Is Trump a Navalist?
President-elect Trump tells Hugh Hewitt
What does the next administration have in mind for the US Navy? What actions can we expect to see?
We don’t have to wait for the President’s pick for SECNAV, John Phelen, to get to confirmation hearings.
On Hugh Hewitt’s show Monday, President Trump put it on the record. Very Salamanderesque, hitting the high points we’ve been discussing for a very long time.
The bold faced items:
More Ships. Perhaps Built Overseas:
We don’t build ships anymore. We want to get that started. And maybe we’ll use allies, also, in terms of building ships. We might have to. We need ships. China’s building, from what I’m hearing, every four days, they’re knocking out a ship. And we’re sitting back watching. And we’ve suffered tremendously.
Program Management Reform:
…they started playing around with the design. I heard about that a year later. They took what I had. It was perfect. And what it is, is you build it. No changes, no change orders, no extra money, no nothing. You build it. They were doing a great job. But the generals or the admirals went in and they said oh, why don’t we make it a little bit wider? Why don’t we do this? Why don’t we do that? And it was designed specifically for speed and other things. When you start making it wider, you start making it slower. And it was also designed on a ship that was unbelievably successful in that same class, you know, design-wise.
Of course, he is referring to the Constellation Class FFG that started with the proven Franco-Italian FREMM. Was supposed to have 80% commonality, not it is 15%. Heartbreaking what we’ve done.
More Maintenance Capability:
We need ships. We have to get ships. And you know, everybody said oh, we’ll build them. We may have to go to others, bid them out, and it’s okay to do that. We’ll bid them out until we get ourselves ready. We’re not prepared for ships. We don’t have docks.
This is a bit unclear, but “We’re not prepared for ships. We don’t have docks.” to me sounds like more facilities, more maintenance.
I would expect to hear more from the new administration on the Navy. What we need to support that are the right players in the House and Senate to make sure the money flows that way as well.
Let me apologize up front for this post. It stems from a career at NAVSEA, but much more importantly, my comments reflect frustration and deep concern for the fleet - especially for my family members serving in it at this time in history.
Program management for ship acquisition at NAVSEA has been a cluster f..k for many years now. This is clearly evidenced by several programs - the LCS being the most screwed up thing to come out of DC in decades. PEO Ships, and the PEO organizational structure, has done a great disservice to the Fleet and to the country, but of course DASN(Ships) also is at least equally responsible for this mess. No discipline, free spending and continual change, appointment of naval officers who have no experience and civilians appointed to key positions with little to no background but were put in place purely for politics only to pass through to yet another senior position climbing the BS career ladder. The waterfront - actual operational requirements and maintenance processes and are unknown or ignored by these people. Let’s not even discuss engineering discipline or adherence to technical standards - these were thrown out years ago. Manning for maintenance and damage control? No need we’ll use practices similar to the aerospace industry, but won’t apply the necessary standards nor the funding to employ it. We’ll simply automate everything on the ship, and don’t worry about a design, we don’t need a design, the contractor will get it done while building it at the same time. And we’ll stick it to the fleet twice with two different variants. I was grilled - rightfully so - by the LANTFLEET maintenance officer who said “explain to me how NAVSEA” let this piece of shit be built. “ I was not part of the LCS effort (thank God) but of course I listened to him while squirming in my seat all the while apologizing for my command. My friends in commercial shipping laughed at all the nonsense happening at NAVSEA. Their ships are usually far less complex (and their contracts are much better), but that’s a whole other subject…
Many years ago during a command review of a ship acquisition program (I won’t mention which one) the cost of ownership was being briefed by the PM. As there were no Fleet maintenance reps in the room I asked if his cost estimates were reviewed by the fleet maintenance officers or staff. He replied that they were not, being the smartass I am I said, that since the Program Office isn’t responsible for operating or maintaining the ships and have no authority over O&M,N funding why are you determining the maintenance strategy for this class? I was asked to leave. No collaboration with the real customer the fleet operators and maintainers, but were told “Industry” is our “Partner”… Wow , I thought the Navy was the customer….
I clearly recall the good ole boy who was put in charge of NAVSEA after the Berlin Wall fell. Declaring success against all future evil in the world ( as he was told to do) he gathered all of HQ engineering and said “I don’t know what we’re going to do with all you engineers…”. Goldwater Nichols was later enacted and the Navy took its own interpretation of this act shortly thereafter transferring all funding, all authority and all resources to the PEOs. Engineering was cut severely and relegated to an advisory role. NAVSEA had become little more than a conduit for money to contractors and industry. Unless you are SEA 08 there is no real technical authority, but if something goes wrong suddenly all eyes turn on the engineering community ( or what’s left of it) to fix it after the fact. Add to this the actions of other great minds with stars on their shoulders to destroy rate training, maintenance and training at regional maintenance centers, the closing of naval shipyards, etc and increasing the optempo of the fleet, our greatly reduced industrial capacity and we have created the perfect storm for China to exploit.
Trump shows that he has used his Wilderness Years wisely. He reviewed the mistakes he made and will not make them again. He has looked at the Navy (and the other Service Branches) to see what went wrong. Trump will not allow the system or the people to continue making the same mistakes that put us in our current position. People will be held accountable. Processes will change. The opaque shield protecting Navy will not be allowed to continue. There will be accountability and transparency.
Trump's OODA Loop will be compressed in this Presidency. Trump has developed a Tier 1 Team of change agents and disruptors. TIghten the seat belts boys, we are in for a ride.
Behold the recent comment by Susie Wiles: "President-elect Trump’s incoming White House Chief of Staff said there won’t be any “backbiting” or “drama” tolerated in the next administration. “I don’t welcome people who want to work solo or be a star,” Wiles, who was Trump’s campaign co-chair and is a veteran political consultant, said in an interview with Axios. “My team and I will not tolerate backbiting, second-guessing inappropriately, or drama. “These are counterproductive to the mission.” This expectation and promise applies to all those under Trump's umbrella, it is not limited to the White House.