This article was originally submitted as a special research project for the Naval War College in October 2002 by the LCDR Michael Junge, United States Navy. Purchased but never published by the United States Naval Institute for publication in Proceedings, this article seems to align itself very well to recent discussions regarding leadership and promotions tracks.CDR Michael Junge is currently assigned to the Office of the Secretary of Defense in the Emerging Capabilities Division. He previously commanded USS Whidbey Island (LSD 41).
Introduction
When asked why officers with specific records or jobs seemed to screen over those who had done something else, a Navy Flag officer replied “Ducks pick ducks.” No matter how large, every organization’s actions devolve down to the personalities of the senior leadership. Those personalities are shaped by many factors, where one grew up, went to college, the course of instruction, tour patterns, supervisors, subordinates. All of these form the frames of reference from which leaders think, decide, and act. This study is a very limited attempt to look at the potential frames of reference that bound the current U.S. Navy Flag Officer Community. Diarist Anais Nin aptly describes my purpose: “We don’t see things as they are, we see things as we are.” Or, we can say that this is an attempt to picture a duck, the 2002 model.
Methodology
For this project I reviewed biographies of the 197 Flag Officers and Flag selectees from the Unrestricted Line communities serving on active duty between April and August 2002. The Unrestricted Line was chosen in order to reduce the sample size as well as to review those officers who lead the operational forces, as opposed to purely support forces, of the United States Navy. 164 of the biographies were considered complete enough for analysis beyond the basics of rank and designator, forming the sample set for this study. Though the data analyzed is self-reported, because of the official nature of the biographies obtained from the Department of the Navy Chief of Information, it is assumed to be factually correct. However, as there are no official standards for these biographies, there is a significant variance in the data contained therein. At the very least, these biographies illustrate that career information which each flag officer finds important or relevant. In the case of missing information, statistics were derived only from those officers who reported for that area being evaluated. Unless otherwise noted, all statistical derivations are made from those biographies and the Naval Flag Officer database available from the Bureau of Personnel.
In 1972 historian Peter Karsten published “The Naval Aristocracy.” His review of the geographic, social, economic, and political background of the nineteenth century/early twentieth century Naval officer provided much of the conceptual format for this study.
Statistical Distribution
Flag Officers make up less than one half of one percent of the officer corps, and one tenth of one percent of the overall force. 75 percent of the population of Navy admirals comes from the Unrestricted Line (URL) community while the URL makes up only 50 percent of the overall officer community. 24 of the 30 Vice Admirals and all eight full Admirals come from the URL.
Designator
41 percent are naval aviators, 34 percent surface warfare officers, and 20 percent submarine officers. The remaining 5 percent are from the special warfare (4) and fleet support (6) communities. While these percentages are somewhat aligned with the Navy officer corps at large, there are some differences. Aviation officers make up 47 percent of the URL - an under representation of 6 percent. Surface warfare officers, who make up 31 percent of the URL, have slightly more than a “fair share” of flag officer billets while submarine officers, who fill 20 percent of flag officer billets, make up only 13 percent of the URL. Fleet Support and Special Warfare are comparatively more significantly under represented with only 5 percent of flag officers while making up almost 10 percent of the URL.
Community and Sub-community
Within each of the communities there also exist sub-communities - often unofficially. As a result of the varied types of platforms, these are most prominent within the surface and aviation communities. Because of the smaller number of platforms and common training pipelines, the submarine community has instituted personnel control policies that move officers back and forth between the two types (SSN and SSBN) of vessels they operate.
Within the careers of aviation flags there have been over a dozen different types of aircraft - usually exclusive of the others. Among the current flag officers, 70 percent come from the fixed wing communities, 58 percent from carrier based fixed wing, and 56 percent carrier based, jet propelled, fixed wing. Yet, this subset makes up only 27 percent of naval aviation officers. Aviators choose their aircraft type (or have it chosen for them by the needs of the Navy) during the early stages of flight training, usually around the second year of commission service. As a result, an action that is taken very early on in ones career can greatly increase, or decrease, the potential that one is selected to flag rank.
Surface Warfare is also broken out into three distinct communities, surface combatants (cruisers, destroyers, and frigates), amphibious forces, and combat logistics forces. Since 1965, surface combatants have averaged 52 percent of the force (ranging between 40 percent in 1965 and 65 percent in the mid 1990s). Combat logistics forces have averaged 28 percent but over the last decade have been transferred to the Military Sealift Command - counting among the force but not manned by U.S. Navy personnel. Amphibious forces have averaged 18 percent with little variation. Yet, 75 percent of surface warfare flag officers have come from predominantly surface combatant careers and 81 percent have served onboard surface combatants. In the accession years studied, Combat Logistics force ships comprised a third of the force and were manned and operated by U.S. Navy personnel - but only 2 of today’s flag officers have any experience in combat logistics force ships. Amphibious experience has also not fared well. While 21 percent of the surface flags have some form of amphibious ship experience, only 4 (6 percent) have had what can be characterized as predominantly amphibious backgrounds. All four of them have served at least one tour in surface combatants.
Age
While biographies do not list age, an assumed college graduation age of 22 provides an average age range of 50 to 54 with an assumed low of 46 and a high of 58. Predictably, the higher ages are provided by the senior ranks of Admiral and Vice Admiral while the younger age groups are the more recently promoted Rear Admirals. There are some exceptions - RADM Rempt is a contemporary of three more senior officers commissioned in 1966 and a number of other two-star admirals were also commissioned in the late 1960s. The newest selectees, however, were commissioned between 1971 and 1978, with the majority clustered between 1974 and 1975. In all, the current inventory of flag officers generally began their quest for a commission between 1962 and 1974, with the overwhelming majority in some form of officer training during the height of the Vietnam War.
Sex
190 of the 197 total URL flag officers are male. 194 are married (1 man and 2 women are not). While much could be made of this portion of the analysis in comparison to today’s force and society, it is far more indicative of the force twenty-five to thirty years ago. The repeal of the Combat Exclusion Law in 1994 has the potential to alter the makeup of the future flag inventory, though it is likely that the unusual demands of the Navy will prohibit exceeding the ability of industry to promote and retain women in senior executive positions. It is important to also recognize that the selection of RDML(sel) Deborah Loren marks the first flag selection of a “warfare qualified” woman in the history of the Navy.
Geographic
The 1997 TISS study of civil-military relations made much of the influence (and difference) of geography in the accession and retirement patterns of military and civilian leadership. The oft quoted finding that the military was largely southern and conservative does not necessarily hold true with this group of flag officers. Using 1969 census data, 33 percent of the nation’s population was from the south, but only 27 percent of today’s flag officers originated there . 39 percent claim the northeast, far over representing the then population statistic of 22 percent - and higher than 2000’s 27 percent. The West and Midwest, like the south, also showed less than expected representation among flag officers. A note of caution with these numbers, however. Of the 164 Flag Officers who had relatively complete biographies, over two thirds (69 officers) did not list an accession state potentially biasing the results.
Commissioning Source
56 percent of the surveyed admirals were graduates of the U.S. Naval Academy. Officer Candidate School and Naval Reserve Officer Training Corps were more evenly matched at 20 percent and 18 percent respectively. In 1998 Naval Academy accessions comprised 26 percent of the URL, comparable to ROTC’s 24 percent with OCS providing the remaining 50 percent. This is a difficult comparison to the 1969-1978 yeargroups that saw the Vietnam buildup and drawdown but is illustrative for those attempting to compare today to yesterday. In making such a comparison it would be very easy to find “proof” of a modern Annapolis aristocracy in charge of today’s Navy. Seven officers have prior enlisted service. Two of these officers graduated from the Naval Academy, the others from either Aviation Officer Candidate School or Officer Candidate School.
Undergraduate Education
A basic requirement for commission as an Unrestricted Line officer is the possession of a baccalaureate degree. Of the 164 biographies reviewed, 98 did not disclose their undergraduate major. Of those who did, 47 (71 percent) were technical or science degrees. Math (10) was the most commonly listed major. There was no detected rationale behind not listing undergraduate major or degree. Naval Academy graduates neglected this information at nearly the same proportion as existed within the sample. Among Naval Academy graduates of the time period, Management, Oceanography, Math, Aeronautical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, and International Security Affairs provide nearly fifty percent of overall majors. While not necessarily degree graduates, 27 officers attended Harvard - usually as a member of the Executive Training Program. Of note, 36 officers listed no educational accomplishments, either undergraduate or graduate.
Graduate Education
In contrast, 110 officers listed at least one graduate degree (67 percent), 14 percent indicated two or more graduate degrees; eight officers posses doctoral degrees. Again, limited information with regards to major was provided, but there was a significant drop from the undergraduate 71 percent technical majors to only 23 percent (32 officers). The most common source of graduate education was the Naval Post Graduate School (25 percent) followed by the Naval War College (16 percent) and the Industrial College of the Armed Forces. The belated accreditation of the various war colleges potentially limits the number of graduate degrees conferred. While few of the biographies provide attendance dates, given the commissioning years studied, only the most recent (1975-78) would have had the opportunity to attend the Naval War College’s College of Command and Staff after the 1991 accreditation by the New England Association of Schools and Colleges.
Joint Education and Experience
JPME
52 officers (30 percent) reported attendance at one of the nation’s service colleges. 31 attended the Naval War College, 14 the National War College, and 8 the Industrial College of the Armed Forces. Only one (a surface warfare officer) attended the Air War College, one the Army War College (Fleet Support who also attended the Naval War College), and one National Defense University. Four officers attended service colleges more than once. Yet, despite the 1986 requirement by the Goldwater-Nichols Act that all flag officers receive joint professional military education, 91 of the 164 biographies had no mention of any form of joint education.
JCS or Joint Command
There is a commensurate scarcity of joint experience prior to attaining Major Command. 134 of the 164 Flag officers had no joint experience. Of those that had experience, most were assigned to the Joint Staff, many as members of a personal staff. There was no correlation between assignment to a joint billet and corresponding joint education. Half of the officers who had served in Joint billets made no mention of Joint Professional Military Education in their biographies. In contrast, 35 officers were assigned Joint Duty after major command.
Tour Patterns
All unrestricted line officers are expected to gain some level of proficiency in management, fleet operations, and equipment operation and maintenance. Officers are encouraged to broaden their experience through tours that span the spectrum of operations and equipment within their medium (air, surface, subsurface) and even across geographic locations. Each of the communities follows a similar path of increasing responsibility from division officer to department head to executive officer and finally command. Each of these tours is separated by assignment to shore duty to allow for maturation and broadening experience between operational tours. The primary differences occur in timing, selection flow points, and retention percentages.
Aviators undergo basic flight training, then an initial operational tour within a squadron. This is followed by a support tour in either a training squadron, teaching new aviators, or in some other shore support role. A “disassociated” tour follows as aviators go to sea in broadening roles as division officers in aviation focused ships or staffs. This is followed by a department head tour and, hopefully, a rotation among the major departments (maintenance, operations, training) within the squadron. A second shore tour brings staff experience followed by command screening and assignment as executive officer with subsequent command of the same squadron.
Submariners and surface warriors follow a similar path. Initial training is followed by division officer tours. Surface Warfare officers serve in either an operations, combat systems or engineering billet for twenty-four months with a transfer to a second ship and broadening tour for an additional eighteen months. Submariners (ideally) rotate among departments over a thirty-six month tour. Both move to shore duty in either training, education, or staff commands followed by department head tours. Surface Warfare uses two succeeding tours to specialize within one of the major departments (operations, combat systems, and engineering). Submariners generally serve a single longer tour leading one department (navigation, combat systems, or engineering). A second shore tour provides staff experience and, following screening for executive officer, assignment as second in command. A third shore tour is an opportunity for assignment to additional staffs or the War College. Command screening brings the officer to their “Commander Command”, followed by another shore tour and then Major Command as a Captain.
It is important to note that the aforementioned paths are by necessity notional. No two career paths are likely to be the same. That said, there is a nominal expectation to remain within the general bounds of the notional path. Among the biographies reviewed, there were no major deviations noted from this career path. There were, however, some interesting patterns.
Personal Staff
72 officers (43 percent) had served at least once as member of an admiral’s personal staff as an aide, flag secretary, or executive assistant. For those officers who served on a personal staff, 13 began as Lieutenants, and 6 of those have served on a personal staff more than once. 30 served on personal staffs as early as the rank of Lieutenant Commander - 9 having served more than once, five more than three times. Only 7 officers served for the first time as Commanders and 12 as Captains. Only four of them served more than once.
Washington DC
156 officers (95 percent) served in at least one Washington DC area staff position prior to being promoted to Flag Officer. However, only 100 of these officers were assigned to the DC area prior to attaining a position in Major Command. 42 officers served more than once in DC with four serving almost all shore tours in DC. Many of these tours were on personal staffs.
Navy Staff
47 percent did a tour with the Navy Staff.
Bureau of Personnel
28 percent served at least once with either the Naval Military Personnel Command or the Bureau of Personnel.
Notes on the Flag Officer Selection Process
There have been some criticisms of the current system but almost no academic research. One criticism is that selection boards have tended to look primarily at assignment patterns and for the absence of negative material rather than attempting to measure performance under difficult or stressful conditions, without exclusive emphasis on outcome or results. Another is the assertion that in too many instances, officers are selected on the basis of whom they have worked for. In 1963 the Secretary of the Navy commissioned a board to examine the criteria for selection to Flag Rank. The three major findings are still relevant. The board recommended that the Navy keep the basic selection system as it was, to shift towards subspecialist relevance, and to “select, educate, and train the numbers of officers in lower rank to meet the Navy’s requirements for special, professional, and technical qualifications at all levels.” After a review of the last five years’ selection board precept letters, there is no evidence that the system for selection is any different today.
Conclusions
Modern Implications
Peter Karsten found that the nineteenth century Naval officer was part of a “strikingly homogeneous, socio-professional group with a remarkably stable pattern of thought and behavior. ” This could be said of today’s flag officers as well. While there may have been some diversity prior to their entry upon active duty the modern flag is now an officer of limited variation in their operational experience, extensive time assigned to personal or Washington area staffs, limited (nonexistent?) experience or education within Joint operations, and while valuing post-graduate education, has done so without much regard for the subject matter.
Their experience up to the point that they were selected as Flag officers was within defined and restricted communities. Mavericks who specialized in naval warfare were less likely to rise than those who settled into a specific warfare area (especially carrier based attack aircraft or surface combatants). When ashore they spent time at staffs - either fleet or administrative, but nearly all have served in the Washington area.
They have broad education, both undergraduate and postgraduate, but few appear to take pride in those accomplishments. The possession of the post-graduate degree is more important than either the subject, and in many cases the school. For undergraduate, the reverse is true - the school is more important than the degree.
Finally, less than a third have attended Joint Professional Military Education - or cared enough to mention it within their biographies. As a result, their education in important concepts of fleet and national strategy has been taught on the job - removing the important theoretical components and replacing them with pragmatics. Only 31 officers (19 percent!) indicated attendance at the Naval War College. In 1957, Retired Vice Admiral George Dyer began an article for the Naval Academy Alumni association with a bold title: Only One Flag Officer in Seven is a Naval War College Graduate. “At the start of World War II every Flag Officer of the Navy qualified for command at sea, except one, was a graduate of the United States Naval War College. ” While today’s 19 percent is an improvement over Dyer’s recognized failing at 14%, it does not bode well for the Naval War College. The knowledge gained in Newport will be considered increasingly irrelevant if this percentage remains constant.
However, to properly discuss today, we must first look at yesterday. When today’s flag officers were first commissioned the Navy had an average strength of 700,000 personnel, 61,000 officers, and over 700 ships. Today the Navy hovers around 300 ships, 370,000 personnel, and 51,000 officers. While the Navy’s warfighting capabilities have expanded and the individual contribution of a sailor, officer, or ship is far better than it was thirty years ago, the requirements for presence and visibility of the Navy overseas have not dropped to the same degree that force structure has.
When these Flag officers were commissioned the Navy was in the final stages of the disastrous. Vietnam War and headed for drastic cuts, an oil embargo, and recession. In the middle of their career they lived the Reagan/Lehman 600 ship Navy and then as senior commanders, captains, and in some cases already Flag officers, oversaw the post-Cold War drawdown. It is not farfetched to think that many of them expected the return of a Republican administration to herald a military resurgence - and to plan their budgets accordingly, only to be caught in the reform and transformation minded fiscally conservative Bush (43) Administration.
Similarly, these officers have witnessed a quantum change in the position of minorities and women within the Navy. They entered an officially desegregated, but still divided, Navy. Women were barred from serving onboard ships. Today, we are a culturally and racially diverse force with appropriate representation of Blacks, Hispanics, and Asians in positions of responsibility. We have seen the first warfare qualified woman officer selected for flag rank and can expect to see more in the near future.
Two final areas of modern concern are the lack of amphibious and joint experience. While it is obvious that the primary forces of the Navy are those that are capable of offensive operations, amphibious forces are rapidly becoming a primary Naval weapon system. Likewise, the ability to interact at a junior level with officers of the Army or Air Force provides an ability to understand joint operations at the operations, vice command, level. This is not a new problem. In his 1989 study of the “personalities of the armed forces, Carl Builder quotes General David Jones, who in 1982 wrote “The Department of the Navy is the most strategically independent of the services - it has its own army, navy, and air force. It is least dependent on others. It would prefer to be given a mission, retain complete control over all the assets, and be left alone. ” Jones further illustrates the Navy’s reluctance towards joint or unified operations by relating a story that President Truman was brief that “the only way to overcome the Navy’s resistance was to do away with the War Department, transfer all of it’s elements to the Navy, and redesignate that organization as the Department of Defense. ” Until we can promote more officers who have served within the staffs of the Unified Commanders, we will fail to realize the benefits that true Joint interoperability can bring.
Given the decades long emphasis on Joint education and operations, how have we chosen a cadre of flag officers without either? The simple answer: Ducks pick ducks. Flag officers are chosen by other flag officers, and what they value is what they generally expect of their successors. It is rare that an officer values experience that they have not had. Joint experience is scarce, despite annual exhortations that “the Navy’s ability to operate effectively with the other services is vital to [the Navy’s] warfighting capability.” Because they and their predecessors did not have it, Joint education and Joint operations experience were not stressed to the officers who chose today’s flag officers - and the cycle continues. Post-graduate education is a similar commodity and also specifically listed within the board precepts as important. The reality of past experience led decision making is best exhibited by a recent initiative within the Surface Warfare community to alter the accession training given to junior officers. The current flag officers predate the current training plan, and simply, since they were trained in a shipboard, hands on training environment, they have ended initial classroom training in favor of shipboard assignment. Apparently they have done so without analysis or study of the alternatives. Anecdotally the rationale was “I didn’t have it that way and I made flag…why do we need to waste our junior officers time?” Rather than indict they decision, I simply offer it as an example of the experience based, vice analytical, decision process.
Future Implications
There is a cyclic theory of history that recognizes patterns of thought and action that span, on average, fifty years. This theory recognizes at least nine patterns of ideas dating to the 16th Century and calls these periods “long waves.” In 1990, Carl Builder used this theory and conducted a study for RAND the results of which were published as “Patterns in American Intellectual Frontiers.” The intellectual frontiers he describes peak at approximately fifty year intervals, rising and falling over the course of a century. As one wave is on the rise, another is declining. In 1990, Builder placed U.S. in the declining phase of the “Technological Frontier.” The frontier rested on the idea that scientific knowledge was being deliberately applied for the invention of “gadgets” whose principles were not obvious of fully understood by most of society. This is the frontier that dominated the early career of all of our current flag officers - and in some cases still does. In this same study, Builder predicted the rise of the (then) next frontier - that of Information. The Information Frontier - which included the idea that enough information could even prevent or win war - was expected to peak in the year 2000. This is the ascendant frontier that has molded the environment of the latter half of the modern flag officer’s naval career as they have replaced those who grew up in Korea and led through Vietnam and the end of the Cold War. Yet, if we accept Builder’s hypothesis, the Information Frontier is failing. There is evidence all around us, from the declining stock market to the tragedy of September 11th, 2001, to support the idea that like the industrial and technology frontiers, the information frontier is not the panacea it was thought to be five to ten years ago. Regardless of what the next frontier is; whether it is bio-genetics, neuro-computing, or space exploration, the critical ability of Navy leadership to recognize and capitalize on those changes are what will ultimately determine her success in politics as well as battle. The flag officers of today are at a critical point in history - as critical as those who led at the transition from sail to steam, wooden to steel hulls, and industrial to technological war. The very fact that today’s flag officer has seen the change of generations and waning of not one but two frontiers positions him to train and educate those who follow to look for the same changes tomorrow. The limitations of specialized experience and limited joint exposure will, however, continue to limit them.
Postscript: Areas for further study
In 1972, Peter Karsten, quoting from 1940, wrote that “there has been no first rate study of the philosophic inspiration of modern navalism.” In conducting research for this project, that quotation is as true today as it was in 1940 and 1972. Given the small amount of academic research in this area the field is ripe for further study. Comparisons between flag officer sub-communities as well as more detailed analysis of the major communities within the Unrestricted Line, as well as the incorporation of the Restricted Line are possible. Surveys of current flag officers to better determine career paths, especially to a detail not exhibited within the self-provided biographies, would allow for an examination of the name recognition versus. patronage question. Likewise, an exploration of former supervisors would be of interest. Do future flag officers learn specific traits and ideas from other, more senior, officers destined to be flags? Or, are flag officers chosen from among the best - by those who know them personally? How does a duck recognize a duck? Regardless, where an officer has come from, where they have been, and what they have learned, shape the decisions they make in the future.
Bibliography
Andrews, John S. Breaking the command barrier. United States Naval Institute. Proceedings Annapolis Feb 2000. 126:2. p70-73
Defense, Department of. Population Representation in the Military Services. 2000.
Dyer, George C., Let the Figures Speak. Shipmate. Sep 1957. p3-5.
Feaver, Peter D. and Kohn, Richard H., Soldiers and Civilians: The Civil-Military Gap and American National Security (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2001).
Hartman, Nathan, Hudson, Edwin C., and Fender, Johnny C. Senior Service School Attendance and Promotion to Colonel and General/Flag Rank: Is there a link? Air War College. April 1975.
Jones, David C. “What’s Wrong with Our Defense Establishment,” New York Times Magazine, 7 November 1982, p73 as quoted in Builder, Carl. The Masks of War. Rand. 1989.
Karsten, Peter. The Naval Aristocracy. The Free Press, NY. 1972.
Kelly, James F Jr. In search of real leaders. United States Naval Institute. Proceedings Annapolis Jan 2001. 127:1. p56-57.
Navy, Department of. Precept(s) Convening a Selection Board to Consider Officers of the Navy on the Active Duty List in the Line for Promotion to the Permanent Grade of Read Admiral (Lower Half). FY 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, and 2003.
Navy, Department of. Report of the Board to Examine and Recommend Criteria for Selection to Flag Rank in the Navy. 1963.
Navy, Department of. Use of Substantiated and Relevant Information by General and Flag Officer Selection Boards. Secretary of the Navy Instruction 1401.4. 7 November 2024
No comments:
Post a Comment