Venice Regional Seapower Symposium 2015 Final Recommendations PREAMBLE 45 Delegations from Navies 1, Naval services and International Organizations 2 convened in Venice, from the 21 st to the 23 rd of October 2015, to attend the Tenth edition of the Venice Regional Seapower Symposium (RSS) for the Navies of the Mediterranean and Black Sea Countries, whose main theme was: Enhancing Maritime Security in the Wider Mediterranean. The participating Delegates had a very fruitful discussion which was articulated in two panels, analyzing the main theme under different perspectives. The debate confirmed the common understanding about the central role of Navies to achieve Maritime Security in the Wider Mediterranean through: Cooperation among Navies, Dialogue with key regional leaders and International Organizations, the full implementation of the action of the State at sea covered by an adequate legal framework and using a balanced and flexible naval power, able to cope with the full spectrum of maritime challenges. The most important findings of the Symposium and the shared final recommendations are summarized in this document. 1 Albania, Algeria, Angola, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, China, Colombia, Croatia, Ecuador, Egypt, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Israel, Italy, Japan, Lebanon, Malta, Montenegro, Morocco, Nigeria, Peru, Portugal, Qatar, Romania, Senegal, Singapore, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Tunisia, Turkey, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom and Unites States of America. 2 Centro Alti Studi Difesa, E.U. Military Staff, E.U. DG Mare, FINCANTIERI, FINMECCANICA, NATO MARCOM, USNAVEUR. 1
AGREED FINDINGS The Mediterranean region, a bridge between three continents, where different religions, cultures, economies and societies live together since centuries, is no longer experiencing stability and peace. It has become again a risk area, characterized by security issues encompassing: terrorism, massive migration, territorialisation of the high seas, merciless illegal and not regulated fishing, intentional and accidental pollution, problems that originate also beyond his boundaries to a planetary level. Maritime Security, especially in terms of securing the freedom of the international maritime trade and supply routes, is vital towards the undisrupted functioning of global markets and industry. The significance of maritime routes to the globalized economic system has encouraged, and will continue to do, an array of state and non-state actors to take advantage of the inherent vulnerability of maritime routes on the High Seas in order to promote their interests. Today, even more than in the past, Navies are called upon to protect the States sovereignty and the citizens security, promote global peace, secure economic interests, prevent crises, grant the rule of law, the freedom of navigation in the High Sea and reassure citizens living permanently abroad. Then, still looking at the maritime space, we operate in a security continuum sharing the same operational context between conventional and non-conventional threats. In times of shrinking budgets, to create specialized fleets dedicated respectively to high end and low end tasks is an option that we cannot afford anymore. The solution is to enhance the inherent flexibility of navies that should cope, using the same set of capabilities, with the full warfighting role, including kinetic responses, and with the conduct of a diverse bunch of missions, even not military. This requires the need to keep traditional capabilities while strengthening the non-traditional ones. In this perspective, recent operations have confirmed the need for our navies of thinking about new models for training and education, besides the need to maintain 2
adequate skills in the conduct of any traditional warfare activity. We consider as very relevant: the improvement in the conduct of maritime law enforcement operations in the high seas; the increase of the interactions with the world of merchant mariners; the development of a full knowledge of the interagency domain. To allow naval forces to execute all missions with proficiency in a changing environment with new threats and challenges appearing on a daily basis, it is necessary to allocate sufficient resources, to enhance coordination with national maritime agencies and to include all actors acting in the maritime cluster. In this perspective, the core capabilities of the fleet have to ensure and support also not military related missions and tasks. In details, Navies have to look at innovative solutions: operational flexibility and extended availability/sustainability must be the driving factors of any innovation process. High speed, long endurance, resilience and seaworthiness will be necessary, in order to be able to intervene at long distances in a broad spectrum of situations. High modularity will further enhance the operational flexibility to conduct military and civilian tasks. Moreover, Navies are requested to reduce the environmental footprint and to effectively contribute to the marine protection. On the other hand, a gap of legal frameworks, which are indeed essential to achieve an effective Maritime Security, is still present and needs to be filled through a proactive and collective effort which must involve all maritime stakeholders. The inherent ability of the Navies to exploit existing transnational dialogue and cooperation at sea through a proactive approach is an enabling ability in sustainment of a stable environment, available to the political decision makers as a long-term preventive measure. Dialogue and Cooperation are crucial to develop confidence and mutual trust among Nations. In this perspective, Navies can contribute directly to build up strategic trust and to foster habits of cooperation so as to buttress regional peace and stability. 3
The regional initiatives, mostly lead by the Navies, play a fundamental role as force multiplier and to prevent and deconflict overlapping and waste of resources. The signature of two Technical Arrangement within the Adriatic and Ionian Initiative (ADRION) testify both the proactive attitude of the Navies and the concrete achievements of regional initiatives. The maritime operational environment gives opportunities to even a single ship, having a high degree of autonomy, to improve international partnerships offering a wider range of activities that were not foreseen before. All the challenges and the opportunities will lead Navies to develop command and leadership in a complex reality, building and adapting their organizations which are to be agile, proactive and open to discussion and criticism. Ultimately, the Navies continuously have to commit determination and positive spirit in developing a progressive ability to operate in a combined way, moving ahead and always promoting valuable initiatives in the cooperation field. 4
FINAL RECOMMENDATIONS The main headings have been identified as the most appropriate recommendations to meet effective results in enhancing Maritime Security in the Wider Mediterranean: a. Action of State at sea. The lessons we have learned confirm that Navies should be on the lead of any maritime operation, thanks to their Command and Control capabilities, the ability to gain a comprehensive Maritime Situational Awareness, the entitlement to enforce international maritime law and a proper mind-set to optimize the use of resources, avoiding duplications. b. Comprehensive Approach remains critical in today s landscape to achieve effective results. Navies are called to look for feasible solutions that include also coordination with governmental and non-governmental actors, regional key leaders and International Organizations. c. Dialogue and Cooperation are key factors to develop confidence and mutual trust among Nations, as well as to ensure the stability in the maritime domain. In this sense, the sea is an operational environment that offers a wide range of opportunities in the field of partnerships. d. Regional Initiatives, mostly lead by the Navies, play a fundamental role as force multiplier and to prevent and deconflict overlapping and waste of resources. They testify both the proactive attitude of the Navies and the concrete achievements on a practical level. Building on the success of Navies partnerships such as the various V-RMTC communities (T-RMN, 5+5, Bilateral ITA-LEB), we d like to explore new maritime security strategy opportunities for the wider Mediterranean, to cover fields other than the information exchange. e. Shaping the Fleet and training the crews. The aim is to create credible, effective, well-trained and adaptive Fleets and crews, which are the cost effective solution to face the whole spectrum of maritime challenges, ranging from the low end and the revamping of high-end ones. In conclusion, Navies are challenged by the need to handle wide and divers spectrum of actions and threats. Part of the challenges is to correctly analyze and grasp each situation on all three levels, Strategic, Operational and Tactical. 5