Air & Space Power Journal

How Navies Fight: The US Navy and Its Allies by Frank Uhlig, Jr., Naval Institute Press, 118 Maryland Avenue, Annapolis, Maryland 21402-5035, 1994, 455 pages, $34.95

Frank Uhlig, editor emeritus of the Naval War College Review, has completed a well researched and extremely throught provoking book - How Navies Fight. Uhlig ends How Navies Fight with a stand-alone chapter entitled "How Navies Fight and Why," in which he concludes that navies fight performing some 43 separate tasks which this reviewer hopes can be identified in the Joint Staff's new Universal Joint Task List. The final chapter summarizes the author's view on each of the 22 historical cases and builds upon excellent summaries found at the end of each.

Uhlig's cases include a mix of global conventional wars as well as major and lesser regional contingencies. How Navies Fight assesses naval campaigns both in deep waters and shallow, against both foes with powerful fleets and those without. Some campaigns, notably those near the end or World War II in the Pacific and the much more recent British struggle over the Falklands, pitted a fleet chiefly against a shore-based air force. Uhlig draws an excellent parallel with the latter and the campaign fought over Guadalcanal.

Uhlig concludes that over time "there is remarkable constancy in how navies go about their business." Of the 43 tasks of navies, the author argues there are really five ways that navies fight: first, to support the strategic movement of troops; second, to acquire advanced bases; third, to land an armed force on hostile shores; fourth, blockade; and fifth, to master the local sea.

Commenting on the use of navies in wartime since the middle of World War II, Uhlig concludes that since then "allies have been able to land troops on a hostile shore, supporting them then and thereafter with fire and logistics without first having to fight an enemy fleet." Such an observation has extremely serious programming consequences for naval forces today.

Why navies fight is also developed in the book's last chapter. Uhlig argues that there are three purposes for naval warfare. First, navies fight to ensure "that friendly shipping can flow." Second, they fight to ensure "that hostile shipping cannot." Third, having accomplished the former, "navies can risk landing an army on a hostile shore, supporting that army with fire and logistics."

With a few exceptions, the purpose of the US Navy's campaigns have been to support troops ashore until they triumphed, sometimes well inland. After all, it is on the land that the great questions of war and peace ultimately are decided. It was the failure to keep this function in mind that caused some of the criticism directed at the Navy's 1980s-era Maritime Strategy. Uhlig does not duck the controversies associated with his conclusions and directly addresses the employment of Task Force 38 during the Battle of Leyte Gulf. The Navy today is directly addressing such issues as they flesh out the doctrine supporting "...From the Sea."

In an era of "jointness" when one questions whether there will ever again be Service-specific campaigns, we are reminded that in addition to the air campaign of Desert Storm, a major naval campaign was fought just over a decade ago - the Falklands. Uhlig does not suggest that there will be naval campaigns in the future. However, if we are to understand how navies contribute to joint warfare, we must first understand how navies operate alone. This book will help us do that.

By design, the book does not seriously address the use of navies in operations other than wars. Obviously why navies exist must go beyond their war fighting capabilities and one should read this book in conjunction with the rich menu of other offerings dealing with the non-warfighting aspects of sea power, especially presence.

How Navies Fight makes a major contribution to the literature and is strongly recommended to all professional military officers of all services and defense analysts. The book is not a prescription for naval forces in an era of the Bottom-up Review; indeed, there will be sections not to the liking of many concerned with naval programming. How Navies Fight is instead, a balanced assessment of the warfighting conduct and value of naval combat and its ultimate worth to the larger military objectives and political goals of warfare. Frank Uhlig has already been awarded the Alfred Thayer Mahan Award for Literary Achievement by the Navy League of the United States. He should be nominated for a second award.

Dr James J. Tritten
Norfolk, Virginia