The Chief of Naval Operations’ Navigation Plan 2022 advocates transforming the existing fleet into a hybrid one that includes 150 unmanned surface and subsurface platforms.To achieve this, the Navy must take steps to integrate more existing unmanned technologies, both aerial and surface, into the fleet. Providing concrete examples in which unmanned technologies have saved resources and increased lethality will help give Congress greater confidence in the Navy’s ability to deploy unmanned systems.1 For example, using the MQ-8C Fire Scout as a horizon reference unit (HRU) for the carrier would be immediately tactically beneficial and provide sailors needed technical experience.
The High Cost of HRU Duty
On dark nights, when the horizon line is not visible to the carrier’s landing signal officers (LSOs), a destroyer or cruiser sails off the carrier’s starboard quarter with only its mast light on or, if requested by the air wing, also a blue stern light and dimmed side lights. This gives the LSOs a visual reference to determine the positioning of incoming aircraft. In a January 2022 Proceedings article, retired aviator and former commanding officer of the USS John F. Kennedy (CV-67) Captain Maurice Joyce argues this is a waste of resources and a needless risk to a destroyer, which he dubs a “multibillion dollar lightbulb.”2
For a destroyer or cruiser, the personnel costs of HRU duty are significant, potentially involving up to ten additional watchstanders if the commanding officer desires maximum redundancy. With HRU duty usually lasting five hours a night during flight operations, this could add up to 50 personnel hours a day, 350 hours a week.
HRU duty can be even worse for a cruiser. Strike groups often deploy with just a single destroyer escort and a cruiser. If the destroyer is disaggregated forward as a picket unit, the cruiser will be doing HRU duty every night the air wing flies. This means an additional five hours of full power each night, burning significant fuel and requiring an additional underway replenishment (UnRep) each week to remain above the fuel percentage required of fleet commanders. The UnRep usually lasts four hours from setting to securing the detail, which could add up to 1,200 personnel hours that otherwise could be used for training or preventive maintenance.
The most taxing requirement is on the commanding officer, the air- and missile-defense commander for the strike group, who must focus on ship-handling for five hours each night and an additional UnRep each week instead of air defense. In addition, sectoring air search radars when in close proximity to the carrier further inhibits the air-defense mission. Nightly HRU duty with two UnReps each week is difficult and tiring during peacetime and would be impossible to sustain during wartime.
Task the Fire Scout
With the proper lighting configuration, an MQ-8C Fire Scout easily could provide a horizon reference for LSOs. Using an MQ-8C flown from either the carrier or the cruiser/destroyer would save millions of dollars in fuel and personnel hours and develop a cadre of personnel familiar with unmanned systems.
This broad exposure to the MQ-8C also could be a step in overcoming resistance to unmanned experimentation within the aviation community.3 The surface escorts could use the time saved to prepare and train for the high-end surface, subsurface, and air fight—planning to conduct the creative fleet exercises that Admiral Scott Swift pioneered in 2018.4 Unnecessary risk would be eliminated, and the Navy would have a visible victory in deploying unmanned systems.
Force Design 2045 sets ambitious goals for a hybrid fleet. However, doubts remain both on the deckplates and in Congress on the feasibility and reliability of unmanned and optionally manned systems. Using the MQ-8C Fire Scout as an HRU could help dispel those doubts.
1. Lauren Williams, “Lawmakers Skeptical of Seaborne Drone Fleet,” FCW.com, 23 June 2022.
3. CAPT Maurice Joyce, USN, “There Are Better Ways to Use a Destroyer,” U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings 148, no. 1 (January 2022).
4. Col Noah Spataro, USAF, and LCDRs Trevor Phillips-Levine and Andrew Tenbusch, USN, “Winged Luddites: Aviators Are the Biggest Threat to Carrier Aviation,” War on the Rocks, 10 January 2022.
5. ADM Scott H. Swift, USN, “Fleet Problems Offer Opportunities,” U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings 144, no. 3 (March 2018).