– USNI Proceedings – Dispersing ships in smaller groups will increase the surface Navy’s ability to deceive and defeat the enemy, but such distributed lethality cannot exist without distributed authority.
Build Strategic Fast Attack Submarines
– USNI Proceedings – Arming the Virginia-class fast attacks with submarine-launched ballistic missiles offers an affordable alternative to building the budget-busting Columbia-class SSBN(X).
Mini-Drones & Bayonets: New Marine Warfare Concept
– Breaking Defense – After a generation spent fighting guerrillas, the Marines have just rolled out a new concept for high-tech combat against a nation-state — a concept they’re developing in unusually close concert with the Army and Navy.
New Zealand Navy Chief: U.S. Nuclear Ship Issue ‘Behind Us’, Hopes for Regular USN Port Visits
– USNI News – After more than 30 years, an American warship will pull into a New Zealand port in November and could mark the start of regular port visits for the U.S. Navy
Rotary Wing Aviation in the Royal Canadian Navy
– CIMSEC – A key part of any modern navy is its rotary-wing component. The capabilities that helicopters bring to naval operations are essential in the context of modern warfare, and many large navies around the world boast impressive fleets of shipborne rotary-wing aircraft. Smaller navies, however, need to make due with much less, and there is perhaps no better example of a small navy employing its limited rotary-wing assets to the fullest extent as the Royal Canadian Navy (RCN).
Experts Advocate Harder Stance Against Illegal Claims In South China Sea
– USNI News – Three South China Sea and maritime law experts advocated a tougher stance against illegal Chinese actions, calling for more freedom of navigation operations, possibly with regional allies, that are aimed at Chinese territorial claims that have not previously been challenged.
Russia Building Nuclear-Armed Drone Submarine
– Washington Free Beacon – Russia is building a drone submarine to deliver large-scale nuclear weapons against U.S. harbors and coastal cities, according to Pentagon officials. The developmental unmanned underwater vehicle, or UUV, when deployed, will be equipped with megaton-class warheads capable of blowing up key ports used by U.S. nuclear missile submarines, such as Kings Bay, Ga., and Puget Sound in Washington state.
ISIS has a navy? The US is sinking it
– CNN – US and allied warplanes have sunk over 100 ISIS boats, destroying 65 of them in September alone, according to the international military coalition. While Iraq is nearly entirely land-locked, the Tigris and Euphrates rivers that cross that country are navigable, and ISIS has been using watercraft for a variety of purposes, including transporting fighters and conducting improvised explosive attacks.\
China Experimenting With Catapult Launched Carrier Aircraft
– USNI News – China has stepped up development of Catapult-Assisted Take-Off But Arrested Recovery (CATOBAR) operations for its carriers, with the appearance of a Shenyang J-15 Flying Shark carrier-borne fighter with CATOBAR apparatus and continued construction of supporting land-based infrastructure.
Counter-pivot: China, Russia hold massive South China Sea war games
– Asia Times – China is attempting to counteract the near total isolation it has incurred from regional states as a result of its maritime claims by using a regional show of force together with the Russian military.
Amphib, Destroyer Pairing Seen In High-End Exercise, Current 6th Fleet Operations
– USNI News – As the Navy and Marine Corps work through a high-end warfighting exercise in the Pacific, which features a traditional three-ship amphibious ready group (ARG) operating with a guided-missile destroyer as a peek into future operations, a similar ship pairing is performing real-world missions in the Mediterranean today.
Red Atlantic: Russia Could Choke Air, Sea Lanes To Europe
– Breaking Defense – Russia could hinder US reinforcements headed to Europe in the event of a major war, warned the recently retired Supreme Allied Commander, Gen. Philip Breedlove. It’s well known Russian radars, missiles, and strike planes — “Anti-Access/Area Denial” systems — threaten ships and aircraft across wide swathes of the Black Sea, Eastern Europe, and the Baltic. But Gen. Breedlove’s worries are on a wider scale: He’s anxious about the Atlantic.
China launches two more ASW corvettes
– Jane’s – The first of China’s 1,500-tonne Type 056 corvettes was launched in May 2012, so the rate of production over the last four years has averaged a new hull about every six weeks.
China’s Maritime Militia – Time to Call them Out?
– Defense News – “China’s maritime militia is only as deniable for China as we allow it to be, and we don’t have to allow it to be deniable,” said Andrew Erickson, a professor of strategy at the US Naval War College, where he is a founding member of the China Maritime Studies Institute. The militia, Erickson said, are controlled directly by the Chinese military, adding another degree of complexity to at-sea confrontations below that of the navy and coast guard. The craft, he said, are “working in close coordination with the other two more powerful sea forces or at least with their backing and coordination added as necessary.”
Carrier Ford Has Serious Power Problem
– Defense News – For over a year, the US Navy and its shipbuilders have been anxious to get the new aircraft carrier Gerald R. Ford (CVN 78) to sea and begin engineering trials of the first-of-class design. A number of publicly-announced target dates have come and gone, but the ship is still firmly moored at Newport News Shipbuilding in Virginia. Now, however, a key factor in preventing the ship from casting off lines and getting underway is coming into view. A serious voltage regulator problem on the carrier’s four main turbine generators (MTGs) has prevented engineers from running the motors up to full power, and only now has the problem been identified and a fix decided upon.
Russian Military Activities from South China Sea to Sevastopol
– USNI News – It may not be 1984 again, but it certainly is not 1994 or 2004 either. Incorporated into what appears to be an overarching strategy to assert Russian primacy in their self-identified “near abroad” the Russians are doing several things simultaneously, the most important of which may well be the large-scale exercises in Crimea as part of an apparent larger strategic war game. While many may argue the relative merits of various aspects of Russian power, sanctions, diplomatic isolation and other lines of effort, there is no denying that Russia is synchronizing a strategy to keep Europe off-balance, potential allies encouraged and possible enemies deterred from the Baltic to the Black Sea and further afield.
Think Tragically to Avoid Tragedy
– Washington Free Beacon – An interview with Robert D. Kaplan: What America can expect in an age of ‘great power anarchy’
Japan to join US in South China Sea patrols
– CNN – Japan is planning on upping its activities in the South China Sea through joint training patrols with the United States and exercises with regional navies, Japanese Defense Minister Tomomi Inada said.
Navy Embracing Distributed Operations in Quest to Regain Sea Control
– USNI News – The Navy took risk in many of its destroyer fleet’s mission sets during a period of uncontested operations at sea, and U.S. Fleet Forces Command has now been tasked with regaining sea control and all-domain access.
ARG/MEUs are Key ‘Theater Mobile Forces’
– USNI News – The 13th MEU and Boxer ARG left San Diego on Feb. 12 for the seven-month deployment that was busy, with air strike missions supporting coalition forces fighting Islamic State in northern Iraq, amphibious war games in and around the Korean peninsula and training with partner militaries in Malaysia and Sri Lanka.
Stennis CO Talks Deployment: Dual Carrier Ops, Chinese Interactions
– USNI News – Last month the aircraft carrier USS John C. Stennis (CVN-74) returned home from a seven-month deployment to the Western Pacific – the first time in several years a carrier from the continental United States had deployed specifically to that region rather than simply passing through on the way to and from the Middle East. In addition to highlighting a shift in focus to the Pacific, the deployment featured an opportunity to practice high-end warfighting skills with another U.S. carrier strike group, several exercises with allies and partners in the region, and persistent but professional contact with Chinese ships sent to shadow Stennis.
Pågan: the tropical paradise the US wants to turn into a war zone
– The Guardian – Former residents and environmental campaigners to launch a lawsuit against Pentagon’s plans to use the Marianas islands for bombing practice.
China, Russia Kick Off Joint South China Sea Naval Exercise; Includes ‘Island Seizing’ Drill
– USNI News – China and Russia kicked off more than a week of naval exercises in the South China Sea that will include an “island seizing” exercise.
LCS Crewing, Operating, Basing Schemes Are Changing
– Defense News – After more than twelve years insisting the unique crewing and modularity schemes for the Littoral Combat Ship will work, US Navy leaders are changing those plans as part of a larger shakeup of the long-troubled program.
China’s High Seas Ambitions
– Der Spiegel – With its Maritime Silk Road, China is tapping the world’s oceans for its own strategic purposes. It’s a bold plan that is causing unease in India and the United States — and also has implications for Europe.
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