Past Strategy for Relative Decline

Lord Selborne (Spy Magazine)

Admiral Sir John Fisher (also from Spy)

   Several posters here and on other sites have commented that the Littoral Combatant Ship (LCS) might have had a better development process if it had been connected to a defined strategy. That may be true. Since the end of the Cold War the United States has operated under varying degrees of trans-oceanic strategy with a focus on affecting events ashore rather than war at sea. A decline in relative U.S. economic and financial strength, an increase in entitlement spending, the rise of new peer competitors and the additional financial stress imposed by a lingering large scale counterinsurgency effort have all contributed to weaken the ability of the U.S. Navy to continue a global trans-oceanic strategy and simultaneously prepare for future wars at sea. Can LCS play a successful role in both trans-oceanic and war at sea strategies?  Perhaps we first need to manage our own “relative decline” with a bold new strategy that meets both needs before trying to define where LCS really fits? This is not a new situation in that our immediate predecessor in the role of liberal democratic global power (the British Empire) faced a similar crisis at the dawn of the 20^th century. The Royal Navy’s remarkably successful effort to re-balance its force structure for a new century is a useful example for the U.S. in preserving global influence while maintaining an effective battle force.

 

      When he assumed the role of Great Britain’s First Lord of the Admiralty in 1900 the Earl of Selborne was ordered to maintain Britain’s superiority over its immediate rivals France and Russia, account for the rising strength of the German, Japanese, and American fleets and make cuts in his own budget to ensure successful prosecution of the Boer War. Rising British entitlement spending in the first several years of the 20^th century further complicated Selborne’s efforts. In the end he made a bold recommendation to scrap nearly a century of trans-oceanic British naval policy in exchange for a smaller, more powerful and globally deployable fleet capable of both warfighting and traditional show-the-flag missions. Arguing that the British Navy’s global disposition dated from “a period when the electric telegraph did not exist and when wind was the motive power,” Selborne consolidated isolated British squadrons into concentrated capable fleets. He also ordered the wholesale scrapping of both outdated ships and those too slow for global combat operations. After a long naval supremacy throughout the world’s oceans, the British welcomed the development of the Japanese and American navies and significantly reduced both their Pacific and North American forces.

      To carry out this scheme, Selborne brought fiery Admiral Sir John Fisher from his post as Britain’s primary battle fleet commander in the Mediterranean in 1902 to London and made him First Sea Lord (the Royal Navy equivalent of the Chief of Naval Operations). Fisher, a technologist and transformational innovator who often stalked the halls of the Admiralty wearing signs that said “I have no work to do” or “bring me something to sign,” ruthlessly implemented Selborne’s plan over the collective protests of many Royal Navy officers. The admiral advocated high speed cruisers armed with battleship guns to patrol the trade routes and serve as Britain’s “911 colonial defense force”. He experimented with aircraft and submarines, and instituted a new reserve force intended to preserve older ships too expensive to operate in peacetime but useful for combat. Fisher also sought to bring logic to the business of naval strategy and operations. He stated that “Strategy should govern the types of ships to be designed. Ship design, as dictated by strategy, should govern tactics.” Naval officers of the time were aghast at such thinking. Surely all one needed to do was to place their ship alongside the enemy in true Nelsonian tradition. Fisher also successfully communicated his strategy to the general public in that every Englishman of the first decade of the 20^th century knew his nation’s fate depended on that of its fleet. The British Navy was reasonably well deployed for war in 1914. Despite a crippling German U-boat campaign that was blunted with help from the U.S. Navy, the British were able to achieve many of their naval objectives of the war. Acquiescence in the growth of both Japanese and American allies ensured both would be British allies in the First World War.

      What then can the United States learn from the British example of “relative decline” and naval rebalancing? Our force structure and global deployment has undergone some revision since the end of the Cold War but perhaps more change is required. This change must be based on a clear strategy and the platforms, weapons and systems allocated must be designed to fit this strategy. The operational and tactical employment of these elements should be determined by their design features and how they best support the desired strategy. If the U.S. does indeed intend to re-balance a significant portion of its naval forces to the Pacific, that change  may involve leaving  large parts of the oceans in the care of other democratic nations much as the British did in the early 1900s. The Indian Navy would be such a partner. Europe may also need to completely provide for its own naval security, including ballistic missile defense. The U.S. can then focus its naval assets on those regions where naval supremacy is vital to securing our strategic interests. Admiral Fisher replaced slower armored cruisers with battlecruisers capable of rapid transits for defense of imperial trade routes and as Britain’s “911 force” for naval intervention.  U.S. naval units should also be high endurance units capable of rapid deployment across the globe. We must also avoid the mistake Fisher made in not building enough flexibility into his ship designs. His battlecruisers were excellent for imperial defense but highly vulnerable in a line of battle with peers.  In short we need to think more about what the strategy for the next few decades ought to be before populating it with operational art, new platforms and tactics. Hard choices like those made by Selborne and Fisher may be needed to balance any U.S. relative decline while continuing to secure our vital maritime interests. For further information on Great Britain’s solutions to relative decline, read Aaron Friedberg’s The Weary Titan and for one expert’s take on building a strategy first and then platforms in its support, see Seth Cropsey’s Mayday. Both are excellent reads.