By Kris Osborn, President, Warrior
Supported by warships on the surface, helicopters and even submarines, a joint US-Japanese maritime force recently conducted an aerial “Fly Over” in formation along strategically critical areas of the Philippine Sea as part of a collaborative war readiness exercise.
The maneuvers were part of the beginning of the US-led Valiant Shield exercise in the Pacific, a war-preparation drill intended to maintain a strong deterrence posture in highly contested areas such as the South China Sea and the Philippine Sea. It makes sense that the Japanese Maritime Self-Defense force would join this effort, particularly in light of escalated tensions between China and the Philippines and continued turbulence in the highly contested South China Sea.
A Navy essay on the exercise explained that the USS Ronald Reagan and its Carrier Air Wing conducted war training maneuvers with the “first-in-class JMSDF helicopter destroyer JS Izumo (DDH 183), the Maya-class guided-missile destroyer JS Haguro (DDG 180) and the Taigei-class submarine JS Jingei (SS 515).” Meanwhile, aircraft from the Japan Air Self-Defense Force, U.S. Air Force and embarked Carrier Air Wing 5 (CVW 5) flew in formation overhead.
“The Ronald Reagan Carrier Strike Group demonstrated our ability to conduct complex, multi-axis and multi-domain operations with forces from not only across the Indo-Pacific, but across the globe,” said Rear Adm. Greg Newkirk, commander, Carrier Strike Group 5.
While in a certain sense, this kind of collaborative maritime warfare maneuvers may be considered routine, they take on intensified significance as a multi-national, multi-domain demonstration of power in the current threat environment. The US and Japan have indeed been allies for years, as both countries operate ship-based Aegis Combat Systems and have a number of critical weapons systems being developed as “joint” efforts. These include the recently emerging SM-3 Block IIA, Evolved Sea Sparrow Missile Block II and others.
It makes sense that the US and Japan would demonstrate Naval Air Power in support of surface warships in light of several key factors. In recent years, Japan has purchased $35 billion dollars’ worth of F-35s and has already begun operating vertical take-off-and-landing F-35Bs from warships and even mini-carriers. This affords an unprecedented increase in 5th-generation air power projection capability for Japan and greatly enables joint-multi-domain networking with US F-35s; all F-35s operate with a common datalink known as MADL, for Multi-Function Data Link. This means large, networked formations of US and Japanese F-35s can operate along a wide combat envelope to conduct deterrence missions or even launch combat operations if needed. Certainly US and Japanese warships present allied maritime power, particularly in the realm of Aegis and ballistic missile defense, yet integrating these surface capabilities with multi-national 5th-generation air power seems extremely significant.
Why? The People’s Liberation Army – Navy already operates a larger Navy than the US Navy, yet that by no means suggests it has a measure of superiority or overmatch. In fact, upgraded DDG 51s and other US warships would likely be well positioned to rival if not destroy PLA-N warships, given their weapons and the small number of new high-tech Type 055 destroyers now operated by the PLA-N. The largest margin of difference, however, is likely in the air. The Chinese are now operating several prototypes of the sea-launched J-31 stealth fighter but has no operational ocean-launched 5th-generation force. By contrast, the US already operates hundreds of F-35s and Japan is fast-growing its operational fleet of F-35s as well. In tactical or operational terms, this means a US-Japan 5th-generation air alliance could, in effect, form a deterrence-focused “wall” of air superiority from which to counter or destroy any PLA air or surface warfare aggression.
In addition to this, Rear Adm. Newkirk’s comment about multi-domain operations seems especially critical given recent advances in networking technologies. For example, an allied US-Japanese Aegis “shield” of ballistic missile defense could form a geographical wall across the Pacific in position to slow down, stop or intercept any Chinese ballistic missile attack on Taiwan, Japan or the Philippines. A perhaps lesser known, yet critical element of this relates to the F-35, and the US military services are connecting the highly-successfull Integrated Battle Command System with both F-35 air nodes and Aegis-radar surface nodes built into warships. This means that F-35s can function as aerial defensive “nodes” in alignment with surface warships and even some land-based radar; this is the function and operational intent of ICBS, as it is a multi-domain “meshed” systems designed to share threat details across otherwise disaggregated land and maritime formations. With both surface-based Aegis Radar detection, networked successfully with ocean launched F-35s and ground command and control, might in effect enable a massive umbrella of protection across the Pacific.
Kris Osborn is the President of Warrior Maven – Center for Military Modernization. Osborn previously served at the Pentagon as a Highly Qualified Expert with the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army—Acquisition, Logistics & Technology. Osborn has also worked as an anchor and on-air military specialist at national TV networks. He has appeared as a guest military expert on Fox News, MSNBC, The Military Channel, and The History Channel. He also has a Masters Degree in Comparative Literature from Columbia University
