In this episode of Acquisition Talk, I speak with Dr. John Kuehn. He is a professor of military history at the Army Command and General Staff College and former naval aviator. We discussed innovation in the interwar Navy, the newly created Space Force, how constraints may propel innovation, whether kinetic warfare is more important on land or at sea, what we can learn from Arthur C. Clarke, how the Netherlands invented wolfpack submarine tactics, and much more.
We had an in depth discussion of two of John’s books, Agents of Innovation and America’s First General Staff. The Navy’s General Board helped bring about the force that won World War II. One of the many aspects of its wisdom was withholding judgment until after experimentation. Change was helped along by post-World War I arms reduction treaties which limited capital shipbuilding and banned overseas bases in the Pacific. This led to gradual innovation away from the battleship and toward sea-based logistics, floating dry docks, long range submarines, carrier aviation, and more. John argues that a paucity of resources created an imperative to innovate.
The discussion turns to the 21st century. John argued a new arms reduction treaty would benefit the US and the world. While he doesn’t think budgets should be drastically cut, he is no fan of largess. A holiday on aircraft carrier construction, for example, would force military planners to really grapple with new challenges like anti-access. I ask about whether China would agree to limitations. Listen to the whole thing to hear his contrarian — and well-informed — point of view.
Podcast annotations
John gives us a great introduction to the history of America’s first general staff, which actually appears in the Navy. The first instantiation was the Strategy Board hidden within the Navy War College. After the fiasco in the Spanish-American War, particularly disembarking at Tampa Bay, the Navy creates the General Board to take charge of war planning. While the General Board never had statutory power, it had immense prestige and created a tremendous impact. The influence eventually had its greatest impact on ship design, which was controlled by the Navy bureau system (Bureau of Engineering, Construction & Repair, Ordnance, Yards & Docks, Navigation, eventually Aeronautics, etc.). Here is John on that relationship:
The tale of the General Board and the bureaus is a tale of the bureaus slowly losing power to the General Board over time. That will change when the General Board gets absolute veto authority over the bureau functions with ship design. That will happen at the Portsmith Conference in 1908 when President Roosevelt meets with the General Board… But [the bureaus] are never completely brought under control.
That is, until World War II when the bureaus become absorbed by the Chief of Naval Operations — originally created in 1915 and represented on the General Board. The General Board gets dissolved in the late 1940s during the “revolt of the admirals” incident. Eventually, the bureaus lose their statutory authority in 1966, largely due to Robert McNamara’s managerial revolution with the PPBS. The Army arsenals lost their status four years earlier.
A 21st century arms treaty
One of the main themes of the discussion is how a series of arms reduction treaties after World War I caused introspection by the Navy — leading to innovation. With a capital shipbuilding holiday, the Navy was forced to experiment with other technologies, including upgrading the electrical systems and propulsion of the battleships, but also emphasizing submarines, carrier aviation, and destroyers. A lack of resources and limitations on capital ships forced the Navy to really consider lessons learned in WWI, and look to new solutions that proved decisive in the next war.
John observed the same thing in the German Army after Napoleon and after World War I, where a lack of resources led to tremendous ingenuity and innovation.
That led me to this idea that paucity can actually lead to innovation. The Washington naval treaty didn’t actually prevent innovation, they serendipitous aided innovation. So a paucity of resources can lead to a more innovative approach.
He thinks that the 100th anniversary of the Washington Conference in 2021 would mark a good time to begin another round of arms treaties.
I’ve been a fan of a long time for having another Washington Conference, and inviting China, Russia, our NATO allies, back to Constitution Hall for another conference. People have told me it’s a crazy idea. In the realm of information warfare, if people turn us down then its on them. We gain this huge advantage.
I think we’re at the same point we’re at the same point as we were after World War I. We’ve got this huge arms race that’s taking resources from all sorts of other pressing problems… I say hey, we’ll freeze our carriers if you freeze yours. Which means we’d probably think more honestly about how to battle the anti-access environment. What to do with these new technologies.
I’m a contrarian. They freak out because I’m a carrier aviator with almost 200 arrested landings and 3,000 hours in Navy aircraft. We don’t need so many carriers.
John is no “Panda hugger,” and definitely does not advocate reducing defense spending to 1 percent of GDP or anything like that. But as he wisely states: “People don’t think well when money is thrown at them.” No doubt.
China
I respond that unlike interwar Japan, which understood the US could easily out-build them, China is now on the rise and appears to be able to produce equipment faster and at a lower cost. Why would they sign on?
John has many great responses that cannot be summarized here. I recommend listening to the whole thing. But one thing John argued was that he was not convinced carriers have much to offer in littoral waters. In blue water, carriers are important, but we have no near competitors there yet. China’s first domestic carrier, the Shandong, may have reached operations but building hulls is not the same as producing capability. As John reminds us, the last time China threw its weight around at sea was in the Yuan dynasty. Its numerous strategic threats right along its borders means that the Navy might have resources taken away for army and rocket forces.
I would add that China’s economy might not be in as good shape as many Westerners perceive. While China’s GDP may rival or surpass the US, the US has national wealth perhaps 3x greater. And whereas the US’s total debt is around 106 percent, China’s exceeds 300 percent! Many of its state owned enterprises are bogged down in debt, so bad they are called “zombie companies.” Capital flight is another huge problem, not to mention the various internal social problems taking up so many resources. So perhaps the contradictions of an authoritarian market-economy would contribute to China’s willingness to deal in an arms treaty.
Here’s another great part:
The big problem with American torpedoes in World War II was a completely inadequate testing program. The idea that they had for the Mark 14 was a good idea, and they had the whole interwar period to do it.
Perniciousness, hubris, arrogance, lack of oversight. The same old things that come up over and over again. I suspect with the magnetic catapults on the aircraft carriers [EMALS], that’s what we’re talking about.
Thanks Dr. John Kuehn (CDR, ret.)
I’d like to thank John for joining me on the Acquisition Talk podcast. Check out all of his books available on Amazon. I’ve uploaded John’s excellent 2017 report to the CNO on Fleet Design. Watch some of his lectures available on YouTube. Here is a nice paper from John’s student, Innovation from the Sea, on unmanned aerial vehicle policy. He recommends that you check out a great PowerPoint presentation from Jim Corum, Development of German Army Operational Doctrine in the Interwar Period.
Leave a Reply