CNO: US Navy Challenged on the High Seas

This is a well-written piece, thanks to Scout Media for sharing. My first question is -- do we legitimately expect to have a near-peer rival warfare situation on the open seas?

I'm referring to this quote from the article: "The shift, comes on the heels of more than a decade of ongoing ground wars in which the Navy focused heavily on counter piracy, counterterrorism and activities such as Visit Board Search and Seizure, or VBSS. The idea, which builds upon a “distributed lethality” strategy articulated more than a year ago, is to return to a Cold War-like great power focus and ensure the fleet is armed with next-generation offensive and defensive weapons such that it could engage and win, if necessary, against a near-peer rival."