When will the US military return to pre-COVID normal? Probably never, this admiral says

Don't throw your mask away yet.

SSG Robert Mark Odom We will never see the old normal again

Well, different people will infer different things from the same statement. What "I" read was that the Admiral is excited the Navy can potentially reduce operating costs by relying less on "brick and mortar" offices for administration. That's a common theme now throughout industry. Back when I was a brand new ensign, I spent some time between graduation and reporting to flight training "working" in what we called a "stash job"... a basically useless assignment designed to come up with "something" for new officers to do to "earn their pay" before they actually began training for the real jobs they'd do. In retrospect, there's a cost attached to that, and a lot of nonsense. It may have actually been cheaper to just pay us our checks, and let us go on extended "leave" until our "class up" dates. Who knows, maybe instead of inventorying old CPUs or asking people to contribute to the CFC... I could've spent a couple months hiking the Appalachian Trail, or traveling through Europe... either of which may have given me a better perspective once it was time to head to the VTs. I personally feel we did a lot during yard periods in the Fleet that didn't make much sense either. Instead of coming into the docks for endless meetings... we could've been spending time in the simulators honing our seamanship skills, or sending our Blueshirts to important schools for their advancement... all of which we "did", but not as effectively as we might.