The U.S. Naval Institute on Naval Cooperation

By Naval Institute Press

All naval professionals—without exception—encounter, directly participate, or play a supporting role in naval cooperation. It is a key element in the U.S. defense strategy because military and naval operations today are usually conducted by international coalitions and fighting alongside foreign navies is an expected aspect of current and future naval warfare. Activities in support of mutual defense include bilateral and multilateral exercises, international programs such as cooperative acquisition and foreign military sales, combined training, and efforts towards increased interoperability. This volume is intended to provide a basic familiarization to all aspects of the subject and detailed understanding of relevant recent issues. Since there is no formal training offered on the subject for naval professionals—with the exception of certain specialized personnel—the book is designed to bridge the existing gap in knowledge about naval cooperation.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Naval Institute Press
• Release date: Aug 15, 2015
• ISBN: 9781612518633

Book preview

INTRODUCTION

Every Sailor who has made a foreign port visit, stood watch during a multinational exercise, or navigated a ship in accordance with the Rules of the Road, has been a part of international naval cooperation. Since the International Rules of the Road, designed to prevent collisions at sea, were created by treaty, international naval cooperation is literally something no Sailor, Marine, or naval officer can avoid.

It is the nature of both strategy and the sea that ships and fleets interact with those of other nations in peace more often than encountering each other as hostile forces in war. In order to survive such interactions in the ever-changing physical conditions of the inherently dangerous maritime environment, ships must maintain at least a small degree of cooperation. The universal moral principle that ships and aircraft should attempt rescue of the survivors of foundering vessels and shipwrecks no matter their nationality is an immemorial custom of the naval service.

In recent years, international naval cooperation has been a subject with which all naval professionals have become at least superficially acquainted. From then–Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) Admiral Michael Mullen’s discussion in 2005 of his vision of A 1000-Ship Navy, to its codification in the 2007 Sea Services’ strategy entitled A Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower, and to its implementation as Global Maritime Partnerships (e.g., the Africa Partnership Station [APS]), international naval cooperation has evolved into a primary focus of U.S. naval strategy.¹ But APS and similar efforts are but one form in a spectrum of cooperation. Steaming with North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) navies and other treaty allies determined to deter war in their region—as the United States has done for over 60 years—is the epitome of cooperation, the high end of the spectrum. International naval cooperation is certainly not a new policy, even if it has received a lot of recent (and sometimes prolix) discussions.

What Is International Naval Cooperation?

So what exactly do we mean by international naval cooperation, and why is there a wheel book about it?

International naval cooperation is a very broad term, perhaps even too broad. There is no official Department of Defense definition, but international naval cooperation describes a virtual myriad of programs and activities for one overarching goal: to enhance the interoperability of U.S. naval forces with foreign navies and militaries to achieve mutual strategic objectives. Here we are also using the term interoperability quite broadly, not simply referring to the compatibility of technical systems.

To achieve interoperability requires the experience of operating together, an experience that requires learning, performing collaborative tasks, and having trust that the other collaborators will remain professional, cooperative, and without harmful intent. The agreed upon actions of collaboration can be consider programs, even if they are not referred to as such. Those that are referred to as programs generally involve shared resources. However, combined exercises—as described in the eighth entry in this wheel book, RIMPAC Builds Partnerships that Last—can also be considered an international program.

Programs can be formal or informal. With the exception of exercises and training conducted under the control of the combatant commanders, most of the formal cooperative naval international programs are managed by the Navy International Programs Office (NIPO)—a Department of the Navy organization (with an obvious name) reporting to the assistant secretary of the Navy (Research, Development and Acquisition). The formal programs include foreign military sales (FMS), the selling of military equipment to another nation; collaborative research and development; personnel exchange programs; and direct participation in collaborative acquisition programs such as the NATO Sea Sparrow missile, now know as ESSM (Extended-range Sea Sparrow Missile). For the ESSM program, the Navy program manager reports to a consortium of defense ministries, not just to the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD). The fifth entry, Naval International Programs: ‘It’s About Relationships,’ discusses the NIPO programs.

Informal programs range more widely. Military-to-military talks, such as those that led to the Cold War U.S.-Soviet Incidents at Sea Agreement (INCSEA), whose genesis is detailed in the eighteenth entry, are efforts to conduct a periodic dialogue between U.S. armed forces and those of other nations in order to resolve deck-plates issues concerning interoperability, exercises, and other operational forms of direct cooperation. With allies (and sometimes potential opponents), such mil-to-mil talks are often conducted on a formal schedule, but with new partners these talks are more ad hoc. The construction of coalitions of the willing (as described in the sixteenth entry, The New ‘Coalition of the Willing’) may occur along very informal lines, with a command structure agreed upon in midstream.

There are other forms of cooperation that occur simply through the adherence to international law. U.S. naval commanders are required by regulation to adhere in their actions to the international (customary and statute) law of the sea, law of war, and other specified treaties. This is discussed in the ninth entry, International Law and the Naval Commander. As noted earlier, the International Rules of the Road are codified by treaty and therefore constitute an international law requiring direct actions of a cooperative nature. The act itself of creating international law is certainly an effort of cooperation on the part of nations. The United Nations organization is but one forum through which agreement on international law is forged. It should be remembered, however, that some nations do not adhere to international law, and some impose their own unique interpretation that minimizes cooperation with others—a situation that the naval professional may encounter in the South China Sea and elsewhere.

Having considered the above discussion, the point of having a wheel book on international naval cooperation begins to become clear. All naval professionals will be involved in many forms of international naval cooperation during their assignments. Cooperation with other militaries is a part of naval strategy. International naval cooperation efforts do include warfighting. Since there is a wide range of international programs run by the naval services, along with other forms of cooperation on sea and land, it is helpful to have a tool that makes the objections, strategy, methods, and impact of naval cooperation even clearer. This book does not include discussions of all programs or forms of cooperation, but it does cover the most important forms and gives a good sense of what this broad-beamed subject is about.

Organization of This Wheel Book

This wheel book is divided into six parts, each representing a different aspect of naval cooperation. The entries were selected not because they were inclusive of all aspects of naval cooperation, but because they were outstanding discussions of a major aspect of the subject. Part I, Alliances, Coalitions, and Partners, identifies the objective of the United States in fostering international naval cooperation and discusses strategic, warfighting, deterrence, and security-sponsoring aspects of treaty alliances, operation coalitions, and program partners. NATO is prominently discussed, along with the Africa Partnership Station. The entries of Part II, International Programs, Visits, and Exercises, detail some of the formal programs—those involving resource management and acquisition; the cooperative benefits of port visits; and exercises, of which Rim of the Pacific Exercise (RIMPAC) is the example used. Part III, International Law and Diplomacy, discusses the cooperative (and sometimes discordant) aspects of international law; the responsibilities of naval attachés; the controversy over the Law of the Sea treaty; and the current challenge of convincing the People’s Republic of China to accept international law and mediation in its maritime disputes. Part IV, on Maritime Security, provides greater depth in examining the naval mission that most frequently involves coalitions and partnership in at-sea operations. Part V, Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief, contains a case study on typhoon relief in Indonesia that was spearheaded by the U.S. Navy and evolved into an international cooperative effort. The final part, Part VI, Encounters at Sea, describes a past effort on mitigating potentially dangerous armed encounters at sea through a navy-to-navy agreement. This, too, has implications for current encounters in the Pacific Ocean and Persian Gulf.

Proceedings has published a wealth of commentary on international naval cooperation since it was established (although the term cooperation is not always used). In addition to articles, in recent years each March issue has been titled the International Navies Issue, containing short remarks by the chiefs of staff of many foreign navies—usually discussing cooperation. A guide to further readings of contemporary articles in Proceedings follows the entries of this wheel book.

For those who want to do their own assessments (and writing) on naval cooperation, I suggest two alternate means of handling the broad topic. The first is to evaluate cooperation in terms of the relationships between U.S. naval forces and other militaries in terms of direct objectives and levels of commitment. The second is to evaluate cooperation in terms of mission.

Assessing by Relationship

If cooperation is described in terms of the level of commitment toward working together, such associations can be divided into three categories: alliances, coalitions, and partnerships. As previously noted, the order is of descending levels of commitment. Treaty alliances are expected (or hoped) to be permanent relations in which the members pledge to commit military forces even to the level of warfighting on behalf of another’s security. Examples of alliances include NATO and the bilateral treaties between the United States and Japan, the United States and South Korea, and the United States and Australia (along with New Zealand, although that relationship has had unique political strains).² The distinctive feature is that the parties have pledged to go to war together against a common enemy. In naval operations, treaty allies strive for the highest level of interoperability, often collaborating in common acquisition programs (such as the AEGIS weapons system or F-35 aircraft), in the sharing of intelligence data, in a common doctrine, and through extensive, frequent exercises. Alliances have tight command structures to which the interoperative militaries adhere and the same (or very similar) rules of engagement (ROE).

In contrast, coalitions are not expected to be permanent, nor are they necessarily the result of treaties, but do represent a level of commitment that includes the application of force in a particular situation and for limited objectives. The famous coalition of the forces committed to Operation Desert Storm in 1991 included nations that might otherwise have extensive political differences, but were united for one specific and limited objective: removal of Iraqi forces from Kuwait. (Both NATO allies and a coalition of the willing were involved in Operation Desert Storm, as they have been in Iraq and Afghanistan.) The Desert Storm coalition also had a tight command structure, with an acknowledged military commander, even if most members could not be fully integrated and had to fight alongside each other rather than as a fully integrated command. Once the objective was achieved, the coalition dissolved, although relations between various members may have been strengthen by the experience.

Subsequent coalitions quickly arranged to deal with emerging crises are frequently referred to as coalitions of the willing, although the phrase is a bit redundant. By definition, members of a coalition enter it willingly. The coalition of the willing term, however, implies that members may be nations who do not normally cooperate, and may accept an overall commander on the scene but not share the same ROE. The term also implies that the members might drop out of the coalition if ongoing events or decisions displease them. The coalition is effective only as long as the specific objective of each member corresponds.

Partnerships are much more vague arrangements and sometimes do not represent an explicitly stated arrangement at all. Military partnerships, as the concept is used today, represent cooperation in some form to achieve a generalized objective having to do either directly or indirectly with mutual security. The relationship may be totally unbalanced, with one partner providing a preponderant amount of resources, and commitment to the partnership may suddenly change depending on changes in the political environment. For the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD), partnership often means the furnishing of equipment and training (usually free) to nations that cannot otherwise afford effective security. Activities involved are often described as building partner capacity.

It is also possible to have maritime cooperation between nations that have no political relationship at all, if those involved adhere to an international code of conduct, such as the Rules of the Road. There, the commitment is simply to act in a certain way under certain circumstances to avoid greater, more difficult interaction—such as a collision.

Assessing the level of commitment provides insights into the art of the possible concerning which activities a particular partner might be willing to engage in if a particular future crisis occurs, and the likely outcome of the relationship if placed under stress.

Defined by Mission

As implied earlier, international naval cooperation can be more effectively achieved when engaging in certain missions than in others. During a peacetime transit through the territorial waters of a friendly nation, navies generally cooperate by applying the International Rules of the Road, neither colliding with nor harassing each other. The navies may cooperate even further by conducting passing exercises (PASSEXs) in which both gain some useful training and require only a minimum of coordination. In contrast, forging a coalition of the willing to engage in combat is tough stuff indeed.

A Global Network of Navies is not an alliance, and should not be expected to carry out all the missions that a tight alliance would conduct. Rather, its effectiveness can be assessed by identifying which missions—such as regional deterrence, power projection to halt crises, maritime security, or humanitarian assistance/disaster relief—it can actually carry out. The question to be asked and answered is whether or not the particular mission that a partnership has the capacity and will to conduct can be conducted in a way (or to an effect) that is in the interest of U.S. national security. Mutual interest does not mean altruism. If an action taken in partnership is not in the interest of one of the parties (such as the United States), then mutual interests do not exist, and in that particular situation the partnership—even with the utmost expressions of goodwill—is moot.

There are indeed partnerships that are special relationships—ties that bind so strongly because of shared historical experiences that, even when interests don’t coincide exactly, the parties are willing to support each other in the most difficult of circumstances (the relationships between the United States and the United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia come to mind). But most partnerships will never be that strong, so their effectiveness is best assessed in concrete, practical, and proximate terms, such as: Does the partnership actually suppress piracy in the region, or is piracy relatively unaffected? From a direct interest point of view, does the partnership make up for otherwise constrained U.S. resources? Can it lead to greater mutual commitment to stability, or does it simply make us feel good for having taken some sort of action? If the partnership did not exist, would anything be different?

In assessing efforts at building partner capacity—when we are providing resources to fund or aid another’s military capabilities—the criteria might be even more stringent: Are the resources being used as intended, or are they being wasted? Will the receiving partner be able to maintain the systems we provide once our support is shifted to another partner or project? Does the effort encourage corruption, or is the capacity going to be used in ways we don’t want it to be used—like invading a neighbor or suppressing legal trade?

The assessment of the mission that is intended to be accomplished is an assessment of value of the partnership itself.

Critics of the Current Approach to Cooperation

It must be noted that there are critics to the U.S. Navy’s emphasis on partnerships. Their concern is that the more the U.S. naval leadership emphasizes acting with partners, the less they (or U.S. political decision makers and/or the public) realize that U.S. naval forces are capable of acting alone, and, of necessity, must be able to act alone when other nations do not share the same national security interests.³ Although there are other navies that can make far deployments, only the U.S. Navy is truly globally capable and has global interests and responsibilities.

The critics would take particular issue with the very first entry, a good introduction to the practical U.S. national security objectives of cooperation, but one that advocates combined regional force-allocation planning and to better integrate key allies into U.S. campaign plans. The first recommendation begs the question of exactly which partners will provide what forces to be allocated. The second, however, is nothing new; the United States integrated the capabilities of key allies (NATO, Japan, South Korea, Australia, and others) into Cold War campaign plans. The author uses the term interchangeability rather than interoperability to describe this integration, and he envisions the U.S. Navy basing its plans around a near certainty that allied or partner nations will replace U.S. forces with their own to carry out a particular mission or task while U.S. naval forces are diverted elsewhere. This is an idea that spins up the critics.

Some critics reject relying on allies at all, even though, historically, the times in which the United States has relied on allies have resulted in success. We may remember President George Washington’s admonition (usually overinterpreted) that we should avoid entangling alliances, even when we forget that it was the then-allied (later hostile) French fleet that—through its tactical victory in the Battle of the Virginia Capes, 5 September 1781—prevented reinforcement of the British army at Yorktown, thereby causing its surrender to Washington and ensuring U.S. independence. That would certainly seem a positive result from naval cooperation.

In fairness, the critics do raise valid concerns. Reliance on partners is a strategic choice that should not be made through buzzwords or the creative rhetoric of a well-drafted policy paper. Hopefully our decision makers will make choices on how much to rely on any particular partnership based on the assessment criteria we discussed earlier; again, we are talking strategic interests, not how good it feels to be partners.

You Can’t Surge Trust

Having dismissed buzzwords and rhetoric, it is ironic that we conclude this initial introduction with a phrase that threatens, through growing overuse, to become a cliché. But it is a true statement: you can’t surge trust with allies, coalition members, or partners, in the same way you can surge (ready) warships out of home port