As of this writing, the Navy consists of 287 deployable battle-force ships, of which some 31 are part of the amphibious force. These ships—“amphibs” in Navy parlance—are optimized for the transport and delivery of land power from the sea (otherwise known as the U.S. Marine Corps). Amphibs are large and capable and are among the most heavily tasked ships in the Navy because of their versatility and value to regional combatant commanders. What they aren’t is lethal, at least as warships go, and this limitation is no longer acceptable as the Navy limbers up for great power competition. In addition, given the reemergence of budget uncertainty and the near-certainty that the Navy will not achieve the 355-ship level described in its 2016 Force Structure Assessment, it must make more lethally efficient use of the floating real estate it operates, including platforms such as amphibs which traditionally have fielded only self-defense weapons.
Early in 2014, the Secretary of Defense ordered the Navy to restructure its troubled littoral combat ship (LCS) program, truncating it from a class of 52 ships to 28, with further direction to transition the small surface combatant force to a more lethal and survivable frigate. This move was made because of dissatisfaction with the LCS ships then in service and a perception that the class was not sufficiently lethal for the emerging operational environment. This increased emphasis on lethality caused the then-Director of Surface Warfare Requirements (OPNAV N96) Rear Admiral Tom Rowden to begin defining requirements for a proper frigate and to initiate the process of arming LCS with potent surface to surface missiles. Analysis in war-games indicated considerable benefit to adding lethality to the LCS, not only in giving the ship offensive punch, but in creating a bigger planning nuisance for an adversary who must allocate scarce surveillance and targeting assets to a greater number of threats. This thinking led to the creation of the concept of “Distributed Lethality,” a comprehensive narrative that supported several important additions to surface force lethality. These enhancements included upgrades to the Tomahawk missile and the SM-6 missile, both of which took previously single purpose missiles and modified them to target adversary surface platforms.
Rowden’s successor at N96, Rear Admiral Pete Fanta, doubled down on the distributed-lethality narrative, coining a memorable phrase, “if it floats, it fights,” to describe his vision of increased lethality in the surface force. Notable, however, was that although the amphibious force was considered in the narrative, the focus of the concept was on traditional surface combatants. And while great strides have been made in increasing surface force lethality on traditional Navy combatants (frigates and destroyers), the continuing inattention paid to the ships of the amphibious force is not only illogical, but operationally unwise. It is time to make additional progress toward Fanta’s vision by up-gunning the amphibious force, and here are a few steps the Navy should take.
First, the Navy should modify as many amphibious ships as are logistically able with a modular, relocatable missile-launching system capable of deploying antiship and land-attack missiles. The current employment of canister-based Harpoon antisurface missiles from cruisers and destroyers is a model, but the focus here should be on a modern, multirole missile. Not only would several dozen additional missile launching ships add to fleet lethality, it would provide the Joint Force Maritime Component Commander (JFMCC) with enhanced flexibility as opposing commanders are forced to spread surveillance and targeting assets more thinly to account for the enhanced threat posed by armed amphibs.
Next, a unique opportunity exists in Navy acquisition programs that could impact amphibious force lethality for decades, and that is the alignment of schedules for the Navy’s new frigate, FFG(X), and its new amphibious ship, LPD Flight II . More to the point, the FFG(X) combat system is being specified to shipbuilders as “Government Furnished Equipment” (GFE) to ensure that both proven systems and future capability expansion are engineered into the ship. Why not specify that same combat system for the LPD Flight II? The benefits are manifest. First, since both the frigate and the LPD are expected to operate variants of the enterprise air surveillance radar (EASR), a common combat system not only makes sense from a life-cycle cost and integration standpoint, but it offers the promise of future advanced radar networking techniques. Second, installing the FFG(X) combat system on the LPD Flight II ensures that at least some amphibious ships will be able to employ the same upgraded capabilities that are sure to find their way into the combatant force, eventually ending the status of amphibious ships as important but relatively toothless.
Finally, the Navy should take further advantage of the FFG(X)/LPD Flight II alignment by ensuring these ships field a common electronic warfare system, or at least that the systems are co-engineered in a fashion that permits cooperative electronic warfare operations to include passive location and networked cross-fixing between both within the amphibious group and with cruiser-destroyer escorts. The systems should feature active and passive electronic measures, in addition to modern expendable countermeasures.
What stands in the way of more lethal amphibious ships? Money, culture, and service equities. Even before the House of Representatives flipped to Democratic control last month, there were signs that the Trump defense buildup was losing steam. Arming amphibs was not a high priority in a more advantaged resource environment, so it will be unlikely to occur in a more pressurized one without determined advocacy. Internal Navy cultural issues could also play a role in frustrating increased lethality in the amphibious force, as doing so would shatter an operational paradigm of long-standing, one in which relatively cheap and defenseless amphibious ships were protected by nimble and powerful cruisers and destroyers. Increasing amphibious lethality promises to water down the operational differences between the ships and sailors of the amphibious force and those of the cruiser-destroyer force, differences that anyone who has served can verify are considerable. Finally, up-gunning amphibious ships could create service tension, as these more capable ships would be more highly prized by (largely) Navy officers serving as JFMCC for their capability and flexibility in achieving power projection and sea control objectives, which could conflict with the proprietary interests of the Marine Corps which views these ships as first and foremost, transportation for Marines. Recent conceptual thinking from the Marine Corps in areas such as Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations (EABO) indicates that this concern may be overdone, but it bears watching.
As the Navy evolves to meet the challenges of renewed great power competition, it must think differently about how it imposes costs on adversaries in war and in restive peace. Arming a large and important part of the fleet and networking it into the warfighting whole promises to increase aggregate lethality while creating operational problems for adversaries, irrespective of the size of the force. Doing so should be prioritized, and even more so as enthusiasm for a larger fleet wanes in the Administration.
