ABSTRACT
Introduction 2015 marked the sixtieth anniversary of the establishment of armed forces in post-World War Germany. It is also the silver jubilee of German reunifi cation and thus of an all-German Navy. 2 For much of the twenty-fi rst century, German defense policy discourse and its accompanying strategic narrative had largely been dominated by the combat operations in Afghanistan (2001-14) and the threat of international terrorism, 3 even if the Navy had already carried a substantial burden in various maritime security operations in and around Europe since 1990. 4 In a country still struggling with the “coming of age” in a multipolar, violent world order (and clearly uneasy regarding the military aspects of international relations), the German Navy’s roles and missions beyond broad sea control objectives were poorly articulated in Berlin, harly refl ected in capstone documents, and inadequately refl ected in fl eet design. As Bryan McGrath, the primary author of the U.S. “Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower” (2007), has pointed out:
Germany lacks a history and culture (since World War II) of a ‘balanced’ fl eet capable of the full range of modern naval operations. With no carrier or amphibious fl eet to speak of, and without a sea-based nuclear deterrent, the German Navy has historically focused on sea-control missions centered around ASW, ASuW, and maritime security. 5
Amidst recently risen tensions over the Russo-Ukrainian war in the Black Sea littorals (accompanied by a deep souring of relations between the West and Moscow), an increasingly chaotic international order, the brutal ascent of the Islamic State (IS) in the Levant, a disintegrating Middle East and claims to regional hegemony in Southwest Asia and the Indo-Pacifi c, as well as continuing deep fi scal troubles in the European Union, Germany intends to partially reorganize its security policy – once again.
