Lower Court Holding
Decision of the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals
According to the Navy, theability to execute antisubmarine warfare (ASW) is critical to a commander’scertification of a strike group. Improving ASW is the Pacific fleet’s top “war-fightingpriority because of the proliferation of extremely quiet diesel electricsubmarines throughout the world. In turn, an important part of ASW is the useof active sonar, a technology that the Navy deems absolutely necessary todetect today’s extremely quiet submarines. The type of active sonar, the use ofwhich Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) challenges, is mid-frequencyactive (MFA) sonar; other categories of active sonar are low-frequency activesonar and high-frequency active sonar. According to the Navy, personnel…
