Foreign Policy Debate

[SkywardET]

I think this is the larger issue. Increased OPTEMPO on existing platforms with decreased and/or scaled back maintenance periods will do more to harm the Fleets ability to respond to an overseas crisis than squabbling over total number of hulls and what type they are.

I think you hit the heart of the issue, but those concepts are related.

Increased OPTEMPO seems to be a natural consequence of having fewer hulls in the water. Every time an Aegis platform is used to do low-end stuff that doesn't require (but might be enhanced by) Aegis capabilities, that's not really an ideal use of limited resources.

The most regularly used of the Navy's fundamental missions/purposes is power projection, and that requires presence. While we might not slack on our presence, it will be at the notable costs of things like an enhanced OPTEMPO and the myriad issues associated with it. I always get the impression that the Army and the Marine Corps are kind of "burned out" (not completely, of course) because of the OPTEMPO they've had to sustain for an extended period of time; meanwhile the Navy has always had a fairly decent OPTEMPO in peace or war, yet the only direction is up unless we have enough hulls to both meet our obligations and not find ourselves with 9-month deployments being the new normal.

 

[C420sailor]

...and not find ourselves with 9-month deployments being the new normal.

We're already there.

 

[helolumpy]

I wondered WTF he meant by that. As for the number of ships, it is a one what outdated metric. Capabilities is ultimately what matters most (along with the ability to bring them to bear).

You can have the most capable ships in the world, but if you only have a few of them, then our core capability of Forward Presence is degraded. For the Navy, Forward Presence is the "cop walking the beat", through it we can also conduct foreign engagement and training of partner nations. One DDG can only be in one place at one time.
The Navy needs a high/low mix of capabilities. We need lots of FFG/LCS types to be in lots of places at once.
If you want to go straight capabilities, then we need to go to an arsenal ship type fleet and just shoot missiles from the safety of far out at sea.

If you want the Navy's strategy to work (CS 21) you need to be forward and engaged; to do that you need ships.
The Navy wants 313 ships. We have 287, but of those 33 are combat logistics ships, which leaves the Navy with only 253 combatants.

Does anyone really think we are going to get to 313 anytime in the next 20 years?

So, if we decline the number of ships we have two options:
1) Decrease our forward presence and our engagement with other nations (and therefore change our strategy)
2) Increase OPTEMPO and wear ships out faster than their service life.

Romney made a solid point that the fleet size is dwindling. President Obama has made a conscious choice to dedicate more assets to countering China hence the shift of assets between 'Lant to Pac but he did not follow through on the strategy to plus us the fleet really needed to do the job of countering China's influence in Asia and Africa. To engage/contain China we need a robust fleet and the U.S. is not taking a realistic approach to operating a fleet that is required to execute our own strategy.

Saying capability is all that matters for the Navy is like saying capability is all that mattered for the Army... Until you get into a COIN fight, then those high-end tanks don't do you as much good as a squad of troops standing on the corner of the village market.

 

[Brett327]

You're nuking the point I made. You make some excellent points,but as you've pointed out, the devil is always in the details. My point was that if you only quibble about numbers of ships, you're missing the bigger picture.

 

[Fog]

This "Quantity vs. Capability/Quality" argument reminds me of the question alledgedly posed by Calvin Coolidge: "Why don't we buy one airplane and let the pilots take turns flying it?" My point, if I have one, is that dramatic cuts in the number of ships in the fleet may be accompanied by similar dramatic cuts in the number of aircraft devoted to Naval Air. IOW, be very careful what you wish for.

 

[Brett327]

Lets keep this in perspective. Nothing either of the candidates say has any meaningful bearing on the number of ships or aircraft we will have in our inventory in X number of years. They like to act like they can waive their magical executive wand and make things happen, but we all know (or should) that the process is much more complex than that. All of this "on my first day in office I'll do X,Y and Z" is utter nonsense (see closure of GITMO). As is the democratic talking point about Romney proposing increases in military spending that "the military hasn't asked for." Trust me, if congress waived $500 billion under SECDEF's nose, we'd snatch it up faster than a jonesing crack whore.