Airsea Battle VS Offshore Control: Can the US Blockade China?
To slay or strangle the dragon, that is the question. Do Mahan or Corbett have the answer?
[IMG]http://thediplomat.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/5880_5243a9ba07cd6-386x275.jpg[/IMG]
James-R-Holmes_q
By James R. Holmes
[URL="http://thediplomat.com/2013/08/airsea-battle-vs-offshore-control-can-the-us-blockade-china/"]August 19, 2013[/URL]
Retired Marine Corps colonel T. X. Hammes and Center for Naval Analyses researcher Elbridge Colby have been trading salvoes over the merits of AirSea Battle for the past couple of weeks. (Coolest names ever for a pair of debaters.) Writing over at The National Interest, Colby mounts a defense of the ASB doctrine. He maintains in effect that the U.S. armed forces must develop some way to kick in the door should China slam it shut in the Western Pacific. In his rejoinder, Hammes denies that AirSea Battle is a strategy while propounding his alternative concept of "offshore control.” It's a good, and necessary, debate. Have a look at all three installments.
In a nutshell, offshore control means sealing off the first island chain to keep PLA Navy shipping from reaching the broad Pacific; waging submarine and aerial warfare to deny China access to its own offshore waters and skies; and imposing a distant blockade to bring economic pressure on Beijing. Over time, China might relinquish its goals to stop the pain. Offshore control abjures strikes at sites on the mainland — the most objectionable part of AirSea Battle — as needlessly escalatory in a campaign for limited aims.
On the whole, methinks Colonel Hammes has the better of this exchange of fire. My stalwart coauthor Toshi Yoshihara and I have floated similar ideas over the past three years or so, albeit in scattershot fashion and without the catchy bumper sticker (see here) (and here). The point of such strategies is to put asymmetric warfare to work for the United States and its allies, harnessing such advantages as undersea combat to exhaust the adversary without sending a limited conflict spiraling toward the nuclear threshold.
By Clausewitzian cost/benefit logic, Beijing should abandon the effort should it cost too much, drag on without end, or appear unwinnable. Let's not kid ourselves, though. Neither offshore control nor some kindred concept would bring about a quick, neat, or sure victory. If China attaches inordinate — or what looks inordinate to outsiders — value to political objects such as Taiwan or its maritime territorial claims, the Clausewitzian formula suggests Beijing may expend massive resources, indefinitely, to fulfill its goals. Or, as a great man once said, "No war is over until the enemy says it's over. We may think it over, we may declare it over, but in fact, the enemy gets a vote.”
Even a limited maritime conflict, then, would involve a trial of wills in which the adversary would cast his vote against America, and might stand by that vote. How would such a struggle play out? One running debate among maritime strategists is whether navies win wars and, in particular, whether naval blockades can be strategically decisive. Mahan thinks so. The Mahanian algorithm instructs the good guys to vanquish the enemy's battle fleet. Battle represents a prelude to blockading his shores and doing the other things mastery of the sea empowers victorious navies to do. Corbett is a heretic by contrast, urging naval commanders to work with the army to shape events on land. For him, joint action at the land/sea interface constitutes the essence of maritime strategy.
Quoth Corbett, the only way a navy can win all by itself is through "a process of exhaustion." It can sever the enemy's economic and military lifelines and seize control of his "national life." He sounds skeptical, though, and that's because he sees a drawback. Prolonged economic warfare cuts both ways. It exhausts not just the enemy but friendly powers, not to mention one's own constituents who depend on foreign commerce for their livelihoods. Keeping the populace and the allies on the same sheet of music while their economic self-interest suffers poses a challenge, to say the least.
This is a prospect no strategist relishes. War Plan Orange, the interwar U.S. Navy's plan for fighting Japan, predicted a long grind. And that was against a small island state that could be cordoned off far more easily than can continental China. Nor does the United States enjoy the lopsided economic and industrial advantages over China that it commanded over Imperial Japan. In a way, then, offshore control renews the old grudge match between Mahan and Corbett and bets on Mahan. If Corbett (Colby) has it right, a distant blockade could prove indecisive, politically unsustainable, or both. What then?
Another dimension of this debate bears mentioning. Chinese sea power fuses seagoing and shore-based assets into a single implement. PLA commanders would presumably use all assets at their disposal, sea and land, once Chinese vessels started descending to Davy Jones' locker. What if anti-ship cruise or ballistic missiles or combat aircraft flying from airfields ashore started landing heavy blows against allied fleets, whether underway or berthed in ports like Yokosuka or Sasebo? Would Washington or Tokyo really exempt land-based PLA weaponry from counterstrikes should Beijing unleash it?
If so, they would be granting the adversary one heckuva sanctuary. In short, two can escalate. Whether allied political leaders could resist popular pressure to retaliate against the source of attacks on their ships, their sons, and their daughters is a question worth pondering.
Proponents of peripheral strategies can critique AirSea Battle all they want. It needs to be vetted. But at the same time, they need to tidy up their own alternatives. Clausewitz warns against Monday-morning quarterbacking, daring would-be RG3s to come up with better strategies of their own. An alternative then has to undergo the same exacting scrutiny as the strategy its backers want to replace. Something better may emerge from the give-and-take process.
Thesis, antithesis, synthesis; that Hegel guy was on to something.
Debating a Strategy for World War III
[URL="http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/debating-strategy-world-war-iii-8941"]Harry J. Kazianis[/URL]
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August 24, 2013
Over the last several weeks TNI has hosted a spirited debate regarding American military strategy when it comes to a possible conflict with the People’s Republic of China. As a strategic-studies watcher and Asia security hand myself, I wish to applaud the professionalism and candor both sides displayed. There is nothing like a spirited debate allowing ideas to be vetted, challenged and ultimately made stronger. Considering the theoretical topic—what would likely be a Third World War—it is a debate worthy of our most serious attention.
Such a contest at its core pits two very different visions against one another in an attempt to define one of the most daunting security challenges America faces today—the growing military might of China.
C̣n tiếp.
While each side—AirSea Battle and Offshore Control—both have their own merits and drawbacks; I would like to offer some concluding points as we wrap up (at least for now) what has been a worthy contribution to this important discussion that has much larger repercussions when we begin to consider what type of military the United States will need in the future.
AirSea Battle: It’s Still an Operational Concept
This is a point I myself and several others have made. But it seems clear ASB could be rolled into a larger war plan and quite worthy of being compared to other strategies in a broader debate. Since DoD war plans are classified, comparing ASB and OC is a difficult challenge for sure. However, we do know that ASB would attempt to create a higher level of joint combat operations to hinder the ability of Anti-Access/Area-Denial (A2/AD) practitioners to deny access to the commons and negate U.S. military capabilities. China and to a lesser extent Iran are clearly in ASB’s crosshairs.
In the near-future, defense analysts will have a number of ways to gage possible ASB-based strategies when it comes to China and A2/AD practitioners specifically. Clearly U.S. planners are beginning to think about how to fight from distance while also retaining the utility of multibillion-dollar aircraft carriers. The X-47B program—brought back from a very short retirement—clearly demonstrates that U.S. military planners are thinking about how naval aircraft can fight from range considering present aircraft strike capabilities would place carriers close to multiple PLA missile platforms (cruise and ballistic) including the highly touted “carrier-killer,” the DF-21D.
[B]How Would Offshore Control Do Against Other A2/AD Challenges?[/B]
There is certainly a lot to like when it comes to Offshore Control. Such a strategy clearly aims to exploit China’s dependency on the seas for trade and natural resources in an attempt to compel Beijing to end conflict and mitigate any possibility of escalation. Adding to its appeal, such a strategy seems possible with current U.S. force levels and technology.
There are some inherent challenges. It’s important to consider whether Offshore Control could work against other possible A2/AD challengers. Various nations have already begun to embrace the weaponry of A2/AD—ballistic and cruise missiles, sea mines and quiet, conventional-powered submarines, as well as possible attacks across cyber and space domains. American forces could someday soon find themselves in harm's way from multi-dimensional strikes that not only seek to deny U.S. forces access to a combat zone, but also take the fight to America's military in an asymmetrical fashion. Would OC work against an Iranian A2/AD strategy with tight sanctions already in place? What about other nations who in the future could also embrace such technology through purchases from nations like China, Russia or possibly others? While I can see a strong argument being made that OC could be modified to take into consideration such situations, it remains to be seen whether it will.
C̣n tiếp.
ván cờ chiến lược III ; sẽ bùng nổ hay có sự sắp xếp..!!
Kính gửi quí Bạn, T/v Pheng ,
T/v Pheng có nhiều quan điểm.. theo ngu ư th́; chiến trường là thương trường và ngược lại..!! Anh Tàu đi mua đồ cũ về làm mới.. vậy anh Tàu có them bớt ǵ ( đại tu) hay tăng cường khả năng ??
Chưa ai nói ra điều, như con tàu sân bay Lieu Ninh, mua lại là đồ cũ.. ngay cả cái dây barrier đễ móc đuôi máy bay khi hạ cánh c̣n chưa t́m đâu mua được dến nay, anh Tàu đă t́m được ở đâu ?? hay tự làm ra ?? Đó là điều mà hầu hết muốn t́m sự that // Nếu là mua; th́ phải có thương lái.. nếu là chế tạo th́ phải có chất xám.. Mà có thương lái th́ phải có anh làm ra, bán vũ khí đạn dược..
Trên thế giới ngày nay, những nước nào chuyên sản xuất. và có vũ khí để bán ra, nếu bán ra không hết th́ phải có chỗ tiêu thụ, vừa thâu tóm ảnh hưởng vùng mien , kiềm chế, gián tiếp phong toả kinh tế kẻ muốn tranh dành thuơnng trường.. c̣n
ván cờ chiến lược III ; sẽ ra sao ??
... tiếp theo.. xin cáo lỗi v́ máy bị kẹt (jammed)..
Hiện t́nh nước Tàu ; nay đang kiếm đường ra biển Đông cũng như t́m tài nguyên để đáp ứng nhu cầu
, Hiện t́nh Châu Phi, hay Sudan cũng đang lamf nhức đầu giwois cầm quyền TQ, con đường qua châu Phi qua ngả Miến điện đă khong xong, nay lại đến nước phía Nam; Thái Lan cũng đang trong t́nh trạng rối loan.. c̣n con đường phía Nam.. lối ra biển Nam Hải... hiện c̣n trong tầm tay TQ..
Vậy th́ hướng Đông có Nhật.
Như vậy con đường ngắn nhất, dễ làm nhất là đồng hoá VN. Vừa gần sát bên.. lại thong thẳng xuống đên Singapore.. kiểm soát, chế tài cả vùng Nam Hải, khai thác tài nguyên toàn vùng Đông dương.. dường như nhất định là phải đi đến thôi.
C̣n đối với anh Cao bồi, anh đang muốn bít đường của TQ xuống phía nam, như Miến Điện.. rồi lại nắm chặt anh Nhật lùn.. liệu anh có đủ chân tay để ngáng , đễ cản hay là anh phải bỏ bớt để c̣n nh́n đến sân sau của Mỹ châu . Ít hàng nêu lên mong quí Bạn chỉ giáo ./. nmq
Ván cờ chiến lược ; làm sao giữ được bí mật ??
Trên phương diện quốc tế, vấn đề bảo mật là một hệ số quan trọng. Nhất là về khoa học phát minh, tuy nhiên nếu ta làm ra được th́ các khối óc khác cũng có thể mày ṃ ra được, cho nên "bí mật" hay "mật bí" mau hay lâu cũng bị phơi ra.
Trên b́nh diện ngoại giao, nước cờ cao hay thấp của con người tuỳ thuộc vô yếu tố thiên thời, địa lợi và nhân hoà. đây là phong cách dung lời nói trao đổi giữa đôi bên, với sự tín nhiệm của đôi bên làm căn cứ đi đến quyết định ra sao .
C̣n như đem bom đạn đổ xuống đầu.. th́ là chuyện vũ lực, anh cậy có sức mạnh để bát nạt.. hay anh ỷ có sức mạnh kinh tế, tài chánh để chiếm đoạt..
Trên chính trường, ba tấc lưỡi cũng góp phần làm nên việc, nhưng chỉ thấy sự thật thà là đem lại bền vững, c̣n như dối trá, lừa bịp th́... chỉ được một, hai lần rồi.. thiên hạ lảng xa ra chỗ khác..
Sự sống/ c̣n của mọi người tuỳ thuộc vô sự liên đới hợp quần ( mutual solidarity ) cùng chung sức phát triển.. công bằng.. và phân minh.. mới mong hoà b́nh trật tự được thiết lập bền vững../.