Towards a French Strategic Fleet?

  • By François LambertRevue Défense Nationale, 2024/8, No. 873)
  • Translated by Mohamed Sakhri

Definition and History

It seems essential to provide some elements of definition for the “strategic fleet,” a term that may appear diluted today, at least not widely shared. The strategic fleet has, over the years, become “the Arlésienne of maritime affairs.” Everyone believes it exists, but no one can precisely define it. However, Arnaud Leroy is not Alphonse Daudet, and his legal text is not currently implemented [1]. At least not sufficiently.

Let us return to its foundation. Strategy is a military term, a set of coordinated actions aimed at achieving a specific goal. It is distinct from tactics, which operate on a shorter time scale and refer to the means or tools to implement the strategy. A strategic fleet, therefore, is a fleet constructed with a concrete ambition; that of sovereignty, presumably.

Let us intersect the issue of strategy with that of sovereignty. They are actually closely related. The mention of strategy is most frequently heard in support of the notion of sovereignty. Sovereignty obliges us today, at all levels. Numerous actions aim to promote a sovereign approach through strategy. The commercial fleet, therefore, is part of this. Sovereignty, rooted in its Latin origins, carries a sense of superiority. It illustrates the possibility for a state to not be constrained by anything, within the limits of the law [2]. Thus, the commercial fleet becomes—or can become—an instrument of sovereignty in service of strategy; once again, it needs to be defined, and we should reflect on its long history that establishes France as a maritime power.

From the Parmentier brothers, who were the first to round the Cape of Good Hope in the early 16th century, to the supremacy of CMA-CGM in the world of goods transport in the early 21st century, little has actually changed. The real change lies in the role of public power. As long as the public authority believes that the nation’s influence can and will pass through the sea and makes its maritime action an instrument of power, anything is possible.

Richelieu failed to establish a Maritime and Commercial Society of Morbihan, and attempts concerning an East India Company also failed. Out of these failures arose successes in conquering Réunion and Mauritius, where the French held a central position. And here comes Colbert and the Navy. His actions for the renewal of the French Navy proved decisive. In a quarter of a century, he transformed the French royal fleet from 22 units compared to 95 for the English and 85 for the Dutch, and the French merchant fleet, which had a maximum of 2,500 ships while the Dutch had nearly 18,000, to 177 war vessels and over 25,000 for merchant ships! The company founded in 1664 and the port of L’Orient, established in 1666, were the primary actors after fierce battles to dislodge foreign powers deeply entrenched in Asia, develop national shipbuilding, persuade financiers, and fight—already—against a form of protectionism.

Perspectives

This ancient history illustrates the ability of a maritime power to shape itself through the will of its leaders. Today, the commercial fleet experiences a certain enthusiasm. One can believe that capitalizing on its development will further strengthen our country’s sovereignty, within a strategy still in the making.

Maritime transport represents the backbone of global trade, accounting for over 90% of global freight transport. The goods transported by sea are of a very varied nature: liquid bulk, dry bulk, manufactured products in containers, special packages, vehicles… The merchant navy thus enables strategic independence and international influence. Reflecting on the last fifty years: since the oil shock of 1973, the French merchant navy has experienced a certain decline. It is noted that it “managed to maintain itself thanks to the establishment of public support measures for investment, employment, and maritime shipping companies,” as stated on the website of the Ministry of the Sea. The wording is chosen. It represents a defensive stance compared to the previous period described above.

However, we should not feel ashamed of this. Over the years, the state has put in place a support system for the commercial fleet, which includes budgetary and fiscal measures favoring maritime transport companies. These measures aim to create conditions for sustainable increases in their competitiveness and thus in maritime employment; and to develop maritime activities where the effective decision-making center is located in France. This support can be broken down into:

Budgetary support: Exemptions for maritime shipping companies from employer, family, and unemployment charges in accordance with Article L5553-11 of the Transport Code; employment aids for maritime jobs involving exemptions from employee social charges for 2022, 2023, and 2024 for maritime shipping companies benefiting from the exemptions stated in Article L5553-11 of the Transport Code and registered under the first register, the French International Register (RIF), or the Wallis and Futuna Register…

Fiscal support: Tonnage tax [3], exemption for sailors from income tax under the French International Register, and a super-amortization scheme for green ships…

While most of these fiscal and budgetary measures constitute a common foundation for most Western countries, the capacity aspect—potentially the answer to the question of the strategic fleet—is not discussed or mentioned anymore. The result is clear; in 2022, the French fleet ranked 27th among world fleets in terms of tonnage and 12th in Europe. France accounts for 0.4% of global tonnage, with over 60% held by the five leading flags. It includes a transport fleet, which is divided between an oil and gas fleet, a cargo fleet, a passenger ship fleet, and a maritime service fleet. The French commercial fleet had 421 vessels as of January 1, 2022. The goal of maintaining a young fleet (average age of 8.6 years) and the commitment to greening it are made, in connection with an increase in the number of national maritime jobs both at sea and on land.

The French commercial fleet indeed consists of very diverse vessels: oil tankers (crude, refined products), gas carriers (LNG, LPG), container ships, cargo ships, roll-on/roll-off ferries (RORO, ROPAX [4]), cruise ships, passenger ferries, cable layers, oceanographic vessels, offshore vessels (AHTS, PSV [5], assistance vessels, and personnel transport…), dredgers, tugs (both port and offshore), pilot boats…

The actors of this transformation, who will be the players in the strategic fleet, are the maritime shipping companies, the shipowners, who operate the vessel in their name, regardless of whether or not they own it. They employ sailors, both employees and non-employees, who perform a professional activity on board a ship, whether they are sailors or not. This diversity is based on very active national shipowners who can be true global leaders in their respective segments (CMA-CGM for container transport, Bourbon in offshore) or groups with multiple activities (LDA Group). There are also very specialized shipowners (Maritime Nantaise [freight, roll-on, roll-off], Jifmar [workboats], etc.) or more traditional ones (Brittany Ferries, Corsica Linea), as well as innovative ones in an old niche (Ponant: cruises) or very innovative ones (TOWT, Zéphyr & Borée, Grain de Sail [sailing and low carbon transport], etc.). This list is certainly not exhaustive.

The issue of technology in this fleet, however, must be addressed. The current state of the fleet, in terms of both number and volume, does suggest a sovereign capacity: but for how long, given the evolution of technologies? The example of defense deserves mention here. The General Directorate of Armament (DGA) has developed and maintained the concept of an Industrial and Technological Defense Base (BITD). We could transpose the subject specifically into the maritime domain, but civil, to propose a concrete translation of support for certain technologies by making clear choices that would allow the entire sector to be propelled, essentially forming a maritime industrial technology base. Ultimately, this reflects a “nostalgia for the Plan,” with a distribution of funding for maritime initiatives across many (too many) outlets—even with efforts made to group them or, at least, to make maritime funding clearer (competitiveness clusters, CORIMER [6], Meet 2050 [7])—without any real capacity for concentration that calibrates not the ambitions of various strategies but the ambition of ONE strategy that France could adhere to for several decades. However, clarity in international levels of orientation or constraints is still necessary.

What is meant here is that the major changes in global trade, brought about by the awareness of climate change, are technological. The initial strategy of the International Maritime Organization (IMO) regarding the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions from ships sets key ambitions. The geopolitical context also seems to affirm the necessity for a strategic fleet. Yet new constraints emerge with regard to alliances and the fleet under control. It is inconceivable today to consider that the strategic fleet can exist independently of the economic translation of geopolitics, which clearly advocates for a fleet strategy. Conflict can no longer be excluded, and while one anticipates the internationalization of the merchant fleet, reactions are only made in terms of the number of ships, never of sailors.

Strategy

The questions thus remain: how many commercial ships do we need, of what type, with what level of technological maturity, and possessed under what criteria, to ensure our sovereignty and uphold our strategy? Acknowledging that the strategic fleet is currently indispensable, that it concerns different fleets, in their various uses and complexities, and a limited number of sailors, that it covers various operational needs within constrained public finances, what significance should we attribute to it, and around which concrete proposals should we rally to make it exist and maintain it within a resolutely ambitious maritime policy?

Of all the demands made by shipowners that the state must address, beyond technology, the demand for human resources is undoubtedly the most critical, and the National Superior Maritime School, which I have the honor to lead, plays a vital role by holding the monopoly on the initial training of merchant navy officers in France and providing a curriculum for merchant navy officer training. The choice of supporting the flag rather than crews and sailors signifies a slow erosion of our merchant navy.

The exact number of officers currently aboard ships is difficult to determine. It ranges between 3,500 and 14,000 according to reports, and—clearly—this variation does not allow for a calm approach to the issue of competency and talent through the lens of strategy and thus sovereignty.

While, by extension, the 2016 legal text [8] can be considered sufficient and the implementing decree does include the notion of personnel (“jobs”) which could likely encompass setting up a fleet and strategic sailors, it could be imagined—similar to Article 46 of the 2009 law concerning public hospitals [9]—to draft a legal text aimed at creating a new mechanism, a “commitment to maritime public service.”

Meeting the aspirations of sailors and their employers, as well as those of the state, in line with the spirit of the 2016 law while placing the sailor at the heart of this issue is indeed the ambition to uphold in the future creation of norms [10]. This would imply a public and private contribution towards this new structure which would play a fundamental role in our economic sovereignty through the maritime competence of our seafarers. The amount of this contribution would need to be assessed based on the number of positions offered and the stated criticality, which should also be defined by regulatory means.

In light of such perspectives, it is evident that the interest for the state also lies in its ability to forecast better and more about the number of officers trained in France who will continue to operate under the French flag, should it be for strategic reasons. A forward-looking management of employment and skills could thus be implemented thanks to a maritime public service commitment contract system, remunerating student officers from the third year of single-path training and from the multipurpose path, benefiting the chosen legal structure, thus providing a clearer new tool for predictability directed towards the maritime ecosystem. However, it would also be necessary to set the duration of these commitments and their various motivations within the chosen structure while establishing a new framework with a different capacity for control.

The importance of the French sailor, therefore, is not self-evident in the originally conceived strategic fleet. Ultimately, however, it becomes essential in a new aspiration to change paradigms. For yes, it is necessary to provide the French merchant navy, beyond just capacity, which will continue to evolve, with sustainability to the extent that it guarantees the execution of its strategy. It is necessary to offer synergy between the merchant navy and the national navy and, more broadly, the national endeavor. It is crucial to prepare for the future with a new mechanism that will forge a new place for the maritime economy and its active forces.

Sources

  • Loi n° 2016-816 du 20 juin 2016 pour l’économie bleue (https://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/), proposée par le député des Français de l’étranger, Arnaud Leroy.
  • « La souveraineté est la qualité de l’État, de n’être obligé ou déterminé que par sa propre volonté, dans les limites du principe supérieur du droit, et conformément au but collectif qu’il est appelé à réaliser » Le Fur Louis, État fédéral et confédération d’États (thèse, 1896).
  • La Loi de finances rectificative (LFR) pour l’année 2002 a introduit la possibilité pour les armateurs au commerce d’opter, sur une durée de dix ans, pour une taxation d’un bénéfice forfaitaire à partir de 2003, déterminé selon le tonnage des navires exploités, en substitution du régime de droit commun.
  • RORO : Roll-On/Roll-Off (navires spécialisés dans le transport de véhicules où l’on peut « rentrer en roulant, sortir en roulant »), ROPAX : navire mixte embarquant passagers et marchandises.
  • Platform Supply Vessels : navires de ravitaillement offshore à grande capacité de stockage en pontée et en soute. Anchor Handling Tugs Supply : navires PSV qui peut également déplacer des plateformes de forage en mer.
  • Conseil d’orientation pour la recherche et l’innovation des industriels de la mer (https://corimer.fr/).
  • The MEET2050 Institute aims to define and manage the “Zero Emission Ships & Ports” Program, launched in December 2019 with the creation of the T2EM Coalition. Inspired by models from Europe and abroad, this coalition brought together transition experts from businesses, universities, research centers, and laboratories to build the Program, aligning it with various roadmaps, particularly those of the Sea Industry Strategic Committee (CSF) and national strategies like the Port Strategy. Following the One Ocean Summit (February 2022), which confirmed state support and major industrial interest in creating such an institute, MEET2050 will establish a legal framework to further discussions with the government and finalize public and private commitments over the coming months, in alignment with Corimer. Leveraging zero-emission and low-emission vessel projects, the goal is to synchronize efforts to guide the sector toward viable demonstrators by 2030-2035, pacing the necessary technological advancements for energy, ships, and ports on the path to zero emissions. The aim is to establish within a year a team of around twenty experts and project managers, with resources from scientific centers, academic actors, and R&D centers of major companies, as well as start-ups, SMEs, and intermediate-sized enterprises, in partnership with Sea Poles that foster innovation ecosystems across the regions.
  • Loi n° 2009-879 du 21 juillet 2009 portant réforme de l’hôpital et relative aux patients, à la santé et aux territoires (https://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/loda/id/JORFTEXT000020879475).
  • Le décret du 5 juillet 2024 vient à ce titre complété le texte du 9 mai 2017 et laisser envisager des évolutions.
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SAKHRI Mohamed
SAKHRI Mohamed

I hold a Bachelor's degree in Political Science and International Relations in addition to a Master's degree in International Security Studies. Alongside this, I have a passion for web development. During my studies, I acquired a strong understanding of fundamental political concepts and theories in international relations, security studies, and strategic studies.

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