The Role Of Naval Forces In The Global War On Terror

The growth of the terrorism threat to the nation's security has created significant strategic challenges for U.S. armed forces in fighting this global war on terrorism (GWOT). For the Navy, the challenges have centered on developing maritime capabilities to prosecute the GWOT as far forward as possible. To assist the Navy's planning in this area, the former Chief of Naval Operations requested the NRC to conduct an assessment of the adequacy of and prospects for improving the role of Naval Forces in the GWOT. The study developed a defense-in-depth framework as the organizing principle for the report. The report contains information as described in 5 U.S.C. 552(b) and therefore could not be released to the public in its entirety. The public version consists of an executive summary that presents an assessment of the transformation of naval forces for addressing the GWOT; a brief description of the defense-in-depth framework; and a list of findings and major recommendations.

This illustrated history covers the history of the U.S. Navy in the Middle East. America's interests in the Middle East, southwest Asia, and eastern Africa date almost to the founding of the nation. Since World War II, the Navy has been the first line of defense for these interests. From the establishment of the Middle East Force (MEF) in 1949 through the beginning of the 21st century, the U.S. Navy served as a force for stability and peace in the region. The Navy's presence helped prevent regional crises from escalating into wars, enforce international sanctions, and minimize damage done by regional conflicts to American and allied interests. The work concentrates on the Navy's command relationships, roles and missions, and operations in the period leading up to the First Gulf War, the war itself, and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.The Naval Historical Center completed this illustrated history of U.S. Naval Forces Central Command/Fifth Fleet to accompany the exhibit it installed in the headquarters building on board Naval Support Activity Bahrain. In keeping with the Center's mission of supporting the operating forces, the purpose of this book is to inform visitors to the headquarters and American Sailors serving in the Middle East about the Navy's presence in Arabian waters and the variety of missions the Navy has conducted there, in peace and in war. From the presidency of George Washington through the beginning of the Cold War, Americans have forged and maintained ties with the peoples of the Middle East. These bonds strengthened in 1949 with the establishment of the Middle East Force and a permanent U.S. naval presence in the Arabian Gulf. They grew even stronger when America committed itself to the defense of its friends in the region, establishing Central Command and its naval component, Naval Forces Central Command, in 1983. The United States Navy remains an anchor of resolve in promoting peace, stability, and prosperity in the Central Command area of responsibility. The author, Dr. Robert J. Schneller Jr., is well qualified to present this informative and well-illustrated history. He is co-author of a book on the Navy's role in operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm, and since 9/11 has been researching and writing about the Navy's role in the Global War on terrorism. As with each of our histories, the views expressed herein are those of the author alone and not those of U.S. Naval Forces Central Command/Fifth Fleet, the Department of the Navy, or any other U.S. government agency.

Subtitle on cover: The golden age of the Canadian navy in the war against terrorism.

In America’s battle against global terrorism, the goal of the Navy SEALs is to be the best guns in the fight—stealthy, effective, professional, and lethal. Here for the first time is a SEAL insider’s battle history of these Special Operations warriors in the war on terrorism. “Down range” is what SEALs in Afghanistan and Iraq call their area of operations. In this new mode of warfare, “down range” can refer to anything from tracking roving bands of al-Qaeda on a remote mountain trail in Afghanistan to taking down an armed compound in Tikrit and rousting holdouts from Saddam Hussein’s regime. It could mean interdicting insurgents smuggling car-bomb explosives over the Iraqi-Syrian border or silently boarding a freighter on the high seas at night to enforce an embargo. In other words, “down range” could be anywhere, anytime, under any conditions. In Down Range, author Dick Couch, himself a former Navy SEAL and CIA case officer, uses his unprecedented access to bring the reader firsthand accounts from the warriors in combat during key missions in Afghanistan and Iraq. Couch creates a pulse-pounding, detailed narrative of the definitive engagements of this war, while painting an unusually intimate portrait of these warriors in the field. The performance of the SEALs in difficult, changing environments—in the heat of the Afghan desert, in the snow-packed Hindu Kush, on the high seas, and in the urban chaos of Baghdad—has been nothing short of extraordinary. The SEALs, coordinating with other American forces, the CIA, and foreign special operations units like the Polish GROM, have once more shown their genius for improvisation and capacity for courageous action in leading the fight against this new and vicious enemy. The first battle history of its kind, Down Range is a riveting close-up of some of America’s finest warriors in action against a deadly foe.

The Navy has put forth a new construct for its strike forces that enables more effective forward deterrence and rapid response. A key aspect of this construct is the need for flexible, adaptive command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (C4ISR) systems. To assist development of this capability, the Navy asked the NRC to examine C4ISR for carrier, expeditionary, and strike and missile defense strike groups, and for expeditionary strike forces. This report provides an assessment of C4ISR capabilities for each type of strike group; recommendations for C4ISR architecture for use in major combat operations; promising technology trends; and an examination of organizational improvements that can enable the recommended architecture.

Newport Paper No. 29, Shaping the Security Environment, edited by Derek S. Reveron, makes an important contribution to an unfolding debate on the global role of U.S. military forces in an era of transnational terrorism, failed or failing states, and globalization. Reveron, professor of national security decision making at the Naval War College, looks beyond the current conflicts in which the United States is involved to raise fundamental questions concerning the regional diplomatic roles of America's combatant commanders (COCOMs) and, more generally, the entire array of nonwarfighting functions that have become an increasingly important part of the day-to-day life of the American military as it engages a variety of partners or potential partners around the world. These functions are increasingly being given doctrinal definition and a larger role in U.S. military planning under the novel concept of “shaping.” This volume is intended to explore the notion of shaping in its various aspects, both generally and in several regional contexts. The changing role of the regional COCOMs (formerly CINCs) over the last dozen years or so is the focus of a paper by General Anthony Zinni, U.S. Marine Corps (Ret.), who provides a characteristically frank and illuminating account of his own tenure as commander of the U.S. Central Command, with responsibilities for the Persian Gulf and the greater Middle East. Papers by Commander Alan Lee Boyer, USN (Ret.), and Stephen A. Emerson examine maritime and regional security cooperation from the perspective of the U.S. European Command on the one hand and, on the other, the Combined Task Force–Horn of Africa, a joint organization headquartered in Djibouti that has played a critical role in recent years in strengthening the capabilities of countries throughout the region to improve their own security and counter terrorism. Two further chapters examine aspects of shaping from a global perspective. Ronald E. Ratcliffe provides a searching analysis of the “thousand-ship navy” initiative proposed several years ago by outgoing Chief of Naval Operations Michael Mullen, including the difficulties the U.S. Navy has had in operationalizing this concept—and the difficulties some of our allies and partners continue to have in coming to terms with it. Ratcliffe makes a number of useful recommendations as to how the Navy can make headway in the area of maritime security cooperation in the coming years, which is likely to figure prominently in the new maritime strategy the Navy is currently developing. Finally, Dennis Lynn looks at “strategic communication,” also a relatively new concept that is intended to bring greater coherence to the way the U.S. military thinks about the overall impact of its words and actions abroad and how it can better craft messages to shape the environment—friendly as well as adversarial—in which it finds itself today.

A fascinating insight into US and Coalition Special Forces operating in Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia and Mali. Within weeks of 9/11, United States Special Operations Forces were dropping into Afghanistan to lead the war against Al Qaeda and the Taliban. For over a decade, special forces have been fighting a hidden war in Iraq, Pakistan, Syria, Somalia, Mali and Afghanistan, facing off against a range of insurgents from organisations like al Qaeda, al Shabaab, Boko Haram and the Taliban. Leigh Neville draws on recently declassified material and first-hand-accounts from his SOF contacts to lift the veil of secrecy from these operations, giving an unprecedented blow-by-blow description of major Special Forces operations, culminating in SEAL Team 6's Operation Neptune Spear and the killing of Osama bin Laden. Detailing the special equipment, tactics, machinery and training that these Special Operatives received and used this impressive volume shows how the world's elite soldiers fought against overwhelming odds around the world.