“SWO Life – more like No Life Amirite?”
or
“A Sailors Life For Me” Part 3
Navy Coffee
Why can’t the Navy keep its surface warfare officers? (navytimes.com)
Continued from Part 1 and Part 2
SWOs and family don’t mix
While sexism remains a recurring concern in a male-dominated military, the female lieutenant said she doesn’t think that explains why female SWOs leave the Navy at such a clip.
“They want to leave because they want to have a family,” she said. “And SWO life doesn’t offer a good family environment.”
If a female SWO is on sea duty aboard a ship and becomes pregnant, she is removed from the ship but still listed as part of the ship’s crew, and it takes time to refill the billet, according to the lieutenant.
This leads to resentment among the other SWOs on the ship because they must pick up the slack, she said.
“I know of women who have purposely gotten pregnant and women who have accidentally gotten pregnant, and they were both treated like trash,” she said. “Most women want to get out so they don’t have to plan their family life around when the Navy allows them to have a baby.”
While female SWOs aren’t sticking around, the number of SWO women is more than three times higher than female representation in other Navy officer communities, the GAO found.
But while Naval Surface Forces gathers information on SWO separation rates by gender, “it has not used this to develop a plan to improve either overall SWO retention or female SWO retention,” according to the GAO.
“Navy officials told us that they have not identified specific actions to increase female SWO retention rates, and they do not plan to identify specific actions that may increase female SWO retention rates because they do not consider gender as a factor when developing plans to increase retention,” the report states.
Again, this is something I haven’t seen during my [limited] shipboard experiences. On my first ship, my first Department Head was female (and not a great leader IMO), but my second CO was an excellent Captain and mentor and I learned a lot from her. She and her husband were both O-5 (Commanders) when she took command of my ship. She had a few kids already – I think several that were high-school age at the time. I’ve never seen the issue of pregnant sailors or officers on the two ships I served on, but that’s a pretty small sample (although Frigates only had female officers – no female enlisted due to berthing limitations). In practice it’s really no different than soldiers/marines getting pregnant during deployments. In either case, the billets stay “filled” for admin purposes and you can’t get a replacement – no different from any other community.
The shore tour – just four years into the career – is where the Navy has historically encouraged family life/kids. There’s a good 2-3 year window of stability. Similarly, even back in 2010 Big Navy was already floating pilot programs for Career Intermission Programs (CIP) for other family life sabbaticals, internships, etc – but I haven’t heard much about those recently – I think they’re still around but pretty lowkey.
Generalist vs. specialist
An age-old debate in the SWO community revolves around whether officers should be generalized, jack-of-all-traders or authoritative specialists on a given ship system.
Big Navy has long snubbed the idea of SWO specialization, but by a margin of four to one, SWOs surveyed by GAO said they would prefer specialized career paths.
Junior officers reported a higher likelihood of staying in if they could specialize as well.
“The generalist SWO career path may have worked well 50 years ago, but waterways are becoming increasingly congested … combat systems and tactics are becoming more technical and pressurized with our now-peer superpowers like China, and we generally have too few resources (people and ships) to meet the Combatant Command operational demands,” one SWO told the GAO. “We should have specialized SWOs in ship navigation, tactics and combat systems employment, and in engineering.”
Part of the rationale for a generalist path is that a ship’s commanding officer needs to be knowledgeable on all parts of their ship, but according to the GAO, just 22 percent of surveyed SWOs wish to become commanding officers.
Junior SWOs indicated to the GAO that they were more likely to stay in if they could be on a path “that does not provide the opportunity to command a ship.”
Count the female lieutenant among those in support of SWO specialization.
“It should be a topsider and an engineer,” she said. “A topsider who has spent [his or her] whole career fighting the ship should command a ship.”
“I’ve personally had COs who did their whole careers as engineers, and then they know nothing about communications or satellites or guns because they’ve only done engineering,” she added.
The Navy has failed to assess these alternatives, according to the GAO.
“Without evaluating other career and proficiency models for potential benefit, the U.S. Navy may miss opportunities to develop and retain competent and proficient SWOs,” the report states.
Rear Adm. Trinque defended the generalist path in an interview with Navy Times and pointed out that junior SWOs who currently don’t want to command a ship may feel differently further along in their careers.
“I recognize the surveys and the work the GAO has done, and I think it would be interesting to track some JOs and whether their attitudes change over time,” he said.
To Martin, the retired SWO now at Rand, a major problem in SWO retention and career progression remains “the lack of clarity about what the Navy would like its officers to do.”
“Surface warfare officers by and large do not spend most of their careers doing surface warfare,” he said. “They’ll be performing subspecialty billets or serving on headquarters staffs or learning strategic concepts, which are all good things, but do take time and may sometimes have a whole lot more to do with promotion potential than service on ships.”
Trinque defended those off-the-water aspects of a SWO career for the breadth of experience it offers an officer.
“The ability of a SWO to do that in a flexible way is far, far greater than that of a naval aviator and submariner,” he said. “Nothing against those communities.”
This is a point in which I am in 100% agreement with the interviewees. The one thing that really stands out to me (as a PACFLT sailor) is that neither the Canadian or Australian navies are referenced in this article or the GAO paper. We conduct integrated exercises and cross-decking with both navies continually and both of those navies also have specialized officer paths – generally “Navigation and Command”, Engineering, and Weapons Systems.
HMAS Darwin
My interest has always been more along the lines of weapon systems – I loved the job as ordnance officer – probably because keeping track of ammunition by type, caliber, lot number, storage space, authorized expenditures appealed to my more anal-retentive nature. My gunner’s mates were also [mostly] a really squared away bunch and I got along really well with most of them. Probably hung out with some of them in the armory a little more than I should have during deployment, but since I was kicked out of wardroom berthing by the embarked pilots anyways and was already sleeping in the enlisted engineer overflow berthing, it seemed reasonable at the time.
After we did an ammo onload at NAVMAG (Naval Magazine) Indian Island, I decided that being a base CO at a facility like that would be a nice goal – turns out that those sorts of billets are generally only reserved for Ordnance LDOs (prior enlisted) and that SWOs pretty much have no shore duty options at those sorts of facilities under any circumstances. (Although there are still reserve ammunition-handling units that have XO/CO billets open for SWOs – which might still be an option down the road if I stay in that long or move back west before retiring).
That said – the concept of all SWOs needing to be “jack of all trades” and with a couple of exceptions (one of whom was my first department head on my second ship) it is essentially impossible to master them all – is just plain nuts. Technically speaking, I should have been working on my EOOW (Engineering Officer of the Watch) during my second ship tour – even though my watches were all in CIC and I was managing an undermanned combat systems division with a LOT of maintenance and repair headaches. Since I never got that done, the expectation would have been that I would get it during my first department head tour – which is just nuts given the department head workload and schedule – and trying to compete with other enlisted, junior officers, etc. Other than being an “engineer” watchstanding officer even if I was serving in my primary billet as a Weapons Officer or something else – I would still be expected to sit as the TAO (Tactical Action Officer) in combat for my “actual” watch rotation.
File Photo – as if this job wasn’t stressful enough already.
SWOS Department Head school – which would have taken place between my shore tour and going to my 3rd sea tour – would have been about 6 months of training – general admin and personnel paperwork, tactics, etc – cramming in a crap-load of material. My background was generally weapons, Aegis Air Defense specifically, but again, I would be expected to dive into surface warfare and anti-submarine warfare (which while crucial is something I never touched in my first 6 years on active duty) – in addition to the engineering and navigation requirements. In my opinion, it may have been done all these years this way, but even with the newer technical assists, I think it’s just too much to cram effectively onto one plate – even moreso as we are leaning more into the high-intensity threat and operating in conditions that will likely involve loss of GPS, communications, and similar circumstances.
In any case, I really hope the Navy decides to implement these recommendations – after the nth iteration of reviews and surveys recommending them.
———-
For additional recommended reading on these and “related” topics. I’d suggest:
This Congressional Report from some previous vets – pretty thorough and a lot of overlap with the GAO report.
More Commentary along the same lines – good contributor in general.
A little background on the only real surface combat action we’ve had in the last 30 years – trust me….some of the details behind the scenes on this one were a little worrisome from my perspective.
Not directly related, but a link to the full, redacted after action report on the Expeditionary Riverine vessels captured by the Iranians in 2016 due to a complete failure to follow proper procedures – due in no small part to a number of the exact same issues brought up in the SWO paper (and the after action reports from the 2017 collisions).
SIDEBAR————————————————–>
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CROWBAR?
Thank you for your substantive comment and contribution.
I’m trying to decide what level of incompetence is believable in fictitious military branches.
I can’t figure out the believable part.
Army guy perspective: There is a (very) rough correlation between troops that are more likely to be on a two-way firing range and competence. An infantry NCO is far more likely to be a competent leader/administrator than their finance, for example, peer. I think it has something to do with the consequences of mistakes. An a finance soldier’s mistake can be fixed with a few keystrokes, an infantryman’s error is far more likely to result in a folded flag.
That said, there are more than a few days where Catch 22 feels like a true-life account of events.
Cuomo just resigned. I was off by 3 days, although everybody said I was wrong to even think it would happen.
I guess he cut a deal that if he resigns, no prosecution.
That’s my guess. Resign, and this just fizzles out.
Must suck to be one who has outlived their usefulness.
I’m just curious as to who really wanted him gone, and why? It had to be a Democrat pretty high up. Is Herself thinking of running again in 2024, and she’s clearing the field?
I can’t wait for the Joemala episode about this
Careful what you wish for…
Mass murderer won’t be held accountable. Where have I heard this story before?
Well yeah, a nursing home deaths investigation would have hurt other Democrat governors, so they couldn’t let that happen.
Occupied Japan, 1946?
A bunch of gals are suing him. Who knows where it goes.
I’m shocked. What this tells me is that the Machine has other plans.
Poor Tish can’t claim to be the first Female or BIPOC governor, though. I guess she’ll just have to run on her lifelong quests to take down Orange and NYC’s most profitable industry instead.
But can she claim to be the first female and BIPOC governor? Because that’s how intersectionality works, they pretend it’s significant when people combine things for “new” firsts even though each individual element has already been trail-blazed by another.
*sigh* You’re right.
Ding dong one of the myriad slimeballs in politics is gone
Next slimeball up.
One down, about 20 to go.
One down,
about 201000s to go.I meant governors, but yeah.
Chris Cuomo must be feeling nervous right now about his own future, if CNN no longer has a need to suck up to his last name.
Podcast.
+1 Step down.
LOL. The guy has literally nothing to offer except regurgitating DNC talking points. And maybe flexing videos.
Oh pleasepleasepleasePLEASEPLEASEPLEASE let it be so . . .
Effective in 14 days. NY Glibs…hold onto your bungholes!
2 Weeks to flatten that curve?
Just this morning, I was saying he wouldn’t.
So, what is the POS replacing him?
I didn’t even know her name until yesterday. I don’t think anybody does.
And it doesn’t matter because she’s just a placeholder until the machine decides who it really wants for the job.
“everybody said I was wrong to even think it would happen.”
I was one of those.
The age of mafioso are over, the new age of wokeness is upon us. Now with MOAR WOKE!
Looks like the I’m Italian and we’re touchie feelie excuse didn’t quite cut it.
That’s a shame.
As someone born and raised and still living in North Jersey just outside NYC, Italians are touchy feely – if they like you, they’ll hug you, kiss your cheek, pat your cheek. But grabbing boobs and ass isn’t part of it.
The only ass I pat it Mrs. Animal’s, and I think the fact that she’s stayed with me for thirty years is evidence that she doesn’t mind – too much.
And that’s how it ought to be.
“pat is,” not “pat it.” Curse the lack of an edit function.
And in response the Bee comes in from the top ropes: Cuomo Resigns To Spend More Time Sexually Harassing Family.
Wait, do his illegal orders expire when he leaves office?
AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
[catches breath]
Sorry, no. AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
I think I was one of the ones who predicted that his will to power would prevent him from ever resigning. But maybe they were able to “convince” him that resigning now, doing a rehab stint for “sexual addiction,” and making public noises that sound like an apology would allow him a better future than impeachment would.
And a standing invitation to CNN or MSNBC along with book deals. He will not suffer this at all.
Thanks for these, LCDR. I enjoy the inside baseball, even though the bureaucracy makes me a little nauseous.
There are many more to take his place.
Was supposed to be a reply to the Cuomo thread.
I blame squirrel.
It’s cool. I can never get enough of Gunter.
I blame Moose.
CPRM gets it.
Is the guy on the right pregnant? Why is he so nauseated? Sometimes the odor of Starbucks gets to me, and I speak as a coffee drinker.
Things that occur to me
1) need to end up or out, along with the forced career progression
2) more time to develop expertise rather than punching a ticket
3) there needs to be corrective action for service members who make themselves unable to continue their assigned duty position
4) more realism injected into the wet behind the ears kids about what the job entails. Too much recruiting and not enough weeding out at the start.
5) more flexibility on career progression and options, including staying put or even downgrades to a preferred duty position
Yeah….I don’t think there’s enough discussion about certain types of billets. I would have been more than happy to stay as an ordnance officer (even as an ensign – for more than 2 years under the circumstances). I liked managing the ammunition, good sailors to work with, etc – but at the upper levels, larger ships, shore assignments all those “types” of billets are for Ordnance warrant officers (former Gunners Mates, etc).
I “guess” the intent of the ship billets is for the “leadership” potential and training – but it’s just a weird thing to do one or the other – especially when you find the perfect match for your skillset.
As noted before – most folks have no intent of reaching the CO role – and there aren’t that many to begin with – so they need a better filter (even though FITREPS can be a pretty good determining factor) to push people to needed jobs.
“They want to leave because they want to have a family,” she said. “And SWO life doesn’t offer a good family environment.”
What’s the old saw? “If the military wanted you married, they’d issue you a wife”?
That sounds like a horrible plan.
Here’s your dependapotamus.
And some still refuse to believe in evolution. Well, let me ask one question. If evolution was not true, how’d we get a Dependapotamus?
But in the center of the continent, luks the Deplorapotamus.
First Gulf War – our female Marines (supply and admin for an infantry battalion) were sent to Riyad to work in HQ while we headed to the border. They came back with stories of women being sent home daily for pregnancies. Some married and not deployed with their spouse. It was a mess.
Homesick and lonely members of the opposite sex are going to bang even if they’re in the military? Say it ain’t so.
That’s why the military should be all male, like the Greeks, because everybody is gay in a foxhole or something.
Supposedly pederasty was institutionalized in Greek culture as a means of population control, the leaders thought there were too many babies being born and so their solution was to encourage the young men to use each other as outlets for their youthful passions.
Bored and horny.
CLICK HERE FOR LOCAL GIRLS IN {convert_human_readable(get_user_location());}! THEY’RE WAITING FOR You!
There is a reason that bases are surrounded by used car lots, massage palors, and nudity bootys.
See GO #1 rant
I was never deployed with female Marines, our biggest problem after deployments were the pregnant wives some guys came home to.
Our First Sergeant went to his house because his wife didn’t show up and there were other people living there.
We had some poor CPT go home on leave from Iraq, the wife had left and changed the locks on the house.
Tangentially related, I think GO #1 has had a poisonous effect on deployments and war fighting but at this point it’s “always been that way” for nearly every active service member so zero chance of it being rescinded.
From memory
No alcohol
No drugs
No porn
No fraternizing with or fucking locals
No personal weapons
Some of those were supposedly to not offend host Muslim nations, yet the DFACs served bacon every morning
“No alcohol…drugs…porn”
Well, I’m out….
The drugs were verboten anyways.
The booze left the Euros shaking their heads at us.
Porn – are you kidding me?
No banging – yeah, right.
No local entanglements – I kind of get that, but yeah.
Personal weapons had been no no since post-Vietnam.
The drugs (along with being drunk on duty) I don’t disagree with.
IME, the no porn (with exceptions for the laddies mags/equiv) was the opportunity for command to selectively fuck with persons they didn’t like.
I must have hauled a metric ton of British “lads mags” out to the Borderers and Dragoon Guards. Whatever helps.
In Egypt for Operation Bright Star in 2001 a few friends and I would sneak over to the French and German E Club and get hammered with them while we were sitting in “garrison” after our Field Ops.
I was an E-4 Artillery Section Chief and at the time wasn’t worried, but looking back, I’m sure they would have nailed us if we got caught.
I guess my question is, is the Navy now woke enough for the new military?
Guess I could go for my 4th tour of the Navy Academy and I’ll know if the following things happen:
I’m met at the gate by 3 obese pink and blue haired Xes who say ‘Stop right there, whitey! Wait there until 3 BIPOC pass by in front of you and get in the back of the peeples train!’.
The tour guide arrives and says ‘Wypipo to the back of the line!’.
After the tour concludes and I’m on my way out, a Xe hands me free literature named ‘Confessing your white supremacist sins’.
Cuomo and then…Pelosi?!
Welp, browser thought I hit reply. I did not.
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2021/08/10/atlantic-magazine-nancy-pelosi-will-announce-shes-stepping-down/
It is a circle jerk piece of fantastical thinking but oh so had my hopes up.
Pelosi will step down when Hell freezes over.
After she enters it?
And assumes her rightful position as the new
LordLady of Hell.When she finally does fall down, the resulting battle for power is going to be one for the ages.
Ronan Farrow bringing the heat. He’s a Clintonite, IIRC (he was an “advisor” at the State Dept under HRH HRC). When the Clintons come for you…well, Andy’s lucky to be allowed to resign in disgrace. Sounds like they’ve been after him for a long time.
https://twitter.com/RonanFarrow/status/1425128903656361986
In all fairness to Cuomo, Preet was a massive asshole.
When two assholes go to war…
It leaves a shithole laid to waste?
Woodchipper the survivor?
Gas attacks
We lose
Was?
The good news keeps on coming — Texas Supreme Court rules that members of the legislature who ‘break quorum’ can be arrested, overturning a lower court decision.
I’m not sure creating political quasimartyrs is a good move really. I’d rather see them just hold votes without the missing members present and throw the results to the courts. It is good that they can’t just move out of state and flout their duties for extended periods of time with no consequences though.
What do you think the Democrats would do in the reversed situation?
https://www.oregonlive.com/politics/2019/06/oregon-governor-sends-police-to-find-missing-republicans-bring-them-to-capitol.html
https://www.kdrv.com/content/news/Oregon-Democratic-lawmakers-consider-rule-changes-aimed-at-preventing-future-walkouts-568464111.html
LCDR_Fish,
I’ve enjoyed these. My Dad was a Sailor, and because of that, I got very interested in the Navy. He was a member of the USNA and I used to read “Proceedings” avidly when it showed up in the mail. In high school, I leaned very heavily toward an officer career path in submarines. I don’t know exactly what happened, but my interest in military service waned, and I never even applied to the Academy.
In my career, I’ve had the opportunity to work with a lot of former Navy folks (formerly working in the power industry, where the ranks are thick with ex-Navy folks).
Aaand as the shockiest of shocks, my progressive silicon valley employer has decided to backtrack on their stated policy of not requiring vaccines to come back to office. Thankfully, WFH is an option for now, but who knows how long that’ll last.
They also engaged in some foreshadowing.
Vaccination is not a condition of employment at this time, but those who are not fully vaccinated and who must be at a site to do their job will have to adhere to certain safety measures.
???
Fuck
I am thinking all the lawyers are scrambling because that is almost identical to what the FAA told me.
At some point, some bright boy is going to start wondering why other vaccines aren’t also required and start suing the shit out of these companies using the same stated rationale the companies are advancing for covid. I’m going to laugh from the camps when this comes back to bite them in the ass.
No bites coming – they will simply nod and add moar things to the “force” list.
Eventually. I can see an unsafe workplace suit for failing to do so. Don’t have to win, just reach a settlement and take their cut.
That sounds quite possible – unless OSHA jumps up and says “Wait, we’ll fix this – force for everyone!!!!”
I have a feeling they’re just waiting for some other authority to give them the go ahead. Shit’s fucked.
Once the FDA gives its full approval…
And the first time the FDA ever gives a full approval to a Drug, Device, or Vaccine in less than 5 years, will be unprecedented. Emergency approval you know?
From the link I put down below:
“Vaccination is not a condition of employment at this time”
Speaking from experience, that will last at least 3 days, and then…
https://www.lewrockwell.com/2021/08/no_author/will-rna-vaccines-gain-fda-approval-or-turn-out-to-be-a-catastrophe/
Both.
Well, you know, Lew Rockwell were the guys who used to hang out at BWI Airport all the time. And I happened upon them many times. I ain’t saying
it’s alienscrazies, butit’s aliens!it’s crazies!“stated policy of not requiring vaccines to come back to office. Thankfully, WFH is an option for now, but who knows how long that’ll last.”
So when are you next visiting the office? A moot point for sure, because they are going to mandate it regardless and sooner than later. It’s the prog thing to do, and the Borg, they are a lot like the Borg!
So when are you next visiting the office?
Moved back here last June, have never been into the office.
I’d like the option to go in once in a blue moon, but not gonna do it if I need a vaccine passport.
I haven’t been to the office in 20 months, am not going to the office, and I already got my mandated vaccine. So just a little premonition here. And don’t worry, there are ZERO SIDE EFFECTS! VAST RIGHT WING CONSPIRACY!
I wonder if expanding the Navy’s WO program would give individuals that are more interested in being a technician than command? (I do not know what the role of a warrant is supposed to be in the Navy currently. Nor do I know how, or even if Navy warrants are used underway.)
The Army does something similar, the way I always put it was, Officers decide the mission, WOs manages the mission and resources, NCOs manage the joes, and the Joes do the jobs.