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A Coast Guard Albatross patrols the scene after the Liberian-flag tanker Argo Merchant broke up off Nantucket Island in late 1976. The incident brought the Coast Guard additional regulatory functions and is indicative of the trend in recent years to give the service more and more to do. A “can do” attitude has been, in part, responsible for spreading the service too thin and resulting in needless deaths and injuries to Coast Guardsmen.
J-t may surprise many in the Navy to learn that the Seagoing expertise generally attributed to the Coast Guard is becoming less important than policing polluters, regulating the merchant marine industry, and doing other jobs. During World War II, the Bureau of Marine Inspection and Navigation was added to the C°ast Guard, starting a trend away from operationally Rented functions and toward regulatory functions. hls trend continued in 1967, when the Coast Guard ^as transferred from its mother department— teasury—to the newly created Department of Transportation. The Coast Guard was thus taken from its °Perations-oriented brothers—such as the Customs 0 . ervice and the Secret Service—and put into an orphanage with parentless regulatory agencies such as the oderal Aviation Administration and the Federal ^'ghway Administration. The trend accelerated in the 1970s. In 1971, the ITderal Boat Safety Act made the Coast Guard the ^tchdog for boating safety. The service was no °nger responsible only for effecting rescues and help- lri8 boaters in distress but also for making regula- 0°ns for construction of pleasure craft, for personal | business of regulating and away from operating. Admiral Owen Siler, Coast Guard Commandant from 1974 to 1978, recognized this trend as a concern to some when he wrote: “Underlying . . . questions [concerning the role of the service] is an internal debate over the operational versus regulatory roles of the Coast Guard. There is a certain assumption that a dichotomy exists which must be explained, justified, or rationalized. The premise is that there are two poles. Unless we are careful, we may be pulled too much toward the regulatory pole and away from the operational.”1 The admiral then made the point that he did not believe there was a dichotomy between the Coast Guard’s regulatory functions and operational missions, but that both were integrated and interrelated to such an extent as to be inseparable.2 I believe the Coast Guard is too much on the regulatory side and too little on the operational side. (By operational I mean ships and boats at sea, aircraft in the air, and their coordination.) |
°tation devices, for pleasure boat safety features SUch as flame arrestors, fire extinguishers, and whis- j^es)> for the boats’ registration, and for myriad other Oat-related concerns. In 1970 and 1972, the Water VUality Improvement Act and the Federal Water °Uution Control Act gave the service more statutory responsibility for making and enforcing regulations C()ncerning water pollution and polluters. The Ports Waterways Safety Act of 1972 made the Coast uard responsible for the safe transportation of angerous cargoes on the navigable waters of the nited States. The 1974 Deepwater Ports Act made e Coast Guard responsible for licensing and reg- ^jlating construction, ownership, and operation of ^.eepWater ports on the high seas for transferring oil ^()rr> tankers to shore. And after the grounding and faking up of the Argo Merchant in 1976, the Coast Uard was tasked, by executive order, with further gating the U. S. merchant marine and all merC ant shipping off U. S. coasts. The Coast Guard’s (Teration of vessel traffic systems in various ports r°Ughout the country is yet another indicator of | What does all this mean.' It means, first ot all, that the Coast Guard is spread too thinly to be as effective as it once was in its many mission areas. The Coast Guard’s budget authorization has gotten smaller, in real terms, over the years while responsibilities have grown. Secondly, it means that Coast Guardsmen are needlessly dying or getting injured because of a lack of training and materials resulting from the shortage of funds. An example is the sinking of the cutter Cuyahoga (WIX-157) in October 1978. The situation that exists, then, is that the Coast Guard is doing more with less money but at a higher cost in human lives, personnel retention, and increasingly decrepit equipment. Training is almost always the first thing to be eliminated when other requirements begin to make themselves urgent. Without complete, proper training, people are bound to make more mistakes than would otherwise be the case—at least until they learn from experi- |
e*tent to which the service is getting into the | ‘For footnotes, please turn to page 57. |
| 53 |
ence. Likewise, much of the Coast Guard’s equipment causes higher costs than necessary. The situation is analogous to constantly repairing machinery rather than doing the preventive maintenance that would eliminate the need for much of the fixing. In the long run, the cost is higher than it would have been if the Coast Guard asked for and received a bigger budget.
It would be a mistake to believe that money will solve all of the Coast Guard’s problems, however. It would be nice if that were the case, but the lack of money is merely a symptom of a pervasive and dangerous disease from which most of the Coast Guard’s senior officers seem to suffer—a knee-jerk “can do” attitude. This attitude most often surfaces at congressional budget hearings such as that held to consider the Coast Guard’s fiscal year 1979 authorization. The following passage of testimony from those hearings is not taken out of context: Representative Gerry E. Studds: “If you look at some of the details behind here, your workload projections, you are projecting increased foreign fishing vessel sightings, increased boardings, increased cutter operating hours, increased aircraft flight hours, with a budget that is actually decreased. That’s marvelous. I don’t really know how you propose to do that.
“You say this year you are requesting no additional personnel, but you are providing resources by reprogramming from lower priority support activities.
“Where’s it coming from?”
Admiral Siler: “It will come from our training facilities, our engineering facilities, and supply support, medical support and that type of thing.” Studds: “You’re taking out medical support?”
Siler: “It has to come from something of that type. I’m not certain exactly where it will come from, but certainly training facilities will be cut to the bone. We always have a few people that are budgeted to take care of the absences of personnel on leave and in transit. Those people will be cut to the bone.”
Studds: “I would advise no one to go on leave; they may not get back under these circumstances.
“As you know, midnight tonight is the fits’- anniversary of the coming into effect of the 200- mile fisheries zone, and I can think of some better ways to celebrate it than being presented with this budget, frankly.
“Again, I think I know—and I’m not in a position to put words into your mouth, and the record can’t accurately reflect your expression- unfortunately—but I have a feeling of what y°u share deep down inside, and I won’t ask you ro confirm or deny my assessment of the budget.
“If you look at the overall figure for the coming fiscal year, compared with the current one, |C doesn’t even take into account inflation, does it? ^ mean, it’s a net loss.”
Siler: “For our operations it does take into account inflation.”
Studds: “Just barely?”
Siler: “Yes, just barely.”
Studds: “No one could contend it’s an increase to match the increased responsibilities?”
Siler: “No sir. We have pointed out several times m our budget presentations that we have increased responsibilities and we have been advised in each case to look for ways to reprogram and to cut out activities and to apply the resources that we have in our budget at the present time to something that appears to be of higher priority, which means in effect, to cut some of the service we have been providing.”
Studds: “It is certainly not appropriate for us to be' rate you just because you’re the only administr3' tion person sitting at the table, but I can’t refta”1 from observing—well, I’ll try not to observe t°° unkindly about the priorities of the administrate11 which came into this town talking about doing something sensible, about priorities that have been
askew for some time. I’m sick and tired about hearing of the need of a new consumer protection agency when we don’t fund the similar protection agencies that we already have.”
‘‘One of these days we’re going to get your annual budget up to at least one-half of a nuclear carrier. I think that would be a refreshing thing to do. . . .”3
The whole gist of the admiral’s testimony seemed c° be directed at explaining how the Coast Guard could juggle its money from one program to another So as not to have to ask for more. All the while, the congressmen at the hearing were trying to find some Way to increase the Coast Guard’s budget!
While the Coast Guard can be proud that it— arn°ng all the federal agencies—is probably the most cost-effective, the “can do” attitude goes far beyond rtlere cost-effectiveness. In recent years, the Coast puard has suffered tragedies in which its people have °st their lives. The real tragedy in these deaths (if che deaths, themselves, were not tragic enough) is that the Coast Guard’s professionalism has been called into question as a result. The true cause of these tragedies was the “can do” attitude alluded to earlier—not a lack of professionalism. The men and Wotnen with whom the public most often deals do cheir jobs in a thoroughly professional manner. They are unable to do better jobs, because, in many cases,
C ey lack adequate or properly functioning equipment. Admiral Siler cannot be singled out as the °nly commandant ever to answer congressional ques- t'ons as he did; the present state of the Coast Guard ^arne about through many years of such answers, lame cannot be placed on any individuals but rather the belief by senior officers that if the Coast Uard does not bite the bullet and accept new re- sP°nsibilities without question and without more money, it wiH be dismembered and its proud heri- faSe will be only a thing of the past. In other hearts5 > congressmen have asked point-blank if the °ast Guard should, indeed, be given a particular ne'v mission and, if so, whether it needed more men, m°ney and/or material. In each case the answers from ^ e Coast Guard were “We can do the job. No, we . a t need more resources to perform the new mis- Sl°ns. ’ The 200-mile fisheries zone is an example.
^ Pne casualty of the Cuyahoga sinking and the “can q syndrome is the present crisis in enlisted Coast uard retention. Here the Coast Guard is faced with ^ Paradox. The Coast Guard’s missions seemingly ^.aVe more appeal than those of the other armed rces. They are real, everyday peacetime missions, r*°t just training for an eventuality we hope never COtlles. Yet the Coast Guard’s retention of first-term
enlisted personnel is as low as, if not lower than, the lowest in any of the other armed forces: about 15% overall with some ratings as low as 3%. The reasons for the mass exodus of first-term people are many, but one of them surely must be the fact that they must perform often life-endangering work for a pittance, using obsolete or obsolescent equipment that keeps failing or making their work even more dangerous. (The reason the same exodus is not seen among junior officers—who experience even more frustration because they know why things are obsolete and failing—is probably that few of them have the readily marketable technical skills enlisted people do that would enable them to find jobs quickly in today’s economy.)
In my case, I requested an early discharge from the service because of my extreme frustration with the pigeonholing of and slow response to suggestions from myself and others. These suggestions often dealt with pressing Coast Guard-wide issues, would have cost no money to implement, and would have shown immediate results. Often, the ideas never got past the middle managers, officers who are, in many instances, unqualified to make the yes-or-no decision on a suggestion or idea. They were afraid, though, that Rear Admiral So-and-so wouldn’t like that idea and that their fitness reports might suffer as a result. These officers stifle any idea that hints at being controversial. There appears to be no room for a loyal opposition of individuals who desire to make the overall organization a better one.
Still another casualty of the Coast Guard’s “can do-ism” has been its military readiness. In reprogramming funds to accommodate new regulatory functions, the Coast Guard has neglected its military role. The reprogramming was easy, because unless the Coast Guard goes to war, its military readiness is not subject to much public—or even congressional—scrutiny. The actual condition is seen only by Coast Guard people (those who conduct and grade drills and exercises and inspect the material condition of the weapons and sensors) and by the small number of Navy people who come in contact with Coast Guard units at fleet training groups and units. The genuine shame in this is that the military readiness mission is the Coast Guard’s only real claim on continuing existence. By maintaining the perception of the service as a military force, the Coast Guard avoids the danger of bureaucratic elimination if one or more of its civilian functions becomes nonessential and helps ensure that it will not be fractionalized by federal reorganization.4 The military role is the only one that distinguishes the Coast Guard from such agencies as the Drug Enforcement Administration,
ation Administration (FAA) has no military personn working for it, yet it supervises the aviation induStt/ in much the same way the Coast Guard’s Office
the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and the Securities and Exchange Commission. It is the only thing that prevents the Coast Guard from being divided up, with its functions going to other agencies. A recent example of this was the proposal that the Coast Guard be made a part of a new border agency along with the Immigration and Naturalization Service, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and other agencies. It is downright suicidal for the Coast Guard’s leaders to encourage the assignment of more regulatory duties to the service at the expense of its military readiness mission. Those who would do so to save the Coast Guard merely hasten its demise.
Despite Admiral Siler’s assurances that the Coast Guard’s recently acquired regulatory functions p°se no threat to the integrity of the service, the fact that they are proliferating at the expense of seagoing eX pertise tends to refute that claim.
How can future tragedies like that of the Cuyahoga be prevented? There are many things that can he done. The most immediate is for the Coast Guards high-ranking officers to take an objective look at “can do” and begin soul-searching to determine [1] they are really being honest with themselves—af|L ’ more importantly, their subordinates—when the) tell Congress'the Coast Guard can perform more mlS sions with less money. They will find at least the Coast Guard and Navigation Subcommittee of fhe House Merchant Marine and Fisheries Committee re sponsive to justifiable requests for more Iunds' Another way is to gradually civilianize the ti°n operational missions of the Coast Guard and Put them into separate agencies within the Departmetlt of Transportation so the service can return to its sea going heritage. To my knowledge, the Federal Avl
f
Marine Safety supervises the merchant marine indus- |ry- There is a need for a nonmilitary maritime regu- atory agency, but it simply should not be the Coast ^uard. A great deal of money could be saved by ci- vdianizing that one office alone and removing it from Coast Guard. Along with the Marine Safety Of- 1Ce, the Coast Guard might be able to transfer the °Perations of the vessel traffic systems (just as air traffic controllers work for the FAA) and the Depart- of Commerce’s Maritime Administration to °rm a comprehensive civilian Federal Maritime Administration.
in order for the Coast Guard to remain a viable and seaworthy organization, it will soon have to de- c‘de whether to fish or cut bait. Only one of the tasks the Coast Guard now performs combines elements of both the regulatory and operational uctions—enforcement of laws and treaties. All the mst are either one or the other. In my view, one of e two sides must prevail, and that one should be the Perational side. Our operational missions people . 0uld not have to fight purely regulatory staff mis- Sl°n sponsors for funds and manpower.
"Gte Coast Guard is a good organization that is
endangered by those who have been made to believe it can do anything by its outstanding past performance. Those people must realize there are limitations to what the Coast Guard can do and ought to do, and they must act on that realization.
Mr. Webb was graduated from the Coast Guard Academy in 1975. He served in the USCGC Gallatin (WHEC-721) from 1975 to 1977 as antisubmarine warfare officer, weapons officer, and training officer. From 1977 to 1980, he was Coast Guard Liaison Officer, Fleet ASW Training Center Pacific. Mr. Webb was discharged from the Coast Guard 14 March 1980 to pursue graduate studies in international relations, specializing in Soviet affairs. He is now a student at the University of California, San Diego. * [2] [3] [4]
______________________________________ Steamed Shrimp------------------------------------------
Our Coast Guard cutter was steaming to aid a distressed shrimp boat in the Gulf of Mexico. We were a considerable distance from the vessel and were preparing equipment on the main deck. Meanwhile, the Coast Guard radio operator in Galveston was conducting a conversation with the shrimp boat captain, getting essential information from him. The young radio operator was faithfully following what is known as “procedure.” Shrimp boat masters have their own methodology when it comes to using the radio and few adhere to any sort of standard procedure. Soon the young operator and the shrimper entered the critical stage of the conversation.
Radio operator: “Captain, are you green with white trim or are you white with green trim? Over.”
Shrimp boat master, clearly irritated: “You’ll see me when you get out here . . . I’m the only shrimp boat afire!”
Raymon Fullerton
Visual Communications
There are no signalmen aboard Coast Guard cutters, so visual signaling is handled by the quartermasters, who use enthusiasm to make up for what they lack in expertise. In a recent Navy exercise, a cutter was refueling underway from an oiler, while an aircraft carrier took fuel on the far side. The replenishment was going well, and the Coast Guard crew enjoyed a splendid view of the giant carrier only a couple of hundred yards away. Suddenly, a signal searchlight blinked on the carrier. The quartermasters sprang to their stations, armed with code books and message forms. They painstakingly copied every letter that flashed to them. Then one of them rushed the message to the captain, who read, “Turn around; you are being signaled by the ship on your other side.”
Lieutenant Commander Duncan P. Johnson, USCG
*Admiral Owen W. Siler, USCG, “Tradition of Excellence, Time of Change," Proceedings, March 1976, p. 35.
[2]Ibid., p. 36.
[3]U. S. Congress, House, Committee on Merchant Marine and Fisheries, Federal Boat Safety Act—Coast Guard Authorization, Fiscal Year 1979, Hearings Before the Subcommittee on Coast Guard and Navigation, 95th Congress, 2nd Session, 1978, pp. 192-193.
[4]Lieutenant Commander Gary Russell, USCG (Ret.), “The Coast Guard’s Personality: A Product of Changing Roles and Missions,” Proceedings, March 1976, p. 40.