Co-Ed Crew: Reality vs. Taboo
(See K. Eyer, pp. 44–48, October 2012 Proceedings)
Captain Michael Junge, U.S. Navy—Captain Eyer’s article caused a great stir, made me think, and left me wanting as well. As a regular reader of the author’s work I have typically found some incredible insights. Sadly, that was not the case in this article.
I am not a casual observer. I have served in a fully integrated combat unit. As a matter of fact, I have served in four of them, including the one I commanded. I am convinced that men and women can, and are, serving together with a cheerful disregard for one another’s gender.
There is no “full-blown crisis” of gender integration. Fraternization is not “endemic.” Sexual misconduct and fraternization are forbidden by regulation, but Captain Eyer blissfully conflates behavior that is against regulations with behavior that is authorized under current, and past, regulations.
Most troubling are his attempts to present “facts” that are cloaked in falsehoods and innuendo. The greatest of these is his claim that “In fact, almost 40 percent of assessed officers are women,” which is patently false and easily verifiable.
Open-source information from the Defense Manpower Data Center shows that in September 2011, there were 1,309 women ensigns out of 6,465 total, or 20 percent. While that percentage has risen over the past decade, it is nowhere near the claimed 40 percent.
He also claims that “there are . . . fewer than 30 women . . . eligible for command of a ship.” Again, patently false. In the past 20 years, more than three times that number of women have commanded or been selected to command ships at every rank from lieutenant to captain.
If the challenge is that fraternization occurs but is covered up, then the challenge is not that there is a problem with women on board ship, but rather that there is a leadership problem. But is fraternization covered up? Not in my experience.
I personally investigated a case of fraternization while serving as executive officer. While I was in command my XO investigated a case. In the former the officer involved was separated. In the latter there was insufficient evidence to do anything but admonish the officer. In the other two mixed-gender commands I served in there were no cases of fraternization that I knew of. Was my head in the sand? Or was I avoiding the alarmists and sticking to facts and due process? I, of course, believe the latter.
If “sex between shipmates” occurs ashore, and does not act in contravention to good order and discipline, or violate the Navy’s rules on fraternization, then no, no one should care. If, however, a commanding officer recognizes a problem but delays taking action because the offender is too important, too critical to an inspection, or some other reason, then that commander should be relieved as well.
Captain Eyer commanded two ships. One of them was integrated. Yet he fails to cite any experiences of having to deal with fraternization or sexual misconduct while in command. If his command tour was so free of such problems that they don’t deserve mention, then why does he believe that “sex between shipmates” is endemic, or such a problem?
Captain Tom Davis, U.S. Navy (Retired)—A couple of things caught my attention in reading Captain Kevin Eyer’s article. Number One: He has it right that the “gender diversity” program was a political decision imposed on the Navy without consideration for the psychological issues of placing men and women together in confined, highly stressful conditions. While Captain Eyer considers that gender integration was “inevitable, reasonable, and fair” and was “in step with the cultural times,” the fact that there was little or no consideration given to the effect gender integration would have on combat readiness is, in my view, a failure of the military command structure to stand firm on the matter of combat readiness on which they are supposed to be professionally expert. While there is a firm recognition of civilian control, matters that affect combat readiness are under the purview of naval military professional management control, not to be fiddled with by civilians who are supposed to serve only as administrative assistants in the command structure, but from whom the gender integration policies seem to have sprung. This leads to the second issue—civilian control.
After two tours in Washington I became convinced that the professional civilian managers in the Navy management hierarchy have become policy makers. They have come to operate independently of the Navy military managers who were nominally supposed to form policy and exercise control of those things that did not impinge on national policy. Because senior civilians essentially spent their entire careers in Washington they have gradually moved into positions of controlling policy (such as gender integration) just by being continuously on scene. Meanwhile, senior military managers follow career paths that take them away from Washington or out of the policy structure periodically or permanently. Those necessary absences open the door for civilian control to steadily extend to matters such as ignoring the effect of gender integration on combat readiness—thereby allowing a civilian ideal to displace the ability to conduct the Navy mission.
The Navy’s Newest Warfighting Imperative
(See K. L. Card and M. S. Rogers, pp. 22–26, October 2012 Proceedings)
Paul A. Strassmann, former Director of Defense Information, Office of the Secretary of Defense—Vice Admirals Card and Rogers’ article overlooked that the opening of a future war may occur after an enemy has accumulated intelligence about our cyber defenses from insiders. Insiders are people with access to classified knowledge. They include Navy personnel, contractors, auditors, manufacturers, or coalition staffs. Even though the Navy restricts access to secure information, there will always be insiders who acquire classified information and transmit it to our adversaries.
There is no question that the Navy must maintain information dominance through battlefield awareness, secure command and control, unified combat information, integration of kinetic actions, and the deployment of a superior information workforce. However, to our enemies the most valuable source of secrets will come from insiders. Our adversaries will patiently collect classified data for years and then piece together what they discover. The technology for fusing purloined bits of data into a coherent picture already exists.
A cadre of computer experts is available globally for collecting data on cyber targets. Such efforts are compartmentalized. Disclosure of who is collecting data is disguised. Cyber spying is the most cost-effective way of gaining an understanding of how defenses are organized. It is also the least risky and the most deniable method for preparing an attack.
Insider breaches can never be prevented. Therefore, the Navy must re-examine its approach to system design. It must put protection against insider compromises in its requirements. The objective of insider-proof protection should be a rapid interception of unauthorized leaks. An emphasis should be placed on the organization of counterintelligence before putting defense software into place.
A system design that protects against insiders is radically different from the prevailing approach, which depends on intrusion-detection hardware and software. All personnel in sensitive posts will have to be tagged with their current identification of missions and responsibilities. Outbound communications will have to be screened according an individual’s roles and not according to security clearance. The patterns of outgoing communications, which includes tracking of removable media and printing, will be kept for years, because suspected exfiltration calls for correlations of traffic. Diverse messages, from mobile communications to personal messages, must be segregated into controlled enclaves. All documents will have to be filed on private clouds, with exceptions allowed only for unique cases.
We need to remember that insider breaches must be caught by intelligence personnel and not by computers. Computers can check only for procedural compliance. Intelligence analysts may depend on computers for discovering atypical events or outliers that signal potential malfeasance, but not for the discovery of a well-protected spy.
We must extend our thinking about cyberspace beyond viewing it as an extension of the doctrines of warfare. We must recognize it as a new form of intelligence that screens millions of messages per day.
A ‘Leap Ahead’ for the 21st-Century Navy
A New Kind of Carrier Air Wing
(See W. Moran, T. Moore, and E. McNamee, pp. 18–23, and D. Goure, pp. 24–28, September 2012; and W. Tunick, J. D. Perry, and J. A. Stout, pp. 8–9, October 2012 Proceedings)
Captain Ken Denbow, U.S. Navy (Retired)—The two articles concerning the future of the carrier Navy were both very informative, and were well paired, as an air wing without a carrier is nothing, and vice versa. The description of the Ford class made my adrenaline flow and made me wish I were 50 years younger! However, the Ford-class piece also made the unintended point that to be truly effective, another class of ship is required as well. The article on the air wing made the point that a “truck” rather than a “luxury” aircraft is required, but unfortunately pointed to more “luxury” aircraft as the solution.
The greatest value of the aircraft carrier is her ability to disappear in the vast ocean reaches, to reappear without warning, deliver a devastating blow, then disappear again. Any nation with a long coastline cannot defend against this type of threat. Anyone who has looked at an airborne radar screen will know that the carrier is on the screen. The question is, which of the 200–300 surface targets is it?
However, the identity problem is solved if the carrier exercises command and control and has a unique electronic signature. Ancient history (for some) pointed that out with the original “Bee Hive” radars on the USS Enterprise (CVN-65) and Long Beach (CGN-9). The command-and-control function must move off the high-value unit and onto some other platform that accompanies the strike group. If this requires a new class of ship, a larger cruiser or specially built platform, so be it.
The carrier air wing of the future must have a truck that will haul a large payload (say 28,000 pounds), have a long un-refueled range, and be able to stay on target for a period long enough to provide ground support to troops in the field. No matter how accurate a guided weapon is, it can only destroy one target. Several potential enemies can field large naval forces and even larger armies in the field.
Some points about the truck: All aircraft are stealthy if they fly below the radar horizon. No special engineering is needed. Anyone who has worked with long-wavelength radars (S band, UHF, etc.) can tell you there is no such thing as a supersonic stealth object unless the laws of physics are repealed. The shock wave has too much reflective area. Currently projected stealth carrier aircraft are not stealthy if they carry a meaningful bomb load that must be mounted externally. One $100-million aircraft cannot be in as many places simultaneously as four $25-million aircraft.
Thus, the truck needed for the air wing of the future far more resembles a platform like the ancient A-6 or A-10 than it does the F-35 or the F/A-18. Not all future wars will be fought against small, loosely organized forces. The aircraft carrier and her embarked air wing must be capable of handling the larger scenario.
Time to Fly Right
(See L. Lederer and J. Byington, pp. 30–34, September 2012 Proceedings)
Captain Kenneth Ruggles, U.S. Navy (Retired)—Lieutenant Lederer and Commander Byington have it right. Let’s do away with using commissioned officers operating from a carrier as unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) pilots. Well-trained senior petty officers and warrant officers would excel as members of UAV operations detachments that could deploy on a wide variety of afloat platforms and control UAV aircraft, large and small. Dr. Goure, writing in the same issue, seems to see larger UAV systems as a synergistic part of a carrier air wing. While larger UAVs certainly require use of a carrier or airbase for launch, recovery, and aircraft maintenance, there is no need for the flight control to be on the carrier, or for the controller to be a commissioned naval aviator. Flight control could just as well be on a smaller ship (or submarine) located near an engagement site, and the pilot a flight-qualified chief petty officer.
Seasick: Our Acidic Ocean
(See D. Walsh, p. 86, September 2012; and P. C. Wider, p. 80, October 2012 Proceedings)
Commander Robert C. Whitten, U.S. Navy Reserve (Retired), research scientist, NASA—Dr. Walsh supports Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) claims that the acidity (pH) of ocean surfaces is changing, changes that are ultimately inimical to ocean life and the health of the planet. Based on the work of other scientists, notably Pieter Tans of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration, the IPCC claims appear substantially overestimated. (See www.co2science.org/data/acidification/acidification.php.)
Specifically, Dr. Tans’ projections of maximum pH change for the year 2050 lie between about 0.1 and 0.2 from present values, whereas the projections of the IPCC are about 0.47 below present values. Moreover, it’s noteworthy that IPCC estimates of atmospheric warming due to CO2 emissions, are based solely on the output of atmospheric general circulation models and do not agree with temperature observations by satellite and balloon-borne radiosonde measurements. Thus, the IPCC claims are seriously questionable. Following his proposal that humankind cease burning fossil fuels, Dr. Walsh admits the enormous difficulties of persuasion. I submit that the concurrent economic stress would doom such action from the start. As in climate change, we all must adapt to whatever changes occur in the oceans.
Needed: A Sub Change
(See N. Polmar, pp. 88–89, July 2012; R. Butrovich, p. 84, August 2012; N. Polmar, pp. 8–9, 82, and J. C. Harvey, pp. 82–83, September 2012; and N. Polmar, p. 84, October 2012 Proceedings)
Bob Gabbert—I enter this discussion having trained some of the crewmen on the USS Thresher (SSN-593). Friends went down with her. Later, as an engineer at Newport News, I was personally involved in the SubSafe program that followed.
I can assure Mr. Polmar, or anyone else, a reactor scram did not cause the loss of the Thresher. I’ve been on sea trials of submarines where that specific event was tested. When the reactor scrams, the sub loses way and then begins to slip downward. Such events are cause for action, but they’re not cause for emergency response.
However, the reactor did scram, but it was caused by a seawater rupture that shorted out the switchboards. A seawater break at test depth has such force and velocity that it will follow cables, pipes, hull structure, or anything else that can direct its path, causing it to be virtually impossible to know where the water is coming from. Even if the Thresher had had the later fast-response scram recovery, with no electrical power it was impossible.
The crew probably tried to slow the descent by emergency-blowing all ballast tanks. It’s unlikely the air valves froze up. It’s more likely that because of flooding, they ran out of air in the ballast air system. They probably even fishtailed the rudder to try to slow the descent, but it’s estimated the boat slammed into the bottom at high speed. On the way down, the interior bulkheads were compromised by sea pressure compressing what little air remained in the compartments. It’s estimated the entire incident lasted less than two minutes.
Some will question the scenario I’ve described, but let’s look at the SubSafe program that resulted. There were four key elements. One: On the Thresher there were more than 100 seawater hull penetrations. SubSafe put in an auxiliary seawater cooling system that reduced that number to 16, and all had quick-closing valves. Two: Electrical switchboards were made splash-proof by installing air plenums that prevented water from entering switchboards from any direction. Switchboard cable entries had boots installed around the cables to make the entry watertight. Three: Ballast air pressure was increased by 50 percent, effectively increasing air inventory by that amount. Four: Prior to the Thresher, when the reactor scrammed, the main steam stop-valve shut automatically to prevent cooling the reactor. Afterward, the main steam stop-valve stayed open to allow the engine room to keep operating for a short period of time. That allowed a fast-recovery scram procedure to be effective.
When the Thresher was lost, every nuclear submarine in the Fleet was restricted to 50 percent test depth until SubSafe modifications were completed. At Newport News the first boat to complete SubSafe and go back to test depth was the USS Sam Rayburn (SSBN-635). I was on those trials.
No “minor” problem or reactor scram caused the Thresher to be lost. Crews are too well trained for that.