Notes to the New CNO Series

By Sean F. X. Barrett, Mie Augier, and William F. Mullen, III

Calls for innovation, technological development, and establishing new organizations are commonplace across the national security enterprise.¹ Indeed, integrating emerging technologies into formations by seeking new ideas, evaluating them with a rigorous process, and learning from the feedback is crucial to the continued viability of warfighting organizations. Such calls, however, tend to portray new technologies and weapons systems as panaceas to great power challenges while paying less attention to the importance of developing the warfighters who will actually employ them. By empowering people to find and fix problems, Get Real Get Better is an encouraging first step, but more meaningful steps can nudge the pendulum back towards Capt. Wayne P. Hughes Jr.’s first cornerstone — “Sailors matter most.”² This goal can be furthered by investing in the training and education of Navy Sailors and officers, and cultivating a culture of mission command so they are prepared to make decisions and take initiative based on their commander’s intent.

The increasingly complex security environment demands that warfighters develop the intellectual agility to make decisions and transfer knowledge across domains, or apply it to entirely new and unforeseen situations while facing demanding constraints. As such, the culture of the Navy needs to change so that its best and brightest not only understand the value of lifelong learning and continuing their professional military education (PME), but that they are also formally incentivized to pursue both. Concrete incentives can include meritorious promotions and enhanced recognition when being considered for command and promotion. Seniors should positively recognize warfighters who complete advanced and terminal degree programs, and who return to the fleet where the benefits of their advanced education can be best utilized. By rewarding the application of education to fleet operations, careers will not be as negatively impacted by the opportunity costs typically associated with formal PME. Without such concrete incentives, Sailors may feel they can hardly deviate from narrowly pre-defined career paths to pursue valuable educational opportunities that would otherwise benefit both themselves as warfighters, as well as the service.

Since the U.S. military can no longer count on a material or technological edge against its competitors, all members of the sea services must help maintain and hone their intellectual edge. They must be able to out-think and out-learn any opponent, especially in dynamic and rapidly changing situations. This is their greatest advantage, but it is also perishable. If it is neglected due to other priorities, it will atrophy and wither away. For example, the Education for Seapower initiatives were a step in the right direction, but they faded away without a senior champion.³

The Navy must adopt a mission command philosophy and ensure it is practiced throughout the force to take full advantage of critical thinking skills and learning leaders. Seniors must issue their intent, then trust subordinates to make decisions and take initiative. Subordinates must trust their seniors to support them in the actions they take, and welcome constructive feedback along the way. Without the trust inherent in mission command, organizations lack the agility to take advantage of fleeting opportunities or adjust course when the original plan is no longer viable. In the anticipated operating environment, this could mean the difference between victory and defeat.

LtCol Sean F. X. Barrett, PhD, is a Marine intelligence officer currently serving as the Operations Officer for I Marine Expeditionary Force G-2. He has previously deployed in support of Operations Iraqi Freedom, Enduring Freedom, Enduring Freedom-Philippines, and Inherent Resolve.

Dr. Mie Augier is a Professor in the Department of Defense Management, and Defense Analysis Department, at the Naval Postgraduate School. She is a founding member of the Naval Warfare Studies Institute and is interested in strategy, organizations, leadership, innovation, and how to educate strategic thinkers and learning leaders.

MajGen William F. Mullen, III, USMC, retired after 34 years as an infantry officer. Among his many assignments, he served 3 tours in Iraq, and as a General Officer, was the President of U.S. Marine Corps University and Commanding General of Training and Education Command. He is also the co-author of Fallujah Redux, which was published in 2014 by the USNI Press and the author of What It Means To Be a Man, which was published by the Marine Corps University Press in 2023.  Since retirement, he taught leadership at the University of Colorado and is currently a Professor of Practice at the Naval Postgraduate School (Department of Defense Management).

References

1. CIMSEC, for example, published a call for papers to pitch new capabilities in June 2023. Dmitry Filipoff, “Pitch Your Capability Topic Weeks Kicks Off on CIMSEC,” Center for International Maritime Security, June 5, 2023, https://cimsec.org/pitch-your-capability-topic-week-kicks-off-on-cimsec/. See also Jaspreet Gill, “INDOPACOM Standings Up New Directorate to Better Connect Industry, DoD Innovation Efforts,” Breaking Defense, August 28, 2023, https://breakingdefense.com/2023/08/indopacom-stands-up-new-directorate-to-better-connect-industry-dod-innovation-efforts/; Justin Katz, “EXCLUSIVE: Navy Weighs Creation of ‘Disruptive Capabilities’ Office to Rapidly Field Tech to Fleet,” Breaking Defense, August 30, 2023, https://breakingdefense.com/2023/08/exclusive-navy-weighs-creation-of-disruptive-capabilities-office-to-rapidly-field-tech-to-fleet/; Will Knight, “The AI-Powered, Totally Autonomous Future of War Is Here,” Wired, July 25, 2023; Leonardo Jacopo Maria Mazzucco, “Achieving More With Less: The U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet Bets on Unmanned Vehicles and AI Systems to Bolster Maritime Domain Awareness,” Center for Maritime Strategy, August 21, 2023, https://centerformaritimestrategy.org/publications/achieving-more-with-less-the-u-s-navys-5th-fleet-bets-on-unmanned-vehicles-and-ai-systems-to-bolster-maritime-domain-awareness/.

2. Wayne P. Hughes, Jr. and Robert P. Girrier, Fleet Tactics and Naval Operations, 3rd ed. (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2018), 15-19.

3. The Department of the Navy, for example, removed funding increases associated with Education for Seapower in its Fiscal Year 2022 budget request. Diana Stancy Correll, “Navy Aims to Reduce End Strength, Cut Higher Education Funding in New Budget Request,” Navy Times, May 28, 2021, https://www.navytimes.com/news/your-navy/2021/05/28/navy-aims-to-reduce-end-strength-cut-higher-education-funding-in-new-budget-request/.

Featured Image: PEARL HARBOR (Aug 16, 2023) Lt. Christopher Shaw (Left), from Plaquemine, Louisiana, communications officer assigned to Unmanned Surface Vessel Division One, explains to University of Hawaii Navy ROTC midshipmen the operational capabilities of the unmanned surface vessel Ranger during a tour of the ship on Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Hawaii, Aug. 16, 2023. (U.S. Navy photo by Chief Mass Communication Specialist Jonathan B. Trejo)

Notes to the New CNO Series

By Capt. John Cordle (ret.)

The number 17 should have special meaning for the CNO, as it does for me. It is the number of Sailors we lost in the 2017 collisions, due to entirely preventable flaws. The CNO should continue to pay attention to the lessons from those events, and gauge the extent to which they have truly been learned and implemented. While those collisions happened more than six years ago, the process of learning from them remains very much a work in progress.

Among the many challenges highlighted by those fatal events, manning shortfalls and pervasive fatigue continue to persist. The U.S. Fleet Forces Comprehensive Review (CR) features the words “manning” and “fatigue” 117 times. In the years since the terrible events of 2017, the number of gapped Sailor billets at sea has still managed to increase from 6,592 (per the CR) to over 9,000, with many ships manned below 90 percent. Many have forgotten the fact that the USS Fitzgerald had no Quartermaster Chief for at least a year leading to the collision, and that the helm and lee helm driving the USS John S. McCain were cross-decked from another ship. Both the CR and the National Transportation Safety Board report cite a lack of manning as a major contributor to fatigue, which exacerbated both events, according to the investigations. The issues of manning and fatigue are inextricably linked. Fatigue is also linked to operational stress, mental health, and even suicide.

A cornerstone of the CNO’s duties is ensuring there are enough Sailors to serve at sea. Granted, there are limits to what the CNO can do, including topline budgets, recruiting and retention challenges, and a strong economy to compete against. But in the end, it comes down to setting firm priorities and making the tradeoffs. The best weapons in the world will fall short if they are manned by overworked and exhausted Sailors.

The CNO should pay close attention to two measures – the number of billets currently gapped at sea, and the average hours slept by sailors on ships. The measure of effectiveness will be for the former to go down and the latter to go up each month. If successful, the gaps will go from 9,000 to zero in four years, and the sleep average from 5.5 to 7 hours. The result will be improved operational effectiveness, quality of service, and safety. The memories of the Sailors we lost deserve no less.

Captain John Cordle is a retired Surface Warfare Officer who served as a Type Commander Personnel Officer and Chief of Staff, and twice Commanding Officer of Navy warships, USS Oscar Austin (DDG 79) and USS San Jacinto (CG 56). He is the recipient of the U. S. Navy League John Paul Jones Award for Inspirational Leadership.

Featured Image: EAST CHINA SEA (July 16, 2020) Deck department Sailors repair line using a technique called ‘serving’ on the forecastle of the amphibious dock landing ship USS Germantown (LSD 42). (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Taylor DiMartino)

Notes to the New CNO Series

By LCDR U.H. (Jack) Rowley

China’s Navy has now eclipsed the U.S. Navy in size, and the gap continues to grow. For this reason, as well as for the benefits that uncrewed surface vessels (USVs) bring to the fight, the U.S. Navy’s Force Design 2045 envisions a future Navy of 350 crewed hulls and 150 uncrewed surface vessels. Like their air and ground counterparts, these unmanned systems are valued because of their ability to reduce the risk to human life in high threat areas, to deliver persistent surveillance, and to provide options to warfighters that derive from the inherent advantages of uncrewed technologies.

However, so far the Navy has only committed to developing and acquiring large uncrewed surface vessels (LUSVs), ranging in length from 200 to 300 feet. These vessels are envisioned to have two roles – as uncrewed ships that can carry missiles or other weapons, or as motherships that can carry medium (MUSVs) and small USVs to the fight. Anticipating that medium USVs will be the workhorses for missions such as ISR, mine countermeasures, and combat logistics, MUSVs have been evaluated by the Navy and the Marine Corps in a large number of exercises, experiments and demonstrations in recent years.

However, after almost a decade of demonstrating the capabilities of MUSVs, the Navy has been slow to establish programs of record to populate the fleet with these workhorses. The Navy should now shift its efforts from prototyping to serial production, given how these vessels have demonstrated their potential to perform the abovementioned missions. These vessels are affordable enough that they can be constructed in large numbers for the cost of a single conventional surface combatant, and allow the Navy to rapidly increase its fleet size to meet burgeoning operational demand signals. Otherwise, the Navy will not be able to confidently keep up with China’s historic naval expansion and offset the pressures that are threatening to shrink the fleet until it makes a firm commitment to serial production of unmanned vessels.

While there are a number of MUSVs that can potentially meet the Navy’s needs, there are three that appear to be furthest along in the evaluation cycle and which have been featured most prominently in numerous Navy and Marine Corps events. They cover a range of sizes, hull types and capabilities, including:

• • The Vigor Industrial Sea Hunter, a 132-foot-long trimaran. 
  • The Textron monohull Common Uncrewed Surface Vessel (CUSV) featuring a modular, open architecture design.
  • The MARTAC family of catamaran hull USVs that include the Devil Ray T24 and T38 craft. 

The CNO can accelerate the Navy’s journey to achieve a robust hybrid fleet by directing a down-select of MUSV candidates and establishing programs of record. The U.S. Navy can diversify its capabilities and make itself more competitive for great power challenges by accelerating its adoption of unmanned vessels.

LCDR U.H. (Jack) Rowley (USN-Ret) is a career Surface Warfare and Engineering Duty Officer whose 22 years of active duty included nine years of enlisted service before commissioning. Since his retirement he has continued to work, as a Naval Architect and Ocean Engineer, with the marine ship design and construction areas in both government and commercial sectors. He has had extensive experience with unmanned surface vehicles including serving as the SAIC Lead Engineer in the early stages of the development of the DARPA/ONR Sea Hunter USV Trimaran now operating with the Navy in the Port of San Diego. He currently serves as the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) for Maritime Tactical Systems, Inc. (MARTAC).

Featured Image: An Expeditionary Warfare Unmanned Surface Vessel autonomously navigates a predetermined course through the water during Advanced Naval Technology Exercise 2019 at Camp Lejeune, N.C., July 12. (Lance Cpl. Nicholas Guevara/Marine Corps)

Notes to the New CNO Series

By Artem Sherbinin and Daniel Stefanus

The Core Issue 

The U.S. Navy’s human resources (HR) policies are failing, and not because the policies themselves are ineffective, but because of their poor digital implementation. Our 21^st century workforce – mostly Gen-Z and Millennial Sailors – expects a fast, accessible, and intuitive HR software experience. Instead, they are left feeling unsupported while wasting millions of workhours annually in the battle against websites, performance evaluation tools, and knowledge management software from the 1990s. Consistent errors in their HR experience, often driven by these unreliable digital HR tools, push many Sailors out of the service. Sailors’ digital HR experience is not a quality of service or quality of life issue. Getting HR digital implementation right is a warfighting and readiness imperative.

Telltale signs of the Navy’s HR woes abound. The Navy has not met its officer recruitment or retention targets for the past two fiscal years, and enlisted end strength has been sustained only by extravagant bonuses and waiving requirements that are otherwise part of maintaining a capable military workforce such as test score minimums, high-year tenure restrictions, and PRT scores. These trends must be placed within the broader context of a population that largely cannot serve or is uninterested in serving. However, ensuring that Sailors have the digital HR tools necessary to successfully navigate and manage their careers will yield more satisfied, high-performing warfighters, driving the higher retention and recruitment we need to offset our macro headwinds.

See the World Through Gen Z Sailors’ Eyes 

The suite of HR products Sailors use today are largely unchanged since the late 1990s. From the Netscape-era BUPERS Online to the hyperlink carnival that is the My Navy Portal, the user interface/user experience (UI/UX) of the majority of Sailors’ HR systems look like retro throwbacks to a generation raised on smartphones. Antiquated UI/UXs are complimented by fragile backend systems that cannot be trusted for needs as fundamental as on-time pay, permanent change of station moves, and assignments without manual intervention and offline Microsoft Excel files.

Fundamentally, Sailors do not want to work in an environment where it takes an hour to log in to a computer or monthly paychecks that do not arrive on time, a basic function of any organization. Most worrying is the overall trend: these issues have been discussed for nearly a decade without significant improvements to Sailors’ ability to self-resolve their HR needs, especially at sea in low-bandwidth environments.

How We Got Here 

For context, in 2015 then-Chief of Naval Personnel Admiral Bill Moran launched a series of initiatives to modernize the Navy’s platforms, policies, and procedures that would become the “MyNavyHR Transformation.” In 2023, it is apparent that due to a confluence of challenges like COVID-19, intra-Navy and inter-branch IT bureaucratic gridlock, and underperforming contractors, the $1.6B transformation has failed to accomplish its objectives. This is despite mighty efforts by successive Chiefs of Naval Personnel.

The root cause of this can be traced to four key issues: the underutilization of civilian and uniformed digital talent, a lack of technical understanding and program management skills – largely at the O-6 level (knowing how to lead does not necessarily mean you can lead digital transformation), an archaic and conservative data regime, and above all else – a failure to understand end-user (Sailor) needs due to a lack of effective user feedback. Combined, these issues ran the MyNavyHR Transformation aground before it left the slip.

Charting a New Course 

The CNPs of our era – Admirals Moran, Burke, Nowell, and Cheeseman – have pushed Navy HR on all fronts to transform for our Sailors. But the problem is bigger than one DCNO and their team. Delivering the modern digital HR tools Sailors need will require significant course corrections to understand our past and steer towards our future. The Navy should first execute a top-to-bottom hot wash on what has been learned from these transformation efforts and what the Navy has not been able to overcome in fielding these tools at scale. From there, it can identify ways to better leverage and “make secure” commercial HR tools, secure additional HR IT investment in future budget cycles, have clear Get Real Get Better metrics to solve the issues stymying progress, and establish a consistent, honest feedback loop with the waterfront. If the Navy’s people are its biggest advantage over China’s military, it must prioritize empowering the HR tools that enable their careers.

Artem Sherbinin is an active-duty Surface Warfare Officer currently leading TASK FORCE HOPPER – U.S. Naval Surface Forces’ digital transformation team. He previously deployed three times to the Western Pacific onboard cruisers and destroyers. He is a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy and holds an M.A. from Georgetown University.

Daniel Stefanus is a Surface Warfare Officer reservist who worked for the Chief of Naval Personnel from 2018-2020 following three deployments to Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. He currently works in corporate strategy and holds an MBA from Harvard Business School, an M.A. from the Naval War College, and a B.S. from Duke University. He was the President of CIMSEC from 2019 to 2020.

Featured Image: PACIFIC OCEAN (April 3, 2020) U.S. Navy Gunner’s Mate 1st Class Courtney Mauldin, from Tallahassee, Fla., loads a dummy round into a Mk 45 5-in. gun aboard the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Rafael Peralta (DDG 115) (U.S. Navy Photo by Mass Communications Specialist 2nd Class Jason Isaacs)