The US Navy held its annual strategy forum last month in Newport Rhode Island. The topics discussed were no surprise to me when I heard them. They are in line with the headlines and that we have observed and line up perfectly with the posts that we have been making in this blog.
CNO Admiral Gary Roughhead brought up several of the issues which our Navy ring customers will have to deal with in the future. His topics of conversation were the free flow of commerce across the worlds waterways (which alludes to the problem of piracy), the protection of undersea cables and fiberoptics, expanding worldwide responsibilities, and a shrinking budget.
The navy is the smallest that it has ever been but the mission that it has to perform is larger than ever. It’s budget is shrinking and drastic budget cuts are in the future.
I think that the biggest problem that our navy will have to face is the Chinese naval buildup. The Chinese are adding offensive weapons to their arsenal and there is no doubt in my mind that they want to project worldwide naval power and not self defense as they claim. We must make wiser decisions with our strategy, technology, and budget decisions now and in the future or we will find ourselves in a serious mess.
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