NPS Prof in Forbes: "Kill the Carriers"

[Uncle Fester]

Yup. The ironic part is, these same guys will be the ones stomping and moaning about how the military is always "fighting the last war" when we get our asses handed to us in the next conventional war.

The early-20th-Century British Army was built for and very experienced in fighting low-level counter-insurgency and police actions. But that didn't help much in 1914.

 

[nittany03]

There were many wars where the belligerents showed up ready to fight the war of the past and got their ass handed to them. Which means that those who study history decided that this meant that they needed to predict the next war in order to be ahead of the power curve.

Problem is, it's as easy to screw that away as predicting where a hurricane will hit. With the possibility of more people dying based on your prognostications. But that's OK, because for some, the corpses are hard to see from that high up in the ivory tower.

 

[Junkball]

I thought I was reading a story from The Onion at first glance.

This guy seriously needs to get a grip.

In any case, carriers will always provide that several acre platform of sovereign U.S. steel wherever we should need it.

 

[airgreg]

It's not going to be the carriers that respond/save the day in the first 5 minutes though.

Yup, that was the point of the guy's article. It won't be a carrier that prevents the next big full-scale war unless you park a couple off the coasts of Taiwan and NK continuously for the next few years.

I don't want to be an advocate for this guy. I agree with his point that carriers, like all weapons systems, have weaknesses. I don't agree with his overall belief that we should cut carriers.

btw SS, saw the Gator pics. Bunch of non-tactical, skirt-chasing bastards! I hope you did a 3vX on the way down and debriefed with the models to make up for it. You gotta give me the stories that came out of that one.

 

[Picaroon]

Check out his book.
http://www.amazon.com/Worst-Enemy-Reluctant-Transformation-American/dp/1566637503

Reduce all branches to 100,000 people? Eliminate the Pentagon? I may not be an expert but these ideas seem retarded.

 

[LazersGoPEWPEW]

Check out his book.
http://www.amazon.com/Worst-Enemy-Reluctant-Transformation-American/dp/1566637503

Reduce all branches to 100,000 people? Eliminate the Pentagon? I may not be an expert but these ideas seem retarded.

AWESOME IDEA! Then we can spend more money on these...

and they'll do all the fighting for us!

 

[Renegade One]

This is a curious op-ed piece from Forbes regarding wasteful defense spending on new aircraft carriers. Thought you'd get a kick out of it if you haven't already seen it.

V/R, R1

http://www.forbes.com/business/forbes/2008/1208/032.html

 

[HAL Pilot]

John Arquilla is a professor of defense analysis at the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California

I say we sick Zab on him....

 

[Flash]

I am all for challenging the way we do business, even the worth of carriers, because it in turn challenges us to really think about how and why we do things. But we can't anticipate every challenge and we will always have to learn a lot of our lessons the hard way, no matter how hard we try.

Even though this guy might be a 'useful idiot', his article may presage future battles about whether to to keep the carrier force in its current form. I distinctly remember before 9/11 that there was a lot of noise that Rumsfeld was considering cutting the carrier force as part of his 'transformation' of the military, and there was a lot of push-back from the Navy and others. While there is a lot of political weight behind keeping our carrier force largely intact there will probably be growing pressure to cut it, from several 'interested' parties. Think about it, with all that is invested in the carrier cutting even just one or two could produce enormous savings in the near and long term. About 70 less aircraft, 5000 less sailors, a couple of escorts and support ships on top of the carrier itself.

So while it is easy to sit back and call people who think like this idiots, what you should take away is to really think why we do need the carrier force that we have today. Articulating in a coherent argument why we need the carrier force we have today will get you a lot further with interesed members of the public than calling people like this idiots or wannabes. Arm yourself for the coming fight.

And yes, the guy is an idiot. His arguments are so simplistic and amatuerish that it is almost embarassing. And surtey bond executive? RAND consultant? I wouldn't trust this guys as far as I could throw him......

 

[zab1001]

I say we sick Zab on him....

yeah, right after I confirm I'm actually graduating.

 

[phrogpilot73]

Articulating in a coherent argument why we need the carrier force we have today will get you a lot further with interesed members of the public than calling people like this idiots or wannabes.

I thought I did?

 

[Flash]

I thought I did?

You did, I was just talking in general terms.

 

[FLYTPAY]

Part of the NPS/NWC experience is an "unbiased" education......I think having this guy speak out loud is the ying to any red-clooded naval aviator's yang.....and thus we hate him and want to tar and feather him.

PS-he is a nerd.

 

[HeyJoe]

I'm just saying there is a time-distance problem associated with carriers.

That cuts both ways. Since 1991, carrier-based aircraft have flown from the Persian Gulf, Red Sea and Eastern Med to targets in Iraq. Air Force pundits like to point out they are muy better in terms of time/distance. However, when OEF kicked off, it was the reverse situation and the conventional air wings aboard aircraft carriers were in best position and USS Kitty Hawk provided a Special Operations staging base as well while two ESGs were able to validate USMC OMFTS/STOM in setting up Camp Rhino.

Even in OIF scenarios and over Kosovo, the advantage of OPSEC was demonstrated using sea-based strikes over land-based option with watching eyes observing and reporting on aerial activity.

 

[wink]

So while it is easy to sit back and call people who think like this idiots, what you should take away is to really think why we do need the carrier force that we have today. Articulating in a coherent argument why we need the carrier force we have today will get you a lot further with interesed members of the public than calling people like this idiots or wannabes. Arm yourself for the coming fight.

This isn't so hard. Just dust off the argument from the last time we had to defend CVNs, and spend a few hours updating it. This debate comes up every time we get a DEM in the White House and at other regular intervals, like when we are considering the next generation CVN class. The math, or operational analysis, changes very little. In the long run it is more cost effective and operationally efficient to have large deck CVNs. I have witnessed this debate several times over the years and the pro CVN argument is nearly always the same. It also prevails, every time. As long as the decision makers are unbiased and looking at the data, and history, it is a slam dunk.