The heart of the Navy is its ships, and all else in the Navy must be relegated to a subservient and subordinate role. For it is the ship that is the basic fighting unit of the Navy, and it is combinations of ships of varied design, acting as a team, that makes it possible to express under, upon, and over the oceans of the world, that power, which, without the ship, can stem only from the land.
The manning, the fighting, the servicing of these ships has been done throughout the ages by seamen—men who are a breed apart. They are proud of their calling, and the mastery they have over the many techniques that bring the ship to life. Their never-ending efforts to protect the ship from the menace of the elements as well as from the enemy calls for teamwork, and esprit de corps, and the selflessness which we honor as shipmate spirit. It is something different and precious. It attracts to the Navy the finest of America’s young men. This spirit must be preserved, for without it a ship is just another machine. With it she has a life and personality of her own that will spur all aboard her to make supreme efforts in her behalf. With what impatience does the midshipman and recruit await his first ship. If the rigorous training period is later remembered with nostalgia, it is endured only because at its' end is the promise of a ship. Not so long ago the sailors of gun deck and wardroom remained in the ship, and returned to the land only long enough to nourish old roots and to enjoy those delights of life that only the land can give. As they went ashore, they took a backward glance over their shoulders and with a fusion of heart and head said, “I’ll be back.”
These men who went ashore were now sailors. Their service ashore was as dedicated as it was afloat, because it was in the interests of the ships that had become their life. As seamen will, they looked outward, not inward, but even as they looked outward to the sea, they reaped the bounties of the shore. The period ashore, in fact, enriched the Navy and the seaman the more. Here now was time to confirm courtship with marriage, to start a family; but the arrangements were honest ones and should be. The good wife knew that her husband’s calling would frequently take him away; however, if she was of spartan stuff, she, too, found glory in the sacrifices she was called upon to make. Those sacrifices made her a part of the Navy, also; the wife of a sailor, bless her, must have that extra something. Frequently all the duties of the household are hers. Often alone, and without the counsel of her husband, she must make important decisions, or watch around the clock, without relief, over the precarious fortunes of a sick child. Small wonder that at times her breaking point is near, but the greater wonder is that it seldom ever comes. For the shipmate spirit has invaded the land, too, and with the succor of other valiant spirits like her, the many crises pass and go away. Except for the courage of these women, the sailor himself would weaken, and leave in the lurch those ships behind whose impregnable barriers all America feels secure in the enjoyment of liberty’s eternal joys and bounties. How true the saying, “They also serve who only sit and wait.”
These good women understand that just as their marriage vows bind them to their sailor, the oath he has taken ties him to his ship. In the ideal sense, whatever the contract, both knots are tied the firmer by the dual tradition of sharing proudly something very old, something very new, and something very blue. Neither of these marriages must be permitted to falter. A sailor must return to the shore often enough to insure that family life be not imperiled by unnecessary stress and strain. He must return to the sea often enough to make certain that the ways of the land do not “unsailor” him.
The ship must continue to be the good shepherd of American liberty. But this good shepherd, this good ship, must have good sailors to man her. Just having good men is not enough. Today in our U. S. Navy, the nature of things has delayed the transition from good prospect, good man, to good sailor. We must not only hurry the process along, but make it all-embracing as well. The training center does a creditable job of turning out men-o’-wars men. It does not, however, turn out sailors, and cannot be expected to. Only the school of the ship can make a sailor. The training center renders that service to the ship which is best performed ashore. It succeeds as well as it does because in the main the instructors there are learned in the ways of the sea. But life at sea must be lived, not theorized on, and that is why it is so important that a tour at sea follow as quickly as possible the completion of the training period. Only the interim of a service school should intervene here. To send a man to a shore billet from the training center, or even from a ship before he has become learned in the ways of the sea, renders a disservice to both the man and the Navy. The sea marks a man, but it is a good mark. No bona fide sailor should be ashamed of it.
Let us look at the future of a man who has just completed his first tour of naval service ashore. If he leaves the regular Navy, he still faces a mandatory period of reserve service. The reservists most valuable to the Navy are those with shipboard experience behind them. Here then we have the paradox of a regular Navy man, who ought with his background to play a major role in the reserve organization, actually starting at the bottom as a reservist. Now picture his plight if he stays with us—remember we are talking here about a good man who will undoubtedly advance in rating—sooner or later he will go to sea, and despite his higher rating, he will not be as shipwise as some of the non- rated men whose service is numbered in months rather than years. Frankly, having senior petty officers on board who are not shipwise, however able they are in the special duties, cannot but weaken the morale of the ship. A senior petty officer who was utterly confused by a sound-powered telephone head set, who possessed but the barest fluency in the language of the sea, and, worse still, who was unfamiliar with the nomenclature of the ship, was nevertheless a wizard in his own specialty and more than pulled his weight in the boat. If this same man had only learned his trade on board ship instead of at one of our shore bases, he would not only have been a good man, but would have been a good sailor to boot.
Strangely enough, very few of these men want it that way when they are “fresh caught” in the Navy. It is usually the ship that lured him to join our service, but somewhere, well inside the jetty buoys, he lost his interest in ships, although not necessarily his interest in the Navy. Of course it is difficult for a man in what might be called an operational rate to advance without shipboard service, but the stress which in late years has shifted from the ship to the shore has trapped many in this category. These men started out as bona fide sailors, as good as any, but became “desailorized” by long periods ashore. This, of course, is not a universal experience, but it does happen often enough to disturb morale. More often than not it is the distaff side of the family who raises the bothersome question. With understandable logic she will ask how come “Chief Shoreside,” who has the same rating as you have, comes home every night for years on end? Previously you have explained and taken pleasure in her comprehension of why you had to be in the Davis Straits and Cuba in 1949, in Korea for part of 1950 and 1951, in Panama and Labrador during 1952, in Europe in 1953 with the Sixth Fleet, and in Asia with the Seventh Fleet in 1954. Now she is not sure that you have been honest with her, or, worse still, she begins to wonder if you are professionally apt.
It is in the sea billets based ashore where you will find this long standing shore party. In fact, most of these men have never had a tour of legitimate shore duty and don’t want one. Or you will find others riding in the circuit of fleet shore duty, over-seas duty, embassy duty, and then at long last they get a ship—a tender. There is no denying that many of these men are where they are for such a long time simply because they are good men, and in the beginning of their careers they were also good sailors. But after years ashore it would be a travesty of truth for them to deny that they are operationally less effective. Sea duty in a ship is the tonic and the answer.
By the same token there are men who have garnered to themselves the better ship billets and who stay with them. This constitutes selfishness in a positive form and is much more understandable. It does not hurt the ship, and these men are to be lauded for improving upon rather than lessening their professional abilities as sailors. It does, however, force some sailors to continuous duty in one type of ship, and thus they lose that general appreciation of the Navy and its mission which experience in all of its components gives.
But there are other things besides a vested interest in the land which have toppled the ship from the pedestal where it was enshrined by many good men who wear the Navy blue. The importance of the ship has been lost in other areas as well. Today when shipboard athletics are discussed, it is done so in undertones. Intramural athletics have not lost any ground, but inter-ship athletics seem to have lost some of their zest. Interest in athletics has not lessened, but merely, in the spirit of the times, emphasis has been shifted from the ship to the shore. This is most unfortunate, for spirited athletic programs between ships do much to foster high morale and team spirit. The keen competitive edge, once whetted, spins over into gunnery, engineering, and every other phase of shipboard life. When men will risk their entire month’s pay on the outcome of a whaleboat race, their ship spirit needs no further priming. Once the chief topic of conversation in the fleet was who would win the “Iron Man.” Today this once-revered trophy is mentioned only in whispers. And why? The answer is simple: Now instead of the great ships of the fleet being a household word in athletics, the teams of the shore bases have taken over. In almost every instance, the famous Navy teams of late have represented an amphibious force or base, a naval air station, a naval station, or a district. What a far cry this is from the reefing matches in the era of sail, or the whaleboat races of little more than a decade ago. Here were real sailor games that made for spirited sailors and spirited ships. Today, though no aspersions will be cast on any sport, the very nature of many of them makes it difficult to tie them to a ship. But we can do one thing, we can shift the emphasis on naval athletics from the land back to the ship again. What has helped along the change from sea to . land has been the inter-service competition. Naturally, the Navy wants to put a good team in the field, but we are competing with services whose duties tie them to the land. The Navy is different. We must live in our machines of war, our ships. To offer any competition whatsoever, emphasis on athletics has to be shifted from the ship to the shore, at the expense of our ships, the only reason or excuse that gives us the right to wear a blue uniform.
It is too bad that we ever gave up the whaleboat races. This was one sport peculiar to our service alone. The members of the world champion Naval Academy racing crews are now on duty in the fleet. Here is a wonderful chance for them to show their high quality leadership and exploit their skill with the oars by getting our sailors interested in rowing and sailing again. The best of sailors appreciate the order “way enough,” but we’ve been resting on our oars too long. The order to “Stand by your oars” implies more work. It is a lot of fun, too. Take care of the morale of the ship and the morale of the Navy will take care of itself. Fleet athletics, revolving about the ship rather than the shore, will do just that.
One may look elsewhere and readily find many small but contributory reasons for the decline of the prestige of the ship as such. Mind you, it is not intimated that the ship has lost one iota of its importance. It is merely that appreciation of that importance has lessened. One wonders if the scarcity of big flags afloat does not tend to make the ship diminutive. Almost all the fleet and type flags are ashore. Whenever possible the others are berthed at the dock. There is no doubt that this makes for better administration, and perhaps it is unavoidable, but something is lost by it, too. Anyone who has ever stood even the humblest watch on the quarterdeck or bridge can well remember what fear and trepidation the approach of the admiral’s barge wrought in the ship. A principal duty of the signal bridge was to report immediately to the quarterdeck the appearance of the meal pennant under the flag of any officer afloat. This meant the admiral would pay an official visit somewhere in the harbor in five minutes, and this called for a maximum of alertness, for from CinCPac down all the flags were afloat. There is no doubt that this arrangement put the whole fleet on its toes. Passing honors, side honors, spotless boats, and the constant appraisal of the admirals and captains of other ships made for smart sailors and snappy ships. Not only the flag officers but the entire chain of naval command was honored by this respect for the traditions of the sea. It paid a tribute to the ship, as well as to the people in it.
Anyone who thinks all these trappings are redundant would do well to read over several times Vice Admiral Lovette’s Naval Customs, Traditions and Usage. After the mutinies in the latter part of the 18th century in the Royal Navy, Admiral Sir John Jervis rightly attributed much of the breakdown of discipline to the neglect of the tradition of honors and ceremonies. At colors every evening in his flagship, he was present on the quarterdeck in his dress uniform. In his homage to the tradition he was an example to the entire fleet. Thus he confounded the mutinies, and, as Admiral Lovette writes: “ . . . Jervis by inculcation of spirit, regular drill, and observance of ceremony wielded the weapon that won for him the decisive victory of Cape St. Vincent, and passed on to Nelson the fleet that the hero of Trafalgar commanded with incomparable genius.” Time has not lessened one particle the importance of honors and ceremonies, the appreciation of which marks the man-o’-wars man from the landsman, as well as the ship from the shore. In 1944 there was nothing in the regulations that permitted the ships of the U. S. Navy to fly the battle ensign from the foremast. By the same token there was nothing that forbade it. When it was noted that the Tuscaloosa and the British ships had their battle ensigns flying at Normandy, it was brought to the attention of the Captain. The ship was at General Quarters and was bombarding the beach. The Captain reflected a moment and then ordered, “Hoist it, Chief! We can’t live for today alone!” The next day an acoustic mine sheared off one hundred feet of the stern. Incomplete cleavage caused it to sink in ten fathoms and act as anchor to the forward part of the ship. The following day, when Jerry so demolished with shellfire the immovable forward section of the ship that it had to be abandoned, the battle ensign, now reduced to ragged bunting, and hanging from one halliard, made the death, destruction, and travail easier to sustain.
Nothing has happened during this last decade which justifies abandonment of the tradition. The ship is the sailor’s icon and the rightful repository of that tradition. Some shoreminded persons, in good faith, are trying to convince us that traditions are the seaman’s millstones. Let us not buy this new concept, because without them our ships would lose their spiritual buoyancy, and ships are our business.
In 1947 a little thing such as doing away with the old right arm rates, rendered a disservice to the ship. For these old rates, in the main, were as old as the Navy itself. Their special position in no way detracted from the left arm rates. They were a continuation of the tradition established by the boatswains, gunners, and quartermasters who fought with Paul Jones. All other ratings are descended from some function of the old ones, including the loblolly boy, sail- maker, and carpenter. The right arm rates merely emphasized that petty officers whose duties involved direct command of the ship or her guns in battle had precedence. It is recognized that the mechanization of everything in the Navy offers some excuse for the leveling, but it still hurt the ship, for it was a retreat by the line to the new technology. A similar situation also exists with the line officer. As Lieutenant Rairden has pointed out in his article in the Proceedings, the officer who is qualified to command at sea is indistinguishable from his fellows of the line who are not. It should be made easy for anyone in the Navy to recognize at a glance the general practitioner of the line, who alone has the general over-all knowledge of the ship that cuts across all lines of specialization and ties them into the knot of command. There is no demeaning of the specialist implied or intended. After all, the medical officer has a doctorate in his specialty and is one of the most honored officers afloat. Similarly honored are those architects of the audit and logistics—our supply officers. Who is more proud to be a specialist within the sea services than a Marine officer? We honor him because he knows all the duties of a soldier, as well as many of the duties of a sailor. Nonetheless, the heart of the Navy is still the ship and the officers who are qualified to command should stand out from those who are merely eligible. The star of the line officer no longer differentiates. Here again is some evidence where the tradition of the shore is encroaching upon the ship.
Perhaps an area where the influence of the shore has been most dangerous to the security of the ship is in the attitude toward discipline and achieved degree. Fundamentally it is a clash between the traditionalist and the modernist point of view. Its unresolved condition is dangerous because it is insidious and works slowly. Before one knows it, he is entirely taken over by the shore point of view. There is nothing wrong with the civil discipline of the shore from which the new approach emanates, but unfortunately fighting ships, or for that matter any other, cannot be run that way. Perhaps a review of the philosophy underlying all American purpose, power, and authority is in order. American philosophy, customs, laws, mores are based primarily on the English experience, and the philosophy of Locke and Rousseau. In essence it recognizes that man is born with certain inalienable and natural rights, which Locke called “life, liberty, and protection,” but which later were called by Jefferson, “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” In uncivilized or unorganized areas respect for these natural rights in others is left to the individual. This is what has spurred men to live in communities, and to put into contract form their respect for each other’s rights. Rousseau called this the social contract. Americans live in civil peace under their social contract, the Constitution. Under the Constitution communities are given police powers to deal with emergencies that threaten from within, such as lawlessness, subversion, and threats to health. When the threat to the community is from without, military power meets it. These threats to the community from within and without necessitate an abandonment of the absolute in democratic precepts and form to assure survival. They are not an abandonment of democratic beliefs and attitudes. Those of us who are in custody of the police and military power have numerous inhibitions placed upon us that are not the lot of those who have custody of the civil power. The latter under our form of government is supreme over the other two. The Navy exercises management control and command of its personnel by use of the military power as spelled out in Navy Regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. In addition, custom and tradition play a much stronger part in the Navy than in civil life. This is understandable because in fulfilling its mission a ship of the Navy must often ask a sailor to give his life in its behalf. It is tradition that honors all who have made the ultimate sacrifice in our ships, or in the boats, planes, and bulldozers that are ancillary to these ships.
It is custom more than law that fixes the honors that go with achieved degree. Each plateau of command stands for higher achievement, more responsibility, more authority, and more privileges. The traditionalist believes in cherishing all these trappings whose only aim is to perpetuate a reverence for the Navy and its ships. The modernist, in all honesty, says we can do without them—or many of them. Who is right? The traditionalist views stem completely from the sea, while the modernist views stem from the land. The modernist calls it progress; he wants to foist civil principles upon the seaways. We must proceed with caution when piloting within the ten- fathom curve, and it is hoped that the modernist will learn to live with our traditionalist caution. We want to make sure that the ships of our Navy do not run up on the beach with him. The modernist will be given a respectful hearing on all his new views on discipline and tradition that are seaward of the danger bearing, but the traditionalist will give those views a long, hard look. There is a strong implication that the only thing the modernists want to do is humanize the Navy. Today’s new shipmates who take the oath of enlistment are coming into a Navy that is not one iota more humane than the Navy of two decades ago. If an officer or a petty officer is firm and fair, and accords to his shipmates the honor that goes with his degree of achievement, he can be as democratic, friendly, courteous, and humane as he wishes and still be admired and respected. By the same token he must be unbending and hurry quickly to the mast willful or careless violators of the regulations. If he does, he will be respected even more. A few taut skippers have been disliked by some, but there were none who were not respected. The only reason for this tauter discipline of the sea is to ensure the reliability of execution of the orders that originate at any point in the line of naval command. You cannot mix the two treatments of discipline, civil and naval. Where you do, you do not get a weaker form of either, but instead get an individual improvisation that changes with the whim and caprice of the individual. So the rule of law, regulation, and custom ends, and the rule of man with all his frailties begins. First, justice goes, then loyalty in its truest and voluntary sense. Things may go on for a while, but they will not go on in style. Fortunately this has not happened in the United States, or in her Navy. But just as responsible citizens in civil life are asking probing questions about progressive education and looking askance at some of its results, those of us in the Navy who take a traditional view of discipline, ask the modernists who have imported improvements from the shore to lay more proof of practical workability on the line before we buy in their entirety the new concepts. Perhaps it is apropos at the moment to peruse Ulysses’ great speech on degree or natural order from Shakespeare’s Troilus and Cressida:
Take but degree away, untune that string,
And hark what discord follows! Each thing meets
In mere oppugnancy. The bounded waters
Should lift their bosoms higher than the shores,
And make a sop of all this solid globe.
Strength should be lord of imbecility,
And the rude son should strike his father dead.
Force should be right, or rather, right and wrong,
Between whose endless jar justice resides,
Should lose their names, and so should justice too.
Then everything includes itself in power,
Power into will, will into appetite,
And appetite, a universal wolf,
So doubly seconded with will and power,
Must make perforce a universal prey,
And last eat up himself.
When Shakespeare wrote this speech, men’s minds were troubled by threats at home of some vast revolution that was likely at any time to break down the natural order. It means even more today when degree, and natural order, and decency are still in the balance.
The recent decision to award names to LST’s is a step in the right direction. Placing the names of ships on the sailors’ “flat hats” is another small move that would on sight separate the ship-bound sailors from the shore-bound sailors. Anything that is done to tip the balance in favor of the ship vis-d- vis the shore is a positive move. Responsible people know that the primary function of the shore establishment is to service the fleet so that it can achieve readiness for battle. It exists for no other purpose.
The Bureau of Naval Personnel has made some far-reaching strides in their efforts to find shore billets for those ratings who must spend years at sea before being assigned a shore billet. The word eligibility is not used because in some instances it is meaningless. Ratings such as Boilerman and Machinist’s Mate must remain at sea long after they are eligible. At the same time, serving in the same ship with them are ratings who can for a certainty expect orders to shore duty after eighteen months at sea. This must cause impairment of morale. It would be a monumental job, but the person who could arrange an equitable rotation for all sailors would be making a major contribution to the ship. When a sailor stays too long in a ship, the law of diminishing returns impairs his efficiency. When he is at sea for too short a period, he is promoted primarily on the strength of his special duties, and he is never really tested as to his seamanship. Either way, the ship suffers. The ship must not capitulate completely to the shore. Let the shore party make its contribution. WAVES and civilian personnel can help remove the imbalance by taking over more shore billets of those ratings who spend the preponderance of their time ashore and relatively little time at sea. Perhaps a sea duty waiting list, or better still a ship duty waiting list, would assure those on shore duty of the certainty of being assigned to a ship. Remember morale suffers just as much from the disparity between sea duty requirements, as it does from the long tenure at sea required of some ratings. My concern is primarily with the ship. The sailors who serve in her faithfully for long periods of time should be rewarded in proportion, but the measurement of a sailor must be his service to the ship, not the shore. The shore is just a pleasant and necessary interlude between ships. It cannot dominate the very thing its purpose is to serve. We all want to be with our families as much as possible, and the Navy wants us to be with our families. What is contended is that the dissimilarity of periods of service at sea between the different rating groups, or even by different persons within the same rating group, does chip away at the morale of those who bear the brunt of sea duty. It also creates a group of Navy men who over the years lose that flavor of the sea that makes for the shipmate spirit. It threatens with disunity a service whose forte over the years has been its homogeneity and brotherhood. The Navy is one service that cannot sustain a splinter group; it especially cannot sustain one based ashore.
Before World War II the life of every sailor pivoted about the ship. It is only since the war that this “ship to shore” movement has taken on such momentum. And what has been its result? You find an admiral bemoaning the vanishing officer. You find an officer writing with equal emphasis and concern on the vanishing petty officer. Throughout the Fleet you hear that all a chief is interested in is getting in his “twenty” or “shore duty.” The junior officer is singled out as not respecting the age-old prerogatives of the senior petty officers, and of bypassing him in the line of command. Can it be that we are all at fault a little? There is no intentional disloyalty, but perhaps our defection from the ship is what is blinding us. If we could center our energies in the ship and outside our individual selves, the areas for agreement will be larger. The ship is the most truly American of our communities, and the community effort which it demands must bring out the best in all of us. Beneath the great canopy of the carrier’s flight deck, for instance, live citizens from every comer of the U.S.A.
Once Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote a poem which saved a ship—“Old Ironsides,” the symbol of all our ships. Later that same ship, about to be abandoned for lack of funds, was rescued by the pennies of American school children. Today it is equally important for us to heed those stirring words of Lawrence: “Don’t give up the ship!”