#SavetheSkirt
(See A. Scott, p. 12, April 2016 Proceedings)
Captain Bernard D. Dunn, Supply Corps, U.S. Navy (Retired)—I agree with Lieutenant Scott. I find no valid reason for requiring female members to dress in male-designed uniforms. The first time I saw the female Midshipmen in the brigade with the male combination caps I could not believe it. They looked ridiculous. Sometime later on a news broadcast I saw a female admiral with a male-style combination cover. At first I wasn’t sure whether the admiral was a male or female; she looked outlandish. That type of cover looked too big and too heavy for a female.
This business of gender neutralization has gone too far. The last I knew, men are men and women are women, and gender neutralization is the figment of someone’s imagination. For heaven’s sake, keep the female personnel in female uniforms, keep the skirt and the bucket cover. If uniform changes have to be made, put all personnel back in Class-A uniforms again and limit the cammies to shipboard use only. Let’s get back to looking like the Navy again.
Nancy Lindemeyer—First, I salute Lieutenant Scott—in the main, what marvelous common sense. One might suggest that men wear skirts—as the Scots do—if one wants to neutralize.
I proudly wore the naval officer’s uniform once upon a time. To tell how long ago that was, our summer uniforms were leftover nurses’ uniforms. I don’t think, however, that having personnel voice opinions is the way to go—other than as research to make solutions for the good of the service.
The whole purpose of uniforms is to identify the service and the role one plays in that service.
How best does one do one’s duty—that’s what the Navy needs to be concerned with. Making women appear more like men? Not sure that does it.
Burton R. Laub, Jr.—Lieutenant Scott, among other things, has made a strong case that the objective of upcoming changes to female officers’ uniforms is about “gender neutralization.” The changes are not inexpensive and affect only female personnel. In the interest of fairness, perhaps it would be beneficial to institute additional, more gender-neutral policies. I suggest the following across-the-board changes:
• Eliminate trousers from service dress blue uniforms and their derivatives (e.g., full dress blue).
• Replace the trousers with kilts. (I believe that the U.S. Naval Academy Pipes and Drums already wear Polaris-pattern kilts.)
• Replace the combination cap with Glengarry-style headgear, which is already unisex in nature.
• Consider replacing khaki uniform trousers with khaki kilts. (These would be more comfortable in hot weather than long-leg trousers.)
There may be some resistance at first from male officers who are not used to wearing kilts. But our northern neighbor boasts several crack military units that wear the kilt, so the problem should be short-lived.
Twilight of Manned Flight?
(See B. Stickles, pp. 24–29, April 2016 Proceedings)
Lieutenant Commander Alan K. Gideon, U.S. Navy (Retired)—Commander Stickles concludes that we cannot afford the cost of using human pilots, and aircraft are becoming too expensive to entrust to erring live computing devices. Although I never flew for the Navy, one of my objections to his bottom line is that as a private pilot and experienced engineer, I can say that there are far too many decisions to make in the course of an operational mission to execute it solely via automation—at least in the immediate future. With respect for the author’s experience, I find his account of the conversation between the pilot and engineer at the LSO Ops Advisory Group to be a small part of the equation.
That said, we should continue this conversation and experimentation. The U.S. Navy should become masters of every technology that may offer an advantage over an adversary. I doubt, however, that the final answer will be one-for-one substitutions of computers for humans. Doing so limits our horizons and our possible tactical and strategic options.
Innocent Until Investigated
(See J. M. Dahm, pp. 36–41, April 2016 Proceedings)
Peter Orlowicz, General Attorney, U.S. Railroad Retirement Board—As a federal civilian attorney and ethics official, I believe Commander Dahm makes some errors in his article, and expresses some misconceptions that ought to be challenged.Commander Dahm begins with a mistaken premise when he refers to the Civil Rights Act of 1964. That section mainly applies to private-sector employers (not uniformed service members or federal civilian employees) and protects employees who make complaints to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission or participate in investigations. The Military Whistleblower Protection Act, to which Commander Dahm refers, is codified at Title 10, U.S. Code, Section 1034, and prohibits retaliatory personnel actions against military service members for engaging in protected communications.The author also misinterprets the burden of proof for a prima facie claim of retaliation. For such a claim, evidence must be presented by the complainant to make the allegation more likely to be true than not (the preponderance-of-evidence standard Commander Dahm cites). Only after that threshold is reached does the burden shift to the accused, and at no point is the complaint “assumed to be correct unless proven otherwise.” Statistics support this point: in the semiannual Department of Defense Inspector General’s Report to Congress, the IG explains that 403 out of 669 complaints during Fiscal Year 2014 were dismissed “due to insufficient evidence to warrant an investigation,” essentially failure to establish a prima facie case. This is hardly indicative of complaints “assumed to be correct.”
Commander Dahm opines that “There does not appear to be an epidemic of reprisals” and is critical of the idea that whistleblowers are protected even if their communication does not reveal actual wrongdoing. Unfortunately, the 2014 Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey found that 18 percent—almost one out of five—of DOD employees surveyed did not feel they could disclose suspected violations of law, rules, or regulations without fear of reprisal. The “reasonable belief” of wrongdoing is necessary to encourage service members to report possible violations without risking their careers if they happen to be wrong. Does the author really believe commanders should be able to retaliate against subordinates for being honestly and reasonably mistaken about a violation?
Finally, Commander Dahm recognizes several flaws regarding the timeliness and thoroughness of the investigation in “Commander White’s” case. It is important to recognize that most of those problems are already contrary to law or inconsistent with the DOD Joint IG Investigations Guide and other internal guidance. Enforcing these best practices is a better answer to Commander Dahm’s concerns than taking aim at the general policy of properly protecting whistleblowers and preventing reprisals. The rate of high-profile retaliation incidents in other federal agencies, such as the Veterans Administration and the Department of Homeland Security, ought to convince us that the reprisal problem is not as insignificant as Commander Dahm would like to think.
‘All Manner of Contingencies’
(See A. Bradshaw interview, pp. 42–45, April 2016 Proceedings)
Terry Murphy—The interesting interview with NATO’s Deputy Supreme Commander in Europe, General Sir Adrian Bradshaw, was marred by two “localisms.” First, unless times have recently changed, because the members of the army helped first to overthrow and then publicly to decapitate King Charles I in the 17th century, there has been no “Royal Army” since. “Royal Navy,” “Royal Marines,” and “Royal Air Force,” of course. But “British Army.”
Second, by British custom and practice, a knight (or equivalent “lady” in her own right) is referred to by title and given name. Thus your lower caption on page 44 should have read “General Sir Adrian” or “Sir Adrian,” but not “General Sir Bradshaw.”
Let Talented Officers Opt-In for Early Promotion
(See R. R. Shaw, p. 10, March 2016 Proceedings)
Commander Dave Kurtz, U.S. Navy—Captain Shaw has added yet another candidate to the onslaught of “talent management” proposals currently bubbling in the Navy and throughout the Defense Department. While his proposal is targeted at letting hot-running officers move up faster, there are two main problems that he either doesn’t foresee or chose not to address. First, as he states, while “a senior lieutenant commander with a strong leadership record may forgo . . . [an] XO tour in favor of early selection,” this officer must be advised that he or she may have chosen to seek higher pay earlier over future command/enhanced responsibility opportunities. Such an officer may have a strong record, but when up for command screening, I can’t imagine any board member would look favorably on an officer who consciously opted out of responsibility.
Second, and more important, his proposal would dramatically impact great officers more negatively than positively. The law limits how many officers at each rank the Navy may have. If our O-5 or O-6 ranks are filled with non-upwardly-mobile officers who chose to skip milestones (and the DOD’s proposal to end “up or out” could create such lifers), then it must necessarily not have room for those who did those milestone tours and unfortunately didn’t screen for the next. It doesn’t take long in this business to see a department head or command screen list come out and wonder how some great officer didn’t make the cut. These are the officers who have excelled but for one reason or another were left on the table at the board. These are officers who have earned promotion and other opportunities for increased responsibility.
The hardest conversations I had in command were with those department heads who had missed my number-one ranking by a hair, but I assured them I would do everything in my power to get them the assignment to help them get promoted. They’d earned the new rank by sacrificing for their country, their unit, and their people, and unfortunately at that level, the competition is a game of inches. Promotion should be held for those who gain experience and put their Navy first, not just those who believe the “system” is holding them back and seek to get paid sooner.
Ahoy from the Zumwalt!
The F-35’s New OODA Loop
(See J. Kirk and M. G. Kelly, pp. 18–23, 24–28, March 2016 Proceedings)
Mitchell R. Miller—Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld’s aphorism, “You go to war with the army you have, not the army you might want or wish to have at a later time,” has a corollary: You go to the war you have, not the war you might wish to have.
Captain Kirk’s and Colonel Kelly’s articles illustrate the point. While a few Zumwalt-class destroyers and F-35-equipped big-deck carriers may have a deterrent effect on potential adversaries, they will likely see no more combat than did General George S. Patton’s fictitious First U.S. Army Group (a D-Day deception) in World War II.
We are in a revivified Cold War. The potential aggressor states—Russia, China, Iran, North Korea—will probe the United States frequently, seeking and obtaining any territorial or other gains they can. But those conflicts will be contests of will, not of technology, for which Patton’s inflated rubber planes, tanks, and trucks would do almost as well as real DDG-1000s and F-35s.
If the United States has the will to block further Russian expansion westward, further Chinese assertion of control over the South China Sea, further North Korean nuclear saber-rattling, or further Iranian threats against its neighbors or the Strait of Hormuz, it can stop them with F/A-18s and Arleigh Burkes just as well as with F-35s and Zumwalts. If we don’t have the will, no amount of fabulous technology will be of any use. (Indeed, F-35s and DDG-1000s may be contraindicated: A President may be more reluctant to put a multi-billion-dollar ship or multi-hundred-million-dollar aircraft in harm’s way than he would a last-generation destroyer or a slow, loud, non-stealthy Warthog.)
Another similarity to the Cold War era will be dozens, if not hundreds, of insurrections, civil wars, and large and small terrorist attacks—“small wars,” with which our Marine Corps, transported and supported by our Navy, is intimately familiar.
The aircraft the Marine Corps needs are close air-support planes—navalized versions of the A-10, upgraded OV-10, or Super Tocano. What the Navy needs are small, fast, well-armed and -armored, real littoral combat ships: a combination of World War II PT boats, Vietnam-era Swift boats, and patrol craft hydrofoil sthat can ambush a swarm of fast-attack boats, follow a suspicious dhow up a river, sink a narcotrafficer semisubmersible, or infiltrate and exfiltrate a SEAL team on an isolated point. And then there are minesweepers, too (because the mine is the naval asymmetric warrior’s weapon of choice), arsenal ships, and “escort carriers” to bring an aviation punch to a small fight.
I suggest that the time is long past for us to start planning and building for the wars that we will fight, not the wars that we’d like to fight.
A Potent One-Two Punch
(See G. Galdorisi, pp. 70–75, March 2016 Proceedings)
Captain John G. Shannon, U.S. Naval Reserve (Retired)—Captain Galdorisi presents a compelling argument for the urgent need to develop and field breakthrough military technologies, such as high-powered lasers for shipboard missile defense, to help mitigate the Navy’s ever-increasing shortfalls in capability, capacity, and readiness resulting from severe budget cuts imposed by the 2011 Budget Control Act and sequestration. Captain Galdorisi rightly states that the Department of Defense pursued the goal of using directed-energy technologies, such as high-powered lasers, more than 50 years ago.
What is not well known, however, is that the U.S. Navy began such laser research during the mid- to late 1960s with relatively modest-powered blue-green lasers (e.g., solid state Nd:YAG lasers operating at a wavelength of 532 nanometers, chosen for optimum transmission through ocean waters) for various air-underwater applications such as antisubmarine warfare (ASW) and airborne communications with submerged submarines. This breakthrough research and development was carried out by dedicated scientists and engineers from the Laser/Magnetics Branch of the Electro-Optics Division of the former Naval Air Development Center (NADC) in Warminster, Pennsylvania. Initial research emphasis was on conducting experiments to develop and validate an analytic “optical ranging and detection” performance-prediction model that described the round-trip transmission path and energy loss of an airborne blue-green laser beam, transmitted through the air-water interface, spreading in seawater, reflecting off an underwater target, and then returning to a receiver that was bore-sighted with the airborne transmitter.
Subsequently, emphasis was placed on understanding the phenomenon of air-to-underwater optical communications. As one of those NADC engineers, I remember our airborne Nd:YAG laser (mounted in the vacant dipping sonar well of a hovering SH-3) ranging off, as well as conducting one-way and duplex communications with, the submerged USS Grayling (SSN-646) at the Atlantic Undersea Test and Evaluation Center in the fall of 1971. Unfortunately, for various reasons, including the demise of the Cold War, such blue-green laser technology development for ASW applications never moved beyond the exploratory development phase.
Search and Rescue in the Arctic
(See D. T. Wahl and T. P. McGeehan, pp. 82–84, March 2016 Proceedings)
Captain David (Duke) Snider, Canadian Coast Guard (Retired)—I read Commanders McGeegan and Wahl’s article with great interest. After more than three decades sailing in the Arctic on Canadian Coast Guard icebreakers and commercial shipping, and still sailing as an ice navigator each “navigational season,” I was glad to see a reasonably good description of the state of search-and-rescue capability in the Arctic. It is important, however, to offer some corrections and provide feedback from a seasoned Arctic navigator.
First, the Global Marine Distress and Safety System (GMDSS) does indeed cover the high Arctic. Area A4 is ably covered in the GMDSS system through Sat C text capability. Sat C is a very reliable fallback for all safety-related comms. It is true that the major geo-stationary satellite communication systems have a poor footprint over the polar regions. Filling the gap, lower bandwidth low earth-orbit systems such as Iridium provide almost constant linkage.
With respect to navigation, virtually the entire Canadian waterway is covered by charts, though depending on sources may only be charted to “modern” standards in up to 20–30 percent of the region. Areas remaining outside these well-surveyed corridors of modern charting have remained so primarily because there has been no traffic to warrant the effort. However, when traffic increases are witnessed or expected, the Canadian Hydrographic Service has stepped up focused surveys.
Of the incidents cited as proof of navigational hazard, though both specific examples are used to highlight the risk of major disaster, both were not directly attributable to poor charts, but suspect navigational decisions. The region of the 1996 pocket cruise ship grounding near Gjoa Haven actually occurred well west in Simpson Strait as a result of the bridge team relying on a floating aid-to-navigation that was out of position. The second specific incident cited, that off Kugluktuk in 2010, occurred as the vessel struck a reported but uncharted shoal. One cannot fairly blame charts when the proximate causes of both incidents were found by the Canadian Transportation Safety Board to be related more to decisions made than chart accuracy.
I must object to the final statement, “When it comes to Arctic SAR, given the extremely short survival times imposed by the harsh environment, would improved communications, navigation, logistics, and infrastructure really matter?” Of course they would. If the commanders threw this out as a challenge, it is in poor taste. Any mariner, any resident of the Arctic, or any other region deserves the best we can provide to prevent the loss of life or damage to the environment. The same life expectancy time is true for many non-Arctic waters, and we do not simply throw in the towel. Shipping is increasing in our shared Arctic waters. Both Canada and United States must step up their games to improve all the forces available to provide effective and prompt search and rescue: building up infrastructure, providing sufficient numbers of capable icebreakers, continuously updating navigational charts and aids, and improving on communications and on weather awareness, forecasting, and warnings.