Military History: Spain’s Siren Song

17th Century Spain and The Allure of Idealized History in Grand Strategy

 

Many readers may be familiar with Paul Kennedy’s classic The Rise and Fall of Great Powers. It is often recommended to those who have an interest in grand strategy.  However, readers might be less familiar with a collection of essays edited by Kennedy, Grand Strategies in War and Peace, which, while less comprehensive than Kennedy’s 1987 work, poses a number of interesting questions about how states conceive of their national interests and of effective grand strategy. Out of the book’s 10 essays, J.H. Elliot’s “Managing Decline: Olivares and the Grand Strategy of Imperial Spain” is a particularly interesting perspective on how idealized history may warp the desirability of grand strategic models and creates obstacles for managing decline.

In “Managing Decline,” Elliot outlines the 17th century geopolitical climate facing Spain and Prime Minister Gaspar de Guzman, the count-duke of Olivares. Having made a tentative peace with the Dutch following a largely unsuccessful and costly war aimed at fully reintegrating the rebellious Netherlands, Spain and its political elite felt a great deal of trepidation when it came to making plans for the future of the country. Out of this unease emerged a deluge of writing on issues of decline and prescriptions for restoring Spanish glory. The dialectic of decline generally manifested in two ways. The first argument was essentially a discussion of the seemingly natural historical forces that lead to decline and of how to slow the cyclical decline of the state. The second argument concerned itself with the moral aspects of the decline in Spanish power. The moral arguments were usually framed by a historical narrative of the Roman slide into decadence, corruption, and “effeminacy” leading to that ancient empire’s downfall. The antidotes for the poison that threatened Spain’s greatness, in this second area of analysis, lay in a simple return to the traditional values that ushered the country into its golden age in the first place.[1]

So, according to the 17th century equivalent to policy wonks, if Spain was to maintain its place in a rapidly changing and globalizing world, it must defend the physical limits of its realm from erosion and look to social and political reforms to strengthen the state and its ability to make war, drawing on the notion that reversion to tradition could bring back the rhythm of progress. Unfortunately, progress from Spain’s present position would be costly and predicated on more than piety, and its economic and political woes would exacerbate its inability to effectively confront its foreign policy challenges in the coming years as expenditures grew and revenues shrank.

Olivares came into office in 1621,  three years after the beginning of the Thirty Years War, and oversaw a renewal of hostilities with the Dutch in that same year. In a time of great trials, the Olivares regime looked back to, as Elliot writes, the “more remote and glorious past of a reign of Phillip II that was beginning to be idealized with passage of time…Renewal, in other words, could only come with the restoration of old values.”[2]

Read the Remainder at Real Clear Defense

Military History: Top 5 Worst Submarine Disasters

 

North Korea’s apparent loss of one its submarines this week is a stark reminder that operating in the undersea domain is fraught with danger.

Since the Second World War, the United States, Russia and China—and a host of other nations—have lost vessels and their crews to accidents. Operating submarines is a risky business under the best of circumstances—and will likely remain so. Even the highest technology nuclear submarines can end up on the ocean floor if the crew isn’t careful or the technology fails.

Here are some of the worst submarine disasters of the past several decades.

Kursk, 2000

Perhaps the worst submarine disaster in recent memory was Russia’s loss of K-141Kursk, which was a Project 949A Antey-class (Oscar II) nuclear-powered guided missile submarine.  The massive 16,000-ton submarine was destroyed in a massive explosion on August 12, 2000—which killed all 118 members of its crew.

Kursk’s wreckage was eventually recovered and the accident was ultimately traced to the Type-65-76A torpedo. Though the weapon is powerful enough to destroy an aircraft carrier with a single hit, the Soviet Union inexplicably designed the torpedo to run on hydrogen peroxide fuel, which is highly volatile and requires careful handling. Unfortunately for Kursk’s crew, they apparently had neither the training nor the experience to handle those weapons.

After the Kursk disaster, the Russian Navy removed hydrogen peroxide-fuelled torpedoes from service.

 

Komsomolets, 1989

K-278 Komsomolets was the only boat of the Project 685 Plavnik-class (NATO: Mike) ever completed. Designed primarily as a testbed for new technologies, the 8,000-ton Komsomolets was one of the highest performance submarines ever built—it had an operating depth greater than 3000ft. Like the Papa-class, Project 685 Plavnik was designed to test automation technologies and perfect the Soviet Union’s ability to built titanium pressure hulls.

The submarine sank on April 7, 1989, after a fire broke out onboard. The fire set off a chain of events that ultimately caused the boat to sink. Despite the heroic efforts of the crew, 42 of the 69 crewmembers were killed during the accident. However, only four people died as a direct result of the fire—the rest died from exposure. More of the crew might have been saved if the Soviet navy had acted more quickly to mount a rescue operation.

Meanwhile, Komsomolets’s nuclear reactor and its two nuclear warheads remain onboard the stricken hull under 5,500ft of water in the Barents Sea—a disaster waiting to happen again.

 

K-8, 1970

K-8 was a Project 627A Kit-class (NATO: November) nuclear-powered attack submarine that sank after a fire in April 12, 1970. (K-8 didn’t have a name, the Soviet Union only rarely named its submarines)

The submarine had originally caught fire on April 8, 1970, during an exercise in two separate compartments. The fire apparently started as a result of oil coming into contact with the air regeneration system. After the fire spread throughout the boat via the air conditioning system—and the reactors shut down—the captain ordered the crew to abandon ship. The crew boarded the submarine again after a rescue vessel arrived. But eventually the submarine sank in heavy seas while undertow—with 52 members of its crew.

The Russians have had multiple incidents with fire onboard their submarines. Indeed, Russia’s first nuclear-powered attack submarine— K-3 Leninsky Komsomol —was nearly destroyed due to fire caused by a jury-rigged repair in September, 1967. “A non-standard gasket from. . . a beer bottle was installed in the ballast tank,” a former crewmember told Pravda last year. “Naturally it was displaced, the hydraulic fluid leaked under the pressure of 100 atmospheres and got sprayed onto the lamp, which had a broken protective cap. Inflammation occurred immediately.”

 

USS Scorpion (SSN-589), 1969

While Russia and the Soviet Union have had their fair share of submarine disasters, the United States Navy has lost submarines too. On May 22, 1969, the USS Scorpion, a Skipjack-class attack submarine. was lost with all hands 400 miles southwest of the Azores islands. There were 99 sailors onboard.

It is still a mystery as to what exactly happened to Scorpion—the boat simply failed to return to port on May 27 that year. The Navy launched a search, but eventually declared it lost on June 5. Eventually, Scorpion was located under 10,000ft of water by a Navy research ship later that year.

U.S. Navy source tell me they have a good idea about what probably happened to Scorpion—but didn’t provide any details. Most public sources, suggest that the most likely cause was an inadvertent activation of the battery of a Mark 37 torpedos or a torpedo explosion.

USS Thresher (SSN-593), 1963

USS Thresher sank on April 10, 1963, with 129 sailors onboard. It was the first nuclear submarine disaster, and to this day, has the highest death toll. Unlike with Scorpion, the U.S. Navy has reported exactly what caused Thresher to sink—poor quality control.

The submarine sank while it was conducting a dive to its test depth of about 1,300ft. Five minutes prior to losing contact with the vessel, the submarine rescue ship Skylark received a garbled UQC transmission (an underwater radio of sorts) that said Thresher was having some minor technical difficult. Skylark continued to receive garbled messages until the sonar picked up the sound of Thresher imploding.

A Navy court of inquiry found that a piping failure probably caused the accident.

As the boat’s engine room flooded as a result, salt-water spray shut down the nuclear reactor.  Subsequently, Thresher’s main ballast tank failed to blow after ice formed in its piping. The crew was unable to access the equipment needed to stop the flooding.

As a direct result of the Thresher disaster, the Navy instituted the SUBSAFEprogram to ensure that there is a thoroughly documented system of checks and re-checks on all critical components of a nuclear submarine.

Read the Original Article at National Interest