From the monthly archives:

December 2014

If the U.S. Navy is really putting “Warfighting First“, then, well, why not just turn the non-fighting seamanship, navigation and ship-handling work over to civilian mariners? The connection between the conn and battle at sea is less intimate than ever–and civilian mariners are generally better qualified in ship operations, have more experience conning ships, and […]

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The Eleven Carrier Fleet Is…Only Seven

by admin on December 18, 2014

Over on the excellent Navy Matters Blog there’s a little bit of a low-grade panic brewing up over the apparent mismatch of an “eleven carrier fleet” with only nine carrier air wings. Dastardly things are afoot, it seems. With one member of the “eleven-carrier fleet” constantly committed to a three-year refueling/refit cycle, the fear is […]

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New Navy Budget Buys…Time:

by admin on December 11, 2014

For a last-second, end-of-year compromise, the “Consolidated and Further Continuing Appropriations Act of 2015” does a surprisingly good job of preserving America’s naval industrial base. To me, it’s less about buying ships and more about buying…time. The Act offers the Nation a measure of flexibility–if it advances intact, the 11-Carrier fleet is (relatively) secure for […]

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Navy Strips CVN-79 Of Close-In AAW Enablers

by admin on December 5, 2014

Did anybody notice how the Navy responded to the CSBA report, “Commanding the Seas: A Plan to Reinvigorate U.S. Navy Surface Warfare“?  It seems the Navy’s CVN-builders are less than enthusiastic about Bryan Clark’s call to fundamentally shift the Fleet’s air-defense protocol. The CSBA report, as we have been discussing here and here, urges a […]

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When confronted at sea, Americans have an unbroken, century-long record of building new maritime competitors–whomever they are–into ten feet tall, impossible-to-defeat monsters targeted directly at the good ‘ole U.S.A.. Maybe it’s some institutional holdover from America’s early underdog struggles against the British Fleet, but this habit of fearfully over-hyping anything and everything challenging in the […]

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