90 percent by sea - Defence Academy of the United Kingdom

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largely had to become a self-sustaining industry as yards are unable to maintain the workforce at the appropriate level by constructing merchant ships when military orders dry up. In many ways, therefore, access to a global market has proved to be a maritime leveller, where traditional maritime powers no longer have preferred access to the maritime economy; trade between nations is liberalised and open, allowing access for all; and where maritime skills are no longer seen as a national asset, but can also be acquired as needed through the market. Naval construction is less globalised but has not been immune: defence contractor consolidation and the increasing complexity of warships means that whilst assembly can take place in the UK, the idea of a national, complete and discrete ability to build warships is, at best, optimistic. Additionally, since the flag nexus no longer is mutually reinforcing, the requirement for a state to provide protection for its vessels has also been diluted. A British flagged, owned, operated and crewed vessel destined for the UK makes a compelling case for protection; a foreign owned, operated, crewed and cargo’d vessel taking advantage of the considerable tax advantages of UK registry, 80 less so. If the responsibility to protect globalised merchant shipping has itself evolved into a global responsibility, there is a far less compelling imperative to ensure that the capability to protect one’s own flagged fleet is maintained. Thus the Department For Transport’s assertion of the RN as a ‘benefit’ of UK Flag registration has a profound caveat: ‘Worldwide security threat level information provided to UK registered ships with support for British Nationals on board from British Consuls and Royal Navy protection dependent on the availability of assets and the nature of the threat’. 81 Containerisation and the use of “hub and spoke” may make a container ship transiting the Indian Ocean an indiscriminate target if the aim is to disrupt the UK: her cargo will be likely to be multinational, perhaps delivered in Rotterdam, with the UK portion of containers shipped via the Channel tunnel or delivered by one of a fleet of small container ships. But the majority of imports – particularly the vast tonnage of bulk commodities - do not arrive in containers. For example, 35% of the UK’s LNG will be delivered by sea by 2030; 82 a steady stream of LNG carriers between Qatar and the newly constructed South Hook LNG terminal in Wales – one per week – will transit the Straits of Hormuz, Indian Ocean, Cape of Good Hope and Atlantic. This represents a significant potential point of failure for the UK’s energy security. 80 Maritime Coastguard Agency, UK Ship Register Tonnage Tax, Department for Transport, http://www.dft.gov.uk/mca/mcga07-home/shipsandcargoes/mcga-ukshipregister/mcga-ukshipregistermerchantships/mcga-ukshipregister-tonnagetax.htm (accessed 1 Mar 2012) 81 Maritime Coastguard Agency, Advantages of Registration, Department for Transport, http://www.dft.gov.uk/mca/mcga07-home/shipsandcargoes/mcga-ukshipregister/mcga-ukshipregistermerchantships/mcga-ukshipregister-advantagesofreg.htm (accessed 1 Mar 2012) 82 Chamber of Shipping, Protecting UK trade and the UK way of life, Chamber of Shipping, http://www.britishshipping.org/publications (accessed 1 Mar 2012) 15
Taken in the round, therefore, the expression of a nation’s seapower is far more aligned with its maritime power than ever before: as the virtuous maritime circle has been inherently weakened, it stands to reason that the repository of the nation’s residual seapower lies with its navy. That said, the decline in the national, British view of the significance of seapower has not necessarily been echoed elsewhere: the emerging economic nations have embraced a different model, seeing seapower as once the UK did: as an interrelated tapestry of military and civilian interests contributing to their security and prosperity. It is no coincidence, therefore, that nations rising fastest economically – the so-called BRIC nations 83 – are also the nations embracing seapower - and with the military dimension heavily weighted towards the ability to deliver sea control – power at sea. In China’s case this is expressed in both the development of a vigorous domestic shipbuilding and owning nexus as well as the construction of a large, blue water navy. Indian naval construction has become a priority for defence spending in recent years, in part as a response to China’s increasing capabilities. China’s ‘turn to the sea’ 84 - reminiscent of European mercantilist notions of the 19 th Century - has been triggered by a number of factors: the decline of the landward threat and the ‘marinisation’ of her more pressing security concerns; the colossal rise in dependence on SLOCs for energy security (by 2015, 75% of all crude oil imports will be shipped via the Malacca, Makassar and Lombok straits); 85 and the tremendous economic growth enabled by an explosion of seaborne trade. 86 The traditional Gorshkov-inspired, Anti-Access and Area Denial (A2AD) model aimed at countering the US Navy’s expeditionary capabilities has been increasingly supplemented by the development of well-found blue water capabilities – a relatively new development – with the People’s Liberation Army (Navy) (PLA(N)) the fastest growing force in the Chinese military. 87 Indeed, the PLA(N) is expected to expand considerably out to 2020 – a force of 78 submarines, 73 escorts plus the highly publicised carrier programme. 88 ‘Active Defence’, China’s maritime operational strategy, seeks to ‘improve its sustainability and combat capability in distant waters’, 89 a doctrinal shift away from the defence of Chinese physical borders to a broader and more outward looking view: the defence of her interests. What is notable about these developments is both in how China has recognised the strategic merits of pursuing an integrated maritime strategy; as well as the conviction that the Navy is there to deliver power at sea – sea control of essential sea 83 Brazil, Russia, India and China 84 James R. Holmes and Toshi Yoshihara, Chinese Naval Strategy in the 21 st Century: The Turn to Mahan (Abingdon: Routledge, 2008),2 85 Mold Nizam Basiron and Sumathy Permal, ‘The Malaysian Perspective’ in Southeast Asia and the Rise of Chinese and Indian Naval Power: Between rising Naval powers, eds Sam Bateman and Joshua Ho (Abingdon: Routledge, 2010), 89 86 Holmes and Yoshihara, Chinese Naval Strategy in the 21 st Century: The Turn to Mahan,3,4 87 Huang Jing, ‘The PLA Navy: expanding into uncharted waters’, in Southeast Asia and the Rise of Chinese and Indian Naval Power, eds Bateman and Ho, 22 88 Ibid., 24 89 Ibid., 29, 30 16
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