page_title: Exercise Summer Pulse
section_title: Background
hierarchical_section_title: Exercise Summer Pulse / Background
caption_attribution_description: English: Admiral Vern Clark of the United States Navy in mid-2000.
context_page_description: Summer Pulse 2004 was the codename for a worldwide surge deployment that served as the first full-scale test of the United States Navy's then-new Fleet Response Plan. During Summer Pulse 2004, a total of seven carrier strike groups were underway at the same time in five different theaters of operations. This number of underway carrier strike groups had not been matched since the six carrier battle groups deployed during Operation Desert Storm. In addition to the carriers, the Navy also deployed 17 submarines and one submarine tender.
  The FRP was designed to allow the Navy to provide up to seven carrier strike groups to support any contingency worldwide in 30 days. The plan allowed for two more CSGs to be ready within three months to reinforce or relieve the forces initially deployed. This allows for a continuous presence and the ability to swiftly respond to different crisis situations. Summer Pulse 2004 also allowed the U.S. Navy to exercise the logistics and shore infrastructure needed to execute a large-scale surge operation, as well as the operational concepts in its Sea Power 21 strategy.
context_section_description: Developing upon the lessons learned from Operation Iraqi Freedom and the global war on terrorism, the U.S. Navy introduced the Fleet Response Plan in 2003. The FRP was described as a new concept of planning and organizing fleet assets for deployment that replaced the 18-month Inter-Deployment Readiness Cycle used during the Cold War.  The objective of the FRP was to provide six aircraft carrier strike groups that can be deployed or be ready to deploy within 30 days and another two aircraft carrier strike groups ready to deploy within 90 days.  During his meeting with the Navy Times editorial board, Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Vern Clark (pictured) summarized the objective of the Fleet Response Plan by noting:
  I would rather muster two battle groups for three months and do something really significant internationally, and cooperate with partners in training and so forth, than just go over and hang out for six months without purpose. The position that I’m pushing is that we should be less interested in presence and more interested in presence with a purpose.
  The Fleet Response Plan allowed the U.S. Navy to be ready to surge as well as be able to vary the lengths of deployments, providing a more flexible, ready to deploy capability.  By increasing the duration of time that a ship could be deployed, the operational availability of several ships will always overlap, providing the Navy with the capability of deploying multiple ships or battle groups simultaneously.  The FRP also involved new ways of operating, training, manning, and maintaining the fleet, resulting in increased force readiness and the ability to provide significant combat power in a crisis situation as well as reinforce U.S. relationships and interoperability in five theaters of operations.  The U.S. Fleet Forces Command was tasked to lead in the implementation of the FRP.
caption: Admiral Vern Clark, USN
exif: {}