Sea Control - Sea Control 569: The U.S. Navy and Innovation

Episode Date: March 27, 2025

Links 1. The U.S. Navy and Innovation: Twentieth-Century Case Studies, edited by Peter C. Luebke, U.S. Navy History and Heritage Command, September 2024.J. Overton is co-host of the Sea Control podcast and edited the essay collection “Seapower by Other Means: Naval Contributions to National Objectives Beyond Sea Control, Power Projection, and Traditional Service Missions.”

Welcome aboard, Sea Control fans! This is Jay Overton. My guest today is Dr. Peter Loebke. He's going to talk about an essay collection he edited just out from the U.S. Navy History and Heritage Command called the U.S. Navy and Innovation, 20th Century Case Studies. Peter, would you mind starting off telling us a little bit about yourself? Hi, Jay. Thanks for inviting me to come on the podcast to talk about the book. I'm a historian at the Naval History and Heritage Command, which is an Echelon II command aligned

under the Chief of Naval Operations here in Washington, D.C. The command stretches from coast to coast. It embraces all of the Navy's history enterprise. So that includes museums, historic aircraft, naval shipwrecks, and aircraft wrecks across the globe. And then it also embraces the Navy's historians, of which I'm one. And so we produce official history for the Navy that takes different forms, can do larger kind of bricks of books, the sorts of things people think of when they think of official history that are really the authoritative narratives of offices or operations that include all of the details anyone would want to know really now or in the future.

And we also do a wide range of other sorts of staff products or things that we think would be of interest to the Navy establishment and fellow travelers. and it's that last kind of group of products that my book the u.s navy and innovation 20th century case studies is one of nice thanks well i'm excited to get to talking about this as a reminder to listeners all opinions expressed today are our own and not representative of any institution with which we might be otherwise associated all right let's get to talking about the book a little bit i'm going to say you know innovation has been a hot topic maybe a buzzword at least for a long time within u.s navy and dod circles operationally and academically and it's

used through various directives and plans during the 21st century in particular and going back for that you see innovation and nearly every uh every plan and strategy comes out says that's it we need to get get doing that um your book goes back mostly to the last century the 20th and explores Navy innovation, often before it was even called, you know, innovation, but well before this became a buzzword. But could you tell us, what was the impetus to put this work together now? Well, I think, well, there's two strands for the impetus. And really, the first one was here at NHHC, we have lots of really talented historians. And a lot of the work that we do is staff product. It's not necessarily publicly facing. We have a lot of very talented people working. And so the real impetus behind the book was to say, how do we get this great information out there for not only Navy policymakers and decision makers and authorities,

but something that the wider public can get a hold of and circulate throughout all of these other different organizations that are interested in the Navy and Navy history. And so that was the starting point for me as the editor was we have a great talent pool here. And how do we showcase or how do I showcase that talent? And so I thought of, as you point out, is that innovation is one of these buzzwords or an issue of perennial interest. And so that topic seemed very relevant and also allowed the contributors freedom to draw upon their own interest and expertise and really leverage all of that to create a great essay. and so the innovation was a bit of an organizing principle for the whole essay collection from the start and as editor I left that a little bit vague for the staff and wanted them to think about kind of how what they thought of the term innovation how it really applied to what they

were doing you know the idea as you pointed out is with it being a buzzword right it really fit with the highest levels of guidance within the Navy establishment. When I started working at NHHC, well, actually shortly thereafter, was Admiral Richardson's design for maintaining maritime superiority. And one of the lines of effort with his policy document there was high-velocity learning. And then, of course, with Admiral Gilday, he instituted Get Real, Get Better, which included um really the directive that we should always learn and seek to improve and now admiral uh cno frank ketty has carried get real get better forward and then emphasize

the need for uh short cycle innovation for the navy to accelerate learning and so for me that's really what is attractive about this organizing concept of innovation It's something that's current. It's going to be perennially current. It's going to be evergreen, really, because as an organization, I think any organization really needs to always be engaged in this loop of self-reflection and analysis and assessment and recalibration. And I think that's really what we're talking about when we talk about innovation. And this book is not necessarily the technical ins and outs of something, but really this process of learning. And so I think there are insights or observations of value in past case studies of innovation and learning that might be of use today or might help people today think about how to confront the challenges that they encounter on a day to day. Yeah. And something looking over the book, which you touched on a little bit, and maybe that was a benefit of not having the folks who are writing it giving them two specific topics. But innovation is, I think, commonly, maybe too commonly associated with just technology, with just coming up with new equipment sort of things.

But this book has essays on innovation in command and control relationships, tactics and strategy, wholly new functions like the underwater demolition teams, UDTs, back in World War II. Could you talk a little bit about those particular chapters that deal with something besides new ship designs and weapons? So innovation is process. That was something that was really fascinating when the authors proposed their subjects. is that I think that in one sense is a result of all of us being historians here, is that when I approach a subject, I'm approaching it from the perspective of people as the agent. You know, I think sometimes with histories of technology or science is that technology or science itself is treated as something that's almost in a way autonomous traveling along its own sort of path and so I think by throwing it open to historians it was okay so people are behind this and people

are behind the technology and so people are searching for particular technology or particular tools to use for particular purposes and I think that's what I found very fascinating with these essays and the volume they're more on process right and so these are evergreen in their approaches uh sean woodford right wrote about kamikazes and how the u.s fleet in world war ii attempted to deal with the kamikaze threat and so he was able to chart out this process that occurred of response and counter response and how the measures and the countermeasures and the different tactics and techniques were responsive to one another and so the japanese and attempting to do damage to the u.s fleet understood that the u.s navy

was responding to them and so rather than really this narrative of technological progress in his chapter of some particular innovation such as radar or the combat information center being this panacea that solves all the problems sean was able to show okay so the u.s navy is trying out this new technology but the japanese are becoming aware of this countermeasure and then are altering their tactics or approaches in order to counter that new technology uh and then i think um to talk a little bit more about one of these other chapters on i would say process or organization um that's what was fascinating to me about guy nasuti's chapter on underwater demolition teams uh and i think he did a really good job of showing how at the

start of World War II, there were all of these really almost in a way freewheeling outfits of different sorts of experts as you had the sort of the elan and prestige of these British commando units. And this is when the British also pioneered the special air service. So all of these raiders and units that don't really fall onto the normal table of organization or handling tasks outside of what you would expect standard infantry or seaborne infantry or whatever normal unit, right? And so there's this atmosphere of all these specialist units to do special things. And then the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps had realized going into World War II that maybe

they need some of these sorts of outfits to handle particular tasks during amphibious operations or power projection. But in the interwar period, there wasn't really the funding or the manning available to experiment or stand these things up. And so Guy Nasuti shows in the chapter, as the Navy starts to drive across the Pacific, as it's thinking about starting to drive across the Pacific, particular individuals, including Draper Kaufman, to name check one of the more important ones, you know, starts really putting together these groups and working with the establishment, which sees the need for these sorts of groups and these capabilities and capacities. And then there is this feedback loop that's instituted, where the groups are fielded,

they collect the information from the operations, and then they field it, or they take that information and they feed it back into the training pipeline. And that's, I think, a nice segue into Nick Rowland's chapter on naval surface gunfire support, which is a similar story, is that the Navy Marine Corps, the, I don't know, the U.S. writ large understands that it's going to need to do something to support Marines or infantry going ashore and amphibious operations. but due to wartime well pre-war restrictions or funding the navy and the marines hadn't expanded to the level that would really allow them to experiment much is that these ideas are notional and then once the war starts and these operations happen the navy has to

figure everything out really, really quickly. And so I really appreciate how Nick was able to break that down and show some of these feedback loops and show how these feedback loops worked on the level of pre-war doctrine and then these other organizations and groups within the U.S. Navy that were working on similar problems. And for example, I just thought it was really worth noting, as Nick pointed out, that to help figure out how to defeat Japanese bunkers and pillboxes in the Pacific, the Navy built Japanese pillboxes and bunkers at Dahlgren so that it could do test shots and try out different fusing and shell caps and really collect the data in a more controlled environment of what would work and what wouldn't work so they could support the fleet

forward and so particularly with those three chapters with woodford nisuti um and roland you know they're really engaging in a larger conversation um and to name check uh one of the more important books in recent memory about this is trent hone's learning war the evolution of fighting doctrine in the u.s navy oh sure and trent yeah right trent talks some of our listeners Yeah. And Trent really talks about doctrine and how these pre-war plans and these different interwar testbed areas, right, is that the Naval War College is involved in thinking about these problems. They're the famous fleet problems. You know, there's all of this intellectual effort being expended and actual effort being expended on charting these problems, creating with doctrine that's going to address it. And so the chapters in this book really add, I think, start to flesh out the picture that Trent really did broad outlines for. And so I think they're satisfying from not only a narrative that's interesting and straightforward in this book, but also contributes to the historical knowledge and overall understanding of the Navy's history during World War II in these areas. Yeah, I found it was interesting. I suppose maybe comparing it to current times, and just so folks know, we're recording this on November 6, 2024. I'm looking at how there's been a lot written about how Ukraine is innovating right now during wartime.

So it was interesting comparing sort of the way the U.S. Navy has innovated both during wartime, like with a, you know, a very serious deadline. And then also just at points when they sort of had time to think this stuff through, like in the, you know, the 30s at the War College, that kind of thing. And speaking of innovating during wartime, you know, you edited and also wrote an essay for this work. It was called A Wild Weasel That Wasn't, Innovating Counter Radar Tactics and the Suppression of Enemy Air Defenses During the Korean War. So I'm going to go, since you're clearly the expert on that particular topic, can we do a little deeper dive on that, on your essay there, Peter? Sure, Jay, that'd be great. And it's a really, I think the essay shows these feedback loops that I was just talking about and some of the challenges of it. So for the listeners, I think probably like the listeners, as I associated taking out enemy SAMs or enemy radar defenses with really the Air Force in Vietnam. You know, I remember watching Desert Shield, Desert Storm on the television when I was growing up.

And one of the big things right there were the EF-111 Ravens. And so I had associated taking out enemy air defenses with the Air Force and what was going on in Vietnam and then carried on into Desert Shield and Desert Storm. And so I must say I was rather shocked and taken aback as I was looking at a Pacific Fleet interim report that was collecting and collating and making known the lessons learned of the Korean War, that there are actually Navy squadrons attacking radars in North Korea during the Korean War. And that was just so shocking to me that I said, there's got to be more of the story here. And so that's what really sent me down this rabbit hole. And so in the broad contours is that by the, not early on in the Korean War, but when the U.S. Navy starts really operating almost in a, I'd say, strikes for operational and strategic effect against North Korean targets rather than support of the troops directly. And as the communist Chinese surge more resources into the theater in the area, is that there's a ground control intercept radar network that is set up to help guide the MiGs to intercept UN and Navy strikes. And the Navy figures this out because at the time, the Navy airwings have a mix of prop and jet planes, is that the strike aircraft are usually F-4 Corsairs or AD Sky Raiders. And so these are prop-driven aircraft that can hold a lot of ordnance.

And the combat air patrol are really mostly composed of the F-9F Panthers. And so the jet-powered aircraft, as they travel, you know, at different speeds, is that they operate more efficiently at different altitudes. And so what the Navy people on the aircraft carriers realize is that if they send Panthers ahead to do a target combat air patrol, the MiGs stay away. and right that involves this element of planning and prediction because the migs have to go to altitudes that they can intercept so forth and so on but if it's just prop planes then the navy realized that migs were waiting and there to intercept them and so the supposition that was drawn that was actually confirmed by an air force history that was done on wild weasel tactics during the vietnam war uh was that the north koreans or chinese i will sort of use that interchangeably

because i wasn't able to figure out who the personnel actually were at the the radar sites but sure sure just broadly speaking the the north koreans right um the enemy that's what we were the enemy the adversary yes the adversary i'll use that the adversary in korea will be without sort of assigning any responsibility to a particular nationality. But the adversary in North Korea had radars and the Navy figured it out because there's no other way that the MiGs could have really been where they were and stayed away if there were air superiority fighters on station to oppose them. And so then this is where the kind of the innovation starts to happen is that there

are limited numbers of aircraft on the air wing in composite squadrons which are at the time that's the radar aboard aircrafts aircraft uh was a a rarity or what we would kind of consider the modern radar suite was uh not common right is that there's some identification relief oh that's sort of minor that's a very new technology in the early 50s i know that's it yes and so the the composite squadrons are the ones that had the radar transmitters and the receivers right and there were two main lines of effort for the composite squadrons with those technologies is that one was night fighter you know interception and then the other one was really kind of doing all-weather bombing is that the navy experimented some with tactics that had

been pioneered in world war ii where you know a pathfinder would use radar to determine position and overcast weather so that the strike package could kind of hit once you've got inertial guidance and timing and all that down but the composite squadrons for the point of this story had receivers that if tuned a little bit differently than was normal they could pick up these adversary radars when they were transmitting and so if they could pick up the radars that were transmitting they could track them down and that's essentially the you know part of the wild weasel tactic is to either get a hard kill on the radar site or at least do a soft kill and make it stop transmitting for the period of time that the strikes really inbound or doing its thing or going back out so

that it can't direct or otherwise provide information for the adversary and so the composite squadrons figure out that these adversary radars are there the composite squadrons work with the organic air wing the main carrier for this i believe was the bonham rashard and so they work with some of the strike squadrons and set up flights with the receiver equipped aircraft and then corsairs or sky raiders with rockets and so they'll fix the position of the radar site basically follow the signal and then just plaster the area with rockets and so the adversary figures out that this is happening um and that's something that the higher authorities in the u.s fleet actually pick up on as well is that okay so now we're flying a

predictable flight path right at the radar they kind of know where we're going to be coming what altitudes we're going to be coming the adversary radars in turn decide that if they see something coming straight at them they're going to shut down so what was interesting at the time is that navy leadership at least with seventh fleet was they didn't see the value in that kind of soft kill is that they seemed a little bit more focused on the hard kill was we want to destroy the technology we want to knock out that radar set we don't want to like that's what they were after is being able to say they've destroyed it rather than uh just forcing it to cease transmission and so then what happened at least at organic on the aircraft carrier is that the composite

squadron to ask for photo reconnaissance so they were trying to create these ginormous to use the technical term right these very big photo mosaics they would create these photo mosaics because the composite squadrons or the receiver equipped aircraft would basically go in with this cat and mouse type game and then have a general idea of where the radar set might have been when it ceased transmitting and then have photo resources do that and so the problem with that is they were completely swamping the organic uh photo development capacity on the aircraft carrier because that's how it was handled at the time is that the organic uh photo recon flights on the aircraft carrier were designed for really

tactical intelligence for the air wing and that's what the facilities were for so then a throughput was just uh very very great and for not much return right because they would be creating these photo mosaics of here's a bunch of forested area or hill hillside where we think it might have been and so radar sets even then were fairly small and difficult to locate and so this is the really fascinating part of the innovation with the story is so the carrier started sending all of these photo mosaic arrays for development back to the main photo lab which at that time was located in Atsugi. And it was co-located with Navy very long range patrol aircraft in Atsugi, a number of which were already flying what would be called today ferret missions, but

electronic intelligence gathering along the Chinese coast. And so they had a peripheral reconnaissance mission to chart adversary radars there. And so those squadrons offered to create a new dogleg to develop this intelligence for use of 7th Fleet and these squadrons that were flying strikes against the adversary in North Korea. And so then that's what happened is that the patrol squadrons started hoovering up transmissions and trying to fix and locate adversary radars in theater. And then there was additional development of this product and information um between the navy and actually the army uh is that the army signal corps wanted to work with the navy and so they set up a joint electronic intelligence center far east in japan

to really try and create this electronic order of battle try and figure out are the returns that are the receivers picking up spurious returns are there actually adversary radars that are energized and transmitting or is it just a you know a flaw in the system and so there's this greater effort that really comes about to say okay we need to really think about this spectrum and domain that we hadn't thought about up until that point or at least hadn't thought about in that way and then you see this or at least when i was writing the chapters i could see this in additional ramifications and how all this was operating in the fleet is so the patrol squadrons told the aircraft carriers hey you got to stop energizing your radar sets when we're coming by because

you're a lot closer to us than the adversary radars and your power is a lot stronger than the adversary radar so you're drowning out all their signals and we can't detect the adversary through all this noise and initially the navy commanders and the carriers were skeptical that this was going on and so they did a little bit of exercise environment and the patrol aircraft were able to locate the fleet basically because of the poor emissions control and so then the fleet started to realize okay this emissions control was something that we've got to really really worry about in this new environment uh and this new domain nice thank you i although it's uh it's all about innovation that's so much of this kind of goes

back to klauswitz about every time you're uh you know when you innovate the the enemy also gets a vote um that's about all we have time for i want to thank you so much for being with us we're going to put links to the book in the show notes here and it's of course free coming from an hhc and encourage listeners to all go out and download that or order themselves a hard copy and read over your good work thanks again for being with us peter yeah thanks jay I'm back with greasy alley, put it on the shimbo now. So help me, Bob, I'm put in the alley, way, hey, put it in the alley. Help me, Bob, I'm put in the alley, put it on the shimbo now.

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