Tuesday, January 04, 2011

Senator Webb - call your office

In January 1999, now Senator Jim Webb (D-VA) publised an article in Proceedings titled, The Silence of the Admirals. It is behind the membership wall - so you now have another reason to join USNI.

I'll be nice though and get a pull quote for you. Let me babble a bit first.

Only after it was pointed out to me and I read it did I remember reading it over a decade ago. A little embarassed that I didn't remember it as of late. Reading it a third time I realized how much it was an influence in the then LCDR Salamander - a "I'm not alone" moment in the pre-blogg'n world.

The junior officers he is speaking of are todays CDR and CAPT - my generation.

The problem then also applies to the problem we see now. Bask.
Military subservience to political control applies to existing policy, not to policy debates. The political process requires the unfettered opinions of military leaders, and military leaders who lack the courage to offer such opinions are just as accountable to their people as the politicians who have secured their silence.

The silence of the admirals as the fleet shrinks and their sailors continue to do more with less has not gone unnoticed. An October 1998 Proceedings article pointing out that only one in ten Navy junior officers in a recent study aspires to command—and that number not even addressing the issue of quality—is an ominous warning. A lot of reasons were given, but two messages came through loud and clear. The first was that money alone won't solve the problem. Americans never have been mercenaries, and although it is the duty of their leaders to provide for their well-being, they cannot be bought. The second was an overwhelming disenchantment with the Navy's senior leaders. I heard these same two messages again and again during a recent discussion with junior aviators in Japan.

This breakdown in the junior officer corps is troubling, for it hints of a fundamental change in the Navy's culture, probably fueled in equal parts by the Goldwater-Nichols legislation and the effects of the Tailhook scandal on Navy leadership. Command is tough, risky, lonely—the most challenging job an officer can have. But it also is the very emblem of traditional military service. It is what dedicated officers always have lived for and aspired to. ...

These young officers did not come into the Navy with this attitude. The circumstances of their careers have inflicted it on them.

When leadership fails, sometimes a fundamental shift overtakes a unit, or a military service, or a nation, that is so profound that it can change an entire ethos. Most often it occurs gradually, not because of decisions taken by senior leaders so much as from their inaction, an acquiescence to insistent, incremental pressures generated from the outside. Usually, the leaders,
reacting to and sometimes overwhelmed by these pressures, are the ones who comprehend the changes the least, and in some cases cannot perceive what has happened until it is too late for them to protect even their own legacy.

Let's hope that this will not be the epitaph for a U.S. Navy on its way to 200 ships and a third-rate future. Its history, its traditions, and its special place at the center of all that is great about this country demand that those who serve—of whatever rank and level of experience—do what they can to explain to the American people that the Navy must be led from within, that what has happened over the past ten years is not right, and that what is left is not enough.
I've bragged about warning about a 220 ship Navy for years ... but Webb was calling 200 ships 11 years ago. A nod to James.

Here is my question - where is Senator Webb now when his Navy needs him the most? His silence about what was done to USNA over the last half-decade is bad enough; but the rest as well?

Where is your leadership Sen. Webb? You have the power. Your Navy needs you.
UPDATE: Hey - it's up on USNIBlog. Give the full thing a read.

16 comments:

Tom Goering said...

The Goldwater-Nichols legislation, Tailhook, and now add social media.

Mike M. said...

<span>Nine hundred fifty</span> ships in 1968.  My God, how low we've sunk.  

Anonymous said...

Tom, I visited your website in the past but I just now realized why your name rings a bell. I was a RINC in Foothill Zone under Dwight Keola and Dwayne Rosser at NRD LA while you were Region West CR, IIRC. 

Back on topic, two things bothered me today:

1. Reflecting on LCS, having jumped into the program knowing nothing about it whatsoever, that was nearly five years ago. Nothing surprises me anymore.

2. Standing in line for two hours at pass and decal and knowing that someone was ensuring their smooth transition into the Lochheed corporate structure when they decided to contract all those duties out. Now, we are left with two plus hour lines and contractors on gates and in the armory who probably shouldn't have the job that Sailors did better. Christ.

Someone_blogged said...

<span>Tom, I visited your website in the past but I just now realized why your name rings a bell. I was a RINC in Foothill Zone under Dwight Keola and Dwayne Rosser at NRD LA while you were Region West CR, IIRC.   
 
Back on topic, two things bothered me today:  
 
1. Reflecting on LCS, having jumped into the program knowing nothing about it whatsoever, that was nearly five years ago. Nothing surprises me anymore.  
 
2. Standing in line for two hours at pass and decal and knowing that someone was ensuring their smooth transition into the Lochheed corporate structure when they decided to contract all those duties out. Now, we are left with two plus hour lines and contractors on gates and in the armory who probably shouldn't have the job that Sailors did better. Christ.</span>

ewok40k said...

but half of them was old WW2 stuff! they were not transformational!  they needed large crews to operate! they werent modular! they didnt reach 50 knots!
sarcasm off...
200 ship navy? it was predictable once the peace dividend combined with gold-plated tiffany navy ships...

pk said...

hey mike:

about half of that 968 were sitting in sisuin bay or other like places as paart of the mothball fleet.  i know i was there keeping them running. the WWII stuff had machinery made of alloys that were not temperature stable and with time (about 20 years) things like turbine cases etc. had to be remachined so they didn't leak steam.... back then you didn't have officers scraping paint (the warrent would stand there and offer comments on your technique with a paint scraper though) and figure on a 75 hand working party to manhandle chow every duty day.

they were crowded and some of the berthing conditions were horrible. on the destroyers there was a berthing compartmend directly above the screws that vibrated like a b@#%ard above about 25 knots. there were 18 and 20 inch scuttles in various places and one of the water tight hatches really needed to be about 2" wider so that we could get the forced draft blower roters out of the boiler rooms to rebuild them without having to "notch" the knife edge.

but guess what? the "FASTEST CAN IN THE FLEET" could actually do 38 kts.

and even though some of them would do 15 degree rolls tied to the pier during church call they had spirit.

maybe the city police would chase a carload of snipes to the gangway and if they made it to the safety of the quarter deck, they knew that they had to answer to the skipper but he was better than the local judges.

and diversity!!!  we liked the navy system. time in grade, then get grades on courses, reccommendations (you really had to be f%^&ed up not to get outstandings) and then it was all masticated "back east" and the guys that made the top grades got promoted and we believed that the back east bunch had no idea what race, color or creed we were.

much much different from now.

C


  

Casey Tompkins said...

Mr. Goering, you provided an excellent hook for a question which has been bothering me for a while now; what evil effects has Goldwater-Nichols had? It was my impression that the act provided for a more effective chain of command amongst the Joint Chiefs, not to mention forcing better "jointness" between the services, as opposed to the more traditional squabbling.

Casey Tompkins said...

I suppose I will have to continually post certain information until some of our more cherished myths die...

Ahem. The huge Navy (recalled so nostalgically) of the mid-to-late 20th century was built during WW2. Yes, you knew that. :)

The point is that that tremendous building surge came during a world war, wherein by 1945 defense spending was over 37% of GDP, and comprised over 89% of Federal spending that year.

Basically we coasted for half a century after an incredible amount of the national income for a few years. It should now be self-evident why we don't have such a large navy today.

Mike M. said...

Since you ask....

Goldwater-Nichols had three major deleterious effects.

First, it required that DOD submit a single unified budget.  This meant that the services could not put together their requirements and submit them to Congress, but were instead constrained to top-level decisions made by OSD and handed down.  As a consequence, Congress was not kept properly informed of the need, nor allowed to hear the debate between the services for resources.  All discussion was kept inside the Pentagon - instead of being open.

Second, the joint command structure became a rice-bowl of epic proportions.  It was particularly destructive to the Navy, which brings substantial airpower to the fight as well as seapower.  Navy capabilities were frequently under-used and underfunded, since the JFAAC position was an Air Force rice bowl.

Third, the theater command structure discourages a global perspective.  Theater commanders are prone to think of their theater's needs.  One of the greatest strengths of the Navy is that seaborne assets can be moved from theater to theater readily.  They can be massed anywhere on a global battlefield.  Air Force assets are less mobile, the Army movable only with great effort.  This strategic mobility is lost in the G-N theater sructure.

UltimaRatioRegis said...

pk,

Your last sentence is a doozy.  Well-said.

However, your assertion that the vessels in Suisun Bay or Bayonne or Philly counted against the 968 in commission is in error.  That was 968 fully commissioned US Navy ships.  Everything in the reserve basins were on top of that.  They numbered almost 2,000 in the late 40s, and still had several hundred into the late 1980s.

Guest said...

Where are your calls to Senator McCain?  Double Standard?

cdrsalamander said...

Did he co-write this 1999 article with Webb?

Mindless troll.

Grandpa Bluewater said...

Surveyed a bunch of them anchored in nests at Suisun Bay in about ' 74 with INSURV, wearing a hard hat with a miners lamp (very, very cold iron). 

One of them still had the chart on the table in the charthouse, with the fixes from the Farralons in to the Embarcadero on her trip home in Dec 1945. The bearing book had the date, she made it home by Christmas. The Nav put down his pencil and walked off, the QM's dumped the butt kits and put them in the clips, walked out with the trash bags. Spooky. The binoculars were in the drawer and the chronometers wound down in the pooka in the chart desk. They apparently towed her up to Susuin Bay and put the igloos over the 40mm's in the tubs fwd and the 5" open mount on the fantail. Did a light mothball treatment and left her.

Victory hull AKA. Commissioned in '44, Wespac, back in '45, immediately decommisioned. Slept for 30 years in mothballs and to the breakers. Good strong simple ship. Utterly functional, MacNamara Lace on the wheel and the Quarterdeck brow stanchions the only decoration. Rate insignia cut into the tile on the deck  (white into green)  outside the DIv Offices and the berthing compt door/hatch. Dust but no dirt. Cathodic protection gone forabout 15 years at that point.  Dozens still left at that point, all from WWII, all auxiliaries in the nests we visited. Did about 4 inspections a day.

More to the point, only ships in commission were counted for fleet totals. In '65 a little shy of 1000, didn't count LCU's and smaller - "yard and district craft".

One definition of a Dark Age is that not only knowing how is lost, so is knowing it could be done.
In shipbuilding for general mobilization, we are pretty much there now.

We get some leadership and clean out the rot, somebody is going to be remembered as long as Pliny the Elder or more to the point, Don John of Austria. We got nowhere to go but up. or will, toot sweet.

ewok40k said...

Makes me remember the derelic Imperial Navy in the Isaac Asimov's Foundation...

Anonymous said...

People that didn't write this article shouldn't be expected to do anything.  Get your act together, troll.

Byron said...

Some people sho' do like dancin' near the fire...