013, http://www.mda.mil/system/AEGIS_bmd.html.
41 Hoyler, “China’s ‘Antiaccess’ Ballistic Missiles and U.S. Active Defense,” 91.
42 Ibid., 92. 22
to preemptively strike the launch platforms. While the Tomahawk cruise missiles and current carrier aircraft do not have the range to strike ASBMs like DF-21Ds (which have a range of around 1500 nm43), it is quite possible that future systems, such as the production follow-on to the X-47B unmanned carrier drone with its unrefueled range of
1600 nm, will be able to strike ASBMs before they launch. However, the mobile nature of the DF-21D makes it very difficult to know whether all such missiles will have been neutralized before the CSG enters waters within the ASBM’s range. In sum, it would appear that the Navy’s force structure will not be adequate for defeating the ASBM threat so long as it is dependent upon the use of current and projected AEGIS/SM-3-based systems for BMD; this may be mitigated in the future as longer-ranged land-attack weaponry become available to take out launchers before the carrier enters range of the
ASBM, though it is likely the latter’s range will also be increased over time. That being said, it can be safely concluded that the United States Navy fully recognizes the threat posed by ASBMs and is actively working towards countering them, putting significant monetary resources towards BMD development.
Finally, once U.S. naval forces are able to get past opposed transit and anti-access threats, they face a combination of land, sea, and air short-and-medium-range threats.
These area-denial weapons include mini-submarines, mines, fast attack craft, shore- based cruise missiles, and even coastal artillery. The NOC acknowledges that mines are the “greatest area-denial challenge in the maritime domain” and that current American systems and procedures are slow and requires exposing the mine-clearing platform to
43 Hu Yinan, Li Xiaokun and Cui Haipei, “Official confirms China building aircraft carrier,” China Daily, July 12, 2011, accessed December 29, 2011, http://www2.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2011- 07/12/content_12881089.htm.
23
enter the mined area.44 This is historically and empirically supported by the fact that of the twenty-one ships that have been victims of successful enemy hostile actions since
1950, sixteen of them were the results of mines.45 Therefore, it is justified that the NOC emphasizes the area denial capabilities of mines. That said, naval developments in the years since NOC 10’s introduction have not reflected its emphasis on mines, as the coming paragraphs on the current state of MCM capabilities will show. One might argue that this means perhaps the US does not serious see mines as a threat. However, it is also possible that the relative freedom with which US naval forces have operated on the world oceans over the last decade have made the naval establishment take a somewhat lackadaisical attitude towards the problem. Certainly, the success of MCM efforts in the
2003 Operation Iraqi Freedom would appear to suggest that there is nothing to worry about, that US forces are perfectly capable of neutralizing the mine threat.46 However,
Iraqi Freedom took place when the US had the initiative to take the first steps; it is likely that any future enemy that decides to take the mine warfare initiative would make things much harder for American MCM efforts, if simply by deploying mines before the US forces are fully aware of such activities. In any case, the NOC expects USN mine countermeasure weaknesses to be fixed by new capabilities that are quicker and less risky. It is thus within the area-denial context that this thesis situates its discussion on mine warfare. The following section will cover the force structure of the USN’s mine
44 U.S. CNO, CMC, and CCG, “Naval Operations 2010,” 56.
45 N852 Mine Warfare Branch, “Branch’s Brochure,” U.S. Navy, October 13, 2007, http://www.navy.mil/n85/pdfs/n852_FINAL.pdf.
46 U.S. Navy, “21st Century U.S. Navy Mine Warfare: Ensuring Global Access and Commerce” (PDF primer, June 2009), http://www.navy.mil/n85/miw_primer-june2009.pdf, 6-7, 14-15. 24
countermeasure assets over the last two decades before concluding with how this affects the USN’s sea control capability
2.3: MCM Capabilities: Post-Cold War to Present
Mine countermeasures has, since the end of the Cold War, been mainly the domain of smaller surface vessels. The exception to this was the brief experiment with
Arleigh Burke class destroyers DDG 91 through to DDG 96. These ships were built to a slightly modified Flight IIA design that incorporated a hangar on the starboard side that was to store and operate the AN/WLD-1 Remote Minehunting System (RMS). The RMS involved the use of a remotely-operated underwater vehicle that would be equipped with a variety of acoustic and electro-optical sensors. This would be used to go into mine- infested waters and locate and identify mines without risking the mother vessel. The
RMS proved insufficiently reliable, however, especially given that these Burkes could only carry one such vehicle. Since these ships’ commissioning, it appears that almost all of them have had the RMS hangar welded close. The decision has been made, however, to continue development of the RMS for the Littoral Combat Ship’s MCM mission package, which will be discussed further below.47
The exception with these six unique Burkes aside, mine countermeasures since the
1990s have been left to the MCM 1 Avenger and MHC 51 Osprey classes. The two classes are similar in function and equipment, though the latter is newer and 300 tons smaller, making it a “coastal” mine hunter. Despite the Ospreys’ younger ages, however, they have all been decommissioned, the last being in 2007 – most have been sold to
47 Director, Operational Test and Evaluation, FY 2008 Annual Report (2008), 107-108. 25
foreign navies and the remainder are slated for such.48 This leaves the Avenger class as the sole vessel for MCM activities in the US fleet. The fourteen-ship fleet has recently been reduced to thirteen after USS Guardian infamously grounded on a reef near the
Philippines, which required its in situ dismantlement and removal.49 Currently, six
Avengers are stationed out of Manama, Bahrain, though recently there were as many as eight following a redeployment of four MCM ships from the continental US.50 The reduction in number from eight to six is at least in part due to the loss of Guardian, as one of the two ships leaving the Gulf is destined for Guardian’s homeport in Sasebo,
Japan.51 Quite aside from the decreasing numbers of forward-deployed MCM vessels, there is one significant drawback to vessels like the Avengers – they require sailing into the minefield itself before the localization and neutralization of mines can begin, with clear safety risks to the sailors and ships. Although advances in sonar technology mean that detection of mines can now be accomplished with more finesse than the blind mechanical sweeping of the past, technical limitations to current sonar technology reduces its reliability in cluttered environments. Furthermore, the Avenger class’s SLQ-
48 mine neutralizer, despite several upgrades since the ships’ commissioning in the early
48 Naval-Technology.com, “Osprey Class, United States of America,” Naval-Technology.com, 2012, http://www.naval-technology.com/projects/osprey-class-minehunter/.
49 The Associated Press, “Last of USS Guardian removed from Philippines reef,” CBSNews, March 31, 2013, http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-202_162-57577162/last-of-the-uss-guardian-removed-from- philippines-reef/.
50 Christopher Cavas, “Pictorial: Units of the U.S. Navy’s Naval Forces Central Command,” Intercepts: The Official Blog of DefenseNews, March 18, 2013, http://blogs.defensenews.com/intercepts/2013/03/pictorial-units-of-the-u-s-navys-naval-forces-central- command/#more-5107.
51U.S. Navy, “130255-N-PV215-044,” U.S. Navy, February 25, 2013, http://www.navy.mil/view_single.asp?id=144953. 26
1990s, remains unreliable.52 This unsatisfactory performance compounded by increased difficulty in keeping the system operational has meant that the USN is turning to the
United Kingdom’s Seafox system. This process has only recently begun, suggesting some familiarization will be needed before they can be effectively employed.53 As well, not only are the individual systems lackluster, the ships themselves are old and difficult to get underway. The Avengers located in San Diego have been “cannibalized” for parts to maintain the ones deployed overseas.54
The Littoral Combat Ship is set to become America’s replacement for both the
MCM 1 Avenger class mine countermeasures vessels and the FFG 7 Oliver Hazard Perry class frigates. There are twenty-three of the latter remaining in the USN as of November
2012, and more are slated to be decommissioned as they approach the end of their service lives in the next few years.55 The Perry class is currently armed with only a 76mm gun and Phalanx Close-In-Weapons-System (CIWS), plus two organic MH-60R helicopters and two sets of triple torpedo tubes. Originally fitted with the MK 13 single-arm missile launcher for use with SM-1 surface-to-air and Harpoon anti-ship missiles, the launcher
52 Christopher P. Cavas, “U.S. Navy Prepares for Extended Mine Force Presence in Arabian Gulf,” DefenseNews, November 15, 2012, http://www.defensenews.com/article/20121115/DEFREG02/311150005/U-S-Navy-Prepares-Extended- Mine-Force-Presence-Arabian-Gulf.
53 Christopher P. Cavas, “U.S. doubling minesweepers in Persian Gulf,” NavyTimes, March 15, 2012, http://www.navytimes.com/news/2012/03/dn-us-doubling-minesweepers-in-persian-gulf-031512/.
54 Tom Gough, Rahul Banerja, and Kirby Hobbs, “Analyzing and Improving Mine Countermeasures (MCM) Class Readiness” (paper presented at the 2011 Fleet Maintenance & Modernization Symposium, San Diego, California, August 30-31, 2011), accessed April 11, 2012, https://www.navalengineers.org/SiteCollectionDocuments/2011%20Proceedings%20Documents/FMMS20 11/Papers/Gough.pdf.
55 U.S. Navy, “Frigates – FFG,” U.S. Navy, November 7, 2012, http://www.navy.mil/navydata/fact_display.asp?cid=4200&tid=1300&ct=4. 27
was removed as the remaining SM-1s were “no longer sustainable”.56 In recent months,
America’s FFG 7s have begun to be fitted with a remote-controlled 25mm machine gun on a bandstand on top of the old MK 13 launcher area.57 Given these limited armaments, the Perry class is not expected to engage significant surface and air opponents, though they do appear to be adequate in ASW and countering small boats. That said, once they are all taken out of service, the USN will have lost a large number of blue-water ASW- capable hulls, since the LCS is only meant to conduct ASW in littoral regions. This may severely handicap any future convoy system should an enemy decide to oppose the transit of US forces into a region of conflict, as described above in NOC 10.
The roughly 3,000-ton Littoral Combat Ship, on the face of it, appears even less capable – a single 57mm Bofors gun on the bow and a RAM or SeaRAM launcher.58
RAM, or Rolling Airframe Missile, is a twenty-one-round point-defence weapon against incoming cruise missiles, and the SeaRAM variant is an eleven-round RAM launcher mounted within the Phalanx CIWS frame so as to provide radar guidance in the absence of a separate guidance radar on the LCS 2.59 Two versions, then, of the LCS exist: the
LCS 1 Freedom monohull design and the LCS 2 Independence trimaran. Despite the
56 Richard R. Burgess, “Guided Missiles Removed From Perry-class Frigates,” Seapower Magazine, September 2003, http://www.navyleague.org/sea_power/sep_03_34.php.
57 For examples, see the following photos: FFG 59 USS Kauffman http://www.navsource.org/archives/07/images/59/075942.jpg (July 15, 2010); FFG 61 USS Ingraham http://www.navsource.org/archives/07/images/61/076139.jpg (May 19, 2011) and http://www.navsource.org/archives/07/images/41/074143.jpg (June 11, 2011)
58 Ronald O’Rourke, “Navy Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) Program: Background and Issues for Congress,” Congressional Research Service, 2013, 23, 29.
59 Chase D. Patrick, “Assessing The Utility of an Event-Step ASMD Model by Analysis of Surface Combatant Shared Self-Defense,” (Master’s thesis, Naval Postgraduate School, 2001), 5. 28
drastically different hull forms, they are both nonetheless fairly similar in terms of naval capabilities. The aforementioned weapons are standard to both, as well as room for organic helicopter: two MH-60 Seahawks and a number of unmanned aerial vehicles, though the LCS 2 design can more comfortably accommodate and operate multiple aircraft. The major innovation with the LCS is the concept of mission-specific “plug-and- fight” mission packages. These are separate systems which offer a variety of capabilities: mine countermeasures (MCM), surface warfare (SUW), and anti-submarine warfare
(ASW). Twenty-four each of the MCM and SUW packages and sixteen of the ASW modules are planned to be procured. These will be distributed amongst a planned total of fifty-two LCS hulls, though recent developments suggest this may be reduced by as much as one half.60 Depending on the mission, an LCS can swap out its modules (or have them added in) within, in theory, two days. Additionally, the LCS was built for very high speeds: over forty knots for short durations.61 Their structural forms were also designed to be stealthy against radar emissions.
The mine-hunting package is currently undergoing revision as the original mine- clearing system is not performing as well as the Navy would like; instead, the Navy is looking into a pair of new helicopter-mounted systems called the Airborne Laser Mine
Detection System (ALMDS) and Airborne Mine Neutralization System (AMNS) as a basis for modification into carrying out the mine-hunting mission. Another part of this mission package is the unmanned vehicles that would operate on and under water, such
60 Christopher P. Cavas, “U.S. Navy Weighs Halving LCS Order,” DefenseNews, March 17, 2013, http://www.defensenews.com/article/20130317/DEFREG02/303170001/U-S-Navy-Weighs-Halving-LCS- Order.
61 Ronald O’Rourke, “Navy Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) Program: Background, Issues, and Options for Congress,” Congressional Research Service, 2012, 1-2. 29
as the AN/WLD-1 Remote Minehunting System mentioned above.62 The idea behind all these new technologies is to primarily remove the sailor from the minefield, and secondarily to increase the rate of mine removal. However, these systems have yet to demonstrate efficacy in realistic conditions or have yet to be proven sufficiently reliable.63 More details on these complications and the reasons behind them will be the subject of Chapter Three’s discussion. But despite such complications, it is hard to disagree with the expectation that the LCS MCM system will be more effective than the old Avengers – if nothing else, the LCSs are armed with self-defence weapons, while the
Avengers had little more than deck-mounted machine guns. As Chapter Four will suggest, a well-protected (or at least, better protected) minehunter can be absolutely vital to the
MCM effort.
The anti-surface warfare module currently consists of two 30mm cannons added to slots located on top of the hangar. These would be used in conjunction with the stock
57 mm Bofors, which has a range of seventeen kilometers.64 The Navy has recently decided to settle on the Griffin missile as an extra means of providing defence against small boat swarms. The Griffin missile is currently very short-ranged – a mere 2.7nm.
This is supposed to be a short term solution until a longer-ranged weapon of comparable size can be found.65 This may not seem like a lot of reaction time, but the LCS’s high sprint speeds may well provide the extra time needed to address the threat. Running away
62 John Keller, “Ocean mines have nowhere to hide,” Military & Aerospace Electronics 8 (2007), 16.
63 O’Rourke, “Navy Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) Program,” 2012, 28.
64 “Bofors 57 Mk3 Naval Gun System,” last modified 2006, http://www.baesystems.com/BAEProd/groups/public/documents/bae_publication/bae_pdf_57mk3.pdf
65 O’Rourke, “Navy Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) Program,” 2012, 10-11. 30
from threats may not be very glamourous, but the tactical advantage this may provide cannot be ignored: it may allow the LCS to run ahead of the “swarm”, allowing it to address each enemy one-by-one instead of being surrounded.
Finally, the following equipment would be added to comprise the anti-submarine mission package: a “Light-Weight Tow Torpedo Countermeasure”, a “Multi-Function
Towed Array System”, and a “Continuous Active Sonar – Variable Depth Sonar”. In conjunction with the MH-60R (presumably equipped with torpedoes), this should give the LCS a decent ASW capability.66 In the ASW context, the LCS’s speed once again provides a defensive advantage. Most torpedoes are incapable of sustained high speeds67
– should one be targeted at the LCS, the ship can attempt to run away, hopefully buying enough time until the torpedo loses fuel and ceases to be a threat.
While the Anti-Surface (ASuW) and Anti-Submarine (ASW) mission packages do not initially appear to be related to mine countermeasures, they can, in fact, have a large role to play. Iran has been known to practice deploying mines from small speedboats. One of the more effective MCM strategies is to prevent the mines from being deployed in the first place. Ergo, LCSs equipped with the ASuW package would theoretically be suitable for engaging such smaller minelayers. In regards to the ASW suite, Iran is also known to possess submarines that can deploy mines.68 Naturally, an
LCS equipped with its littoral ASW equipment would be well-suited (as long as all
66 Victor S. Gavin, “Program Executive Officer Littoral and Mine Warfare,” (Unclassified brief at Sea-Air- Space 2011, National Harbour, Maryland, April 12, 2011), 15.
67 See speed listings in the torpedoes section of: Norman Friedman, The Naval Institute Guide to World Naval Systems (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2006).
68 Khan, “Iranian Mining of the Strait of Hormuz,” 6. 31
systems are functional) for countering such threats as well. In Chapter Four, more discussion will be paid to the roles submarines and small boats can play in mine warfare.
But despite these positive observations, the LCS program has received significant criticisms based on their cost, low survival standards, and construction defects. The Navy initially desired 55 LCSs over the next few decades as a relatively cheap way to bolster its force numbers. The original price for the LCS seaframes (without mission packages and modules) was to be $250 million, but has since nearly doubled. Congress appears to have become resigned to the inevitable fact that the $250 million figure was too optimistic and has settled for instituting a cost cap of $480 million.69 The dynamics of the
LCS cost issue will also be a subject of study in Chapter Three.
Concerns have also been voiced regarding the survival standard to which the
LCSs are built. To minimize cost and leverage existing civilian infrastructure, the ships are built only to a “Survivability Level 1+” standard – enough to allow the crew to evacuate after a hit, nothing more. In other words, despite the fact that it is termed a
“combat ship”, it is not expected to maintain mission capability in a hostile combat environment.70 That is not to say it is going to be a write-off at the first sign of combat, however. Some fragmentation armour protection and automated damage control systems, plus a shock-hardened hull, means that it has a chance to “reposition” after being hit.
That the LCS will heavily employ remote-controlled vehicles for its various missions also means that it does not have to approach threats, particularly mines, as closely and thereby reduce its risk exposure. Further, it appears that the LCS is expected to operate as part of
69 O’Rourke, “Navy Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) Program,” 2012, 5-6.
70 Ibid., 19 32
a networked group of combatants, either other LCSs or large surface combatants and aircraft, if the threat expected is to be of “high intensity”. When operating by itself, it is to be in only “low-to-medium threat environments” where it can outgun small boat threats and defend itself from sudden ambushes with its RAM. The design principle appears to based on the acceptability of a “mission kill”, which is a tactical loss, so long as the ship survives and thereby maintains theatre-level strength.71
Of course, to get to the point where combat survivability is an issue, a basic structural integrity under non-combat conditions has to be initially present. Yet, LCS 1
USS Freedom has suffered from significant hull cracking during its trials. In February
2011, heavy sea conditions resulted in a six inch crack below USS Freedom’s waterline on the outside hull, with a three inch crack on the inner side of the bulkhead and resultant leaking. The crack appears to have been the result of a poor-quality weld between steel plates, rather than a design defect. However, other smaller cracks had also appeared earlier on the vessel’s aluminium superstructure, which have since been addressed via design changes.72 Problems with the first-ship-of-class notwithstanding, these appear to be problems that are well on their way to being addressed as the follow-on hulls have yet to demonstrate the same problems.
Despite the problems outlined in this section, the Littoral Combat Ships are likely to be effective so long as they keep within the strict confines of the operational concepts that justified and defined their development. The only problem - one that has not been mentioned - that appears likely to plague the LCS fleet in the future is the same one that
71 Ibid., 14-19.
72 Ibid., 24-26. 33
threatens the relevancy of the Arleigh Burke class: room for growth. The need to attach ad hoc buoyancy tanks to USS Freedom and subsequent lengthening of other LCS 1 hulls means that they are already reaching their maximum usable displacement.73 This may severely limit the extent to which future technologies can be integrated with the LCS 1 seaframe.
The general trend in mine countermeasures, as seen above, is to, above all, increase the safety of sailors and ships doing the MCM mission. To this end, efforts have been made to leverage unmanned and aerial technologies, allowing sailors to stay outside known minefields and conduct mine-clearing safe from the mines themselves. Another trend is the increase in speed with which MCM activities can take place, as seen in the various helicopter-borne technologies. As will be seen in Chapter Three, however, this second trend has a relatively low priority when faced with developmental challenges. In the mean time, USN MCM capabilities are severely handicapped by outdated technology and ill-maintained vessels, both having essentially remained the same since the early
1990s. As a result, American naval forces will have difficulty establishing effective sea control where mines have been deployed. This break in the NOC 10’s capabilities chain means that American naval strategy may not be able to anchor itself upon the idea of conventional deterrence as it heavily depends upon effective power projection capabilities, which in turn hinges upon successful control of the sea.
73 Lockheed Martin, “Anchors Aweigh for LCS 3,” Lockheed Martin LCS Team, August 7, 2012, http://www.lmlcsteam.com/archives/2145. 34
2.4: Conclusion
Unlike anti-submarine warfare and ballistic missile defence, the ability to clear waters of the threat of mines is currently limited to only a few vessels in the Navy, as established above. Unfortunately, not only are these vessels few in number, their individual capabilities are lacking – it is a dire sign when the world’s most powerful navy has to resort to buying key equipment from another country (i.e. SeaFox). With its various aerial and remote systems the LCS will, in theory, be able to clear mine fields without exposing the ship itself to mines, thus avoiding the drawbacks of the current
Avenger class. Although problems continue in these various systems’ reliability and performance, it should be safe to assume that so long as the need for effective MCM capability exists, then these systems will continue to be improved and developed until they reach full operational capability. The twenty-four MCM packages planned on being procured mean, theoretically, that a maximum of twenty-four MCM LCSs can be put to task, minus those out of service due to maintenance. This will be a quantitative increase in MCM capability compared to the current thirteen-ship Avenger fleet.74 While it can be argued that it is unlikely that nearly half (twenty-four of fifty-two) of the entire LCS fleet will be configured for the MCM mission, the fact remains that major surface warships can conduct ASW and ASuW missions to varying degrees, but not MCM at all. Thus, it makes the most sense that the LCSs will take on a role that is not already covered. If the various subsystems of the MCM mission package can be made reliable and operational, then the USN will have an adequate, though perhaps not stellar, force for establishing sea control in the littorals.
74 U.S. Navy, “21st Century U.S. Navy Mine Warfare,” 15. 35
For the US naval strategy’s end goal of deterring conflict, sea control in and of itself achieves little. Rather, sea control’s purpose is to establish a safe operating area from which US maritime forces can project power ashore. This capability is what demonstrates America’s ability to win wars, thus deterring conflict from erupting in the first place. To put it simply, CS-21 and NOC 10 envision a capabilities chain with deterrence as its anchor. However, an anchor is useless if any link in the chain is broken, and the Sea Control link is perhaps the most vulnerable of all at the current time, as demonstrated in this chapter’s coverage of US mine countermeasures capability. With the inability of US forces to clear a waterway of mines, sea control cannot be established, and thus power projection options are limited as US naval forces will not be able to freely maneuver into optimal positions. This thus results in a decreased credibility in deterrence, jeopardizing the feasibility of American naval strategy as currently set. In Chapter Four, an historical case study reveals a challenge to even the basic adequacy of CS-21 and
NOC 10’s strategy, for this capability chain may not even be suitable when facing the threat of naval mines. But first, in the next chapter, the question of why such a capability gap exists will be asked and some answers developed.
36
Chapter 3: Obstacles to the Development of Next-Generation MCM
On March 15, 2012, the United States Navy (USN) announced that it would drastically increase the amount of mine countermeasure (MCM) assets in the Persian
Gulf.75 Presumably in response to the recent threats by Iran to “close” the Strait of
Hormuz, this announcement indicates a recognition on the part of the American military that it has a quantitative shortfall in its ability to conduct MCM missions in that region.
However, this move does nothing to address the qualitative deficiencies in current MCM systems, which, as noted in the previous chapter, have changed little since the end of the
Cold War. These deficiencies will prevent American forces from effectively and quickly neutralizing the threat of naval mines. As a result, the United States would not be able to directly deter Iran from carrying out its threat of closing the Strait of Hormuz.
So if these tactical inadequacies have such great importance on America’s ability to prevent war, why have they still not been addressed? This question is the overarching query behind this chapter. It will look for reasons behind the cancellation and/or delays of various next-generation MCM capabilities. More specifically, the focus will be on two distinct elements that comprise naval hardware: equipment and platform. That is, the individual system components (such as weapons, engines, radars) and the ships that field them, respectively. Complementing research on these two elements is the recognition that they each belong in two distinct stages of acquisition: Research and Development (R&D) and Procurement. The research will assess whether it is excessive monetary costs,
75 Cavas, “U.S. doubling minesweepers in Persian Gulf”. 37
insurmountable technological obstacles, or both that are the prime factors behind these individual elements’ developmental difficulties.
The decision to focus on R&D and Procurement instead of Operations and
Maintenance is a result of the recognition that the latter is irrelevant until the hardware has been successfully developed and entered into USN service. It is essential to first examine the basic preconditions (i.e. the successful physical procurement of hardware) before exploring the costs that would be relevant only after those preconditions have been met. This is due to the difficulty in, if not impossibility of, assessing operational and maintenance costs when there is no operational experience to reference in the first place.
This chapter will be comprised of three sections. The first will briefly review the hardware solutions that are so necessary to resolve the current MCM deficiency. In particular, the next generation mine countermeasure capability of the USN will be covered. The second section of the paper will examine obstacles facing the Navy in the
R&D stages of the various hardware equipment and systems needed for this capability.
The last section will explore the complications involved in successfully procuring (i.e. purchasing) the ships that will field the items resulting from the R&D process – i.e. the
Littoral Combat Ship (LCS). The chapter concludes with analysis on what appear to be the constraints on the US Navy’s ability to develop and field the hardware it needs.
3.1: Part One: Upcoming Tactical Solutions to the MCM Problem
Chapter Two ended with an overview of the Avenger class MCM ships in the
USN inventory today. A combination of tactical and technological problems (physical presence in the minefield and problems with existing gear) have made them somewhat 38
outdated for the ideal MCM mission. To address some of these concerns, the USN has two other major systems for MCM. MH-53 Sea Dragon helicopters are used to tow a decoy sled through the water that is meant to set off any mines in the nearby area. To address the limitations of sonars in finding mines in cluttered littoral regions, the Navy’s
“marine mammal” program enlists dolphins.76 The animals’ echolocation is much more capable of distinguishing objects in cluttered environments than man-made sonars. Once mines are found, these dolphins can also place explosive charges upon them in order to neutralize the threat. Complementing the marine mammals are human divers, which conduct similar duties using hand-held sonars and their own eye sight.77
However, these methods still have their drawbacks. The helicopter only works against certain mines that can be set off by the stowed led’s “signatures” and cannot guarantee the removal of all mines. Dolphins and divers are slow and are exposed to great risk. The decision to deploy four more Avenger vessels and four more MH-53s does nothing to resolve these problems. Thus, better methods that are fast, effective, and above all, safe need to be developed.
To this end, the USN is focusing its efforts on developing unmanned and airborne vehicles. This will allow the MCM platform and its sailors to stay outside of the minefield, addressing the safety factor. To increase the speed of finding the mines, a helicopter-borne laser detector is supposed to be able to scan wide swaths of the sea and locate mines quickly and comprehensively. Once found, a 30mm cannon on the helicopter would fire a projectile through the water, disabling the mine. However, these
76 U.S. Navy, “21st Century U.S. Navy Mine Warfare,” 18.
77 Ibid. 39
systems are effective only against simple mines that are near the surface of the water. For deeper mines, there are also to be remotely-operated surface and subsurface vehicles that either locate and classify mines or set them off if locating is too difficult. Once one of these unmanned vehicles finds a deep water mine, the helicopter will then deploy a disposable neutralizer into the water.78
However, in May 2011, the 30mm anti-mine cannon (RAMICS) was cancelled, the reasons for which will be discussed in the next section.79 Instead, the disposable neutralizer (AMNS – Airborne Mine Neutralization System) would be modified for use against shallow and surface mines as well. This will likely reduce the speed at which the
USN can clear shallow mines, as the AMNS is much bulkier than the 30mm rounds on the RAMICS, requiring more frequent reloads as the neutralizers are used up. The advantage to using AMNS for both shallow and deep mines is that it results in there being only a single system for mine neutralization, potentially reducing costs.
Another of the unmanned technologies being developed is the AN/WLD-1
Remote Minehunting System, or RMS. This was briefly mentioned at the end of Chapter
Two in the context of their prospective use onboard six of the Arleigh Burke class destroyers. The RMS consists of a remotely-controlled diesel-powered sub-surface vehicle (referred to as the RMMV) towing an AQS-20A variable-depth sonar, along with their associated deployment/recovery systems. The RMS is a mine-detection and identification system, with no neutralization equipment.
78 “Raytheon’s AN/AQS-20 Mine Detection Sonar (AMCM),” Defense Industry Daily, December 22, 2009, accessed April 9, 2012, http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/raytheons-new-aqs-20-mine-detection-sonar- 03764/.
79 Sam LaGrone, “US Navy halts RAMICS development,” Jane’s Defence Weekly, May 26, 2011, http://www2.janes.com/janesdata/mags/jdw/history/jdw2011/jni74448.htm (accessed April 9, 2012). 40
The platform upon which these various systems are to be deployed is the Littoral
Combat Ship (LCS), a fast, stealthy, and shallow-drafted vessel that will serve as the
USN’s next generation small surface combatant. The premise of its design is that it is meant to employ different “mission packages” as necessary for a particular mission. One of them is the MCM mission package, which plans to consist of all the systems mentioned in the previous paragraph. 52 LCSs are to be built, with 24 MCM packages to be developed. This will provide the quantitative increase in MCM capability that the
USN desperately needs as well as the qualitative improvement resulting from the new systems.
This all sounds excellent, but significant problems remain on the part of both the systems’ development and the ships’ construction. Together, this means that the earliest deployment date of a working LCS-based MCM capability will not occur until around
201880, providing Iran with a large temporal window during which it can threaten international shipping.
The next parts of this paper will look into why development of these systems has taken so long and what implications there are for American naval acquisition in general.
3.2: Part Two: Obstacles in MCM Mission Package Development
This section focuses on the various elements that make up (and were to have made up) the LCSs’ MCM mission package and the obstacles they have faced so far. It will try to trace the broader factors that led to these problems and some lessons they may
80 LCDR Brian Armador, ”U.S. Navy Funding Goals for Future Mine Warfare Capability” (Presentation slides presented at 16th Annual Expeditionary Warfare Conference, Panama City, Florida, October 24-27, 2011), 13, accessed April 9, 2012, http://www.dtic.mil/ndia/2011expwar/MondayAmador.pdf. 41
hold. Some may argue that it is dilatory to examine the reasons behind the mission package delays since there are hardly enough LCS platforms to host them even if the packages have finished development. However, given the abovementioned problems that exist in the current MCM fleet, it is absolutely imperative that replacements are made available to the fleet as soon as possible – certainly earlier than the 2018 date currently projected for LCS MCM operations. At the current rate of mission package development, the Navy will not have a single fully-capable mission package (MCM or otherwise) until
2016, at which point there should already be nine LCSs in service.81 If the MCM systems could be made ready before this, then clearly some of those nine LCSs could join the
MCM assets in the Strait of Hormuz, providing much-needed capability. Furthermore, many of the components that make up the MCM mission package can be moved from ship to ship; the helicopter-based systems, for example, can be redeployed on board one of the existing ships in the region – not necessarily an LCS. Thus, it is relevant to explore why the mission package components have not progressed past the developmental and testing stages.
3.2.1: Remote Minehunting System
The RMS is one of the MCM mission package (MP) components that continues to experience problems despite having been in development for a long time. The focus of this examination is the RMMV, or Remote Multi-Mission Vehicle, which tows the AQS-
20A sonar used to find and identify mines.
81 Government Accountability Office. Defense Acquisitions[:] Assessments of Selected Weapon Programs, GAO-12-400SP, March 2012, 109. 42
The RMMV, after many years in testing, appears to be finally on track for operational use. The whole RMS “completed the first of three phases of reliability testing” on November 17, 2011.82 This five-month-long test “validated reliability improvements made to the RMMV Design”. According to the program manager of the
RMS program, “all testing and program objectives” were met or surpassed.
This progress is commendable, but it should be placed within the context of a half-decade’s worth of costly and troublesome development. Initially expected to be used on at least six Arleigh Burke class destroyers and housed in a specialized hangar, the
RMS’ reliability has been so undependable that by 2007, only one of the six destroyers built with RMS facilities actually retained the ability to employ the system.83 By
December 2009, cost growth in the program (85.1% by one metric)84 had far exceeded the cancellation cap placed by the Nunn-McCurdy Act, resulting in a review of the reasons behind the cost growth.85 The findings of the review, authored by Bailey et al., are summarized in the following paragraph.
The RMMV was originally to be used in both the LCS MCM and anti-submarine warfare (ASW) mission packages. However, it was decided in January 2009 that it is now only to be used for the MCM mission, as a more advanced system was selected for the
82 “LCS Remote Minehunting System Reaches Reliability Milestone,” Naval Sea Systems Command, accessed April 10, 2012, http://www.navsea.navy.mil/Newswire2011/15DEC11-02.aspx.
83 Director, Operational Test and Evaluation, “FY 2007 Annual Report,” Office of Director, Operational Test and Evaluation, 103.
84 John W. Bailey et al., Remote Minehunting System: Root Cause Analysis (Alexandria, VA: Institute for Defense Analyses, June 2010), S-2.
85 Bettina H. Chevanne, “Minehunting System Breaches Nunn-McCurdy,” Aviation Week, December 21, 2009, accessed April 9, 2012, http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/generic/story_generic.jsp?channel=defense&id=news/RMS122109.xml. 43
ASW package.86 In effect, this halved the number of RMMVs the Navy will be buying, from 106 to 52.87 In accordance with economy of scale trends, this drastically drove up the per-unit cost. Not only would there be less units produced overall, the rate at which they will be produced was also changed: no new units would be produced between 2009 and 2014, and once production does resume, it will be only at a rate of four per year instead of the original twelve.88 The five-year production gap is a result of the need to implement the Reliability Growth Program (RGP)89, which seeks to “improve the mean time between operational mission failures”90 of the RMMV – basically, a critical redesign of the vehicle in order to make it more operationally viable. The cost associated with the
RGP is thus yet another factor that has driven up the costs of the RMMV. Finally, the initial baseline cost estimates only accounted for the costs of RMMV hardware production, ignoring all of the engineering, integration and testing, and management costs.
Bailey et al. concluded that of these factors, the decision to cut procurement quantities in half contributed the most to the Program Acquisition Unit Cost (PAUC) increase – 43%.91 PAUC is the cost-per-unit including all development, procurement, and
86 John W. Bailey et al., Remote Minehunting System, 8.
87 Bailey et al., Remote Minehunting System, 6.
88 Ibid., 7.
89 Ibid.
90 George I. Seffers, “Lockheed Martin to Improve Remote Vehicle Reliability,” SIGNALscape, December 19, 2011, accessed April 9, 2012, http://www.afcea.org/signal/signalscape/index.php/subject/remote-multi- mission-vehicle-reliability-growth-program/.
91 Bailey et al., Remote Minehunting System, 13. 44
construction costs.92 This is an interesting example of the impact that the pursuit for more advanced and capable systems has on higher equipment costs. While it is known that higher costs usually accompany more advanced and specialized technologies, it is rarely considered in light of cross-program impacts. That is, while the Navy may have considered how much more it would cost to develop an advanced separate ASW vehicle instead of using the RMMV, it would appear that they failed to anticipate the reverse impact that this would have on the RMMV’s own unit cost; alternatively, the Navy may have expected the cost increase, but deemed it acceptable in light of the increased capabilities that the separate ASW vehicle would bring. This latter explanation is fairly unlikely, however, given the prospect of cancellation under the Nunn-McCurdy arrangement due to too high a cost increase. But regardless, RMMV development appears to be on track: as of June 2013, it has managed to remain operational for 115 hours before breaking down, far exceeding the 75 hours required by the Reliability Growth Program.93
It seems likely that the RMMV, and thus RMS, will succeed in becoming a staple component of the LCS MCM mission package in the coming years.
3.2.2: Airborne Minehunting Systems
Helicopter-mounted mine countermeasures whose development are currently ongoing consists of two components: the Airborne Laser Mine Detection System
(ALMDS) and the Airborne Mine Neutralization System (AMNS). While the ALMDS
92 Moshe Schwartz, “The Nunn-McCurdy Act: Background, Analysis, and Issues for Congress,” Congressional Research Service, 2.
93 Andrea Shalal-Esa, “Testing shows big improvement in Lockheed unmanned minehunter,” Reuters, June 20, 2013, accessed August 2, 2013, http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/06/20/lockheed-navy- minehunting-idUSL2N0EW0HB20130620. 45
description is fairly self-explanatory (it uses laser pulses to search the water for mines), the latter system requires some clarification.
In MCM nomenclature, “neutralization” and “sweep” have very distinct meanings. The neutralization of mines refers to the precise removal of a mine as a threat, usually via an explosive charge placed directly on the mine. In past, current, and near- future systems, this is done one mine at a time. The precise nature of this activity requires the MCM actor to know exactly the location of the mines, which up to now has been (and continues to be) an extremely time-intensive pursuit.94
The sweeping of mines, on the other hand, is a quicker and broader activity.
Usually used against contact mines that would explode only if touched, “mechanical” sweeps involves sailing a minesweeper into a minefield, with chains and/or cutters that would cut the cables that keep buoyant mines moored to the ocean floor; cutting the cables allow the mines to float to the surface, where they can be more easily disposed of.
However, with the advent of mines that can be triggered by non-contact means such as acoustic signature or wave influence, mechanical sweeping becomes very dangerous even for minesweepers made of non-metallic materials. In such cases, it is easier to sweep for these advanced mines via the use of some kind of signature emitter. This device would mimic the various acoustic, magnetic, and wave signatures of a ship and thereby set off mines that are sensitive to such inputs.95 The MK 105 tow-sleds currently used by the
MH-53 Sea Dragon helicopters are one such example of this method.
94 U.S. Navy, “21st Century U.S. Navy Mine Warfare,” 13.
95 Ibid., 14. 46
Thus, the AMNS is meant to disable individual mines; it is effectively a small helicopter-dropped torpedo equipped with various sensors that allow an operator to guide it against a mine and explode, “neutralizing” the mine. An SH-60 helicopter can carry up to four AMNS at a time.96 Clearly, being able to destroy only four mines per sortie is not exactly a swift process, especially if Iran deploys all of the 300 mines (or more) that are necessary for closing the Strait of Hormuz. So while the AMNS is an improvement over existing neutralization methods in terms of range (a helicopter being able to go much farther distances than the current neutralizer deployed from the Avengers) and safety (no need for dolphins and divers; the ship can keep far out of the minefield), it does not appreciably speed up the mine-clearing process. This is because the AMNS was not originally conceived to be the only next-generation neutralization system.
The AMNS was in fact supposed to be only used against mines located far below the surface of the water, such as ones that would rise up before exploding and ones that are buried or sit on the ocean floor. Shallower mines were to have been the domain of the
Rapid Airborne Mine Clearance System, or RAMICS. This was a 30mm cannon mounted on a helicopter that would fire “supercavitating” rounds, allowing them to travel some distance through the water. In theory, this would allow the helicopter to quickly blow up mines one-by-one from the air without having to go through the lengthy process of deploying and guiding the AMNS vehicle to the mine. However, the RAMICS was cancelled in the summer of 2011 as a result of technical difficulties.97 While the gun itself
96 “LCS & MH-60S Mine Counter-Measures Continue Development,” Defense Industry Daily, April 5, 2012, accessed April 10, 2012, http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/mh60s-airborne-mine- countermeasures-continues-development-01604/.
97 O’Rourke, “Navy Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) Program,” 2012, 15. 47
appears to have performed well, the targeting system for it was considered too difficult to perfect. This appeared to have been primarily a software problem. While it is theoretically possible to compensate for the effect that refraction would have on the perceived versus actual location of the mine under the water’s surface, it appears that the role that waves had on this drastically increased the difficulty involved. The cost involved in coming up with the necessary corrections was deemed too high, thus eliminating the
Navy’s only method for quickly clearing an area of mines.98
The RAMICS program is an excellent example of the classic technology versus cost constraints on successful systems development. Was the technology just not there to make it work? Or was it simply too expensive to make work? In a typical chicken-and- egg fashion, the answer is unclear. Few documents exist that mention the RAMICS’ cancellation, much less possible reasons behind it. Yet, there may be an answer if we look at similarly advanced systems and seeing whether they have been successful.
The Airborne Laser Mine Detection System (ALMDS) is a good candidate for comparison. As was with the RAMICS, it is also meant to be able to look down into the water and identify sub-surface objects. The difference is that the ALMDS does not have to do complex calculations necessary for a physical object to be able to strike the sub- surface mine. In this way, then, the ALMDS is a simpler system. However, despite the apparent simplicity of the ALMDS (how hard could it be to shoot a laser beam into the water and see how it reflects?), it is not without problems. One of the major obstacles has been the amount of “false positives” – seeing mines when there are no mines. While this is a better situation than finding no mines when there are mines, it is hardly conducive
98 Ibid., 15-16. 48
towards a speedy and efficient mine-clearing operation. The “bug” that appears to be responsible for the false positives is, as with RAMICS, environmental physics. In this case, it is reflections off the water as a result of light sources such as the sun.99 Like the problems involved with RAMICS’ refraction compensation, the ALMDS’ reflection problem is holding back its success. Unlike RAMICS, however, the ALMDS has not been cancelled100 and it has been determined that the reflection issue is resolvable.
The conclusion, albeit tenuous, that can be drawn from this is that there is a
“tolerance” point, one where the technological hurdle is present but deemed sufficiently manageable by little to no increase in funding costs. The ALMDS problem managed to just barely fit on the tolerable side of this point, while the RAMICS’ was deemed to be on the other. This tolerance point is difficult to pinpoint, but asides from the cost required to make the system work, there also appears to be considerations of alternative means. In the case of RAMICS, it was cancelled only once it was demonstrated that the AMNS could be adapted to also counter shallow mines with minimal cost and difficulty.101 Thus, one significant factor that appears to impede the development of technologically advanced systems is the availability of “good enough” alternatives – so long as an alternative is available that works better than current systems, then it is acceptable even if it is less capable than the most theoretically capable option.
99 “LCS & MH-60S Mine Counter-Measures Continue Development.”
100 John Keller, “Navy’s laser-based Airborne Laser Mine Detection System enters final development before full-scale production,” Military & Aerospace Electronics, April 8, 2012, accessed April 10, 2012, http://www.militaryaerospace.com/articles/2012/04/almds-lrip.html.
101 O’Rourke, “Navy Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) Program,” 2012, 14. 49
There is one further element to the MCM mission package – an unmanned surface vehicle (USV) towing a surface sweep device. This “Unmanned Influence Sweep
System”, or UISS, is to be similar in function to the tow sled currently used by the MH-
53 helicopters. There are conflicting reports regarding the status of this element. On the one hand, the Government Accountability Office “Assessments of Selected Weapon
Programs” states that the USV has been cancelled, citing certain design deficiencies that will require a six-year period to resolve.102 However, the actual budget request by the
Navy for Fiscal Year 2013 indicates that the USV is still very much to continue development and in fact procures two more USVs. No mention is made of whether these two USVs for FY 2013 are to be of the existing design that the GAO report indicates is deficient.103 It would be interesting to look further into the deficiencies implied by the
GAO, but the recent nature of the alleged cancellation makes it difficult to find sources.
Thus, we will continue on to the Littoral Combat Ship itself.
3.3: Part Three: Littoral Combat Ship Procurement
In discussing the cost growths associated with the various MCM elements, it should be noted that they are quite minor in comparison to that of the Littoral Combat
Ship platform upon which they will be deployed. At slightly less than $500 million per ship, the LCS has failed to meet the original conception of a low-cost small combatant.
This is made especially glaring in light of the fact that many foreign warships that are
102 Government Accountability Office. Defense Acquisitions[:] Assessments of Selected Weapon Programs, 110.
103 Department of the Navy, Fiscal Year (FY) 2013 President’s Budget Submission, Justification Book Volume 2: 436. 50
available at that price (or less) are often much more capable in terms of combat power.
One example is the Danish Iver Huitfeldt class, which some sources state costs as little as
$333 million per ship (including sensors and weapons!) despite displacing nearly twice as much as an LCS.104 So why has the LCS cost so much? This section seeks to answer that question with a review of some literature on the general subject of shipbuilding costs before testing those findings for the LCS case.
Perhaps the most salient starting point is the RAND Corporation’s study on “Why
Has the Cost of Navy Ships Risen?” In sum, RAND concludes that the answer to their book’s title is that cost growth in the US Navy can be explained mainly by the desire for ever-increasing complexity on America’s warships. In particular, two warship characteristics were identified as proxies most strongly correlating with increased ship costs beyond annual inflation: power density and Light Ship Weight (LSW).
Power density is quantified as the amount of electrical power available to a ship
(in kilowatts) per cubic foot. Power density in and of itself does not explain the increased costs of ships. Nor is it merely the cost of more powerful electrical generators. Rather, the connection between power density and increase ship costs is via the implication that greater power density means that there are increasing amounts of power-intensive systems on board ships. These systems are the drivers behind the need for (and thus presence of) increased power density of ships over the last decades, and thus the true sources behind increased ship costs.
104 “An Overview of Current, On-Going Danish Naval Projects 2005-2009,” Canadian American Strategic Review, March 11, 2010, http://www.casr.ca/id-danish-naval-projects-frigate.htm. 51
LSW is the weight of a ship with all non-permanent items removed.105 Increases in LSW are a result of larger ships. As with the power density proxy, LSW itself does not result in increased costs. It is once again a reflection of how well LSW represents the various complex systems being put on the ship. Here, instead of the equipment’s costs being related to their power consumption, it is a matter of larger ships being able to fit more and larger (and thus costlier) systems on board.
Both of these proxies are manifestation of the general trend towards increasingly complex ships. This can be traced back to the last decade of the Cold War, when the design and construction of what would become the current US surface fleet began. The two major designs to have survived into the 21st century, the CG 47 and DDG 51 classes, were both “multi-mission” warships. They are now responsible for every traditional combat mission – anti-air, anti-submarine, and anti-surface. Added into this mix is the ballistic missile defence mission, thanks to the flexibility of the AEGIS combat system and the ships’ Vertical Launch System. Not only do their missions run nearly the full gamut of warfighting capabilities, they are also expected to conduct them to the best ability that the US Navy can put into operational status. That is, whereas earlier Cold War force structure saw a mix of “high end” and “low end” vessels with varying weapon types, ranges, and effectiveness, today’s major surface combatants are more-or-less equal in capability. What this has meant is that for a guided-missile destroyer (RAND compares a 1961 DDG 2 with a 2002 DDG 51, compensating for inflation), there is an 81% increase in LSW and an 88% increase in power density, with a net result of some 2.1%
105 Mark V. Arena et al., Why Has the Cost of Navy Ships Risen? A Macroscopic Examination of the Trends in U.S. Naval Ship Costs Over the Past Several Decades (Santa Monica: RAND, 2006), 34 52
cost increase in each intervening year. RAND concludes that rising ship costs are thus the result of Navy requirements for more complex multi-mission vessels.
But what about factors like labour, materials, and procurement processes? Should not they also play a role in affecting ship costs? RAND finds that while they do factor in to cost increases, they play a much less significant role than the requirements mentioned earlier. RAND’s methodology separates possible factors into two broad categories: economy-driven and customer-driven. The former refers to costs outside of the Navy’s control such as labour, construction materials, and “contractor-furnished” equipment.106
The latter applies to costs that the Navy, as the customer, can directly influence – complexity requirements and procurement practices being two main ones. It was found that economy and customer driven factors contributed roughly equally to the annual cost increase of ships: 4.5%107 and 4.4%108, respectively, for surface combatants. Because annual inflation is roughly equal to half of the annual ship cost increase, RAND considered the cost escalation associated with economy-driven factors to be the result of normal inflation. Thus, they come to the conclusion that customer-driven factors are the reason why ships have been getting more expensive.
With that established, it then becomes a question of which customer-driven factor(s) is responsible for the bulk of the cost increase. The answer to this was already laid out in previous paragraphs – Navy requirements for more complex ships. By itself, the complex nature of modern ships is responsible for 2.1% of cost increases. Adding
106 Mark V. Arena et al., Why Has the Cost of Navy Ships Risen?, 24.
107 Ibid., 31.
108 Ibid., 47. 53
another 2.0% is the effect of standards and regulations on shipyard practices, in addition to improved ship performance in areas such as habitability. Finally, the remainder 0.3% that makes up the customer-driven contribution to cost escalation results from procurement practices. To examine the impact of procurement practices, RAND looked at both procurement rates and the number of shipyards. It was concluded both those factors contributed only minutely, relatively speaking, to the overall annual cost increases.
3.3.1: Applicability of the RAND Analysis to the LCS Program
The RAND analysis, despite its clinically neat and tidy conclusions, may not necessarily apply for all surface combatant programs. We will now examine its premises and conclusions in the context of the LCS program.
RAND’s finding that the main reason for increased ship costs has been the increased complexity of ships, and in particular the insertion of more numerous combat and non-combat systems, resulted in their recommendation that perhaps ships should be built separate from their systems. In particular, they cite the Littoral Combat Ship program and its approach of developing the mission packages separate from the hull.
RAND at the time of their report suggested that this may be one way of reducing the costs of ships. The logic behind this proposal is that the Navy would only have to buy enough mission packages for the ships that are operating in the package’s role – for example, instead of buying 55 massive ships capable of holding the MCM, ASW, and anti-surface warfare mission packages all at the same time (and thus require 55 units of each of those packages), the Navy could settle for 55 small LCSs and a reduced quantity 54
of those packages based on the operational vision that there would never be 55 LCSs needing the same mission package type at any given time.109
This logic certainly is sound, and though there is much truth that the LCSs and their mission packages are extremely expensive relative to traditional combat capability, this does not take away from the expected cost-savings for the LCS program as a whole versus building the same amount of multi-mission combatants. The one caveat here is that a situation similar to that faced by the RMMV may also apply: that an increased unit cost for the mission packages may exist due to the reduced amount of mission packages needed in the LCS concept compared to a prospective program of 55 large combatants that requires 55 of every package.
In any case, RAND’s suggestion for ship-systems separation rests upon the finding that systems do in fact contribute significantly to ship costs. This chapter will now examine briefly the validity of this by looking at other shipbuilding industries around the world. Stuart Young and Jonathan Davis noted in their study on United
Kingdom warship procurement methods that for the UK, systems held the dominant percentage of the price of a warship: 70% compared to 30% for the hull.110 This is in stark contrast to commercial vessels, where the reverse is true – 20% systems, 80% hull.
The same trend holds true in Australia, as noted by Stefan Markowski and Robert Wylie:
33% for “Platform design, hull, machinery, and equipment” versus 41% for combat
109 Ibid., xviii.
110 Stuart Young and Jonathan Davies, “United Kingdom Warship Procurement Strategies,” in National Approaches to Shipbuilding and Ship Procurement, ed. Douglas L. Bland (Kingston: Defence Management Studies Program, School of Public Policy Studies, Queen’s University, 2010), 7. 55
systems.111 Logistical support and training and project management make up the remainder costs. Markowski and Wylie do not use the same metric as Young and Davis, so these numbers should not be taken as directly analogous to each other. Nonetheless, if we isolate Markowski and Wylie’s “Platform design, hull, machinery, and equipment” and combat systems sections, we can start to do a more direct comparison with the dichotomous British example. The British “systems” element probably includes the machinery and equipment costs that are in the Australian study’s “Platform design, hull, machinery, and equipment” section. Thus, if we shift the percentage composition of those non-combat systems (machinery and equipment) into the combat systems section, we will have a hull versus systems dichotomy that much better reflects the duality used in Young and Davis’ study. Though the exact percentages of this “shift” are unclear, it stands to reason that the relative percentage composition of systems versus hull in the Australian case would more closely reflect the British case. In sum, RAND’s conclusion that systems contribute most significant to ship costs is a valid observation.
Another factor that RAND concluded would result in increased ship costs was the use of multiple shipyards for the same class of vessels. RAND suggests that further consolidation of shipbuilding industries and eliminating competition between shipyards would result in cheaper ships. Certainly, historical practice appears to bear out the economic validity of this suggestion. Throughout the Cold War, the British shipbuilding industry continually merged shipyards in “rationalization” schemes. The 1950s began with fifteen different shipyards building only twenty-six ships – less than two ships per
111 Stefan Markowski and Robert Wylie, “Australian Naval Shipbuilding Strategy 2009,” in National Approaches to Shipbuilding and Ship Procurement, ed. Douglas L. Bland (Kingston: Defence Management Studies Program, School of Public Policy Studies, Queen’s University, 2010), 87. 56
yard. This was part of the strategic requirement that the UK maintain “maximum warship-building capability”.112 However, providing fifteen warship yards with continuous work was a very costly endeavour and with tightening defence budgets, the
Admiralty had to look for ways to reduce costs. One method was to “return to competitive tendering with fixed prices in order to encourage efficiency and economy.”113 The known side-effect of this was the closure of shipyards which did not submit a successful bid – thus the elimination or merger by 1965 of ten of those fifteen yards. Even then, there were still more shipyards than Royal Navy ship construction schedules required; this “overcapacity” became yet the subject of further
“rationalization”. The end result of this trend was the reduction to three naval shipyards in the whole of the United Kingdom, each specializing in particular classes of warships.
By September 2009, defence industry giant BAE Systems finished acquiring majority shares in all three shipyards, putting them all into the hands of a single company.114
The effect this consolidation had on the costs of Royal Navy warships is unclear – a comprehensive study on the topic has yet to be done or been made publically available.
Nonetheless, as a country’s budget is a zero-sum game, money that is spent on upkeeping idle yards would be money that could not be spent on new ship production. Thus, it would stand to reason that the UK’s consolidation strategy was overall in agreement with
RAND’s suggestion that doing so would be more cost-efficient.
112 Young and Davies, “United Kingdom Warship Procurement Strategies,” 2.
113 Ibid.
114 Ibid., 3. 57
RAND notes that although competition amongst shipyards should theoretically result in cost savings, there is “little evidence” that this holds true in practice.115
Furthermore, competition amongst shipyards may well result in economic ruin, or at least hardships, for one or more of the yards. During Imperial Germany’s dreadnought construction program, for example, the “highly competitive climate” then present resulted in major shipbuilders like Blohm & Voss to actually lose significant sums of money for every ship they built.116 The LCS program provides us with a very interesting case study of the impact of using competing shipyards may have on ship costs.
At least one Navy official has publically stated that the decision to buy both versions of the LCS, and thus two separate shipyards and companies, has resulted in a
$600 million net savings over buying only one design. The Navy in September 2009 had originally wanted to carry a “Down Select Acquisition Strategy”; this would have saw a decision in late 2010 deciding which of the two LCS builders would win the contract to build the first ten ships. The LCS design of the winning bidder would from then on be the only design built, regardless of which shipyard wins build contracts after the first ten ships.117
As it turned out, the Navy decided in late 2010 to go ahead with buying both the
Lockheed Martin monohull and the General Dynamics trimaran designs, awarding each company ten ships. The justification for this was the expectation that the act would save
115 Arena et al., Why Has the Cost of Navy Ships Risen?, 65
116 Holger H. Herwig, “Imperial Germany: Continental Titan, Global Aspirant,” in China Goes to Sea: Maritime Transformation in Comparative Historical Perspective, ed. Andrew S. Erickson et al. (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2009), 186.
117 O’Rourke, “Navy Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) Program,” 2012, 8. 58
$600 million in total procurement costs versus going with the Down Select strategy.118
This figure already accounts for the $300 million in extra costs associated with maintaining two designs’ worth of spare parts, simulators, and differing components.119
Information is scarce regarding how is it exactly that buying and supporting two drastically different ship designs, each with their own different radars, engines, and other hull-specific components,120 can end up being cheaper than going with just one design.
Nonetheless, if the Navy is honest (and accurate) in its savings estimation, then it threatens to completely reverse the consolidation suggestion put forth by RAND.
One possible explanation for why there were cost-savings involved in this particular scenario may rest, ironically, in the very distinct differences between that the designs of the two LCS versions. RAND’s assertion that expenses increase when the same ship design is being built by two or more different yards was due to the observation that “multiple producers may not make it as far down the learning curve as a single one will during a constant production run.”121 That is, a single design spread over multiple yards means fewer hulls built by each, and consequently each yard may not have the opportunity to gain sufficient familiarity with the design to find areas where savings can be attained (i.e. “learning”). In contrast, a yard that is responsible for building all of the hulls can gain the experience necessary to benefit from that learning and still have new
118 Ibid., 8-9
119 Grace Jean, “Buying Two Littoral Combat Ship Designs Saves the Navy $600 Million, Official Says,” NationalDefenseMagazine.org, January 12, 2011, accessed April 10, 2011, http://www.nationaldefensemagazine.org/blog/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?List=7c996cd7-cbb4-4018-baf8- 8825eada7aa2&ID=283.
120 Director, Operational Test and Evaluation, “FY 2011 Annual Report,” Office of Director, Operational Test and Evaluation, 139
121 Arena et al., Why Has the Cost of Navy Ships Risen?, 47. 59
hulls on which to apply those cost-cutting lessons, resulting in lower total procurement costs. This is essentially an economies-of-scale argument, in which each shipyard is treated as a self-contained producer.
So why not go with the original down-select strategy of building a single design of the LCS at one yard? Simply put, the $600 million figure may well be a “potential” or
“expected”, rather than actual, cost savings – a relative savings dependent on a comparison with the possibility of awarding the second (and/or subsequent) batch of LCS builds to a company that did not have the experience of working on the initial 10 ships. In such an event, that second company would have had to be paid for retooling all of its construction equipment and facilities to conform to the winning design. As well, this second company would have to “relearn” areas in which cost-savings had already been achieved by the first company. Finally, the second company may experience delays in restarting construction since it will have to rehire some of the workers that would leave while there was little or no work to be had during the construction of the first batch by the first company. This outcome runs the risk of costing the Navy more money than if it had chosen the current option of both designs and both shipyards. In purchasing both designs for the first twenty ships, there is work stability in the likelihood of the Navy continuing to award both shipyards a roughly equal distribution of the remainder of the 55 total hulls. This stability means that there is less potential risks of cost increases due to any switching back-and-forth between two shipyards to build a single design, as may have been the case under the initial down-select procurement plan.
Of course, much of this could have been mitigated had the Navy insisted on there only being one design to reach the physical stage. A more rigorous analysis of the two 60
radically different designs could have avoided the problems involved in paying for the establishment and disestablishment of physical equipment and manpower to build both designs. In short, the $600 million in relative savings, and probably more, would have already been covered had the Navy decided to build all 55 ships in one shipyard with the same design.
One final suggestion that RAND put forth for reducing ship costs was to “Build
Commercial-Like Ships”.122 This would see naval vessels being built more towards civilian survival standards. Navies other than the USN have already been doing so –
RAND cites examples like HMS Ocean of the Royal Navy and the ships of the Royal
Dutch Navy. In theory, building ships towards a lower, civilian, standard would result in significant cost savings. However, unlike the previous two suggestions, the LCS appears to throw a proverbial wrench into the works.
The LCS, despite the word “Combat” in its name, was never conceived to be a true combatant. To the extent that a combat-capable warship is usually able to absorb some battle damage while continuing to fight, the LCS fails this criterion.123 The Navy decided that the LCS should be built with only the minimal amount of durability – what the Navy colloquially terms “Level 1+”.124 The lowest level of survivability being 1 and the highest 3, 1+ implies a Level 1 basis while incorporating additional sources of protection that falls short of a full Level II survivability. This puts the LCSs at a rank that
122 Ibid., 68.
123 O’Rourke, “Navy Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) Program,” 2012, 17.
124 Ibid., 19. 61
is lower than the FFG 7 class frigates they are nominally replacing.125 The additional bit of protection that the LCS has is meant to allow the ship to retreat from the area of hostilities if it is damaged by hostile forces. Part of the reason behind this choice of lesser protection was that, in line with RAND’s suggestion, it would be cheaper, since Level 1 survivability is little more than what commercial ships have. Yet, the LCS, originally supposed to cost $220 million and now nearly half that of a Level III Arleigh Burke destroyer, has shown that the efficacy of this cost-saving measure suggested by RAND is not evident.
3.4: Conclusion
This chapter has outlined the issues behind the difficulties and resultant delays in developing and building the US Navy’s next generation of mine countermeasure systems.
It has focused on the Littoral Combat Ship and its prospective Mine Countermeasures mission package, stressing the factors that affect the costs of the program. The paper’s separation into the elements of the MCM mission package and the LCS itself reflects not only the ontological differences between the two, but also the literature available (or not available) on the topic. This latter determined the research approach that was taken and the factors that were unveiled for the dichotomous components.
The dearth of secondary-source literature on the development and progress of the
MCM mission package components dictated that much of the information come from a wide variety of disparate sources. Complicating the analysis is the lack of a framework from which to proceed. Regardless, two main conclusions were arrived at, one for the
125 Ibid., 26. 62
waterborne MCM systems and the other for the airborne. For the former, it was found that the halving the number of orders for the RMMV resulted in drastically increased per- unit costs. The desire to improve the anti-submarine warfare package by itself was a positive thing, but it failed to take into account of how it would, or could, affect the costs of the MCM package. The lesson of this incident, and one that should be remembered for future procurement projects, is that seemingly unrelated (or minimally related) projects can have unexpected feedback effects on each other. On the airborne side of the MCM mission package, the continuation of the Airborne Laser Mine Detection System and the cancellation of the Rapid Airborne Mine Clearing System shows us that the combination of technical difficulties that are too expensive to resolve and the availability of a “good enough” alternative can stall the development of advanced systems. This last point echoes a broader trend noted by naval scholar Geoffrey Till, who observed that naval innovation tends to proceed at a “slither”, rather than as a “big bang”, due to the fact that older technology were better at what they did than the most cutting edge experiments.126
The lack of an analytic framework present in the mission package section was not the case in the examination of the Littoral Combat Ship itself. This section heavily employed RAND’s study on factors behind the cost increases of US Navy warships. The paper sought to test the validity of RAND’s suggestions for reducing ship costs in the
LCS context. Three of RAND’s suggestions were examined: the separation of ship’s hull from ship’s systems, the consolidation of industry shipyards, and the use of commercial standards in warship construction. This chapter’s findings concluded that RAND’s suggestions appear to be valid for some parts. The suggestions that did not appear to meet
126 Geoffrey Till, Seapower: A Guide for the Twenty-First Century (London: Frank Cass, 2004), 138-139. 63
expected cost-savings were the use of commercial construction standards and, though it cannot be confirmed, the use of two designs and two shipyards. Roughly speaking then, this section of the paper actually found sources of savings, however dubious some of those may be, for the LCS program, rather than the original intention of uncovering sources of costs.
All of the conclusions arrived at in this chapter should be read with the caveat in mind that the LCS and its mission packages are still at the early stages of production.
Cost estimates at this point of the program are still relatively fluid and it would not inconceivable for the conclusions in this paper to drastically change within the next twenty years of the LCS’s prospective construction program. Once the production matures, we can reasonably expect the costs of the LCS itself to go down, though new technologies may well result in higher mission package costs. This latter possibility should be tempered, however, with finding in this paper that advanced and prohibitively expensive technologies may be discarded in favour of “good enough” solutions (.e.g.
RAMICS and its modified AMNS replacement).
This chapter examined a very particular subset of the overall US Navy establishment. It is far from an overview of the costs associated with maintaining a navy superior to all others – “the cost of seapower”, to quote the title of Philip Pugh’s eponymous book on the subject. Yet, the complex interplay between technology, ship design, and shipyard dynamics partially explored in here are absolutely essential to understanding why costs and delays are present in the first place. Only by understanding this is it possible to fully appreciate the complexity of the answer to the question that sparked this chapter – why has the US Navy yet to field a capability that is so crucial to 64
its strategic goals? The findings here thus have greater utility than just for MCM issues and can be applied to the greater naval procurement regime.
But for the area of mine countermeasures, this chapter has illustrated the difficulties involved in fielding rapid and safe methods for neutralizing naval mines.
Although one hundred years of technological advances separate the modern day from the
First World War, it is clear that the simple mine remains difficult to counter and that technology on its own has yet to be the panacea for this threat. Yet, as the next chapter illustrates, these technological problems must be solved, lest the United States Navy wishes to remain vulnerable in times of crisis when operational and strategic challenges further complicate mine countermeasures.
65
Chapter 4: Learning From the Past
On March 18th, 1915, a combined fleet of British and French battleships attempted to force their way through the Dardanelles, the southern half of the Turkish
Straits that connected the Mediterranean with the Black Sea. “Attempted” is the key word, for it was a spectacular failure. Two of the greatest navies in the world had failed to enforce their will upon the puny and seemingly obsolete forces of the Ottoman Empire, sparking the infamous and bloody land campaign on the Gallipoli peninsula.
Nearly a century later to the southeast, the United States Navy (USN) is building up its forces in Persian Gulf.127 Though never directly admitted, the nature of these forces makes it clear that they are meant to dissuade the Islamic Republic of Iran from following through on its threats to “close” the Strait of Hormuz (SOH). Should this dissuasion fail, those same forces are expected to be able to swiftly end any attempt at following through on that those threats. Commonly viewed as being the world’s most powerful, many observers expect the USN to easily overpower its Iranian counterpart.
But is that actually the case? One is reminded of the cliché adage that those who do not learn from the past are doomed to repeat it. It is worth considering whether a scenario similar to the one the United States may face in the Strait of Hormuz has already occurred in history. Such a historical comparison may well reveal some valuable lessons for America and her allies in the near future. It is in this context that this chapter examines the Ottoman defence of the Dardanelles in World War One. The similarities
127 Cavas, “U.S. doubling minesweepers in Persian Gulf”.
66
between that campaign and a potential Iranian attempt at closing the Strait of Hormuz should be apparent. In sum, both involve a power with a “small” navy trying to prevent a power (or powers) from using its “large” navy to successfully force its way through a narrow body of water.
This chapter thus seeks to assess the extent to which Ottoman area-denial operations in the Dardanelles can provide a rough outline for Iranian actions in the Strait of Hormuz, as well as what the United States and her potential allies can learn from the mistakes of the British and French forces. The chapter will be split into two main parts: the first will examine the details of the Dardanelles campaign as it was conducted by both sides, while the second will analyse the applicability of part one’s conclusions to the modern-day Strait of Hormuz scenario. Because the premise of this section is dependent upon the initial similarities between the respective parties despite their temporal distance, the first part will begin with a historical overview of the Ottoman Navy’s development and its force structure by World War One in order to establish its status as a relatively minor force.
The term “area-denial”, as mentioned in Chapter Two, is used here to describe the stage of military operations during which the objective of the defender is to hinder the attacker’s ability to freely operate within a given area of operations. This is in contrast to
“anti-access”, in which the defender is trying to keep the attacker from entering the area of operations in the first place. For our purposes, the area of operations in the Dardanelles campaign is the Dardanelles itself. This focus on the waterway does not preclude discussion of the shore and coastal land regions, of course, and both sea and land will be discussed. Similarly, the area of operations for the discussion in part two will be the Strait 67
of Hormuz. Also for the purposes of clarity, the combined German and Ottoman forces in
World War I will be referred to as simply “the Ottomans” and the joint Anglo-French forces the “Allies” unless otherwise stated.
4.1: Part One: An Historical Overview of the Dardanelles Experience, 1915
4.1.1: The Ottoman Steam Navy
The end of the 19th century was a tumultuous period for the world naval community. The evolution brought on by the introduction of coal-fired engines and armoured hulls continued to make its effects felt throughout the navies of the world.
Generally speaking, all countries adopted the products of the industrial revolutions, but to differing degrees of success. On one end of the spectrum, those navies which pioneered the new technologies were also the ones in the best position to exploit them to the fullest.
For example, the Royal Navy’s numerical and technological superiority continued to ensure that the sun will not set on the British Empire. On the other end, countries that were merely receiving the fruits of this naval evolution found themselves unable to foster the seeds that would allow them to fully profit from it. China, for example, purchased several modern warships from both Great Britain and Germany, but was unable to maintain them at optimal strength, much less build its own128. Furthermore, the quick pace of developments at the turn of the century meant that ships were often made obsolete soon after their completion.
It is in this context that the Ottoman Navy, or Osmanlı Donanması, found itself
128 Bruce Elleman, “China’s New ‘Imperial’ Navy,” Naval War College Review 55, no.3 (Summer 2002): 146-147. 68
struggling to maintain relevancy as a tool of the Sultan. Although the Ottomans had been trying to produce a modern navy since Sultan Mahmut II’s initial flirtations in the late
1830s, its efforts remained just that – never amounting to anything permanent and reliable. Though more and more of the Ottoman fleet became composed of steam ships, the process was slow and fraught with low reliability. Much like Imperial China, the
Ottoman Empire’s industrial capabilities in the 1800s were primitive, requiring the purchase of advanced engines and cannons from the British while hiring trainers from that country to help maintain those acquired products. The 1861 succession to the
Ottoman throne by Sultan Abdülaziz initially appeared to be a positive gain for the navy, as he had quite an interest in naval affairs since his youth. However, his enthusiasm for new technologies, combined with a lack of education in that field, caused him to waste money on ships that the navy did not need. This vulnerability of Abdülaziz resulted in even higher foreign debts and an ever-increasing reliance on foreign capital.129
Sultan Abdülhamid, who eventually replaced Abdülaziz on the eve of the 1878
Russo-Ottoman War, feared that the military would revolt against him as it did against his predecessor. As a result, he severely curtailed the power of the military and, in the navy’s case, forbade its ships from being completed (several were in construction at the time) or sailed.130 The navy’s indecisive contribution to the 1878 war (mainly serving as troop transports) may have also played into this decision.131 The net effect of all this was
129 Bernd Langensiepen and Ahmet Güleryüz, 1828-1923 Osmanlı Donanması The Ottoman Navy 1828- 1923, trans. James Cooper and Renan Mengü (Istanbul: Denizler Kitabevi, 2000), 60-61.
130 Sir Edwin Pears, Forty Years in Constantinople 1873-1915 (New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1916), 106, 170-171.
131 Langensiepen and Güleryüz, The Ottoman Navy, 63. 69
that the Osmanlı Donanması was ill-prepared to fight in the Greco-Ottoman War of 1897.
Although the Ottoman army was very successful in the Greco-Ottoman War, the navy was severely less so. Due to it having been essentially locked up in the Golden
Horn, or Haliç, for the preceding nineteen years, the ships were poorly maintained with missing and immobile parts aplenty. Further, the sailors were so out of practice (those that had any to begin with) that in some cases it took them over two hours just to load and aim an Armstrong gun.132 Thus, though they made some token forays into the Aegean
Sea, they were kept under the protection of the Dardanelles forts. 133
This dismal performance finally convinced Abdülhamid to put resources towards rebuilding the fleet. The various skirmishes between Ottoman forces and minority groups during the 1890s proved to be a way to get the ships built. In order to compensate for damages incurred by Italian, American, French, and British property within the Empire, it was decided that the Osmanlı Donanması would order its new ships from those countries.134 With the exception of the American-built cruiser Mecidiye, most of the purchases (primarly torpedo boats and destroyers) turned out to be a cheap way to acquire reliable modern fleet additions.135 This fleet was augmented in 1910 by two German predreadnought battleships of the Brandenburg class, as well as a few more destroyers.136
This was the fleet with which the Ottoman Navy entered the First World War.
132 “Turkey’s Bad Navy,” New York Times, November10, 1889, 16.
133 Langensiepen and Güleryüz, The Ottoman Navy, 64.
134 Pears, Forty Years in Constantinople 1873-1915, 172.
135 Langensiepen and Güleryüz, The Ottoman Navy, 64-65; “Turkish Cruiser Rushed,” The Washington Post, February 22, 1904, 3.
136 Langensiepen and Güleryüz, The Ottoman Navy, 67. 70
Though she was very close to acquiring two state-of-the-art dreadnoughts from the
British, the imminent outbreak of war caused them to be commissioned under Royal
Navy service. As an aside, the funding for these two ships, which commissioned as HMS
Erin and HMS Agincourt, was raised in part by civilian subscriptions – that is, everyday
Ottoman citizens donated money to the navy in order to pay for them.137 The Agincourt, as the largest battleship in the world at the time, “was regarded [by the Turkish people] as a panacea for all the [Ottoman Empire’s] troubles and injuries”, a view clearly demonstrated in the populace’s eagerness to fill the many “For our Fleet” fundraising boxes around the country – some women went as far as to sell their hair.138 Thus, when the ships did not end up in Ottoman hands, the last vestiges of pro-British sentiments in the the Ottoman government (particularly of the Minister of Marine) was transformed into “mental anguish”.139 There was little sympathy for the British side now - the
Ottomans, at best, would be neutral, and at worst, join the side of Germany.
Despite this, the Ottomans managed to acquire a dreadnought of their own. Or more appropriately, it was an irreversible fait accompli of one Enver Paşa, the Ottoman minister of war.140 Though the mid-August handover of the battlecruiser SMS Goeben
(renamed Yavuz Sultan Selim, or just Yavuz) and protected cruiser SMS Breslau (renamed
Midilli) was essentially free for the Ottomans in the immediate financial sense, this singular action would lead to bringing the Ottomans onto the side of the Central Powers
137 Robert K. Massie, Castles of Steel (New York: Ballantine Books, 2003), 22-23.
138 Richard Hough, The Big Battleship: or The Curious Career of H.M.S. Agincourt (London: Michael Joseph, 1966), 97-98.
139 Hough, The Big Battleship, 127-128.
140 Massie, Castles of Steel, 48-50. 71
and all the costs that decision would eventually incur. With a navy as small as the
Ottoman’s was, it would appear that this was a cost the navy could ill-afford, even with the addition of the two powerful German ships. There appeared to be absolutely no chance that the Osmanlı Donanması would be able to challenge, never mind defeat, any of the enemy powers in the coming war. As it turned out, however, the Ottoman Navy would not need to act alone in this endeavour.
4.1.2: The Dardanelles Campaign
The Allied attack on the Dardanelles defences began on November 3rd, 1914, with the British battlecruisers Indomitable and Indefatigable as well as the French pre- dreadnoughts Suffren and Vérité conducting a “show of force” against the outer forts of the Dardanelles.141 There were both strategic and tactical objectives to this action: to convince the Ottoman Empire to comply with the British ultimatum that it remove the
German crew from Yavuz and Midilli (and therefore render them useless as no Turkish crew are trained to operate them)142, and to discover the forts’ gun ranges143for eventual use should that strategic objective fail to be accomplished. Constantinople refused to comply with the British demand, thus effectively announcing the activation of their alliance with Germany. Soon afterwards, war was formally declared by the Allies (Russia may have done so earlier, on November 2nd – sources differ144), but detailed plans for
141 Ibid., 428.
142 Ibid., 50, 429.
143 George H. Cassar, The French and the Dardanelles: A Study of Failure in the Conduct of War (London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd, 1971), 43. Trumbull Higgins, Winston Churchill and the Dardanelles: A Dialogue in Ends and Means (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1963), 91.
144 Massie, Castles of Steel, 50. George Nekrasov, North of Gallipoli: The Black Sea Fleet at War 1914- 1917 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1992), 26. 72
further actions against the Dardanelles did not form until several months later.
The overall military objective of the Allies was to bring Constantinople within range of British and French naval guns (but not to actually bombard that historic city).145
It was hoped that doing so would convince the Ottomans to capitulate and cease further operations on the side of Germany. An Ottoman surrender would also, in theory, encourage the undecided Balkan states to side with the Allies. Opening the Turkish
Straits would also, of course, re-enable trade between Russia and the Western allies. This would be consistent with Britain’s historical strategy of using her sea power to attack the enemy at vulnerable points away from the primary battlefront (in this case, France).146
The impetus for the Dardanelles campaign was initially the desire to assist the Russians, who were facing a significant challenge in the Caucasus against Ottoman troops. Grand
Duke Nicholas, commander in chief of the Russian army, asked the Western allies as to whether they could, somehow, draw away the Ottoman troops. Winston Churchill, then the First Lord of the Admiralty, became enamoured of the mental image of a line of
Royal Navy battleships sailing up the Dardanelles to hold Constantinople hostage, and thereby give the Russians some much-needed reprieve.147 This certainly sounded easy – after all, with the combined might of the British and French navies, how could the tiny and less-than-stellar Ottoman fleet resist? Yet, the Ottomans had one ace up their sleeve: geography.
145 Robin Prior, Gallipoli: The End of the Myth (London: Yale University Press, 2009), 42.
146 Paul G. Halpern, A Naval History of World War I (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1994), 109-110.
147 Massie, Castles of Steel, 431-433. 73
Despite the massive advances in naval armament since the onset of the Industrial
Revolution, naval guns remained insufficiently powerful to fire a shell from the Aegean
Sea that could hit the Ottoman capital. As the crow flies, the distance from the northeastern-most point of the Aegean Sea to Constantinople is over 180 kilometers, far beyond the capabilities of naval rifles at the time; the famous HMS Hood’s unique 15”
Mk. II gun mounts could only fire some twenty-seven kilometers, and that was with the benefit of ten extra degrees of gun elevation that ships during the Great War did not enjoy148. Thus, it would only be via the extremely onerous task of breaching the
Dardanelles defences and reaching the Sea of Marmara could Allied guns be brought to bear on The City.
Broadly speaking, two major obstacles prevented the Allies from reaching the Sea of Marmara: naval mines and the fortresses that lined the Dardanelles on either side.
These two elements, when put together, made it extremely challenging for an enemy fleet to successfully sail through the Strait. As the Admiralty saw it (though First Sea Lord
Fisher soon realized its foolishness149), it would only be a matter of reducing the forts using naval artillery (the largest of which had greater range than the fortress guns) and then sending in minesweepers to clear a path for the fleet while the ships’ secondary batteries engaged the mobile howitzers on the shore. Churchill was especially inspired by the Germans’ ability to silence the great modern Belgian forts with their land howitzers in a matter of days.150 If those guns, so puny compared to the great battleship rifles, could
148 John Roberts, Anatomy of the Ship: The Battlecruiser Hood (London: Conway Maritime Press, 2001), 16.
149 Halpern, A Naval History of World War I, 111.
150 Massie, Castles of Steel, 435-436. 74
do it, then why not the Royal Navy against the ancient Turkish kaleler and hisarlar, the castles and fortresses?151 However, the Clausewitzian “fog of war” has always plagued military conduct, and this situation was no different.
The brief bombardment on November 3, 1914, may have been insignificant in its immediate effects, but the ultimate consequences were substantial. The action persuaded the Ottomans that an Allied attack up the Dardanelles was a real possibility and to accept
German suggestions to bolster the forces lining the strait. Of particular note was the arrival of twenty-four mobile 6” howitzers, as well as increased amounts of searchlights covering the minefields against potential Allied night minesweeping operations.152
However, these additions would not see any use for several more months, as the Allied blockade outside of the Dardanelles continued without any more offensive actions.
The next attack by the Allies was the beginning of the “real” attempt at forcing through the Strait, occurring on February 19, 1915. This was aimed at reducing the outer fortifications that guarded the entrance to the Dardanelles: Kumkale and Seddülbahir on the Asian and European shores, respectively. The attack on the 19th was, despite the expenditure of some 140 twelve-inch shells, inconclusive.153 While it was easy to hit the stationary and fairly large fortresses, these hits had nowhere near the same impact as a similar hit would on a floating battleship: a land fortress cannot take on water and be sunk. The only way to “reduce” a fortress is to directly destroy its guns or otherwise prevent its crews from safely operating the guns. This drastically increased the accuracy
151 Cassar, The French and the Dardanelles, 45.
152 Massie, Castles of Steel, 445.
153 Ibid., 446. 75
demanded of the Allies’ gunfire. However, the very nature of land bombardment makes precision corrections to naval gunfire difficult: the massive clouds of dirt and dust thrown into the air by exploding ordnance tend to linger, hindering the ships’ fire control systems from seeing where shells are landing and where targets are. Not even the introduction of aerial spotting from airplanes and balloons was able resolve this problem, as noted in
H.M. Denham’s recollections from his time on board HMS Agamemnon, one of the pre- dreadnoughts at the Dardanelles.154
Despite these challenges, however, the outer forts were cleared with relative ease.
After a period of inaction due to stormy weather, the fleet re-engaged the forts six days later, on the 25th. Keeping in mind the lessons learnt from the 19th, a two-tier attack plan was developed. For the purposes of destroying the individual fortress guns, one group of battleships would move into close range so that the ships’ secondary weapons could be brought to bear. This was probably expected to increase the efficiency of the bombardment in two ways: more shells will be landing on the forts, as well as making it easier for the ships’ fire control systems to spot specific enemy gun targets. To prevent this group from being attacked by the forts, another group of battleships will sail outside the range of fortress guns and bombard the forts using their main batteries. This long- range bombardment would keep fortress troops in hiding while the closer group of ships conduct their attack in safety.155 After several hours of bombardment, the ships retired to anchor off Tenedos, an island to the south of the Dardanelles mouth. The next day, the forts’ guns appeared to be silent and a white flag was spotted at the top of a minaret; it
154 H.M. Denham, Dardanelles: A Midshipman’s Diary 1915-16 (London: John Murray Ltd, 1981), 26.
155 Massie, Castles of Steel, 446. 76
was decided to send in demolition parties over the next few days to ensure the permanent destruction of those guns.156
These landings first took place on the 26th and were not conducted again until
March 4th due to windy and foggy weather. The landing parties were able to approach the shores with no problems, but did meet significant resistance once they made landfall.
This was especially the case for those who landed on the 4th, when Turkish and German snipers would fire upon the landing parties from concealed positions such as village ruins and cemeteries. Midshipman Denham recalls that enemy infantry were also “spotting from windmills and the church” at Yenişehir village south of Kumkale, which resulted in those structures being fired upon by the battleships.157 Throughout this amphibious action, mobile artillery guns that were not located in the forts continued to fire upon the land parties, preventing them from permanently securing either of the forts.158 The Allied parties, in their haste to retreat, had to leave behind their Maxim machine guns, which had to be retrieved later in the evening by other volunteers.159
Despite being ejected from the Turkish shores, the objective of the first phase of the Dardanelles campaign had been completed. The outer forts and their (permanent) guns have been taken out of action, allowing the Allied ships to safely begin sailing into the Dardanelles itself. With less than a hundred casualties thus far, it was no wonder that spirits ran high in the Admiralty and the War Council in London. Admiral Carden, commanding the fleet off the Straits, expected that he could be through to the Sea of
156 Denham, Dardanelles, 38.
157 Ibid., 46.
158 Higgins, Winston Churchill and the Dardanelles, 147.
159 Denham, Dardanelles, 47. 77
Marmara within two weeks.160
Yet, the ease with which the Ottomans were driven from the outer forts was perhaps less due to the ferocity and efficacy of the naval attacks and more to do with their defence strategy. The outer forts were not meant to be the only line of defence. Should they fail (and they were likely expected to), the Ottomans could fall back to the “inner forts” located at the Narrows – where the Dardanelles is less than 1500 meters wide. The
Narrows were where the Ottomans concentrated the placement of their naval mines. If the
Allies want to reach Istanbul, they will have no choice but to get past both the forts (more numerous and with larger guns) and the mines.
The minefields that blocked the Narrows were comprised of a series of lines, ten in total, spanning perpendicular to the long axis of the Dardanelles. The first three lines, numbering 88 mines total, were laid down at the very beginning of the war in August
1914. The end of September and beginning of October saw another two lines laid with 29 mines each. On November 9th, another 16 mines were laid in a new line – likely in response to the British bombardment earlier that month. Two more lines, 78 mines total, were laid on December 17. The final line for the year was laid the day before New Year’s
Eve, with 39 mines. Throughout this period, extra mines had been appended to the first three lines, thus adding 45 more to the total count. However, before the Allies’ minesweeping could begin, a final line of 53 mines was laid down on the same date as when the demolition parties first made landfall: the 26th of February.161
160 Massie, Castles of Steel, 448.
161 Piotr Nykiel, “Minefield in the Dardanelles (August 4, 1914-March 9, 1915),” http://www.navyingallipoli.com/teksty/mines.pdf. 78
With a grand total of 377 mines, this was the barrier that the Allies faced when they began their minesweeping operations in earnest. The mines were laid by the three
Ottoman minelayers responsible for the Dardanelles region: the Selanik, İntibah, and
Nusret.162 Selanik and İntibah were both originally built as mere tug boats, but were refurbished into minelayers by the Ottomans shortly before the war. Nusret was built in
Germany from the outset as a minelayer and could thus carry more mines per displacement unit than the other two as well as being marginally faster.163 From the beginning of March all the way through to the 18th, the Allies made many attempts to sweep the mines but most being of only limited success. Several factors were responsible for this difficulty.
The primary reason was the vulnerability, both actual and perceived, of minesweeping ships to gunfire. Being little more than fishing trawlers fitted with minesweeping gear, the minesweepers could very easily be destroyed by hostile action.
Though “steel plate protection...saved many lives”, they could not protect the exposed kites, wires, and winches.164 Worsening the situation were the weak engines of the trawlers that allowed them to go no more than 3 knots relative to land due to the strong currents of the Dardanelles; the slow speed made them nearly stationary targets. Thus, the trawlers were easily driven off or destroyed by the mobile howitzers that lined the shores of the Dardanelles. The rapid fires from these guns, though less powerful than those from
162 Piotr Nykiel, “Minefield in the Dardanelles”.
163 Langensiepen and Güleryüz, The Ottoman Navy, 233.
164 Admiral of the Fleet Lord Keyes, “66. Keyes to his wife,” in 1914-1918, ed. Paul G. Halpern, vol. 1 of The Keyes Papers: Selections from the Private and Official Correspondence of Admiral of the Fleet Baron Keyes of Zeebrugge (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1979), 106. 79
the heavy fortresses at the Narrows, were especially effective against the civilian crews who initially operated the trawlers. Many of these men had minesweeping experience from their time spent on the North Sea coast of Britain, and thus the Admiralty assumed they were the optimal choice for mine-clearing in the Dardanelles. However, the North
Sea setting did not expose those civilian crews to incoming enemy gunfire and they were therefore unprepared for what they faced in the narrow waters of the Dardanelles.165 This caused them to turn back on numerous occasions before even reaching the mines, even though only a very few trawlers were actually sunk. This problem of the civilians’ attitude towards taking fire was fixed to some extent by the placing of volunteer Royal
Navy sailors onboard the minesweepers, providing some moral encouragement to the regular crew. The co-employment of RN battleships bombarding the forts also somewhat improved the morale of the trawler crews, despite the forts not being the primary sources of gunfire.166 Eventually, the trawler crews were persuaded to sail on in the face of danger.
However, while human bravery can be induced with a bit of extrinsic encouragement, such is not the case with the forces of Mother Nature. The strong current of the Dardanelles and its effect on making the trawlers easy targets for shore guns has already been mentioned. Nonetheless, the historical record indicates that hitting the small trawlers was not, in actuality, a very easy task, especially at night when all minesweeping operations took place. Even though the Ottomans had many powerful searchlights to illuminate the targets, the lighting was very concentrated, likely making it difficult for
165 Massie, Castles of Steel, 450-451.
166 Piotr Nykiel, “Minesweeping Operations in the Dardanelles (February 25 – March 17, 1915),” http://www.navyingallipoli.com/teksty/minesweeping.pdf, 3. 80
gunners to see where their shell splashes were in the surrounding darkness. So the trawlers had a fairly reasonable chance of getting to the minefields as long as they kept going forward. But once they reached the mines, the persistent Dardanelles current again made itself known. With a total forward speed of no more than 2-3 knots, the trawlers could not apply enough force upon the mines’ mooring cables; the mines could not be dragged up to the surface where they could be destroyed, nor could they be pushed into the wire cutters that would allow the mines to float freely to the surface.167 The solution to this was to sweep with the current, using the trawlers’ full speed of some 6 knots plus the Dardanelle’s 4-knot current to apply the necessary force for dragging the mines to the surface. 168
But sweeping with the current, as opposed to against it, presented a corollary problem: increased exposure to gunfire. In order to sweep with the current, the minesweepers had to first go past several lines of mines before turning around with the current. This meant bringing them closer to the fortresses and their artillery. Thus, they became even more susceptible to shore fire. The with-current attempt on the night of
March 13 saw delicate minesweeping gear blown away by near-misses; another trawler had all of its above-decks crew killed, including the captain; and two of the trawlers, amidst the confusion of exploding shells and dazzling searchlights, collided and remained stuck as they floated through the minefields. Surprisingly, none of the seven trawlers used that night were sunk, though the damage was sufficient to put them out of action for
167 Lord Keyes, “66. Keyes to his wife.” 106.
168 Lord Keyes, “66, Keyes to his wife,” 106-107; Robin Prior, Gallipoli, 35. 81
the remainder of the campaign.169
All of the sweeping attempts up to now took place at night, when it was hoped that the trawlers would remain undetected or, failing that, the Ottoman fires would be less accurate. However, the presence of many powerful searchlights along the Narrows made this tactic less useful than it otherwise would have been. Not only did the searchlights light up the trawlers for artillery fire, they also blinded the trawler crews, whose eyes had been accustomed to darkness during the trip up to the minefields. It became obvious that the searchlights had to be taken out, and the only way to do so would be by bombardment. Thus, the March 13th attempt saw the trawlers being accompanied by the cruiser HMS Amethyst, which provided fire support from the edge of the minefields.
However, the difficulty in destroying searchlights echoes that of destroying the fortress guns: the lights themselves had to be destroyed with a direct hit and anything less would be insufficient. Although some shells managed to sever the electric cables that powered the lights and shatter the lens themselves, those things were easily and quickly repaired or replaced by the next night.170 To further complicate the Allies’ ability to hit the searchlights, the Ottomans appeared to have switch back and forth between them, turning some of them off and others on; to quote Admiral Carden’s Chief of Staff: “for all the good we did towards dowsing the searchlights we might as well have been firing at the moon”.171 Amethyst paid for her actions on the 13th with a hit to her steering gear, jamming her rudder for twenty minutes and thus enabling a shell to strike her full mess
169 Lord Keyes, “66. Keyes to his wife,” 107; Massie, Castles of Steel, 453.
170 Piotr Nykiel, “Minesweeping Operations in the Dardanelles,” 8.
171 Massie, Castles of Steel, 452. 82
deck, killing twenty-four and wounding thirty-six.172 While paling in comparison to the killing fields on the Western Front, this was nonetheless a stark reminder that the Turks and their less-than-modern equipment would not be so easily defeated.
The attempt on the 13th persuaded Admiral Carden that nothing short of a full out bombardment of the forts and flanking artillery before sending in the minesweepers would be sufficient. Thus the planning began for the great concentrated attack on the
Narrows. The entire fleet of Allied battleships would take turns bombarding the inner forts until the minesweepers could take advantage of the forts’ state of distraction (and hopefully silence) to conduct their sweeping operations. This operation had to take place during daylight, as it would have been impossible to conduct accurate fires at night, given the Allies’ inability to precisely spot the Ottoman forces in the dark.
So it was that on the morning of March 18, 1915, the superdreadnought HMS
Queen Elizabeth led the battlecruiser Inflexible and the two newest predreadnoughts
Agamemnon and Lord Nelson into the Dardanelles. These four ships formed Line A – the first line – of bombardment vessels, responsible for suppressing the forts from long range. In their eaves were the four French predreadnoughts (Gaulois, Charlemagne,
Bouvet, Suffren), their curved tumblehome hulls standing out in odd contrast to their
British counterparts. These four (Line B) would take up the vanguard and attack the forts from close range once Line A has sufficiently suppressed the fortress guns. A third line
(Line C) of four old British predreadnoughts would sit near the entrance of the
Dardanelles to be ready to relieve the French. To protect the eight attacking battleships from the mobile shore howitzers, four predreadnoughts were assigned: one to each side of
172 Lord Keyes, “66. Keyes to his wife,” 107; Massie, Castles of Steel, 454. 83
each line.173
The thunder of the battleships, forts, and howitzers rang and reverberated through the Dardanelles, echoing off of the cliffs and hillsides in a great cacophony celebrating mankind’s deadliest creation to date. Not for nothing were battleships called “castles of steel”, for despite multiple hits on every single vessel in attendence by noon, “there were fewer than twenty casualties.”174 Though the decks of the predreadnoughts had not been built to withstanding plunging fire from other battleship guns, they were generally more than adequate to protect against the 6” and smaller howitzers that lined the shores.
Meanwhile, the heavy side armour protected them from the forts’ larger guns. However, there were crucial areas of the ships that were not armoured, such as the fire control stations high up on the masts and the bridge. Though narrow in profile, any hit on the masts was sure to cause severe damage to the crew operating in the “spotting tops”.
Inflexible’s, for example, was perforated and her bridge had caught on fire, which made recovery of the men on the forward spotting top difficult. 175
It was the French, however, who suffered the most disproportionate amount of damage on the 18th. At 12:30 pm, Gaulois was hit below the waterline near the bow by a large-calibre shell fired from one of the forts. Though she did not sink, she was down heavily by the bows, with her hawse pipe nearly at the waterline. She had to make her way out of the Dardanelles, beaching herself on a small island off Tenedos just in case
173 Admiral of the Fleet Lord Keyes, “69. Keyes to his wife,” in 1914-1918, ed. Paul G. Halpern, vol. 1 of The Keyes Papers: Selections from the Private and Official Correspondence of Admiral of the Fleet Baron Keyes of Zeebrugge (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1979), 111.
174 Massie, Castles of Steel, 460.
175 Lord Keyes, “69. Keyes to his wife,” 111. 84
she took on more water than could be handled. But the greatest tragedy for the French occurred one-and-a-half hours later, when Admiral de Robeck, who took over from the suddenly sick Carden just a day before, ordered the relieving of Line B by Line C. The remaining three French ships turned to starboard, with Suffren leading the way. As they passed Line A, Bouvet, which was behind Suffren, struck a mine. A big cloud of smoke poured from her funnels as she continued to move forward, rolling over onto her starboard side. In less than two minutes, she had capsized and sank, taking with her 640 men, including the captain.176 In less than two hours, half of the French battle fleet had been removed due to enemy action.
This was not the end of the Allied fleet’s setbacks, however. Inflexible, having recovered somewhat from her fire earlier, now ran into, quite literally, another problem.
Two hours after Bouvet’s sinking, Inflexible also struck a mine, flooding her bow compartments and drowning twenty-nine crew members. She was able to sail back to
Tenedos, but was out of the action for the foreseeable future – nothing but a full drydocking would fix the gash in her hull.177
These deadly weapons would claim two more ships before the day was over.
Irresistible, one of the predreadnoughts in Line C, lost her engines to a mine, causing her to drift towards the Asiatic shore. The Ottoman gunners, spotting an easy target, aimed their guns to pepper her decks as her crew climbed out to be rescued. A destroyer was sent to retrieved them, leaving Irresistible crewless and adrift. Two hours later, HMS
Ocean, also of Line C, struck yet another mine, and the scenario with Irresistible was
176 Lord Keyes, “69. Keyes to his wife,” 112; Massie, Castles of Steel, 461. For images of Bouvet’s sinking, see photographs 37 and 38 in Denham, Dardanelles, 62.
177 Massie, Castles of Steel, 462. 85
repeated. Both ships sank later that evening before they could be recovered by towing parties. 178
To add insult to this grievous injury, a brief failed attempt at sweeping the mines at the Narrows occurred shortly before Inflexible’s mining. Though the fortress guns were mostly silent, the shore howitzers and small guns were, again, active. Much like the previous few nights, the trawlers were once again driven off with only three mines swept for their trouble.179
But from where did the mines that sunk and injured so heavily the Allied fleet come? After all, the fleet had been basically operating in the Dardanelles for the last several weeks without encountering any of the mines – why on this day did they rear their ugly heads? As it turned out, and it wouldn’t be known until after the war was over,
August 8 saw the Nusret, that purpose-built minelayer, enter the Dardanelles. She carried with her a load of 26 mines, with which she proceeded to create Line 11 of the
Dardanelles minefields. However, unlike the other ten lines that blocked the Narrows, this one was in a drastically different location. Line 11 was placed parallel to the shoreline at Erenköy Bay, the large indent that makes up most of the Asiatic shore before the Narrows. The Allies, having already swept this location several days earlier, did not think that the Ottomans would be so brazen as to construct another minefield right under the noses of the Allied ships operating there. Interestingly enough, the night of August
15/16 saw a few minesweepers actually finding and catching up to seven of those mines.
However, their crews were not able to note the location in which the mines were found,
178 Lord Keyes, “69. Keyes to his wife,” 112-115; Massie, Castles of Steel, 462-463.
179 Lord Keyes, “69. Keyes to his wife,” 112; Massie, Castles of Steel, 461. 86
and little thought was given to the event, much to the Allies’ regret two days later.180 One last chance for the Allies to find the Erenköy Bay mines was offered when seaplanes conducted a last-minute reconnaissance mission over the area prior to the attack on the
18th, but they reported nothing. Given their ability to spot mines down to eighteen feet in the trial waters of the Aegean, it was assumed that the planes would also be able to spot mines in the Dardanelles as well – an erroneous assumption. 181
Thus it was that the great March 18th naval attack on the Narrows ended with a third of the Allied fleet sunk or too heavily damaged to continue operations. In return, practically nothing substantive of the Ottoman defences was destroyed. The Dardanelles campaign was supposed to be the dynamic success that would lift up the heart of a nation tired of the brutal and bloody stalemates on the Western Front.182 Alas, the Dardanelles, too, turned out to be a futile endeavour. It was determined that the paramount obstacle facing the Allies were the mobile howitzers, which were able to so effectively drive off the minesweeping trawlers. By hiding behind hills and gullies, the howitzers could remain undetected and protected by earthworks while firing at the ships. The only way to destroy the howitzers would be by ground troops, hence the great Gallipoli land campaign.
The Ottoman defence of Gallipoli was primarily an action between land forces, and thus detailed examination would be outside the scope of this paper. However, the
Allies did continue to use their battleships for naval gunfire support missions during this
180 Nykiel, “Minesweeping Operations in the Dardanelles,” 11..
181 Halpern, A Naval History of World War I, 115; Massie, Castles of Steel, 462.
182 Lisle A. Rose. The Age of Navalism, 1890-1918, vol. 1 of Power at Sea (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 2007), 210 87
time, remaining in the Dardanelles. This provided the Ottomans with some opportunity to conduct area-denial activities, the most spectacular of which was the torpedoing of the battleship Goliath in the early morning of May 13, 1915. Anchored in the first small bay
(Morto Bay) on the Gallipoli side of the Dardanelles, she was struck and sunk by three torpedoes fired from the Ottoman destroyer Muavenet-i Milliye, which had managed to elude the patrolling British destroyers and sneak into firing range. With cover fire from the shore providing adequate distraction, she launched her German Mark A/08
Schwarzkopf torpedoes. These successfully detonated against Goliath, which promptly capsized and sank within a matter of minutes, highlighting the vulnerability of those old predreadnoughts when facing underwater explosives. Muavenet-i Milliye managed to get away amidst the confusion and her crew was well-awarded with gold and watches.183
Torpedoes would cause the death of two more predreadnoughts: Triumph and Majestic were sunk within days of each other by torpedoes launched from German submarines, despite countermeasures such as anti-torpedo nets.184
4.1.3: A Brief Note on Mine Warfare in the Black Sea
This concludes the first part of the chapter on the Ottoman defence of the
Dardanelles against the combined British and French forces. It should be noted that this wasn’t the only example of area-denial strategies being applied to a narrow waterway by the Ottomans – it was also used against the Russians in the north on the Bosphorus, though the Black Sea Fleet never did attempt to “force” the Bosphorus as was done with
183 Halpern, A Naval History of World War I, 117; Massie, Castles of Steel, 483-484; Langensiepen and Güleryüz, The Ottoman Navy, 74.
184 Haplern, A Naval History of World War I, 118; Massie, Castles of Steel, 492-493; R.A. Burt, British Battleships of World War One (London: Arms and Armour Press Limited, 1986), 15. 88
the Dardanelles. Although the combination of forts, mobile guns, and mines were also present there, one of the elements that differed in the Black Sea compared to the south was the practice of offensive mining. Whereas the Dardanelles saw the use of mines for the purposes of keeping the enemy out, the Black Sea saw the employment of mines for the purposes of keeping the enemy in their ports: the Ottomans laid mines outside the
Russian port of Sevastopol, while the Russians laid mines right outside the Bosphorus
(amongst other places).185 Some rather innovative tactics were employed, especially by the Russians – laying mines via submarine and heavy use of aircraft, for example186. Also unlike the Dardanelles, the Black Sea saw much greater ship-to-ship combat due to the more balanced quantity and quality of either side’s naval forces, especially at the beginning of the war. Despite these interesting practices, further examination of the Black
Sea conflict will not take place as the nature of it deviates too much to be of overall use to this paper; however, some tactical elements of the northern conflict do have significant parallels and will be brought up as relevant.
4.2: Part Two: Applying Lessons
One of the enduring questions in modern strategic studies is whether strategic concepts can be applied and used regardless of time period, or whether technology can change so drastically that strategy is dependent on the tools available to the user. It is hoped that this section of this paper can provide some perspective with empirical examples at strategic, operational, and tactical levels.
185 Nekrasov, North of Gallipoli, 24-25, 36, 106.
186 Ibid., 62, 126. 89
In the event that the Iranian government decides to close the Strait of Hormuz to traffic (both military and civilian), many observers expect that this would be done via the deployment of numerous mines in the water way. Since the end of World War II, the vast majority of ship casualties (some 70%) have been the result of mine strikes. The victims have ranged from purpose-built minesweepers to guided-missile cruisers and amphibious assault ships.187 As mines were also the principle cause of death for the Allied fleet in the
Dardanelles, it is only appropriate that we begin out examination with them.
Modern mines differ from those used in the Dardanelles in a variety of ways, but the most distinctive would be the way they can be fused. The ones used in the Turkish
Straits were simple moored Hertz mines that exploded upon coming into contact with any object that broke one or more of its many protruding “horns”, each triggering the mine’s explosive cargo.188 These mines had three components: the buoyant mine itself containing the explosives, an anchor, and a cable or chain that connected the two together. The anchor prevents the buoyant mine from floating to the surface where it can be easily spotted. The methods for neutralizing this type of mine has already been discussed briefly in the first section of this paper, but it generally involves using minesweeping cable to either cut the mine’s mooring cable or, failing that, drag the mine and its anchor to shallower waters where the mine would be close enough to the surface to be destroyed by gunfire.189
187 U.S. Navy, “21st Century U.S. Navy Mine Warfare,” 8.
188 Jim Crossley, The Hidden Threat: The Story of Mines and Minesweeping by the Royal Navy in World War I (Barnsley: Pen and Sword Maritime: 2011), 17-18, 101-106.
189 Crossley, The Hidden Threat, 28. 90
By World War II, however, so-called “influence-triggered” mines were beginning to be used. The major difference between influence mines and contact mines is that the former does not require a ship to actually touch it. This drastically decreases the number of mines that are needed to deny an enemy fleet access to a particular area. Today, example triggers include magnetic, acoustic, and pressure-sensitive. While magnetic mines can be countered by the use of degaussing on metal ships and by building mine- countering vessels out of wood and fibreglass, acoustic and pressure-sensitive mines are less easily eluded. The miniaturization and advancement of sonar and electronics have made it possible to build mines that are set off only when ships matching prerequisite signatures pass by; for example, an Iranian acoustic mine can be set so it only blows up when it hears an American aircraft carrier instead of being “wasted” on a minesweeper, which would have alerted the Americans to the presence of mines, thus decreasing the likelihood of the primary target (the carrier) being successfully attacked.190
To complicate counter-mine activities even further, modern mines can be positioned in a variety of ways. In addition to the traditional buoyant bottom-moored more, there are now mines that rest on or under the sea bottom. Such types of mines can pack a much greater amount of explosives because they do not need to be light enough to float. However, this also requires that they have to be located in fairly shallow water in order to be effective. These mines cannot be swept in the manner that bottom-moored mines can and thus requires a much more tedious process involving the use of remotely- operated vehicles (ROVs) and/or trained marine mammals. Even more innovative are moored mines that contain a small upward-firing guided torpedo, further increasing
190 U.S. Navy, “21st Century U.S. Navy Mine Warfare,” 10. 91
lethality and accuracy.191
So it is clear from the above that modern mine countermeasures (MCM) has to be much more involved and complicated than in the past. This will have significant impact on the analysis that follows below. The paper will now examine the parallels between mine-hunting today and in World War I.
4.2.1: Currents
For the sake of clarity, assume that the Dardanelles operations had taken place without the forts or mobile artillery that caused such havoc amongst the minesweeping trawlers. In such a scenario, the main obstacle facing the minesweeping teams was the current, which ran down the Dardanelles at some 4 knots and prevented the over- burdened and under-powered trawlers from sweeping the mines.
In a modern day scenario, currents in the Strait of Hormuz would not be sufficient to immobilize an Avenger class MCM ship, the only ship in the USN inventory currently dedicated to mine-clearing. With a published speed of 14 knots, it should be able to overcome any open-water current.192 However, as noted above, some modern mines cannot be swept, and others can harm the minesweeper if sweeping is attempted (for example, an acoustic mine set to explode upon hearing an Avenger’s engines). Thus, in order to keep sailors safe, today’s mine-clearing methods is less about sweeping in a large ship than about hunting and neutralizing. In part, this involves the use of Unmanned
Underwater Vehicles, or UUVs, to locate the mines and “neutralize” them – i.e. destroy
191 Ibid., 8-10.
192 U.S. Navy, “Mine Countermeasures Ships – MCM,” U.S. Navy, November 10, 2011, http://www.navy.mil/navydata/fact_display.asp?cid=4200&tid=1900&ct=4. 92
them with explosives.193
The tidal current of the Strait of Hormuz has been measured to be as high as 4.8 knots, though it appears to vary significantly depending on time of year, depth, and exact location in the Strait.194 One of the more commonly used UUVs for exploding mines is
Atlas Elektronik’s SeaFox, which fills the inventory of most European navies and, as mentioned in Chapter Two, has begun filling the USN’s. The SeaFox is 1.3m-long torpedo-shaped vehicle that carries a shaped explosive charge. Using its onboard sonar, it is designed to locate and identify enemy mines, swim up to one, and explode, destroying itself and the mine. But being relatively small and dependent on sonar, it cannot have a very high speed – according to Atlas’ website, its maximum speed is 6 knots.195 Against a current of 4.8 knots, a SeaFox cannot expect to make much headway. The consequences of this are two-fold: firstly, it will significantly reduce the SeaFox’s operational range and secondly, because of that reduced range, the MCM ship deploying the SeaFox will have to sail much closer to a suspected minefield. This exposes the ship to greater danger than if SeaFox were to be faster and/or have greater endurance.
For the USN, SeaFox is an interim solution until Raytheon’s Airborne Mine
Neutralization System (AMNS) enters service. The AMNS consists of four “rounds” of
Archerfish neutralizers. The Archerfishes operate nearly identically to SeaFox – even the maximum speed is the same. However, being much smaller than SeaFox, the
193 U.S. Navy, “21st Century U.S. Navy Mine Warfare,” 13, 16.
194 “Fujairah, UAE: Currents and Tides,” last modified February 2006, http://www.nrlmry.navy.mil/medports/mideastports/Fujairah/index.html; Prasad G. Thoppil and Patrick J. Hogan, “On the Mechanisms of Episodic Salinity Overflow Events in the Strait of Hormuz,” Journal of Physical Oceanography 39(6): 1348.
195 “SeaFox C,” Atlas Electronik, http://www.atlas-elektronik.com/en/systemsproducts/uuv-auvrov/seafox- c/. 93
Archerfishes can be, and will be, deployed from the ubiquitous SH-60 shipboard helicopters.196 It is thus an improvement over the SeaFox in that MCM ships of the future
(i.e. MCM mission package-equipped Littoral Combat Ships) will not have to be near a minefield at all even if the Archerfish’s range is drastically reduced due to currents, since the helicopter can operate far away from its mothership while hovering safely above the minefield. Nonetheless, once placed in the water, the Archerfish will have to be sufficiently powerful to get to the mine itself in the face of possible currents – the “need for speed”, as it were, remains.
But this need will be difficult to address. At a 2012 maritime security conference in Victoria, B.C., Canada, the author had the opportunity to meet a defence research scientist who specialized in unmanned vehicles. When asked about whether there were any attempts to increase the speed of MCM UUVs, she replied that current battery technology does not allow for such increases. It was mentioned that the United States’
Naval Research Laboratory is working on a new hydrogen-based power source but until that becomes operational, UUVs for the foreseeable future will be unable to move any faster than the Dardanelles trawlers.
But regardless of the speed problem, MCM forces still have to know the general location of minefields before they can conduct a precise search to neutralize them. A side benefit of gaining such knowledge is that MCM forces may be able to find optimal deployment zones for UUVs that minimize the impact of currents – one solution to the
196 “AN/ASQ-235 Airborne Mine Neutralization System (AMNS),” Raytheon, last modified May 16, 2008, http://www.raytheon.com/businesses/rids/businesses/scs/www.raytheon.com/businesses/rtnwcm/groups/pu blic/documents/content/rtn_bus_ids_prod_amns_pdf.pdf. 94
speed problem suggested by the abovementioned scientist. This will be the focus of the next examination.
4.2.2: Airborne reconnaissance
The deadly and unexpected mines laid by Nusret were not spotted in the run-up to the March 18 operation, despite aerial reconnaissance efforts. For whatever reason, the aircraft conducting the mine spotting did not see the ones in Erenköy Bay. The planes
(rather, their pilots) were expected to be capable of seeing at least down to eighteen feet below the surface of the water. The logical conclusion would be that the waters of
Erenköy Bay were less crystal-clear than those in the Aegean where the eighteen feet benchmark was set, or that the mines laid there were deeper than eighteen feet.
In either case, the lesson should be obvious: never take for granted that sea conditions in one area will be the same as another, even if they are only a short distance away. The waters in one area may be murkier than another, or the surface of the water will be choppier, distorting the view to the bottom. Perhaps even the sun’s reflections on the water are more dazzling in one location versus another (not to mention variance due to time of day and year), hindering the observer’s ability to see clearly.
These precautions are especially relevant today, as the United States is developing its Airborne Laser Mine Detection System (ALMDS).197 To be mounted on a helicopter like the above-mentioned neutralizer, the ALMDS will use laser beams to pierce through the water, scanning for mines. This would be a much faster way of finding mines that are moored close to the surface as it will no longer be necessary to wait for a sonar-equipped
197 “LCS & MH-60S Mine Counter-Measures Continue Development”. 95
UUV to slowly swim laps along a search grid. But if the developmental difficulties faced by ALMDS, as detailed in Chapter Three, are any indication, lasers are obstructed by the same things as visible light: the same conditions that prevented the pilots on March 18,
1915, from spotting Nusret’s mines are the same conditions that can decrease the
ALMDS’ success rate. Not only must the ALMDS be fixed to increase its reliability, it must also be programmed so that it can compensate for different environmental conditions.
Furthermore, the airborne nature of future mine-clearing practices does have a weakness in itself. Just as the reconnaissance and spotting planes at the Dardanelles were easily threatened by shore anti-aircraft artillery (the primitive carrier HMS Ark Royal lost the use of three out of her five planes by March 8th, 1915198), so are helicopters. Due to the slow and methodical nature of counter-mine operations, helicopters are easy targets for enemy anti-air weapons if they happen to be within range. It will be prudent to make sure that mine-clearing helicopters are conducting their operations under protection by other assets.
It is clear from the above that current and upcoming mine-hunting technologies will have to keep in mind the behaviour of water bodies in order to reach their full potential. UUVs will have to be powerful enough to maneuver even in the strongest of currents while the ALMDS will have to be made to compensate for various oceanic conditions. As the USN’s begins leading annual International MCM Exercises, hopefully the international forces present will learn just how much the Strait of Hormuz’s natural
198 Denham, Dardanelles, 53. 96
conditions can affect MCM equipment, and revise accordingly.199
In addition to the technical lessons, there is also the simple, but crucial, operational lesson rendered by Nusret’s March 8th laying: it should never be assumed that a cleared area of water will remain permanently free of mines. Areas where an enemy can place more mines need to be continuously checked before any ship goes through. Any hint of the presence of mines should deserve a full and comprehensive MCM effort to ensure that there are no more lying in wait. Hand-in-hand with this is the recognition that ships using the same stretch of water repeatedly should expect the enemy to take advantage of that fact. After all, it was only after observing the Allied battleships operating in Erenköy Bay in the days before March 8th that the Ottomans knew to send
Nusret there.
4.2.3: Beyond MCM
Before this paper ends the discussion on mines, there are certain warnings to be interpreted from the Ottoman and Russian use of those weapons in the Black Sea during the war. The practice of “offensive mining” is something that the USN and its allies in the Persian Gulf should be concerned about. With the US Fifth Fleet (and its MCM ships) based out of Bahrain, the situation in the Gulf becomes somewhat similar to that of the
Black Sea – major naval bases of opposing forces on either sides of a confined body of water. Just as the Ottomans and Russians snuck up on each other’s ports to lay mines, we can reasonably suspect that Iran may try to conduct a similar operation against Manama harbour to prevent the Avenger or, if later, the Littoral Combat Ships from leaving port to
199 Rear Admiral Kenneth Perry, “International Navies to Conduct Mine Countermeasures Exercise,” Navy Live: The Official Blog of the United States Navy, last modified August 30, 2012, http://navylive.dodlive.mil/2012/08/30/international-navies-to-conduct-mine-countermeasures-exercise/. 97
conduct MCM duties. Just as the Russians used submarine minelayers to deploy mines close to enemy territory, so might Iran be expected to do the same with their own submarines. As well, the Russians’ ad hoc conversion of the Elpidifor class transports into minelayers and the tactic of transporting small boats via larger ships in order to lay mines more closely to enemy shores should not be forgotten.200 These examples highlight that any vessel, large or small, purpose-built or converted, can be a minelayer. Though the Iranians have already been known to lay mines in international waters using ad hoc vessels (i.e. the Iran Ajr during the 1980s “Tanker Wars”), the Russian example informs us that covert minelayers may well conduct their activity in inshore areas close to basing areas: the USN and its allies should be on the alert for any kind of vessel, regardless of its physical appearance and location. This makes CS-21’s second Implementation Priority,
Enhancing domain awareness, of truly paramount importance. Only with comprehensive
Intelligence-gathering, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) abilities that provide advance maritime domain awareness can the threat of covert minelayers be addressed.
Conversely, the USN and its allies may find it useful to conduct mining operations of their own. Although this would likely be politically unpopular, the fact that the Russians were able to end the German submarine menace decisively in 1916 by placing special anti-submarine mines (“rybki”) in the Bosphorus and other Ottoman ports shows that it can be a very effective tactic.201 With the numerous small submarines that
Iran is purported to have202, a blockade of Iranian ports with small mines set to explode
200 Nekrasov, North of Gallipoli, 117, 125-126.
201 Nekrasov, North of Gallipoli, 115, 125.
202 Senior Intelligence Officer – Iran, Iran’s Naval Forces: From Guerilla Warfare to a Modern Naval Strategy, (Declassified report, Office of Naval Intelligence, Fall 2009), 17-18, 24. 98
only if Iranian submarine signatures are met may well be an excellent defence against them. However, the smallest mine in the United States’ inventory is the Mk 62 500 pound converted bomb; compared to the 30kg mines used by Russia in WWI, its size may cause unacceptable collateral damage as well as being too costly. Furthermore, the USN has not been in the business of using mines for quite some time and it will take a while before the details of counter-submarine mining operations can be determined.203
4.2.4: Other Lessons to be Learned
Up to now, the comparisons have been focused on the mine and counter-mine warfare aspect. But there was, of course, much more that contributed to the Allies’ failure than just the mines. One of them was the lack of professional and battle-ready minesweeper crews. The absence of thought for human psychological preparedness resulted in more than a few nights of wasted efforts in March 1915. It highlights the necessity of preparing sailors – both in terms of technical proficiency and their mental state of readiness. The Implementation Priority of Preparing our people in CS-21, mentioned in Chapter Two, is thus a positive step in this direction as long as it encompasses preparing sailors for the experience of war.
But perhaps the most significant, if easily overlooked, cause of the Allied failure in 1915 were the mobile howitzers. Portable, well-hidden, well-protected, and deadly against the lightly-armoured trawlers, mobile howitzers played a major role in preventing any successful attempt at sweeping the Dardanelles mines. Is there a parallel weapon today that might achieve the same effect?
203 U.S. Navy, “21st Century U.S. Navy Mine Warfare,” 25-26. 99
The most obvious comparison would be modern towed or self-propelled howitzers. Iran is known to possess 155mm (6.1”) howitzers that can fire rocket-assisted shells to a distance of 30 kilometres; Iran has even claimed the development of a new projectile that can fly up to 34 kilometres.204 However, the distances involved in the Strait of Hormuz are much greater than those in the Dardanelles; the narrowest point of the
Strait of Hormuz is approximately 53 kilometres wide, compared to just 1.5 km at the
Narrows. Thus, even though Iran’s modern artillery have much greater range than those used by the Ottomans, the geography prevents them from having the same effectiveness.
Of course, if Iran had controlled of both shores of the Strait, then they can easily bring their guns to bear on any ship that tried to pass. Military planners may wish to consider the possibility, if somewhat remote, that Iran may try to covertly land mobile artillery on the Musandam peninsula. There are also a few small uninhabited islands off the
Musandam shore that will provide landed artillery with sufficient coverage of the Strait, though the islands’ small size would make the artillery difficult to hide.
The threat of artillery to naval ships is not restricted to just unarmed MCM ships, however. Unlike the battleships in the Dardanelles, modern warships are not provided with armour that can withstand large explosive projectiles. Thus, even frontline warships like destroyers, cruisers, and aircraft carriers are vulnerable to a successful artillery strike.
This makes the threat of artillery an even greater priority in any operation in the region.
But even if Iran chose or could not land artillery on other territory in the Strait, there are modern long-range weapons that are somewhat analogous to the longer-ranged
204 “DIO 155mm 39-calibre HM41 howitzer (Iran), Towed anti-tank guns, guns and howitzers,” Jane’s, last modified March 1, 2012, http://articles.janes.com/articles/Janes-Armour-and-Artillery/DIO-155-mm-39- calibre-HM41-howitzer-Iran.html. 100
fortress guns in the Dardanelles. Shore-based anti-ship cruise missiles (ASCMs) have significantly more range than artillery and can easily reach across the width of the Strait of Hormuz; unlike the old fortress cannons, however, many ASCMs can be carried and deployed from mobile carriages.205 This allows ASCMs to have both the long-range advantage of the old forts and the elusive mobile capabilities of the howitzers – a combination that poses severe challenges to an enemy. However, given the complexity and price of ASCMs, there are much fewer of them in Iran’s inventory than, for example, army howitzer shells. Thus, like the great fortress guns at the Narrows, it is possible the
ASCMs will be reserved for use against major enemy surface combatants, especially those of direct strategic importance such as aircraft carriers. On the other hand, because
ASCMs can reach the entire width of the Strait, Iran may choose to employ them against
MCM assets as well in order to keep minefields intact. Certainly, MCM assets are likely to be more easily struck than an aircraft carrier with all the defensive capabilities of its escorts. This is especially key since Iranian ASCMs are not as advanced as those used by larger countries like Russia and are thus more susceptible to ASCM countermeasures.
Given the choice between expending limited numbers of cruise missiles against a well- defended aircraft carrier versus a few unescorted mine-hunters, it is likely the latter target will be chosen. In so doing, the Iranians, just like the Ottomans, can let the mines do the work of sinking major ships.
Thus, the lesson here is that MCM assets must be protected. They are easy and vulnerable targets and their loss would severely constrain the USN’s ability to maneuver in the region. Without adequate MCM capabilities, the rest of the fleet may well end up
205 Senior Intelligence Officer – Iran, Iran’s Naval Forces, 17. 101
in the same situation as the Allied fleet on March 18th, 1915.
The possibility of Iranian submarine minelayers was mentioned above, and the conventional threat their torpedoes pose is obvious and well-known. But what about the attacker’s submarines? British submarines were the only vessels in the Allied inventory that could travel past the minefields and into the Sea of Marmara, where they conducted anti-shipping missions. It was possible for cautious submariners to snake between the many moored mines without setting them off.206 Could today’s large nuclear-powered submarines do the same in the face of modern influence mines and if so, for what purpose? This is a potentially salient question, for although anti-shipping can be conducted today via aerial means, a significant amount of American first-stage attacks are conducted via ship- and submarine-launched Tomahawk missiles. There may be targets in northern Iran that could only be reached if the launch vessel was in the Persian
Gulf, necessitating their passage through any minefields if it was not already there before the minefields were laid.
The Ottomans’ use of searchlights and the Allies’ inability to counter can also provide a short lesson. The role of searchlights is analogous to radar today: to search and track the location of enemy forces when visual/optical means are not possible. By switching back and forth between different searchlights, the Ottomans had made it impossible for the Allies to have the time needed for eliminating them. Conceivably,
Iranian radars can also be arranged to do the same: turning different sets on just long enough to locate American and allied forces and then turning them off before anti-radar assets can be brought to bear. The portable nature of modern radars further complicates
206 Langensiepen and Güleryüz, The Ottoman Navy, 76-81. 102
the situation. Although Iran is not likely to have the network-centric capabilities needed to make such a “web” of radars and their data feed into a singular output, it should nonetheless be considered a possibility, especially if technical assistance is received from countries with more advanced militaries.
4.2.5: Amphibious Lessons
The preceding analyses assumed a naval-only approach to a potential Iranian attempt at blocking the Strait of Hormuz. To some extent this can be justified given the weariness of the Western public over the land wars in Iraq and Afghanistan; it is likely that civilian leaders will be reluctant to authorize the use of land forces in significant numbers for any attempt to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. However, as Admiral Fisher adroitly pointed out, “Not a grain of wheat will come from the Black Sea unless there is a military occupation of the Dardanelles.”207Analogically, the statement can be modified to
“Not a drop of oil will come from the Persian Gulf unless there is a military occupation of the Strait of Hormuz.”
The basis for this perspective comes from the fact that while mines can be swept away and the waterway itself thus be freed of obstacles, an operation that uses only ships will not be able to permanently prevent an enemy from using the shores for launching area-denial operations. To put it in real-world terms, if the Allied battleships had managed to make their way through the Narrows and into the Sea of Marmara in March
1915 without the use of land forces, what would happen next? The ships would be continuously using fuel and their ammunition likely low from bombarding the forts; they
207 Prior, Gallipoli, 28. 103
would have to be replenished somehow. A replenishment vessel would have to be sent through the Dardanelles. But with no Allied forces on the coasts of the Dardanelles, there would be nothing to prevent the Ottomans from moving back into attack position (if they left at all) and harass the unarmoured supply ships. The same vulnerability would apply to any Russian wheat carrier trying to get through the Turkish Straits – Ottoman land forces can attack and sink them with ease. Thus, even if the navy did not require army forces to help destroy the forts and howitzers that guarded the mine field, it would still need them to ensure that traffic through the Strait can pass free from harassment.208
The strategic lesson for the modern day scenario should be clear: it is almost certain that some kind of persistent presence, probably land forces, has to be on the
Iranian shores to prevent them from being used (or reused) as staging points for attacking oil tankers making their way to and from Persian Gulf terminals. Unless Iran agrees to discontinue any attempt at closing the Strait of Hormuz (and in essence, surrender),
American and allied ground forces will be necessary to enforce freedom of navigation in the Strait. However, it should be kept in mind that securing the SOH is only one part of the equation: the US and its allies must be able to make use of a secured waterway. In particular, it must have the robust sealift capability needed to transport troops onto land – a crucial logistical element of the CS-21 strategy mentioned in Chapter Two.
Having established the necessity of inserting ground troops, tactical-level lessons from the Dardanelles experience will now be discussed. One lesson is that the defenders can hide among civilian population centers and rubble, making them difficult to attack.
This may be a less effective tactic in the 21st century, given the extensive experience that
208 Halpern, A Naval History of World War I, 121; Prior, Gallipoli, 29, 41-42. 104
American and NATO forces have had in conducting urban warfare operations in Iraq and
Afghanistan – experience that the British and French in World War I may not have had prior to the landing of their demolition parties. Nonetheless, this is crucial to keep in mind lest Western leaders mistaken the broad swath of tan-coloured terrain on maps of
Iran’s coast to be unpopulated desert that can be easily occupied with little resistance.
Another lesson can be drawn from the Ottomans’ ad hoc use of tall civilian buildings (e.g. windmills and churches) as vantage points for artillery fire. Intelligence- gathering, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities are crucial to warfighting, and though Iran’s electronics miniaturization skills are not as well-developed as those of
Western countries’, due diligence should be exercised when searching for the locations of
Iranian ISR assets. Small radars, infrared sensors, and light weapon emplacements can be hidden in civilian buildings. Iran may take advantage of the coalition forces’ rules of engagement (and public sensitivities) to hide their equipment in buildings that are politically dangerous to attack. Mosque and madrassa (religious school) minarets, for example, can likely be adapted for ISR and fire control purposes; their height and prevalence in nearly all Iranian population centres make them a tempting solution in the event that regular military ISR assets are destroyed. Although mosque imams will likely object to the military use of religious structures, the possibility should not be discounted.
These are some of the challenges American and coalition forces are likely to face should an occupation of the Strait of Hormuz coast be considered necessary. Had the author decided to expand the research into the Gallipoli campaign, there would likely be even more lessons. However, the scenario of an invading amphibious force versus a well dug-in opponent is relatively common (compared to forcing passage through narrow 105
waterways), and thus such an examination may well be redundant in terms of existing literature. It is also reassuring (for those seeking to maintain a SOH free of mines, anyway) that A Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower already sees land operations as a given element in 21st century kinetic conflicts; theoretically, then, the US military establishment should not have too much trouble in accepting and planning for a mine-clearing operation that includes some land component.
4.3: Caveats
The original intent had been to examine the role that the Ottoman Navy played in preventing the British and the French from forcing their way through the Dardanelles.
However, the research has clearly indicated that the Ottoman success was not the result of just the Navy. Indeed, one may argue that the Army played the largest role, with their howitzers preventing the minesweeping trawlers from completing their assignments.
Many comparisons have been drawn between the past and the present (many of which share a resemblance that is quite uncanny), but the author would now like to acknowledge some of the deficiencies in this study.
Firstly, the threats posed by Iranian aircraft and fast attack craft (FACs) have not been mentioned. This decision was made not only due to space constraints, but because this chapter’s main objective was to see what lessons the Dardanelles experience could teach the present. 1915 saw no aircraft in use by the Ottomans; small fast surface craft was never employed in the scale and method that Iran’s FACs are expected to via with the infamous “swarm” tactic. Thus, a full discussion of those two platforms is outside the scope of this research. It suffices to say that on top of all the aforementioned challenges a 106
Western fleet would face in the Strait of Hormuz, FACs and aircraft would only add to them.
Secondly, this chapter ignores the element of alliances. How would Iran’s ability to defeat an American-led attempt at re-opening the Strait of Hormuz be affected if Iran were to have the support of a more powerful country? Just as the Ottomans had significant German assistance at strategic and tactical levels (not to mention financial), so too might Iran find the same support.209 Who would be the most likely country (or countries) to provide that support? And in what form(s) might that support come? These are broad questions that go beyond this thesis’ focus on MCM, but would be excellent grounds for further research.
And finally, it cannot be denied that although both the Dardanelles and the Strait of Hormuz are narrow waterways connecting two larger bodies, there are significant geographical differences. Perhaps the greatest is the matter of distance between shores, which is many times greater in the Strait of Hormuz. Yet, as the analyses in Part II indicate, the development of modern weaponry with their incredible reach has made this factor less significant than if the study were conducted decades earlier. Of course, it must be admitted that a comprehensive closure of the Strait of Hormuz via mines would require a much greater quantity than in the Dardanelles, even accounting for the greater coverage that modern influence mines provide.
209 Ulrich Trumpener, Germany and the Ottoman Empire 1914-1918 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1968), 67-70. 107
4.4: Conclusion
Despite the above drawbacks, this chapter has demonstrated that many elements from the Ottoman defence of the Dardanelles can be applied to a modern scenario in which Iran seeks to close the Strait of Hormuz. In particular, it appears that the use of naval mines by a power with only a “small” navy can sufficiently halt and even defeat a much stronger power. The vulnerability of large and conventionally-powerful ships was shown on March 18th, 1915. Some may say that the impact there was so large because the victims were old predreadnoughts not equipped to handle underwater strikes. Yet, this would be ignoring the example of HMS Inflexible, a then-modern battlecruiser equipped with anti-torpedo protection. Indeed, even the Yavuz Sultan Selim, that fearsome ex-
German dreadnought, was incapacitated for over fourth months after hitting Russian mines off the Bosphorus, rendering her unavailable during the Allies’ attempts at forcing the Narrows.210 Had the Allies been successful at passing through the Dardanelles in
March 1915, Yavuz would have not been in a condition to challenge the fleet. As mines evolved and became more lethal and difficult to counter over the decades, the vulnerability of surface ships to mines remain unabated. A multi-layer defence of a well- laid minefield, combined with intelligent tactics, operations, and strategic sense can allow a defender to rout a much stronger naval force with minimal losses to itself.
At the tactical level, the main historical lesson is that current and upcoming US
Navy mine countermeasures must recognize and address the constraints imposed by primarily natural conditions. The two key MCM systems being developed – underwater
210 Nekrasov, North of Gallipoli, 36-37. 108
drones and helicopter-borne optical search systems (i.e. ALMDS) – are both vulnerable to environmental variations in the operating area. But addressing these systems’ technical weaknesses is only half the battle. As the historical study in this chapter has demonstrated, naval mines can be especially difficult to counter in unfamiliar atmospheric and oceanic conditions. To reduce this unfamiliarity, the USN must take seriously CS-21’s implementation priority of increasing maritime domain awareness.
Cooperation and partnerships with local authorities and maritime agencies can assist greatly with gathering and keeping the vast volume of environmental information in regions of the world with relatively few US oceanographic and atmospheric assets. After all, it does little good to deploy minehunting equipment that compensates for different oceanic/atmospheric conditions if the operator does not know what those conditions are.
Operationally, the Allies’ Dardanelles experience suggests that MCM assets must not operate on their own without significant defensive forces protecting them. This is especially true for the near future as the slow unarmed Avenger class remains the mainstay of US MCM forces. The advent of the LCS and its MCM gear may alleviate the problem somewhat as they have significantly better self-defence tactics available than the
Avengers, but these are likely to be insufficient and will require an operational level solution that diverts major combat units to support the MCM ships. Furthermore, MCM and anti-submarine warfare operations should be cooperatively conducted given how submarines can lay mines stealthily and in relatively large amounts. Finally, the efficacy of minefields depends on the predictability of the intruding fleet, as demonstrated by
Nusret’s 11th line. As the ancient Chinese strategist Sun-Tzu once wrote, “...the pinnacle 109
of military deployment approaches the formless.”211 If the mines cannot be reliably removed, then it would be wise to reduce the opportunities for which they would be useful – in this case, the US fleet being unpredictable in its movements.
Ultimately, however, it is perhaps the strategic effects of mines that are the most noteworthy. Very few weapons can deny the United States and its Navy from using the world’s waterways, but naval mines are one of them. By making a part of the seas impassable for a period of time, mines can force an opponent to engage in land operations. As has been illustrated in this chapter, this holds especially true for narrow waterways that can be guarded by land forces, greatly influencing the strategic direction of the intruder as MCM in such situations cannot be confined to just naval operations. In the context of US naval strategy, mines in narrow waterways effectively expands MCM efforts from a sea control issue to one of power projection, as gaining control of the sea is now dependent upon the USN’s ability to remove threats from enemy shores. Only by doing this can USN forces safely project power even further inland and with greater freedom of maneuver. However, this is complicated by the fact that such power projection operations may not be feasible unless the mines are first removed, as they would hinder the ground forces’ ability to reach the shore. Thus, it can be argued that the strategy laid out in CS-21 and NOC 10 is actually not quite sufficient to address the mine threat. The anchor that is deterrence may well not be attached to chain links of sea control and power projection, but to a cable consisting of sea control and power projection intertwined with each other, mutually supportive and crucial to the deterrence strategy.
211 Sun-tzu, The Art of War, trans. Ralph D. Sawyer (New York: Basic Books, 1994), 193. 110
The answer to the question stated at the beginning of Part Two in this chapter is thus in the affirmative – that yes, despite changes in technology over time, strategic (and operational and tactical) principles can still apply. Perhaps not entirely and always, but certain situations are similar enough that the past is valid reference for the future. Lessons from the past may even be so salient as to unveil weaknesses in a modern naval strategy given particular conditions. To rephrase a common saying, learning from the past can prevent it from being repeated.
111
Chapter 5: Conclusion
Through an interdisciplinary approach, this thesis has demonstrated that the
United States Navy faces a significant challenge now and in the years to come against an adversary that can achieve its strategic goals via the deployment of naval mines. The preceding chapters have accomplished this by first outlining the importance of sea control to American naval strategy and the threats that mines pose to this in their area- denial capacity. The chapters then proceeded with a description of US mine countermeasures development since the 1991 Gulf War, concluding that up until recently, very little has changed and that current measures remain as effective, if not less so, than they were at the end of the Cold War.
To examine why this has been the case despite the very real threats posed by mines, obstacles to the development of next-generation mine countermeasures were examined, both monetary and technological. It was found that there is essentially a
“tolerance point” on a “cost-to-overcome-technological-hurdle” line – some technologies remain in development if they fell on the “acceptable” side of the tolerance point, while those that did not were cancelled. Cancellation was also usually done when it was demonstrated an existing system could do the same task with less developmental costs, even if it comes at the cost of effectiveness. Finally, to put all of these findings in perspective, the final chapter conducted a partial historical analysis that demonstrated the weaknesses of a “large” navy like the United States’ when facing a weaker power whose goal is to establish and maintain a naval minefield in order to deny the use of a confined waterway to an outside power. Many lessons were drawn from the past in that last 112
chapter, but perhaps the most prominent is the importance of ensuring the efficacy of
MCM assets in the face of both enemy action and environmental complications.
The findings in the second and third chapters suggest that it would be difficult for the USN to overcome the challenges mentioned in the fourth chapter. The slow implementation of the Littoral Combat Ship with its self-defence systems (however basic compared to larger ships) means that the unarmed Avengers will continue to be the mainstay of USN MCM activities for years to come, continuing their vulnerability to enemy action – a tactical weakness that has strategic implications, as illustrated in
Chapter Four. Of course, even as the LCSs are being built and commissioned (seemingly immune to the effects of recent sequestration outcomes212), the advanced MCM equipment themselves need to be improved and fixed if they are to be effective for regaining sea control of an area-denied waterway. Elements requiring improvements are the speeds of unmanned underwater vehicles so they can reliably operate in spite of any water currents and the tendency to identify false positives in the Airborne Laser Mine
Detection System. The possibility of submarine offensive mining also emphasizes the importance of developing the anti-submarine warfare Mission Package for the LCS, with its own and separate unmanned technologies.
To answer the research question posed in the beginning, then, this thesis has put forth the argument that the USN will be severely limited in its ability to safely and quickly clear a maritime chokepoint if the adversary in question is equipped with shore- based weapons that can easily strike unarmed MCM vessels. This is further complicated
212 Ellen Mitchell, “Chief of Naval Operations: Sequestration will not affect Austal’s existing LCS and HSV contracts,” AL.com, February 22, 2013, http://blog.al.com/press-register- business/2013/02/chief_of_naval_operations_sequ.html. 113
if local oceanographic and atmospheric conditions are unfamiliar to US forces and equipment. Furthermore, if the enemy is committed to a comprehensive closure of the chokepoint, it will be necessary for US and coalition forces to commit to a land operation of some sort – essentially, much as the recent Libyan “no-fly zone” resulted in strikes against Libyan land targets, so would be the case in a potential counter-mining operation.
In sum, there cannot be a military operation against a naval minefield without it becoming a war of some kind.
Having summarized this thesis’ conclusions, it is now appropriate to discuss the drawbacks of this thesis work in its entirety.
The importance and significance of this paper’s findings is based on the premise of certain assumptions being true: perhaps most concretely that Iran is, indeed, interested in following through on its threats to close the Strait of Hormuz. Part of the problem here is that Iran’s interest in doing so is based upon its intent, and intent, in turn, manifests itself in the threatened move – i.e. “closing” the waterway. But what exactly is meant by
“closing” the Strait? The standard and conventional interpretation (and indeed, the interpretation this thesis employs) is to stop 100% of all seaborne traffic transiting to and from the Persian Gulf. This move suggests an almost irrational vengeance-based motivation – after all, Iran itself will not gain anything from the move directly, not least because it would limit its own sea trade. The only tangible benefit of carrying out the threat would be if it causes the United Nations to lift its sanctions – a highly unlikely outcome as it would set a dangerous precedence for future conflicts. Closing Hormuz in such a manner would thus serve little purpose if actually conducted and is much more effective as a threat, particularly in its current ambiguously defined form. 114
Other potential forms of “closure” may include a target-specific approach, such as one directed against American vessels. Because of the indiscriminate nature of simple non- computerized fuses such as contact and magnetic, such “dumb” mines could not be used, limiting the cost-effectiveness of such weapons. Obviously, this would drastically alter the utility of this paper as alternate means of area denial must be sought by Iran – means that have not be the focus of this research.
The strategist Sun-tzu is famous for emphasizing the importance of knowing one’s enemy as well as oneself – only with this can victory be ensured.213 The incorporation of this crucial aspect in this paper is limited by the author’s unfamiliarity with Iranian sources, which are difficult to locate. As well, the author’s inability to read
Farsi limits the utility of any such sources. The author’s source of knowledge for the
Iranian perspective is thus constricted to just English translations, either by Iranian institutions or Western media. This carries certain risks: asides from the standard concern of accidental mistranslations, there is also the possibility of intentional mistranslations.
For example, Iranian translations may contain certain phrases and terms that are purposely meant for Western governments so as to induce the latter to take political demands and threats more seriously. Conversely, Western media translations may, purposefully or subconsciously, exaggerate any aggressive phrases as a result of biases.
The language barrier thus affects this thesis negatively in terms of uncertainty over
Iranian intent, with consequences such as that mentioned in the previous paragraph.
Furthermore, lack of access and ways of interpreting Iranian sources prevents the author from accurately assessing the extent to which Iran would be willing to engage Western
213 Sun-tzu, The Art of War, 215. 115
forces in military action – for example, would Iran really fortify coastal towns and villages with anti-ship missiles, thus turning those population centres into targets, in order to protect the minefields as suggested in Chapter Four?
As well, this thesis did not take into account the capabilities of potential US allies.
The United Kingdom, for example, also has MCM vessels forward deployed to Bahrain and has trained extensively alongside their USN counterparts. NATO also has a permanent rotational MCM task group that would likely be called upon in the event of a counter-mining operation in the SOH. The exclusion of these forces from the thesis can be justified, however, by the fact that allied contributions cannot be guaranteed. Just as this thesis assumed the worst-case scenario of Iran carrying out its threats, the thesis has also assumed the worst-case scenario of the United States having to “go it alone” with no allied assistance.
Perhaps one of the most poignant criticisms of this thesis is that the United States is decreasing its dependence on oil from the Middle East. As “fracking” is developed in the continental US and Arctic resources become more accessible, some observers expect the US to be nearly self-sufficient in oil and gas in the coming years, drastically reducing its need for Middle East petroleum.214 This may significantly reduce any incentive for
American military presence and intervention in the Middle East. Tempering this expectation, however, is the recognition that while the US may become self-sufficient in oil, its allies abroad may not be. Some East Asia countries, such as Japan, import as much
214 Asjylyn Loder, “Fracking Threatens OPEC as U.S. Output at 20-Year High,” Bloomberg, February 13, 2013, http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-02-13/fracking-threatens-opec-as-u-s-output-at-20-year- high.html. 116
as 87% of their oil from the Middle East, some even from Iran.215 Despite America’s
“pivot” to Asia, ensuring the continued satiation of Asian allies’ Middle Eastern oil appetite may well require that region of the world remain an integral part of US foreign policy. Should China become allied with Iran and engage in a conflict with Japan,
American forces may well have to engage in both East Asia and the Middle East, ensuring the safety of Japan’s oil supply from the latter region. Therefore, the USN may still be expected to assist in ensuring freedom of navigation in Middle East waters for its allies, if not directly for itself. USN MCM capabilities in the Strait of Hormuz, despite
America’s potentially decreased national interest in that region, will thus remain pertinent for decades to come.
Some may also scoff at the degree of threat that a mined SOH poses to American naval forces, as it would be highly unlikely that the USN will send one of their precious carrier strike groups through such a dangerous waterway in times of war. While this is likely the case, there are other ships in the USN that have strategic relevance requiring transit into the Persian Gulf. In particular, AEGIS destroyers or cruisers equipped for the anti-ballistic missile mission may well need to be positioned in the northern end of the
Gulf in order to prevent Iranian ballistic missiles from striking targets in, for example,
Israel. Furthermore, a potential alliance between Iran and nearby states, such as Iraq with whom it has warming relations216, may well require the presence of an aircraft carrier in
215 John Calabrese, “Japan’s New Energy Future and the Middle East,” Middle East Institute June 11, 2012, http://www.mei.edu/content/japan%E2%80%99s-new-energy-future-and-middle-east.
216 Bilgay Duman, “Where are Iran-Iraq Relations Heading?” Al Monitor, April 25, 2013, http://www.al- monitor.com/pulse/politics/2013/04/iran-iraq-relations-possible-alliance.html. 117
the Gulf. As a result, major US vessels would still require safe transit through the SOH, requiring a dedicated MCM effort.
Despite these weaknesses (many of which have been countered), the thesis’ focus on the tactical and operational possibilities of a given strategy, however broadly defined, allows the paper to remain a relevant and salient piece of work within certain scope conditions. But as suggested in the beginning of the thesis, the lessons here are not restricted to just the Strait of Hormuz scenario. Other waterways around the world, such as the Formosa Strait between Taiwan and China and the Strait of Malacca between
Malaysia and Indonesia, are just as strategically important. Their geographic arrangements are also very similar. Admittedly, the Strait of Malacca is unlikely to become a flashpoint of conflict between the regional powers, but there are several non- state armed groups in the region who may take advantage of the favourable geography.
The Formosa Strait, on the other hand, separates two states which have mutual animosity.
Though the dynamics in this case involves crossing the width of the Strait rather than through it, the lessons in this thesis on the need for protecting MCM forces and supportive ground operations remain salient.
To answer the enduring question in strategic studies about the universality of strategy over time, this paper’s findings suggest that although actors and political objectives may differ, the strategies, operations, and tactics of the past remain a viable pattern for current and future actions. 118
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