World Events Increase Demand for Naval Forces

Navy Answers All Bells But Questions QDR Limits

TOM PHILPOTT, a freelance journalist, has spent more than 20 years covering the U.S. military as a reporter and editor, including more than six years as editor of Navy Times. His articles have appeared in the Proceedings of the U.S. Naval Institute, The Washingtonian Magazine, and Readers Digest. In May 1994 he began syndicating a weekly news column, Military Update, which now appears in 50 daily newspapers that strive to keep military readers informed on national-security matters.

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The final year of the 20th century saw five U.S. Navy aircraft carrier battle groups and two amphibious readiness groups involved in combat operations--a level of naval engagement not seen since the 1990 Persian Gulf War. At the same time, the size of the fleet continued its inexorable decline to the smallest U.S. fleet since 1931--when the Depression-era Navy numbered 308 active ships.

If the average American failed to realize this, blame it not on apathy but on warfare's changing nature--and a changing world. Modern warfare at the end of the 20th century involved smart bombs and cruise missiles--most of them dropped or launched by the world's only remaining superpower, the United States, leading an alliance, NATO, that also has no peer.

Its dominance makes the United States a popular country to call in times of international crisis. And if the United States wants to deliver a swift response with bomb, missile, or an intimidating presence, forward-deployed naval forces most often get the nod, as they did again last year.

Amid a fast-paced and demanding operational environment, three issues seemed to occupy the attention of naval leaders and shape their near-term agendas as 1999 drew to a close--worries about force structure and force quality, and an emphasis on new technologies offering revolutionary warfare capabilities:

Force Structure: Given the extraordinary pace of operations in the post-Cold War era, ceilings on the numbers of submarines, air wings, and surface combatants set by the 1997 Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) have come in for a blast of criticism from the Navy's top admirals.
Force Quality: Attracting and retaining the right quality and number of personnel were top priorities for the Joint Chiefs of Staff in 1999, and they were helped by Congress and, to a lesser extent, the Clinton administration. Naval leaders are pressing for sustained increases in pay and benefits and insisting that new ways be found to improve Sailors' working conditions and reduce their time away from families.
Information Technology: The Navy made long strides in 1999 toward unlocking the power of the information age to enhance the way it fights, communicates, and sustains Sailor morale.
Answering the Bell

In late 1998, the Joint Chiefs of Staff pulled the readiness alarm, warning Congress in blunt testimony that years of budgetary neglect and an intensive operating tempo had brought the services to the edge of crisis. Overall preparedness was in decline, and personnel quality was falling, most sharply in the technology-heavy Navy and Air Force. In response, tens of billions of dollars were added to the fiscal year 2000 defense budget to improve pay and future retirement plans, and to beef up spending on critical readiness items to remedy spare-parts shortages and repair backlogs.

Adm. Jay L. Johnson, chief of naval operations (CNO), called it a "pivotal year" but warned that one robust budget will not end the Navy's readiness challenge. Indeed, Johnson said, the Navy received only about half of the added $6 billion per year sought by the CNO. Over the course of the Future-Years Defense Plan, the annual increases sought by CNO total $36 billion in additional funding.

"Overall, we haven't really turned a big corner yet," Johnson said. "Investments in operating and maintenance (O&M) accounts and manpower accounts are starting to give us more fidelity at the deck plate but it takes so long." A year after the first infusion of O&M dollars, Johnson said, he still finds it "very frustrating" to visit ships and aircraft squadrons "and hear the same stories about not having this or not having that ... but it's a work in progress."

The pace of operations did not slow in 1999, not with NATO's air campaign over Kosovo and Serbia, continuing air patrols over Iraq, and rising tensions in the Western Pacific. Rear Adm. Michael G. Mullen, director of surface warfare for the Navy staff (OPNAV), noted that, over an 84-month period ending in September 1999, naval forces participated in 80 contingencies--from combat to peacekeeping, from noncombatant evacuations to disaster relief. "It has become so routine that I worry about it being taken for granted," Mullen said. If that happens, Sailors will not get the attention or equipment they deserve.

Maj. Gen. Dennis T. Krupp, director of the expeditionary warfare division, used a different yardstick. U.S. amphibious forces, he said, responded to 44 crises in the final two decades of the Cold War, ending in 1989. In the decade since--with a much smaller fleet--it has responded to more than 100 crises.

"I don't see anything to change that landscape" of contingency after contingency, said Vice Adm. Conrad C. Lautenbacher Jr., deputy CNO for resources, warfare requirements, and assessments. He enumerated some of the lesser-known operations of the past year: maritime intercepts in the Persian Gulf and Red Sea; peacekeeping in East Timor; disaster relief following earthquakes in Turkey.

It is not just the pace of operations that has naval leaders desiring more resources and more platforms. It is also the risk associated with shuttling fleet units from one part of the world to another to cope with the latest crisis or contingency--drawing down U.S. naval presence in key geographic areas of vital interest to the United States. Peacekeeping assignments also are often preceded or accompanied by hostilities--or run the risk of transitioning to low-intensity warfare very quickly. Every air wing that works up for deployment now "is getting ready for combat," said Rear Adm. John B. Nathman, director of air warfare for OPNAV.

"There is just a lot going on in an unstable world," said Lautenbacher. "A lot of nationalistic, ethnic, and religious strife is not contained by any mechanism other than world order under the United Nations [U.N.] and led by the United States. Our involvement in all regions seems to be critical to economic and political stability."

Force-Structure Strain

As 1999 came to a close, Navy leaders openly questioned whether fleet levels set by the last QDR were realistic. Aircrews and aircraft may perform flawlessly over Kosovo and Iraq, but they still feel the stress of having only 10 air wings rotating for deployments on 12 aircraft carriers. The Navy is "on a slow trend to bust operational tempo for air wings because we don't have the right mix," said Nathman. "The 11th air wing has got to be part of our story."

Demand for "missile shooters," both surface-combatant warships and submarines, also stayed high during 1999, even as their numbers slid too far toward the QDR goal of 305 surface ships and 50 attack submarines--down from October 1999 levels of 327 and 57, respectively. The Navy's submarine- and surface-launched Tomahawk cruise missile demonstrated remarkable around-the-clock, all-weather accuracy during Operation Allied Force--including numerous strikes against mobile Serb targets.

"Since we took those decisions in the last QDR, you see how busy we are," said CNO Johnson. "Our sense is [that] we cannot get any smaller and, indeed, we may need to get larger. I make no apologies for that. That's what the world requirement for the Navy's utilization has shown us the last three years." The days of assuming that the Navy needs to get smaller are over, Johnson said. "As we put together our next QDR effort, we have to be real honest with ourselves about the glide path we're on in number of ships, force structure, and how we deploy ... and then ask ourselves very honestly, 'Do we have the numbers right?'"

Adm. Frank L. Bowman, director of the Naval Nuclear Propulsion Program, believes that the Navy is "understructured across the board, but particularly in attack submarines." A new Joint Staff report on submarine requirements, due out a month ago, was said to recommend raising the ceiling on attack submarines (SSNs) from 50 to a figure between 62 and 68.

Meanwhile, the inventory of attack submarines fell by another eight in 1999. That means, at any given time, only 12 to 13 attack submarines are on patrol around the globe versus a requirement for 15 to 16, said Rear Adm. Malcolm I. Fages, director of submarine warfare for OPNAV. "There is a plethora of things we are unable to do across all mission areas, including even the highest priorities, National Command Authority tasks, and special operations. We just don't have enough assets."

U.S. submarine presence in the Mediterranean, for example, has fallen from an average of four boats on patrol to a new average of 2.5. The drop comes at a cost. The submarine force routinely turns down intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) missions it no longer can fulfill. Exercises with allied forces are rare. "We anticipate essentially eliminating our ability to participate in counterdrug and Arctic operations very soon," said Fages.

But submarines continue to deliver a powerful punch. They fired 25 percent of all cruises missiles launched against Iraqi and Serb targets last year. Within the context of strike warfare, the submarine's contribution "has increased significantly," Fages said.

Two primary initiatives are under study to increase efficiently the number of attack submarines. The first would scuttle plans to retire eight Los Angeles-class attack submarines and instead refuel them. For an added cost of $300 million each per year, the Navy could extend the life of eight submarines 12 to 15 more years. "That's a bargain,'' Fages said. The second initiative would convert four Trident ballistic-missile submarines, due to leave the fleet, into guided-missile SSGNs. The new-model submarines would carry seven cruise missiles in each of 22 of the current 24 Trident missile tubes. "The SSGN, configured for strike, would have about as many Tomahawk missiles as are resident in the entire carrier battle group today,'' said Fages. The SSGN, while not an attack submarine, still could carry out other missions, including the delivery of special warfare units.

Surface Navy

The number of surface combatants stayed level in 1999 at 116. "I certainly do not want to drop below that number," said Rear Adm. Michael G. Mullen, OPNAV's director of surface warfare. In the short term he is confident that the Navy will not. Mullen is more worried about long-term shipbuilding. To maintain the fleet at 305 ships in 2005, the Navy needs a build rate of eight to 10 ships per year. So far, budgets do not accommodate that plan. Not until the middle of the decade will the shipbuilding program rise to a level sufficient to sustain 300 ships, said Lautenbacher. Congress views the matter with concern and has directed the Department of Defense to submit a detailed shipbuilding report in February.

Naval Air

Despite thousands of combat missions over Kosovo and Iraq, naval aviation had its safest year in history in 1999, with only nine major accidents and seven fatalities through 1.16 million flying hours. That rate of .77 accidents per 100,000 flying hours is the lowest ever recorded. By contrast, in 1998, the Navy had 27 major mishaps for an accident rate of 2.32 per 100,000 flying hours.

Nathman partially attributed this impressive achievement to "landmark" improvements in the way pilots are trained. Pools of trainees waiting at various points in the pipeline for their next phase to begin have been eliminated. "We know it's important to sustain the flying part," he said. Total training time has been cut 20 percent, he said, so that jet pilots now complete training in two and a half years "street to fleet," and are better prepared for the fleet squadron.

"We are still getting the air wings down too low in terms of readiness" after squadrons return from deployment, Nathman said. "The slope to climb back up to deployed readiness is a challenge." More budget dollars have been pumped into maintenance and spare parts, but more time could elapse before squadrons see the improvements.

Personnel Challenges

Though acknowledging the seriousness of "platform and mission issues," particularly with respect to attack submarines, Secretary of the Navy Richard Danzig said the most significant problem the Navy still faces is attracting and keeping quality people. "We know we're not retaining at as high a rate as we want," he said. "We know recruiting is a substantial challenge."

In 1999, the Navy completed its post-Cold War drawdown, eliminating a final 9,000 Sailor billets to level off at 372,000, so it should begin the first period of stability in the personnel arena in 25 years, said Vice Adm. Daniel T. Oliver, chief of naval personnel until his recent retirement. But leveling off after a drawdown means tough challenges in other ways. For the first time in a decade, the Navy must recruit a new Sailor for every Sailor who leaves--and 58,000 are expected to leave this year.

The Navy met its recruiting goal of only 53,000 in FY 1999 after missing the mark by 7,000 a year earlier. To succeed in 1999, the Navy increased its recruiting force by 50 percent and launched a "Proven Performers" program to double--to 10 percent--the number of non-high-school diploma graduates who can enlist if they score well on the entrance exam and demonstrate solid work records. To meet its goal, the Navy also placed a moratorium on separating overweight Sailors or those who failed biennial physical-fitness tests.

For the third year in a row, the Navy missed its retention targets. The reenlistment rate sought for first-term Sailors was 32 percent. It came in at about 28. Second- and third-term reenlistment rates for career Sailors also were disappointing. Retention rates of mid-grade officers fell 10 to 12 percentage points off target but were turning around at the end of 1999--thanks to new retention bonuses across the warfare communities.

Danzig said he wants the Navy to move beyond "simply solving" personnel challenges "to effecting a transformation in Sailors' lives." The service needs "to stop thinking of Sailors as a relatively free good"--the mindset from the era of conscription--and treat them as "professionals whom we need to treasure and develop." Danzig was leading an effort to arrange college credits for early Navy training, to improve living spaces, and to reform the personnel system to treat enlisted personnel more like officers in the way careers are laid out and developed.

Perhaps the most important factor affecting Sailor morale "is the perception of the American people on the work of the military," said Vice Adm. Robert J. Natter, deputy CNO for plans, policy, and operations. "That's where [President Ronald] Reagan contributed even more than he did in pay. He made the military, through the American people and Congress, feel good about this profession. That was a huge factor and needs to improve, in my judgment."

Shortage At Sea

The Navy ended FY 1999 still short 12,000 Sailors in seagoing billets. But that gap was down from a shortfall in November 1998 of more than 19,000 vacant billets at sea. "You can't wipe that out in a year," said Lautenbacher. "It's just too hard."

The USS Abraham Lincoln carrier battle group deployed in 1998 roughly 800 Sailors short. "The most recent carrier deployment [in the fall of 1999] was only 150 short," said Lautenbacher. Ships between deployments are still living with shortfalls. "But now we are able to make sure deployed forces are manned just about right."

Just over 50 percent of U.S. ships were underway at any given time in 1999. More than 30 percent were on six-month deployments, up from "just over 20 percent" deployed a decade ago. Another busy year, said Mullen. "We must give [Sailors] some down time," he said. "They joined the Navy to see the world. So we've got to get them on liberty in good ports. ... If we do that, there is a tendency to hook them for life."

"We are right up against the stops in the personnel tempo, and that is the biggest concern," said Natter. "They're racing out, answering the bell, answering another bell and then coming home. We are very concerned that we're stretching that wire to the point where people don't want to do it anymore."

The pace of operations, though high, remains "controlled," said CNO Johnson. No ship is exceeding six months at sea, "portal-to-portal." The long hours Sailors work when they return to home port causes the greatest stress, he added. A year ago, at Johnson's direction, commands were ordered to reduce the workload during interdeployment training cycles by 25 percent. "We're almost there," Johnson said. "We've gotten a lot of what you might call the low-hanging fruit. Now it's a little more sporting. But there's no magic in 25. I would like to go for more."

Information Age

Last year the Navy intensified its communications revolution, installing a voice, data, and video package called IT21--Information Technology for the 21st Century--on four more aircraft carrier battle groups and four amphibious ready groups. When combined with more aggressive use of the Internet, battle force commanders down through deck-plate Sailors are able to shrink the world through the new technology.

"The battle group commander now has the ability to process a lot more information from the beach and pass it around the battle group [with] the simultaneous ability to collaborate in real time, by voice or operational e-mail, with commanders on other ships," said Rear Adm. Richard W. Mayo, director of space, information warfare, and command and control for OPNAV. "The idea of collaboration has really transformed operations at sea." Operational commanders have been creating secure Internet web pages to share mission plans and responsibilities, allowing every participant to punch up what has occurred in real time to review mission orders, details, and milestones.

"The commander controlling the web site can just update it whenever new contact information or changes in mission are wanted," said Mayo. "We've almost gotten out of the mode of having to do individual radio phone calls or individual messages." The system mirrors capabilities provided by the Internet--just a little more sophisticated and a great deal more secure. "We brought that to sea with IT21," Mayo said. Thirty years ago information reached the ship through high frequency radio transmissions, perhaps even Morse code, at a maximum rate of about 100 words a minute. "Today, with IT21, we're up to transmission speeds of 56 kilobytes, 128 kilobytes, and, on our large ships, 1 megabyte of information per second," said Mayo. A ship's information pipeline, once limited to the stream of Teletype, now flows with data, voice, and video.

Submarines, too, can take advantage of IT21, said Mayo, adding antennas to increase data-rate collections from standard satellite technology. "Without a doubt," said Mayo, "IT21 has been the hallmark achievement of what we've been able to do for the fleet this year."

During the Persian Gulf War in 1991, air-tasking orders with targeting data had to be delivered to aircraft carriers by helicopter from the Desert Storm air command in Saudi Arabia. Satellite communication "pipes" were too narrow. IT21 allows real-time transmission of a lot of data, including strike orders. "We are completely out of the business of flying the air-tasking order around by helicopters, and into the big leagues in information throughput." On-scene commanders with the U.S. Sixth Fleet praised the improved operational impact demonstrated during the air war over Kosovo.

By the fall of 1999, a third of the fleet was upgraded with IT21 capability. The system should be installed in the entire fleet, Mayo said, by October 2002. "Fleet commanders are enthralled with the capability," Mayo said.

One of the greatest difficulties with IT21 is the impact on operations with allies. "It is a real problem because more and more maritime naval activities overseas have a coalition component," said Mayo. To promote allied involvement, the Navy has developed a "low-end interoperability solution" for IT21, a compromise that does not require U.S. allies to buy faster, more expensive, more sophisticated systems. "The only gap that exists [with] our allies is a resource gap," said Mayo. They need to make the commitment to buy the equipment. Allies, Natter said, are not spending enough on defense in general, and on command and control specifically.

The first IT21 installations on U.S. ships generated interoperability problems that were manifested during critical at-sea work-ups and predeployment training periods, Mayo said. By year's end, systems were being installed on deploying ships earlier and faster so Sailors had time to train on them before deployment. The Navy's systems commands and fleet staffs followed through aggressively to implement a plan developed in 1998 to improve configuration management and to identify and correct system problems before ships went to sea.

The submarine force also is investing in IT21, with new investments aimed at expanding bandwidth and high-data-rate capability. IT21 will improve connectivity and enhance command, control, and communication, officials said. A submarine soon will test a buoyant cable antenna that will allow Internet protocol exchange between submarines operating at speed and depth--without requiring the submarine to put an antenna out of the water.

CEC and AEGIS

The Navy is one year into a two-year fix of software compatibility problems between two critical systems: the Aegis radar and the Cooperative Engagement Capability, or CEC. The problem forced USS Hue City and USS Vicksburg, two Aegis Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruisers outfitted with CEC, to miss a deployment in 1998. By late fall 1999, the Navy completed an underway test of CEC and Aegis aboard the same two ships. The systems had been integrated, and they worked.

"We have made spectacular strides in solving that kind of [software] problem," said Mullen. The two cruisers still weren't battle-group-ready by the fall, he said, but they were in "much better condition than a year ago." CEC uses sensors from a variety of platforms to present one unambiguous track for an incoming missile or enemy aircraft. It does so by sharing sensor data in real time, calculating the best firing solution, and determining which platform should fire. It has enormous implications for Theater Ballistic-Missile Defense. "There is no other technology that competes with it," said Mullen. "It's center stage to the future of an integrated battlespace."

Regarding Ballistic-Missile Defense (BMD), the Navy expects to start test-firing a missile-defense weapon within two to three years. Mullen calls BMD the "most significant" mission the surface Navy--indeed the whole Navy--will have in the future.

The Navy, he said, should have a robust missile-defense capability by 2007. "World events in 1999 conspired to teach us a lesson: that human nature hasn't changed much," said Vice Adm. Oliver. "That's the bad news. It also underscores why the United States needs a strong Navy--a reflection on the strategic requirements of the world's greatest maritime power."

"The good news is," said Oliver, "there's great demand for our product."

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THE CARRIER GAP

The Navy faces a keen obstacle in arguing that 12 aircraft carrier battle groups are not enough: Despite what it believes is an undersized fleet, it keeps accomplishing its global mission with its existing force structure.

"Time-sharing" carriers between critical regions of the world can preclude immediate U.S. action--vividly demonstrated by the USS Saratoga's 1986 intercept of an airliner carrying the highjackers of the Achille Lauro cruise ship--slow the U.S. response to a crisis, and raise the risk of armed conflict--conflict that might have been prevented had U.S. naval forces been on station. The warnings so far have had little impact on Navy budgets, however, because the 12-carrier fleet "gets the job done" with no apparent consequence to the United States or its allies. Still, the warnings are getting louder and, in 1999, became more specific.

Vice Adm. Daniel J. Murphy Jr., commander of the Mediterranean-based U.S. Sixth Fleet, made one of the strongest cases for additional aircraft carriers in recent memory in testimony last October before the Senate and House Armed Services Committees. Murphy suggested that if a carrier air wing had been available for Operation Allied Force last March, when NATO began its air war against Serb aggression in Kosovo, Serb leaders might have capitulated sooner, presumably saving lives, property, and much hardship for the people of Yugoslavia--Serbs and Kosovars alike. Instead, because of fresh provocation by Iraq, a carrier air wing did not arrive off Kosovo until two weeks after the fight began--too late to influence the Serbs' early diplomatic or military response to the crisis.

"Had the CINCEUR [Commander in Chief Europe] requirement for continuous carrier presence been met, a Navy air wing would have been in the fight from day one," Murphy testified. "Though we can only speculate as to the difference naval air would have made in the first two weeks, I believe it would have been substantial."

Murphy noted that Carrier Air Wing Eight aboard Theodore Roosevelt arrived after hostilities commenced, and though it represented only 8 percent of allied aircraft it still "accounted for 30 percent of all verified kills against fielded forces in Kosovo." The carrier's air wing commenced combat operations the day it arrived on station--ten days after it departed its homeport of Norfolk, Va. The untimely gap in continuous carrier coverage was unavoidable, Murphy said, given a force structure limit of only 12 carrier battle groups set during the 1997 Quadrennial Defense Review. The limit was imposed despite assessments by U.S. unified combatant commanders documenting a requirement for 15.

Indeed, Murphy noted, carrier presence in the Mediterranean "has dropped to a historic low." In 1998, the U.S. European Command had a carrier under its control only 148 days, or 40 percent of the year. That climbed in 1999 to a projected 60 percent but only because of the Kosovo air war. "There are simply not enough carrier battle groups, amphibious ready groups, and submarines to meet global tasking," Murphy testified.

On 16 March, eight days before air strikes began against Serbian forces, the carrier Enterprise was ordered to leave the Mediterranean for the Persian Gulf to keep pressure on Iraq. "CINCEUR wanted to keep the Enterprise but we simply did not have the numbers," Murphy said. He also told Congress that the redeployment sent a mixed diplomatic signal to Serbia at a critical stage in allied diplomacy. After spending the final weeks of its deployment in the Gulf, Enterprise returned home in time to stay below the six-month deployment cycle so critical to Sailor morale.

The carrier USS Kitty Hawk had to be surged from Japan to fill the void left in the Gulf by the Roosevelt's diversion to the Kosovo conflict. This, in turn, left the U.S. Pacific Command without a carrier presence near North Korea--where tensions with the unpredictable regime were rising. "Thus far, by time-sharing and splitting apart [battle group and amphibious ready group] assets, we have retained minimally sufficient numbers to do the job," said Murphy. "In most cases, however, numbers arrive just in time, leave a gap elsewhere, and place a strain on the Navy globally."

Adm. Frank "Skip" Bowman, director of naval nuclear propulsion, said running a Navy with 12 aircraft carriers boils down to managing risk. The danger is invisible to most Americans--but worrisome nonetheless. When there was no carrier on patrol in the Pacific last spring, he said, "we didn't go to war, North Korea didn't come across the 38th Parallel, and China didn't invade Taiwan. So what did we lose?

"It's not necessarily all about bullets and governments falling," Bowman continued. "It's about perception. What signal are we sending to our allies, and does it make them less fervent in their support of our values? Are they starting to look around for other partners because, after all, we're not going to be there if the bell does ring? ... I would argue there is some intangible harm done every time we drop our guard like that." Other observers note that today's shrinking U.S. fleet is not sized properly to fulfill new requirements associated with the U.S. engagement strategy adopted by the Clinton administration in recent years.

Adm. Thomas B. Fargo, commander in chief of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, said aircraft carriers, thankfully, are "incredibly flexible and responsive. We do have the ability to move [them] from theater to theater to be in the right place at the right time. It's not always perfect--somebody's important needs go unsatisfied for a period of time--but our strength is our ability to respond." Fargo, who was deputy CNO for operations when the Pacific region was left without a carrier last March, said the gap was filled to some degree by relocating additional land-based aircraft into that theater.

"As fleet commander," said Adm. Vernon Clark, commander in chief of the U.S. Atlantic Fleet, "I can't spend any time thinking about having 15 carriers. Collectively we've got 12." And, from his past perspective as the former director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, there are compromises and alternatives to a carrier in time of crisis--including moving additional Air Force or Marine Corps squadrons into a theater or "surging" a carrier from its homeport early. Though not optimal, such solutions can lower risk to an acceptable level, he suggested. Given the increased time and effort now necessary to return carrier battle groups to higher readiness levels during the interdeployment training cycle, however, the feasibility or desirability of surging carriers from their homeports early are questionable unless no alternative exists.

The Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI) does not have good information on how potential adversaries might respond during periods when carrier battle groups are gapped in critical regions, said Earl E. Sheck, the assistant director of ONI, because it still hasn't happened often or for very long. "There are really so few cases where ... there isn't a carrier within the theater for any length of time. We've looked at some specific instances to see if somebody had taken advantage. But the windows are so short and so infrequent [that] I'm not sure I could make a judgment."

No, gapping a carrier's presence has not become routine, although it did occur with increasing frequency during 1999. Indeed, if conditions in the Balkans and the Persian Gulf calm down, the Navy could return to a more normal cycle for carrier deployments. Accommodating maintenance schedules and a reasonable rotation for crews, 12 carriers should allow what planners call a 2.5 global presence. That equates to 1.0, or a carrier on station full time in the Pacific; a .75 presence in the Central Command's area of operational responsibility in Southwest Asia (i.e., a carrier deployed at least nine months out of the year to the Persian Gulf or Indian Ocean); and an identical .75 presence in the Mediterranean. Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and Serbia's President Slobodan Milosevic combined to destroy that deployment pattern in 1999.

Amphibious Ready Groups (ARGs), which have fewer aircraft but an impressive warfighting capability, can go far toward filling a void in the aircraft carrier battle group's presence, said Maj. Gen. Dennis T. Krupp, director of the Navy's office of expeditionary warfare. A review of recent contingency actions, he said, shows that, "very rarely is it full-blown combat." More and more, ARGs are being used separately to quell crises or provide humanitarian assistance.

"The carrier will respond to certain crises, and the ARG will be alone and unafraid in other crises. You're not going to have the cover of the carrier in most things we're going to do in the next century," Krupp said. "In Iraq and Iran wars, you certainly will. But East Timor, probably not."

So are 12 carriers and 12 ARGs enough? "No," said Krupp. The next QDR, he said, is "an opportune time for the Navy to say, 'If we're the force of choice--because of what we do and where we are--then maybe we need more.' Where does that 'more' come from? It comes at someone else's expense. And those are tough decisions."

"We're making do with 12 carriers--barely," said Rear Adm. Michael G. Mullen, the Navy's director of surface warfare--adding, with obvious pride, that the fleet's execution of missions in recent years "has been flawless."

"It's something we manage and, if I do say so myself, I believe we manage it quite well," said Adm. Jay L. Johnson, chief of naval operations. "We've had a lot of experience with it now--the Navy, the Joint Staff, the unified CINCs [commanders in chief]--everybody working together."

Informed observers continue to worry about the impact the Navy's prolonged high operational tempo will have on its Sailors' morale. But, ironically, their impressive performance of combat operations and execution of multiple global missions during 1999 could remain the Achilles' heel of any renewed Navy push for a 13th aircraft carrier. TP