Sea Control - Sea control 545 Naval Operations in the Mexican-American War

Episode Date: August 23, 2024

Notes1. "Improvised Partnerships: U.S. Joint Operations in the Mexican-American War," by Nathan A. Jennings, Joint Force Quarterly 105, April 14, 2022. 2. "D-Day Veracruz, 1847 – A Grand Design," by Paul C. Clark, Jr. and Edward H. Moseley, National Defense University, 1996. 3. Sea Control 510 – The Fortress Fleet with Lt Col Nathan Jennings, PhD, CIMSEC, April 13, 2024.

You're listening to Sea Control, hosted by the Center for International Maritime Security. Aloha, Shoemates, and welcome back aboard Sea Control. My guest today is Lieutenant Colonel Nathan Jennings, Ph.D., and we're going to discuss one of his primary research interests, naval operations during the Mexican-American War. So, Nate, welcome back. We gave your bio the last time you were on. This time, I'll start by asking how an Army guy got so interested in Navy stuff that he's now come on twice to discuss naval matters.

Yeah, so it actually started my interest with teaching Mahanian sea power theory. And then I kind of connected that to a war I'm interested in that I study. And it brought about a realization that we have underappreciated the Navy's role in that war, which itself is underappreciated in its impact on American history. But, you know, when we think about the Mexican War, we think about the big land battles, Buena Vista, Mexico City. Actually, the Navy has a very fundamental role they play in that war that enables strategic success for the U.S. government. So what I'm hearing you say, I think, is that the Navy was the linchpin of the Mexican-American War. Yeah, we could say they were the slice of operation if we want to. It wouldn't be true, but we could say that. Okay. All right. Fair enough. As a reminder to the listeners, all opinions today are our own

and not representative of any of the institutions with which we might be otherwise associated. So Nate, what was the state of the Navy at the beginning of the war? And why don't we hear more about the Naval War as part of this? So in 1846, the U.S. is maintaining a sizable fleet, a capable fleet, not as powerful as some of the European navies, but definitely able to prosecute U.S. interests in the Western Hemisphere. And it's divided between the home fleet, rather than the Atlantic and the Gulf. You have a West Indies or Pacific fleet, and then an Africa fleet, probably smaller. You have capital ships with frigates, you have gunboats, transport. So it's a modern fleet, and it's actually catching naval affairs in a period of transition. There's

some steam, some sail. And so it's a period of mixed capabilities, which actually will provide some interesting logistical challenges to go to war with steam frigates. Mexico, on the other hand, only has 16 ships, only two are steam. And so they are vastly outnumbered. And really, if you want to think about Mahanian theory, which prizes the fleet battle, the end-all be-all engagement, the U.S. Navy is able to move right past that into a blockade, similar to the Union Navy in the Civil War. And that's what their first primary task will be to block both coasts of Mexico and apply economic strangulation. What experience did the two services have with amphibious operations prior to the war? Because you and I are going to talk quite a bit about

amphibious operations today. Yeah, they have some, but it's important to note nothing on the scale that they will be compelled to execute in the Mexican War. You have small-scale stuff in Africa, some friction maybe in the Far East, and then some sizable engagements during the War of 1812. Great Lakes region, the Atlantic seaboard, by the way, some very unsuccessful operations. We actually are unable to prevent invasion of home territory in the capital. That's why the White House is burned. So a mixed record coming out of the War of 1812. And really, it's going to require a lot of ingenuity, planning for things that probably the Navy was not really prepared for, but had to innovate their way through. The most famous landing and the largest

U.S. landing prior to World War II was at Veracruz. So Winfield Scott was tasked with leading that part of the war? How did Scott prepare to conduct the landing? So Winfield Scott, just for our audience, he's the commanding general of the U.S. Army in 1846 when the war starts. He is both potentially an operational commander and the institutional commander at that time. He's in D.C. while the war is being prosecuted throughout 1846 in the Rio Grande Theater and in California. He's chomping at the bit to get his own command, but he's actually in different political parties with the president. It's complicated. But he ends up getting his field command eventually. And that's only because the war kind of enters a stalemate. The U.S. is successful in applying

the blockade. It seizes basically all of northern Mexico. You have a string of garrisons from Monterey to Brownsville. And the Mexicans are still unwilling to come to the table and give up half of their land, which, you know, is not surprising. They're people who are proud of their culture, their territory. And so the U.S. government realized it's going to take something more. And so they start thinking about an amphibious invasion via Veracruz. So this is a large fortress city on the Atlantic coast. And more importantly, it's the entry point for any march on Mexico City. And so this, Scott's going to basically, as the President Polk's last option, be given this command. And he's going to have to put together a plan for, again, something of

unprecedented scope and scale for the U.S. military, not just the Army, for the Navy, for the Marines. No one has done anything on this scale. It's going to be 11,000 soldiers, an armada of 200 ships of various sizes, projecting force at a significant distance. And so he's going to actually plan the beginnings of this from DC. And I think we'll talk about more, but using naval intelligence. But he's going to build a very methodical plan. He's going to have to do things like contract the surf boats, have them constructed. He's going to work with the Army quartermaster to convert supplies. He's going to take most of the active duty or the regulars from Zachary Taylor's command in the Rio Grande Theater and create a new field army out of hide

for the assault. And it's going to require transport, you know, southward from kind of the Rio Grande area, from New Orleans to converge and prepare for this momentous event. All right, you hinted at this a little bit in your last answer. So how did Scott and his staff interact with the Navy in the lead up to the operation? She mentioned Clark and Mosley's contribution has many instances of, I wouldn't say naval intelligence, I would call it nautical intelligence. For example, Lobos Island is a suitable angle for rendezvous. And I just, I don't think that Scott's necessarily getting that from his Army staffers. Yeah, that's right. This is unknown territory for them. And so in a fortuitous act, the Secretary of War, Secretary of the Navy, they order the home fleet commander, a guy named David Connor, he's a commodore, to go south. And as he's doing the blockade, to also do a reconnaissance of Veracruz and also map out where the potential intermediate staging bases would be, and then a proper staging area near Veracruz. And he does exactly that, sends a report, and that is instrumental in allowing Scott to plan a very detailed operation. What were the command and control arrangements for the landing and how did the services handle communications? So this is one of the most interesting aspects of this war, because there is no joint doctrine and very little joint experience. So inter-service cooperation. You have some up in the Great Lakes during the War of 1812, maybe some down in New Orleans as well, but not a lot.

nothing again on this scale. And so if we want to use modern terms, Scott will be the joint force commander, really by position, by seniority. I don't know that he's ever, I looked at the specific wording of his order from the president and from the secretary of war, and it says take command of forces, but it really means those forces in the Rio Grande or the army forces. And so the Navy will defer to him though, as the senior commander. He's also the land component commander. So he's both in charge of the overall operation, but he's also going to command and control the operations once they're on the beach and enacting the siege. For the maritime aspect, the home fleet commander, Commodore Connor, he will be the, I guess, the maritime component

commander reporting to Scott, but it's not, let's say, a strict subordination. He's working kind of for with Scott. And he also has orders from the secretary of the Navy to not be a quote adjunct to the army, meaning he's got to represent and bring home some glory for the Navy. And so he has his own interests, his own agenda. And so they're going to have to work together. And one of the most amazing things is Scott is a prickly personality. He has feuds with basically everybody of the other army generals at one time or another. Other politicians don't like him. Sometimes some do. And in this moment, he gets along very well with Connor. He brings him, he writes him a very welcoming letter saying they're going to work on it together. And then when they get together,

they actually will do a joint reconnaissance of Veracruz on a ship once they make it down, you know, to the staging area and everything. And he will actually change his plan and give some more of the responsibility to the Navy yielding to their expertise based off Connor's advice. What role did the Navy play in the capture of Veracruz once the Army was established ashore? So the Navy's already blockading the city. They will deliver in one day about 9,000 men to a beach south of the city. It goes off without a hitch. I'll just say it's a very well done task. And this is one of the areas where Scott will defer. He gives responsibility of the landing and the small, you know, the surf boats to the Navy, which he originally planned to control

himself. Once he's on the beach, he extends a line of siege line north around the landward side of the city, isolating it from all support from the interior. At the same time, as I said, the Navy's blockading, so the city ends up completely isolated. So that's job number one for the Navy to maintain their part of the blockade after delivering the amphibious assault. And then job too is after asking uh the city to surrender and offer terms which the mexicans refuse scott commences a joint bombardment um so both from the land side and the navy side they're going to time a uh very destructive uh and lethal cannonade of the city we would call this joint fires now and it gets really interesting because the army doesn't receive uh all of its field cannon and

these are relatively small cannon anyways, because they have to be moved by horses to the interior and march with the army. And so Scott will ask, Scott will ask for the Navy will offer, I'm not sure how the conversation starts, but receive six large cannon from the Navy move inland to be part of the siege line to assist with the cannonade. Interesting, a young Captain Robert E. Lee will be in charge of constructing the position for those cannon. Also interesting, Scott thinks he's just going to get the cannon, but the Navy insists that their gun crews go too. This could be a technical thing, but it's also them wanting to maintain their share of the responsibility and owning some of the outcome. So let's go further afield here and bring

some of the brothers and sisters from the other services in the conversation here. Prior to Buena Vista, the Marines had assaulted major Mexican ports in the Gulf of Mexico. So was Is there existing Marine Corps doctrine for landings at this point and how the assaults on Tabasco and Tampico unfold? Yeah, I would say no existing doctrine, we would say. And certainly at that time, the Marine Corps is not really organized for that kind of warfare. It's actually dispersed in garrisons and ship detachments, small packets. And the Mexican war is going to challenge that organization, force a bit of a transformation.

I would say similar in scope to what the Corps is going through now. So it's going to have to join assault teams, consolidate into larger units, and assist with attacking those cities you mentioned, as well as there'll be a company and then a battalion at Veracruz. They're going to be on the Pacific coast. They're going to participate in the conquest of Alto California, as well as take part in some of the assaults along Baja California. So they're basically everywhere, participating in mostly smaller groups. Of note, they will form a larger battalion and march on Mexico City. They will actually catch up with Scott for the assault on the capital and play a very productive role. And this is where we get the halls of Montezuma.

What was the revenue cutter services that the name for what would become the Coast Guard's role in the war? Okay, so this is the smallest service involved. And it's actually a small naval force that works for the Treasury Department, working on customs and diplomacy, transport, things like that. And it ends up playing a very important role because it has smaller ships. And it turns out many of the Mexican ports are a little ways up rivers, and the larger Navy ships can't get up there. So when assaulting these cities like Tabasco or Tampico, the Revenue and Counter Service, which is the precursor of the Coast Guard, will play an important role in allowing these basically kind of shallow water riverine operations to enable those ground force assaults. How did the Navy increase pressure on Mexico and the Pacific? Right. So after the U.S. Navy and the U.S. Army have worked together to take northern kind of Alto, California, they call it, it's California to us today. By the way, a back and forth campaign, they lose some engagements on land and you actually have to make a task force of sailors, Marines, militia, army, get together for a final march on Los Angeles. But they get it done. By the way, afterwards, they fall into acrimony. They can't agree on anything for who's going to govern the territory, who controls the port, all of that, because, again, there's no joint doctrine. There's no real joint force commander involved there. It's a partnership.

And so we see that the perils of, of not having that doctrine in that campaign, but very shortly after that, they do commence a series of assaults on port cities along Baja, California, the Navy will receive a New York infantry regiment of volunteers to assist with that. But the Nate, the Marine Corps is also down there in smaller forces, and this is going to be a back and forth thing, but the net result, it's applying additional pressure. If you're the decision makers near Mexico city, they've been ousted by Winfield Scott, who's now occupied really the Mexican plateau. They now are not just dealing with those problems. They've already, you know, the whole North is under occupation. Now they're, they're both of their entire coastlines

are now being assaulted. And so it will definitely inform their strategic equation and force them to come to the table. Do all these amphibious operations set any sort of precedent for future conflicts? Yeah, absolutely. Many of these lieutenants and captains in this war, both, or we could say junior officers in all the services that are involved, they're going to be decision makers and field commanders in the U.S. Civil War. So we have major amphibious operations in Virginia. We have major capture of New Orleans and opening up the Red River campaign. We have attempts to seize the Texas coastline, some of which are successful, but really remaining minor affairs. But the point is, there is some experience here. What we don't know, what I'm unsure of,

is how much was codified and passed on as lessons learned. I don't know that, but definitely there's experience there. And so we take Robert E. Lee in particular. He's on the offensive side of this at Veracruz. Later on, he'll be on the defensive side, defending against an amphibious assault. So certainly probably informs some of his judgment. Well, unfortunately, that's all that we have time for today. I'd like to thank my guest, Lieutenant Colonel Nathan Jennings, PhD. Nathan, where can we find you online and what are you working on next? Right now, I've recently joined as a fellow with Army University Press. And really, I'm working on some aspects of conflict

with the 1973 Arab-Israeli War. Well, thank you again for joining us. Listeners, thanks for tuning in. We'll see you next time. © BF-WATCH TV 2021 Put it out, put it out, put it out.