SBattleforAtlanticCaseStudyPageOne

By Steven D. Mercatante [1]

Introduction

On February 6, 2006, the Department of Defense issued the Quadrennial Defense Review
Report (QDR). Among other things this expansive one hundred plus page document
examined the United States' long-term defense requirements. As part of this review, the
Department of Defense is seeking to "prepare for wider asymmetric challenges and to
hedge against uncertainty over the next 20 years."[2] The QDR, and subsequent
documents issued by the Department of Defense has thus in part advocated exploration
into indirect approaches to warfare; a theory ascribing to attacking the enemy where he
least suspects, avoiding enemy strengths, and striking at weakness.[3] Nevertheless, what
happens if a competitor and potential enemy such as China, a country singled out in
Department of Defense documents such as the QDR as one posing particular concern to
the United States, [4] seeks to engage in asymmetrical attempts to rectify power
imbalances versus the United States military?

China, more than any other country in the world, is looking to flex its newfound muscle and
challenge US military hegemony in the Pacific. In particular, the Chinese are building up
impressive capabilities regarding ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, torpedoes, and
submarines[5] all representing significant threats to perhaps the greatest source for US
military supremacy; the unrivalled power enjoyed by the US Navy (USN) and her domination
over the worlds seas. Included in China's naval buildup are plans for a substantial
submarine fleet, not unlike those built by the 20th Century German and Soviet rivals to the
British Royal Navy and USN.

Much as the Royal Navy early in the twentieth century, the US Navy in the twenty first
century acts as an international policeman on the high seas. As such, the USN faces many
potential threats from both state and non-state actors. This article examines whether the
United States is missing the proverbial boat regarding two key asymmetric naval threats.
First, has the USN adequately prepared to counter a peer competitor choosing to arm in an
asymmetric manner, i.e. China? Second, has the USN used the three years since the 2006
QDR's publication to counter pressing and real threats to the U.S. protected global
maritime trade network - most prominently the impact on trade caused by marauding
pirates off the Horn of Africa?

The answer to these questions lies not just in what the USN does today but also whether
the USN learns from its not so distant past. In that past an emerging continental colossus,
this time German, with a potent asymmetric naval threat represented by her Second World
War era U-boat fleet, nearly rendered irrelevant the combined power deployed by the
British Empire's massive Royal Navy and the emerging American superpower's equally
impressive surface fleet.

Prior to the Second World War the potential major naval combatants spent considerable
time and money preparing for a decisive naval battle involving great fleets of capital ships
in the open waters of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. The expense on these vast fleets
seemed justified when on December 7, 1941 the Japanese carrier fleet devastated the US
Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor. The same Japanese carrier aircraft followed the Pear Harbor
raid with a series of blows reaching across the vast Pacific. These Japanese attacks drove
the Royal Navy from Asian waters and evicted the United States from her Philippine and
Central Pacific holdings.

Even before Pearl Harbor, however, a far greater threat to Britain's existence than the
Imperial Japanese Navy had, over two years, steadily chipped away at British naval and
economic strength. Moreover, this same threat delivered a far more devastating setback to
the US war effort than the defeat at Pearl Harbor. A setback occurring during a battle
waged in the littoral waters off the American coast. That common enemy bringing Britain to
her knees and then America to the brink of irrelevance in the war in Europe was the
German U-boat.

Although the Battle of the Atlantic fought by the western Allies ended in Allied victory, it
proved a closely fought campaign lasting the European war's duration. This critical battle
represented not only the longest naval campaign during the twentieth century but also the
longest running submarine war in history. Characterized by incredible sways in fortune, the
battle's outcome remained in doubt for much of the war. The Battle of the Atlantic's
intensity is best understood when one considers that of the 5,140 Allied merchant ships,
representing 21,500,000 tons of shipping sunk across the globe during the Second World
War, more than half of these losses occurred in the North Atlantic.[6] The vast majority of
this destruction was directly attributable to German U-boats. These U-boats represented
one of the most efficient uses of men and material in the entire war.

In spite of this recent lesson, the most powerful navy in the world since WWII - the US
Navy insists on concentrating primarily on building a massive blue water fleet organized to
defeat a similarly armed and trained peer competitor. Meanwhile the USN's primary
potential opponents develop extensive asymmetric capabilities - in this case both littoral as
well as undersea. Therefore, it is a good time to revisit the Battle of the Atlantic, when
German U-boats seriously threatened the Allied ability to project power across the Atlantic
Ocean. A US Navy built for war against Japan in WWII almost was rendered impotent by a
small, cheaply built U-boat fleet. Is the USN today repeating past mistakes regarding
inadequate levels of funding for weapons and tactics specific to a possible asymmetric war
in the Pacific Ocean, or the current asymmetric challenges to the global trade network?

To answer these questions we will return first to the era between the world wars. An era
in which the Royal Navy, much like the USN today, seemingly reigned dominant over the
world's seas and during a time when a powerful continental power, Germany, much like
China today, prepared for a potential war at sea by facing and almost overcoming
significant pre-existing handicaps.

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