ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the ability of the US Navy to help secure American interests in the Western Pacific-East Asia region. It addresses some changes since the mid-1970s in the United States’ perceptions of the importance of the area, and outlines US foreign policy goals there. The chapter describes both the Navy’s role and general capabilities to advance US interests in East Asia. It explains the Navy’s capabilities in perspective by assessing the extent of the challenge that the Soviet Navy, or Voyenno Morskoy Flot (VMF) , poses or could pose to the successful exercise of US naval power. The chapter focuses on the Soviet challenge because, the VMF constitutes the only significant rival to the US Navy in the area. The Navy is the most flexible US military instrument in the area, and without its maintaining sea control in the Western Pacific, other US forces would ultimately be cut off from important sources of resupply necessary to sustain themselves.
