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03 Nov 22. Stratcom Commander Says U.S. Should Look to 1950s to Regain Competitive Edge. The current conflict in Ukraine is not the worst that the U.S. should be prepared for. Around the corner, said the commander of U.S. Strategic Command, the U.S. must be prepared for much more.
“This Ukraine crisis that we’re in right now, this is just the warmup,” Navy Adm. Charles A. Richard, commander of Stratcom, said. “The big one is coming. And it isn’t going to be very long before we’re going to get tested in ways that we haven’t been tested a long time.”
During a speech at the Naval Submarine League’s 2022 Annual Symposium & Industry Update Richard said the U.S. must get itself prepared.
“We have to do some rapid, fundamental change in the way we approach the defense of this nation,” he said. “I will tell you, the current situation is vividly illuminating what nuclear coercion looks like and how you, or how you don’t stand up to that.”
Competitors like China, Richard said, are outcompeting the U.S., and in a dramatic fashion. The U.S. must step up its deterrence game, he said, or it’s going to be bowled over.
“As I assess our level of deterrence against China, the ship is slowly sinking,” he said. “It is sinking slowly, but it is sinking, as fundamentally they are putting capability in the field faster than we are. As those curves keep going, it isn’t going to matter how good our is or how good our commanders are, or how good our horses are — we’re not going to have enough of them. And that is a very near-term problem.”
One area where the U.S. still dominates is with its underseas capabilities — the U.S. submarine fleet, Richard said.
“Undersea capabilities is still the one … maybe the only true asymmetric advantage we still have against our opponents,” Richard said. “But unless we pick up the pace, in terms of getting our maintenance problems fixed, getting new construction going … if we can’t figure that out … we are not going to put ourselves in a good position to maintain strategic deterrence and national defense.”
Regaining the advantage in other areas might mean looking backwards, as much as 60 or more years, Richard said, to a time when the U.S. military was able to do things faster than what it does today.
“We used to know how to move fast, and we have lost the art of that,” he said.
One example he provided was that of the AGM-28 Hound Dog cruise missile, which entered service in 1960.
“The Air Force went from a request, almost written on a napkin … when they figured out in the late 1950s that the Soviet integrated air defense systems were getting to the point that the B-52 just wasn’t going to make it in, and we needed a thing called up ‘cruise missile.’ And so, they envisioned what a standoff weapon looks like.”
The U.S. military was able to deliver the Hound Dog cruise missile in just 33 months.
“We had two squadrons of B-52s equipped with this 800-nautical-mile Mach two-plus, one megaton nuclear warhead with accuracy that was really good for its day, hanging off the wings of B-52s in less than three years,” he said. “This weapon was so cool you could actually turn the engines on, on its cruise missiles on your wings, to give you additional thrust on takeoff.”
Richard said there are other examples of how the U.S. military was able to rapidly develop and field capability to meet its needs, and that the U.S. must get back to that.
“We have got to get back into the business of not talking about how we are going to mitigate our assumed eventual failure to get Columbia in on time, and B-21, and LRSO, and flip it to the way we used to ask questions in this nation, which is what’s it going to take? Is it money? Is it people? Do you need authorities? What risk? That’s how we got to the Moon by 1969. We need to bring some of that back. Otherwise, China is simply going to outcompete us, and Russia isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.” (Source: US DoD)
03 Nov 22. Better weapons, complex training bolster US submarine force.
The U.S. Navy has combined two undersea warfare courses that pit two platforms against each other, according to the commander of Naval Submarine Forces. This is the first time the service has made a major change to the submarine command course in 20 years, Vice Adm. William Houston said Nov. 1 at the Naval Submarine League’s annual conference.
Even as the service considers what it wants in a future attack submarine, the undersea community is making today’s boats more lethal through high-end training and advanced weapons. Chief among the training changes is the combination of the submarine command course for attack submarines and the D5 backfit course for ballistic missile submarines,
With two attack submarines and one ballistic missile submarine now involved, “what we are finding is tactics on SSNs and SSBNs operating together that we either had forgotten about or we did not know. It is tremendously powerful,” Houston explained.
He said the ballistic missile submarine Tennessee is currently in the course with attack boats Colorado and Indiana. Tennessee received upgrades including a large vertical array sensor and the Submarine Warfare Federated Tactical System, making it “an exceptionally capable platform,” he added.
Houston later told Defense News that “our submarine command course is one of our pinnacle events; it’s where we practice tactics to go to war.”
With the inclusion of the ballistic missile subs, “we’re literally operating the best SSNs in the world against the best SSBNs, and we’re seeing who actually comes out on top,” he said.
Another at-sea event, the Black Widow exercise in the Atlantic, includes helicopters, P-8A Poseidon aircraft, surface ships and submarines working together to conduct a range of anti-submarine warfare activities.
A second exercise series, Silent Recluse, helps subs develop new tactics for going after surface ships. Houston would not go into detail about those tactics, but noted that “it’s consistent with our vision of preparing for combat in the most dangerous decade that we’re facing.”
The existing Los Angeles- and Virginia-class submarines are also receiving improved weapons.
Rear Adm. Doug Perry, the director for undersea warfare on the chief of naval operations’ staff, said at the same conference that his office is focused on increasing the quantity and the capability of heavyweight torpedoes, which is the “weapon of choice for the foreseeable future” due to its stealth and destructive capability as well as the difficulty involved in defending against them.
Mark 48 torpedo production ended in 1996. Since then, the Navy has focused on increasing the capability of its existing inventory but did not invest in buying more torpedoes to fill stockrooms. Now, Perry said, the Navy needs to do both.
The first new torpedoes are delivering this year after the production line was restarted in 2016. These new weapons have better processing power and software, and they have an improved range due to the introduction of a stored chemical energy propulsion system previously used on lightweight torpedoes.
Additionally, he said, the Harpoon anti-ship missile is back on submarines after two decades, having undergone test at the 2018 Rim of the Pacific exercise.
And the Maritime Strike Tomahawk is on its way to the sub fleet; this effort adds a new seeker to the Block V Tomahawk to create a long-range anti-ship capability that’s expected to reach initial operational capability in 2025, Perry said.
And, he added, hypersonic missiles are coming to the newest Virginia-class SSNs starting in 2029.
“Across all our instruments of lethality, we’re improving readiness and capacity: We’re building our [heavyweight torpedo] inventory, improving [the torpedo] capabilities, and moving forward with a number of strike weapons that give us diversity and lethality in the battlespace,” Perry said.
For Houston, who oversees the entire submarine force, these advances are necessary to keep up with what the National Defense Strategy demands of the undersea force.
“We are a sea-denial platform. We are also one of the platforms that can get into bastion areas. We need no support; we’re an independent operator. But we can also be plugged in networkwide for the distributed maritime operations,” Houston said of the force. “I call us the apex predators of the Navy.” (Source: Defense News)
01 Nov 22. Official Says Nuclear Posture Review Gives Options. On Thursday Oct. 27, the Defense Department released the public versions of three strategic documents — the National Defense Strategy, the Nuclear Posture Review and the Missile Defense Review — after having developed both the classified and unclassified versions of all three in conjunction with one another.
During a discussion today the Atlantic Council, Richard C. Johnson, deputy assistant secretary of defense for nuclear and countering weapons of mass destruction policy, participated in a fireside chat regarding the Nuclear Posture Review at the Atlantic Council.
The NPR offers a range of options for nuclear threats of all types on the United States as well as on allies and partners.
There are three nuclear triad legs. Ground-based intercontinental ballistic missiles can be quickly launched, if needed. The submarine delivered weapons are very survivable, and the strategic bombers are visible and recallable.
“One of the most important aspects of this 2022 NPR is that we see it as comprehensive, and we see it as balanced. We think that there is just as much discussion in this document about the importance of nuclear deterrence, about our modernization of our nuclear triad, and also about things like arms control, risk reduction, strategic stability — all things that this administration has said they want to regain the leadership role in,” he said.
Johnson mentioned the two nuclear peer adversaries China and Russia.
“The Chinese nuclear force, which is a new and important factor that we have to take into account that we haven’t had to think about in previous nuclear posture reviews, the document makes very clear that we are now facing potentially the rise of two nuclear armed competitors that we’re going to have to take into account, whether it’s from a deterrence perspective, or from an arms control perspective,” he said, noting that the first NPR was in 1994.
The U.S. is extremely concerned to see the construction of two fast-breeder reactors in China that could create a lot of plutonium for use in nuclear weapons, as well as the reprocessing facilities that would extract the plutonium, Johnson said.
The Chinese could be working through the International Atomic Energy Agency or other means to be more open about whether their plutonium stocks are for civilian or military purposes, he said. There’s a lack of transparency on their part.
Spotlight: Support for Ukraine
The other nuclear-armed competitor is Russia. There are concerns not only with Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine, but also its irresponsible nuclear rhetoric, he said.
“Any use of a nuclear weapon would have a strategic effect and would fundamentally change the nature of a conflict,” he said. (Source: US DoD)
31 Oct 22. Threat of Violent Extremism. The US government has issued a notice to law enforcement agencies across the country in which it raises the threat of extremist violence against lawmakers, election candidates and voting officials. The bulletin came just a few hours after Paul Pelosi, the husband of Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, was attacked at the couple’s home in San Francisco during the early hours of 28 October. The government’s warning is in line with our previous assessment that the threat from extremism will increase in the run-up to and during the midterm elections on 8 November (see Sibylline Situation Update Brief – 3 October 2022).
SIGNIFICANCE
- Paul Pelosi was hospitalised after he was attacked at his home by an assailant wielding a hammer. The suspect, a 42-year-old man named David DePape, reportedly shouted ‘Where is Nancy?’ during the incident. Preliminary investigations reveal that DePape is an avid right-wing conspiracy theorist. He regularly posts online in support of claims by the former president, Donald Trump, that the 2020 presidential election was stolen by Joe Biden.
- The attack comes during an already tense political period in the US. The congressional midterm elections on 8 November will determine which party controls the Senate and the House of Representatives, which together make federal laws that apply to the whole country. The elections are being framed by both sides as a crucial moment in US history. Many Republican politicians and voters claim the midterms represent the last opportunity to put a check on Joe Biden’s presidency. Conversely, Democrats believe US democracy is under threat because of Republican candidates who continue to reject the results of the 2020 presidential election.
- We previously assessed that people’s trust in the legitimacy of the midterm results will be undermined should their candidate lose, making it easier for extremist groups to stoke unrest and instigate violence.
- Data collected by the US Capitol Police reveal that the number of cases in which threats were made to congresspeople has increased significantly in recent years. Over 9,600 threats were reportedly investigated in 2021, roughly three times as many as in 2017. More than 1,800 incidents were reported in the first three months of 2022.
FORECAST
Further attacks by motivated and extremist individuals against congresspeople (and their families) are especially likely in the coming days. These officials routinely travel to and from their homes in the capital Washington DC, as well as from the capital to different locations across the US. Importantly, the threat of attacks against prominent individuals stems from both ends of the political spectrum. A man was arrested near the home of the conservative Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh in June after he had travelled to Washington DC from California. He called the police after he arrived to tell them he had a gun and wanted to kill Kavanaugh. In July, the Republican candidate for New York governor, Lee Zeldin, was attacked while on stage during a campaign rally in Fairport (New York).
The attack against Paul Pelosi will exacerbate tensions at already politically febrile spots. Among the most vulnerable locations are polling stations. Right-wing groups in Arizona, for example, have arranged for armed and masked ‘poll watchers’ to position themselves outside ballot drop boxes, supposedly to monitor for election fraud. A voter in Maricopa county (Arizona) claimed that individuals watching a drop box photographed them and followed them after they deposited their ballot, accusing them of being a ‘mule’ (someone who stuffs ballot boxes with votes; the term gained traction after far-right groups touted unfounded theories about wide-spread ballot stuffing in the 2020 election). In addition, a group called ‘Clean Elections USA’ photographed voters and election workers at the Maricopa election headquarters on 19 October (see Sibylline Extremism Quarterly Q3 – 24 October 2022).
Although congresspeople and polling officials are the most likely targets for individual extremists looking to conduct isolated attacks, such incidents will increase the risk of violent confrontations elsewhere. Attacks by extreme left- or right-wing elements against officials from either party will prompt supporters of targeted individuals to accuse rival supporters of adhering to a political ideology which encourages violence. This will likely lead to scuffles and unrest at political gatherings or polling stations, increasing the risks to bystanders and businesses nearby. If an attack against a political official or election worker involves firearms, anti-gun lobbyists are highly likely to confront armed protesters at political gatherings or outside polling stations. This will increase the likelihood of firearms being used in the event of escalating unrest.
In our recent report focusing on the extremist threat in the run-up to the midterms (Sibylline Situation Update Brief – 3 October 2022), we assessed that inflammatory rhetoric espoused by political figures or media personalities will drive extremists’ recruitment efforts. The same is true of the risk of violence increasing if celebrities promote conspiracy theories following attacks against election officials or congresspeople. The risk of unrest at political gatherings and outside polling stations will increase if influential and partisan figures with significant social media followings peddle baseless claims that attacks against officials from either political party are the result of conspiracy theories concocted by one side trying to discredit the other. Extremists will use any such accusation to demonise opposition supporters and stoke unrest at gatherings. (Source: Sibylline)
28 Oct 22. DoD Releases the Strategic Management Plan for Fiscal Years 2022 – 2026. Today the Department of Defense made public the Fiscal Years 2022 – 2026 Strategic Management Plan, as required by the Government Performance and Results Act Modernization Act of 2010. The SMP articulates the Secretary of Defense’s strategic priorities, consistent with the National Defense Strategy, with an emphasis on priorities focused on building enduring advantages.
In her introduction to the SMP, Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks states: “This Plan establishes accountability to measure our progress in realizing our National Defense Strategy. It also demonstrates to the President, Congress and most importantly the American people, the Department’s commitment to transparency.”
The SMP provides a management framework for describing general and long-term goals, actions the department will take to realize those goals, and how DOD will address challenges and risks that may hinder achieving results. It also includes detailed performance goals and measures to ensure SMP implementation in the near term in the Annual Performance Plan for fiscal 2023 and the consolidation of prior year performance results across all DOD components in the Annual Performance Report for fiscal 2021.
The SMP strategic goals and objectives, together with the performance goals and measures, showcase how the department intends to achieve its goals and priorities and succeed through teamwork with our allies and partners. The Fiscal Years 2022 – 2026 SMP focuses on four strategic goals:
- Making the Right Technology Investments and Transforming the Future Force
- Strengthen Resilience and Adaptability of Our Defense Ecosystem
- Taking Care of Our People and Cultivating the Workforce We Need
- Addressing Institutional Management Priorities
(Source: US DoD)
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