Posted on 06/20/2022 10:40:49 AM PDT by Retain Mike
Surface warfare reforms crafted to improve mariner skills and manage demand for ships are trickling into the fleet five years after two fatal collisions in the Western Pacific forced the Navy to retool how the service trains the surface fleet.
Multiple investigations and criminal prosecutions found that basic failures in seamanship and ship handling led to the June 17, 2017, early morning collision between USS Fitzgerald (DDG-62) and ACX Crystal off the coast of Japan. Seven sailors died.
Two months later, a misunderstanding of a newly installed throttle control system led to USS John McCain (DDG-56) drifting out of a ship separation scheme outside of Singapore and colliding with merchant tanker Alnic MC. Ten sailors died.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.usni.org ...
....”Rum, sodomy and the lash....!”
Remember that U.S.Navy advertising campaign of the 1980s (I believe), “The Navy - not just a job, but an adventure”....the print ads showed a smart, white (!) more than likely straight, non-transgender, non-woke sailor in his dress blues (with slightly bell-bottomed trousers....)...ah; those were the days.....
What, instead of 14-16 hour shifts, they moving to 12 hour shifts? /s
And the ships rust.
"It is the responsibility of every sailor to take advantage of sleep opportunities. Sailors who are provided with protected sleep periods but deliberately use them for other purposes are subjecting themselves, their shipmates and their ship to unnecessary risks,” the instruction states."
The above is from NSNI site. What a load of feel good crap. Right, the sailors are not using their off-duty time to sleep. Guess what? They also need to eat, chit/shower/and chave. Then stand a watch for 4 hours at 0-dark thirty and then start a new day at 0600 depending on rating.
While sailors work more at sea than most know, this is not about the behavior of the crew. IT IS ABOUT LACKING THE TIME FOR PROPER TRAINING. That is why the Fitzgerald and McCain ran into cumbersome huge ships. Recently, a submarine ran aground from the same lack of training.
I'm surprise this article doesn't mention how many Captains, XO's, and CPO of Commands have been fired. After the one or two of the collisions, the CiC of the Pacific Fleet was fired. Looks like the Navy is trying to CYA according to this article.
My story about sleep deprivation: Enlisted at the old age of 25 (75-86). I worked the flight deck sometimes 14 hours. Was lucky to get a bologna sandwich in the island for dinner. Once relieved, I had maybe 3-4 hours for sleep and other hygiene requirements. 0000-time for a roving patrol. If lucky, I didn't get that watch until 0400. Then back to the flight deck. It was my job and I sucked it up.
I don't know what the answer is. However, I do read that Navy is having difficulty recruiting which amounts to less sailors for the same amount of ships. I also believe that the Navy like other branches are focused too much on diversity and women that it has weakened morale and specifically training. Example: The female OOD of the Fitz was in a pissing contest with the female commander of Combat Information Center (CIC) that they both failed their own watch duties.
This is not my Navy I proudly served for 11 years.
Yup, this Navy with its obsession with diversity and women's rights is not the Navy I served. It looks to me like the Perfume Admirals are trying to lay their misguided woke crap on the basic seaman and NCO's. What's your take?
Maybe lack of sleep for John McCain was the cause he killed over 100 sailors on his carrier deck. Bad hangover may have played a part.
What? Those were GQ drills for 36 hours? You guys were lucky you didn't pass out at your GQ stations. IIRC, the entire ship is locked down to Zebra with NO movement beyond your GQ station. By your post, it sounds like you weren't fed during those GQ drills, which includes the mess cooks.
Wow. I thought I had it bad in a real GQ with a Soviet sub tailing us for 5? hours. BTW, how do "officers" declare GQ drills for 36 hours? It used to be by the Captain, XO, or the OOD by direction. I could have that wrong.
When you are out to sea, it’s 12 on 12 off seven days a week, plus a 4 hour watch every third day
WTF.
In combat (full disclosure-never been on a warship in combat, but I don’t think I am going out on a limb here) our sailors won’t have the luxury of good nutrition, protected sleep periods, or even staying physically active.
That is the most absurd thing I have ever read. Is that for real? Good God. I am sympathetic to over-deployed, undermanned crews who are working with equipment that is not being given the time, parts, or money to keep it fully operational.
But the mishaps we have seen were fully preventable. Fully.
You are spot on: THIS IS ABOUT LACKING TRAINING, AND THE RIGHT KIND OF TRAINING.
I wrote this in a private Freepmail to someone who asked my opinion on the state of affairs:
I am extraordinarily pessimistic and concerned regarding the future of the US military, with this caveat: I am not active in it, and have not been for more than forty years, which is a long, long time.
So my observations that something is amiss, besides being based on accounts from current active duty personnel, are based on things like the Fitzgerald, McCain, and Bon Homme Richard incidents.
It is clear to me that leadership is lacking, from the very top down. At the top of the Defense Department, and the civilian oversight above that. And leadership is important for the mundane things. IMO, one doesn’t need leadership for the good things, things people like and want to do. Leadership is necessary for the scut work. The dirty work. The mundane work. The training work. Leadership is instilled, and flows downward. You need people to lead, to make people understand how important training is, to take it seriously, and to expend energy on it, and money too. Because training on a ship at sea is tedious and unpopular. I don’t think I am alone in saying this.
General Quarters drills are inconvenient and unrewarding. Ask any guy who just got off a 12 hour shift and is trying to take one of those “Navy Showers”, covered with soap suds when the bosun’s whistle sounds the alarm. You frantically fumble trying like mad to get all the soap off before the water shuts off. (I recall you might get 15 seconds).
Man overboard drills are just something that can get your tits in a wringer simply by being a drill if you screw it up. They aren’t a fun kind of training, the way a pilot might enjoy training to drop ordinance or sharpen flying skills. If you screw up, and someone from your squadron (never mind YOU) is late checking in and your name is called over the 1MC, you are going to be in trouble.
Washing planes is as irritating and undesirable a task as scraping paint off a house before painting it. EVERYONE hates it.
But those three things, and dozens I didn’t mention and have little knowledge about, are CRITICAL. You have to be good at General Quarters in preparation for the crucial day you MUST do it to survive. You have to know exactly what to do, where to go, and in what frame of time, because a multi-billion dollar warship and all of its escorts steaming around in circles at 0300 with all 10,000 men in the task force running wildly to find out if there is really a man overboard, and if he is, his life depends on you. Washing planes sucks. I just does. I hated it more than anything else if my memory is accurate, but...you have to do it. You MUST do it. If something corrodes and breaks, it could cost not just the life of the pilot, but the lives of dozens or hundreds of men in the process of failing.
And that is why leadership is important. The DOD leadership tells The Brass to make sure the weapons and forces are prepared, and allots enough money to maintain and train. The Brass develops training and works it into busy schedules. They make sure, from their own actions, how seriously it must be taken.
And so on.
In ALL of these incidents (Fitzgerald, McCain, Bon Homme Richard) these crews seemed not only poorly trained, they seemed to be either Mal-trained or even un-trained, and in the basic fundamentals of operations, seamanship, watch standing, and damage control. Not to mention war fighting.
It seems ludicrous, but possible that the military places far, Far, FAR more stigma on the failure of commanders to have violations of perverted HR and woke policy infractions within their commands, than they would place on any training shortcoming or failure in the areas of operations, seamanship, watch standing, and damage control. With all my heart I don’t want to believe that previous statement is true, but I feel in my heart that is exactly the core of the issue.
I believe they have been purging the military, something I was unwilling to believe, but I now believe it is true. I believe they have been purging the military base not on failure to execute military duties and missions, but on the failure to implement perverse and woke HR policies. And they have been replacing those purged people with not just with personnel who will be compliant, but with people who will be...enthusiastic.
And those types of people who are “enthusiastic” about this fundamental social transformation of the military are not patriots. They are not principled in a good way. They are not honorable. They don’t believe in God. They don’t believe in Country. And they sure as Hell don’t believe in Family. These are people not to be trusted. They are more beholden to Leftist ideology than they are to Duty, Honor, and Country. And when they get into positions of power, from the Top Brass down to the NCOs...they will do what they are told to do. And they will do it with relish.
But all this pales in the face of when we have to use our military in anger against a foe who has the means and skill to fight in more of a peer-to-peer fashion. When that happens, we are going to lose, and lose badly.
If this can be turned around at the top-if we have three successive terms under real conservative Presidents and can maintain control of the House and Senate who actually have the guts to advocate for the majority of Americans who find this woke business reprehensible, where this nonsense can be fought and rolled back, we have a chance. It is a small one, and it is the only one, but...it is a chance.
get the women off the attack ships and readiness, morale and fighting capability will soar.
Amen brother.
Yes. See my post above. Dammit. We need to train effectively, and that doesn’t mean taking a break to have dinner, or ending the drill so people can go to sleep.
This kind of stuff I read makes me steaming mad.
I hated drills. But damn. WTF? Learn how to go to GQ when an anti-ship missile is inbound?
Of all the things I have read over the past two years regarding preparedness in the military in general and the Navy in particular, this one really eats at me.
It indicates clearly the depth of the rot.
Reading the linked article just makes me want to spit.
This is all just good and fine for a civilian corporation. It is idiocy for warfighting, IMO.
forever blanking gone...
A lot of these Sailors are putting in 20 hour days. Twelve to 14 hours at their workcenter and then go stand a watch.
The Navy has built newer ships with more automated systems for smaller crews but they cut back too much on the crew size. Now it's difficult to up the manning even if they wanted to because there isn't enough berthing space, food storage, galley seating, or potable water to accomodate larger crews.
Ping
Just when you think that stupidity is at an all-time high, this happens...🙄
That’s why I joined the USAF...
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