Navy focuses on maritime superiority in complex world.

• Author: Tadjdeh, Yasmin

* The U.S. Navy is juggling many missions around the globe. It is challenging the Islamic State in the Middle East and is increasing its presence in the Asia-Pacific region as China continues to intimidate its neighbors. At the same time, other nations--such as Iran and North Korea--remain concerns.

To maintain its global dominance, Navy leadership released in January a strategy called, "A Design for Maintaining Maritime Superiority," that is intended to guide the sea service as the world grows more complex, said Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John Richardson.

"The character of the entire game has changed," he said during a speech in January. "In particular, the pace of things has become so accelerated. ... If we do not respond to those changes, if we do not recognize and adapt to the changing character of the game, we are a Navy that is at risk of falling behind ... our competitors."

While the world was once more black and white with only two superpowers--the United States and the Soviet Union--it now faces a more congested playing field, he said. Competitors include Russia, China, North Korea, Iran and terrorist organizations.

"For the first time in what I would say is roughly 25 years, the United States is back to an era of great power competition," he said. "When I was deployed in 1983 ... it was a different world. When the Soviet Union dissolved, the Cold War ended, we really entered a period where we were not ... challenged at sea, not in a very meaningful way. That era is over."

As outlined in the Navy's new strategy, some of these actors are seeking to exploit what Richardson calls the three global forces: traffic in the ocean, the global information system and the increasing rate of innovation.

"I'm focusing on three forces that for the Navy are sort of defining our way forward. The three forces that are causing our world to be more used, more trafficked, more stressed, more important and perhaps, most interestingly, more competed than ever," he said.

The maritime domain looks physically the same, but it is becoming more crowded. Since 1992, maritime traffic has increased by a factor of four. Technology is making previously unreachable parts of the ocean floor accessible. That is opening up certain areas to mineral, oil and gas exploration, he said.

The global information system is also rapidly expanding, Richardson said. Undersea cables, satellites and wireless networks connect the globe. Citing data from IBM, Richardson said 2.5...