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SS News Daily for 05DEC05
Since 12-05-05
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U.S. Navy photo, November 2005
Plan Would Add 32
Ships To The Navy
David S. Cloud, The New York Times, 5 DEC 05
Navy heads toward SeaWeb, a distributed undersea bi-directional communications and sensor network
By Clarence A. Robinson Jr., Signal Magazine, December 2005
By Jason Ma, Inside the Navy, 5 Dec 05
By Christopher J. Castelli, Inside the Navy, 5 Dec 05
By David S. Cloud, New York Times, December 5, 2005
By Jason Sherman, Inside the Navy, 5 Dec 05
$5 million facility will allow repairs on year-round basis
By Anthony Cronin, New London Day, 4 Dec 05
Carrier Washington To Be Shipped Off
To Japan In ’08
Dale Eisman, The Virginian-Pilot, 03 DEC 05
By Suzanne Yohannan, Inside the Navy, 5 Dec 05
Wiley Hilburn, The Shreveport Times, Dec 5 05
Blueprints from National Archives surface in Manitowoc
By Kristopher Wenn, Sheboygan Press, 4 Dec 05
Defense News, 2 Dec 05
The Canadian Press , 1 December 2005
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U.S. Navy photo, November 2005
Two Air Force Special Tactics Squadrons conduct launch and recovery operations by fast-roping from a helo (left) and via RHIB boat (right) onto a COMSUBRON 19 ballistic missile submarine (SSBN) acting as a guided missile submarine (SSGN) surrogate. The purpose of the joint exercise, held November 14-17, 2005 in the Pacific Northwest, was to refine SSGN Special Operations Forces (SOF) tactics, techniques and procedures and demonstrate joint interoperability.
Plan Would Add 32 Ships To The
Navy
David S. Cloud,
The New York Times, 5 DEC 05
WASHINGTON — The Navy wants to increase its fleet to 313 ships by 2020, reversing years of decline in naval shipbuilding and adding dozens of warships designed to defeat emerging adversaries, senior Defense Department officials say.
The plan by Adm. Michael G. Mullen, who took over as chief of naval operations last summer, envisions a major shipbuilding program that would increase the 281-ship fleet by 32 vessels and cost more than $13 billion a year, the officials said Friday. That’s $3 billion more than the current shipbuilding budget and almost $5 billion more than the Bush administration requested for 2006.
While increasing the fleet size is popular with influential members of Congress, the plan faces various obstacles, including questions about whether it is affordable in light of ballooning shipbuilding costs and whether the mix of vessels is suitable to deal with emerging threats, like China’s expanding navy.
“We are at a crisis in shipbuilding,” a senior Navy official said. “If we don’t start building this up next year and the next year and the next year, we won’t have the force we need.” The officials would not agree to be identified because the plan had not been made public or described to members of Congress.
The Navy’s fleet reached its Cold War peak of 568 warships in 1987 and has been steadily shrinking since then. Mullen’s proposal would reverse that, expanding the fleet to as many as 325 ships over the next decade, with new ships put into service before some older vessels are retired, and finally settling at 313 between 2015 and 2020.
The new plan appears to be a substantial departure from the course set by Mullen’s predecessor, now-retired Adm. Vern Clark. His five-year tenure, which ended in July, was marked by cuts in the fleet and in Navy manpower. Clark hoped to use the money saved by those reductions to pay for new ship designs that he said would allow a smaller force to pack a larger punch.
Clark had projected a future fleet of 260 to 325 ships, depending on the mix of large and small ships.
“The Navy appears to be grappling with the need to balance funding for supporting its role in the global war on terrorism against those for meeting a potential challenge from modernized Chinese maritime military forces,” said Ronald O’Rourke, a naval analyst with the Congressional Research Service, an arm of the Library of Congress.
The plan has not been formally adopted by the Bush administration, though officials said it had been examined by senior civilians in the Pentagon as part of a larger strategic review of all military programs. The proposal is not expected to change much, if at all, before the review is made public in February, the officials said.
Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, which is home to major shipyards, endorsed the Navy proposal when told about it recently and called on President Bush to finance it in next year’s budget.
“Military requirements should drive the budget, not the other way around,” Collins said. “I hope that the Navy’s requirement for a fleet of 313 ships will be matched with adequate funding in the president’s budget to achieve that goal over time.”
But Defense Department officials acknowledged that with financial pressures mounting and the overall Navy budget not likely to increase, their plans could come apart unless they can trim costs in other areas.
The Navy is planning to squeeze money from personnel and other accounts and ask shipyards to hold down costs, even if it means removing certain capabilities.
The plan calls for building 55 small, fast vessels called littoral combat ships, which are being designed to allow the Navy to operate in shallow coastal areas where mines and terrorist bombings are a growing threat. Costing less than $300 million, the littoral combat ship is relatively inexpensive.
Navy officials say they have scaled back their goals for a new destroyer, the DD X , whose primary purpose would be to support major combat operations ashore. The Navy once wanted 23 to 30 DD X vessels, but Mullen has decided on only seven, a Navy official said. The reduction is due in part to the ship’s spiraling cost, estimated at $2 billion to $3 billion per ship.
The plan also calls for building 19 CGX vessels, a new cruiser based on the DDX design and intended for missile defense, but the first ship is not due to be completed until 2017, the Navy official said.
The proposal would reduce the fleet’s more than 50 attack submarines to 48, the official said. Some Navy officials have called for keeping at least 55 of them.
The choices have led some analysts to suggest that the Navy is de-emphasizing the threat from China, at least in the early stages of the shipbuilding plan. Beijing’s investment in submarines, cruise missiles and other weapon systems is expected to pose a major threat to U.S. warships for at least a decade. That gives the Navy time, some analysts argue, to build capabilities that require less firepower and more mobility, a priority for Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld.
The plan also calls for building 31 amphibious assault ships, which can be used to ferry Marines ashore or support humanitarian operations.
“This is not a fleet that is being oriented to the Chinese threat,” said Loren Thompson, an analyst at the Lexington Institute, a policy research center in Arlington. “It’s being oriented around irregular warfare, stability operations and dealing with rogue states.”
But the Navy would keep 11 aircraft carriers, just one fewer than the dozen it has maintained since the end of the Cold War. Retiring the 37-year-old John F. Kennedy could save $200 million a year.
Virginian-Pilot staff writer Dale Eisman contributed to this report.
Navy heads toward SeaWeb, a distributed undersea bi-directional communications and sensor network
By Clarence A. Robinson Jr., Signal Magazine, December 2005
An expendable one-way gateway buoy that provides a paging system for submarines is undergoing technology demonstrations in the Pacific Ocean. The U.S. Navy considers the buoy to be a possible near-term interface between radio frequency satellites and acoustic communications. This paging system is designed to ensure submarine communications at speed and depth.
Indeed, dramatic changes are taking place in undersea force network communications that exploit the latest in commercial information technologies. The Navy resolutely is transforming the submarine from an intermittent node operating at periscope depth into a persistent cooperative network node functioning at speed and depth—without sacrificing inherent stealth.
Moreover, the Navy is moving to integrate distributed and netted sensors with unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs), submarines, and surface and aerial platforms. The objective is to gain situational awareness of the undersea battlespace to locate and engage threats rapidly in littoral areas. This mobile ad hoc network is being developed around wireless nodes that can function cooperatively and spontaneously without a fixed infrastructure. Early elements of this system already are emerging.
The Navy’s submarine force steadfastly is moving toward a long-term Seaweb concept—a bi-directional communications capability between patrolling submarines, the theater commander and various undersea off-board sensors. In response to a request for information from industry for communications at speed and depth, the sea service received 58 white papers that addressed more than 80 technologies for evaluation. These responses have been grouped into eight categories, both near- and long-term. They have been winnowed further to some 22 alternatives that are more technically mature.
A funding request from the Navy calls for acceleration of key submarine communications programs by two years, fiscal year 2007 rather than 2009. Innovative technologies for speeding up submarine communications include the acoustic-to-radio-frequency gateway buoy, a tethered Iridium two-way expendable buoy, an Iridium-based BRT-6 follow-on one-way buoy and a tethered ultrahigh frequency (UHF) satellite communications expendable buoy.
The Raytheon Company is under a small $500,000 technology demonstration contract for the tactical paging buoy, called Deep Siren (SIGNAL, December 2000, page 53), as part of the Communications at Speed and Depth (CSD) program, Leo deCardenas explains. He is the company’s Navy programs senior business development manager, network-centric systems. “This untethered tactical paging buoy is designed to operate on the surface and interface with one of the 66 Iridium satellites in circular low earth orbit.” As the constellation orbits over the oceans, Iridium delivers essential voice and data communications to and from remote areas. These cross-linking satellites act as a fully meshed network.
“While the Navy pursues both one- and two-way submarine communications options, the paging buoy can be dispensed from a surface ship, an aircraft or from the submarine itself,” deCardenas says. Once the buoy takes position on the surface, it immediately establishes communications with an Iridium spacecraft within range via a radio frequency (RF) link. While in contact with the satellite, the buoy deploys a hydrophone down to a fixed depth and converts RF satellite signals into an acoustic frequency (AF) transmission, sending it through the water at a much lower audio range.
AF signals will travel significant distances from the buoy. The submarine does not have to come to a more shallow operating depth to receive the acoustic signals. The depth and distance at which the buoy’s signals can be received depend on the hydrophone and submarine being within the same ocean thermalcline boundary layer. Water temperature and salinity also are critical factors in the acoustic signal’s range, deCardenas reveals.
In earlier experiments in various ocean locations, the paging message was transmitted in excess of 100 miles to significant depths. In shallow, noisy littoral waters, the distance was reduced to about a third of the deep-water range. “The buoy transmission is not restricted by the speed of the submarine, as long as it is not outrunning audio frequency waves,” deCardenas notes.
In the past, submarines had to sacrifice some degree of stealth whenever the vessel needed to communicate. This situation makes the CSD the sine qua non for a network that integrates the undersea force with the rest of a battle group and the fleet, including aircraft for Tomahawk cruise missiles and special operations, deCardenas points out. Deep Siren’s buoy design also allows the submerged submarine to launch the device and send it to the surface. Once on the surface, the buoy receives Iridium signals, while the submerged boat listens for the communications response.
A surface ship, an aircraft or any submerged vessel also can launch the Deep Siren buoy to communicate with submarines. The buoy quickly establishes the satellite link and drops its hydrophone. A surface ship, as an example, dials up the satellite and sends a message to the spacecraft’s transponder, which, in turn, is received by the buoy. Once the buoy is in the water, any vessel also can employ the Iridium link to that buoy to transmit a paging message, deCardenas discloses. “The buoy’s battery power lasts approximately three days with intermittent communications but only about 30 minutes with constant transmissions. Once the battery is dead, the buoy scuttles itself.”
The Navy anticipates using this tactical paging buoy technology during the upcoming Trident Warrior 2006 exercise in the Pacific. DeCardenas reports that the U.S. Navy and Great Britain’s Royal Navy are cooperating with CSD technology programs. Raytheon also is working with the British firm Ultra Electronics Sonar and Communications Systems and its U.S. subsidiary, Ultra Electronics Ocean Systems, and with RRK Technologies Limited, the Glasgow, Scotland-based software company that originally developed Deep Siren communications.
Capt. Robert Gurczynski, USN, relates that without submarine force network integration, today’s architecture provides periscope-depth operations that rely on legacy pathways, which are limited to 4.8-kilobit-per-second text-only data transfer. The captain is the director for command, control, communications, computers and intelligence (C4I), N-6, Commander, Naval Submarine Forces, Norfolk, Virginia. A career submariner, he is the former commanding officer of the USS Jacksonville, a Los Angeles-class attack submarine. He also is a previous chairman of the Leadership, Ethics and Law Department at the U.S. Naval Academy.
Today, intermittent Internet protocol (IP) data rates are up to 64 kilobits per second, with limited access and limited links in the extremely high frequency (EHF) range at medium data rates, the captain observes. Primary communications are via shared 32-kilobit-per-second access, with limited high-volume transfer via the Global Broadcast System (GBS) in a shore-to-ship-only transmission. There also is limited tactical network integration. At speed and depth, the submarine is now limited to very low data rates of 50 to 75 baud, with no IP connectivity and a receive-only capability, he adds.
Submarine force network integration between 2007 and circa 2012 is intended to eliminate legacy pathways and to provide fully netted worldwide IP connectivity. This approach will make multiple links available: super high frequency (SHF), EHF at medium data rates and UHF, Capt. Gurczynski explains. Technology upgrades in the developmental pipeline will provide IP connectivity at speed and depth with persistent real-time communications with the warfare commander and his coalition forces.
“Tomorrow’s architecture will make the submarine force a covert player in network-centric warfare with an open architecture—shipboard tactical systems fully integrated as part of the Submarine Warfare Federated Tactical System (SWFTS). This SWFTS architecture will be integrated into the force network through the external communications system,” the captain continues. “The fully netted submarine force connectivity will provide UHF satellite link data rates up to 32 kilobits per second for IP messaging, Web and e-mail access; a Tomahawk strike network; and tactical voice communications.”
GBS, SHF and Ku-band satellite data rates will be from 6 to 23.5 megabits per second to a submarine, with GBS inputs in a receive-only mode. Communications satellites will provide high-speed data transfer, imagery transmission and links for Predator unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) video, Web access and e-mail. The Advanced EHF satellite (SIGNAL, July 2005, page 39) will permit data rates of 1,024 kilobits per second for communications links with IP messages, tactical voice communications, imagery, high-speed data transfer and videoconferencing. Improved bandwidth will enable simultaneous operations, multiple communications links and global connectivity, Capt. Gurczynski observes.
“The Navy intends to have some technologies for CSD fielded by 2008, the earliest that funding can be made available in the procurement process. There are only three technologies that we can move forward with that quickly, and the Raytheon tactical paging buoy falls into that category,” the captain claims. Meanwhile, the undersea force is shifting every system on board its submarines to an IP base, including combat systems, and all of its sensors.
Recent demonstrations in noisy water emulated acoustic conditions in the littorals. The tests were to determine that sufficient power in the gateway buoy could transmit the signal through the water and have it received despite a submarine’s baffles, including directly astern with the submarine traveling at a fast speed. “We were able to do this at almost flank speed, and the worst case condition was at approximately 40 nautical miles with the contact in the baffles,” according to Capt. Gurczynski.
In addition to the gateway buoy, the Navy will upgrade other submarine communications systems, replacing equipment that has been in the fleet for years, according to Capt. Dean A. Richter, USN. He is in the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command (SPAWAR) program executive office for C4I and space, PMW-770. “These improvements include new modern radio sets and modems with high data rates that provide fairly long ranges. One- and two-way optically tethered communications buoys are being developed but not just for use with the Iridium satellites. Eventually, the buoys will interface with UHF military satellite communications.”
A retrievable tethered fiber optic buoy for communications and surveillance is another important long-term research opportunity of the CSD. The submarine deploys the buoy, which surfaces as the cable plays out. While at depth, the submarine can travel up to a distance of about two miles from the buoy, which provides an RF interface for satellite communications. Once the cable is fully deployed, communications terminate and the buoy is recovered from the surface automatically for reuse, Capt. Richter reveals. The tethered buoy could be carried on an SSGN, or guided missile, submarine, or potentially on the sail of the advanced Virginia-class boat.
Located in San Diego, PMW-770, the submarine C4I integration office, manages the CSD program for the Navy and has established the initial capability for the sea service. The very low frequency (VLF) submarine communications system also is undergoing modernization that will extend its service life to 2025, Capt. Richter continues. “The software for this system is simultaneously being upgraded to provide a completely interactive capability for tactical use to page submarines throughout the world. VLF also will use improved modulation techniques to communicate at deeper depths and at rates of 800 bits per second, much higher than today.”
Various types of acoustic technologies are being considered for the CSD. The communications systems include hull-to-hull, submarine-to-submarine, submarine-to-surface ship and submarine-to-UUV as part of a mobile distributed undersea network, Capt. Richter maintains.
The stationkeeping energy-harvesting buoys and ocean gliders are other technologies for the CSD. “The gliders operate on a concept of changing their buoyancy by flooding water into the nose and diving to significant depths before pumping water out and traveling to the surface. Depending on the glider’s wingspan, a speed of advance of three to four knots can be achieved over vast ocean distances. While deep, the gliders can receive acoustic messages, store them and, when they surface, use an antenna to transmit RF messages to satellites,” the captain discloses. “With a school of the gliders, you can have an acoustic/RF gateway distributed network for a variety of unique applications. We have already tested the technology in the water during an exercise.”
A submariner, who has served on a number of boats, including tours as executive officer of the USS Alabama and commanding officer of the USS Jefferson City, Capt. Richter reports that the concept development and demonstration phases of the acquisition program are beginning. “We would like to field the first increment of a family of systems with a near-term capability in fiscal year 2007,” the captain says. “This would give us some type of operational evaluation later that year to begin fielding operational systems throughout the fleet in fiscal year 2008.” He adds that a competitive contract will be sought for all of the systems.
The gateway buoy will enable a strike group commander to tactically page a submarine, either in a one- or two-way fashion acoustically. The submarine can receive the message on its sonar system and can respond in kind acoustically, or via some other means—a buoyant cable antenna attached to the submarine and floating on the surface, an expendable buoy or a fixed antenna at periscope depth, Capt. Richter says.
Approximately 100 yards long, the cable is a floating copper wire antenna for high frequency communications embedded in highly buoyant foam. While laying on the surface, the wire can receive and transmit at bandwidths of 128 to 256 kilobits per second as the submarine operates in the littorals or performs antisubmarine warfare missions.
Two-way laser communication between submarines and various aircraft is another potential for the CSD capability, along with the possible development of a submarine-launched small UAV to support this concept. Laser communications, already tested and used on submarines in the fleet, are likely to expand to airborne and space-based systems. The CSD makes the submarine a far more valuable tool for the battle group commander. The Seaweb distributed undersea network will open up a wide variety of submarine capabilities and missions.
By Jason Ma, Inside the Navy, 5 Dec 05
U.S. Special Operations Command is delaying plans to buy additional Advanced SEAL Delivery System miniature submarines to focus on fixing reliability problems with the first sub, which has suffered developmental troubles for years.
SOCOM had planned to buy a second and third ASDS by fiscal year 2011, but money for those subs will instead be reprogrammed to pay for additional work on the first sub, said Vice Adm. Eric Olson, deputy commander of SOCOM, at a briefing Nov. 30. Upgrades initially planned for the second and third subs will now be included in the first sub too.
SOCOM has not abandoned plans to buy a “small fleet” of subs, he said, adding that the additional investment in the first sub will improve later ASDS subs.
So far, $446 million in research and development has been spent on the ASDS, and about $1 billion was budgeted for the second and third subs throughout the future years defense plan. SOCOM will redirect “some” of that $1 billion to the first sub with the rest going to other Defense Department priorities, he said.
But the exact dollar amounts -- and the extent of the delay from the program’s restructuring -- have not been determined yet, Olson said.
In a statement, prime contractor Northrop Grumman said it was “disappointed” with the decision to delay work on the later subs. The company is working with SOCOM and Naval Sea Systems Command, which is acquiring the sub for SOCOM, to support the work being done and provide planned upgrades.
“Since being delivered to the U.S. Navy in June 2003, ASDS-1 has been operational and performed successfully and reliably to the warfighter,” according to the company’s statement.
Olson seemed to leave the door open to holding another competition for the program in the future. Asked whether SOCOM remains committed to keeping Northrop as the contractor and using Northrop’s design, he replied, “We are committed to pursuing a program that will deliver to us a small fleet of special-purpose submarines.”
Dale Uhler, SOCOM’s acquisition executive, said it is premature to speculate about another competition.
A milestone C review, which has already been delayed several times, was scheduled for April 2006. A successful review would have allowed SOCOM to start spending money for additional subs. But SOCOM decided to divert money to fix the first sub when it became clear the program would not pass the milestone C review, Uhler said.
Some concerned lawmakers on Capitol Hill have recently sought to prohibit defense officials from funding the second sub until ASDS has a successful milestone C review.
Reps. Rob Simmons (R-CT) and James Langevin (D-RI), who both have General Dynamics submarine-building facilities in their states, sent a letter Nov. 21 to House Armed Services Committee Chairman Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-CA) asking him to endorse a Senate proposal that would tie future ASDS subs to a successful milestone C.
A spokesman for Hunter said SOCOM’s announcement last week would be considered during the conference committee negotiations that would reconcile differences between House and Senate versions of the fiscal year 2006 defense authorization bill.
The ASDS, which is designed to covertly transport SEALs, has had problems with its battery life and noise. Northrop has since selected a new battery and replaced the tail section. After its delivery, the sub performed some exercises and long-range transits while attached to a host sub, Olson said. After one of those long transits, damage to the sub’s horizontal stabilizer was discovered, he said.
But the most recent problem occurred when the crew was preparing the sub for follow-on test and evaluation. The crew detected axial movement in the propeller shaft while under way, Olson said. The movement caused vibrations that, while “not catastrophic,” were enough of a concern to delay the program, he explained.
The additional work on the first ASDS will include a “holistic” look at the sub’s previous fixes and how they might have resulted in unintended problems elsewhere, Uhler said. For example, the sub’s aluminum tail section was replaced with a titanium one, and the sub has new batteries, he said.
SOCOM has established an ASDS reliability panel comprised of government and industry officials, including someone from General Dynamics’ Electric Boat submarine-building division, Uhler said.
By Christopher J. Castelli, Inside the Navy, 5 Dec 05
The leaders of the Navy and U.S. Special Operations Command met privately at SOCOM headquarters Nov. 28 to discuss and resolve key issues, including money matters and Navy plans to create new ground units that might perform missions typically associated with special forces.
Officials remain tight-lipped about the “warfighter talks.” But Inside the Navy obtained details about the agenda for the closed-door conference.
Major discussion items included the future of Naval Special Warfare Command; an operational update on high-speed vessels; partnering special operations forces with Navy intelligence, reconnaissance and surveillance; supporting special forces with Navy logistics; the troubled Advanced SEAL Delivery System; the partnership between the Navy and SOCOM; Navy enhancements developed for the war on terror; the new Navy Expeditionary Combat Command; using Navy seabasing to support special forces in distributed operations; SEAL retention issues; and a memorandum of agreement (MOA) between the Navy and SOCOM.
Significantly, both sides are mulling revisions to the existing agreement, which outlines the kinds of support the Navy is committed to providing special forces. Other armed services have similar pacts with SOCOM. It remains unclear what changes might be made to the agreement. But SOCOM and the Navy plan to establish a working group to review the document, a Navy official said.
SOCOM spokesman Kenneth McGraw said the command’s MOAs with the services “primarily delineate roles and responsibilities concerning the management of resources.” This is because SOCOM has its own funding program, does not own any installations and is dependent on the services for installation support, and shares acquisition and unit-equipping responsibilities with the services, he said. The annexes to the SOCOM/Navy MOA reflect this resource focus, he said. The MOA does not address operations or operational command relationships.
There was no shortage of top officials at the meeting, which took place at MacDill Air Force Base, FL.
Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Michael Mullen led the Navy delegation, which was slated to include Vice Adm. John Morgan, head of information plans and strategy; Rear Adm. Gerald Talbot, head of military personnel; Rear Adm. Mark Edwards, the chief requirements advocate; Rear Adm. Joseph Walsh, head of submarine warfare; Rear Adm. Robert Murrett, director of naval intelligence; Rear Adm. Donald Bullard, head of the new Navy Expeditionary Combat Command; and Rear Adm. Charles Martoglio, head of strategy and policy.
Army Gen. Bryan Brown, the commander of SOCOM, led a delegation that was slated to include Vice Adm. Eric Olson, Brown’s deputy; Marine Corps Brig. Gen. George Flynn, SOCOM chief of staff; Army Lt. Gen. Dell Dailey, head of the new Center for Special Operations; Air Force Brig. Gen. Alfred Flowers, head of SOCOM’s J-8 office; SOCOM acquisition chief Dale Uhler; Army Brig. Gen. Steven Hashem, head of SOCOM’s J-7/J-9 office; and Rear Adm. Joseph Maguire, head of Naval Special Warfare Command.
Maguire’s command, the naval component of SOCOM, is responsible for ensuring maritime special forces -- including SEALs and special warfare combatant-craft crewmen -- are ready to meet the operational requirements of combatant commanders.
Meanwhile, under Mullen’s leadership, the sea service established the Navy Expeditionary Combat Command Oct. 1. This nascent organization has functional command of the Navy’s explosive-ordnance disposal, construction, logistics, expeditionary salvage and maritime security forces. The Navy wants these forces to be fully engaged in the war on terror.
The creation of this command raises questions about what kinds of missions -- foreign maritime security training and force protection, for instance -- might be shifted from SOCOM and its maritime component to the Navy, according to an internal Navy document prepared prior to last week’s meeting.
Navy Expeditionary Combat Command would oversee enhancements to help the Navy better fight the war on terror, the document indicates. These include the development of riverine forces, an expeditionary training team and civil military operations group, increased intelligence capability, and an expeditionary security force alignment.
Defense officials will have to sort out what this means for the missions and funding of various forces. To make these changes happen, the Navy will need “money and staffing,” according to another document, a briefing prepared for the meeting by Bullard’s office.
The Navy sees the new command creating a process for “irregular warfighting development,” the briefing indicates. The command would prepare “ready task organized combat support and combat service support force packages.” Bullard’s organization would ensure expeditionary forces have sufficient capability and capacity to meet requirements for major combat operations, the war on terror and homeland defense, according to his presentation.
The specific mission of the command would involve manning, training and equipping Navy forces to operate in an expeditionary environment, the briefing states. This would mean providing a secure area for forces and logistics to flow ashore from a sea base. It would also mean supporting naval and joint combat forces with explosive ordnance disposal, combat engineering and construction, inland waterway operations and force protection.
Further, the mission would involve using the distributed capability of assigned forces to extend the awareness of the joint force maritime component commander to the “near coast, inshore and riparian environment,” according to the briefing.
Bullard’s office sees the command having “interdependencies” with SOCOM, the Marine Corps, the Coast Guard, and air and surface forces in the Navy.
Another major item discussed was the program to develop Advanced SEAL Delivery System miniature submarines for SOCOM. Two days after the meeting, SOCOM announced it would delay plans to buy additional subs to focus on fixing reliability problems with the first one (see related article).
Some of the changes being considered for the Navy/SOCOM pact may have to do with improving logistics support for forward deployed forces. A briefing prepared by Naval Supply Systems Command in October cited plans to update a Navy/SOCOM memorandum of agreement for that purpose.
According to yet another document, an article by Capt. Gerry Harms that appeared in that command’s newsletter in early 2004, Operation Iraqi Freedom was the first time in naval special warfare history that a dedicated logistics element deployed with the operational force. Logistics support was a key factor in the success of special forces, according to the article, but until recently there was no planned support for Navy special forces operating ashore.
“SEALs would literally figure it out when they got there, cobbling together support for basics like food and transportation, from wherever they could,” Harms wrote.
Navy and SOCOM leaders plan to reconvene for another high-level conference next summer.
By David S. Cloud, New York Times, December 5, 2005
WASHINGTON, Dec. 3 - The Navy wants to increase its fleet to 313 ships by 2020, reversing years of decline in naval shipbuilding and adding dozens of warships designed to defeat emerging adversaries, senior Defense Department officials say.
The plan by Adm. Michael G. Mullen, who took over as chief of naval operations last summer, envisions a major shipbuilding program that would increase the 281-ship fleet by 32 vessels and cost more than $13 billion a year, $3 billion more than the current shipbuilding budget, the officials said Friday.
While increasing the fleet size is popular with influential members of Congress, the plan faces various obstacles, including questions about whether it is affordable in light of ballooning shipbuilding costs and whether the mix of vessels is suitable to deal with emerging threats, like China's expanding navy.
"We are at a crisis in shipbuilding," a senior Navy official said. "If we don't start building this up next year and the next year and the next year, we won't have the force we need." The officials would not agree to be identified because the plan had not been made public or described to members of Congress.
The Navy's fleet reached its cold war peak of 568 warships in 1987 and has been steadily shrinking since then. Admiral Mullen's proposal would reverse that, expanding the fleet to as many as 325 ships over the next decade, with new ships put into service before some older vessels are retired, and finally settling at 313 between 2015 and 2020.
"The Navy appears to be grappling with the need to balance funding for supporting its role in the global war on terrorism against those for meeting a potential challenge from modernized Chinese maritime military forces," said Ronald O'Rourke, a naval analyst with the Congressional Research Service, an arm of the Library of Congress.
The plan has not been formally adopted by the Bush administration, though officials said it had been examined by senior civilians in the Pentagon as part of a larger strategic review of all military programs. The proposal is not expected to change much, if at all, before the review is made public in February, the officials said.
Senator Susan Collins, a Republican from Maine, which is home to major shipyards, endorsed the Navy proposal when told about it recently and called on President Bush to finance it in next year's budget.
"Military requirements should drive the budget, not the other way around," Ms. Collins said. "I hope that the Navy's requirement for a fleet of 313 ships will be matched with adequate funding in the president's budget to achieve that goal over time."
But Defense Department officials acknowledged that with financial pressures mounting and the overall Navy budget not likely to increase, their plans could come apart unless they could trim costs in other areas.
The Navy is planning to squeeze money from personnel and other accounts, and ask shipyards to hold down costs, even if it means removing certain capabilities.
Admiral Mullen is in some ways paying for the priorities of his predecessor, Adm. Vern Clark, who improved pay and benefits during his tenure as the service's senior officer but also agreed to trim the Navy's budget in an unusual sacrifice to help pay the Army's bills in Iraq.
Now Admiral Mullen is seeking a fleet that will give the Navy a greater role in counterterrorism and humanitarian operations.
The plan calls for building 55 small, fast vessels called littoral combat ships, which are being designed to allow the Navy to operate in shallow coastal areas where mines and terrorist bombings are a growing threat. Costing less than $300 million, the littoral combat ship is relatively inexpensive.
Navy officials say they have scaled back their goals for a new destroyer, the DD(X), whose primary purpose would be to support major combat operations ashore. The Navy once wanted 23 to 30 DD(X) vessels, but Admiral Mullen has decided on only 7, the Navy official said. The reduction is due in part to the ship's spiraling cost, now estimated at $2 billion to $3 billion per ship.
The plan also calls for building 19 CG(X) vessels, a new cruiser designed for missile defense, but the first ship is not due to be completed until 2017, the Navy official said.
The proposal would also reduce the fleet's more than 50 attack submarines to 48, the official said. Some Navy officials have called for keeping at least 55 of them.
The choices have led some analysts to suggest that the Navy is de-emphasizing the threat from China, at least in the early stages of the shipbuilding plan. Beijing's investment in submarines, cruise missiles and other weapon systems is not expected to pose a major threat to American warships for at least a decade. That gives the Navy time, some analysts argue, to build capabilities that require less firepower and more mobility, a priority for Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld.
The plan also calls for building 31 amphibious assault ships, which can be used to ferry marines ashore or support humanitarian operations.
"This is not a fleet that is being oriented to the Chinese threat," said Loren Thompson, an analyst at the Lexington Institute, a policy research center in Arlington, Va. "It's being oriented around irregular warfare, stability operations and dealing with rogue states."
But the Navy would keep 11 aircraft carriers, just one fewer than the dozen it has maintained since the end of the cold war. Retiring the 37-year-old John F. Kennedy could save $1.2 billion a year.
By Jason Sherman, Inside the Navy, 5 Dec 05
The first wave of Pentagon budget decisions has largely spared the military’s major programs.
The first program decision memorandum, issued in draft form Dec. 1 by the Pentagon’s office of program analysis and evaluation, largely leaves intact Navy shipbuilding programs and Army plans to outfit new modular brigades with new equipment sets, according to a source who read the document, “program decision memorandum 1.”
Navy plans for the Littoral Combat Ship are funded and the new destroyer DD(X) remain on course after the service cut $2 billion from other parts of its budget to keep the programs afloat, said the source.
The Pentagon recently breathed new life into the DD(X) program by granting approval for a major milestone (Inside the Navy, Nov. 28, p1).
The Army will be able to fund a key modernization effort that provides 43 active-duty and 34 National Guard and Army Reserve brigades with updated equipment sets.
“Creating the modular brigade equipment set in both the active and reserve components remains sacrosanct through this budget process,” said the source of the fiscal year 2007 budget effort.
Pentagon officials expect the White House Office of Management and Budget to issue guidance next week that will bring into clearer focus the amount of money available to the Defense Department for its fiscal year 2007 budget request and the out year spending plan.
Earlier last week, officials from the services said the office of program analysis and evaluation informed the Defense Department that the first wave of PDMs would not contain controversial decisions.
Collectively, the services still face at least $32 billion in cuts that are expected to have a significant effect on either modernization programs or force structure.
$5 million facility will allow repairs on year-round basis
By Anthony Cronin, New London Day, 4 Dec 05
Naval Submarine Base technicians are looking forward to the construction of an indoor crane maintenance facility that would greatly assist their maintenance and repair efforts during the cold winter months.
Base officials welcomed the House and Senate's approval of nearly $5 million in funding for the new crane facility, but they also caution that President Bush hasn't yet signed the appropriation to allow the funds to flow to the base.
Last month, U.S. Sens. Christopher J. Dodd and Joseph I. Lieberman, both Connecticut Democrats, announced that the Groton sub base would receive $4.6 million for the construction of the indoor crane repair facility, allowing critical maintenance and repair of the sub base's outdoor cranes on a year-round basis.
The money was included in a military-construction appropriations bill agreed to by the House and Senate.
Senior Chief Steve Strickland, a spokesman for the sub base, said the indoor crane facility would cover about 10,000 square feet.
“Right now, existing cranes are stored outdoors and are exposed to the elements and that increases the wear on the cranes,” he said.
If the appropriation gains the president's approval, building the indoor facility would allow technicians along the waterfront to bring cranes indoors to service them or perform repairs or other maintenance procedures.
The outdoor cranes are used for a variety of tasks on the lower base, which houses the waterfront and piers that are used for the submarines. Among their duties are to assist in moving large equipment or supplies onto or off the submarines.
“It would have a positive impact on operations down there,” said Strickland. Currently, repairs or maintenance on the various types of cranes on the lower base is done outdoors year-round.
“This is a essential for a lot of jobs on the waterfront,” Strickland said.
Once the appropriation for the indoor crane facility is approved, the Navy would have to seek a request for proposals and then award contracts to build the large structure. Strickland said it was too early to determine a timetable for the project.
Both senators praised the appropriation for the submarine base, which faced the threat of closure this summer as part of the Pentagon's base closings and consolidation process.
An independent base closing review commission voted in late August to keep the base open, saving more than 11,000 military and civilian jobs at the 687-acre base.
Carrier Washington To Be
Shipped Off To Japan In ’08
Dale Eisman, The Virginian-Pilot, 03 DEC 05
WASHINGTON — The Norfolk-based aircraft carrier George Washington will relocate to Japan in 2008, the Pentagon confirmed Friday, but the Navy is keeping mum for now about whether another carrier will replace the Washington in Hampton Roads.
A five-paragraph announcement on the ship’s future said the Washington will leave behind its current air wing and take on Carrier Air Wing 5, already based in Japan, when it completes the move.
A Navy spokesman, Lt. Herb Josie, said the Washington also will assume leadership of a strike group of destroyers, cruisers and submarines already in Japan.
Air Wing 5 and the strike group ships now operate with the carrier Kitty Hawk, which the Washington will replace at the Navy’s base in Yokosuka, Japan.
The Navy plans to retire the Kitty Hawk, which will be 47 years old in 2008, after the switch.
The announced plans signal the start of a major political struggle and a nautical version of musical chairs, which could end with major economic damage to Norfolk or Mayport, Fla., the two East Coast carrier ports, and a cut in the Navy’s carrier fleet from 12 to 11 ships.
Because the big ships are powerful economic engines for communities where they’re stationed, their moves are closely scrutinized by lawmakers. T he loss of one carrier would drain about 3,000 jobs and $225 million per year from the Hampton Roads economy, according to preliminary estimates by the Hampton Roads Planning District Commission.
Pentagon leaders already have underscored their desire to cut the overall carrier force to 11 by retiring the 37-year-old John F. Kennedy, a move some lawmakers have set out to block.
A ny attempt to reduce the number of carriers in Norfolk, either by not replacing the Washington or by moving another Norfolk-based ship to the Kennedy’s home in Mayport, is likely to draw fire from U.S. Sen. John W. Warner, the Virginia Republican who heads the Senate Armed Services Committee.
One new carrier, the George H.W. Bush, will be entering the fleet about the time the Kitty Hawk retires; another, the Bremerton, Wash.-based Carl Vinson, is to complete a three-year overhaul at Northrop Grumman Newport News shipyard in 2008.
The Navy has not said where it will station the Bush or whether it expects the Vinson to return to Bremerton after the overhaul.
The international shuffling of forces is a milestone for the Japanese, who for the first time will be providing a home for a nuclear-powered ship.
Japan is the only nation to be attacked with atomic weapons and the government’s agreement to allow a nuclear ship to move in – even 60-plus years after the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki – has triggered protests in Yokosuka.
Negotiations to move a nuclear-powered ship to Japan have been going on for several years and did not produce an agreement until this fall.
And the selection of a ship to replace the Kitty Hawk proved sensitive as well; at least three ships, the Harry S. Truman, Nimitz and Bush, were ruled out because of their namesakes’ involvement in campaigns against Japan during World War II.
By Suzanne Yohannan, Inside the Navy, 5 Dec 05
In response to a court order, the Navy is proposing to restrict its use of the highly controversial low frequency active (LFA) sonar in more biologically sensitive geographical areas than it previously has proposed, according to a draft supplemental environmental impact statement (SEIS) released by the service last month.
As required by the court, the Navy considers other mitigation measures in the document. But the sea service dismisses these as impractical or unnecessary, reports sister publication Defense Environment Alert.
The document also suggests the Navy plans to train with LFA sonar in the Pacific, Atlantic and Indian oceans and Mediterranean Sea, a much larger area than allowed under the original court order. A Navy spokesman says these are the same LFA training areas as outlined in the final EIS that was challenged in court. These areas were subsequently pared back by the court.
The Navy proposal is contained in a draft SEIS released in mid-November that seeks to address a U.S. district court’s ruling that found the service had failed to fully comply with the National Environmental Policy Act and Endangered Species Act when evaluating the environmental impacts of its Surveillance Towed Array Sensor System (SURTASS) LFA sonar, the document states.
The Navy’s LFA sonar has long been opposed by environmentalists, who say the sound waves generated by it can travel more than 300 miles underwater and could harm marine mammal and fish populations. However, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) -- the federal agency that regulates man-made underwater noise and actions -- has said the maximum sound exposure an animal could receive from LFA is not as loud as natural sounds.
The SEIS predicts the Navy’s use of LFA sonar on up to four vessels in combination with monitoring and mitigation will not kill any marine mammals. This conclusion “is supported by the fact that SURTASS LFA sonar has been operating since 2003 in the northwestern Pacific Ocean with no reported Level A ([Marine Mammal Protection Act]) harassment takes or strandings associated with its operations,” the SEIS states.
The Navy began public hearings on the draft SEIS this month. The hearings were scheduled for Dec. 1 in Washington, Dec. 3 in San Diego, and Dec. 5 in Honolulu. The document’s public comment period ends Dec. 27.
The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), the named plaintiff in the court case, has been planning to request the Navy extend the comment period, an environmental source says. The group recently updated a report on marine noise, which found that military sonar and other man-made sources of sound are increasing, posing a “significant long-term threat to whales, dolphins, fish and other marine species,” NRDC says in a Nov. 21 press release.
The NRDC report recommends a comprehensive strategy to reduce man-made ocean noise. “Among other things, it calls for geographic and seasonal restrictions on intense noise from military sonar and seismic air guns; technological improvements to reduce sonic damage; better monitoring and population research; stronger enforcement by [NMFS], including the management of marine populations for cumulative impacts; and a commitment to international solutions.”
In 2003, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, ruling in NRDC et al. v. Donald Evans, et al., issued an injunction against the Navy, restricting its use of LFA sonar in training to oceans off the eastern coast of Asia, as well as requiring certain seasonal and coastline restrictions. The ruling found violations of NEPA, ESA and the Marine Mammal Protection Act, although it later dismissed the MMPA claims based on DOD-backed amendments Congress passed in 2003 that relaxed military requirements under that law.
The court found the original EIS failed to consider training in areas that pose a lower risk of harm to marine life when practicable; failed to consider extending sonar shutdown procedures beyond marine mammals and sea turtles to include schools of fish; neglected to adequately consider fish impacts; and should have considered additional monitoring and mitigation such as the use of aircraft or small observational craft before using sonar, according to the SEIS.
The court had also criticized the Navy and NMFS’ decision to postpone indefinitely additions to a list of Offshore Biologically Important Areas (OBIAs) -- sensitive, restricted offshore areas that are replete with marine mammals. It also questioned the Navy’s distance from the coastline beyond which it was planning to use the sonar.
As a result, the Navy says it is proposing to add OBIAs to its SURTASS LFA employment plan. “The additional OBIAs reflect a thorough review of potential areas where SURTASS LFA sonar may be restricted from operating without significantly impacting the Navy’s required [anti-submarine warfare] readiness and training evolutions.”
The Navy lists 10 OBIAs, including areas off the U.S. East Coast, Costa Rica, and Hawaii. These areas and areas within 22 kilometers of coastlines will not receive sonar levels above 180 decibels referenced to 1 microPascal at 1 meter, according to the SEIS. The restrictions would apply to OBIAs during “biologically important seasons,” it says.
Near dive sites, LFA sonar would not operate above 145 decibels, it says. And to prevent injury to marine animals, the Navy when employing LFA sonar would conduct visual monitoring for marine mammals and sea turtles by trained personnel, use passive acoustic monitoring to listen for marine mammal sounds, and use active high-frequency sonar to detect and track marine mammals and sea turtles close to the LFA sonar’s transmit array, it says.
But the Navy rejects other measures suggested by the court. It says increasing the coastal standoff range from 22 kilometers to 46 kilometers would lower exposure to higher received levels of sonar for species closest to shore, but would do so “at the expense of increasing exposure levels for shelf break species and pelagic species,” the SEIS says.
The court order prompted the Navy to sponsor independent research on whether high intensity, low frequency sonar affects fish. The investigation found of two species examined so far, the high intensity sounds have had little or no effect on fish.
In considering whether to shut down LFA sonar for schools of fish, the Navy concludes that the likelihood for schools of fish to be exposed to sound pressure levels from LFA that would harm them is negligible. “Moreover, the implementation of fish mitigation measures is impractical,” it says, pointing to the lack of technology or methods to identify them.
And the Navy dismissed the court’s suggestion of additional monitoring and mitigation by using aircraft or small observational craft prior to operating LFA close to shore. The Navy’s evaluation of these found that “small boat and pre-operational aerial surveys for SURTASS LFA operations are not feasible because they are not practicable, not effective, may increase the harassment of marine mammals, and are not safe to the human performers,” the SEIS says.
The Navy is also proposing to drop interim operational frequency restrictions imposed by NMFS due to a new study. NMFS had restricted LFA operations to a frequency of 330 Hertz and below because it was not clear whether higher levels could cause resonance-related injuries to marine mammals, the SEIS says. But a 2002 NMFS study provides “empirical and documentary evidence that resonance and/or tissue damage from LFA transmissions are unlikely to occur in marine mammals at levels less than 190 dB for the frequency range 330 to 500 Hz.”
Wiley Hilburn, The Shreveport Times, Dec 5 05
In that sinking clear moment of high anxiety before a sudden, possibly life-altering crisis or collision, who hasn't thought, "This is the end of the world."
But what if the world was about to explode in the radioactive fire of a nuclear war and you had to, in effect, pull the trigger, with minutes to ponder consequences of the act? It would be the ultimate test of training and duty and country.
That shattering, doomsday scenario was acted out in December of 1968 -- 37 years ago -- by Travis Henderson, then of Choudrant, now of Ruston. Henderson was the 24-year-old reactor officer of the Polaris nuclear attack submarine, the USS Lewis and Clark. He was reactor operator EM-1, mate first class in charge of all generators, motors and electrical systems.
Henderson had earned his front-row seat in the Cold War by scoring high marks for what amounted to an engineer's degree crash course and more in the new, expanded submarine school after he volunteered for the Navy in May 1962. Travis knew that his short, stubby sub had its deadly mission. "Stay hid, ready to fire missiles if there's a war."
There were countless rehearsals, he said, always prefaced with "This is a drill." The crew took pride in its fast, record-breaking run-though, leading to the always-aborted attack.
But nothing had prepared Henderson and the Lewis and Clark crew for the admonition that went with the next action stations alert -- the klaxon siren that sounded like a crazy parrot -- that time in late 1968, somewhere in the North Atlantic.
"This is not a drill ... this is not a drill ... this is not a drill." The summons came in deep night, and Henderson pulled on his nylon blue nuclear submariner jumpsuit in open-mouth amazement and rushed to his station -- what amounted to the nuclear bridge.
All orders before were prefaced with, "This is a drill." "This is not a drill" put the issue in nightmare perspective for Henderson, who had all but fled Choudrant to see the world in the nuclear Navy of pioneering submariner Adm. Hyman Rickover.
Henderson knew the stakes. The Lewis and Clark was armed with 16 nuclear warheads which represented "more firepower than was dropped in all World War II."
Those world-ending destructive firepower numbers came easily to the lips of Henderson, safely at the Huddle House just the other day, blowing smoke into coffee. But back in the moment of Cold War, at the underwater tip of the spear, "I felt like it was the end of the world," Henderson said, over and over, not moving. "The end of the world."
The Lewis and Clark crew was then told the Soviet Union had already launched the dreaded first strike against New York; Washington, D.C.; Charleston, S.C.; and Norfolk, Va.
"My wife and children were in Charleston," Henderson said, biting his lip.
"Some people were crying," Henderson said. But there was no doubt of what had to be done. "Everybody thought to the last second we were fixing to shoot missiles," Henderson said.
"That was what the sub was built for. This is what we had trained for. We got everything ready (to fire) in record time. This was the way to do it. I knew the score."
Then, at almost the last second, "This is a drill," came over the intercom. At first, Henderson said, "There was hysterical relief and hugging ... complete relief."
"Then some were upset ... angry" at the tactic and even the mission, Henderson said. But soon training, commitment and duty restored, and even improved, morale. "This is what we trained for," Henderson repeated at the Huddle House, 37 years removed from the potential end of the world.
While Henderson and the Lewis and Clark were stalking the Soviet Union at the peak of the Cold War, America was enduring one of its hottest, most violent years in history -- at home and in Vietnam.
Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. were assassinated in 1968. The Democratic National Convention in Chicago nominated Hubert Humphrey for president (the Vietnam War led a broken Lyndon Johnson not to seek another term) in what amounted to an extended televised riot.
In the hot Vietnam War, LBJ upped troop totals to 524,000 and the bloody Communist offensive launched that year was actually a costly defeat for Hanoi, but it broke the back of the American public's will to continue a war that had become the most divisive in U.S. history.
Travis Henderson knew little of these momentous events aboard the sealed Lewis and Clark; only brief "Family-grams" and Navy news were communicated to the submarine.
Henderson's seven-year tour in the nuclear submarine service ended in May of 1969. A successful career at Xerox, based in Ruston, never matched the day the world almost ended in 1968.
Henderson and I grew up in seasons at the Huddle House. Henderson was always happy-go-lucky, the chief kidder at the restaurant.
I only accidentally surfaced his nuclear submarine experience in the last month. The revelation changed my view of Travis.
This smiling, joking man had, at 24 years of age, peered into the abyss of world-ending nuclear war and never blinked, though the vision must have been searing.
Henderson looked into the radioactive abyss, so we were spared the agony that lurked so desperately close throughout the 40-year Cold War. I salute him.
Blueprints from National Archives surface in Manitowoc
By Kristopher Wenn, Sheboygan Press, 4 Dec 05
MANITOWOC -- Talk to Gerald Pilger, 81, of Manitowoc, about the days when he worked on submarines for the Manitowoc Shipbuilding Company during World War II and he will say the keys in building the subs were the ship-engineering drawings or blueprints.
The drawings were guides showing builders how to construct vessels piece-by-piece until the 28 subs built here were finished war machines, a number of which were used in the Pacific Theater of Operations.
"I worked as a shipbuilder helper for the company and built the first eight of those ships," he said. "I took the 18th to war and had three successful combat patrol missions."
Shipbuilding was a skill that began with understanding the layout of the ship and reading the drawings' patterns in the mind, before the era of computerized design, he said.
The days of submarine building in Manitowoc may have passed, but the Wisconsin Maritime Museum has received one more piece of that history.
In November, drawings used to build 28 fleet submarines in the freshwater shipyard along the shores of the Manitowoc River arrived at the Wisconsin Maritime Museum from the National Archives and Records Administration in Washington D.C.
"We are known to be one of the largest repositories for World War II artifacts in the U.S. and we have the facilities to store such items," said Bill Thiesen, curator at the Wisconsin Maritime Museum. "We are considered a leader, so it was a done deal."
It is the museum's turn to take care of the drawings after years of trading hands between the submarine designers, builders and library archivists.
An affiliation with the Smithsonian Institution helped the museum's chances of becoming a suitable repository to preserve the drawings for research after personnel at the National Archives realized there was no longer space for the documents. The archives keep 2 percent of the drawings while the other 98 percent is stored at the museum, he said.
"In this case we got permission to send the plans because the museum had a strong interest in housing them," said Keith Kerr, archives specialist at the National Archives.
Kerr estimated the drawing collection, which weighs more than 1,200 pounds, consists of nearly 3,000 items. The drawings, sometimes called "linens" because of the print's linen-like material, range from large-scale designs to prints of the nuts and bolts of the vessels, he said.
During the war, one set of the plans was located at the Manitowoc Shipbuilding Company and back-ups were secretly stored inside the Rahr Malting Plant in the event the shipyard was attacked, Thiesen said.
"All the prints were designed by the Electric Boat Company in Groton (Conn.) and sent to Manitowoc for production, which served as another shipyard to build submarines. The ships were sent down the Mississippi River on barges before heading out for battle," said Bill Flanagan, member of the Submarine Force Library in Groton, Conn.
The future of the prints, says Thiesen, is "on hold."
Rather than open the boxes and sort through the drawings, the prints will remain stored in the museum's off-site facility until the museum receives grant funding for the cost of properly handling, cataloguing and researching them.
"We'll need extra help once it comes time to catalogue and organize the prints," he said.
The museum is seeking grants from the National Park Service and the Institute of Museum and Library Services, a federal agency in charge of assisting libraries and museums with collections.
Eventually, Thiesen envisions using a small percentage of the drawings for an exhibition. The remainder would be used for research, information, and preservation. A library archive housing the drawings will be off-limits, but the public can view prints if they've identified which ones they want to see.
The U.S. Navy stored the prints, official government documents, for 25 years after the submarine fleet was discontinued in the 1970s, Kerr said. The drawings were then transferred to the National Archives from the U.S. Navy. Before the museum was allowed to receive the drawings, the National Archives had to de-accession the prints - a process that officially takes the prints out of the possession of the National Archives and into the museum, he said.
Defense News, 2 Dec 05
India announced Dec. 2 ambitious acquisition plans for its navy and said the new military hardware would give it greater clout in the strategic energy corridors of the Indian Ocean.
It also said the Indian navy, besides constructing or buying ships, submarines and aircraft, was also building ties with countries in the region to expand its blue-water reach in the Indian Ocean.
“The Indian Ocean is now the highway along which over a quarter of the world’s trade and energy requirements move,” Indian Navy chief Adm. Arun Prakash told a news conference in New Delhi.
“The Asia-Pacific region holds immense promise for political, economic and military cooperation and the vital role maritime forces play in this regard makes the Indian Navy a key component of the nation’s foreign policy.”
The 137-ship navy played an international role during last December’s tsunami last December when New Delhi deployed its warships to help devastated Sri Lanka and Indonesia.
Analysts saw the move as a bid by India, which rejected Western bilateral offers of help during the tsunami, to project itself as a regional power with off-shore military strength.
“It became our defining moment as people could perceive the speed with we could react (to the tsumani),” Prakash said of the operation to help victims in two foreign countries as well as in India’s far-flung Andamans archipelago.
“The exercises we undertook with various navies in the past year underline the theme that we have reached out far into the Indian Ocean region,” he added.
The navy has already handed out contracts for construction of 27 vessels to state-owned ship-builders and has embarked on its grandest mission to indigenously build an aircraft carrier, Prakash said.
“We’re reducing dependence on foreign suppliers to cut down revenue drain and uncertainties in supplies,” he said, adding that a recent $2.1 billion deal to acquire six French Scorpene submarines would enhance naval strength.
“There are 36 more ships on the cards and I don’t think there is any navy in the world which currently has such a large project in hand,” he said.
“India aspires to a certain position in the world and so we must have a navy commensurate to our needs,” he said, adding New Delhi has asked Russia, its largest military supplier, to provide three latest destroyer-class warships.
Senior military officials said the navy was also shopping for 30 long-range helicopters to replace its British-built Sea King rotorcraft and was awaiting a U.S. offer to lease to India two anti-submarine warfare P-3 Orion aircraft.
“We have not yet received the offer for the Orions and we think it could turn out to be a very costly project,” the admiral said.
The navy was also awaiting delivery of a refurbished Soviet-era aircraft carrier from the Russians as well a wide-bodied Illushyn-76 aircraft - re-configured for maritime surveillance.
India, which declared itself a nuclear weapons state after exploding a string of atomic devices in 1998, is seeking to establish a triad of land, air and sea launch platforms for missile-based weapons.
Admiral Prakash said the navy, which has bases in the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal, was also working on a complex project to link up its warships and submarines via satellite.
“We’ve taken small steps in this major direction as this is a very complex and expensive project,” he said, adding the navy would fund construction of an exclusive satellite for the project if necessary.
The Canadian Press , 1 December 2005
HALIFAX (CP) _ Canada's only working submarine came home looking a little battered Thursday after losing at least 70 acoustic tiles in rough seas.
HMCS Windsor participated for six weeks in its first major exercises with the Canadian and U.S. navies off the eastern seaboard.
Waves sucked off the rubber tiles meant to keep the sub's position secret by masking its acoustic signature and reflecting sonar signals from other vessels.
“We had a fair bit of rough weather,” said Lt.-Cmdr. Luc Cassivi, Windsor's skipper.
Losing the tiles didn't make a “significant” difference to the sub's performance, he said. “We were quite stealthy,” he said of the exercises in which Windsor sailed with a Canadian task group made up of ships Montreal, Ville De Quebec, Fredericton, Glace Bay, Shawinigan and Moncton.
The submarine experienced smoke problems from an overheating transformer Oct. 30 off Nova Scotia. Smoke drifted into a forward engine compartment and crews were called to emergency stations.
Cassivi downplayed the incident, saying “a little piece of electrical wiring with lacquer on it the size of a coffee mug overheated.”
“It was really a non-event for us,” he said.
Windsor, which spent 75 days at sea this year, is one of four used subs Canada purchased from Britain for $891 million. It is slated to go back to sea in February.
HMCS Corner Brook has been out of service since April 2004. Both HMCS Victoria and HMCS Chicoutimi, which caught fire last year, killing Lieut. Chris Saunders of Halifax, are also out of commission. (Halifax Chronicle-Herald)