{"id":18493,"date":"2019-05-19T16:08:12","date_gmt":"2019-05-19T16:08:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/?p=18493"},"modified":"2019-05-22T16:08:57","modified_gmt":"2019-05-22T16:08:57","slug":"arrias-hms-pinafore-and-the-navy-staff","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/arrias-hms-pinafore-and-the-navy-staff\/","title":{"rendered":"Arrias: HMS Pinafore and the Navy Staff"},"content":{"rendered":"

In Gilbert & Sullivan\u2019s HMS Pinafore Sir Joseph Porter sings that he\u2019s done many things in his career that led to being named First Lord of the Admiralty, but none of them took place at sea, or, for that matter, had anything to do with ships. The Chorus tells us: \u201cStick close to your desks and never go to sea and you all may be rulers of the Queen\u2019s Navee!”
\n\u201d
\nThe US Navy isn\u2019t led by men who\u2019ve never been to sea, but there\u2019s growing room to wonder whether it\u2019s led by men who know more about the Navy than Sir Joseph.
\n Screen Shot 2019-05-19 at 2.49.42 PM.png<\/p>\n

Consider our newest destroyer class, USS Zumwalt. Zumwalt has been called \u201cthe most sophisticated ship ever built,\u201d and perhaps she is, with electric propulsion, a wave-piercing bow, new sensors, etc.; all intended to reduce the \u201csignature\u201d of the ship. The ship, you see, was designed to operate near shore, using its sophisticated guns to provide precision strike to support US forces ashore.<\/p>\n

Each ship would carry (per the internet) some 700 rounds for the two guns.<\/p>\n

Except for one small problem: the shells (originally expected to cost $35,000 each) were a tad expensive: more than $800,000 per shell. The Navy decided that $800,000 or more per round was too much and cancelled production. So, Zumwalt (and her two sister-ships) has no rounds for her two guns.<\/p>\n

The Navy originally wanted 32 of these ships, but when costs mounted the total number was eventually cut to just three ships, at a total cost of $22 billion. Production of USS Zumwalt began in 2009, the ship\u2019s keel was laid in 2011 and she commissioned in 2016. The second and third ships are now outfitting. Zumwalt has conducted short \u201coperational periods\u201d at sea but has yet to operationally deploy to the Western Pacific and Indian Ocean, and the Navy states the ship will be \u201coperationally delivered\u201d this coming September.<\/p>\n

If this were just one ship, albeit a very expensive one, there would be a temptation to say: \u201coh well, and move on.\u201d But, there\u2019s every reason to believe it\u2019s the way the Navy Staff functions these days.<\/p>\n

Consider the statement made by a Vice Admiral last week as he talked about increased readiness: \u201cWe\u2019re also coming to realize what that is going to cost, and how you\u2019re going to sustain today\u2019s fleet while continuing to grow.\u201d The planning process is \u201cmuch more challenging than anyone realized,\u201d he said, \u201cbut we\u2019re much smarter about our business\u201d than just a few years ago.<\/p>\n

He added that :\u201cWe don\u2019t have the complex modeling to even understand what all of these costs are going to materialize to over the next 20 years,\u201d he said, but the service is \u201cworking hard to converge on a model\u201d to sustain the ships over the long haul. <\/p>\n

Really? OPNAV didn\u2019t know? What have they been doing for the past few decades?<\/p>\n

The Navy has people who do their jobs well; the sailors at sea now in the Persian Gulf, the sailors, in particular the SEALs, deployed around the world performing their assigned missions quietly and professionally.<\/p>\n

But, meanwhile, back at the farm, the system is breaking down. <\/p>\n

Consider the report several weeks ago that the V-22, which will take over all delivery of cargo to our carriers within a few years, can\u2019t seem to get past 52% readiness – 12 years after becoming operational.<\/p>\n

Again, this would be acceptable if it were an isolated incident. But it\u2019s not. F-35 budget woes are – sadly – well documented; $13 billion USS Ford remains non-operational 2 years after her commissioning; and the Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) remains complex and expensive to maintain, too expensive, and, most importantly, unchanged since an Under Secretary of Defense found it would not survive in combat; and the list goes on.<\/p>\n

Bad decisions have become systemic at OPNAV.<\/p>\n

The Navy recently introduced a new promotion process to allow officers selected for promotion to be additionally re-ranked for \u201cmerit.\u201d But, this new system was created and will be implemented by the same officers who\u2019ve brought you this procurement and readiness mess. It\u2019s probable that they\u2019ll accelerate the promotion of the wrong people.<\/p>\n

Before we go any further, the DOD needs to take a hard look at the Navy; the Navy needs new leadership, leadership that doesn\u2019t trace its pedigree from the current crop of admirals. Or we\u2019re going to get more Joseph Porters, and USS Zumwalts.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2019 Arrias
\nwww.vicsocotra.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In Gilbert & Sullivan\u2019s HMS Pinafore Sir Joseph Porter sings that he\u2019s done many things in his career that led to being named First Lord of the Admiralty, but none of them took place at sea, or, for that matter, had anything to do with ships. The Chorus tells us: \u201cStick close to your desks […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18493","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-arrian"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18493","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18493"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18493\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18495,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18493\/revisions\/18495"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18493"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18493"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18493"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}