What Is The Problem With The Navy Service Culture?

Sailors (at Sea) work longer and harder than anyone I have ever seen. The OPTEMPO is just constant, and insane. The ship does not stop running. It has to be constantly maintained, regardless of what else is going on.

They're "cities" and the Captain is in charge of it all, down to the last bolt.

Being at Sea, there is no running to Mainside if you find yourself short of X. You have to make it to the next UNREP, and a little mistake is anything but. They snowball fast.

Moving away from the US Navy for just a second. Look at these cruise ship disasters over the last few years. A plumbing problem, or an engine problem, and you end up with 3k~ people stranded for 7 days, and no way to get them home. Now imagine doing that with a military vessel in the middle of the Indian or Pacific, and the food is running out.

This promotes a "zero defect" mentality, and honestly, in the Navy I can understand it. While I was in, I saw more Captain's Mast (NJP / Art 15) on Ship than I saw anywhere else. They did not screw around. The "relieved for cause" piece is just an extension of that.

I think we are just more aware of it now, because of the internet, and social media. As information is more available, Higher Headquarters is just faster about removing people at even a hint of trouble. If you're in charge a billion dollar piece of equipment, and thousands of lives, there is no reason to give the benefit of the doubt. We'll assume guilt, get someone else out there, and let the investigation clear you. I know this seems counter to American Ideology... but think of the alternatives.

Now, that said, this isn't all bad or good. It can promote a fear of failure mentality, but it can also promote a trust in the organization that toxic leadership will just be "disappeared" swiftly. No games, no muss, no fuss. Just gone.

I wish I could speak with any authority on what most of the Navy does, but I just fly land-based airplanes.

The zero-defect culture we have now is one that followed Admiral Rickover and his nuclear program. Once the rest of the admiralty saw what kind of results he could get by belittling people, treating them like slaves, and forcing them to live in utter fear of a single mistake, they knew what they had to do to replicate them.

As for getting away from a blue water concept and into a green water mindset, the best answer I can give is that we don't have any rivals. Our current submarine fleets and carrier battle groups are more than capable of winning in the open ocean, but there is a desire to be more hands-on in littoral waters, with a bigger presence than gun boats can give. It's the street fighter concept.

I think the whole military in general (with the possible exception of the Marines) seems to be quite confused as to it's role. The Cold War has been over for over 2 decades and we just spent the last 13-14 years fighting a war no one was prepared for nor wanted to fight. Now with budget cuts and global uncertainty every service is trying to find the best way to stay relevant (in order to maintain their budget). Also, our foreign policy hasn't had a sufficient update since the end of the Cold War so the services are really just playing it by ear at this point.

If we want all the chaos in the branches to stop we need to set a realistic and solid foreign policy from which they can be guided. There needs to be directives about what their missions should be (i.e. USMC is the amphibious, rapidly-deployable, ground combat force). And there needs to be more cooperation between the service chiefs and Congress on budgets, that are realistic (no more F-35 fiascos).