Lessons from the desert

CHIPS, Winter, 2004 by Vern Clark

It is absolutely necessary for the Navy and the Department of Defense to dissect, study, analyze and determine the effects and causative factors of what we are accomplishing in Afghanistan and Iraq.

... We need to challenge every assumption--everything that we think about the way we conduct our business. It's healthy for us to challenge those assumptions and see where the future takes us. In the course of these discussions it is absolutely appropriate that you examine tactical, operational and strategic perspectives. It would be inappropriate for me to talk about the tactical level perspectives and I'm not going to... but I will share this piece... First and foremost is that we are ready.

Strategic lesson number one is that readiness counts.... It's necessary to say that because we have not always had the discipline to finance a ready force. I think that as an institution it's wrong to identify the requirement and then fund 85 percent of it. In my confirmation hearing, I said to Congress that it was my view that we had fundamentally understated the requirements and then we fundamentally underfunded the understated requirements--and we've done it for a long time.

So we invested in readiness... in the tools to see to it that the men and women who wear the cloth of this nation would be ready... We were in the tank in the third week of December [2002] and the plan was fundamentally set, but the force selection was not. I will never forget the Chairman asking me, "Vern, how many carriers can I have? Can we have four?" There have been times in the past that mustering four fully ready, in the green, all the way across and ready would not be possible. We have been famous in the past for crossdecking things. It was such a thrill to be able to say, "Yes General, you can. In fact, if you need them--take eight," because that's how many were ready--because we invested in readiness--and it wasn't just carriers... I remember talking with the ACMC [Assistant Commandant of the Marine Corps] about potentials and if our amphibious structure was ready. They weren't on the list, but in the third week in December we offered up Amphibious Task Force East and West, the U.S. Marine Corps-Navy team, and on the 6th of January they were rolling out the gate--and they weren't on alert.

One of the things that we're talking about is to make sure that as institutions we establish... attitudes that reinforce that we are going to live the lifestyle of readiness. We are going to exist in a culture of readiness.

Lesson number two: joint warfare is decisive. I'm tremendously impressed with the joint team and I press this point to everybody who wears a uniform. If you're thinking about lessons learned and you're not thinking joint--recalibrate. The future is about the Navy-Marine Corps team and the rest of the joint structure and--how we're going to respond to give the president options.

... One of the tasks I have is talking to groups about why we need a Navy. I have a 30-, 20-, 15- and 10-minute speech--and sometimes I don't even have that long. Sometimes I just have 30 seconds and the 30-second version is: credible combat power, far corners of the earth, sovereignty of the United States of America, anywhere, anytime, options for the president without a permission slip... My new favorite word is persistence. So now it's not credible combat power, far corners of the earth, etc., it's--credible, persistent combat power, far corners of the earth...

Lesson number three: access over flight and basing are not guaranteed. It fits in with the without a permission slip thing. Maneuver is a key part of Army discussions, but I don't think we talk about maneuvers enough in the Navy, and we happen to have a pretty good-sized maneuver space. Lesson number three is about exploiting that maneuver space to the fullest. It's about the freedom to maneuver.

We need to understand that maneuver space allows us the opportunity to distribute our force in ways that we never thought about before, for example: a three-axis attack from the Red Sea, the Mediterranean and the Arabian Gulf. I'm convinced that to truly understand and get at the lessons in warfare--we must understand LIMFACS, the limiting factors that we confront in crisis. Access is going to be an issue everywhere we go.

For the U.S. Navy what it means to me at the strategic level is that this is what Sea Basing is all about. Sea Basing is about the ability to exploit the freedom to maneuver. So when the 4th Infantry Division couldn't go in the East Med--we took it south and someplace else. When it was necessary to alter course for a long-range strike with TLAMs [Tomahawk Land Attack Missile] we just moved to where we could get the job done. These are examples, but the lesson for us is that in everything that we think about for the future we must understand the value of freedom to maneuver in the international domain. Very soon, you will see a report from the Defense Science Board that talks about the third leg of the triad in our Sea Power 21 strategy called Sea Basing. We need to think about Sea Basing in a very joint construct and what it does for the entire military structure...