NATIONAL HARBOR, Md.–The Navy is in the “very early stages” of modifying the tri-service maritime strategy, the service’s chief acknowledged publicly Monday.
The Navy, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard released the current maritime strategy, a “Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower,” with much fanfare in October 2007.
Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) Adm. Jonathan Greenert said Monday he has “talked extensively” with Navy Undersecretary Bob Work about making some modifications to the nearly five-year old guiding document.
Greenert, addressing the Navy League’s Sea Air Space conference, said when he transitioned to the CNO role last year he thought the strategy document could use a “refresh,” though not a full-scale revision. Since then Congress has passed the Budget Control Act of 2011, which calls for at least $487 billion in cuts to planned defense spending over the next 10 years, and the Pentagon crafted a new Defense Strategic Guidance. After those two new plans came into place, Greenert said, he decided “we should take longer” in looking to update the maritime strategy.
The CNO praise the advice Work has given on modifying the strategy, calling the undersecretary “amazing” and “very analytically driven.”
“He said maybe there are chapters here that we need to get involved in, (and) look at when we talk about the maritime strategy, what do we believe makes up our fleet as we know it today, maybe we ought to talk about that,” Greenert said.
Greenert said officials may add addendums to the current strategy document that “would be classified that might address things like anti-access area-of-denial and things of that nature, to provide maybe a more holistic look at our Navy and its strategy.”
The Navy chief acknowledged he has to talk with Marine Commandant Gen. James Amos and Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Robert Papp about modifying the maritime strategy.
“This is a sea-service strategy,” Greenert said while sitting alongside Amos and Papp during a panel discussion at the annual naval conference. “I’m giving you kind of a snapshot of my thoughts. But I have to make this, lay it out, be coherent, and give direction and talk to my colleagues.”
The current maritime strategy was signed by three now-retired officials: former Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Gary Roughead, Marine Commandant Gen. James Conway, and Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Thad Allen.
It was the first-such document signed by the three service chiefs.
That plan calls for maintaining a global positioned force that has credible combat power, can limit regional issues, deter conflict, and fight and win when called upon to do so and in cooperation with others. It describes the Navy, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard conducting sea-control operations and projecting power, as well as expanding more than previously into maritime security, disaster response, and humanitarian assistance (Defense Daily, Oct. 18, 2007).