Secretary of the Navy James Forrestal and Chief of Naval Operations Ernest King barely spoke to one another in the latter part of World War II. Both were aggressive, smart leaders, and both thought that they alone were in charge of the Navy.
Admiral James Watkins, the Reagan-era CNO who passed away on 26 July at the age of 85, was King’s equal in aggressive leadership and superior in intellect and political savvy. And as with King, Watkins’ Secretary (yours truly) was also convinced that the SecNav ran the Navy. But the relationship between the two of us was very different from King’s and Forrestal’s. To begin with, I had been in the job of SecNav for 18 months and was the major voice in choosing Watkins to succeed the equally strong and intelligent Tom Hayward. Jim Watkins and I both made a constant effort to communicate daily, often walking into each other’s offices unannounced.
Like Hayward, Watkins was a strategic thinker and a reformer. When Hayward had command of the Pacific Fleet he had developed a strategy based on prompt offensive action, taken up and made operational when Watkins later commanded the Pacific Fleet. Unfortunately for Hayward, he had become CNO during the post-Vietnam drawdown and the relatively anti-navalist presidency of Jimmy Carter, and he found himself fighting a rear-guard action to preserve the core of the Navy and its Mahanian strategy, which he did quite ably.
Watkins, by contrast, was given the job by a President—Ronald Reagan—who had become a thoroughgoing navalist. He had earlier chosen me as SecNav because of my advocacy of a “600-ship Navy” and a forward global strategy for its use. Watkins was the man for the job; he took the strategy of maritime superiority, and working with me and his own posse of strategists, he turned it into fully integrated and implemented plans for operating all naval forces worldwide. He understood that the new naval mission was to demonstrate to the Soviet Union every day that the U.S. Navy and its allies would have the capability to defeat the Soviet navy and to strike hard into the Soviets’ heartland if they ever attacked a member of NATO. As a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Watkins knew that attempting to get a full formal endorsement of the new forward strategy from the JCS would be impossible; his deft touch kept the issue from requiring that green light. Knowing the President and Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger were committed to it allowed the SecNav and CNO to proceed without seeking approval.
On the same principle, no formal approval was sought from NATO for the change in doctrine. It was well known that Army General Bernard Rogers, the Supreme Allied Commander, opposed using the Navy for offense in the NATO theater. The Royal and Scandinavian navies were enthusiastic participants in the planning and execution of annual multi-carrier exercises that took place in the Norwegian Sea and Northwest Pacific close to Soviet bases (and demonstrated the capability to attack Soviet strategic forces). Here again, it was Watkins’ smooth diplomacy with Rogers’ NATO allies that enabled the new strategy to be implemented without an outburst from Brussels
Watkins knew that the new strategy had to be a constantly evolving set of works in progress that should never become static doctrine. He labored constantly to mold naval institutions to teach the logic of the strategy and to instill confidence and aggressiveness into naval personnel at all levels. Morale was never higher than during his tenure. Cold War victory proved the validity of the strategy and the forward Fleet operations of which he was a major architect.
Watkins and I were in complete agreement on the large issues but had many disagreements on lesser issues, most of which were resolved without much conflict. He was ahead of his time on many things, and it was over one of these that we came close to rancor. Watkins and two of his colleagues in the JCS agreed that all three services should abolish the traditional Friday happy hour at officers’, NCOs’, and enlisted clubs, and to merge them into common-use family centers. While the other two services went forward with the plan, I summarily vetoed its implementation in the Navy, much to the CNO’s chagrin.
Watkins’ contributions to the long-term Navy culture of excellence mark him as one of the Navy’s great leaders. His subsequent service to Presidents Reagan and George H. W. Bush in the Department of Energy and other domestic assignments was outstanding, but to all naval personnel it is his Navy leadership that will keep his memory alive for generations to come.