In any conceivable future, the U.S. Navy will be central to making and keeping the peace. This is a key lesson from the Cold War period, but it has been largely forgotten. It will take presidential leadership to square this circle.
Maintaining a strong Navy used to be taken for granted; it was obvious to everyone from Main Street to the White House that not only was it the right thing to do, but it also was in the nation’s economic and security self-interest. At the end of the Cold War, however, the notion of the Navy as a global peacekeeping and peacemaking force collapsed along with the Berlin Wall.
This is not an issue of simply picking up where the Cold War left off. The Navy today has shrunk to perilous levels, and the broad national and human infrastructure required to maintain it—a Constitutional requirement—has atrophied to a dangerous degree. To make matters worse, we seem to have forgotten how to dig ourselves out of the deep hole we have created.
In reality, rebuilding the Navy is a relatively straightforward task. It starts with recruiting, training, and putting to work the men and women necessary to build and maintain the fleet. This will be a job for industry, government, and schools at every level. The effort and expense should fit nicely with the emerging public and political determination to re-energize the country and its place in the world. After all, the Navy and its shore establishment are critical national infrastructure and contribute greatly to both U.S. economic and industrial vitality.
But straightforward doesn’t mean easy. Restoring the Navy is not just building more of what we have. We are in a period of profound technological change, and that broad transformation is affecting the character of war in every domain, including at sea. The tools and techniques of naval warfare are changing faster than ever, in what always has been a competition of technology and ever-advancing weapon systems. Determining the correct industrial, technological, and operational approaches will require the nation’s best minds and judgments—and presidential leadership, the likes of which the great wartime navalists Washington, Lincoln, the Roosevelts, and Reagan enthusiastically embraced.
President Donald Trump will face the challenge of confronting and deterring the forming axis of chaos—China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea. Therefore, in this “Cold War Redux,” the Navy will have to be global, present, on the strategic and operational offensive, and ready to fight. If this sounds like the old Cold War Navy, it should. It will require a fleet forward deployed and operating at strength in every region; trained, equipped, and ready in every physical and moral aspect.
The stakes are high. Command of the sea is a virtuous circle. The strategic economic implications alone are enormous. Conversely, the consequences for the United States should it fail to develop, sustain, and maintain its sea power advantages are dire. The competitive unease is increasingly palpable.
Are the budgetary and political investments worth it? Financially, the deterrence and warfighting power the Navy provides always have been pennies-on-the-dollar investments in national security and prosperity. As a strategic expression of presidential leadership, national will, and commitment to peace and security, the geopolitical payoff far exceeds the price.