The historic close cooperation between the US Navy and the US Coast Guard will likely continue and intensify in coming years. As the Coast Guard 2020 future vision document makes clear, the Coast Guard will be increasingly called on as America's Maritime Law Enforcer, with clear scope for support from the US Navy. A 1995 agreement between the Secretaries of Defense and Transportation assigned the US Coast Guard four major national defense missions in support of US regional Commanders-in-Chief: (1) Maritime Interception Operations, (2) Military Environmental Response Operations, (3) Port Operations, Security, and Defense (in the US and overseas), and (4) Peacetime Military Engagement. In this latter area of engagement operations, the US Navy recently noted “The Coast Guard brings unique coast guard-type skills to the world's maritime and naval services ... However, there are limits to Coast Guard's ability to support this mission, and the current level of effort of approximately 370 shipdays per year is appropriate for the task.⁴⁶ The Navy also noted the need for Coast Guard assistance in even a Major Theater War, specifically for port security and defense, environmental disaster response, and perhaps in coastal interdiction operations and ” to escort high value sealift ships in medium and low threat environments.“ Although some perceive a potential Navy/Coast Guard battle over the overseas regional engagement mission, the fact is that a Coast Guard with 41 major cutters (twelve frigate size, 3000 ton, HAMILTON Class High Endurance Cutters, and 29 corvette-size Medium Endurance Cutters in two classes--thirteen 1820 ton, BEAR Class and sixteen 1000 ton, RELIANCE Class cutters), 190 aircraft, and 35,000 personnel-which would rank as the world's seventh largest “Navy”-- does and must carry much more relative weight in US maritime calculations when the US “600 ship” Navy has been reduced to 116 surface combatants. ⁴⁷

　

　　The way ahead for closer US Navy/US Coast Guard cooperation was outlined in the September 21, 1998 joint policy statement by the Chief of Naval Operations and the Commandant of the Coast Guard. The objective of this policy statement was “to ensure a Navy and Coast Guard that can support one another's missions and tasks....”⁴⁸ The National Fleet will be “comprised of surface combatants and major cutters that are affordable, adaptable, interoperable, and with complementary capabilities. ..whenever appropriate, designed around common equipment and systems, and including coordinated operational planning, training and logistics. The Navy's contribution will be highly capable multi-mission Navy surface combatants designed for the full spectrum of naval operations...The Coast Guard's contribution will be maritime security cutters, designed for peacetime and crisis-response Coast Guard missions, and filling the requirement for relatively small, general-purpose, shallow draft warships. All ships and aircraft of the National Fleet will be interoperable...”⁴⁹ Clearly, the US Navy sees value in the potential of the Coast Guard to provide supplements to the “low end” of its ship mix, particularly as smaller US Navy frigates are retired without similar replacements. The US Coast Guard, for its part, sees its National Fleet role as providing additional support for its new “Deepwater” program (now in early development) to acquire an integrated system of ships, aircraft, and C4I to replace its older cutters and some older aircraft. Although the Commandant of the Coast Guard has also stated that “The Coast Guard is not a navy but a distinctive force with a separate identity and purpose,” it seems likely that both of these US maritime armed services, driven by their respective needs, will increasingly cooperate in future operations.⁵⁰