Sailors say Navy leaders failing to prepare for war
A recently released report from two retired Flag Officers paints the US Navy as not ready for war- it has apparently become “captive to bureaucratic excess.” The report, prepared for members of Congress paints a portrait of the Navy as a service adrift.
The report, commissioned by Sen. Tom Cotton, Reps. Mike Gallagher, Dan Crenshaw and Jim Banks, concluded that the surface Navy is not focused on preparing for war and is enduring a crisis in leadership.
“I guarantee you every unit in the Navy is up to speed on their diversity training,” said one recently retired senior enlisted leader. “I’m sorry that I can’t say the same of their ship-handling training.”
David sends.
REPORT: The US Navy isn’t ready for war
According to a new report, the US Navy isn’t ready for war and has apparently become “captive to bureaucratic excess”, according to interviews with both active and recently retired service members:
WSJ – Is the U.S. Navy ready for war? A new report prepared by Marine Lt. Gen. Robert Schmidle and Rear Adm. Mark Montgomery, both retired, for members of Congress paints a portrait of the Navy as an institution adrift. The report, reviewed exclusively by the Journal, concludes that the surface Navy is not focused on preparing for war and is weathering a crisis in leadership and culture.
The impetus for the report was a series of recent catastrophes—a ship burning in San Diego last year; two destroyer collisions in the Pacific in 2017. Were these isolated events? Or did they indicate “larger institutional issues that are degrading the performance of the entire naval surface force”? The report surveyed active and recently retired service members of various ranks, conducting 77 candid hourlong interviews. A key finding: “Many sailors found their leadership distracted, captive to bureaucratic excess, and rewarded for the successful execution of administrative functions” rather than core competencies of war.
So much for training as you will fight. This self-inflicted distraction will cost us dearly in the event of a major conflict, and isn’t going away any time soon.
Thanks, David.
Category: "The Floggings Will Continue Until Morale Improves", "Your Tax Dollars At Work", Diversity, Guest Link
Butbutbut the higher echelons have made absolutely sure that everyone is up to date on training for uuuhhhm, self esteem, sexual harassment and classes on how to rat out your shipmates for not having the political beliefs that are not approved by higher up, right?
Yep. It seems the Navy has been in decline since the Obama administration (when Ray Mabus was running things) and is trending towards becoming more “woke” (race, inclusion, diversity) and so on.
https://media.defense.gov/2021/Jan/26/2002570959/-1/-1/1/TASK%20FORCE%20ONE%20NAVY%20FINAL%20REPORT.PDF
Hey, but now we have the Pizza MRE!
Damage control now means reading “How to be an Anti Racist” in order to control the damage done by white supremacy and racism./sarc
“Anti-ship missiles and torpedoes disproportionately affect Sailors Of Color!”
—CNN
Well, this clearly creates more work for those diversity, equity and inclusion panels – I mean, if a ship sinks, we need to have a plan to rescue survivors in an equitable way. If you think a rescue swimmer should just save whomever is closest first, that’s your white privilege speaking.
How do ‘you people’ not get this?
OK, ya got me right in the Rescue Swimmer. Well played, LC.
These two flag officers are saying exactly what our nautical dickweed brethren at TAH have been saying for years. This is my shocked face.
YOU BET YOUR AZZ!!! It’s been that way for at least 20 years, if not longer.
I knew a guy from the was in the Navy and got a job where I work. I practically had to fight him to fill out a simple daily log report when I was told to train him on it. It was a very easy thing to do. You could probably train a chimp to do it. This guy had another job working at the Navy base supply area. No wonder the Navy is a mess.
Admiral Dilgay was no available for comment.
“Dilgay”…ROFL. Well done.
I’d say the comments he made when he showed his ass to Congress was probably “’nuff said”.
Captain Obvious agrees. Now, have the troops assembled to practice their Synchronized Prancing for next year’s Gay Pride Parade.
Synchronized swimming to “Dance of the Fairies” ala Esther Williams, Hack.
They are squids after all…😜😜😜😜
I damn near had an anger aneurysm when I read the ship collision reports in 2017.
Getting underway with a crew who didn’t know how to competently steer the ship? A CO who allowed himself/herself to be MEDEVAC while his ship was still fighting to stay afloat? And much, much more.
How quick “leadership” was to forget the fresh blood on their hands from four whole years ago. Not to mention the thousands of Sailors blue side who got tapped for IA duty in Afghanistan/Iraq. And the tons of my greenside brothers and sisters who did tour after tour.
Instead of learning expensive lessons (paid for in blood, body parts and sanity), these nitwits have focused on DIC (diversity, inclusion, cowardliness) while worshiping at the alter of PC Marxism.
The empty uniforms who have their hand on the helm of the my Navy deserve to be keel hauled for needless deaths of Sailors.
“Sow discord in the enemy camp”
That shit is coming straight from Bejing, and its advocates are willing slaves to their CCP masters.
tokhe straav’
(Spit)
Da, comrade, is always whole plan with “progressive” stuff!
The only thing I find shocking about this is that an intelligent, thinking person would find out that this is shocking. As SFC D points out above, even us nautically challenged ‘weeds have been seeing this coming for years. Just another layer of the Oblowme plan to fundamentally change the face of America. Trump’s defeat of the Bitch of Benghazi slowed their destruction of America, but did give them opportunity to practice their pitting of We, The People against one another and perfect the implementation of Operation Dominion.
In the grand scheme of things, the idea is to surrender the US Navy to the Chinese Communists intact. No need for all of those nice shiny ships to get banged up in a fight. Joe’s handlers are just waiting for the proper time to tell him to run up the white flag.
I’m ready to spit on my hands and hoist the black flag.
Yup. Jolly Roger me… too
If the Navy wants to see how a war is fought, have them get some pointers from watching the movie Duck Soup.
Yes, today’s Navy is more scared of an EO complaint than the Chinese. The simple truth is that for the last 10-15 years the Navy has tried to mimic society instead of being a war-fighting machine. Give Sailors time off for school? No problem. Extended time off to have kids? Sure! You know, working hard to learn your rating and how to fight your ship is just not important at all. We just want to make sure you have all these opportunities that have nothing to do with Navy business.
You reap what you sow….
You really think that today’s youth are ready to see the bloodshed that was seen during WW2? I think with the way the current generation has been babied that we’re looking at a full scale route at the beginning of high casualties.
Um, they need a “safe space” and intensive therapy because someone said something they didn’t like, so no.
Feel better USA, the state and status of our Canadian Navy is somewhere between a Sad Sack and a complete Sack of Shit. Between inept leadership(understatement!), a so-called Navy that hasn’t been modernized never mind updated in…decades, rampant sexual abuse and harassment and what the hell, Trudeau just plain doesn’t give a fuck if the Russians want to patrol our Arctic waters whenever they feel like it. As for Canada’s stance on China – embarrassing and shameful would be the gentlest words I could use. Seems like ‘Leadership’ is just a word that leadership itself G**gles every once in a while…
I am very sorry to hear that.
Way back in 1982, on my first TAD deployment on board ship, I had occasion to be highlined to HMCS Provider. VERY impressive to this then Petty Officer Second Class. I had my own cabin, you could lay across the passageways and not touch the bulkheads, the chow was GREAT, and there was BEER (as much as you could stomach)!
But the thing that was most impressive was how professional the Sailors on board were. It was obvious that you guys knew your business. One Sailor told me that there was a two year wait to get in the Navy! I believe it.
After Provider, we pulled in to Esquimalt and well, the EOD unit there treated us like kings.
Very fond memories. I hope you turn it around soon.
Thank you for the compliment,MC.
Yeah, I’ve talked to quite a few presently and formerly serving RCN folks and while a lot of the present-day problems are largely solvable – according to the people I talked to – there doesn’t seem to be any sort of cohesive plan other than talking about it and then half-heartedly flailing away at it- kinda like Hope – not a good plan. I’m former Land Element(Reserves-CFMS), my Uncle Joe was former WWII RCN Shore Patrol and absolutely loved his service in it. He swore that the only reason he left the RCN after the war was because the Regina Fire Dept offered him more money than the Navy could. A lot has changed since then. These days, John and Susie Q Canuk can’t pick up a newspaper without reading yet another detractive story about the state and status of our Forces. As one guy in our unit said before he left “Everything went south after Somalia”. These days, it’s hard to be proud of our Armed Forces with almost every one our CF Command Staff making Sniffer-Joe-Biden look like…a saint.
https://ottawacitizen.com/category/news/national/defence-watch/
My pleasure, Hatchet!
[…] people have been talking recently about a new report commissioned by several veteran congresspeople […]
I still like their mess halls.