What are we bringing to the (possible) Middle East War this time? Well, according to the U.S. Navy History and Heritage Command, we kicked off Desert Shield with the following: (9/30/90)
Make that 620; we need two battleships refurbished. One patrol about 1/2 mile off Gaza firing away. The other in the Red Sea doing the same to the Houthis.
It's time to party like it's 1816. And, just because.
There are no longer ANY battleships economical or even practical to return to service. Nor are there any longer ratings of the special types needed young enough to recall to the colors. Worse, there may be ZERO ships of any kind we can return to service. When we tried to restore the seven Peary class frigates, we found NOT ONE had been properly stored, and ALL had been gutted of potentially useful equipment. The hulls were rusted, and they all needed massive equipment replacements. We elected to restore none at all.
"How unstable would the Middle East and Europe be without the anti-ballistic missile capabilities only the US Navy has with its Aegis destroyers and cruisers?"
Important but overstated? Clearly the Navy VLS provide magazine depth and additional launchers to the Western side, but have the Iranian Axis launched any missile that Israel can't counter? Yes, it's the "quantity has a quality of its own" issue as well. For that matter, absent range issues, can Patriot variants shoot down the various Iranian missile types?
What is unique to the Navy SAM tool kit? beyond magazine depth...
"What is unique to the Navy SAM tool kit? beyond magazine depth..."
Where they can put the magazines (and launchers) geographically. Israel is not placing any air defense assets any place outside of their sovereign soil. Naval based systems gives you that additional flexibility.
understand. Though I tried to frame things as the Western side, I think that Israel has some different SAMs.
Let me ask this way: Assuming a Saudi Patriot battery is within range, do the Iranians have missiles it is not capable of defending against? If so, do the Israeli missiles handle threat? If not, what do the SM2/SM3/SM6 bring to the game?
Some ballistic missile interceptions are exo-atomospheric SM-3/SM-6. They intercept warheads outside the atmosphere. Patriot and SM-2 intercept warheads inside the atmosphere. Endo-atmospheric .
The Israelis have the Arrow ABM which is exo-amospheric
"Magazine depth" is a valid variable as long as those magazines are full. As previously posted here, we are on the wrong side of the production power curve, to use an aviation expression.
WW I added the air domain to the battlefield in a big way (beyond observation ballons from earlier fights). The air domain became the new "high ground". Tanks broke trench warfare in WW I and birthed Blitzkrieg (combined arms with air and artillery and comms) in WW II. The aircraft carrier hugely expanded the air domain in WW II (the new "high ground") and in all conflicts since. Battleships became secondary in WW II, then tertiary and out of the inventory after Desert Storm.
Space became a new domain as comms and GPS impacted Desert Storm and now space domain "National Technical Means" are significant and closely guarded capabilities of the highest security classifications. The carrier, while long in the tooth, currently remains our best tool for the job. As air power made the battleship obsolete (the battle in the USN between the battleship and carrier advocates was legendary), will space (the new "high ground") make the carrier much more vulnerable, if not obsolete? "The world wonders...".
"...We may want to concentrate on the Pacific, but the Middle East and Europe...."
Exactly, exactly, exactly! over and over and over.....THAT'S where the action is; and is coming, first.
Whatever else Iran is, or does, ....their proximity to their nuclear ambitions absolutely commands attention beyond any other considerations.
China? IndoPacific? Likely after we have been whittled down just a tad bit more than our current sad state. A bit more Mid-East activity will exacerbate that.
If we had an Interior Department and State Department that was effectively managing our relationships with the island countries of the Pacific, we may have a bit more buffer across the region. Alas, from the most recent podcast guest it seems we (being our designated bureaucrats) have manage to screw the pooch there as well.
"It is no secret that the Navy has been traditionally the most reluctant of all the services to commit wholeheartedly to joint duty, training, and operations. Today, however, says Vice Admiral Williams, it is “really pushing joint more than any other service.” He says that the CNO is implementing jointness from the top down and that the Navy is now putting its best people in joint duty assignments. “Those who do not have the word haven’t been listening very carefully. But they will get it,” he says."
"Highlights of 1991 ►The Navy decommissioned 43 ships in 1991, a U.S. record. Among them were the training aircraft carrier Lexington (AVT-16), the nuclear- powered ballistic missile submarine Lewis and Clark (SSBN-644), and the battleships New Jersey (BB-62) and Wisconsin (BB-64). The last of the old dreadnoughts, the Missouri (BB-63) completed her last cruise, a Pacific voyage to Pearl Harbor for the 50th Anniversary commemoration of the 1941 Japanese attack."
I agree, we're severely under resourced. A third (maybe 4th or even 5th) rate military has caused innumerable problems for global shipping by making the Red Sea transit to costly for most shippers. Honestly, I'm kinda surprised Egypt hasn't launched an effort to destroy the Houthis for interrupting Suez Canal traffic. That's gotta be cutting into the pocket book.
I've wondered whether the current administration sees weakening Egypt as a 'good thing' given that the attempt by us during the Obama administration to support the installation of an Islamic government there didn't work out.. I doubt Egypt has the capacity to impact the Houthis, given that the Saudis couldn't.
Egypt? The same country that can't keep terrorists from digging tunnels in their country into Gaza or just maybe purposely builds the tunnels themselves while accepting billions in US aid.
"How unstable would the Middle East and Europe be without the anti-ballistic missile capabilities only the US Navy has with its Aegis destroyers and cruisers?"
Nice to have the ships there, taking batting practice at cheap drones, or even expensive drones or no-kidding missiles aimed at OUR ships. Now what happens when our ships are there and the magazines are empty? Got bunkers full back in CONUS or elsewhere? Ever come up with a way to reload other than in port?
Maybe in addition to asking "Where are the carriers?" we need to start asking "Where are the AE's?" and "How many replacement rounds will the contractors deliver when?" And, "Is free stuff more important then freedom of the seas?"
I have said in the forums that one of our major military weaknesses is that we buy to budget not budget toby whatʻs needed. At one time, we needed fifteen carriers, then twelve, now ten -- until we need them. Then we really need them. You canʻt just sign in to Amazon and buy a Ford class carrier. They take years to build.
I often hear about how expensive they are. How expensive is it to not have what you need? BTW, "An Associated Press analysis found that fraudsters potentially stole more than $280 billion in COVID-19 relief funding; another $123 billion was wasted or misspent. Combined, the loss represents 10% of the $4.2 trillion the U.S. government has so far disbursed in COVID relief aid."
USS Gerald Ford cost $13.3 billion. We could buy and man ten Ford class CVNs for what we wasted on COVID (not counting the costs of the shutdown).
I do not believe for a minute that those funds reallocations were a deliberate decision between butter and guns. The forces in power in DC want this country to fail.
They may want it to fail, but I donʻt think so. I just think that they are too enamored with themselves and their infinite empathy to recognize that they are putting the nation at risk.
I was thinking of senior civilians in positions above DoD. Obviously they do not want to ever lose their positions of power. Perhaps "fail" is the wrong word, though destroying Constitutional freedoms is a good definition of that term in my mind.
I suspect it is even more insidious. I actually had a five hour conversation with then Rep, now Secretary Xavier Becerra. At one point I asked why he got into politics. He said he wanted to help people. So, the logic goes:
- I want to help people
- I can help more people if I use tax dollars and government force to compel behavior
- Too many people are not behaving "the way they should"
- Therefore, it is necessary to make the behave the way they should
- The Constitution gets in the way, so I must subvert it.
Ah, yes. Compulsion. Can’t have the little people believing they get to think for themselves, can we? “1984” shouldn’t have been used as a training manual, but here we are. I first raised my hand to support and defend the Constitution (the whole blinking thing) in 1969, and don’t consider that obligation to have been terminated by time or current employment.
The CVN is expensive is bull excrement. It’s a national asset that stays on the balance sheet for 50 years. The Nimitz class adjusted for inflation is $11.2 Billion. The First in class Ford is $13 B with more capacity & power.
The sneaky thing about that $13B unlike covid spending or the Green Programs ww spent trillions on is the dollars spent are spent here in the US. Paying US labor and suppliers.
It should be noted that the additional fighter squadron mentioned in the press release is a F-22 squadron out of Langley AFB.
To defend an Iranian cruise missile/done attack with air to air interceptions over Kuwait/Jordan/Iraq/KSA you don't need LO-aircraft. 4th Generation F-15/16's in unstealthily "Beast Mode" will work mighty fine.
Now if you are flying an offensive counter-air mission over Iran an F-22 is the tool to use.
Carriers are last big war's weapons. Too vulnerable in the modern age of an enemy with drones & missiles. Look at Okinawa 1945 and see how many carriers rated in final months of war against an enemy with limited resources but willing to turn themselves into bombs. That was 80 years ago. Remember damage to USS Oriskany in 1966 that put her out of commission requiring extensive repairs.
Naval Air is important, but in a different kind of war than is brewing in west Asia today..
From Sal - "We have too few carriers and Aegis-capable warships." "Too few" because hypersonic missiles will take out too many too early in the next peer event.
My understanding is that PRC either has cruise missiles of that speed class, or is on the verge of having them. If not hypersonic cruise missiles, then let's talk about their multi-warhead nuclear IRBMs that would present to the fleet at hypersonic speeds, with targeting courtesy of their satellites. When I was a kid, the US Army had artillery capable of firing nuclear shells, called Atomic Annie. I had the toy version. After the fall of the Soviet Union we discovered that every one of those guns had a Spetsnaz team assigned to take it out if the balloon went up. The PRC would be very much derelict in their duties if they did not know exactly, repeat exactly, where every CVN is at all times.
Courtesy of what satellites?? Nobody, the US included, has full surveillance of the SCS, let alone the Phillipine sea and rest of WestPac. Everyone's saying how CVNs are big easy targets- but they still dissappear into the open ocean. They aren't easy targets if you can't even find them. And even then, the difference between having a location, and somthing you can shoot at, are vastly different things...
it's an 11 carrier navy in a 15 carrier world. It's the only weapon system that can reload in the midst of the fight, and it's now fielding a mod, air to air version of the SM-6, returning the air wing to outer air battle.
1. Wouldn't we be better off festooning our ships (within reason based on weight) with a bunch of relatively cheap radar-directed AA cannons instead of shooting down $1,000 drones with $1,000,000 missiles? Save the missiles for the more lethal stuff?
2. Another circa 1990 feature of the US Navy was a carrier operated ~90 aircraft instead of the ~60 they seem to operate today. Is it even still feasible to start loading our carriers up with a couple of extra squadrons of F-18s and re-learning the operational requirements of maxing out our current carrier capacity?
In both cases, the theme I'm going for here is to maximize what we've got, because it's pretty clear that we aren't going to be getting anything else anytime soon.
To get to that level of decision making would require absolutely honest war games, not the usual group gropes, where everyone is tied to "rules" and we hope only a minimum number of sailors are killed or maimed.
Back in ancient history as an ED LCDR assigned to David Taylor Model Basin, a group of our SES and GM14 level civilians participated in a war game at the Naval War College. The purpose was to let the civilian workforce see which of the planned weaponry would or would not work in somewhat real life. Contrary to the usual brief, I was allowed to attend, and served as the Blue Force Surface Warfare Coordinator. Maximizing whatever level of ingenuity I had at the time, I executed off an "off the books" A-6 attack against the Red fleet. At the end of the week-long exercise we found out that that attack totally destroyed Red fleet and the umpires had to reconstitute it on Day 3 just to fill out the week. Not a brag, just making the point that we learn things when people are let loose.
RE point 2: the reduction in T/M/S of the CVW really cut down on overall numbers. I'm not sure about the overall benefit, but I'm pretty sure not having several smaller dets onboard is seen as better by the commanders. There's a post from a 2019 on Sal's OG blog about plans for the CVW. The strike element is planned to stay about the same size, but an increase in VAQ and VAW, along with MQ-25 should be of use. https://cdrsalamander.blogspot.com/2019/09/your-next-airwing.html
The loss of the All-weather attack squadrons, though, still strikes me as short-sighted.
Marine officer: "Maggot, you're here to defend this ship against the deadliest enemy she's ever faced".
Skyler: "Soviet commandos? Iranian terrorists?"
Marine officer: " NO MAGGOT, BUDGET CUTTERS!"
We used to say that our opponents were the Soviets. The enemy is the Navy.
What are we bringing to the (possible) Middle East War this time? Well, according to the U.S. Navy History and Heritage Command, we kicked off Desert Shield with the following: (9/30/90)
Battleships: 4
Carriers: 13
Cruisers: 43
Destroyers: 57
Frigates: 99
Submarines: 93
SSBNs: 33
Command Ships: 4
Mine Warfare: 22
Patrol: 6
Amphibious: 59
Auxilliary: 137
Surface Warships: 203
TOTAL ACTIVE: 570
The situation is even worse when you consider how much less our NATO allies have to offer.
Every day, when you get up, the first thing out of your mouth is "600 ship navy."
Make that 620; we need two battleships refurbished. One patrol about 1/2 mile off Gaza firing away. The other in the Red Sea doing the same to the Houthis.
It's time to party like it's 1816. And, just because.
There are no longer ANY battleships economical or even practical to return to service. Nor are there any longer ratings of the special types needed young enough to recall to the colors. Worse, there may be ZERO ships of any kind we can return to service. When we tried to restore the seven Peary class frigates, we found NOT ONE had been properly stored, and ALL had been gutted of potentially useful equipment. The hulls were rusted, and they all needed massive equipment replacements. We elected to restore none at all.
This is why shooting the Archers on mass becomes even more important.
"How unstable would the Middle East and Europe be without the anti-ballistic missile capabilities only the US Navy has with its Aegis destroyers and cruisers?"
Important but overstated? Clearly the Navy VLS provide magazine depth and additional launchers to the Western side, but have the Iranian Axis launched any missile that Israel can't counter? Yes, it's the "quantity has a quality of its own" issue as well. For that matter, absent range issues, can Patriot variants shoot down the various Iranian missile types?
What is unique to the Navy SAM tool kit? beyond magazine depth...
"What is unique to the Navy SAM tool kit? beyond magazine depth..."
Where they can put the magazines (and launchers) geographically. Israel is not placing any air defense assets any place outside of their sovereign soil. Naval based systems gives you that additional flexibility.
understand. Though I tried to frame things as the Western side, I think that Israel has some different SAMs.
Let me ask this way: Assuming a Saudi Patriot battery is within range, do the Iranians have missiles it is not capable of defending against? If so, do the Israeli missiles handle threat? If not, what do the SM2/SM3/SM6 bring to the game?
Some ballistic missile interceptions are exo-atomospheric SM-3/SM-6. They intercept warheads outside the atmosphere. Patriot and SM-2 intercept warheads inside the atmosphere. Endo-atmospheric .
The Israelis have the Arrow ABM which is exo-amospheric
"Magazine depth" is a valid variable as long as those magazines are full. As previously posted here, we are on the wrong side of the production power curve, to use an aviation expression.
WW I added the air domain to the battlefield in a big way (beyond observation ballons from earlier fights). The air domain became the new "high ground". Tanks broke trench warfare in WW I and birthed Blitzkrieg (combined arms with air and artillery and comms) in WW II. The aircraft carrier hugely expanded the air domain in WW II (the new "high ground") and in all conflicts since. Battleships became secondary in WW II, then tertiary and out of the inventory after Desert Storm.
Space became a new domain as comms and GPS impacted Desert Storm and now space domain "National Technical Means" are significant and closely guarded capabilities of the highest security classifications. The carrier, while long in the tooth, currently remains our best tool for the job. As air power made the battleship obsolete (the battle in the USN between the battleship and carrier advocates was legendary), will space (the new "high ground") make the carrier much more vulnerable, if not obsolete? "The world wonders...".
"...We may want to concentrate on the Pacific, but the Middle East and Europe...."
Exactly, exactly, exactly! over and over and over.....THAT'S where the action is; and is coming, first.
Whatever else Iran is, or does, ....their proximity to their nuclear ambitions absolutely commands attention beyond any other considerations.
China? IndoPacific? Likely after we have been whittled down just a tad bit more than our current sad state. A bit more Mid-East activity will exacerbate that.
If we had an Interior Department and State Department that was effectively managing our relationships with the island countries of the Pacific, we may have a bit more buffer across the region. Alas, from the most recent podcast guest it seems we (being our designated bureaucrats) have manage to screw the pooch there as well.
And how quickly did we lean into "Jointness" and "Peace Dividend"?
https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/1992/may/us-navy-1991
Proceedings May 1992
"It is no secret that the Navy has been traditionally the most reluctant of all the services to commit wholeheartedly to joint duty, training, and operations. Today, however, says Vice Admiral Williams, it is “really pushing joint more than any other service.” He says that the CNO is implementing jointness from the top down and that the Navy is now putting its best people in joint duty assignments. “Those who do not have the word haven’t been listening very carefully. But they will get it,” he says."
"Highlights of 1991 ►The Navy decommissioned 43 ships in 1991, a U.S. record. Among them were the training aircraft carrier Lexington (AVT-16), the nuclear- powered ballistic missile submarine Lewis and Clark (SSBN-644), and the battleships New Jersey (BB-62) and Wisconsin (BB-64). The last of the old dreadnoughts, the Missouri (BB-63) completed her last cruise, a Pacific voyage to Pearl Harbor for the 50th Anniversary commemoration of the 1941 Japanese attack."
"......not as some clever briefer sells you that it should be..." Didn't Congress take that function away from the Admirals?
I agree, we're severely under resourced. A third (maybe 4th or even 5th) rate military has caused innumerable problems for global shipping by making the Red Sea transit to costly for most shippers. Honestly, I'm kinda surprised Egypt hasn't launched an effort to destroy the Houthis for interrupting Suez Canal traffic. That's gotta be cutting into the pocket book.
I've wondered whether the current administration sees weakening Egypt as a 'good thing' given that the attempt by us during the Obama administration to support the installation of an Islamic government there didn't work out.. I doubt Egypt has the capacity to impact the Houthis, given that the Saudis couldn't.
Egypt? The same country that can't keep terrorists from digging tunnels in their country into Gaza or just maybe purposely builds the tunnels themselves while accepting billions in US aid.
Egypt intervened in Yemen under Nasser, and it didn't work out to well.
"How unstable would the Middle East and Europe be without the anti-ballistic missile capabilities only the US Navy has with its Aegis destroyers and cruisers?"
Nice to have the ships there, taking batting practice at cheap drones, or even expensive drones or no-kidding missiles aimed at OUR ships. Now what happens when our ships are there and the magazines are empty? Got bunkers full back in CONUS or elsewhere? Ever come up with a way to reload other than in port?
Maybe in addition to asking "Where are the carriers?" we need to start asking "Where are the AE's?" and "How many replacement rounds will the contractors deliver when?" And, "Is free stuff more important then freedom of the seas?"
That’s what the CSG is for to take out the archers so the arrows don’t fly.
I have said in the forums that one of our major military weaknesses is that we buy to budget not budget toby whatʻs needed. At one time, we needed fifteen carriers, then twelve, now ten -- until we need them. Then we really need them. You canʻt just sign in to Amazon and buy a Ford class carrier. They take years to build.
I often hear about how expensive they are. How expensive is it to not have what you need? BTW, "An Associated Press analysis found that fraudsters potentially stole more than $280 billion in COVID-19 relief funding; another $123 billion was wasted or misspent. Combined, the loss represents 10% of the $4.2 trillion the U.S. government has so far disbursed in COVID relief aid."
USS Gerald Ford cost $13.3 billion. We could buy and man ten Ford class CVNs for what we wasted on COVID (not counting the costs of the shutdown).
I do not believe for a minute that those funds reallocations were a deliberate decision between butter and guns. The forces in power in DC want this country to fail.
They may want it to fail, but I donʻt think so. I just think that they are too enamored with themselves and their infinite empathy to recognize that they are putting the nation at risk.
I was thinking of senior civilians in positions above DoD. Obviously they do not want to ever lose their positions of power. Perhaps "fail" is the wrong word, though destroying Constitutional freedoms is a good definition of that term in my mind.
I suspect it is even more insidious. I actually had a five hour conversation with then Rep, now Secretary Xavier Becerra. At one point I asked why he got into politics. He said he wanted to help people. So, the logic goes:
- I want to help people
- I can help more people if I use tax dollars and government force to compel behavior
- Too many people are not behaving "the way they should"
- Therefore, it is necessary to make the behave the way they should
- The Constitution gets in the way, so I must subvert it.
- Therein lies tyranny
Ah, yes. Compulsion. Can’t have the little people believing they get to think for themselves, can we? “1984” shouldn’t have been used as a training manual, but here we are. I first raised my hand to support and defend the Constitution (the whole blinking thing) in 1969, and don’t consider that obligation to have been terminated by time or current employment.
Alan, Have you heard of The Calvert Group? calverttaskgroup.org. No dues, but donations accepted (Iʻm the treasurer) :-)
True. But COVID as used by the Deep State to get rid of Orange Man and to them that was worth ten carriers
The CVN is expensive is bull excrement. It’s a national asset that stays on the balance sheet for 50 years. The Nimitz class adjusted for inflation is $11.2 Billion. The First in class Ford is $13 B with more capacity & power.
The sneaky thing about that $13B unlike covid spending or the Green Programs ww spent trillions on is the dollars spent are spent here in the US. Paying US labor and suppliers.
The chickens are coming home to roost with a vengeance, and to mix a metaphor--the wolf is already in the coop.
The sheep is at the door, and the wolf is wearing chicken's clothing.
My eyesight and hearing are poor, but I'd swear it was a pack of weasels, Captain, not a wolf. Might have been rats. I dunno.
The rats are within the house unlocking the door for the weasels & wolves.
A USN focus on Power Projection here...
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/wA4KAex0rrU
Priorities.
pathetic
It should be noted that the additional fighter squadron mentioned in the press release is a F-22 squadron out of Langley AFB.
To defend an Iranian cruise missile/done attack with air to air interceptions over Kuwait/Jordan/Iraq/KSA you don't need LO-aircraft. 4th Generation F-15/16's in unstealthily "Beast Mode" will work mighty fine.
Now if you are flying an offensive counter-air mission over Iran an F-22 is the tool to use.
Carriers are last big war's weapons. Too vulnerable in the modern age of an enemy with drones & missiles. Look at Okinawa 1945 and see how many carriers rated in final months of war against an enemy with limited resources but willing to turn themselves into bombs. That was 80 years ago. Remember damage to USS Oriskany in 1966 that put her out of commission requiring extensive repairs.
Naval Air is important, but in a different kind of war than is brewing in west Asia today..
From Sal - "We have too few carriers and Aegis-capable warships." "Too few" because hypersonic missiles will take out too many too early in the next peer event.
Which "hypersonics?" Who has them, in what number, and where are they stationed.
Like, actually, right now.
My understanding is that PRC either has cruise missiles of that speed class, or is on the verge of having them. If not hypersonic cruise missiles, then let's talk about their multi-warhead nuclear IRBMs that would present to the fleet at hypersonic speeds, with targeting courtesy of their satellites. When I was a kid, the US Army had artillery capable of firing nuclear shells, called Atomic Annie. I had the toy version. After the fall of the Soviet Union we discovered that every one of those guns had a Spetsnaz team assigned to take it out if the balloon went up. The PRC would be very much derelict in their duties if they did not know exactly, repeat exactly, where every CVN is at all times.
Courtesy of what satellites?? Nobody, the US included, has full surveillance of the SCS, let alone the Phillipine sea and rest of WestPac. Everyone's saying how CVNs are big easy targets- but they still dissappear into the open ocean. They aren't easy targets if you can't even find them. And even then, the difference between having a location, and somthing you can shoot at, are vastly different things...
it's an 11 carrier navy in a 15 carrier world. It's the only weapon system that can reload in the midst of the fight, and it's now fielding a mod, air to air version of the SM-6, returning the air wing to outer air battle.
1. Wouldn't we be better off festooning our ships (within reason based on weight) with a bunch of relatively cheap radar-directed AA cannons instead of shooting down $1,000 drones with $1,000,000 missiles? Save the missiles for the more lethal stuff?
2. Another circa 1990 feature of the US Navy was a carrier operated ~90 aircraft instead of the ~60 they seem to operate today. Is it even still feasible to start loading our carriers up with a couple of extra squadrons of F-18s and re-learning the operational requirements of maxing out our current carrier capacity?
In both cases, the theme I'm going for here is to maximize what we've got, because it's pretty clear that we aren't going to be getting anything else anytime soon.
To get to that level of decision making would require absolutely honest war games, not the usual group gropes, where everyone is tied to "rules" and we hope only a minimum number of sailors are killed or maimed.
Back in ancient history as an ED LCDR assigned to David Taylor Model Basin, a group of our SES and GM14 level civilians participated in a war game at the Naval War College. The purpose was to let the civilian workforce see which of the planned weaponry would or would not work in somewhat real life. Contrary to the usual brief, I was allowed to attend, and served as the Blue Force Surface Warfare Coordinator. Maximizing whatever level of ingenuity I had at the time, I executed off an "off the books" A-6 attack against the Red fleet. At the end of the week-long exercise we found out that that attack totally destroyed Red fleet and the umpires had to reconstitute it on Day 3 just to fill out the week. Not a brag, just making the point that we learn things when people are let loose.
RE point 2: the reduction in T/M/S of the CVW really cut down on overall numbers. I'm not sure about the overall benefit, but I'm pretty sure not having several smaller dets onboard is seen as better by the commanders. There's a post from a 2019 on Sal's OG blog about plans for the CVW. The strike element is planned to stay about the same size, but an increase in VAQ and VAW, along with MQ-25 should be of use. https://cdrsalamander.blogspot.com/2019/09/your-next-airwing.html
The loss of the All-weather attack squadrons, though, still strikes me as short-sighted.