Amphibious ships--bigger is better.(Robert Hill on new ships)

IN JUNE 2004, the then Minister of Defence, Senator Robert Hill, announced plans for the Australian Defence Force (ADF) to procure two medium (over 20,000 tonnes displacement) amphibious landing helicopter dock (LHD) ships. First pass approval from the government was gained in August 2005, with two amphibious ship designs short-listed for development, and with a preference for the ships to be built in Australia. These ships are required to replace the Navy's ageing amphibious fleet and, in the light of the increased recognition of Australia's global interests, to improve amphibious support to land forces undertaking operations ashore.

The decision initially attracted some criticism, fuelled by a few defence analysts whose views on this subject appear to echo the "defend the moat" era of the late 1980s and early 1990s. Being a personal proponent of "three or four smaller ones", Hugh White has questioned "whether these big ships will do the job", whether they "turn our backs on new technologies", and whether ministers will "ask some very searching questions about why Australia needs these LHDs".

These are fair questions; with the amphibious ships' acquisition worth approximately $2 billion, informed public scrutiny should be encouraged--certainly at a level higher than the responses that Hugh White's articles generated--"the Government is risking building up an inflexible force loaded with equipment we lack the manpower to support and deploy", "a disturbing tendency to swoon in the presence of American weapons salesmen", "two big warships is economically unwise and strategically questionable" and "we need the big ships to carry the big tanks". A reply by Vice-Admiral Chris Ritchie, the Chief of Navy, helped to answer some of these criticisms, although it was not feasible to describe Defence's rationale in detail within such a forum.

STRATEGIC EVOLUTION

DURING THE COLD WAR the security environment, on which Australian and other Western naval planning was premised, was structured on East-West security relations that were organised around two strong and opposing alliances--NATO and the Warsaw Pact. Force structure planning assumptions were relatively stable because the active deterrent role played by the military was well defined and clearly understood, and force structure was based on threat-based calculations, configured primarily for high-intensity war-fighting roles. Likewise Australia's defence strategy, having remained essentially unchanged since the Dibb Review was written in 1986 at the height of the Cold War, has as its central premise that protecting Australia against military attack from a hostile state should determine the structure and capability of the ADE

However, in the late 1980s the Cold War ended; and with it went the planning clarity and monolithic focus it provided. The USA is now acknowledged as the world's hegemonic military superpower. Not since Pax Britannica has any one nation ever been so dominant in its sea power that it could just assume its ability to control the oceans of the world. There appears little argument that the era of Pax Americana, at least at sea, is upon us.

As a consequence of this unchallenged maritime supremacy, there also comes a progressive realisation of the need to shift the balance of force structure away from what might be termed "contest" towards "utilisation". The US Navy (USN) operates almost unchallenged upon the oceans, so there is less need for maritime forces that are intended primarily to fight for the control of the sea and more need for those that are intending to use it. This, indeed, appears to be the theme underlying the USN's own strategic formulations, ... From the Sea and Forward ... From the Sea, and their development through to Sea Power 21. While the USN maintains its sea control capabilities, its recent strategies emphasise regulatory, amphibious and "peace support"--orientated expeditionary operations. This increased attention to expeditionary warfare is now a global trend.