– US Naval War College Review – In 1972, Japan regained administrative control of the Senkaku Islands following years of negotiations with the United States after World War II. However, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the Republic of China already had made claims to these islands. The United States chose not to weigh in on the Senkakus’ sovereignty, leading to the tensions that have resurfaced today as the PRC asserts its dominance in the East China Sea and beyond.
Monthly Archives: August 2019
The South China Sea Is Overrated
– USNI Proceedings – Assigning the South China Sea geostrategic importance based on its popular sea lanes or assumed oil and gas reserves is suspect.
NATO’s Selective Sea Blindness—Assessing the Alliance’s New Navies
– US Naval War College Review – The navies of NATO countries fall into two categories: old and new. The new navies lack modernization and readiness, making them deficient in their contributions to NATO security priorities. Sea blindness is a problem across the spectrum of NATO governments and illuminating this problem is now more important than ever in light of an increasingly aggressive Russia.
Go Get Mahan’s Yardstick
– USNI Proceedings – Mahan’s 3,500 nm “standard distance” for naval planning may be a crude metric, but it highlights the geographic reality that must shape theater strategy and force development in the vast Pacific operating area.
Preparing Today for the Mines of Tomorrow
– US Naval War College Review – Maritime mining long has been called on to support various naval strategies. However, shifting objectives and naval priorities call for new analysis. By adapting methodologies developed for land mines, we can find measures of effectiveness (MOEs) aligned to operational objectives, explore developmental mining concepts, and present new MOEs for maritime mining operations.
Argentina’s Gray Zone Gambit
– Naval History – The 1982 Falklands War was more than “bald men fighting over a comb.” It offers lessons in readiness for today’s Navy–Marine Corps team.
Game Changers
– Air Force – The surface-to-air missile that destroyed a US Navy drone in June heightened tensions with Iran and throughout the region. More importantly, however, it blew a hole in the notion that US aircraft designed to operate in permissive airspace—airspace absent advanced surface-to-air missile (SAM) threats—can operate with impunity anyplace and anytime. Let that be a wake-up call. Maybe Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps did the US a favor.
Localized Sea Denial: Countering Chinese Aggression in the South China Sea
– CIMSEC – There can be no doubt that the United States lacks an actionable maritime strategy with respect to the South China Sea, nor does the maritime force exist to effectively counter Chinese expansion in this economically and politically critical space.
No Free Ride in the Pacific: The Case for Investing in Mobility
– CIMSEC – If the United States wants to compete, deter, and win in a potential conflict its military needs to be able to move troops around the theater in question at will. To do this will require a reallocation of acquisition priorities and investments.
An Autonomous Navy for an Autonomous World
– USNI Blog – Don’t be afraid of the robots.
The “Dumbest Concept Ever” Just Might Win Wars
– War on the Rocks – In the final analysis, expeditionary advanced base operations is a concept designed to exploit geography and contribute to winning a hard war against a nation with military capabilities approaching those of the United States. It gives the American military its best chance to win such a conflict. But, vastly more important, if the United States is prepared to implement this concept, it presents the nation with the best possible chance of deterring a future conflict and preserving the peace.
The Role of Public Affairs in U.S. Seapower, Part 2
– CIMSEC – We will explore how to synchronize information power to enable maritime strategy, along with several counter-arguments and perspectives.
China swings a small stick in the South China Sea
– The Hill – It’s hard to drive China out of the headlines. Yet a dispute between Iran and Great Britain, each of which has seized a tanker ship belonging to the other, has managed it in recent weeks — eclipsing a running feud between Vietnam and China, whose ships have squared off at Vanguard Bank, the westernmost feature in the Spratly Islands. For all that, the South China Sea dispute entails consequences at least as severe as those in the Persian Gulf.
Talisman Sabre: Land-Based Missiles Vs. China
– Breaking Defense – The Army’s experimental Multi-Domain Task Force tested new tactics for Pacific conflict, hand-in-glove with the Marines, Air Force, and Australians.
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