The Chief

I was sitting with Jim and Joe in the center aisle of Hall B1, on the ground floor of the San Diego Convention Center . Outside the breeze blew in from the Bay, and the water glittered and life was a sweet as only it can be in SOCAL.

We were out of Washington, which is always a good thing, attending the Armed Forces Electronics and Communications Association Convention, held in partnership with the U.S. Naval institute.

Jim and Joe are Old School, and we were festooned with bags and keychains and give-away crap from the defense contractors whose booths filled the hall.

We were early for the speech, and this was the keynote address for the biggest Defense show on the West Coast for the year. All the flag officers were there to see and be seen by the Chief of Naval Operations, who if no longer was actually the chief of anything operational, was at least in charge of the promotion system.

One by one the flag officers paraded by, en route their reserved seats down front. By skill and wile, we were directly in the line of advance to the front. Accordingly, we had the chance to talk to those that might remember broken down old contractors.

VADM Barry Costello, old shipmate and current THIRD Fleet Commander was one of them. Barry was the Operations Officer at Third Fleet when I was the ACOS/Intel, and we later worked together when he was on the OpNav Staff and I was in the J-2, working maritime sanctions. I asked  about his views on Maritime Domain Awareness, thinking there might be an opportunity to showcase some technology.

Barry looked a little distant. That is not his mission. He is working the process with the Coast Guard District Commander, the Mexican Admiral to the south and MARPAC in Esquimalt , Canada . It is a joint relationship under US NORTHERN Command in Colorado Springs .

Virtually the entire Flag community on the West Coast turned out to hear the CNO’s remarks. It truly was a glittering affair with the fat gold stripes on the navy blue sleeves.

The CNO is a tall dark man with a stoic and slightly dour manner. He is a ship-driver by trade, and then a program and budget guy. All the warfare specialties of the Navy have their characteristics.

Aviators tend to have a certain flair, and disregard for the by-the-book solution. Certainly the book can be useful, but at 400KTS, some things have to be improvised. On my carriers, they used to say it was better to die than look bad, and not be entirely joking.

Submariners were convinced that the primary mission was driving those General Electric Reactors around safely.

Ship-drivers tend to worry about things, and Admiral Mullen is a classic of the breed.

But before he got to the challenges of the future, he took the podium and announced that he was taking time before the formal remarks to officially name the newest construction guided missile destroyer in the fleet. it will be the USS Stockdale , in honor of Medal of Honor winner VADM James D. Stockdale, who passed away this summer.

Jim Stockdale is survived by his wife Sybil, who co-wrote the memoir �Love and War� with him. It was a complex story about what it was like to be in captivity, and also be at home, held captive by the war.

She was in a wheelchair, attended by her children. it was an emotional moment.

After making the announcement, the CNO left the rostrum to embrace Sybil, and pose for pictures. USS Stockdale will be DDG-106 of the highly capable Arleigh Burk class of multi-mission warships. It was an emotional event, and the entire hall rose to its feet in honor of the moment.

Admiral Stockdale was a member of the Naval Intelligence Professionals, for whatever reason. But Admiral Mullen is not.

Coming up on the money side of the house, he is convinced that intelligence is necessary, and also possessed of the curious notion that it is free.

He is not altogether wrong on that score, by accident of history. At the conclusion of the Vietnam War, the defense budget was slashed severely. At a conference held in Williamsburg , Virginia , the dramatically smaller national foreign intelligence budget was parsed out between the elements of the intelligence community that resided in the Defense Department. There was a relative equity in the amount of funding that was apportioned to the Services; the Army had its Echelon Corps and Above (EAC) Military Intelligence Brigades funded, since they collected intelligence of value to the various theater Commanders.

Air Force had its strategic reconnaissance intelligence squadrons, since those aircraft conducted national missions.

Navy had it Fleet Ocean Surveillance Centers and Fleet Intelligence Centers funded nationally….well, because they were ashore. There was never enough space on the ships for the swarming ants of the intelligence centers, tracking ships and submarines, drafting publicans and analyzing pictures, and delivering the information to the ships at sea.

That funding profile continued through the end of the Cold War, and Operation DESERT STORM. Thereafter, the clamor for the harvest of the peace dividend began, and the full impact of the Goldwater-Nichols Legislation began to be felt. The former meant that belts had to be tightened and duplication eliminated. The latter meant that the center of gravity in DoD shifted from the Services to the Joint World.

In effect, the transition closed down the Fleet Intelligence Centers, and transferred the resources to the Joint Intelligence Centers, which looked up to the Combatant Commander in the Theater, not to the ships at sea.

Aviation Squadrons always had intelligence officers assigned to them to do target support, as Admiral Stockdale knew. Submariners are intelligence collectors as much as warfighting platforms, and they appreciate why the system both uses and supports them.

Aside from Carriers and Big-Deck Amphibious ships, intelligence officers are not routinely assigned to surface ships. It is therefore not unusual to find Ship-drivers who have never ran into an intelligence officer, unless he fell over him at a club somewhere.

With the Ship-drivers in the ascendancy in the Navy, and money being tight, there is no love lost over intelligence.

Admiral Mullen returned to the podium after having several pictures taken with Sybil. He began his remarks this way:

�It is great to be back in San Diego , since I grew up here, and it was great to see all my old shipmates at the conference. As I scan the audience, I see a lot of familiar faces. To all of you, I really am honored to be here. And it doesn’t take long walking into this room to feel one, at home, and two, just to say it’s nice to be back. I have been asked, for my part, to give you the big Navy view of where we are and where I think we are going, and I am happy to do that.

I came into the job I promised that my watchwords would be that I would listen, learn and lead. And I really meant that.

I think AFCEA always does a tremendous job in providing a real bridge between industry and the military. We need to further strengthen the partnership we must have for a viable future San Diego is a great Navy town, and always provides support for our sailors and for our football team! (applause) The State and city have provided great support for the Navy, but that is not where it started.

Back in the 1840s, Admiral Robert Stockton liberated Los Angeles from Santa Ana , the Spanish General. Stockton was commanding a joint force composed of Navy and Army forces. He chased the Mexicans into their own country forty miles, seized the territory, restored peace and harmony among the people and put a civil government into operation. Stockton had an amazing career and one that is relevant today. He engaged the British in the War of 1812, and led the Navy’s Pacific squadron. He reminds us that the sole mission of the Navy is not about sinking the enemy’s fleet; rather, it is to garner the great benefits of sea power for the American people and secure peace and prosperity for them.

Foremost in my mind these first few months as the CNO has been about how we adapt to the new world, and maintain the best possible Navy.

Here are the three big take-aways on the way ahead for the Navy:

First: The term �Sea-power� has become too narrowly defined. We need to open up the aperture on what constitutes power from the sea.

Second: We need a balanced force mix of networks and platforms.

Third, we have to control requirements better.

Just as Stockton contributed to the winning of California , we are now all over such diverse missions, like sanctions enforcement, human trafficking, weapons smuggling, threats to financial networks and weapons of mass destruction and proliferation. We need to go in blue, green and brown water.

I gave the same message at the Surface Navy Association. We still have to be ready for Blue Water operations against any emerging competitor. Nothing and No one will drive us from the sea. We will build a future with a strong navy. We are a strong navy today, but we seek balance. We will deter and win small and big wars, two challenges, but one Fleet.

It is the small struggles we are coming to grips with now. I have talked to 17,000 sailors since I took over as CNO. Most of them are engaged in green and brown water operations. Last week, I had lunch with a group of Seabees building a base camp out in the middle of western Iraq , not a stone’s throw from the Syrian and Jordanian borders. There was not another living soul anywhere near them, on sand so soft and thick you’d think you were walking on powdered sugar.

How they managed to build anything on that surface I’ll never know, but they were hard at work and they loved every minute of what they were doing. Those Sailors are hard at work and they are very enthusiastic�they know that base camp is intended for Iraqi security forces.

I went out to one of the oil platforms in the Gulf and our Sailors were helping the Iraqi’s defend it. I emphasize that � helping the Iraqi’s defend it. They’re out there 24/7, sleeping in CONEX boxes, getting their meals and laundry delivered by coalition ships nearby, but they know that 90 percent of Iraq’s economy pulses through those pipes and that if they fail, there’s a good chance we fail.

I can’t tell you how encouraging it was to see the vast improvements that have been made since that time. There is still bloodshed and violence, and there are still a lot of challenges, but the 25 million people in that nation are rising to meet those challenges, our troops are helping them and freedom is taking root.

Someone asked me when I called it the “long war” what I meant by “long” and my answer was “generational.” We will be at this for generations, how many I know not, but I really believe that my grandchildren, and perhaps even their children, will be fighting it.

We need to think of it in those terms. We need to stay that committed.

Steady as she goes, one might say. We are making progress, though, in Iraq . You can see it on faces and hear it in voices. I am encouraged and I am optimistic.

The sailors I saw last week are optimistic and enthusiastic at an exceptional level. They are working on ships not built for the tasks they have been assigned. For example, USS Austin is serving as an afloat base for oil platform security. No amphibious vehicles coming out of her hold, no landings to cover.

The crew of USS Tortuga essentially conducting a non-combatant evacuation in the water-logged parishes of New Orleans taking their boats far inland to pull people out of dangerous and dilapidated houses.

USS Iwo Jima, pier side in downtown New Orleans , acting as the city’s only functional airport, command center, hotel and hospital.

I ran into Vice Admiral Thad Allen of the Coast Guard in the passageway aboard Iwo shortly after the Katrina, right after he took command of FEMA’s efforts down there and he raved about the performance of the ship, that really being the crew.

Speaking to the significant role the ship had played in the crisis, he told me I ought to consider re-naming it the City of New Orleans . As we stood there, in many ways it was.

That certainly got the Commandant of the Marine Corps’s attention when I mentioned it to him (laughter). Even though he and I go way back, we’re classmates and friends since the day we entered the Naval Academy together. I reassured him, as only a friend could do, that I was not going to be the CNO to meddle with the name Iwo Jima . (laughter)

And consider the operations by Harry S Truman and the Bonhomme Richard off the coast of Aceh after the Tsunami. But that story — as well as all these examples, and there are lots of them really speaks to the power of our Fleet Response Plan, the readiness that we have today. The critical capabilities the Navy brings to the table today and the new sorts of things we are going to be called upon to do in the future.

We’re standing up the Naval Expeditionary Combat Command this month to wrap their hands around what I would call the “below the line” skill sets in our service; EOD, Seabees, master-at-arms, security and the Expeditionary Logistics Force to name a few.

We are going to stand up riverine squadrons here very soon. Surface warriors are once again going to own that mission. We have a long history of being upriver, all the way back to the Civil War and we’re going to rekindle it.

The Navy is going to assume command this spring of the detainee mission in Guantanamo Bay Cuba . I was there just before Christmas. I was completely impressed. It is well led, it is an extremely professional operation and I am very comfortable taking on that mission.

We are also taking over the joint task force in the Horn of Africa. A

Navy unit comprised of mostly Masters of Arms and some Seabees are going to take charge of Fort Suse , Iraq , which is new high security prison about to open.

We have almost 4,000 Sailors on the ground there and in Afghanistan right now, and over 10,000 on the ground in the CENTCOM AOR. That number is going to climb to more like 7,000 and 12,000, respectively.

That’s not the way we have traditionally thought of sea power, but it is a dimension of sea power for this new century and the joint arena we are going to harness it.

Building that future Fleet is the toughest challenge. Many of you in the audience remember when you were where I live. Keep your thoughts alive of when you were in uniform. We need capabilities delivered faster and cheaper than what we are getting now. Two-hundred an eighty-one is the number of ships in the Fleet this year. We only built four in our last build-year. I really think this is as low as we can go, and I don’t want to go lower.

Still, the future is about capabilities, not the number of hulls. This is about platforms, networks and systems. The Future Fleet must be speedy, flexible, dominant, and netted. It must be those things in fact, not in concept. We need intelligence; the largest force- multiplier is ForceNet, but it has got to be real, not imaginary.

Keep in mind, it must be scalable and flexible across the whole range of missions, from disaster to full combat. We can’t get bogged down in a network-centric versus platform centric debate. It is about capabilities to the Fleet. If we concentrate on capabilities , the network will empower the Fleet. I would rather put more capabilities in the hands of the fleet. Admiral Blair talked to this very forum a couple years ago. He said the process was broken, and I think that those remarks are still valid today.

Space and Electronic Warfare Command has done some extraordinary work under Ken Slaght. But we are not there yet. I would say I am encouraged, but not ecstatic.

ForceNet must be the backbone of the Fleet, but we need to bring together the international community to form a �thousand ship Navy.� They will partner with us and they want to do that. That is why we must talk to each other and deliver communications systems that interoperate, and systems that are interdependent.

USS Cape St. George is a step forward, and the Theodore Roosevelt’s AIS is changing how we see the world. In TRIDENT WARRIOR, we have achieved a 500% increase in bandwidth. We have compressed time needed for calls-for-fire from 20 minutes down to two. It is about bandwidth and data. Today, I am funding the DTO 2- bandwidth and data and we are funding the Distributed Common Ground Station-Navy to be compatible with the other services.

We have been competing with each other, and that turf battle that has cost us time and money. We need to make real progress in transitioning existing systems to ForceNet. It will make the whole fleet more interoperable. Maritime Domain Awareness will help us to find terror cells, but we must be linked to the Marines and in MDA to the Coast Guard, and in the global maritime environment with our coalition partners and allies.

I expect every ship will be truly interdependent, with the human systems integration that is so important. Our networks must empower the sailors. The Sailors I talk to are always asking about Sea Warrior. They want systems they can use, and systems they can use to fight. Platforms and systems are not center stage on this. Families and family readiness is at the heart of fleet readiness.

We still have a long way to go, and to get there we must get better control of requirements.

Don’t get me wrong, industry has good ideas. I really believe we need to do a better job determining and then building to requirements.

I’ve been at this game a long time. I have a background in money, and I am here to tell you it is not a bottomless pit. We are near the edge. Still, we must have new earth-shattering technologies. My background is heavy on the programs and the resources side.

But we can’t afford every new gadget, we can’t afford the “Star Wars” version of every new idea.

We need to be selective and efficient. We can learn from Rear Admiral Sandy Winnefeld’s approach as he worked up the T.R. Battle Group up for deployment.

As he was trying to get his arms around the usual last push to install dozens or hundreds of new gadgets in his battle group he decided to block any new installation that cost more than $100 thousand dollars. He didn’t make a lot of friends with that, but that discipline gave him the most capability for the taxpayer’s dollar and generated some significant new capabilities. So it doesn’t have to be expensive.

There is a moderate approach to transformation with a better return on investment.

I am re-aligning the OpNav staff to better do that. I am establishing a new N-6 with a three star in charge. He is going to do it for it, and it must be done differently. We must be aligned better with our sister organizations that are in the business. Command, Control and communications have to be better integrated. The question is, �are we mature enough to handle it?� Can we have an N-6 that will provide the clarity and stability to hold down costs and provide working systems?

With that discipline, I hope that the partnership will meet the challenges to sea-power. We need to listen to one another and we need to lead every day. I need everyone’s help to do that.

God bless you, and God bless the United States Navy.

I think we have the time to take a few questions. You there, Sir.

Q: I’m a retired Navy Captain, Admiral, and I have a question about the Navy and higher education?

A. That is not a new issue. In 1968, on my first ship, sailors showed a thirst for education and training. This is the best Navy the world has every seen not because of stuff but because of people who thirst for education. To make E-8 you have to have an associate’s degree, but if you are going to do that, you have to make sure there is the opportunity for sailors to get that education. We are paying for education. I believe in the Naval Postgraduate School at Monterey and for what it does for us and for the long term.

Sixty countries have people in the Postgraduate school and the War College . Investments are key, and we have to strike the right balance with NROTC and the Academy. The joint future is key. We must participate at the various war colleges, and we will continue to move forward. In the next twelve months I will be forwarding a strategy will emerge on education and training

Q: Admiral, what is the number of ships that you need to have an effective Navy?

A: That will be determined by the Quadrennial Defense Review, and that is the process and the numbers will be in the President’s budget. I can tell you that the Littoral Combat Ship is coming on line and was just an idea three years ago. Her keel is already laid. But LCS is not the exclusive answer. Riverine Forces are port of it, and it is about balanced capabilities. Whatever the number will be is just an approximation. We need to stabilize, and we need to have industry commit to taking the spiraling cost out. I would prefer to take myself out of the constant explanation about �why are costs going up.�

Q: Admiral, the Kadish report on defense acquisition made some stunning recommendations regarding defense acquisition. One of them was the suggestion to move the requirements process to the Combatant Commands.

A: That specific suggestion is tied to paying attention to what the COCOMS see as the specific requirements at the high level, and then bring them to the Service Chiefs to generate acquisition requirements. I am sympathetic to that. I worked for General Jim Jones when I was at AFSOUTH, in Naples , and it had a profound effect on me. I spent 90% of my time in action and on the ground. The joint and combined mission taught me a lot. I think Tim Keating and Jim Giambastiani and Carp and Craddock and been to see Fox Fallon at PACOM. The relationship with those Combatant Commands is a partnership with the Services. I have to put the package together to meet the requirements. We are talking about Navy taking over the mission in Djibouti . We will have to win the hearts and minds. We have an engineer who installed a pump for irrigation in a Tribe. They are now feeding the whole village, and are making a living. They are going to be friends for a long time. That is the kind of impact we must have.

I think the COCOMs have a good view of the future. But there isn’t anyone in charge of requirements. The Uniforms have to get back in the acquisitions game. Kadish is an acquisitions guy, but I agree with him on that score.

Q: Admiral, about the current Navy R&D program. How is it doing?

A. We must go through the 61-65 process more rapidly and make choices. We need to do prototyping to allow us to see what might be useful and what might not be. I want the process to be captured by the Program Executive Offices and get break-through stuff into the early work, and influence the later stuff so that it transitions effectively. We need to have courage early to say �we aren’t going there� and give money back to me, so I can reinvest (laughter). I see a critical need to make smart investments. I have looked at the DoD budget cycle since 1935. It is unchanging, cycling from peak to trough at 19 years, feast and famine, war and peace. That is what it is, and we have to look at where we are. We need to seek a better understanding of what the money does and produces. We must move forward, and we need to follow the money. The same is true in R&D.

Q: Admiral, how are you going to deal with the new tasks and personnel Operations Tempo?

A: When I talked to San Diego sailors, 1,400 of them, I talked about the new missions. They were very enthusiastic, literally saying, �throw me in coach.� But there was another side, and that was the sailor who said �I thought I was going to be an AT or an SK, so what am I doing?� I have talked to 15,000 sailors since I have been CNO and I get asked mostly about education, pay, training, and can you actually deliver Sea Warrior?

I think it is vital that we deliver. Our sailors are multi-dimensional and so is their enthusiasm. Their execution is really good across mission sets, and retention is quite extraordinary, running around 60%. Gary Roughhead is the Fleet Commander out in Hawaii . He reminded me that as Ensign, he won the Golden Anchor for retention with a 14% first term re-enlistment rate.

Trust me, we don’t want to go back there. People are a precious resource. Retention is up, mission accomplishment is up. My job, as CNO, is to improve diversity and that is a responsibility. We can’t walk away form the face of America . We must commit to it. We need to take risks. We are a wonderfully diverse institution, and we have done well. But we need to do better. We are in terrific shape, but I do not take it for granted. Some of the current rotations are tough. When I look at OPTEMPO issues, I like to call it �home-tempo.� I like to monitor it. If training and stuff takes more than half the time at home, we need to be aware of it. I am trying to pay attention.

Q: Admiral, about those emerging missions: we need more languages and area specialty, but in career path where do we find the time?

A. That is a tough question. We clearly need to be more culturally aware, and we likewise need language skills. As you know, I like to spend some time out in the halls in the OpNav Staff, talking to people. I often get a question from a Sailor that says, “Well, when will they do this,” or, “How come they won’t do that?”

And my response to them is, “You’re now talking to they. And I introduce myself as “they.” And I take that responsibility pretty seriously, actually. It’s a wonderful reminder to me that you need to keep thinking about things from a broad perspective.

We spent a lot of time in the Quadrennial Defense Review process talking about a stepped-up commitment to cultural and language training. I asked how many Sailors we have at the Defense Language Institute in Monterey . We have five hundred, which is not inconsequential. We need to leverage that number and our other capabilities in the languages we are likely to need. There is a Machinist Mate Second Class who is a fluent Arabic speaker. He is teaching at the Naval Academy . I think we are going to stand up a foreign officer corps, restricted line officers that will be a vital part of a future capability of 400-500 officers. We need to move ahead, with the first selection board to start filling them out. Retired VADM Rod Rempf told me about running into six midshipmen and cadets in the Pentagon the week of the of Army game. They were up by the CNO’s office, and he asked what languages they were taking. The first cadet said he was taking Arabic, and so did the next two. The last one said he was taking Chinese. The mids were taking French. I have nothing against the Romance languages, but I think the cadets have it right, and it is not just about the language, it is about the culture. I think we have time for one more question….

Q Admiral, what do you consider the relationship between family and fleet readiness, and how do you manage it?

A. I believe family readiness is directly related to Fleet Readiness, and I think there are some early steps in making sure our families can support our Sailors, but we have to do the same thing. The Ombudsman program is at the heart of a lot this issues. The problem is that not everyone has a program, particularly ashore. It takes a great CO, a great Command Master Chief and a great Ombudsman. After Katrina, we stood up a family task force. We had 2,500 families to take care of, many of them homeless, and we had to focus on them. A SEABEE unit deployed to Iraq volunteered to stay there a month longer, so a Gulfport-based unit could stay longer at home for reconstruction. Then we had the floods in Sigonella, in Italy . We are going to have to manage crisis response, and we are going to have to resource it.

I know I can count on your continued support, and that of AFCEA and the Naval Institute. I want to thank you for your time, and have a great AFCEA Conference….�

Copyright 2006 Vic Socotra

www.vicsocotra.com

Close Window