The Future Maritime Operating Environment and the Role of Naval Power

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Figure 5: Offshore Maritime Zones Recognised under International Law Source. Source: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Office of Coastal Survey [www.nauticalcharts.noaa.gov/nsd/xml2html.php?xml=coastpilot/files/cp7/CPB7_E47_ C01_20150112_0913_WEB.xml]. 14 DRDC-RDDC-2016-R085
3 Challenges to Order in the Maritime Environment If one excludes the sea-based deterrents that were initially developed during the latter half of the 20 th century and that contributed to both the stability and the outcome of the Cold War, it has been seventy years since the last great international conflict in which the outcome was influenced to a considerable degree by operations at sea. It has been over three decades since the Falklands War (1982) so clearly demonstrated the continuing strategic utility of sea power. With the lessons of the Falklands largely forgotten, and as the Second World War recedes into history, many people have come to assume that the maritime realm is unchanging and, despite an occasional media focus on environmental decay or contentious boundary claims, that any problems are either far away or readily manageable. Our easy familiarity with what we have has created within many Western societies what some have called maritime blindness. 56 Many of us take for granted the ready abundance of all types of foods year-round and of goods that maintain our modern standard of living without being aware that their delivery depends, at some stage, on maritime transport; and we often fail to acknowledge that the absence of sea-based threats is the consequence of efforts, in the past and ongoing, to purchase such security. In our own age, maritime strategic interests and vulnerabilities are largely overlooked. 57 The public is frequently unaware of the strategic challenge that could come from the sea. Looking to history, a British naval historian recently observed that “even in the darkest hours of that campaign [i.e., the Battle of the Atlantic], when the United Kingdom stood in real danger of being starved to death, there were far more stockpiles of key commodities—fuel and food—at any time than there are now in 2013.” 58 He was referring to a densely populated island country engaged in a life and death struggle. If the discussion had turned to current events, he might have drawn attention to the vulnerability of many advanced economies to disruptions in seaborne trade due to energy import dependence or the just-in-time approach of the commercial and manufacturing sectors. 59 Modern trade and transportation technologies, and the rising threat of remote attacks (i.e., cyber) mean that the oceans cannot provide defence-in-depth to the same degree as they once did. But a greater awareness of vulnerability has not yet translated into a greater appreciation for the strategic importance of the oceans. Any lingering inclination to assume that the oceans are a limitless resource, where inter-state competition can be easily managed, or that they provide 56 One author has described the symptoms of maritime blindness as “[t]he public’s blasé expectation that what we want will be available when we want it without being mindful of how it arrives at the table, store shelf or the assembly shop floor. (…) It also describes the lack of awareness about strategic and security issues associated with international use of the ocean commons.” See Tim Dunne, “The Sad State of Maritime Blindness”, Cutting the Bow Wave (Combined Joint Operations from the Sea Center of Excellence: Norfolk, Virginia, 2013), p. 43. For the ongoing debate on this issue in the UK, see Jeremy J. Blackham and Gwyn Prins, “The Royal Navy at the Brink”, RUSI Journal (April 2007), pp. 10–16 and Lee Willett, “The Maritime Contribution to the Joint Campaign and the National Security Strategy”, RUSI Occasional Paper (June 2009). 57 This argument is made in Jeremy Blackham and Gwyn Prins, “Why Things Don’t Happen: Silent Principles of National Security”, RUSI Journal, Vol. 155, No. 4, August/September 2010, pp. 16–17. 58 Professor Andrew Lambert quoted in Christopher Bellamy, “Naval power: strategic relevance in the 21 st century”, Jane’s Navy International (online), November/December 2014. 59 In early-2015, for example, industry leaders warned that a shutdown of the Long Beach-Los Angeles ports, through which 40 percent of the US import trade passes, would pose a severe risk to the US national economy. See Robert Wright, “Industry warns of crippling impact of work stoppage at US ports”, The Financial Times, 18 January 2015. DRDC-RDDC-2016-R085 15
Page 1 and 2: The Future Maritime Operating Envir
Page 3 and 4: Abstract … Drawing upon a wide ar
Page 5 and 6: Table of Contents Abstract … ....
Page 7 and 8: List of Figures Figure 1: One World
Page 9 and 10: Acknowledgements I am grateful to a
Page 11 and 12: 1 Introduction 1 The maritime envir
Page 13 and 14: Much of the discussion that follows
Page 15 and 16: 2 The Maritime Environment as a Glo
Page 17 and 18: finfish and shellfish are farmed. 3
Page 19 and 20: 2.2 Undersea Communications and Min
Page 21 and 22: esources) there will be continued g
Page 23: 2.4 Regulation of Ocean Space The U
Page 27 and 28: impossible, and certainly not a sho
Page 29 and 30: esult, confrontations between gover
Page 31 and 32: 3.2 Submarine Cables Given their si
Page 33 and 34: jurisdiction.” 99 There is, howev
Page 35 and 36: of al Qaeda had tried to buy into a
Page 37 and 38: 3.4.1 Chokepoints The existence of
Page 39 and 40: There is, moreover, a major securit
Page 41 and 42: In some regions, such as off the Ho
Page 43 and 44: will not be reduced by decisions of
Page 45 and 46: EEZ and protected it by using more
Page 47 and 48: access. 173 They will also alter th
Page 49 and 50: ecently noted, “[e]conomic growth
Page 51 and 52: evenue. Despite improvements in Sin
Page 53 and 54: Table 4: Overview of Major Indo-Pac
Page 55 and 56: 4.2 US Decline and Sino-US Competit
Page 57 and 58: joint statement regarding Beijing
Page 59 and 60: order upheld by the US since 1945 p
Page 61 and 62: population uncomfortable with a rev
Page 63 and 64: An important element of the 2012 st
Page 65 and 66: including the freedom of the seas.
Page 67 and 68: premiums for the NSR make the voyag
Page 69 and 70: activity in the Arctic could preced
Page 71 and 72: Alongside the impact of Russian pol
Page 73 and 74: 5 Mitigating the Challenges Maritim
Page 75 and 76:
Even in areas that directly intrude
Page 77 and 78:
6 The Role of Navies What is the ro
Page 79 and 80:
The Royal Canadian Navy (RCN) is an
Page 81 and 82:
More recently, a Chinese naval frig
Page 83 and 84:
6.4 Sea Control and Sea Denial 343
Page 85 and 86:
quite possibly, the sea denial capa
Page 87 and 88:
detection and counter-detection. It
Page 89 and 90:
Whether they are conventional or nu
Page 91 and 92:
theorists that confronting a modern
Page 93 and 94:
The development of cyber capabiliti
Page 95 and 96:
middle-Power navies will be unable
Page 97 and 98:
those hostilities ended asserted th
Page 99 and 100:
maritime patrol aircraft in controv
Page 101 and 102:
traditional maritime Powers. For ri
Page 103 and 104:
References .. Primary Sources Arcti
Page 105 and 106:
_____, Congressional Budget Office.
Page 107 and 108:
Clark, Bryan. The Emerging Era in U
Page 109 and 110:
Krepinevich, Andrew. Why AirSea Bat
Page 111 and 112:
Till, Geoffrey. Seapower - A Guide
Page 113 and 114:
Burnett, Douglas R., Tara M. Davenp
Page 115 and 116:
Grygiel, Jakub J.. “The Dilemmas
Page 117 and 118:
Montgomery, Evan Braden. “Contest
Page 119 and 120:
Weir, Gary E.. “The answer may be
Page 121 and 122:
“Indian Navy Plans to Acquire 50
Page 123 and 124:
“Pew, National Geographic Applaud
Page 125 and 126:
DOCUMENT CONTROL DATA (Security mar
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