Observing Today's Coast Guard Acquisition Approach

RADM Gary T. Blore, Assistant Commandant for Acquisition and Chief Acquisition Officer (CAO), participated in a blogger Roundtable last week. Blogger Roundtables are hit and miss, sometimes they are really good, sometimes not so much, but credit Jack, Jennifer, and co because they do a great job. Anytime I feel engaged in a conversation where I learn something new, I enjoy it. I learned a lot in this discussion. Jim Dolbow's questions were quite informed and interesting, as one would expect, and he discussed his questions and RADM Blore's answers over at the USNI Blog.

If you remember last week, it was pretty busy with plenty of interesting commentary regarding Navy acquisition, in particular shipbuilding. When Navy shipbuilding is the topic, I end up in dozens of offline discussions in a day regarding various ideas, etc.. of ships, and one discussion was regarding the Sentinel class. The offline discussion I was engaged in was whether the Sentinel class was a viable platform for littoral warfare with the Navy. My answer to that is emphatically, no. But I do think the Sentinel class is brilliant for the Coast Guard, and I was one of the people who actually read the entire GAO summery regarding the protest.

In the spirit of that discussion I decided to throw RADM Blore a softball question (PDF Transcript) first so he could explain the Sentinel class acquisition process.

RAYMOND: Hi, Admiral. This is Raymond Pritchett from Information Dissemination.

I wanted to ask about the Sentinel class, which -- I noticed you put a little blurb up on the commandant's blog that highlighted the GAO summary. And I was one of the people who read through the whole summary, and it seems to me that this validates the Sentinel class development process as a bright star in terms of shipbuilding in the United States right now for our military services.

So can you kind of walk through -- you identify the requirement, you set the requirements for the ship, you -- I mean, the whole process up through the point where you -- this is how we envision it being utilized off the coast of the United States, because there were some interesting things about it. It's one of those programs where it looks like it's an evolution of an existing program. Can you kind of summarize that in a generic sense for me?

ADM. BLORE: Sure, and we have several openings in acquisition, because you sound pretty knowledgeable. So keep us in mind if you'd like a federal job.

Yeah, let me quickly review what we tried to incorporate in the Sentinel class patrol boat. That was a very important project to us. As may have been a little bit inferred in Raymond's question, we've gone through about two years of what we'd call acquisition reform. We had some acquisition projects in our past that did not run smoothly. We've learned a lot of lessons for those, and we've incorporated those lessons into a new reorganized acquisition organization.
And the Sentinel class really does represent a star for us, because it really started with the new acquisition organization going up through contract awards. So, you know, here is the types of things that are in place for the Sentinel.

In this particular case, it's a parent craft. And by parent craft, we mean we're modifying an existing proven design, and when the Coast Guard feel that can be a very successful acquisition strategy and help control costs, as long as the final version that you're going to build is fairly close to what the parent was.

The second thing is, we're having it classed by the American Bureau of Shipping. So we're going to have independent assess theirs -- assessors in the yard with Bollinger reviewing what they're doing, so that it can be classed. We've required in the contract that the designer, which is Damen, is physically there for any design changes and approves any design changes as part of the contract.
We have government personnel that we've established in a project resident office that will be onsite at Bollinger inspecting -- checking quality control, quality assurance; and overseeing the work. It's a fixed-price contract, which we prefer because that sets up good expectations between the manufacturer and us on what's expected. And those are -- that's kind of in a nutshell.
Those are the kinds of things that any new acquisition that we do -- other than the parent craft itself because that applies to some things; may not apply to the others -- but those elements of independent review, onsite government inspection -- I neglected to mention the role of the United States Navy, because we've partnered very closely with the United States Navy on this to help us with cost estimating, review of designs, that sort of thing. And of course, within the Coast Guard, what we refer to as our own technical authorities: our engineering community, our naval engineers and naval
architects, and our C4ISR engineers, and our human resources engineers, in essence, that look at training and the ergonomics for safety of design.

So all those folks are incorporated in this in, I think, a fairly efficient manner, if you look at the time line. But we believe all those elements that I just spoke about represent critical cornerstones of how you can do an acquisition project well.

RAYMOND: What maturity percentage would you mark the Sentinel class at? I mean, 50 percent, 75 percent? In terms of the design maturity.

ADM. BLORE: The design maturity is very mature. I'm not going to give you a number. We did rate it for technological maturity and production maturity.
The modifications we're making to it are not substantial. There's a stern ramp that's being installed which is based off a stern ramp that's already been done on a Damen smaller-class boat that the Coast Guard uses. The parent craft itself operates with stern ramps in other parts of the world, and the parent craft itself has been built by several other countries.

So as far as the production maturity, it's about as mature as you can get. We are making a stern ramp modification. I think our propulsion system is slightly different, although it's pretty much the standard MTU twin-diesel propulsion system. So I would say it's very production mature.

RAYMOND: And you're doing fixed pricing, so I assume you have a rough estimate on the average cost per unit?

ADM. BLORE: Right. We will. I'd rather wait a little bit, because we're doing that right now, as far as our integrated master schedule and cost analysis with the manufacturer. The first element of the contract that was awarded was $88 million, and that's for the first production. But of course, there's a lot of non-recurring costs with the first haul. And it's the government's option -- government option as to whether we want to go forward with the options in the contract.
I'm sure we will.

But if you ask the same question in about six, seven weeks I can give you a lot better figure. By then we'll be further along in the design.

RAYMOND: All right. Thank you.

I really have nothing to add to that. Observe for a moment the state of Coast Guard acquisition.

Everything is transparent. RADM Blore wasted no time telling everyone that there was cost growth in the Bertholf program, indeed he also called a press conference the same day to discuss the issues in detail. It isn't a unique situation, anytime there is an acquisition problem the first thing we see is the Coast Guard call a press conference, and RADM Blore attends every one of them. It isn't just RADM Blore though, I've noticed that the Commandant even attends some of these bad news press conferences. But here is the key, and why I think many CG acquisition critics simply don't get it...

The Coast Guard answers every single acquisition question and follows up to every single request for information, and if the information requested isn't sensitive, they give details. The Coast Guard is a small organization that maximizes funding through "parent" design evolutions with a focus on acquiring mature technologies. What is there not to like? Well, the biggest complaint I hear about Coast Guard acquisition is in regards to TEMPEST.

So I started looking into TEMPEST, and I couldn't believe what I found.

TEMPEST is the most overrated problem in modern defense spending history, and it isn't close... and the facts prove it. Find me someone who thinks TEMPEST problems are a really big deal worthy of bitching at the Coast Guard, and whether they are elected or not, I'll show you a certified, card carrying dumbass. Without question, Michael Dekort is one of the most overrated defense whistleblowers in my life time. The guy sacrificed his career to call out a problem with TEMPEST that SPAWAR had not yet been given a chance to evaluate in full. Are you telling me the smoking gun here is a revelation of a problem at a time before SPAWAR had completed its full evaluation? For his sake Mr. DeKort turned out to be a useful propaganda tool for politicians and Coast Guard critics. Some legacy...

When you think about how much midnight oil has been burned over TEMPEST with congressional hearings, news stories, etc... did anyone ever think to ask how much all of this "TEMPEST" stuff actually costs? Do you know how much money we have wasted over all these years of "TEMPEST problems" in the Coast Guard?

The total cost growth for TEMPEST on the Bertholf is $4 million, and that ship costs $700 million. That is not even 1%. The total cost growth related to TEMPEST for all programs is less than $10 million. When I read folks pointing to TEMPEST as the red flag for problems in Coast Guard acquisition, and these several years later we are talking about a defense problem that has grown in cost less than $10 million... I think the whole conversation is really intellectually stupid. TEMPEST is only a $10 million problem in all programs combined, and SPAWAR is part of the certification process to give recommendations. Like I said, TEMPEST is the most overrated problem in defense acquisition, and it ain't close.

I'll bet a pint of local brew the Coast Guard has spent more explaining TEMPEST issues over the last three years due to bad PR by Mr. DeKort than they have spent actually fixing TEMPEST issues on their ships, meaning the only real effect Mr. DeKort can be credited for is compounding the cost to taxpayers of TEMPEST. I'd love to see that analysis in a CRS report for Rep. Sanchez and Rep. Carney, because to be real honest, I think their time is more valuable than Mr. DeKort's ten million dollar temper tantrum.

Moving on...

After throwing a softball to RADM Blore with the first question, I decided to throw him a curve ball for the second question.

RAYMOND: Admiral, this is Raymond Pritchett. I have a question. You've talked a little bit about the offshore patrol cutter. Have you guys set up any sort of requirements for that vessel yet, or is that still over the horizon and just in development phase? I mean, I'm just thinking, have you thought about what size and some sort of ship requirements? I haven't seen anything. I was just wondering if there was anything that's been discussed.

ADM. BLORE: Yes. (silence)

ALL: (Laughs)

RAYMOND: Good answer, I guess. So there's nothing public, though?

ADM. BLORE: Actually, some of it's public, sir. And what we're doing is, we had an earlier question about the Sentinel patrol boat and how we did that acquisition. And we're actually following that pattern right now with the offshore patrol cutter.

So last year, I think it was in the September-October time frame, we published a request for information. That's in the public domain. And that basically asked for worldwide designs and vessels that were already in service that kind of met the general requirements of an offshore patrol cutter class -- you know, between like, you know, 250 and 400 feet, and with, you know, rough capabilities that we were looking for.

And we got a bunch of responses in on that. We hired an independent third party, just like we did with the Sentinel class patrol boat, to review the input we got and make sure that -- you know, because it's everything from 80-page detailed reports to three- page marketing glossies on a particular manufacturer. So we had the independent kind of do some analysis to make sure that the data we had was accurate. At the same time, we've engaged our engineering forces under our technical authority to start doing some preliminary point designs and to also start doing trade-off analysis, which we also have a research and development center under my jurisdiction working on. So for example, you know, if you have an offshore patrol cutter of a certain size, and it does 25 knots, and you want to drive it 3 knots faster, what kind of trade-offs are going to take place?

How is that going to affect length? How is that going to affect shaft horsepower? How is that going to affect cost?

So all that analysis is being pulled together now. We're starting to do the briefings within the Coast Guard. Our hope was that by the end of March we'd have a much better feeling for what's available worldwide, and then we're matching that against a parallel effort which is also taking place where we've designed what we call our preliminary operational requirements document. And that's a fairly broad-based document, but it starts narrowing the focus down on what are the types of capabilities that would be attractive to us in an off-shore patrol cutter.

And as you do this analysis, as you kind of look at what the world has available versus what the Coast Guard needs, then you have to make some hard choices based on -- again, using cost as an independent variable of what, you know, the nation can afford for the Coast Guard to operate.
So that's where we are. I think you'll probably see something more in the public domain after April, May, hopefully coming out with a request for proposal this summer. And that request for proposal, of course, would have all the details of the requirements that we're looking for.

RAYMOND: And has there been any influence to look at the littoral combat ship platforms?

ADM. BLORE: Absolutely, yeah. We're looking at both parent craft concepts like we're doing with the patrol boat and original design, like we did with the National Security Cutter, and there's pros and cons of both, as you may be aware of. And we're balancing those pros and cons.
And certainly, the littoral combat ship could be looked at as a parent craft and whether it would be, you know, wise for us to use that platform would really depend on how many modifications would need to be made to meet our requirements.

RAYMOND: Thank you, Admiral.

This is what I see. When Gene Taylor suggests the NSC can replace the LCS, he is wrong. The LCS is meeting a requirement for forward deploying unmanned systems technology, and while we can disagree how the Navy should be meeting this requirement, there is no question the NSC does not meet that requirement.

The same applies to the suggestion the LCS should be the Offshore Patrol Cutter. I heard a good analogy on this topic today, and I'm stealing it. The Coast Guard is looking for a Mercedes to fill a requirement, but a bunch of folks see the LCS and are trying to tell the Coast Guard "hey, just take this bus instead of your Mercedes" simply because it is available.

I have a better idea. Why not design a joint CG/Navy littoral/offshore warship from scratch and lets start talking about the National Fleet, starting small instead of big, bring in the Marines for input, and with a ground up approach see what we can come up with.

Was Mumbai a Navy problem or a Coast Guard problem? I can't wait to read the RAND report on the lessons of Mumbai (PDF) and see if they even addressed that question. What about piracy off Somalia, is it a Navy problem or a Coast Guard problem? These questions are not simple, not when the Navy is being asked to make arrests of pirates so they can stand trial, and the Coast Guard may be asked to shoot up terrorists storming Miami beach. I'm looking forward to Bob Works Navy report next week, because if my instincts are right, I bet he'll have a few things to say about a National Fleet approach to a future fleet.

And in my opinion, the Offshore Patrol Cutter looks like a great place to start the National Fleet discussion for addressing the low intensity level of war at sea, the human terrain in the littorals, and the low intensity challenges both the Coast Guard and Navy are being asked to address at home and abroad.

Thanks to RADM Blore (and Laura) for answering my questions, both in the roundtable and offline.

Talking About Somalia and Piracy

EagleOne and Noah cover the details of the blogger roundtable today with Admiral McKnight. Feel free to read the transcript (PDF) of the conversation, but I assure you it was much more painful to participate in than read, and based on the email I've received from those who have read it, the transcript is painful to read.

Be sure and read Noah's article all the way to the end and hit the link, he links back to EagleOne who is covering tactical evolution of piracy off the coast of Somalia, exactly the concern I expressed yesterday over at the USNI Blog.

For the record, the image is stolen from EagleOne, although ID regular Ken Adams was who produced it. The transit lanes for the convoy system are being adjusted on Feb. 1, 2009 further away from the Yemen coast to avoid the fishing flotillas the old lanes were near. Fishing boats and pirate boats look the same, so the international coalition is making adjustments in what I'd bet is an attempt to reduce false alarms.

Sea Basing in South America

Captain Frank Ponds (PDF) can sell soft power from the sea, and he needs a date in about 6 weeks on The Daily Show (yea CHINFO I'm talking to you). I've been involved in the blogger roundtable process for at least a year now, and this morning was the most informative, most interesting discussion I've experienced to date in these conversations with the blogosphere.

Operation Continuing Promise 08 is a strategic sea basing engagement that represents the very best of the diplomatic, national, military, and humanitarian power of the United States Navy. The Navy leverages the uncontested sea for an interactive, cooperative local engagement tailored to the host nations requirements, needs, and requests supporting medical, dental, veterinarian, and engineering engagements that significantly portraits a positive perception of the United States, and does so empowered by the invitation of the host country.

While I admit to still being concerned how we quantify results, I am convinced this is an emerging pillar of peacetime strategy that must be fully supported, encouraged, and emphasized by political leadership in the 21st century towards the national strategic ends of building partnerships, supporting regional security, and preventing regional conflicts.

Below is the transcript portion of my questions to Commodore Ponds.

Galrahn: Hey, Captain Ponds. It's great talking to you. Listening to you discuss the Continuing Promise mission, it sounds to me like everything is very tailored to the locals' needs, so this question might sound a little absurd. But, I was wondering if there's a typical day: How many people do you bring on the ship? How many sites do you put people at? How many people per site? And I understand there's probably no such thing as a typical day, but I'm just trying to get a feel for a daily operation within Continuing Promise.

CAPT. PONDS: Well, let me just tell you, the Continuing Promise mission requires a continuous day. It is non-stop. There is no break in this process ever. I mean, because when the mission stops ashore, it continues with planning on the ship. So, Continuing -- Continuous (sic) Promise off the ship is continuous operations on the ship.

So, let me give you the life in the day of a sailor onboard Kearsarge: You wake up at 4:30 in the morning. You -- you know, you clean up; you brush up; you have breakfast at 5:00. You muster at 5:30 if you're going to go on a mission -- and that's where we get the accountability of who's going ashore and what they need to do.

You're either on that helicopter, that landing craft at about 06:00 or 06:30. It normally takes you about 30 to 45 minutes to go from the ship to shore, of which you get on another transport vehicle to go to the project site, and that could be anywhere from 15 minutes to an hour and a half, depending on the traffic and the way to get there.

Once you get there, we engage immediately, and work through lunch sometimes -- or to lunch. Lunch is normally 30 minutes, which it consists of a healthy MRE right there on site, which we share with our Force Protection brethren there. We stop lunch at about 13:00 and we reengage until about 17:00. At 17:30, we breakdown the equipment we're going to bring back to the ship, or we stow that equipment that's going to be secured by the host nation. And so you get back on a bus and you travel back to the point of the embarkation -- or debarkation, and then you come back to the ship either by helicopter or by surface conveyance.

You may get back on the ship about 19:00. And they had the hiccup like last night where the waves, and the tides and currents didn't allow those individuals to get back until about 22:00. And then you come back and you're tired; and you shower; and then you eat. And then you get your orders for tomorrow.
And then you link up with the plans that has been going on while you were off the ship. And so once you get your marching orders, at 21:00; and then the day begins again a 04:30 the next day. So, that's a day in the life of a typical operation on-board the ship.

Now let's talk about the project ashore. It depends. On an average day, we have about, maybe anywhere between 100 to 150 individuals that may go ashore to cover the medical sites, the dental sites, the veterinarian sites, and the engineering sites.

Galrahn: So, you're doing one site for each dental, medical, engineering --?

CAPT. PONDS: Well, I mean, like, right now we have two medical sites, two dental sites, and we have a -- we're going to set up a (rove ?) and veterinarian sites. So, these things are not running consecutively, they're running concurrently. So, we could have, like, three medical sites running at the same time; and three engineering sites running at the same time.

Let me give you a snapshot of the total number of sites we've been working within the different countries: In Nicaragua we had eight projects going on -- everything from engineering and medical projects; in the Dominican Republic we had a total of -- let me see, looks like about nine sites in the Dominican Republic; in Colombia we had -- five, six, seven -- looks like eight sites; Guyana, we're going to have 13 sites; and here in Trinidad and Tobago, we can have up to eight sites. So, again, it's a mixture of medical, dental, veterinarian and engineering sites.

Galrahn: Thank you very much, Captain.

....

Galrahn: I talk a lot on my blog about humanitarian -- proactive humanitarian missions and these medical diplomacy missions. And there's a general consensus among my readers that this is a great thing.

But the debate begins when you start talking about how -- and I don't want to get into the white hull, gray hull debate, but I am curious about the capability sets on the ship that you emphasize -- that you would emphasize. Like, you know, is it storage capacity? Is it your medical facilities? Is it your welldeck? Is it your aviation capabilities? What is the capability set that you think requires emphasis for these missions to be successful in deployments like Continuing Promise?

CAPT. PONDS: Everything that you just named. If I had to answer your question, I would just answer just the way you said. I mean, it all depends in what country we are. I mean, as you know, right now I just told you we are off the coast of the country, and not pier-side.

And when you're off the coast, and we call that "sea-based operations," the aviation lift, the heavy lift that's provided by the HMH Fourth and by the 53s -- MH-53s, it's a critical component of being able to lift these heavy, you know, CONEX boxes filled with materiel or supplies -- whether they be medical or engineering, deep into the host nation. It saves times on the logistics -- (inaudible) -, and also it reduces the footprint ashore.

And then let's talk about also the surface lift. Some of these countries have very well-developed ports, some of them -- some of them do not. So, when we can't go pier-side, we have to use the LCMs and the LCUs that are normally used for landing Marines, but now we landing humanitarian assistance and supplies. I mean, so it's critical to be able to broach the beach to get that humanitarian assistance across the beach.

Now, let's talk about the on-board capacity. This ship, as you know, is second only to the U.S.N.S. Comfort and the U.S.N.S. Mercy for being able to deliver this medical capacity. And so whether the ship is gray, white or green,
it's the function that it brings, it's the capacity and the capability that it brings. Just because it has an LHD-3 on it -- I mean, the host nation doesn't care what the number is, or the color, all he cares about is that this ship is bringing a critical capability by sea, air and shore to their citizens.

And that's all they care about. And you know what? That's all we care about. We are no threat to any host-nation down here because we are here on a humanitarian assistance mission. That is it. Period. Point-blank. So, I think the strategic communication sometimes gets lost in the media when it gets -- and when they try to portray this ship to be doing something that it is not. This is an HA mission. This happened to be a (gray hold ?) conducting an HA -- carrying out HA operations.

Galrahn: Captain, has your ship been full? I mean, when you deployed, where you've just crammed in everything you possibly could, like the Marines were deploying? I mean, I know how the Marines deploy. Their loading plans are to pack everything you possibly can. Was that the way you guys are deployed, or do you still have capacity? Is there -- is there non-governmental organization capacity that you could support?

CAPT. PONDS: Oh yeah. Yeah, when we left we were -- we were packed in -- stem to stern, port to starboard. I mean, you couldn't move anything because, between the vehicles, the boats and the supplies -- I mean, it was, it was loaded out.

But, as we moved from one country to another country, we've expended and used those supplies and that equipment, and so we created space because of that. So when we get back we hope to be empty of only -- everything that we needed to do the job. So, yes, we can accommodate. And, again, that's what makes this ship so perfect for HADR missions, because if we had to go and support another hurricane, or whatnot, we could on-load the necessary supplies and equipment and go out and do that mission.

A few notes. It was good to hear that northeastern accent of Boston Maggie whose voice always contains an uplifting spirit within. She set the tone before the call began with energy and I thought it woke everyone up. Keep her in your prayers as she beats cancer. The questions by ID friends Boston Maggie, David Axe, and Chuck Simmons were all very good, and Tom Crowes who I am unfamiliar with, but has this excellent photo album from his trip aboard Kearsarge earlier this year; also had some excellent questions regarding the NGO and medical components of Operational Continuing Promise 08.

For me, the discussion of what platform has become mute, we need ships of various types and my impression from speaking with Captain Ponds is that this deployment, particularly in Haiti but also for the planned HA aspects of the deployment, is simply not possible without any other ship than a LHD. I've heard people complain about them, and after doing my research, I think they are superbly ignorant and uninformed.

There is a retired professor of economics who is a member of my lodge, and he has a special interest in the economy of Africa. I will not identify him by name, but note there are other sources that say at least as much as this...

He believes that the lack of security alone contributes in numerous forms towards $50 billion annual loss of GDP to the Gulf of Guinea region. A LHD costs about $3.5 billion to build, and around $100 million to operate annually for 40 years, not including life cycle modernization. It would take 4 LHDs to operate year around in that region. Even if the United States invested $50 billion over a period of 40 years in the form of LHDs for the Gulf of Guinea, which comes to around $1.25 billion annually over 40 years compared to whatever our actual total annual investment in Africa is.

The return on investment for changing the security conditions of that region, if that $50 billion annual regional GDP loss could be recouped into the global economy, would be a minimum of $2 trillion dollars of regional GDP over that 40 year period. The way I see it, soft power via joint service, multi-national cooperative engagement efforts like what the Navy is doing in the case of Operational Continuing Promise 08 with the USS Kearsarge (LHD 3) is the best bang for the buck going for US soft power. Think about it...

Full transcript here of the bloggers roundtable, and even if he is an alumni of the Crimson Tide you can check out Commodore Pond's blog here. Sorry, a bit of displaced Razorback frustration from a terrible football season spilling over...

The Technology and Culture of a Generation Gap

The activity about blogging almost seems fast and furious, except for average bloggers who see it as just another day in a connected world. Web 2.0 moves information quickly, and those who understand the tools and are comfortable with the technology learn to multi-task quickly, receive and disseminate information quickly, and move on towards accomplishing the next task quickly.

Thad Allen, Commandant of the US Coast Guard, had a bloggers roundtable today discussing the Coast Guards activities in moving towards the utilization of Web 2.0 technologies to open up the information system of the Coast Guard for accessability, but what also sounds like the process of building a communication network between the Coast Guard and its customers and clients, including the taxpayers. There was a lot of revealing information, and I thought the transcript was worth the read in full (PDF).

The reactions are interesting. David Axe, who is a journalist but also blogs both on his own blog and at Wired, sees some irony in the whole process. He's right though, the Coast Guard did trip out of the gate with its first Web 2.0 attempt, and it is easy to be skeptical of today's announced direction of the Coast Guard with a new approach to Web 2.0. I highly recommend watching out for whatever the Unofficial Coast Guard blog says, because lets be honest, it is kind of silly they got denied FOIA request due to lack of legitimacy for an editorial standard when Jim Dolbow is one of the bloggers there. After all, he is on the Editorial Board over at the United States Navy Institute. Are we supposed to believe the Admiral would give priority for the dissemination of very technical Coast Guard information to people in the MSM over that group of incredibly knowledgeable Coast Guard dudes and the Coast Guard is really taking social media seriously? Sounds like they see value in the tools, but still want to have complete control of the content. In other words, they are still in the learning process regarding what Web 2.0 and social media is.

The only thing I picked up is that Wired's Danger Room is screwed if Noah still lets me write articles for them, because while I have no problem wearing a name tag that identifies me and the blog at a Navy sponsored event, I have no intention of identifying myself by name intentionally online until this blogging thing becomes more than a hobby.

However, moving beyond some of the silliness and into the substance, I thought Armed Liberal's question revealed the depth to which the Coast Guard is taking Web 2.0 seriously.

Q Okay. My first question is sort of, as you try and talk about transitioning -- and I apologize because I was a minute or two late -- are you talking about moving the Coast Guard to sort of one common, social media platform? Or are you talking about, in essence, a cloud of tools?

ADM. ALLEN: The answer is probably, all of the above. I think you need to use a variety of tools that are out there. First of all, I think we have to have an air gap between the .mil and .com domains. There's so much stuff that goes on inside the .mil domain where we have to have security concerns. And a lot of it which it can't even be discussed at this level. And a lot of that plays into the decisions we're making about what can be done within the .mil domain and what can't be.

There are also issues about bandwidth and the cost of doing all of this. If you take a look at how many people are on .mil domains that are involved in a .com site at any time during the day dealing with our bandwidth that we're purchasing right now goes towards that connectivity. I'd like to see us move into the .com domain wherever we can and push that content over there.

That said, you shouldn't rule out anything because you don't know what the next big application is. Right now, I intend to work on Facebook. But you know, I'm not saying I shouldn't be in Second Life at some point. I'm not sure we're ready to get there now. And whether or not you're dealing with a specific platform or a cloud, I think you should figure out the effect you're trying to achieve, and it should match that.

That said, whatever we're dealing with that's going to be out there in public domain has to be information that's truly releasable to the public and is consistent with our security policies. And that's where we intend to go.

Back in the day it began with MUDs, then upgraded to Talkers, and eventually IRC. Along came AOL, the webboards and PHPBB, and then it was ICQ. Next it was the MMOs, which rapidly evolved everything as the gamers required Roger Wilco and other voice activated applications to stay coordinated against their opponents. Before you knew it, Napster was a household name, and Yahoo was running commercials during Monday Night Football. That was before Y2K.

The means by which social networking has exploded the internet into content of all forms, from MySpace to Facebook, Teamspeak, Ventrilo, and Mumble. Twitter, Social bookmarks, BitTorrent, blogging, YouTube, and pod casting are just the tip of the iceberg. Ask a Korean gamer in the coffee shop about Lineage II, and you'll begin to understand how 1.6 million Koreans in 2004 represented a global generation that opened the door for MR T. and Verne Troyer to revive their careers as spokesman for the 10 million gamers of World of Warcraft.

If you had a job in 1990 in the military services, a lot of what I'm talking about above means absolutely nothing to you. I graduated High School in 1994, was an IRCop in 1990, and was part of the thinkgeek generation where >SELECT * FROM users WHERE age > 40 returns "no idea what the hell you are talking about." Have your IT guy explain that one to you...

Today's recruit was born in 1990, while today's Generals and Admirals were in the Persian Gulf in 1990, and they don't understand how the world changed when a bunch of young parents watched CNN on a certain winter evening. The culture changed back home, and with the fall of the wall a connected youth experience evolved the culture of a generation of young people to something unfamilar to previous generations. The culture most American youth grew up in is nothing like the culture that today's officers knew as a youth, and it extends far beyond technology even as it was heavily influenced by technology.

I read Admiral Allen's answer and for me it reveals the Coast Guard has seriously considered Web 2.0 in the broad context necessary to be successful over the long term. Domain distinction does matter. OPSEC is the consideration with the largest learning curve. Bandwidth defines the amount of content flow, so it must be center to the decision process. Technology is rapidly evolving, there is no maturity in any of the Web 2.0 technologies currently leveraged for moving information (despite what people believe), and it is unlikely these technologies will fully mature until after IPv6 becomes the accepted standard. We live in a 32-bit information world in transition towards X-Box of information flow. The distance between a MUD and World of Warcraft is the distance between the record player and the IPhone.

My advice to the Coast Guard is the same advice I would give all the services, evolve at the pace necessary to give the older officers time to adapt to the culture changes best reflected in the generation you are recruiting today, because the changes will be much broader than just the tools of technology. Technology is just one of many ways the generation gap is reflected. The entire culture of the connected generation is different, and the generation gap will extend far beyond technology.

A Lunch Meeting Worth Attending

I am usually excited about lunch tomorrow, likely to be enjoyed with a BLT on this tasteless low calorie bread my wife buys. It isn't the food I'm looking forward to, rather the company.

The DoD Blogger Roundtable folks are hosting a very interesting conversation which can be heard on blogger talk radio here at 1:00pm EST. The topic:

Dr. Goldberg and Mr. Sottilare will discuss Technology in Army Training, specifically the use of gaming and other techniques in training 21st century Soldiers. They plan to discuss the current research their organizations are conducting; of particular note will be a projects using multi-player game technology to train units in different locations.

Last time I posted on gaming and virtual worlds, I got a great comment from a regular reader:

You know, maybe I've been taking this blog a bit too seriously.

I don't know why, but that is one of my favorite comments. But... we all start our careers somewhere, and I was one of those guys who was the right age and professional experience at the right time to jump into the virtual world industry during its birth. It was a great experience, particularly for someone like me who did not go to college and at the time had more experience with IP protocols and technologies than 99.9% of the college graduates with computer related professional education. Every college graduate at that time was a master of inline code, but found the mainframes being retired in mass within the decade following their graduation. Most had to learn object oriented programming on the job. It is amazing how quickly technology has evolved.

Nearly a dozen years later I find myself removed from the gaming industry, and very curious to see how the Army is adapting virtual world technology for their own needs. My experience is the vast majority of folks over 40 are interested in observing the technology, but that same vast majority of folks over 40 don't really understand virtual worlds or its usefulness. However the culture in the Army is different than the culture of the private sector, and adapting towards the usefulness of technology is one thing the military does do very well.

The use of virtual world technology has already had practical effects to society as a whole though, US researchers have used virtual world technology to study the housing market bubble and effects, and virtual world technology has also been used to predict and protect against the effects of counterfeiting and inflation. Another use is how economists have used virtual worlds to predict the effects of globalization. There are several other applications in use today for economic, social science, and marketing research.

I dug up some old biographies from both speakers.

Robert A. Sottilare is currently the Chief Technology Officer for the U.S. Army Research Development & Engineering Command Simulation and Training Technology Center (RDECOM-STTC) in Orlando, Florida. Mr. Sottilare has 24 years of experience in various modeling, simulation and training positions as an engineer, program manager and researcher within both U.S. Army and U.S. Navy training organizations. Mr. Sottilare has a Masters in Modeling and Simulation from the University of Central Florida and is an alumnus of the Advanced Program Managers Course at the Defense Systems Management College (DSMC). He is currently pursuing a doctorate in Modeling & Simulation at the University of Central Florida.

Stephen Goldberg, Ph.D. is the Chief of the US Army Research Institute’s Simulator Systems Research Unit in Orlando, Florida. He has over 30 years experience leading and conducting training and Soldier performance research. He received a Ph.D. in experimental psychology from the State University of New York at Buffalo. He has authored numerous technical reports, book chapters, and conference presentations. He recently completed a five year term as Chair of the multi-nation Training Technology Panel of The Technical Cooperation Program (TTCP). He is also US National Leader and co-chair of a NATO Research Study Group investigating human factors issues in the military uses of Virtual and Augmented Reality technology. Steve has served the Society for Military Psychology as Newsletter Editor, Program Chair, Secretary, and President. During his presidency he arranged the first cosponsored a mid-year symposium with Division 21. He currently serves as Chair of the Fellows Committee. He is also an Associate Editor of Military Psychology, the society’s journal.

Based on what I know of Mr. Sottilare, Land Warrior could come up as a topic. For those of you who use the submarine training simulation systems, I'm almost positive those systems were in part developed by Mr. Sottilare.

According to Virtual Worlds Management, subscriptions for MMO gaming has now reached over 1 billion annually, and is expected to rise to $1.5 billion over the next 3 years. Based on my own experience with IGE, the black market for virtual world gaming is somewhere around $1 billion or more annually, and I'd be shocked if the 'farmer' market' (second definition) wasn't at least a quarter billion.

Among the aspects I hope to learn more about include how the Army is using virtual worlds for political, social, tactical, and strategic training. For example, one can teach Asian culture, or tribal culture with virtual world environments as part of training and simulation, is this being done? Virtual Worlds are also excellent for quickly learning the basics of foreign languages. I'm also curious about the relationship between the Army and the big players of the virtual world gaming industry.

The Navy and NASCAR

Today there was a blogger roundtable I missed due to travel, the topic, Recruiting. The Navy is leveraging NASCAR for recruitment, specifically the Navy car driven by Dale Earnhardt Jr. (#88) to recruit. Enter one of my favorite bloggers, Boston Maggie, who we'll refer to as the goddess of the naval blogger strike group keeping us all honest. Maggie kicked ass today at the roundtable, giving us something to talk about with this issue, which I was not sure was actually possible. Even better, she did it with one good question.

Well, recently the CNO spoke about diversity. And I believe the quote was, when the nation looks at the Navy, it should see itself reflected back.

How are you incorporating that motive into this campaign?

Great question, because like you the first thing that pops into everyone's mind when I hear recruiting and NASCAR is diversity! Maggie is quoting the CNO from reporting like this from just the other day.

Capt. Jack Hanzlik has an interesting answer though, I'll post in parts. I have completely ignored the "diversity" discussions in the Navy because I'm not in the Navy, but because this is a blogger roundtable, because I'm at least aware of NASCAR being a sports fan, and because this is a Navy blog I'm opening the floor.

Well, I think NASCAR has had the reputation of being more of a male-dominant, white-attracted or Caucasian-attracted type of sport if you will. We're finding that that demographic has changed substantially.

There's at least equally a large number of female folks who are interested in NASCAR. And so that's one element. We're heavily focused on attracting women to the Navy these days. So we do reach that demographic in that audience.

There are fewer minorities in the service, I'm sorry, in NASCAR, than you'll find in other areas, other sports for example. But it seems to be growing. And I don't have any measure to give you at what rate it's growing. But you'll see it in the drivers. We certainly see it in the teams too. I mean, the team is as diverse as they come.

And what we try to show when we bring our sailors there is that we are a diverse service, from those folks that are involved with the recruiting activities. We have both men and women and usually each of the different race and ethnic backgrounds represented there too, so that as young men and women approach us to talk to us about the service, they see that we are a diverse organization.

I don't get the daily bombardment of diversity love letters that sailors get, so I have no idea what the policy is nor what it is like in the Navy. I do know what its like in business though, and diversity means very little outside of government and politics. Government in general has become too sensitive and too politically correct for my taste. In the workplace, at least in all the workplaces I travel to, people don't want to have their race highlighted for positive spin, they want to have their work highlighted for positive spin, which is why so many people work so damn hard. It isn't about what they are, it is about what they are doing.

I get that it might be useful to "have both men and women and usually each of the different race and ethnic backgrounds represented" but as far as the rest of the answer, it sounds fake because it is bullshit. Is the Dale Earnhardt Jr. recruiting campaign really about recruiting women and minorities? If it is, next time hire Brad Pitt and Tyra Banks.

Here is what Capt. Jack Hanzlik should have said, "We recruit white people too." That isn't racist to say, and it is the truth, and there is nothing wrong with saying it. Am I suggesting minorities don't go to NASCAR or don't like NASCAR? Nope, but trying to tie diversity in recruitment on the topic of NASCAR is a bit dishonest, and is spin. How clear was it that he was spinning? Capt. Hanzlik got so dizzy he somehow took the topic of diversity and NASCAR to its logical destination... Ballistic Missile Defense.

We also carry that one step further in that we have a program called the Fleet Honoree Program. And that's part of our morale focus, where we bring young men and women who are sailors out in the fleet, doing great work, and it's kind of a reward where we choose one of our commands to be honored at each race. And a lot of times it may tie to something unique that has happened in the real world also.

For example, down at Talladega, we brought the folks off of the USS Lake Erie. Lake Erie, if you remember, a little more than a month and a half ago, was the cruiser that shot down the spy satellite. And we thought that there might be some real interest for media to have the opportunity to interview the young kids -- I say kids, but -- the young men and women that were involved in that incredible event.

And so we try to bring down sailors that have recently done something that is noteworthy, that media might be interested in talking to them about. It's a nice reward for them to come down and experience -- that's kind of a unique thing. And then we bring them right down to the pits, and they spend the day in the garage, at the pit, with the team throughout the day, and they get a chance to meet those folks that are really running the programs for the drivers.

And they get a chance to sort of share their respective experiences and see men and women like themselves that are doing different jobs.

And you know, it puts our best foot forward. And I think that everybody that's had a chance to meet the young men and women that come down and participate as a fleet honoree, they've always been very impressed with them.

For recruiting at a NASCAR event, I have a suggestion. Set up a booth with 100 pictures and video of the Sea Fighter, Austal LCS, HSV Swift, and Super Hornets supersonic. Find a few former enlisted and officers who have served on those platforms, and tell them to share stories. People don't go to a NASCAR event because they love left turns, they go because they like to drink, but also because they enjoy speed. Considering how much speed is costing the nation in shipbuilding, we might as well start getting some return on investment somewhere!

The program Capt. Hanzlik describes sounds like an awesome program, and a very smart way to capitalize on events like the Satellite shoot down. Here is my question though, if you are rewarding an entire section for their work during an event, does it take work to create diversity? I'd wager not, because the numbers are what they are. From the same article linked above.

Across all branches of the U.S. military, the numbers are (enlisted and officer ranks):

White - 66%; Black - 20%; Hispanic - 7.5 %, Asian/Pacific Island - 3.5%, American Indian - .9%;

For whatever reason, and I honestly don't care what those reasons are because they do not matter at all, the percentages listed are not balanced against the total population of the United States. According to the US Census Bureau the racial demographics from 2006 break down as follows:

White - 73.9%; Black - 12.2%; Hispanic - 14.8%, Asian/Pacific Island - 4.5%, American Indian - .8%;

You can see it however you want, but I see it like this. The comparison tells me the military doesn't have a diversity problem, they are clearly reaching minorities and if there was one area that could use improvement, it would appear based on these statistics they should perhaps look for creative ways to reach out to the Hispanic community.

The Navy can suggest NASCAR recruiting fits into all this diversity talk and even suggest a NASCAR recruiting campaign is intended to target women, but at the end of the day, Capt. Hanzlik's answer is spin, driven by fear of the diversity brigades more than anything. It isn't doing the Navy any good if the PAOs are walking on eggshells, and are forced to spin themselves dizzy because a blogger asked a good question.

Since Capt. Hanzlik can't say it, I will. The NASCAR recruiting program is doing what any smart recruiter program would do, is is targeting a base of potential candidates that are more likely to sign up. As I've mentioned many times, part of my role as a business owner is to hire qualified people who will do a job and do it well. When I need specialized folks for high level IT jobs, I don't advertise using the local newspaper. I use technical lists and websites specific to my requirements where I know I am more likely to find someone experienced and knowledgeable with the skill set I desire for the position.

The Navy deserves credit for this program. They are going to places where they are more likely to find patriotic young people willing to join the Navy. Sounds like a smart use of money for recruiting to me. It is a shame that the Navy PAO for the program can't tell it like it is, and it takes a good question from Maggie and some analysis here to offer honesty to the program and its objectives. For the record, I don't blame Capt. Hanzlik, sounds to me like he does a good job, its the stupid screwed up system he is operating within that creates the problem, and that should be clear as day to his superiors.

Blogger Roundtable Topic: 4th Fleet

I plan on participating in this today.

Navy Rear Adm. James Stevenson, commander of the U.S. Naval Forces Southern Command, will discuss the reestablishment of the U.S. 4th Fleet. 1:00 p.m. Eastern.

You can always listen live at 1:00pm EST here. I have 2 questions ready to go, but if you think you have a really good question I should consider asking instead, leave it in the comments.

This topic should fit in well with this weeks theme of maritime peacemaking strategy.

Maritime Strategy: Blogger Roundtable

This evening several bloggers participated in a Blogger Roundtable conference call with Deputy Chief of Naval Operations Vice Adm. John Morgan. It was my first time participating in one of these blogger discussions, and I personally thought it was interesting. Other participants included Eagle1, SteelJaw Scribe, David Axe, and I think the fourth was Greg Grant of GovExec (I might be wrong). Invited but unable to show up was CDR Salamander, Chap, and Thomas Barnett.

First I want to give credit to the Navy. Last Friday I was critical of the Navy not leveraging the internet, and then yesterday I get an email from CDR Salamander who forwards me a message from the host of the blogger roundtable, with a link to that criticism no less, asking how to get in touch with me. Mike, for the record, I'm rethinking my position and you might be right.

The audio of the discussion is available on BlogTalkRadio if you are interested. Listening to myself is a reminder that 8 years in New York has done little to take the Arkansas draw out of my voice, even if I still haven't recovered said voice in full from my recent illness. My wife told me yesterday I sound like I'm going through puberty, but thankfully the voice returned enough that the little boy voice from yesterday won't be broadcast across cyberspace.

I will probably discuss the roundtable discussion further once I get done thinking about some of what was said. I was the only person who was able to ask two questions, perks of arriving first. My questions were (this is not verbatim).

Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Response is featured as one of the 6 capabilities the Navy intends to execute with the MS. Observing the proactive deployments of both grey and white hulls, the Mercy and Comfort missions for example, the Peleliu deployment to SE Asia last year, and the upcoming deployment of the USS Boxer to South America, the Navy is committing budgetary resources including ships and personnel to what some are calling Naval Medical Diplomacy. Conventional wisdom, of which I am a subscriber, suggests these missions do (or should) contribute to the National Interest, but my question is, what empirical data is being measured to determine success or failure of these Medical Diplomacy deployments? What metrics is the Navy using to measure the return on investment of this capability outlined in the MS?

The answer was that the Navy is using the independent analysis by Pew Research to collect the data. At first Vice Adm Morgan started discussing statistics, but he pulled up short realizing those aren't measurements of success, rather measurements of work conducted. I've been thinking about this for awhile now, and it seems to me this is something the State Dept would do if they were worth a shit, and Pew Research data would be crossed reference as a second source. The ability to measure soft power including initiatives like Naval Medical Diplomacy is going to be critical in the development of successful peacetime strategy principles, and right now the government is outsourcing this role. Maybe I am off base here, but if I was the Navy, I would want to measure the degree of success of my own strategy. Every successful large business in America internally measures the success or failure of their strategies, I think the Navy should too.

The second question.

The 2006 QDR lists "Shaping the Choices of Countries at Strategic Crossroads" as one of its 4 strategic priorities, and it goes on to say "The United States will attempt to shape these choices in ways that foster cooperation and mutual security interests." While the QDR goes on to list a number of countries, it spotlights the choices of major and emerging powers including India, Russia and China as key factors in determining the international security environment of the 21st century. The Maritime Strategy makes reference to preventing great power war and announcing the concentration of combat credible maritime power in the Pacific, but does not specifically identify these and other emerging challengers to the international security environment by name, My question is, why does the MS intentionally not discuss the challenges of emerging regional powers? For example, why doesn't the MS discuss the impressive growth in China’s maritime power when we are potentially on the edge of a maritime competition?

I kinda stumbled on myself getting both questions out, oh well. In answering this question Adm Morgan basically said they didn't want to name any names and he didn't offer a reason why. I was left unimpressed by the answer, there was no intellectual reason offered regarding why the Navy would ignore naming the challenges. In my opinion Russia, India, and China each represent a unique challenge, the Middle East represents a unique challenge. This isn't about naming an axis of evil, I simply think if we are going to develop a maritime strategy to manage the disruptions to a world emerging through globalization in the 21st century, it seems a bit silly for us not to acknowledge challenges regarding the nations that will have the most influence on the international security environment of the 21st century.

In reflection, based on the non answer, but also due to the questions asked by SJS and Eagle1, I'm wishing I would have used my last question to discuss the duality nature of the Maritime Strategy. You have to listen to the short conference call to understand what I mean, but the Navy basically has developed two strategies, and we are way beyond the object being command of the sea.

I have two new phrases for the lexicon. Thanks to David Axe I'm thinking the phrase used by Vice Admiral Morgan that "Every budget is a Strategy" is something that we will be using quite often. Also SJS's question brought out an interesting discussion point, something more readily discussed before my generation grew up, but something that I think will be worth several thousand words on this blog in the future: Escalation Control. To me this sounds a bit like a strategic principle for a peacetime strategy.

Other points of interest. Vice Adm. Morgan thinks the fleet is too small to execute the maritime strategy. Vice Adm Morgan somewhat combined several aspects of the strategy to emphasize forward presence.

Final thought, prior to today I had not heard Vice Admiral Morgan speak, but I have read many dozen transcripts and published works that gave me some sense of his vision for naval strategy. A few months ago the question was asked who in the military are the great active duty modern security thinkers of our time, and I answered Vice Admiral Morgan. Today he validated my thinking at the time. I'll have more thoughts on the blogger roundtable discussion this weekend, but I want to digest the discussion before I dig in.