Context Reveals a Reckless CVN CO Got His Revenge

This New York Times article is incredible. A lot of people are talking. Read it all.

Comment:

No one in the Navy can survive a five month investigation, so whenever that happens the officer being investigated is going to get hit hard. Doesn't matter who it is. The SECNAV will have the last word on this, so I'll wait to see what the ultimate conclusion is. And yeah, FOIA will tell all, because everyone and there mother wants to know if the Navy is jumping the shark with all these firings. Is the Navy upholding a high standard for leadership, or an unrealistic standard and simply using the firing of COs for PR purposes now? Time will tell.

Be warned, the "racially insensitive remarks" are not going to be what you think it is, unless you get offended when a strike group commander is encouraging the 5000 person crew of an aircraft carrier to be vigilant and intelligent when protecting the ship from the beeping beep Iranian mother beepers. The context is going to be interesting, and it will be very interesting to see how Ray Mabus sees this.

Here is what is really fascinating to me though. The New York Times just told the American people that the CO of the only CVN in the 7th Fleet today is a vengeful, reckless asshat. As outlined by the New York Times, the CO is so reckless that he will "fly" a 100,000 ton nuclear reactor waving the US flag through the most congested sea lanes in the world, and when the CO was called out for his reckless behavior at the time it was occurring, the CO reacted by getting his superior shipped off the CVN through the IG process, and ultimately ruined the career of the Admiral with a FIVE MONTH IG investigation - an investigation which no one of any rank in the Navy can possibly survive. When process is weighed with result, the IG process is looking less credible, and when the CO is still in command the Navy loses credibility.

The aspect of the New York Times story related to the CO is shocking when everything is examined in context. The behavior demonstrated by the CO is dangerous. It is poison to the institution when commanding officers must be that cautious when witnessing incredibly dangerous behavior, deadly behavior even.

Kirby may think he doesn't need to comment on the IG report, but when the New York Times undermines the CO of a deployed aircraft carrier in a way that tells a very specific and detailed story of a CO on a power trip, that issue cannot simply be ignored. I find it incredible that the Navy has looked the other way on the CO here, because this is clearly not an issue of a whistle-blower, this is an issue of a CO abusing professional processes for purposes of person revenge being told to America through the New York Times.

The New York Times and National Security

With this recent editorial, the New York Times demonstrates once again its fitness only to harm national security through damaging leaks, rather than contribute to coherent debate.

Climbing aboard the Robert Gates bandwagon (as the Secretary has replaced John McCain as Every Democrat's Favorite Republican), the Times lauds many of the Secretary's recently announced directives to cut defense spending, some of which are spot on.  Where the Times reveals its facile understanding of the security environment is with this sentence: "Once the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan wind down, the administration must look at trimming troop strength, beginning with the Navy and the Air Force." 

So let me get this straight--we plus-ed up land forces over 100K people to deal with Iraq and Afghanistan more effectively, yet when those wars wind down, cuts should begin with the two services that have shrunk in the past ten years?  This, even as a chorus of defense experts is taking up the tune of Chinese influence in Asia, and the role of Sea and Air Power in mitigating it? 


The Times continues to be the nation's leader in pretentious wedding announcements and stories of the woes of the Hamptons real estate market.  National security insight is simply not a forte. 


Bryan McGrath