The Navy's Changing Force Paradigm
Abstract
The recently issued Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower reflects an institutional response to America's changed strategic circumstances and embodies a logic that suggests a significant change to the Navy's force structure paradigm. However, because the document is broadly worded, the service still has a lot of work to do to achieve an internal consensus on the implications of this logic for its future force structure. There is considerable intellectual "churn" associated with this shift, and the Navy has yet to come fully to grips with its implications for force structure. This article will attempt to describe the broad outlines of the paradigm shift and assess some of the programmatic implications, including the need for additional numbers of general-purpose surface combatants. A naval force paradigmis a theory of how various types of ships and weapons available to a navy should be organized for warfare. The paradigmis governed by the characteristics of the principal naval weapons of the day and by the maritime strategy a nation pursues. In this nation's early days, the principal weapon was the naval cannon, which could hurl a twenty-four-pound shot about half a mile with effectiveness. The strategy of early administrations not to be drawn into European wars, coupled with their determination to protect American merchant shipping, produced a force paradigm of a small fleet of highly capable frigates, operating independently or in small squadrons. At the dawn of the twentieth century, as the United States elected to widen its strategic perspective and become a player on the world stage, its force paradigm shifted to a battleship-centric fleet, reflecting the governing weapon of the day, the large-caliber naval gun. With the advent of the airplane and the impetus of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the battle-line paradigm shifted to one of circular formations centered on fast aircraft carriers.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jan 01, 2009
- Accession Number
- ADA519304
Entities
People
- Robert C. Rubel
Organizations
- Naval War College