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Human Capital

Learning to Get Real and Get Better: A Conversation with Learning Leaders

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“History shows the navy which adapts, learns, and improves the fastest gains an enduring warfighting advantage. The essential element is fostering an ecosystem—a culture—that assesses, corrects, and innovates better than the opposition.”—Admiral Michael Gilday, Chief of Naval Operations, remarks at 2022 Surface Navy Association Symposium

Assembled and edited by notetakers Professor Mie Augier and Maj Gen (Ret.) William F. Mullen, USMC.

Learning is an important topic. The increasing pace of change in the operating environment, as well as the evolving requirements of leading each new generation that comes of age, makes both individual and organizational learning essential. At the same time, dedicated time for learning may be missing, or the desire for continued learning is lacking. But it can be reawakened through learning about learning itself, and discussing the need for both individual and organizational learning for warfighters.

The CNO’s recent initiative of “Get Real, Get Better” (GRGB) touches on the importance of learning on several levels. Learning is difficult and often painful as it involves transformation and change, and is not just something that one can put on “like a new suit,” as Mortimer Adler wrote in his classic piece, “Invitation to the Pain of Learning.” The emphasis in GRGB on taking hard honest looks at our performance and to have the courage to take the steps to improve have resonated well with the recent iteration of our Naval Postgraduate School course, “Maneuver Warfare for the Mind: The Art and Science of Interdisciplinary Learning for Innovation and Warfighting Leaders.” We sat down with a handful of students/learning leaders to listen to their reflections on the topic and how learning about learning itself can help us get real and get better as warfighters and warfighting organizations.1

The course starts with understanding the ‘why’ of learning, the need to exercise our minds, and embracing the pain along the way. It approaches learning as a manifestation of Marine General Al Gray’s approach to “maneuver warfare,” and as a mindset that is relevant across industries, organizations, services, and warfighter topics. We focus on different dimensions and elements of learning, such as the mechanisms for individual learning, organizational learning, learning organizations, and some of the key tradeoffs between refining existing competencies and exploring and experimenting for new ones.2 We use a broad set of interdisciplinary as well as warfighter-oriented readings ranging from Mortimer Adler’s ‘How to Read a Book,’ Herbert Simon, James March, General Gray, Secretary Mattis, Colonel John Boyd, and other articles on behavioral strategy, organizational learning, and counterfactuals.

We believe that active minds are best developed through active learning, and not lecturing and rote learning (no PowerPoints). That too was something emphasized in Gen Gray’s approach to learning and education, and we try to honor that by facilitating discussion through questions, small groups, and relating scholarly material to warfighter issues. As a result, we studied and learned from Gen Gray’s leadership and the maneuver warfare movement not just as an important episode in USMC institutional history, but also an approach to thinking, leading, and learning that can be useful to help evolve current initiatives (such as GRGB) into something that can have lasting impact on how our organizations think, learn, and fight.3

In the conversation below, our learning leaders reflected on aspects of what we studied and discussed in the course; such as different mechanisms and levels of learning, some links between individual and organization learning, the role of leaders in facilitating both, and how learning is essential to ‘get real, get better.’

What is your main takeaway about the importance of learning at the individual level and how it can help us become better learning leaders? How does that help us ‘get real’?

Individual learning becomes a building block for the organization. If learning is inculcated on an individual basis, it is more likely that the organization can become a learning organization. However, while individual learning is important, it is not the only thing needed. The organization has to provide the space, time, and opportunity for the individuals to be learners. And specific to Navy or military bureaucracies as a whole, there has to be a culture to allow for learning, innovation and innovative thinking, and the status quo needs to have less of a hold on progress. The status quo can be an inhibitor of innovation and of change in general.

Another takeaway is the role of the leader as a teacher. You cannot teach if you do not have a desire to learn, understand the mechanisms of how people learn, and more importantly for the sake of the organization, you need to understand how to help others be lifelong learners. That is really important because in organizations like the Navy and Marine Corps that are multi-tiered and stratified, the one thing you can find that will bind us all together as a learning organization is to cultivate this in future leaders/teachers. This is an example of something that links individual learners/leaders to building learning in others and a broader learning culture as well.

It is not enough to say you are a learning organization – you have to learn how to learn, and you have to learn to teach how to learn. That is a mechanism for how our approach to learning as individuals can help transmit and transform the organization into a learning organization.

We feel strongly that the role of the organization is essential. That is not specific to learning only – but to everything since the leader drives where the organization is going. We also saw that in some of the cases we discussed in class and some of the guest speakers. Boyd did that; Gen Zinni did that; Gen Gray too. All of those leaders offer examples of people in key positions deliberately driving change and learning in their own way.

There are important traits and skills that characterize learning leaders. It takes vulnerability to push folks beyond their comfort zone, to admit they may not know something, or to be willing to ask for another’s advice. It can also take vulnerability to stand up for learning efforts, especially when their takeaways challenge the norm. We discussed Gen Grays emphasis on “we,” not “me,” which is one manifestation of humility. How do you see the roles of humility, vulnerability, and courage in learning?

We better understood that through one of the readings, the Levinthal and March reading.4 In their article they are looking at learning at the individual level, and how that has implications for the organizational level. They are also looking at the cultural and social aspects for why learning fails or does not always succeed. That could be due to friction between people; people being too focused on themselves and not the organizations; and the myopias of learning.

It is also connected to the idea of satisficing – that we are often satisfied with the minimum solution, or what is good enough, to be effective. We also probably over-attribute success (or failure) to particular events or people. What if the success or failure was just by chance? What happened, and how much of that was attributed to things we were doing intentionally, and how much of that was influenced by chance? It involves self-awareness and comfort with uncertainty. Too often people and organizations attribute success or failure to efforts, mainly individual efforts, that may not have much to do with the actual causes. The “Myopia of Learning” article speaks to that in a great way. Admitting that you as a leader may not be the source of all great things involves some humility as well.

At a deeper level, it also relates to the idea of moral courage as a leader and that revolves around humility and vulnerability. Humility is difficult to teach, but it might be easier if you engage in a conversation about vulnerability as well. There have been leaders who lead with the statement, “I will confide in you something that I wouldn’t tell anyone else, and you do the same.” It is a challenge because it relies on trusting someone you may not know well. So vulnerability here builds trust. And that is part of the fuel that gets to learning.

Modeling learning behavior is critical, like with any other favorable leadership trait. To be a leader you need to be willing to be vulnerable, not only for accepting outside criticism, but also to be self-critical. As you embark on Senge’s concept or discipline of personal mastery, it is a journey that is ongoing and you never fully arrive at the destination. We can tie in a little bit of Boyd as well. A lot of folks naturally start the OODA loop with the first part, the observation. But once you delve into it you realize that you never take off on the OODA loop unless you get the orientation right, the part where you consider the implications of your observations. And orientation is itself its own OODA loop that is built on things like culture, norms, shared values, and others. But through observation from other parties and your own self-observation you are able to change that orientation. This then changes the nature of the OODA loop and how you perceive the environment, decide, and act.

As a leader, what we talked about regarding vulnerability, humility, and values, if you tie it back to Boyd, you are hitting the center of the orientation piece and the necessity of you as a leader to really understand yourself. A leader has to have the self-awareness to understand their strengths and shortcomings, while actively striving toward personal mastery so that they can make better decisions, and they can model better learning behaviors for those they lead.

How can learning help the Navy “get real, get better,” and what are the difficulties in creating learning organizations? Is there anything from the course that would be particularly useful to share? What would we do to help make it more like a movement, like MW/FMFM-1 Warfighting?

You can take a page out of General Dempsey’s “Mission Command,” and you have intent, trust, and communication. This helps with explaining the importance of learning, not just for learning’s sake, but for the mission and the organization, a point Gen Gray made in the maneuver warfare panel we discussed. This would ideally guide you as a leader and your colleagues to foster an environment where people have your intent and your trust. Trust is defined here as the absence of fear of humiliation, mocking, or ridicule, including for wanting to learn something new or pursue a novel idea. Once you have that environment, a leader can embrace those efforts, including those trying to understand what is wrong and develop solutions.

If you as a leader do not foster an environment where people can think outside the box – can think beyond the NAVADMINS and instructions and guidelines – then you are going to struggle to explain the orientation part of your thought process. You are going to struggle to think differently. If a leader does not foster trust, adequately communicate their intent, and foster an environment where people are not afraid to explore beyond the conventional boundaries, then they will struggle to develop creative solutions. It is not enough to say we need to harness constructive failures. We have to be able to create an environment where people are not afraid to explore beyond the boundaries of what they would normally do or think about. You will struggle to get to the creative solutions GRGB is aiming for without that organizational environment. GRGB is both about individual-level traits and approaches, but definitely organizational culture as well.

Boyd was able to use the bureaucracy against itself at times. The true secret is to reward the behavior you want and carefully manage the incentives. A perfect example for the U.S. Navy is this – I came across a NAVADMIN that completely rewrote the definitions for performance evaluations, and it put out exactly what should be ranked in terms of efforts to create and sustain a learning environment at both the individual level, in the workspace, at the organizational level, across the U.S. Navy. We saw this document come out – and be completely ignored – and then we had the perfect opportunity where the performance evaluation system was completely revised. Now we have gone from navfit98 to eNAVFIT online. Lo and behold, all of that wonderful criteria that was supposed to evaluate me on how good I am as a personal learner and how good I am at getting those under my charge to be learners – it evaporated overnight! How can we get better in building more lasting changes? It needs to be pushed within the bureaucracy itself, we need it to be sustained, unlike the implication of that NAVADMIN, unfortunately.

Another problem is leadership turnover. Leaders often want to put their mark on things and change things just for the sake of change. But they often rotate out of the position after so little time in the seat that things can rarely be sustained, or rarely do leaders have to live with the possible consequences of their initiatives, and the cycle repeats with turnover.5 So we need to help build a sustainable vision and change how the organization thinks, so it becomes embedded in our overall approach, much like the Marines and Gen Gray did with FMFM-1 Warfighting.6

What do you see as barriers to GRGB?

I think if you survey all members of the Navy, most would want the organization to become a learning organization where they can have time for personal learning, have the room and freedom to think, and they want to become deeper learners themselves. But it is hard. Learning is painful as we discussed in class, and it needs to be. On the organizational level, it is often everyone else’s fault for why it doesn’t happen. Because of the Navy mentality and what is valued, certainly in the officer corps it is often about FITREPs and promotion. No one is going to make the push that is needed when it may be seen as professionally risky. In other words, there can be a mentality of, ‘The system that promoted me can’t be wrong,’ but the GRGB initiative could change what the system values in people.

The Marines seem to have done a decent job at reversing some of these trends, both historically with the reforms Gen Gray lead, but also more recently. They seem to be at least trying to build an organization that embraces learning and exploration, with MCDP-1 Warfighting and the recent publication of MCDP-7 Learning really demonstrating that. Not having as much funding and having different challenges might have helped. We could learn something from how the Marine Corps institutionalized the emphasis on thinking and learning with FMFM-1 early on and the value of lifelong learning it embodied.7 It doesn’t cost money to think as Gen Gray reminds us.

Some of the recommendations in the Education for Seapower study can address these themes if we applied them. These include an organizational emphasis to developing learning and thinking as part of the culture and the ethos of the organization. It includes emphasizing this in the key documents which the organization derives guidance from over time, not just in a set of instructions that are changed tomorrow. The Navy hasn’t done that.

In the Navy we are so focused on our communities and too focused on depth, and unwilling to accept breadth in knowledge and proficiency, that we sort of get in our own way. We focus so much on operating our highly technical platforms that it signals to people that this is all we really care about. But what do you do in your free time, what do you do to educate your mind? What do you do officially, formally, organizationally to enhance learning for yourself and your command beyond the baseline standards?

What can we do to help GRGB become more of a movement and build it into our organizations?

We saw examples of the mentoring process in class and having a dialogue about the purpose, where to get more information, and how it can be implemented. Taking the time to discuss and share the ideas behind the GRGB initiative is essential and can help build excitement for it as well.

But it is really about renovating or transforming organizational culture and that is very difficult. The pamphlet and training package is good in providing some structure and training for how to deliver GRGB. But what they don’t really get at is where does it go from here, what is the follow-through? Who does this? What is the qualification? Where do we do this? There is nothing that says this is part of our organizational DNA now, as MCDP-1 is for the USMC. So as far as you can help make GRGB be part of the organization, you have to make it an agent of change, to make it something that is genuinely embraced by the organization, not just printed by the organization.

There are things happening at a high level now that supports making it a movement, such as mandatory GRGB training for flag officers, and the fact that it is a warfighting enabler is important. The Navy respects and acts upon what is written in ink. If it is not in ink then it is less likely to care. This spans from completing a travel voucher, to performance evaluations and other things. We need to have that hard document that I can wave and say, ‘This is why we are doing this, because this is directive, this is official.’ That is when it will really start to take hold.

The idea of publishing an FMFM-1/MCDP-1-type document for the Navy is key. It can become something the organization embraces as a sign of it becoming a deeper learning organization. It can be something that is foundational to new and experienced members of the organization, and part of who we all are and how we learn. An outline for an MCDP-1 type document might be a good start to at least start the conversation and discuss the benefits of a more structured organizational movement.

We look forward to you writing that!

Commander (Dr.) Art Valeri is an Operative Dentist stationed at NMRTC Great Lakes serving as the Department Head/Chief, Dental Service of the Veterans and Military Staff Hospital Dental Clinic, Captain James A. Lovell Federal Health Care Center, North Chicago, IL.

Commander Paul Nickell is a Naval Flight Officer currently stationed at the United States Naval War College as a student in the College of Naval Warfare in Newport Rhode Island and an MBA Candidate at the Naval Postgraduate School. 

Captain Daniel G. Betancourt is a career Foreign Area Officer and Naval Aviator specializing in Latin America and the Indo-Pacific. He currently serves as Chief of the United States Naval Mission to Colombia.

Commander (Dr.) Jay Yelon is a US Navy Trauma Surgeon currently stationed at the military-civilian partnership at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania.

References

1. The course, inspired by Gen Gray’s approach to thinking and learning, utilizes organizational documents, scholarly articles as well as cases and examples relating to learning to study and understand different dimensions and levels of learning and how we can improve.

2. The classic tradeoff between exploration and exploitation and the difficulties balancing them and how both are essential for learning, is discussed in James March’s work (e.g. Exploration and Exploitation in Organizational Learning | Organization Science (informs.org)). A recent discussion and application of important parts of “Learning to Win” ( 060822_Learning_to_Win_Report FINAL.pdf)

3. During this iteration of the course, perhaps one of the most interesting aspects is the contribution from the students in the 865 program, which offers an innovative and very student centered graduate degree with a lot of flexibility and electives, in keeping with what navy leaders have emphasized as being essential for the ‘cognitive age’. Each of the students in this program were all taking the course (and in their program) despite working full time in responsible positions, thus already having important intrinsic motivation as learners. The 4 learning leaders in this conversion are all part of this program.

4. The myopia of learning – Levinthal – 1993 – Strategic Management Journal – Wiley Online Library

5. Gen Zinni talked during his visit to class about the problem of leadership ‘By temps’; the lack of continuing to vision. That is a problem both for our own organizations focus over time, and at the national level (General Anthony Zinni (ret.) on Staying Honest with the Troops and Translating Experience | Center for International Maritime Security (cimsec.org))

6. Gen Gray emphasizes the importance of thinking and learning embodied in FMFM-1 as a way of thinking that is applicable across organizations and industries. FMFM-1 later became renamed as MCDP-1; hence it is referred to both by students.

7. Gen Gray and Van Riper both mention the study groups and the informal efforts that helped inspire and facilitate learning beyond instructional learning Warfighting Panel – YouTube.

Featured Image: PACIFIC OCEAN (Oct. 14, 2022) Sailors conduct training in the combat information center aboard Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruiser USS Bunker Hill (CG 52). (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Jordan Jennings)

Indo-Asia-Pacific

Assessing the U.S. Pacific Partnership Strategy for a Free and Open Blue Pacific

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By Captain Tuan N. Pham (ret.)

“As an Indo-Pacific power, the United States has a vital interest in realizing a region that is open, interconnected, prosperous, secure, and resilient.” –2022 National Security Strategy

“We will focus on every corner of the region, from Northeast Asia and Southeast Asia, to South Asia and Oceania, including the Pacific Islands.” –2022 Indo-Pacific Strategy

“The United States is a proud Pacific Power. We will continue to be an active, engaged partner in the region…The history and the future of Pacific Islands and the United States are inextricably linked.” –2022 Pacific Partnership Strategy

Last September, Washington published the Pacific Partnership Strategy (PPS), the first ever U.S. government strategy dedicated to the Pacific Islands after decades of American disengagement. Pundits, to include this author, immediately began to question whether the new strategy was too little and too late or exactly right and just in time to curtail the deepening Chinese political, economic, and security inroads that threaten to render the United States regionally irrelevant. China undoubtedly will not back down and likely push even harder across the diplomatic, information, military, and economic (DIME) domains, as evidenced by Chinese President Xi Jinping’s nationalistic speech at China’s 20th National Party Congress on 16 October and disingenuous remarks at G20 Summit in Bali on 15 November.

To Chinese Communist Party (CCP) members and the Chinese people in October, Xi confidently reiterated China as a global alternative to the United States and a more reliable and enduring partner, especially for developing (and vulnerable) countries. The recurring Chinese theme is a derivative of the central narrative from the 4 February joint statement of Russian President Vladmir Putin and Xi, where they boldly declared a shift in the global order, one in which the United States and the Western-biased liberal international order do not lead. To G20 members and the international community a month later, Xi took a more tactful and modest tone, calling for “not drawing ideological lines or promoting group politics and bloc confrontation that will only divide the world, and hinder global development and human progress” — a subtle jab at the 2022 PPS, 2022 Indo-Pacific Strategy (IPS), and 2022 National Security Strategy (NSS).

Beijing likely believes that it must respond in the context of today’s Great Power Competition and tomorrow’s Chinese Dream. The strategically situated region expands China’s growing exterior sphere of influence (and interior security periphery), extends the expansive and ambitious Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) line of communication to the Americas, and presents another steppingstone toward national rejuvenation. Beijing may also believe that it has an opening strategic window of opportunity of perceived U.S. domestic and foreign weaknesses that it can exploit. How then should Washington respond and adjust accordingly its new strategy to curb Beijing’s increasing encroachments into the South Pacific? The short answer is with asymmetric reciprocity, contesting Beijing across the interconnected DIME domains for the hearts and minds of Pacific Islanders and become an enduring “Pacific Power” in both words and deeds.

The Pacific Partnership Strategy

The new strategy takes the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) as its guiding principle, “…to strive for effective, open, and honest relationships and inclusive and enduring partnerships based on mutual accountability and respect with each other, within the subregions, region, and beyond.” The PIF empowers the Pacific Island nations to collectively speak with one voice on shared interests, values, and priorities. The strategy seeks to roll back growing Chinese regional influence and rebuild diminished U.S. regional influence and credibility, aligning well with the higher IPS (February 2022) and NSS (October 2022), which call for a “free, open, interconnected, secure, resilient, and prosperous region.” The PPS contains four bedrock objectives (OBJ):

  1. A strong U.S.-Pacific Islands partnership
  2. A united Pacific Islands region connected with the world
  3. A resilient Pacific Islands region prepared for climate change and other 21st century challenges
  4. Empowered and prosperous Pacific Islanders

Underpinning these objectives are ten interconnected lines of efforts (LOE) designed to advance the Pacific Islands’ priorities as outlined in the 2050 Strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent. All in all, U.S. strategists and policymakers crafted the PPS around the key themes of deeper and broader regional engagement and combating climate change, the region’s “greatest existential threat to the livelihoods, security, and well-being of the peoples of the Pacific.”

U.S. diplomats synchronized the PPS’ rollout as the cornerstone for the first-ever U.S.-Pacific Islands Country Summit in September. At the summit, they pitched closer relations with the Pacific Islands through “shared history, values, and people-to-people ties…and broadening and deepening cooperation on key issues such as climate change, pandemic response, economic recovery, maritime security, environmental protection, and advancing a free and open Indo-Pacific.” However, Special Presidential Envoy Ambassador Joseph Yun said it best when he stated that in the contest for the region’s hearts and minds, “What the Pacific countries are looking for is a long-term, sustainable relationship and not just [the United States] paying attention now and then.” In other words, the United States must put its money where its mouth is and close the say-do mismatch by not over-promising and under-delivering, but giving real commitments in the coming years (and decades). Fortunately, the United States also committed $810M to implement the PPS, including the following:

  • To build a strong U.S.-Pacific Islands partnership, Washington will conclude negotiations for the Compacts of Free Association, South Pacific Tuna Treaty Annex Amendments, and associated Economic Assistance Agreement for 2023 and Beyond; and expand the U.S. diplomatic mission through increased presence and enhanced infrastructure (reopening embassies, reappointing ambassadors, and expanding interagency engagement).
  • To build a united Pacific Islands region connected with the world, Washington will appoint the first-ever U.S. envoy to the PIF; encourage connectivity with other multilateral groupings like the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and the Quad; and bolster the Partners in the Blue Pacific to better meet the needs of people across the region.
  • To build a resilient Pacific Islands region prepared for the climate crisis and other 21st century challenges, Washington set aside millions for a climate change resilience, ocean and weather data collection, and the new Resilient Blue Economies Initiative aimed to “strengthen marine livelihoods by supporting sustainable fisheries, aquaculture, and tourism;” and directed the U.S. Trade and Development Agency to help Pacific Islands countries develop “climate-resilient and adaptive infrastructure.”
  • To build more empowered and prosperous Pacific Islanders, Washington will request a 10-year $600M Economic Assistance Agreement from Congress.

Altogether, these targeted actions will contest Beijing’s activities in Oceania, “…going island-by-island from a national level down to the village level.”

What may be Lacking or Missing

While the PPS is a timely diplomatic initiative, it is unlikely to resonate immediately with Pacific Island nations. As Australia-based Lowy Institute research fellow Mihai Sora noted, “Pacific cultures have long memories and it will take time to win Pacific countries’ trust that the United States’ strategic intent in the region is genuinely to their benefit.” The enduring challenge for future U.S. Administrations remains sustained and consistent implementation to prolong generated mutual trust and confidence. That said, a couple policy adjustments may be warranted now before going too far ahead.

Firstly, as underscored in the current NSS, Washington should consider greater attention to countering transnational organized crime (TOC) beyond the passing mentions of “challenges to security and sovereignty in the maritime domain” in OBJ 3 (a resilient Pacific Islands region) and “eliminating drug trafficking and other maritime security matters…counter threats such as IUU fishing, wildlife, and drug trafficking” in LOE 6 (support marine conservation, maritime security, and sovereign rights). TOC is one of the root causes of human suffering and socioeconomic instability. TOC undermines regional and local governance, feeds violence in local communities, and threatens public safety and health. TOC manifests itself in many forms in Oceania, from drug and human trafficking to money laundering and illegal fishing. These illicit activities degrade regional security and stability by undermining the rule of law, fostering corruption, and exploiting and endangering vulnerable populations.

From the outside, the region appears to fare better than others in terms of criminality. According to the Organized Crime Index, the Pacific Islands region has a criminality score of 3.07, which is much less than the global average of 4.87. However, although criminal actors are lesser in numbers, their relative impacts are significant in these smaller economies and societies… “In contexts where senior state officials are not well paid, the potential for criminal actors to subvert governance by way of bribery is high. Meanwhile, countries such as Tonga and Samoa are having to deal with the socio-economic impacts of increasing drug use and addiction with scarce resources.”

In the Indo-Pacific, there is also a growing concern that China may be leveraging TOC to realize its revisionist and revanchist ambitions (the Chinese Dream) and advance its power projection across the region and beyond. The concern stems from the ubiquitous and controversial BRI. In addition to China and its state partners, Chinese criminal enterprises (CCE) are also using the BRI to expand their economic and political influence, albeit for monetary gain. Many of tbe BRI’s infrastructure projects overlap with and stretch over extant illicit trafficking routes. The more regional countries integrate themselves into the BRI, the easier it becomes for CCE to recruit new members, acquire new clients, diversify their portfolios, and outsource their criminal operations and activities to less-developed countries with laxer laws and lesser law enforcement capabilities and capacities.

Secondly, Washington should consider moderating LOE 7 (support good governance and human rights of all people) to guard against the narrative of imperialist America imposing its culture, values, and will to the region and local populations. Washington can focus on activities to promote good governance but take a more measured and incremental approach toward human rights to overcome extant cultural biases in several Pacific Island nations. Otherwise, China will exploit the narrative to expand and deepen its inroads into Oceania with its own counter-narrative: We are interested in providing you with opportunities to drive economic growth, development, and prosperity. We are not interested in lecturing you on human rights or imposing our beliefs and values on you. As a fellow victim of colonial rule, we understand you and respect your sovereignty, independence, and right to choose your own path.

Too Little and Too Late or Exactly Right and Just in Time?

Last May, China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi conducted a 10-day diplomatic tour of the Pacific Islands, visiting eight countries (the Solomon Islands, Kiribati, Samoa, Fiji, Tonga, Vanuatu, Papua New Guinea, and Timor Leste), holding virtual meetings with three additional nations (Cook Islands, Niue, and Federated States of Micronesia), and hosting the second round of the China-Pacific Islands Countries Foreign Ministers Meeting in Fiji. The visit underscored Beijing’s determination and commitment to expand and deepen its regional influence, extend its sphere of influence into Oceania, and asymmetrically counter the IPS.

During the lengthy visit, Yi proposed a sweeping multilateral agreement on a range of issues (building police forces, digital governance, cybersecurity systems, etc.) to strengthen Beijing’s growing political, economic, and security ties with the region, but then quickly withdrew the agreement due to an apparent lack of support from the Pacific Island countries. Nevertheless, the visit and agreement revealed three key takeaways that underscore the strategic urgency to curtail China’s political, economic, and security inroads before they solidify and become permanently embedded into the local governments, cultures, and institutions.

  • Wang’s trip did not accomplish all of China’s goals, but Beijing remains committed to expanding its influence into the Pacific Islands.
  • Many Pacific Islands countries remain wary of China’s intentions, especially related to security issues.
  • Although the region refused to be rushed into a multilateral deal, Pacific Island nations are still open to China’s engagement but on their terms.

The time to act is today. It is much easier to slow or stop China’s progress now than it is to wait for it to gain momentum later. Inaction, or worse yet, retrenchment, would further embolden Beijing’s regional goals to expand to the other Pacific Island nations from Kiribati to the Solomon Islands, and eventually transform Oceania into a Chinese sphere of influence. As for the sufficiency of proposed actions, they are steps in the right direction but will need continuous re-assessment and adjustment as events unfold and the situation dictates.

How Beijing Will Respond

Beijing will likely push back hard across the DIME domains. The PPS obstructs China’s relentless drive beyond the First Island Chain and into the Second and Third Island Chains. Beijing’s short-term economic and diplomatic goals in the South Pacific are to lay the groundwork for the extension of the BRI eastward into the Americas and sway more vulnerable PIF nations to sever ties with Taiwan, while also realizing the long-term information and military goals to erode U.S. regional influence and credibility and block potential U.S. military intervention in East Asia.

Washington should expect Beijing to increase and accelerate its diplomatic charm offensive and expand the extant bridgeheads in Kiribati and the Solomon Islands to the rest of Oceania, building dual-use bases along the primary maritime avenue of approach to East Asia. Chinese diplomats will highlight Kiribati and the Solomon Islands as partnership exemplars and offer even more lucrative infrastructure projects, economic aid packages, and economic development programs to entice vulnerable PIF nations with upfront short-term gains and hidden long-term costs.

China hopes these bases will become de facto “unsinkable aircraft carriers,” akin to the Japanese sea bastions during World War II and today’s Chinese military outposts (artificial islands) in the South China Sea. Toshi Yoshihara, a senior fellow with the Center for Strategic and Budget Assessments, assesses these strategically located bases (whether permanent or merely regular air or naval transit and refueling rights) will complicate U.S. and allied military planning and operations in peace and war. If so, the nature, scope, and degree of the expected pushback could also be an indicator of China’s timetable for the reunification of Taiwan. Beijing will undoubtedly plan ahead and set favorable political-military conditions accordingly prior to any planned operation, and interdicting U.S. military forces to prevent or delay intervention will certainly be one of the key military conditions for a calculated Chinese victory.

How Washington Should Adjust

In the diplomacy domain, Washington has put together a robust package of diplomatic initiatives to counter Chinese political, economic, and security gains within the region. Implementation and sustainability of actions remain challenges in the coming years. First, the United States has to integrate and synchronize its diplomatic activities with the other instruments of national power for unity of effort and consistent messaging. Second, the United States must sustain diplomatic efforts to build enduring regional trust and goodwill and rebuild diminished U.S. regional influence and credibility, eliminating the say-do mismatch. Following through on promises is a critical part of being a “Pacific Power” in both words and deeds. Otherwise, Pacific Islands countries will regress to the prevailing perception of the United States as a transitory friend and unreliable partner, then buy into the Chinese-driven narrative that America is a waning global power irrelevant to the South Pacific.

In the information domain, Washington cannot let Beijing have the strategic communications advantage. The United States needs to maintain the information high ground, linking the expansive and ambitious BRI, revisionist and revanchist Chinese Dream, and China’s DIME activities within Oceania. The United States also needs to highlight the fact that Chinese diplomats will not hesitate to make empty promises to achieve their short-term objectives and buy time and space to set the conditions to realize their long-term goals. Djibouti, Sri Lanka, Laos, and Cambodia offer cautionary tales to cash-strapped Pacific Island nations entertaining Chinese offers, particularly as they struggle to recover from the COVID pandemic and ongoing global recession. China saddled these struggling developing countries with unsustainable debts, while destabilizing local politics, disrupting traditional social patterns, and eroding sovereignties.

In the military domain, Washington must compete with China for basing rights along critical sea lanes. Beijing expressed interest in military access to and basing in Kiribati, the Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, Fiji, and Vanuatu. Washington should make China work hard for these potential basing deals, outbidding Beijing for the contracts or at least raising the costs of the contracts for Beijing by reminding prospective partners of China’s poor economic and environmental records, corporate unreliability, and political propensity to lash out at countries it perceives as acting contrary to its national interests. Washington should also remind them of the BRI debt traps in Djibouti, Sri Lanka, Laos, and Cambodia.

In the economic domain, Washington has put together a robust package of economic aid to build stronger ties with the Pacific Island nations. In all of these programs, economic aid — not economic development — takes front and center stage in the PPS. That stands in contrast to China, which at least offers some trade and investment opportunities as well as aid. Washington should reconsider and also offer financial means for real economic growth and development to include most favored nation status.

Roadmap to Relevancy

The PPS is a roadmap to take targeted actions in the South Pacific to roll back growing Chinese regional influence, rebuild diminished U.S. regional influence and credibility, protect U.S. and allied national interests, and provide regional security and economic prosperity to the people of the Pacific Islands region. The PPS is not exactly right but definitely just in time to curtail the deepening Chinese political, economic, and security inroads that threaten to render the United States regionally irrelevant. It is best to consider this timely diplomatic initiative as a “living” strategic document that requires continuous re-assessment and adjustment as unforeseeable events unfold and the dynamic situation dictates, bearing in mind that PIF leaders want to focus on regional concerns, not geo-politics: “To put it simply, counterbalancing China’s recent moves in the South Pacific requires the United States to focus on the needs of the region itself rather than placing broader geopolitical goals at the forefront.”

Tuan Pham is a retired Navy captain, maritime strategist, strategic planner, naval researcher, and China Hand (Master-level) with more than 20 years of operational and staff experience in the Indo-Pacific. The views expressed here are personal and do not necessarily reflect the positions of the U.S. government or U.S. Navy.

Featured image: U.S. President Joe Biden with Pacific Island leaders during the US-Pacific Island Country Summit on 20 September (Credit: Bonnie Cash/UPI/Bloomberg)

Capability Analysis

Tankers For The Pacific Fight: A Crisis in Capability

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By Stephen M. Carmel

The Department of Defense is projected to need on the order of one hundred tankers of various sizes in the event of a serious conflict in the Pacific.1 The DoD currently has access it can count on – assured access – to less than ten. Not only does the U.S. lack the tonnage required to support a major conflict in the Pacific, it has no identifiable roadmap to obtain it. Without enough fuel, the most advanced capabilities and ships – even nuclear-powered aircraft carriers – will hardly be available for use. This is a crisis in capability that requires urgent and effective action. There is little time to get a solution in place if speculation that conflict with China could happen this decade proves true. Thankfully, this is a problem that can have a timely and affordable solution. However, the U.S. needs to move past conventional thinking and long-established policies that brought us to this current state.

To Win the Fight Requires Fuel

In the event of a broad conflict with China in the Pacific theater, the U.S. will likely lose reliable access to the currently relied-upon sources of oil within the region. The U.S. will then need to manage exceedingly long lines of supply to ensure oil flows to the forces in the greatly increased quantities demanded by a wartime operational tempo. But it must be remembered that there will be many other consumers of oil competing for those same barrels in a highly disrupted oil market. The cascading effects on the totality of the oil system, from production to distribution across all users, must be hedged against. The Defense Production Act does not apply to foreign refineries and the U.S. government cannot compel where these foreign-produced barrels go. Refiners must not only have the oil to sell, but be willing to sell it to the U.S. military in the midst of what may be a politically controversial war. This access should not be taken for granted, especially given China’s deep reach and increasing influence over the international oil market, the developing world, and the associated energy infrastructure.

The long supply chains for delivering wartime energy from North American sources to the Pacific theater of operations would require a large number of tanker ships. In thinking through the tanker requirement, one must also factor in some level of attrition in lost ships and crews due to combat action, especially when a prudent adversary would prioritize attacking these critical enablers of U.S. power projection. Attrition and escort requirements must be accounted for in planning. Balancing operational logistical demands in the face of attrition and the evolving availability of tankers is a dynamic planning challenge. It requires steady effort throughout the duration of a conflict that features rapidly changing oil supply points and platform availability.

Militarily useful tankers for U.S. operations and TRANSCOM requirements. Click to expand. (Graphic via 2019 CSBA study “Sustaining the Fight: Resilient Maritime Logistics for a New Era.“)

The U.S. would need several different types of tankers to address these challenging scenarios. Larger tankers are needed to do the long-haul parts of the distribution process. These would be principally MR, or “Medium Range” tankers which are the ideal size for the Defense Department and would be needed in large numbers. These are ships that carry roughly 330,000 bbls of multiple types of refined product. They can be fitted with consolidated cargo replenishment (CONSOL) gear to conduct at-sea refueling of oilers which will then refuel the fleet. This capability is currently available on a few MR tankers on charter with the Military Sealift Command. But current CONSOL operations are short-duration exercises and have not been done under contingency conditions in many years. The other type of tanker needed would be smaller, shallow-draft ships in the 40,000 bbl range for intra-theater lift. These smaller tankers would be used to provide fuel to distributed forces across the Pacific.

The current crisis in tanker capability, combined with a high optempo conflict, could result in the distinct possibility that U.S. forces run out of fuel. Sufficient tanker capacity is indispensable to wartime success and must form a central consideration in planning. Current Defense Department planning embodies inherent assumptions about assured access versus assumed access of supply. As the National Defense Transportation Association describes it:

“If the U.S. adopted an assured access approach, it would be comprised of U.S. Flagged ships owned by U.S. companies and crewed by U.S. citizen mariners—somewhat similar to the Chinese strategy (which applies to the entire nation of China, not just their military).The assumed access approach relies on the outsourcing delivery of fuel to the military in times of conflict—with limited description regarding the private parties involved and the extent which access to product would be guaranteed. Working out these details will come at the start of conflict, when demand signals surface for fuel requirements. The assumed access approach relies on the concept that the international tanker market is large compared to the U.S. military demand in a peer to peer full scale conflict.”

Military logistics planners lean toward assumed access, that tankers will be available from foreign-flagged tonnage. This assumption betrays a lack of understanding of the international tanker market and the significant influence China now has over it, including the often-overlooked issue of actual ownership, which is not the same as flag or company. In fact, a substantial portion of European tanker fleets, flying flags normally considered non-hostile to U.S. interests, are actually owned by Chinese financial houses through sale lease back-arrangements.

Assumed access also does not address the very dynamic aspects of the tanker market and the dramatic effects current events can have on availability. The current situation affecting the global tanker markets – tight supply accompanied by high charter rates – is driven by the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. But this is but one example. A conflict with China may have even more dramatic consequences for the markets. There will be significant but unpredictable impacts on oil markets, tanker markets, and trade flows upon which to base assumptions on tanker availability. Assumed access also means assuming tanker companies and their stockholders will value the U.S. military, with whom they may have no relationship, over their commercial interests with whom they have longstanding relationships.

July 11-14 2020 – Off the coast of Southern California Military Sealift Command’s long-term chartered motor tanker ship Empire State (T-AOT 5193) conducted connected at-sea refueling operations (CONSOL) with three MSC Combat Logistics Fleet ships. (Photo by Sara Burford/Military Sealift Command Pacific)

Tanker companies, not countries, ultimately own the ships and it is commercial companies that must choose a side. Part of that decision will be based on their assessment on who will “win” in the conflict. Picking the U.S. is currently far from a safe bet, at least in the eyes of international companies that will still want to preserve their commercial relationships, largely oriented toward Asia, when the conflict is over.

Assured Access Solutions

Assured assess means the U.S. Navy or U.S. flag shipping companies own and control the ships outright. Availability is not premised on assumptions or expectations about external actors and their assets.

Assured access still comes with challenges to tanker availability. The tanker problem must be solved as a system that considers labor requirements and the demands for sustaining economies amidst a systemically disruptive conflict. Tankers require different credentials from dry cargo vessels and a container-ship officer is only qualified to sail tankers if they have the requisite endorsements which can only come from sailing on tankers. In addition, the domestic oil markets which fuel the U.S. economy must remain functional. There will also be heavy demand for tonnage to service allied economies impacted by the distortions in energy flows.

A current legislative effort to address this problem is the proposed Tanker Security Program (TSP), which provides a stipend to firms that flag tankers into U.S. flag for international trade. The program is limited to ten ships due to the amount of annual funding authorized and appropriated for stipends. This program is flawed however, in that the stipend is too small for enrolled vessels to remain commercially viable for trading in normal markets. (The current tanker market, with historically high charter rates, is not considered “normal.”) Instead, the program allows double dipping so ships can be on short-term charter to the U.S. government carrying preference cargo while still collecting a stipend. Because there are already ships under U.S. flag on short-term charter to the government, the TSP vessels will simply replace these existing vessels, collecting a windfall but adding no new capacity. The program is also not scalable, and even if all other elements work as intended, it could not produce anywhere near the needed number of ships for a major wartime contingency. The program has also yet to address other issues, such as ensuring the vessels have the necessary capability and compatibility with their intended use by the U.S. military in time of conflict. As an example, the program has not determined whether CONSOL equipment and CONSOL-trained crews will be required on these ships, creating uncertainty on funding for this capability, which then creates uncertainty within industry on the financial aspects of the decision to bid for TSP slots.

It is clear that the TSP will not solve the overall tanker shortage. A comprehensive tanker solution that is affordable and can grow the fleet at scale would necessarily consist of a combination of several different programs. First, the TSP must be revised to provide a stipend large enough to allow for commercial trading of U.S. flag tankers in the international market with no reliance on U.S. flag military (preference) cargo. In fact, carriage of preference cargo for TSP ships should only be allowed during times of national emergency. Otherwise, participating ships should be restricted to commercial work. This will produce a fleet of incremental U.S. flag tankers the Navy does not already have access to, with the scale of the program determined by the total amount of funding.

Legislation should be enacted requiring cargo preference on refined oil products being exported from the U.S. For reference, the U.S. currently exports 1.4 million bbls of refined product, principally to South America, every day, all on foreign flag tankers. The U.S. also exports a considerable amount of crude oil. While crude tankers are hardly militarily useful, their crews are useful by virtue of possessing the required documents and skills to sail tankers of any type. Therefore crude oil should also be a consideration. If cargo preference – the requirement that U.S.-flagged tankers carry a significant portion of this cargo – were in place, a substantial fleet of commercially viable but militarily useful tankers would be available as “assured access.” A significant benefit of this program would be that the cost of having that capacity available for wartime use is not borne by the U.S. taxpayer until it is actually needed. It is borne by the oil companies and the foreign buyers of the oil.

U.S. domestic sourcing of DoD fuel should also be put in place. The requirements of “Buy American” do not apply to fuel, and the Defense Logistics Agency Energy (DLA Energy) currently buys fuel wherever it is cheapest, normally meaning the closest source to the point of use. This is of course vastly different from the sourcing for so much else the DoD uses or procures, where “Buy American” applies. But those “point of use” sources of fuel for ships in the Pacific may be at risk in the event of conflict with China, assuming they are not owned or controlled by Chinese companies, which should not be overlooked.

As mentioned, the U.S. currently exports a large amount of refined product. Some of these exports could easily be diverted to DoD as a customer without heavily distorting the domestic oil market. It is highly likely some level of domestic sourcing would need to be done in a time of conflict. As a result, this program would put in place an oil supply chain that will be needed regardless, but in a phased approach that does not distort markets as opposed to an emergency program implemented in a time of crisis that is highly disruptive. Sourcing DoD oil domestically now will result in increased ton-mile demand, hence immediately increasing the need for tankers to carry it.

Lastly, the program run by the Military Sealift Command (MSC) for prepositioning refined product on tankers fitted for CONSOL should be put back in place. At one time, MSC had a large number of tankers under charter loaded with the types of fuel that would be needed in a conflict. These tankers were outfitted with all the required equipment for their military mission, were fully-crewed, and ready to respond immediately. This program, if revived, could be done quickly and supply immediate capability of the required type. 

There are several points to consider when reviewing this menu of potential solutions. First, while some, such as adjusting the TSP, require congressional action which will take time, others can be done by DoD quickly. Prepositioning programs or DLA-E sourcing do not require congressional action and could be accomplished in shorter timeframes. Cargo preference for exports could potentially be done by executive order in the short term, but would certainly require congressional action in the longer term. But a central theme is that cargo must be at the center of any viable solution, not government stipends.

The above solutions must also be implemented in a phased approach to give labor and tanker markets time to adjust. The fact that we are presented with a mix of solutions, with some that can be implemented right away and others that require more time, is not necessarily a bad thing. The key point is that this must be implemented as a phased solution to a systemic problem. Stovepiped programs that do not mesh will not work. Given the very short overall timeframe available to implement a solution due to acute national security concerns with China, action must start now.

While the proper mix of the above will produce the required capability at an affordable price, it will not produce capability for free. All capability, from aircraft carriers to missiles, comes at a cost, as does the fuel that enables these capabilities. Fuel, and the capacity to deliver it when and where needed, must be placed on the same level of priority as other essential warfighting capabilities. These must be viewed as interim steps to ensure the tanker capability crisis is solved in a timeframe relevant to the near-term threat of a potential conflict with China.

Conclusion

The very fact that these types of programs need to be considered is indicative of decades of neglect in U.S. maritime strategy. The long-term solution must flow from a coherent national maritime strategy that addresses all elements of maritime power, not just naval power, and treats the maritime domain as an ecosystem that must be addressed holistically. The Chinese clearly have such a comprehensive maritime strategy, which is why China dominates the maritime domain when it is properly understood as encompassing all elements of maritime power. While the U.S. has what it terms a maritime strategy, it is in fact only a naval strategy that does not address the broader dimensions of maritime power. This needs to change, otherwise the U.S. may run the severe risk of neglecting critical elements of maritime power that China has been carefully cultivating.

Steve Carmel is Senior VP at Maersk Line Limited. He is a past member of the Naval Studies Board, the CNO Executive Panel, and Marine Board. 

References 

1. Timothy Walton, Ryan Boone, Harrison Schramm, “Sustaining the Fight: Resilient Maritime Logistics for a New Era,” Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, pg. 78, 2019, https://csbaonline.org/research/publications/sustaining-the-fight-resilient-maritime-logistics-for-a-new-era/publication/1.  

Featured Image: ARABIAN GULF (May 5, 2016) – Fleet replenishment oiler USNS John Lenthall (T-AO-189) refuels the tanker Maersk Peary during a replenishment-at-sea. (U.S. Navy Combat Camera photo by Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Joshua Scott/Released)

Human Capital

The Value of Variance in the Surface Warfare Officer Qualification Process

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By CDR Robert C. Watts IV

In his recent CIMSEC article, Bill Golden argues that there is too much variance in the surface warfare officer (SWO) qualification process and questions whether ship captains have adequate experience to qualify junior officers.1 To address these perceived problems, he proposes that the Surface Warfare Schools Command (SWSC) commanding officer (CO) administer a qualification test between an officer’s first and second division officer tours. The argument for this change overstates the problems posed by variance in the qualification process, neglects the value of the current method, and does not reckon with how the proposed changes would deviate from the community’s culture, which values diversity of experience and command at sea. 

Variance

For context, the existing process culminates in an oral exam, or board, during which the candidate answers a wide variety of questions from the ship’s department heads, Executive Officer (XO), and CO. Based on completing pre-requisite qualifications and their performance in the board, the captain then decides if the candidate has earned the SWO qualification and presents the SWO pin in a wardroom ceremony.

While it is true that qualification boards vary from ship to ship, this variance is not as wide as Golden suggests. To paraphrase Mark Twain, SWO boards do not repeat themselves, but they often rhyme. The SWO Career Manual emphasizes the importance of maintaining “consistent qualification standards.”2 Despite differences in detail, boards across the fleet are generally similar in approach. Every CO designs their boards based on their experience, both as a candidate and then as a board member, resulting in boards that are generally consistent in scope and scale. Variance typically reflects the CO and board members tailoring questions to the ship’s technical and operational circumstances, an assessment of the candidate’s strengths and weaknesses, and the board members’ own diverse professional backgrounds.

It is unclear whether this variance is a problem. Golden writes that “SWOs yearn for standardization,” but neither defines this desire’s extent, nor cites evidence of it. He suggests several potential benefits of standardization, specifically increasing confidence in the readiness of SWOs and improving other communities’ respect for SWOs. Again, Golden presents no evidence for either issue. With regard to readiness, he does not identify negative outcomes caused by SWO qualification variance. Like him, I have not found any. For example, the 2017 Comprehensive Review following the Fitzgerald and John S. McCain collisions did not point to SWO qualification variance as a contributing factor.3 Moreover, managing other communities’ perceptions should not shape SWO qualification policy.

Experience

Golden asserts that COs – of all ranks – are not the most experienced officers available and suggests that the SWSC CO, a post-major command Captain, is the most experienced and would therefore be the ideal qualification authority. Although a ship CO may not be “the best available,” COs of all ranks have sufficient naval experience – and command perspective – to lead a rigorous and fair qualification process that is consistent with community policy. Some COs may have more experience, but even an O-4 CO has served at sea as a division officer, department head and XO, just like any other CO. Although the SWSC CO and staff have extensive experience, they are removed in time and space from afloat operations, inevitably causing their shipboard experiences to atrophy and perspectives to shift.

Benefits

The existing system benefits the candidate, the board members, and the wardroom in ways that would diminish or disappear under the proposed overhaul. For the candidate, qualifying during the first division officer tour provides a significant goal to pursue (and achieve) during that assignment. The oral board format presents a perhaps unfamiliar challenge, but some scholars argue that, unlike a written test, it enables the candidate to demonstrate mental agility and to be treated like someone “who [has] interesting things to say and can handle being put on the spot.”4 Completing the qualification during their first tour also gives them the opportunity to “grow into” their new role as a warfare-qualified officer and report to their second tour as a “full up round.”

For the board members, each board offers opportunities to reinforce and improve their own knowledge, while also considering how they might run boards themselves when in command. For the rest of the wardroom, preparing a candidate for SWO qualifications is a team effort that includes accomplishments to publicly recognize and collectively celebrate. These “pinning” events affirm the qualification’s significance, commend the effort made to earn it, and help build community identity. If centralized ashore at SWSC, preparing for qualification would remain a team effort until the candidate leaves the ship, but the team would lose that direct connection to, and positive feedback from, the new SWO’s milestone accomplishment.

Culture

Golden’s premise also raises important fundamental questions: What does a SWO pin mean? What is the culture of the surface warfare community? What should both be in the future?

The SWO qualification represents that the wearer not only achieved pre-requisite qualifications – most notably officer of the deck underway – but also built a foundation of knowledge, has the aptitude to continue their professional development, can confidently discuss complex naval concepts, and will well represent the community. A SWO pin earned through a standardized, bibliography-based, written test and shiphandling assessment, as Golden advocates, would not necessarily represent the wearer’s holistic foundation for future growth.

Culturally, the current qualification process is consistent with the community’s long-standing character, which values diversity of experience and upholds command at sea as the pinnacle of responsibility and trust. The members’ wide variety of perspectives and experiences enrich SWO boards and increase their rigor. Furthermore, it is only natural that the CO bears responsibility for training and qualifying junior officers on their ship, not just in a division officer’s capstone SWO board, but also throughout their time onboard. The CO observes and guides an officer’s qualification progress and, over time, builds trust in them as a watchstander and confidence in them as a future SWO before making the qualification decision. The Navy entrusts the captain to lead a warship and its crew. It would be logically inconsistent to remove qualifying junior officers from their responsibilities. Such a change would undermine the community’s commitment to the importance of command at sea. 

Conclusion

The surface warfare qualification is a critical career milestone and symbolizes an officer’s identity as a SWO. Golden rightly examines how to improve the SWO qualification process, but standardizing the process and centralizing it ashore would not be as beneficial as he argues and would be contrary to the community’s character. If the SWO community desires to standardize the qualification process, it should first consider refining the current approach. For example, just as the SWO Career Manual outlines what topics should be included in a command qualification board, this instruction could also describe in more detail what a CO should include in a SWO board.5 Although worthwhile to assess through the “Get Real, Get Better” lens how officers earn the surface warfare qualification, the existing process maintains a sufficiently consistent standard, benefits both the candidate and the wardroom, and reinforces the culture of the SWO community.

CDR Rob Watts is the Current Operations Director at U.S. Pacific Fleet and most recently commanded USS John Paul Jones (DDG 53). He holds a B.A. in Foreign Affairs and History from the University of Virginia and a Master’s in Public Policy from Princeton University. The views expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the Department of the Navy or the Department of Defense.

References

[1] William Golden, “Get Real, Get Better: Revamping Surface Warfare Officer Qualification,” Center for International Maritime Security, 25 October 2022, https://cimsec.org/get-real-get-better-revamping-surface-warfare-officer-qualification/.

[2] U.S. Navy, “Surface Warfare Officer Career Manual,” Commander, Naval Surface Forces Instruction 1412.7A, 22 November 2021, p. 3-1.

[3] U.S. Navy, Comprehensive Review of Recent Surface Force Incidents, 2017, https://news.usni.org/2017/11/02/document-navy-comprehensive-review-surface-forces.

[4] Molly Worthen, “If it was Good Enough for Socrates, it’s Good Enough for Sophomores,” New York Times, 2 December 2022, https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/02/opinion/college-oral-exam.html.

[5] U.S. Navy, “Surface Warfare Officer Career Manual,” p. 5-4 to 5-6.

Featured image:  Lieutenant Junior Grade Shamaal Fletcher submerges his SWO pin into the Norwegian Sea as part of his pinning ceremony aboard the guided-missile destroyer USS Arleigh Burke (DDG 51), Sept. 20, 2022. (Credit: Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Almagissel Schuring)