Is the Navy Using Comodore Again
Commodore Michael Harris, Commodore Flotillas, discusses how the Regal Australian Navy (RAN) has been scaling its chore group command construction to enhance operational flexibility.
With returning neat power competition manifested at sea in returning naval rivalry, task group operations are increasingly fundamental for navies in delivering maritime presence.
Task groups bring flexibility in capability and functioning, but to generate this flexibility such groups require effective command structures.
Growing emphasis on job group presence is evident in Indo-Pacific naval activity. As 1 of the theatre's major regional navies, the Royal Australian Navy (RAN) has an established history of operating theatre-wide, from its own waters to the Gulf. Today, task groups sit more centrally in such RAN presence.
The RAN's task groups are built around new platforms bringing new capabilities. The RAN is also operationalising various task group constructs congenital around these platforms, using a new command staff structure to deliver flexibility in using such capability.
The RAN's new chore group presence has been based initially around its Canberra-course landing helicopter dock (LHD) amphibious set on ships, HMAS Canberra and HMAS Adelaide (commissioned in 2014 and 2015, respectively). The LHDs accept deployed across the region for operations and exercises, including as amphibious task groups (ATGs) to provide humanitarian assistance/disaster relief (HADR) support for Commonwealth of australia'southward neighbours. More recently, task grouping presence has been reinforced past the RAN'southward 3 Hobart-class air warfare-focused guided-missile destroyers (DDGs), HMAS Hobart, HMAS Brisbane, and HMAS Sydney (commissioned in 2017, 2018, and 2020, respectively).
The RAN can now deploy different chore group operational and control constructs, using the LHDs and/or the DDGs, and even its MEKO 200 Anzac-class guided-missile frigates.
Optimising Outputs
To maximise and optimise the flexibility and outputs of such job groups, the RAN has established ii primary at-sea operational command-and-command (C2) staff constructs – the ATG and the Maritime Task Group (Mar TG), the latter established most recently, in December 2018.
"The Mar TG staff was stood up to provide Armada Command and, in particular, Commodore Flotillas [COMFLOT] as the maritime component commander [MCC] with some other arm in the staff, and so they could human action as job group command at sea and as well provide their primary role as a warfare staff that constitutes the sea combat commander [SCC]," Commodore Michael Harris, in post as COMFLOT since early 2020, told Fleet International.
This approach is creating a scalable command construct, one which reflects the scalability of the task groups themselves. The scalable control level is shaped by the mission. "It's all derived effectually the mission and the principal warfare commander (PWC) duties," said Cdre Harris. "The brand-upwards has got two streams: in that location is the administrative stream for running the chore grouping, that the Commander Chore Group (CTG) runs; and there is the warfighting stream that the Blended Warfare Commander (CWC) runs."
In 2019 and 2020, the RAN deployed dissimilar chore group constructs on different operations and exercises. The deployments demonstrated how the new C2 structure is increasing command options and flexibility.
In belatedly 2019, the Mar TG embarked in HMAS Hobart to deploy in a CTG office, as the DDG led a iii-ship task grouping on a 3-month operational deployment to Northeast Asia.
In early on 2020, for the Ocean Shield / Ocean Horizon combined synthetic/at-sea exercise, COMFLOT and his staff embarked in Canberra as CTG/CWC, with the Mar TG staff fulfilling the SCC office and supporting Hobart's commanding officer (CO) in the PWC role of the integrated air and missile defense force (IAMD) command platform. "That allowed me as the CTG/CWC, Mar TG every bit the SCC, and Hobart as the IAMD commander to be certified as warfare staff for what was going to be a five-ship task group deployment to Hawaii for RIMPAC," said Cdre Harris.
The almanac, The states Navy (USN)-led RIMPAC exercise took place in August 2020. Although it was delayed (by ii months, from June) due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the RAN's deployment continued. Its RIMPAC task grouping included: HMAS Canberra (with COMFLOT embarked as CTG/CWC); HMAS Hobart, with the Mar TG's SCC staff embarked alongside the IAMD staff; the Anzac frigates HMAS Arunta and Stuart; and the support ship HMAS Sirius.
The task group sailed on an extended deployment, calling first in Darwin, Australia before sailing through Southeast Asia to Guam, and and so on to Hawaii.
HMAS Canberra left the grouping in Guam to render to Australia for scheduled maintenance. Cdre Harris said this necessitated a shift in the command staff and chore group constructs, but noted that the shift demonstrated these constructs' inherent flexibility. The SCC staff switched to HMAS Canberra to return to Australia. COMFLOT and the CTG/CWC staff embarked in HMAS Hobart, with the DDG continuing in the IAMD role. The SCC office was handed over to HMAS Arunta'south commanding officer. HMAS Hobart led the task grouping on to RIMPAC.
Deployed to Fight
The command staff construct used for the 2020 deployment was a significant modify from 2019, said Cdre Harris. "Information technology was the first time the SCC – that comes from the Mar TG organisation – had deployed equally the SCC under COMFLOT as the CTG/CWC," he explained. "And so, nosotros effectively deployed, in that task group, in the way we would fight." For deployments in 2019 (including the Australia-U.s. Talisman Sabre do), the CTG / CWC staff had deployed ashore, rather than at sea, conducting command from the Deployable Joint Forcefulness Headquarters (DJFHQ) in Brisbane.
"The other change that occurred in line with that deployment is that nosotros at present see the command staff [and] the task groups every bit very much scalable," Cdre Harris added.
In tardily 2020, HMAS Arunta and Anzac sis frigate HMAS Ballarat both conducted unmarried-transport deployments (HMAS Arunta to back up international sanction enforcement operations against North korea, and HMAS Ballarat to the Indian Body of water to participate in the multinational, Indian Navy-led practice Malabar), where they operated in the CTG role, although with no additional CTG staff embarked. "Then, what we see very much is that the administrative functions of the job group are very scalable, from the '1-star' [COMFLOT] going to sea all the fashion down to a ship's commanding officeholder; alternatively, I can provide command elements from the ATG or Mar TG equally the task group staff," said Cdre Harris.
In 2021, deployments will follow a like construct, he continued. "When a task deployment is a single- or potentially two-ship deployment and is non-complex in nature, the senior CO of the task group ships deploying tin can act equally the CTG or job unit commander. When the deployment becomes more complex, that'southward when the Mar TG organization can deploy as a task group staff, or I have the ability to do that with an chemical element of the COMAUSATG [Commander Australian ATG] staff." For a big, complex task group – such as assembled for the 2020 RIMPAC deployment – COMFLOT would deploy every bit CTG/CWC.
The deployment and exercise focus for 2021 began in February with the Sea Shield synthetic exercise, which then rolled into Body of water Horizon in February-March and a large fleet battle staff control mail exercise involving the entire staff from COMFLOT downwardly. However, the principal focus is Talisman Sabre, taking place off Queensland in the year'due south third quarter. Here, COMFLOT and his staff will operate ashore at the DJFHQ as the MCC, and the Mar TG will deploy at sea equally the SCC.
"What you can see – from the manner the deployments of task group command happened in 2020, and the manner information technology is going to occur in 2021 in the lead-up to Talisman ' Sabre – is that we're actually getting subsequently the COMFLOT branch motto, which is 'Command the Fight'," said Cdre Harris. Integral to this ethos is continuing focus in the staff structure, from COMFLOT downward, on warfare as the master part, he added. "[This] is what we're developing inside the Mar TG organization."
Command Contributions
When the Mar TG was established in 2018, RAN job group presence was based mostly around the LHDs as the force structure and the ATG every bit the command structure. Now, with the DDGs arriving in the force structure and with the control structure evolving, the RAN can utilize the DDGs and the Anzacs equally platforms to support the Mar TG and other components of the at-sea operational staff. This underlines the scalability of the deployed staff and the flexibility of the administrative and warfighting command streams, relative to the deployed force structure and the mission in paw.
In terms of platforms, for a non-circuitous mission conducted by a single send, the send CO assumes the CTG/CWC role, with the ship's own warfare staff providing the PWC function. For a more complex mission requiring ii or more ships, the Mar TG staff tin can act equally the CTG/CWC, with diverse ship principal warfare officers (PWOs) across the TG delivering the various warfare functions.
For a four or more transport task group, one possibly containing multiple chore units, COMFLOT potentially would deploy as CTG/CWC, with a captain-led Mar TG staff undertaking the SCC role, and with the DDG's CO delivering the PWC part (for case, for IAMD). Other command functions could be shared around the task group, the commodore explained. If the Mar TG assumed the CTG/CWC role in a iii-ship task group, for example, the ship COs would provide the various PWC functions, including the SCC role. "It is really scalable in the way nosotros conduct our chore group deployments," said Cdre Harris.
The principal aim in this force structure and command construction evolution is to deliver maximum operational flexibility. The benefit of that flexibility, Cdre Harris explained, is that "it allows usa to put ships and staff against the mission. Nosotros accept a procedure to ensure that a task grouping, whether it consists of one ship or half dozen ships, is staffed and certified to acquit that mission."
"The kickoff pace is mission analysis," he said. "That and so drives what the task group should look similar: what avails information technology will be fabricated up of, and what capabilities it needs from ship and staff perspectives."
With the HMAS Canberra-/Hobart-led deployment in 2020, "We were able to show our flexibility and chiefly our agility," said Cdre Harris. Due to COVID delaying RIMPAC and HMAS Canberra needing to return home for planned maintenance, "the mission changed, where we needed a dissimilar focus in RIMPAC to what we had originally [planned]. That was when nosotros were able to remove the SCC staff from the DDG in Guam … and a scaled-down version of the staff that I had as my CTG staff in Canberra was able to embark in HMAS Hobart as the CTG staff, augmented by other staff distributed throughout the task group." The staffs remaining on the deployment retained the ability to accomplish dorsum to the staff returning abode with HMAS Canberra.
Sizeable TG Staff
The RIMPAC deployment, including the extended transit when HMAS Canberra sailed with the group, was the first time for a while the RAN had deployed a grouping of such size; moreover, the RAN's entire warfighting staff from COMFLOT downwards was deployed at sea at the same time. Cdre Harris pointed to one detail element: "Because information technology was the first time the SCC had to work for COMFLOT equally the CWC, I was able to drive the Mar TG staff to conduct their role as SCC." "Information technology wasn't only the SCC," he continued: "because of the size of the staff I had and the focus I put on the transit, I was able to drive the warfare arrangement of the task group, which I don't retrieve is something we'd washed for a long fourth dimension because we hadn't operated at that size of task group staff."
Taking this forward into Talisman Sabre, where the RAN volition once more be integrating with the USN, information technology will be looking to demonstrate the emerging at-sea command construct and capability over again. "My aim will be 'We've done it once, only we demand to show that information technology's repeatable' and that, as a learning organisation, we learn from each deployment to make the next one better," said Cdre Harris.
Should the opportunity arise for the Mar TG to operate in the SCC function embarked in a USN ship, for instance, Cdre Harris noted that the Mar TG is designed to do but this. "Information technology's important to remember that the Mar TG part of SCC has been designed around a construct that is similar to, if not the same every bit, the staff that provides that part in the USN. The procedures nosotros use are the same."
"Before the Mar TG was stood up, from the armada battle staff … and from the navy writ large [we had] been able to form staff to provide the SCC office because it'southward a role we've been doing for a long fourth dimension as information technology's role of our warfare organisation," the commodore continued. "The beauty at present is that the personnel that are a function of the Mar TG that provide that function have done it before …. And then, invariably, they can commence in the USN warfare organisation and hitting the ground running as SCC, because it aligns with the USN'due south sea combat command staff."
"The complication nosotros accept this year with Talisman Sabre, like with RIMPAC last year, is that we're operating in a COVID environment," said Cdre Harris. "That drives us downwardly the path that, invariably, in that location are no face-to-face meetings or briefings, pre-exercise: the ships meet at sea, and we then go and conduct the action." Consequently, he explained, "It's kind of 'Nosotros turn up, ready to go', understanding all of our procedures and tactics."
The RIMPAC deployment, said Cdre Harris, "proved to my staff, and to many senior staff, the flexibility and agility of the C2 construct we've developed." "From [COMFLOT] downwards, the ability to provide flexible staff constructs that are active depending on what the mission is, [and] a task group design that tin can change every bit we progress towards achieving the mission, has been a real step forward."
past Dr Lee Willett
Source: https://www.armadainternational.com/2021/07/evolving-agile-and-flexible-command-at-sea/
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