QDR: The Coast Guard, The

Sea Power, Aug 1997 by Kennedy, Jack M

This is my first Message to you as your national president, and it comes at a time in the defense budget cycle when organizations such as the Navy League have a duty to report to their members, and to the American people, on the severe funding problems facing the nation's sea services. If those problems are not speedily resolved, our sea services will not be able to carry out the missions we have assigned them, and will not be able to defend America's interests overseas.

We are now, and always have been, a seafaring nation dependent on the high seas for trade with our global partners. In terms of natural resources, we also are, for all practical purposes-and despite our favored position in the middle of the North American continent-an island nation, lacking many of the metals, minerals, and other raw materials essential to both the functioning of the highly industrialized U.S. economy and to our national defense. This fact is not fully realized by many of our fellow citizens.

Our political as well as economic strength today continues to depend upon our prudent use of the ocean highways, just as it did 221 years ago when our forebears fired the shot heard 'round the world, won their-and our-independence, and forged 13 colonies into one nation, united and indivisible.

America's sea services-the U.S. Navy, U.S. Marine Corps, U.S. Coast Guard, and U.S.-flag Merchant Marine-need the Navy League today more than ever before. It is our duty to lead the way in educating our fellow citizens as to the reasons why. In that context, it is not enough simply to point out that the United States. by far the Leading trading nation in imports and exports in all world history, today relies on foreifn-flag ships to carry 96 percent of its international commerce. Or that our global leadership role is constantly being threatened in crises and near criscs involving U.S. and allied interests overseas. We also must remind our friends and neighbors, the media and Congress, that we remain the world's only true superpower primarilt because of the foward-presence, quick-strike, and follow-up capabilities of our naval forces-capabilities made possible by superior technology and superior equipment.

That equipment is rapidly aging and our Navy/Marine Corps team is facing a crisis of dollars-a crisis that in many respects is mostly a game of numbers between the Executive Branch and thew Congress. That game of numbers has come down to the unrealistic proposition of giving up Sailors and Marines to fund the RDT&E (research, development, test, and evalution) programs and buy the shi[s, aircraft, and other platforms and equipment essential to future combat success.

The recently released QDR (Quadrennnial Defense Review) report is just the latest note in the contrived musical score that attempts to place a dollar value on the future capability of the Navy/Marine Corps Team to carry out its always expanding spectrum of missions throughout the world. The new cutbacks proposed for the fiscal year 1998-2003 time frame would not only resize and restructure our naval forces, they would also, if approved by Congress, drastically reduce the overall U.S. naval/military force structure-betting on future improvements in technology to take up the slack.

Budget reductions of any type in the field of national defense require hard decisions on the size and mix of forces, manpower end strength, and the quality and quantity of equipment provided to the nation's armed services. Those are the decisions now being faced by our military leaders. The Navy League needs to stand behind them, and to assist them where and when we can.

The Navy and Marine Corps have identified their most important procurement priorities in the fiscal year 1998 defense budget and future-years defense plan (for the FY 1998-2003 period). One of the Navy's top near-term procurement priorities is the redesigned McDonnell Douglas-built F/A-18E/F Super Hornet strike fighter, critically needed to replace two Grumman-built carrier aircraft, the excellent but now aging F-14A/D series of Tomcat air superiority fighters, and the workhorse A-6E Intruder medium attack aircraft, which is already retired.

The QDR proposes reducing the Super Hornet buy from the 1,000 aircraft requested by the chief of naval operations to only 548 aircraft, while directing more rapid development of the Joint Strike Fighter, a promising but untested aircraft of a totally new design now being competed between Boeing and Lockheed Martin. Meanwhile, the Marine Corps hopes to expedite procurement of the new-design-but now thoroughly tested-V-22 Osprey tiltrotor aircraft to replace its fleet of CH-46 Sea Knight helicopters, the first of which entered service in 1964. The QDR agrees with the Marine Corps plan in principle, but wants to procure fewer V-22s than the Marine Corps needs.

Those are but two of the choices facing our sea services-and not necessarily the most difficult. Insofar as the U.S.-flag Merchant Marine is concerned, there is only one choice: It must be rebuilt-from the keel up, if necessary-to the point where the United States is once again the paramount maritime as well as naval power in the world. That is a matter of economic necessity that also complements our national security strategy.