By Robbin Laird

I have returned from Australia and the latest Sir Richard Willians seminar.

In that seminar, we dealt with the challenge of how to enhance the ready force while investing in the future force.

The modernization of the ADF is a case study in the clash between force design for an envisaged future force and the need to enhance the force in being to deal with the world as it is.

The challenge for any force planner is to combine a projection of desired core platforms, connectivity technologies, the nature of the adversaries to be dealt with by such a force and to do so from the perspective of what we believe of the future envisaged from the present.

It has always been difficult, but it may be well be the case that future force planning built around projections of the platforms of the future has outlived its day and is perhaps counterproductive.

What good is a thirty-year shipbuilding program when we are entering a period which will be significantly reshaped by maritime autonomous systems?

And are we preparing for World War III or are we shaping a strategy to sort through how to deal with the gray zone conflicts and local wars characterizing the multi-polar authoritarian world?

This difficulty of force planning is enhanced by how today’s ready forces need to modernize to deal with current operations.

Or put another way, closing the gaps for the fight tonite force generates change which simply is not captured by future force planning built around iterative platform replacement. You are not going to capture the nature of future air warfare by designing a so-called sixth-generation fighter to replace a fifth-generation fighter.

We have entered the world of the kill web where the evolution of warfare is being shaped by the payloads which can be configured and connected to create the desired effects in a combat space. We are building combat clusters rather than platform identified task forces. We are building maritime combat clusters not destroyer task forces. And this approach decisively challenges a platform defined future force planning approach.

The Australian government has identified a number of characteristics of the future force. The problem is that for the current force to be effective, lethal and survivable, it needs to upgrade its force on the fly.

And this requires more attention to rapid modernization than has been pursued in the past two decades.

For example, Jennifer Parker, the noted Australian naval strategist, argued this about the implications of the changing littoral environment for capital ships:

I had a chance to follow up with Jennifer Parker on her excellent presentation at the 26 September 2024 Sir Richard Williams seminar which focused on the evolving threat environments in the littorals and insights to be gained from operations in the Black Sea, Red Sea and the Philippine’s Sea.

She argued in that presentation that new capabilities, notably USVs and UAVs used by the Ukrainians and the Houthis posed new challenges to capital ships in the littorals. And that capital ships clearly can still be effective but ongoing modernization of their defensive systems in the new context on an ongoing basis was critical.

In our discussion, she underscored that the threat from land systems was of enhanced range, and new threats posed by unmanned maritime systems introduced additional threats to capital ships as well.

What this meant for her was the absolute importance of ongoing modernization of the combat systems aboard surface ships. Rather than viewing updates as occurring in long periods of block upgrades, there needs to be an ability to weave in upgrades based on the rapid evolution of offensive threat systems from various operational theaters.

It is crucial to have very credible threat information from a diversity of deployments by the Royal Australian Navy and its allies, and to be able to weave that information into ongoing upgrade efforts of combat systems.

And modern airpower is being generated by software upgradable systems such as the F-35 which need regular upgrades to keep pace with the rapidly changing combat environment.

The need to upgrade more rapidly dips into the costs of funding the future force or alternatively if you starve the current force to pay for a future force you threaten its viability.

But in the September 26, 2024 Sir Richard Williams seminar focused on the ready force, a further challenge for future force planning was laid bare. Virtually every major speaker who spoke about how to ramp up the capabilities of the ready force highlighted the salience and importance of incorporating autonomous systems within the force.

But how to do so is a major challenge in part because these systems do not follow the strictures of legacy future force building models. They are payloads more than platforms, and as with all payloads their utility is determined by actual warfighters, not think tank strategists and force planners.

This character of the evolution of the ready force incorporating autonomous systems was highlighted by the former chief of the Australian Navy Vice Admiral Tim Barrett in an interview I did with him.

This is how Barrett put it in the interview:

The reality is that for autonomous systems to come into the current force, they need to be well practiced at the operational end – promotion of their adoption is a behavioral piece. New systems need to be in the hands of warfighters to ensure that these systems make the current force more agile and take actions that are effective in their application.

Operational success is still about the application of force in the mind of the person responsible for delivering it.  It’s about forcing them to think of operational success by whatever means they have available to them, and then having the courage to take those actions.

You are not necessarily after disruptive change in process, but disruption in the effect. In some cases you don’t want disruption in the efficiency of the process of operations. But, you want to be able to cause a disruption that has an effect on your adversary.

 With regard to the Ghost Shark, to fully achieve its potential, it has to quickly enter the operational world of those who are managing the underwater warfare space throughout the regions of our interests.  

To be effective as a disruptive technology, it will need to contribute to the operational effects being sought by those managing the undersea domain; in tactical terms this means it has to be of benefit to those managing the water column. It could generate strategic consequences but not simply because of its technology but in the way this it is used to produce disruptive operational effects.  

A successful water space management process is key to being able to determine where your adversary is, or, more importantly, where it isn’t, so that you can put the right forces in the right place.

Bureaucracies don’t necessarily think like that. Operators absolutely do so, because it’s their day-to-day business, and they’re in the practice of only putting in harm’s way those things that need to be there to affect a disruption to the enemy’s operations.

The disruptive effects that a Ghost Shark can produce should be determined by those who actively manage the battle space, the undersea battle space, rather than someone who’s programming from afar and doing so in complete isolation from the rest of the water space management concepts of operations.

In other words, the Australians face a challenge common to the United States and its allies: How is the changing nature of more rapid upgrades in the ready force affect the practice of future force planning?

There is probably no starker reminder of how things have changed than watching the Israelis execute a strategy in their seven front war. They have combined fifth generation aircraft with exploding pagers and a variety of new combat clusters to deal with a deadly threat generated by Iran through its complex web of warfighting.

Does anyone really think that force planners sitting down a decade ago envisaged the force engaged today?

Rather the Israelis have modified in a variety of innovative ways the ready force, adding some new core platforms, but focused on a kill web enabled force to deal with a range of threats.

We are at a turning point in our military modernization strategies.

Are we paying for a future force while being compromised in the conflicts of today?

By Robbin Laird

The Marines assisted in relief efforts in the Philippines after a Typhoon hit that country. And as has been done in the past, the dynamic duo of the KC-130J and the Osprey provided the means to do so.

As Capt Mark McDonough noted in a 14 October 2024 story:

MANILA, Philippines —

U.S. Marines across multiple forward-deployed commands concluded six days of foreign disaster relief efforts in the Philippines Oct. 10, 2024, supporting the U.S. Agency for International Development’s humanitarian response to Typhoon Krathon (locally known as Julian) at the request of the Philippine government.

Marines and Sailors from Marine Rotational Force – Southeast Asia (MRF-SEA); 1st Marine Aircraft Wing (1st MAW); III Marine Expeditionary Force (III MEF); and the 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit (15th MEU) embarked aboard the amphibious assault ship USS Boxer (LHD 4) delivered nearly 96,000 pounds of foreign disaster relief supplies to Batan Island, a remote island in the Batanes Province and one of the locations most impacted by Krathon.

Typhoon Krathon originated 155 miles southwest of Okinawa before moving northwest, reaching peak intensity Oct. 1, with sustained winds of 195 kph (120 mph). Krathon heavily battered the northern islands of the Philippines, leading to evacuations, infrastructure damage, and food supply insecurity in affected communities.

At the request of the Government of the Republic of the Philippines, U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin directed U.S. Indo-Pacific Command to support USAID’s relief efforts due to the unique capabilities and high state of readiness of forward-deployed U.S. Marine Corps forces.

MRF-SEA first arrived in the Philippines in late September to participate in upcoming training exercises with the Armed Forces of the Philippines. Operating out of Fort Bonifacio, Philippines, MRF-SEA immediately began coordination with the U.S. Department of State, USAID, the AFP, and other U.S. Marine Corps units to plan support for the relief effort. Two teams of Marines and Sailors from MRF-SEA integrated with USAID and AFP personnel in Manila and Laoag to plan and prepare for the arrival of KC-130J Super Hercules aircraft from 1st MAW in Okinawa, Japan, and personnel from 3rd Marine Logistics Group.

“Before Marine Corps aircraft ever touched down in the Philippines, Marines and Sailors with MRF-SEA were integrated with our partners in the U.S. and Philippine governments, on site at Villamor Air Base and Laoag International Airport, with the manpower and heavy equipment needed to package and move aid material,” said Col. Stuart Glenn, commanding officer, MRF-SEA. “Forward-deployed Marine Corps forces allow us to quickly respond to humanitarian missions because we’re already in the region. I am extremely proud that our team was able to set the necessary conditions to quickly provide relief to the Philippine people.”

After arriving on Oct. 5, the cargo planes were loaded with supplies at Villamor Air Base and flown to Laoag International Airport in northern Luzon for staging and preparation to move the supplies to their final destination on Batan Island. The KC-130 crews conducted 26.2 hours of flight operations, successfully transported all aid materials to Laoag.

As U.S. and Philippine personnel worked to move supplies north, the 15th MEU arrived aboard USS Boxer and began flight operations to support relief efforts on Oct. 8. MV-22B Ospreys, assigned to Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron (VMM) 165 (Reinforced), landed in Laoag, and combined teams from the 15th MEU, MRF-SEA, and Philippine Marines spent the next three days loading Ospreys, the Marine Corps’ medium-lift tiltrotor V/STOL platform, with disaster relief supplies for the final leg of the movement to the Basco Airport on Batan Island. Pilots and aircrews from VMM-165 (Rein.) conducted more than 55 flights and successfully delivered the final disaster relief material on Thursday, Oct. 10.

“The primary focus of our mission is helping the people of the Philippines recover as quickly and safely as possible,” said Col. Sean Dynan, commanding officer, 15th MEU. “Humanitarian assistance in an expeditionary environment is what we train to do, and it is one of the reasons we are forward-deployed as an amphibious force.”

The forward presence and ready posture of U.S. Marine forces in the Indo-Pacific region was pivotal to the rapid and effective response to Typhoon Krathon, demonstrating the U.S.’s commitment to its allies and partners during times of need.

This recalled an earlier effort for which I conducted an interview in 2013 with the Marines involved in the Osprey engagement in a Typhoon relief mission.

I entitled that article: “The initial response to the Philippine Relief Mission: An Osprey Squadron in Action.”

That article follows:

As the 1st Marine Wing prepared to celebrate the USMC birthday at a ball, and to prepare for a long weekend around Veteran’s Day, this reverie was smashed by the reality of a Typhoon.

Nature had another idea and another approach to Veteran’s Day.

It was time for the Veteran’s in the making to go to work, and not to celebrate the past.

It was a case of Marines making history; not celebrating it.

A massive Typhoon was heading towards the Philippines and the Marines needed to prepare to assist, notably as the forward deployed force with rapid support capability.

For Lt. Col. Brown, the CO of VMM-262, the “Flying Tigers, this meant as well telling his wife Darcy, that they would have to put a hold on their anniversary celebration as well.

And this meant organizing the C-130s and Ospreys to coordinate for the coming eventuality.

According to Brown, “1st MAW organized a template for the initial engagement, but the first few days on the ground were chaos, which has only now become clarified in terms of how the joint and coalition force will shape its supporting mission.

“When the digital support for the mission was down, the Ospreys used aerial reconnaissance (their own) to determine where to take relief aid.

“Initially, the team thought this was a soccer field but determined upon landing that it was a schoolyard.

“Upon delivering aid, the Filipinos worked with the Marines and the local police who were present to deliver aide in an orderly fashion. According to Brown: “The school children were very happy to see us and the parents and children responded with enthusiasm to our arrival.”

“Because the C-130J squadron commander lives next door to Brown in Okinawa, they started planning the joint mission several days prior to its execution.

According to Brown, “A hub and spoke system is emerging in which the Navy helos are being supported by Marine FARPS (Forward Area Refueling Point) with the Ospreys using either the C-130s or the large deck carrier for refueling.”

In its role the USS Washington is a seasbase operating a few miles offshore and is integrated into the overall operations, rather than being considered as something apart from the overall role of airpower supporting the HA/DR mission set.

Concepts of operations can change as new technologies are added to the fleet.

The Marines have operated as the forward deployed force for the operation, and reminds one of the importance of forward presence.

Having integrated capability for the point of the spear is crucial and the Osprey clearly functions as the tip of the tip of the spear for rapid insertion.

As one senior Marine put it:

“1st MAW had Ospreys and Hercs in Tacloban about 72 hrs after the storm passed. And I am not talking just about people on the ground but real, self-sustaining capability to move the mountains of relief supplies to where it was needed and where nothing else could get the job done so effectively.”

There is no question it is a just a small effort against an immense catastrophe but the combination of rapid deployment and true capability is a crucial part of getting the response in play.

And it has been clear that the Marines see themselves as part of the overall joint and coalition force and working as a supporting command to the Philippine’s Armed Forces overall.

Members of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) spearheaded the relief efforts in Tacloban and surrounding areas by having disaster teams on-hand even before the super typhoon hit.

Multi-national forces soon fell into supporting roles to the AFP, and one week later groups and military representatives from across the globe are aiding in relief efforts.

Lt. Col. Brown highlighted the importance as well of the night operations of the USAF C-130s able to deliver supplies at night so that the effort could be run on a 24 hour basis.

But I pursued the story and focused on the first few days of meeting the challenge

This is the story as published on November 22, 2013:

The devastation from the Typhoon which directly struck the Philippines left in its wake a patch quilt of infrastructure from which to start a relief effort.

The Marines on Okinawa, Japan because of their integrated force structure and forward location were able to go early and to set in motion the process to follow.

The Osprey and KC-130J (teaming) was important for this effort. The KC-130Js provided air to air refueling and path finding creating the conditions for the Osprey to operate at extended ranges with increased time of station throughout the Philippines.

With fuel initially only available in Manilla and Clark, the teaming and extra time on station allowed the Ospreys and KC-130s to conduct multiple insertions in remote areas of relief workers and other elements necessary to set up an infrastructure for a much larger relief effort to follow.

The first five days was the key focus of the initial insertion force, and because of the reach and range of the Osprey, the Marines were able to operate throughout the island chain.

And the reality of the island chain is important in this regard, as it is clearly not a land mass, so considerations of support for the Ospreys – fuel etc. – as well as locations of supplies and the complexity of moving people and those supplies was significantly enhanced by the geographical reality of an island chain.

In a follow up to our discussion with Lt. Col. “Sniper” Brown, the CO of VMM-262, we had a chance to talk with his colleague Major A. “Papi” Guzman. 

According to Lt. Col. Brown, Guzman is his assistant operations officer and the two of them flew lead and wing together interchangeably for the 1st three days. We had the chance to revisit from the Major’s perspectives some of the key realities of those first few days of the relief effort.

The Major noted that the MEB flew out on the 10^th; and they received their diplomatic clearances on the 11^th and then departed for the relief mission. The assessment team from the MEB went first and the airplanes followed.

The first point underscored by the Major was the need to get the planes initially to Manila and Clark Air Base to get a process started on October 11^th.  “The next day we started executing the relief mission.”

And in a relief effort, a common problem which was evident in the Philippines as well is the need to deal with missing ports and airfields and leveraging what remains.  This creates in turn a choke-point management problem of the first order.

“Every plane that was available started flowing into Tacloban. This was a major problem given the absence of real air traffic management and the tarmac getting loaded up with supplies as well.  Supplies, workers, planes, and congestion were evident on the fields where we were to stage from.  Everything was in flux. Although a good thing to do, we realized it was a dangerous effort as well.  We needed to get the right crew elements together to execute the mission and to do so in the presence of devastation only a Typhoon can deliver.

This in turn created significant fuel problems, as we would have to hover prior to landing as much as an hour plus (because of the ground congestion), which meant that fuel was always a challenge.

And clearly without the KC-130Js we could not have done the operation.  I was concerned about being a stranded airplane on a remote island in case of a landing emergency. The KC-130Js were critical to us, prior to the arrival of the USS Washington, which we now use as an alternative fuel base for our Osprey operations. We did not have a running FARP (Forward Air Refueling Point) until the 4^th day of the operation.”

It was clear that not knowing where your Exxons are located is a key aspect of managing air operations in such a large scale relief effort; and managing the choke point as well, because there is no point to flowing through more people and supplies if the surviving ports and airfields are simply becoming dumping grounds and making it more and more difficult to operate from.

After having landed at Clark, they had to sort out where they would go the next day.

“The situation was very unclear. Where were we to go, with which supplies and with which purpose?  Intelligence was completely missing and communications were down.  We relied on the CO’s international blackberry for the first two days for our planning and communication needs.  We had no other connectivity.

We had to work our taskings through the blackberry. We were ready to go but where.  I reached out to a fellow Marine and he reached out to family on Facebook and gave us some information about areas we might consider going to. And we relied on the local newspaper to identify one of our first locations to visit, namely Guian peninsula.

But prior to doing the school field delivery, they flew to Tacloban airfield which was to become a key operational center for the air side of the relief effort.

“The area was so devastated and we had limited ground support so we flew our first two Ospreys there with senior officers in charge of each plane and flew in slowly on rotor because we were not sure of the terrain or the ground conditions for landing.  We had to devise a way for us to get into the airfield.

We remained visual with each other because the weather was so bad initially. I was amazed at the level of destruction we saw as we came in. Although we had four aircraft available, for risk mitigation we felt that only two planes should go in initially.”

Next up was the flight to Guian peninsula.  “We identified a devasted area by reading the Philippine Examiner and saw what we thought was a picture of a soccer field, but later would discover it was a school yard.”

We asked the Major what the field looked like as they began to touch base.

“The area was completely devastated and all we saw was rubble.  It was a never ending path of destruction.  My eyes scanned with total amazement.  I would see images of families and little kids running around in the streets as we passed over. At first, the area looked deserted. But after we landed hundreds of children and older people came out from under the rubble or from cardboard boxes to approach the plane.

You really do not imagine that many people in such a devastated area, coming out from the woodwork. And older gentlemen came up to the plane and shunted the children away from the plane so we could safely shut it down. If we had not had the newspaper we would not have had a good idea where to start the relief area. ”

We pointed out that the plane must have seen like a science fiction object to folks who had never seen it before and asked what happened when they started flying locals on the plane.

“Like most first time flyers, they were amazed when we transition from rotor to propeller mode and become a plane.  The crew chiefs noted that eyes open wide open when the acceleration takes place and smiles came on the passengers faces. Normally we hold 24 in the back; here we had more than that.  I remember we put a man with babies on both shoulders into a jump seat.”

The Major also emphasized the challenge of flying in these conditions.  “Normally we do 3 hours of flight planning for each hour of flight; needless to say we were doing 0 hours of flight planning in these conditions on a contingency task.”

We also discussed the coming contribution of the F-35B in this type of operation.  With the F-35B the Marines will have a C2 and ISR capability to contribute significantly as well to this type of operation.

By getting a five day jump, it was then possible to shape the infrastructure for the next phase.  And by the USMC approach, the first five days was an operational relief effort PLUS putting in place the infrastructure for the next phase.

When we interviewed the Major it was several days into the relief operation and he was having his first day off.  We asked him: “looking back what did it feel like emotionally?”

According to the Major:

“We were flying in a very confused and difficult situation.  We clearly are concerned with our own capability to operate and at the same time this is just a means to an end.  The end is to get relief to people who need, move in relief workers, bring supplies and move locals as necessary.

Virtually none of these folks had ever flown on an Osprey before, but willingly did so in these circumstances.  When we would open the back we would see many women and children crying with no doubt relief but regret and having now to face an uncertain future.  It was difficult to look at this and not have your own emotional reaction.

But it is rewarding. You go through all this training and now you get to make a difference.”

What the Major was experiencing was Thanksgiving a bit early in the month of November; the sci fi platform was working with others to start the Philippines towards that future.

When doing disaster relief, professionals will tell you that time is your most precious commodity.

The Osprey-KC-130J pairing bought time for the current HA/DR mission. 

By having the pairing, the USMC team was able to move in rapidly and prepare for the insertion of additional forces and aide teams.

How much is 3-5 days of additional time worth in putting in motion a relief effort?

Featured photo: U.S. Marine Corps MV-22B Ospreys attached to Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron (VMM) 165 (Reinforced), 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit, land at Basco Airport during foreign disaster relief operations in Basco, Batanes Province, Philippines, Oct. 8, 2024.

BASCO, PHILIPPINES

10.10.2024

Photo by Cpl. Joseph Helms

15th Marine Expeditionary Unit

 

By Robbin Laird

I had a chance to follow up with Jennifer Parker on her excellent presentation at the 26 September 2024 Sir Richard Williams seminar which focused on the evolving threat environments in the littorals and insights to be gained from operations in the Black Sea, Red Sea and the Philippine’s Sea.

She argued in that presentation that new capabilities, notably USVs and UAVs used by the Ukrainians and the Houthis posed new challenges to capital ships in the littorals. And that capital ships clearly can still be effective but ongoing modernization of their defensive systems in the new context on an ongoing basis was critical.

In our discussion, she underscored that the threat from land systems was of enhanced range, and new threats posed by unmanned maritime systems introduced additional threats to capital ships as well.

What this meant for her was the absolute importance of ongoing modernization of the combat systems aboard surface ships. Rather than viewing updates as occurring in long periods of block upgrades, there needs to be an ability to weave in upgrades based on the rapid evolution of offensive threat systems from various operational theaters.

It is crucial to have very credible threat information from a diversity of deployments by the Royal Australian Navy and its allies, and to be able to weave that information into ongoing upgrade efforts of combat systems.

She referred in the seminar presentation to her recent paper she published in the Australian Naval Review concerning the USVs used in Ukrainian operations against the Russian Black Sea Fleet. In that article, she made the important point that these were NOT autonomous systems but remotely piloted ones.

Earlier in the week I met with one of the ADF’s leading practitioners of the art of unmanned and autonomous systems and he reinforced her point by underscoring that far too often the ADF or the Australian government referred to remotely piloted systems as autonomous systems. And the core point is that significant manpower is involved in operating remotely piloted systems – such as with Triton – compared to a very different con-ops involved with autonomous systems.

She called for precision in analysis of any lessons to be learned from Black Sea operations. This is how she put it in her article:

The USVs employed by Ukraine are what this article would consider light (less than 5 tonnes), remotely controlled attack USVs. This is important, as the lessons from the Black Sea are not necessarily scalable to large USVs (greater than 1,600 tonnes) or even small USVs such as the United States’s Sea Hunter (approximately 500 tonnes).

The USVs employed by Ukraine are not autonomous, which is often misunderstood. The ease at which Ukrainian USVs have targeted some surface ships through remote control using electro-optical and infrared sensors cannot be scaled to supposed developments in autonomy.

The lessons from Ukraine’s employment of light attack USVs are different from the lessons you would learn regarding employment of light USVs such  as  a  sail  drone, Bluebottle or  similar USVs that  are  being  trialed  for  intelligence and surveillance capabilities.

The significant effects which the Ukrainians have had using their USVs in the Black Sea clearly showed that countries without much of a capital ship force could still pack a punch in the littorals.

But actions in the Black Sea also demonstrated that the Russian fleet was not prepared with proper defence systems and training against such a threat. And this means that viability for capital ships operating in such waters clearly need to have such systems and such training.

But then we focused on the significant question of how capital ships can be combined with autonomous ones in shaping new combined arms capabilities at sea for a maritime force. It simply makes little sense to send our most advanced destroyers into harm’s way into the littorals to fight the Houthis.

She expressed her concern that both the U.S. Navy’s LUSV program and its RAN counterpart were not perhaps the most credible addition. It is in effect an optionally manned arsenal ship with launch tubes to add to the strike capability of the fleet.

Frankly, I am very skeptical that such a program is going to change the nature of the fleet anytime soon given the concern one has over firing authorities and defensive systems. Precisely the concern which Parker raised regarding the need to upgrade defensive systems on capital ships would apply to an LUSV as well.

We then focused on how UUVs and USVs as autonomous systems could enhance the manned maritime fleet.

In my view, the way ahead is shaping a maritime kill web force. And UUVs and USVs are not platforms but really payloads encased in a carrying system. Or put in other terms, what specific mission capabilities do they add to the manned force? Or how can they work as part of a combined arms maritime operation?

Parker added that it has been overstated what small numbers of these systems can bring to the fight.  And clearly, from an operational perspective these systems need to be put in the hands of operators to determine how to use what additive or replacement capabilities these systems can provide.

The software nature of AI maritime systems requires operators and the company/government team writing the code to work closely together in the evolution of desired and effective capability. By taking a combined arms perspective rather than a manned-unmanned teaming perspective, the focus is specifically on what a specific payload carried by an autonomous carrier contributes to a specific operation and operational capability.

But then we closed by focusing on a key organizational barrier to this route. The RAN and the U.S. Navy are focused on distributed maritime operations, but hierarchies in the defence bureaucracy have made it increasingly difficult for local decisions to be made by the operational force.

In an interview I did with a senior U.S. Admiral last year, he put this challenge bluntly: “When I do mission rehearsals, I find gaps that need to be filled. We can identify gap fillers we should be able to buy to make the distributed fleet more lethal and survivable.”

But of course. he cannot do so given the policy and acquisition hierarchy blocking the innovation which the ready force can discover and implement readily.

If this is not remedied, the promise of autonomous systems for rapidly improving the lethality and survivability of the ready force will not be fulfilled.

Featured graphic: From Jennifer Parker, “An Evolution or Revolution in Naval Warfare in the Black Sea,” Australian Naval Review (Issue No.1, 2024).

See also the following:

How Does the Ready Force Deal with a Rapidly Changing Operational Environment?

Royal Australian Navy Explores Autonomy and Optional Crewing: Eyes LUSV as Potential LOSV Solution