Carriers in the Middle East and unmanned integration in warfare | Navy updates

Hello, my name is Admiral Jamie Fogo, United States Navy retired, and I'm the Dean of the

Center for Maritime Strategy at the Navy League of the United States in Washington, D.C

There's a lot happening in the Middle East right now. As some of you may know, over the weekend

Iran launched live fire drills near or in the Straits of Hormuz, temporarily shutting down

this vital waterway, which carries about 20% of global oil traffic and could become a direct

maritime flashpoint. At the same time, President Trump has deployed a second aircraft carrier

to the Middle East as negotiations continue in Geneva on US Iranian nuclear arms talks

Now, the value of those aircraft carriers that are operating in the shores near to our Middle

Eastern allies and friends, and also Iran, are significant. First of all, the USS Abraham Lincoln

comes from the Pacific theater and we are perfectly capable of swinging assets, particularly nuclear

powered aircraft carriers and their strike groups from one theater to the next in a very short period

of time to answer the needs of the United States of America or the president of the United States That second carrier USS Gerald R Ford has been operating for quite some time in both the European and Middle Eastern theaters recently was down in the Caribbean for the

operations in Venezuela, and is now swinging back into the Middle East

What does that tell you about our carriers? They're able to move fast, dwell on station for a long time, conduct foreign presence from

a sovereign airfield, a couple of acres of sovereign space anywhere in the world with

some of the most sophisticated strike fighters. It gives the president options. It gives him

the ability to let our adversaries know that we're there. It gives him the option of executing

deterrence and if deterrence fails, it gives him the option of using a big stick to get

what we need and what we want in the theater. The second issue that came up this past week was, of course, we had a big conference out

in San Diego West with the U.S. Naval Institute and AFCIA. There was a lot of discussion of Navy thinking and retooling on command of robotic and autonomous systems

I think Admiral Caudill has made it clear that the preponderance of force in our fleet going to be around for a very long time are those manned systems to include destroyers to include a future frigate to include submarines both SSNs and SSBNs

and of course, nuclear-powered aircraft carriers. The life expectancy of some of the surface ships

that I just mentioned in the submarines is notionally about 30 years. In many cases

we've gone to 40 years and an aircraft carrier lasts for 50 years. So Enterprise retired at about

50 and Nimitz will retire at about the same amount of time of service, which is just amazing

So Ford and her sister ships will be around for 50 years. So that's the point. The preponderance

of force to be used in naval warfare will be those manned platforms. The augmentation force

comes from the unmanned systems. And I, like you, would much rather send an unmanned system into

harm's way because I don't want to lose US Navy sailors. Admiral Cottle calls this the hedge part

of the strategy. The niche capability that these unmanned systems, whether they be airborne on the

surface or subsurface, bring to the capabilities of the fleet. The last thing that happened in the

last week which is significant and very interesting and near and dear to my heart is the strategic command shifts in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization We just had the Munich Security Conference over the weekend and prior to convening

that conference in Munich, Germany, there was an announcement that two senior joint force commands

in NATO will shift nations who are in command. So my old command of Joint Force Command Naples in

Italy, Allied Joint Force Command will shift from an American commander to an Italian commander

Time frame is not currently stated. And Allied Joint Force Command Norfolk in Norfolk, Virginia

will also shift from an American commander to a British commander in the near future. Time frame

not necessarily stated. The Supreme Allied Commander will remain in his seat and the U.S

will assume command of NATO MARCOM or the maritime command in Northwich UK. Again, time frame has not

been discussed. Am I concerned about that? Absolutely not. I think one NATO commander is a professionally

trained warrior and is equally interchangeable with any other NATO commander, and I think our

alliance is in good hands. Thanks very much for the opportunity to give you an update this week