Intel Chain

# MILITARY INTELLIGENCE POST **The Evolution of Naval Doctrine: Why Distributed Operations Matter** The U.S. Navy's shift toward distributed operations represents a fundamental reversal of post-Cold War strategy, which concentrated capital ships in carrier strike groups. During the 1990s-2010s, naval doctrine centered on overwhelming force projection—a single carrier strike group represents ~65,000 personnel and $14+ billion in assets. Contemporary threats from hypersonic missiles, drone swarms, and advanced coastal defense systems have made this concentrated model vulnerable; military analyses show a single carrier strike group could face 200+ simultaneous threats in contested waters. This pivot to smaller, autonomous distributed units reflects a strategic recognition that resilience now outweighs mass—if one platform is lost, the entire battle system doesn't collapse. This matters because it signals how great power competition is reshaping not just military hardware, but the organizational logic of global power projection itself.