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i 

61–771 2010

[H.A.S.C. No. 111–174] 

FLEET READINESS 

JOINT HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON READINESS 

MEETING JOINTLY WITH

SUBCOMMITTEE ON SEAPOWER AND EXPEDITIONARY 

FORCES 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED ELEVENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

HEARING HELD 

JULY 28, 2010 
(II) 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON READINESS 

SOLOMON P. ORTIZ, Texas, Chairman 

GENE TAYLOR, Mississippi 

SILVESTRE REYES, Texas 

JIM MARSHALL, Georgia 

MADELEINE Z. BORDALLO, Guam 

CAROL SHEA-PORTER, New Hampshire 

JOE COURTNEY, Connecticut 

DAVID LOEBSACK, Iowa 

GABRIELLE GIFFORDS, Arizona 

GLENN NYE, Virginia 

LARRY KISSELL, North Carolina 

MARTIN HEINRICH, New Mexico 

FRANK M. KRATOVIL, JR., Maryland 

BOBBY BRIGHT, Alabama 

JOHN GARAMENDI, California 

DAN BOREN, Oklahoma 

HANK JOHNSON, Georgia 

J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia 

ROB BISHOP, Utah 

MIKE ROGERS, Alabama 

TRENT FRANKS, Arizona 

K. MICHAEL CONAWAY, Texas 

DOUG LAMBORN, Colorado 

ROB WITTMAN, Virginia 

MARY FALLIN, Oklahoma 

JOHN C. FLEMING, Louisiana 

FRANK A. LOBIONDO, New Jersey 

MICHAEL TURNER, Ohio 

CHARLES K. DJOU, Hawaii 

VICKIE PLUNKETT, Professional Staff Member 

LYNN WILLIAMS, Professional Staff Member 

KATY BLOOMBERG, Staff Assistant 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON SEAPOWER AND EXPEDITIONARY FORCES 

GENE TAYLOR, Mississippi, Chairman 

SOLOMON P. ORTIZ, Texas 

JAMES R. LANGEVIN, Rhode Island 

RICK LARSEN, Washington 

BRAD ELLSWORTH, Indiana 

JOE COURTNEY, Connecticut 

JOE SESTAK, Pennsylvania 

GLENN NYE, Virginia 

CHELLIE PINGREE, Maine 

MARK S. CRITZ, Pennsylvania 

W. TODD AKIN, Missouri 

ROB WITTMAN, Virginia 

ROSCOE G. BARTLETT, Maryland 

J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia 

DUNCAN HUNTER, California 

MIKE COFFMAN, Colorado 

THOMAS J. ROONEY, Florida 

WILL EBBS, Professional Staff Member 

JENNESS SIMLER, Professional Staff Member 
(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF HEARINGS 

2010 

Page 

HEARING: 

Wednesday, July 28, 2010, Fleet Readiness .......................................................... 1 

APPENDIX: 

Wednesday, July 28, 2010 ....................................................................................... 33 

WEDNESDAY, JULY 28, 2010 

FLEET READINESS 

STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS 

Forbes, Hon. J. Randy, a Representative from Virginia, Ranking Member, 

Subcommittee on Readiness ................................................................................ 2 

Ortiz, Hon. Solomon P., a Representative from Texas, Chairman, Subcommittee on Readiness ...................................................................................... 1 

Taylor, Hon. Gene, a Representative from Mississippi, Chairman, Subcommittee on Seapower and Expeditionary Forces ........................................... 4 

Wittman, Hon. Rob, a Representative from Virginia, Subcommittee on 

Seapower and Expeditionary Forces .................................................................. 4 

WITNESSES 

Harvey, Adm. J.C., Jr., USN, Commander, U.S. Fleet Forces Command; accompanied by Vice Adm. William Burke, USN, Deputy Chief of Naval 

Operations for Fleet Readiness and Logistics, and Vice Adm. Kevin McCoy, 

USN, Commander, Naval Sea Systems Command ........................................... 5 

APPENDIX 

PREPARED STATEMENTS: 

Akin, Hon. W. Todd, a Representative from Missouri, Ranking Member, 

Subcommittee on Seapower and Expeditionary Forces ............................. 43 

Forbes, Hon. J. Randy ...................................................................................... 41 

Harvey, Adm. J.C., Jr., joint with Vice Adm. William Burke and Vice 

Adm. Kevin McCoy ....................................................................................... 46 

Ortiz, Hon. Solomon P. ..................................................................................... 37 

Taylor, Hon. Gene ............................................................................................. 40 

DOCUMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD: 

[There were no Documents submitted.] 

WITNESS RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS ASKED DURING THE HEARING: 

Mr. Coffman ...................................................................................................... 53 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING: 

Mr. Ortiz ........................................................................................................... 57 

(1) 

FLEET READINESS 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON READINESS, MEETING JOINTLY WITH SUBCOMMITTEE ON

SEAPOWER AND EXPEDITIONARY FORCES, Washington, DC, Wednesday, 

July 28, 2010. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 10:02 a.m., in room 

2118, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Solomon P. Ortiz 

(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. SOLOMON P. ORTIZ, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM TEXAS, CHAIRMAN, SUBCOMMITTEE ON 

READINESS 

Mr. ORTIZ. The subcommittee will come to order. Today, the 

Readiness and Seapower and Expeditionary Forces Subcommittees 

meet to hear testimony on issues affecting the readiness of the nonnuclear fleet. 

I want to thank our distinguished witnesses from the Department of the Navy for appearing before the subcommittee today. 

Admiral Harvey, as you note in your prepared statement, you 

and your colleagues are here today because the Surface Force’s 

overall readiness trends remain in the wrong direction. When the 

Navy Board of Inspection and Survey in April of 2008 deemed the 

USS Chosin and the USS Stout unfit for combat operations because 

of their material readiness condition, it confirmed the subcommittees’ concern regarding the readiness of the Surface Force. 

The Readiness Subcommittee in March, 2009, examined issues 

the Navy faces in sustaining its Surface Force ships for their expected service life and beyond. The Navy reported at that hearing 

that it had begun taking steps to address gaps in ship maintenance 

funding and to address material conditions through a pilot program 

of technical inspections. 

Since last spring, however, other reports and incidents have 

come to the subcommittees’ attention that once again raise the 

issue of whether the Navy can achieve, let alone extend, the design 

service life of its Surface Force ships. These reports and incidents 

call into question the ability of the surface fleet to accomplish assigned missions. Concerns range from quality assurance issues affecting the USS San Antonio, the lead ship in the new LPD [Landing Platform Dock] class of amphibious transport docking ships, to 

the conclusion of a Fleet Review Panel that Surface Force readiness has degraded to a point that it is well below acceptable levels 

to support reliable, sustained operations at sea. 

The subcommittees today will examine the factors that appear to 

have contributed to these concerns. These factors are wide-ranging 
2 

in nature and comprehensive in impact, from manpower and manning to funding, training, equipping, command, and control culture. 

We also will address what steps the Navy has taken to move 

from a period of degraded readiness where, as you noted, Admiral 

Harvey, commanders were allowed to operate and maintain their 

ships below established standards, back to a Navy that fulfills our 

sailors’ expectations regarding their deployment readiness—where 

effectiveness is more important than efficiency. 

Our witnesses today are Admiral John Harvey, Commander, 

Fleet Forces Command; Vice Admiral William Burke, United 

States Navy, Deputy Chief of Naval Operations, Fleet Readiness 

and Logistics; and Vice Admiral Kevin McCoy, Commander, Naval 

Sea Systems Command. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Ortiz can be found in the Appendix on page 37.] 

Mr. ORTIZ. The chair now recognizes the distinguished gentleman from Virginia, Mr. Forbes, the ranking member of the 

Readiness Subcommittee, for any remarks that he would like to 

make. 

Mr. Forbes. 

STATEMENT OF HON. J. RANDY FORBES, A REPRESENTATIVE 

FROM VIRGINIA, RANKING MEMBER, SUBCOMMITTEE ON 

READINESS 

Mr. FORBES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank all you gentlemen for your service to our country and for being here today. We 

are having this hearing today because it has become wholly evident 

that decisions driven by near-term budget pressures have resulted 

in long-term impacts to the fleet. 

This committee has consistently warned of the risk associated 

with Navy’s resourcing decisions over the last several years. Despite those warnings and efforts to get the Department of Defense 

[DOD] to consider long-term requirements, the trend of declining 

readiness is undeniable. Some may think we ask for things like the 

30-year shipbuilding plan, the annual report on China, and the 

Quadrennial Defense Review [QDR] because we just need a few 

more reports to read each night. In fact, we legislated the specific 

requirements to these plans and reports because we consistently 

see the Department taking a rather myopic view when it comes to 

resourcing decisions. We live in a world where fiscal restraint is a 

national security imperative. The problem is that the DOD has 

taken a view that fiscal restraint means they take actions that are 

contrary to their own best interest. 

Admiral Harvey, I appreciate you coming before the committee 

today. And I am looking forward to your oral testimony and the 

rest of today’s discussion. But for the sake of those that don’t have 

a copy of your written testimony before them, I would like to take 

just a second to highlight some of the things you provided in your 

written submission to the committee. 

You note that risk to the Navy is ‘‘moderate, trending to significant,’’ and that your investigation into the related readiness issues 

found that ‘‘the cumulative impacts of cost-cutting decisions made 

over the last two decades had begun to degrade Surface Force read-
3 

iness.’’ You go on to note that ‘‘these trends were 20 years in the 

making and will take constant pressure over time to resolve.’’ 

Admiral, this is exactly why we ask for plans that contain a 20- 

to 30-year outlook. Instead, oftentimes the reports we get are somewhat narrowly focused and they fail to identify the long-term consequences of the decisions that are being made. The problems we 

are talking about today are problems which result from a QDR that 

fails to look out 20 years and, instead, focuses on the here and now. 

The Navy chose to substantially short-change sustainment and 

manpower accounts in order to extract savings to pay for procurement and modernization efforts. The culmination of several 

resourcing decisions over time has reduced the skills of our sailors 

and significantly reduced the surface life of the ships we were 

counting on for decades to come. This is the equivalent of saving 

up to buy a nice, fancy new car, knowing all the while that you 

won’t be able to afford to change the oil or rotate the tires. 

The budgeters in the Department seem to just push those expenses outside the 5-year budget cycle and hope that someone else 

will come along and fix the problem. The problem with that approach is that there is no magical cash cow outside the FYDP [Future Years Defense Plan]. Year 6, year 7, year 8, even year 20, are 

likely to be just as constrained as year 2. But no one inside the 

DOD seems to be willing to admit that, and no matter how hard 

we try, we can’t seem to get them to acknowledge the obvious, 

much less put a plan in place to deal with it. 

So we now find ourselves with several bills to pay—bills to cover 

corrosion and ship repairs because preventive maintenance actions 

were not done or were deferred; bills to cover end-strength requirements to reestablish the cadre of experienced enlisted sailors and 

instructors; and bills to cover critical parts shortages and tools that 

were at one time deemed to be ‘‘excess requirements.’’ 

I don’t know what that bill is. I haven’t seen it. But I can guarantee my colleagues it is going to cost the taxpayers a lot more 

than it would have if we would have just resourced those readiness 

needs in the first place. 

Mr. Chairman, I don’t know what it is going to take for all of us 

to realize that we have got to develop a reasonable long-term approach that balances sustainment with the need for modernization 

and recapitalization. 

Gentlemen, I know you are good men. You have served your 

country well. And we want to come together and try to find a partnership of how we can just make sure that we are moving our 

Navy forward in the direction that is going to guarantee the safety 

and defense of our country. 

Thanks for taking time to be with us today. 

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Forbes can be found in the Appendix on page 41.] 

Mr. ORTIZ. The chair recognizes my good friend, the chairman of 

the Seapower Subcommittee, Mr. Taylor, for his remarks. 
4 

STATEMENT OF HON. GENE TAYLOR, A REPRESENTATIVE 

FROM MISSISSIPPI, CHAIRMAN, SUBCOMMITTEE ON SEAPOWER AND EXPEDITIONARY FORCES 

Mr. TAYLOR. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. With your permission, I 

am going to submit a statement for the record. 

Mr. ORTIZ. No objection. So ordered. 

Mr. TAYLOR. Mr. Chairman, I want to thank you so much for 

having this hearing. I think everyone here shares the same goal, 

and that is a 313-ship Navy that is fully capable of defending our 

Nation for years to come. The Navy has been given the additional 

mission of providing our Nation’s national missile defense. So it is 

particularly troubling when there are headlines in the Navy Times 

about the Aegis radar systems being inoperable or at less than optimum use. There are a lot of things that are causing this. 

The two sailors who were apprehended in Afghanistan this week 

are a painful reminder of the demands being made on the Navy for 

things that are not normally their mission and the need for individual augmentees to go help the Army and the Marines in their 

missions in Afghanistan, often taking people away from what we 

train them to do, which really causes two problems. It puts them 

in a position where they are not fully trained for the mission in Afghanistan; but it also takes someone who is trained to be manning 

a radar, someone who is trained to be a hull technician, and takes 

them away from the ship where they need to be, with the result 

of less-than-operable ships. 

If we are going to get to 313 ships, we have to have ships that 

last for 30 years. And, with optimal manning, we have seen crew 

sizes reduced to a point where maintenance is not getting done, 

electronics are not being repaired in a timely manner. And the 

other shortsighted cost-saving attempt was buying spares, which 

means that they weren’t there when the ships needed them to replace the parts that are worn out. 

So I hope we will get some answers today from our panel in front 

of us. We, obviously, have some challenges. But I think we all 

share the same goal of a 313-ship Navy—a Navy that continues to 

be the world’s greatest for decades to come. 

I yield back. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Taylor can be found in the Appendix on page 40.] 

Mr. ORTIZ. The Chair recognizes the distinguished gentleman 

from Virginia, Mr. Wittman, for any remarks that he would like to 

make. 

STATEMENT OF HON. ROB WITTMAN, A REPRESENTATIVE 

FROM VIRGINIA, SUBCOMMITTEE ON SEAPOWER AND EXPEDITIONARY FORCES 

Mr. WITTMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will begin by asking 

for unanimous consent to entering Ranking Member Akin’s remarks into the record. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Akin can be found in the Appendix on page 43.] 

Mr. ORTIZ. So ordered. And now we are going to proceed with 

your statement, Admiral Harvey. 
5 

Mr. WITTMAN. Just for a moment. I wanted to thank the admirals for joining us today. We appreciate your dedication and your 

service to our Nation. As you know, I think all of us here believe 

that there are some significant challenges out there ahead for the 

Navy; that operational capability concerns us all. As you know, the 

term ‘‘Ao’’ [Operational Availability] means a lot to a lot of people 

up and down the line. And that operational capability, as we see 

today, is something that is critical and something that we absolutely have to address, just as Chairman Taylor said. 

As we look at the number of ships we have, those ships that are 

in service, the needs that those ships have as far as needing maintenance is of considerable concern to us, especially as we look at 

the challenges that we face around the world. And if you look at 

our Naval force structure, I think all of us believe that there are 

many areas where the demand far exceeds the capability to meet 

that demand. And that is becoming more and more of an issue, 

more and more of a concern for us. 

As you know, there are only a certain number of dollars to go so 

far; and that is where we need to really be focusing this discussion, 

is to say within that context, let’s get back to the basic element of 

what is strategically needed for this Nation. 

And I realize, ultimately, budgets do drive things, but they ought 

to drive things in a reverse order. This body ought to have before 

it the full need of what the Navy has before it, whether it is maintenance of the ships it has, the ships we need to be constructing 

in the future, and then make sure that we put those in context of 

the decisions that need to be made. And that is, I think, more critical than ever these days: to make sure that strategy decides our 

decision-making, not having budgets drive our decision-making. 

I realize budgets are a reality, but I think if we look at the challenges around the world that the Navy faces in its needs, ‘‘We have 

got a lot to do, and a short time to get there,’’ as the old saying 

goes. 

So I appreciate your commitment. I look forward to your testimony today and look forward to your insights as to how we can 

make sure that the readiness of our non-nuclear surface fleet is 

where it needs to be. And that, I think, is critical as we go forward. 

So, Mr. Chairman I thank you, and I yield back. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Thank you. Like I have always stated, we belong to 

the same team. And in order for this subcommittee or for the full 

committee to be able to help you, not that you haven’t been candid 

in the past, but we need you to be candid with us and tell us exactly how we can help you; what is wrong, what can we do, how 

can we help? 

STATEMENT OF ADM. J.C. HARVEY, JR., USN, COMMANDER, 

U.S. FLEET FORCES COMMAND; ACCOMPANIED BY VICE 

ADM. WILLIAM BURKE, USN, DEPUTY CHIEF OF NAVAL OPERATIONS FOR FLEET READINESS AND LOGISTICS, AND 

VICE ADM. KEVIN MCCOY, USN, COMMANDER, NAVAL SEA 

SYSTEMS COMMAND 

Mr. ORTIZ. Admiral, whenever you are ready, sir. 

Admiral HARVEY. Thank you, sir. 
6 

Chairman Ortiz, Chairman Taylor, Representative Forbes, Representative Wittman, members of the Readiness Subcommittee and 

the Seapower and Expeditionary Forces Subcommittee, I do appreciate this opportunity to discuss the number one issue I face every 

day, which is the readiness of our fleet, and in particular the readiness of our surface fleet. And I would ask that my previously delivered written statement be entered into the record, sir. 

Mr. ORTIZ. No objection. So ordered. 

Admiral HARVEY. Thank you, sir. To your comment about being 

on the same team, there has never been a doubt in my mind. And 

that was proven last night with the vote taken here that will move 

the funding to where we need it desperately in this year to keep 

going on many of the corrective measures we have put in place to 

deal with the issues that all of you have just remarked upon in 

your opening statements. So I do thank you on behalf of the sailors 

and Fleet Forces Command for the actions last night in approving 

that funding bill. 

Readiness is my top issue every day. And, in my view, there are 

four components of a ready force: sufficient numbers of high-quality 

people; well-maintained and ready equipment; units that are properly supplied; and effective training programs. 

I believe the first component is the most important. Readiness 

begins and ends with high-quality sailors. And we risk our ability 

to retain high-quality sailors if we do not provide them with the 

tools, the training, and the time required to deploy, confident in 

their ability to accomplish their assigned missions. 

Our Navy, our deployed surface force, is ready today. Our response to Haiti, while continuing all the other missions we are currently executing around the globe, is not the hallmark of an unready force. 

But some key readiness trends are certainly in the wrong direction, as highlighted by unsatisfactory and degraded Board of Inspection Survey results over the last few years. These trends, as 

you have commented upon, sir, were 20 years in the making and 

will not go away overnight. But if not turned around through a determined and steady process, they will impact our ability to sustain 

today’s high operational tempo into the future and ensure today’s 

fleet can reach its expected service life; which is precisely why Admiral Willard, then the Commander of the Pacific Fleet, and I established the Fleet Review Panel, to determine the facts and identify the root causes behind the trends we were experiencing with 

our Surface Force. 

We chose Vice Admiral (Retired) Phil Balisle to lead this panel 

because of his extensive operational and command experience at 

sea, as well as service to shore in positions of significant responsibility with respect to the sustainment and maintenance of the fleet. 

He had the background necessary to determine the facts and the 

determination to follow the facts wherever they led. In our view, 

he had the credibility, independence, and experience to take a long, 

deep look at the problem across the entire manned, trained, and 

equipped spectrum. 

Admiral Balisle gave us a good sight picture of what had happened over time. We let the effort to generate execution-year savings, year after year, overtake our culture of operational effective-
7 

ness, and he confirmed much of what we needed—Admiral Willard 

and I, now Admiral Walsh and I—what we needed to go and do, 

which we have gone and are doing. 

A constant undercurrent within the negative trend lines of our 

Surface Force readiness was the unreliable performance of USS 

San Antonio. The LPD–17 class represents Navy’s strong and enduring commitment—strong and enduring commitment—to expeditionary operations, power projection, and strategic engagement. 

This ship is extremely important to the future of the Navy and Marine Corps team. We had to find the facts behind recurring problems with her propulsion plant and put a corrective plan in effect 

as soon as practicable. We have done so. The plan is in execution, 

and our lessons learned are being applied to the other ships of this 

class. With the completion of the Fleet Review Panel report and the 

San Antonio investigation, we now have a clear sight picture of the 

root causes behind the negative readiness trends we have observed 

in our Surface Force. 

With regard to the Littoral Combat Ship, the LCS, I believe it 

is critical that we, Navy, adapt to the LCS, and we do not force the 

LCS and her crews to adapt to an institutional fleet model. We 

must be more forceful to ensure we do not expect this ship to be 

a destroyer. It was designed, built, and manned to specific littoral 

missions, and is not meant to run with a carrier strike group in 

blue water over an extensive period of time. We deployed her essentially 2 years early to greatly accelerate our learning curve with 

this ship, which was built with research and development funds. It 

was a brilliant move by our CNO [Chief of Naval Operations]. 

I see tremendous opportunities for this ship if we truly take the 

time to learn and then act deliberately on the facts we determine. 

Quickly transitioning LCS to the fleet and getting our ships to expected service life are critical to growing our fleet, as you have 

stated. We have to learn to man our fleet with about 324,000 sailors, which I believe, based on my 21⁄2 years as the Chief of Naval 

Personnel, is about the right number for the fleet size we are attempting to achieve. 

But I also know we still need to work the distribution of our people to ensure we get the ‘‘train and maintain’’ piece correct; in particular, properly manning our optimally manned ships and creating 

the billets ashore to reestablish a seashore flow between ship and 

intermediate-level maintenance organizations to develop the 

skilled, experienced petty officers and chief petty officers we must 

have. 

So we will arrest the negative trends. We will redistribute manpower. We will target resources at root causes to get maximum impact. And we will sustain our efforts over time to get our ships to 

service life. We will stay on it. 

And I would certainly be happy to respond to any questions you 

may have, sir. 

Thank you. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Thank you. 

[The joint prepared statement of Admiral Harvey, Admiral 

Burke, and Admiral McCoy, can be found in the Appendix on page 

46.] 
8 

Mr. ORTIZ. I have some questions that I would like to begin with. 

My first question will be, Why didn’t the Navy understand the 

overall—the big, big-picture impact of the incremental changes that 

were made over the past two decades in the name of efficiency and 

cost-cutting? And does the Navy have enough people to correct Surface Force ship manning and reverse degraded readiness? 

Is there any truth to a recent Navy Times report that the Navy 

could cut as many as 25,000 sailors and officers from its ranks over 

the next few years? 

And I know I am asking too many questions at the same time, 

but you take time to respond. What budgetary changes have been 

made and what programmatic changes are being considered to address the man-train-equip issue cited in the report? 

Admiral HARVEY. Yes, sir, you did ask a few questions there, but 

I will get at them the best I can. First, and to the most important 

one because of the potential impact it has on our sailors today. 

I know of no plan, I know of no planning in place to cut an additional 25,000 sailors from today’s fleet. I have just testified to the 

fact that I think around 324,000 sailors is the right number for 313 

ships. I would react strongly to any plan that would take us an additional 25,000 sailors below that. I find that a statement that, 

wherever it was attributed to, to be wildly off the mark. 

To your second question in terms of manning. Again, I think it 

is based on a distribution issue, sir. We have taken steps today, in 

the recent past, to improve our manning on the LPD–17 class with 

the lessons we learned from the JAGMAN [Judge Advocate General 

Manual] investigation that I ordered. We have redistributed manning today onto our LSDs and our LHAs in the engineering department. We have done that today. We have a plan to continue this 

redistribution through fiscal year 2011, and a larger plan for redistribution in 2012 and out, which is under discussions now as part 

of the building of the POM [Program Objective Memorandum] 

2012. 

So we are taking steps, sir, to effect that redistribution that you 

just talked about. I think that we can execute those steps, not 

based on wishful thinking, but based on what I learned during my 

time as Chief of Naval Personnel and things that are within the 

Navy’s power to do. So I think we can move forward in that, and 

we are moving forward right now, to achieve those goals. 

As to the larger question you asked, Well, how did it all happen? 

I certainly have been part of this for the last—I have been a flag 

officer for 10 years. I was promoted in December of 2000. Very intimate with many of the details that we are talking about here. And 

I see my own experience as kind of indicative of what may have 

happened in the larger sense. 

I think in the surface fleet in particular, we got very focused on 

what can we do this year to save money, and we were not focused 

on what do we get out of the long haul from all this. In my experience in Fleet Forces Command, I have seen a much stronger governance model in our submarine force and in our aviation force. I 

think it is particularly because the results of failure are so much 

higher. A plane will come out of the sky, a submarine will not surface if we don’t get it exactly right. And so that intensity that 
9 

grows from those kind of results was missing in our review, I suspect, of surface fleet changes that were made over time. 

We also were very, very focused on meeting operational demand, 

as Representative Wittman has discussed, and I think that focus 

on meeting the Ao, getting out there and answering every combatant commander demand for the surface ship, today we have 60 percent of your fleet is underway; 43 percent of your fleet is forward 

deployed. Those figures are unprecedented in my experience. And 

we have sustained that 60 percent or above figure for over a 

month. Routinely, we have been deploying over 50 percent of the 

fleet underway every day. So we have really been focused on the 

Ao and not focused enough on the implications of what meeting 

that Ao, that operational demand from the combatant commanders, 

needed day after day, month after month, year after year. 

The trends we see now in our INSURV [Board of Inspection and 

Survey] reports, that started the ball rolling. We now have a really 

good sight picture of what we have to do. And I feel that with the 

sustained funding that we saw in fiscal year 2010, that we have 

submitted fiscal year 2011, and will be part of the 2012 POM bill, 

I think if we maintain that funding, continue the redistribution 

plans that we have recommended, I think we can go a long way 

towards arresting those trends and, just as importantly, ensuring 

the fleet gets to its expected service life and make that 313 number 

a reality. 

Mr. ORTIZ. You mentioned that what we need to do is to be sure 

that we have sufficient personnel to man those ships. If we are 

going to extend the life of these ships, we cannot, in my opinion, 

cut corners. We need to be able to maintain it and, like I say, to 

supply it. 

In the past, we have had testimony that we don’t think we have 

enough personnel on the ships. I don’t know whether through your 

experience and learning from past experiences if you were able to 

come up with the same conclusion that we need more personnel so 

that we can, in an efficient way, do what we need to do to extend 

the life of the ships. 

Admiral HARVEY. Yes, sir. We are putting more people onto these 

ships. We will put more into the fire controlmen on our destroyers 

and cruisers, our enginemen on LSDs and LPDs, and machinist 

mates on our LHDs and LHAs. But it is a redistribution of those 

sailors that we already have within the larger 324,000. 

Also, one of the important things that I think was lost along the 

way is, as all these initiatives were going down their own tracks, 

each of these initiatives, whether it was in the manning world, in 

the maintenance world, or the resourcing world, all of them were 

based upon certain assumptions coming true. And when the assumptions didn’t fully come true, the plan didn’t change. We continued. And so I see that as really at the heart of the matter. Optimal manning depends upon a vigorous shore support capacity. We 

were down this road before. 

I was in the commissioning crew of USS McInerney, FFG–8, back 

in 1978 and 1979. A minimally manned ship. Not an optimally 

manned ship. A minimally manned ship. We showed up in 

Mayport, Florida, and I took the work package over to the shore 

intermediate maintenance activity, as it was supposed to be done. 
10 

I was laughed out of town and told, ‘‘Hey, that’s your problem, Harvey. Get on it.’’ 

We did not fulfill the assumption that a minimally manned ship 

needed significant additional help to do the fundamental maintenance. We didn’t get it right then. And I don’t think we got it right 

now on the shore support piece. That is why we are so focused on 

the LCS. We can’t afford to get that wrong. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Now, we also wondered, you know, about—we are seeing now more Navy boots on the ground in Afghanistan and Iraq. 

I don’t know how many numbers are there, but this has taken 

away from doing the job, like Chairman Taylor stated a few moments ago. Do you have any idea how many boots on the ground 

we have in Iraq or Afghanistan? 

Admiral HARVEY. As of today, we have about 6,500 sailors on an 

individual augmentee [IA] assignment in Afghanistan and about 

2,300 left in Iraq. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Could this be one of the reasons why you need more 

people to be able to operate and maintain the ships? 

Admiral HARVEY. Certainly those are sailors who, if they weren’t 

in Afghanistan or Iraq, would be doing something, not all of them 

on ships. Many of them are in skill sets that come out of the shore 

establishment. 

Admiral McCoy has a significant number of engineering duty officers that are performing important jobs there. We have senior 

supply corps officers doing important jobs in contracting to maintain control of all those funds that are going over there. 

So I can say it is not a reason. If someone says that is bringing 

us down, I would disagree with that. I know the impact. I know 

where those IAs come from, which ships we bring them from. We 

have increasingly, over time, put safeguards in place to ensure we 

don’t take them from certain ships that are already in a manningconstrained environment. 

So, yes. Does it make the daily job tougher for some ships, for 

some sailors, for some squadrons? Absolutely. But it is an important mission for the war. And some of those are missions that only 

our sailors can do. And so when faced with the greater good, I 

think the Navy has made exactly the right choice. And I stand up 

in front of our sailors every day and I tell them as long as those 

conflicts are going, we are going to have IAs over there. We are 

where we are. They are doing a vital mission and they are a large 

part of the progress we have made. I am proud of what they have 

done. I expect it to continue. But I don’t see that as the reason that 

I would say is bringing any unit to its knees in terms of sustaining 

that IA effort, sir. 

Mr. ORTIZ. And I am just going to have the last question, short. 

Going back and looking as to what maybe went wrong, did you find 

that the people who were building these vessels supplied the best 

material? Did you find any material used to build the ship was inferior? 

Admiral HARVEY. I think I will defer to Admiral McCoy on that 

question, sir. He has a far better picture of that aspect of the LPD– 

17 issue than I do right now. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Admiral. 
11 

Admiral MCCOY. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. To address your question. 

Mr. ORTIZ. My question was, going back and looking at some of 

the experiences in the back, a few years back, and why they are 

deteriorating. Were there any facts that maybe the material used 

to construct these ships were inferior; were not the top-quality material that should be used? 

Admiral MCCOY. Mr. Chairman, no, sir. In terms of the basic 

materials and components, we did not find that they were a contributor. What we did find was the fundamental construction processes used by the shipbuilder, for example, on the LPD–17 class, 

the fundamental government oversight at the supervisor shipbuilding, and then some sub-optimized system designs were responsible for the failures, principally on the LPD–17 class main engines 

and on the piping systems. 

Mr. ORTIZ. I am going to yield to my good friend, Mr. Forbes. 

Mr. FORBES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

As the chairman mentioned, we appreciate so much you being 

here. We view this as a team. But, Admiral Harvey, I will tell you, 

oftentimes my frustration is I think we are viewed as a team when 

it comes to appropriating money to spend, but we are not always 

viewed as a team when it comes to sitting down and looking at the 

choices we have for the long-term consequences of where those dollars are—effects they are going to have down the road. 

We appreciate the three of you. You are the guys we have got 

at the table today, so we are not pointing fingers at any particular 

person. But we don’t have the luxury of going over to the Pentagon, 

walking down halls and stopping in people’s offices and saying, 

‘‘What assumptions are you basing this on?’’ 

One of the things that is so frustrating to us is, Admiral, as you 

mentioned, you said, ‘‘The projections are based on assumptions. 

And when assumptions do not come true, the outcome is not obtained.’’ Over and over again, we are trying to get at those assumptions. And we just feel like we just get stonewalled in trying to find 

out what are the assumptions so we can look at those long-term 

impacts. 

Admiral Burke, last week we were talking about the modeling 

and simulation capability that we have. You told us at that time 

that the models were fully accredited and enabled the Navy to 

project resourcing requirements based on a desired level of readiness. 

Can you tell us how those models will be used to improve the 

forecasting and long-range resource management for the Navy and 

how we can get at being able to understand those models better so 

we can do just what Admiral Harvey was suggesting—look at the 

assumptions to see if the assumptions have some common sense to 

them and will work? 

Admiral BURKE. Sir, let me try. Mostly, we are talking about 

ship maintenance, oh let me start with that. The ship maintenance 

model is a set of spreadsheets and databases, and it is designed to 

program and budget for depot and intermediate maintenance for 

our ships and submarines. It has a variety of inputs. Those inputs 

are the force structure, the class maintenance plan, fleet depot 

maintenance schedule, material and labor costs, and workload 
12 

standards. So those inputs are critical. And what you get out is determined by what you put in. And what we put in in the past is 

a class maintenance plan that has not had a view for long-term 

maintenance to get at expected service life. 

So that is what Admiral McCoy’s guys have been working on for 

the DDG–51 class and the LSD–4149 in preparation for the 2012 

budget. They have revised that class maintenance plan. So that 

will now be—and I will let him talk about this some more—but 

that is now designed to get at long-term expected service life of 

these ships—long-term maintenance to get to the expected service 

life. The output of this model is a workload by location; the cost; 

and a backlog, if you don’t put enough money into it. 

The other thing that Admiral McCoy’s guys are working on is the 

class maintenance plan is a notional class maintenance plan. So it 

tells you what the DDG–51—what is needed in the 51 to get it to 

expected service life, that long-term maintenance that we had to 

some degree lost our way on, to what Admiral Harvey was talking 

about, where we are trying to make sure the ships are able to get 

underway. The focus was on getting underway. We needed somebody to focus on what it takes to get the ships to expected service 

life. That is what NAVSEA [Naval Sea Systems Command] is 

doing. And that is what they have done with this review of the 

class maintenance plan. 

The other piece of this is how do you know what the specifics are 

on that ship—on DDG–55, for instance—that are different from the 

notional. That is another piece of what Admiral McCoy’s folks are 

working on. And there is a plan to get through all the classes over 

the next couple of years to develop that improved class maintenance plan as well as to identify the differentials for the specific 

ships from the notional. 

So back to the model again. If we improve the input, which we 

will do, that class maintenance plan will change the database that 

is designed as one of the inputs, down to the level of what does it 

take to repair this specific pump and how frequently should it be 

repaired; what parts, how many people, what level of capability is 

required. When that gets adjusted, that will adjust what comes out 

of the maintenance model, sir. 

Mr. FORBES. Good. 

Let me just ask one more question and any of you can respond 

to this. Again, we appreciate so much your expertise. We understand a lot of these issues are incredibly complex. And it is always 

great to look at them on Monday morning and look with hindsight. 

But some of it is not so complex and some of it comes down to some 

commonsense things. 

One of the things that we have seen, recently the Navy submitted a 30-year shipbuilding plan that contained a profile that 

shows a funding increase of $2 billion per year in constant dollars 

in the middle of the plan. Now these are the years, incidentally, 

that coincide with the procurement of the Ohio class submarine, 

the platform the Navy has decided to fund from within the SCN 

[ship-procurement] account rather than request increased funding, 

with the Secretary of Defense requesting the Navy to find $28 billion in efficiencies over the next 5 years; with your own $523 million shortfall in fiscal year 2011 alone; with $3 billion in shipyard 
13 

infrastructure shortfall; with what at least a couple of us believe 

is a very ill-conceived billion-dollar carrier move to Mayport; is 

there some way you can explain how the Navy will be able to increase the shipbuilding budget in those years? 

Admiral HARVEY. I think when you look at the totality of the 

budget within the Department of Defense and how we have to fund 

ship construction throughout a FYDP [Future Years Defense Plan] 

and submit a 30-year shipbuilding plan to you that makes an extraordinary number of assumptions—we know that those assumptions, the longer you go out in that shipbuilding plan, the less likely some of those assumptions are to hold for 10, 20 years—I find 

it not unreasonable to expect, here is a 30-year plan. Here is what 

we think we need to have over the next quarter or more of a century in order to sustain the fleet into the third part of this century. 

So I don’t find it unreasonable to put in there, Hey, this is what 

it is. This is what it would take to sustain this fleet. On the SSBN– 

X, in particular, we know the goal has to the got to be to deliver 

the minimum essential military requirement that that submarine 

needs at the most affordable cost. And I would say that the search 

for that answer is not over yet. 

So there is considerable more work to be done in terms of that 

particular issue that may make that burden in the outyears far 

less onerous on the overall SCN account. 

Those are my thoughts from Norfolk. I am pretty far away from 

the day-to-day thrust and parry of how you put together the shipbuilding plan and the 30-year shipbuilding plan. But I don’t find 

what has been submitted, sir, unreasonable. Those assumptions 

are certainly true, that we are going to have to increase the SCN 

account. And what our Navy will look like in 5 and 10 years, in 

terms of the action the Secretary of Defense has directed us to go 

and take, may make indeed those assumptions very true for us. 

So I hear you, sir. I don’t see the hopelessness of it. I see something where we have a lot of work to do and a lot of time to do 

it. 

Mr. FORBES. Admiral, I am not suggesting the hopelessness nature of it. What I am simply saying is that one of the statutory requirements of that shipbuilding plan is that the Secretary of Defense give a certification that the budget is sufficient to accomplish 

that shipbuilding plan. And it is just when you look at these numbers, it makes us scratch our head and say, how do you get from 

here to there with the numbers that we have been given. Laying 

out the needs is one thing, which I don’t disagree with that; but 

I think if you look at some of these dollar figures, it is hard for us 

from a commonsense point of view to see how you get there. I think 

that is a question we need to be asking now instead of just 10 

years down the road. 

With that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back. 

Mr. ORTIZ. The chair recognizes Chairman Taylor. 

Mr. TAYLOR. Mr. Chairman, thank you again for having this very 

important hearing. 

Gentlemen, I am going to quote to you a paragraph in the Fleet 

Review Panel’s report. It points out four things in particular that 

I find very alarming. What I am going to ask of you at the end of 

this is, I want to know who is responsible for fixing these four 
14 

things; whether or not those four things have been fixed; and, if 

not, when they are going to be fixed. 

The review of cruiser and destroyer reviews of the SPY radar 

health area of concern and a prior review of the SPY radar led the 

panel to state: 

One, the technicians can’t get the money to buy spare parts. 

Two, they haven’t been trained to the requirement. 

Three, they can’t go to their supervisor because, in the case of 

the DDGs, they likely are the supervisor. 

Four, they can’t repair the radar, through no fault of their own. 

But over time, the non-responsiveness of the Navy system, the acceptance of SPY degradation by the Navy system, and the senior 

officers and chiefs alike, will breed—if not already—a culture that 

tolerates poor system performance. 

The fact that the requests for technical assistance are Navy-wide 

suggests there is a diminished self-sufficiency in the surface fleet. 

The sailors perhaps are losing their sense of ownership of the 

equipment and are more apt to want others to fix it. 

Admiral Harvey, you correctly pointed out that we are not counting on the LCS to be the backbone of the fleet. We are counting 

on cruisers and destroyers—and particularly the destroyers—to be 

the backbone of the fleet. 

I was an early convert to Admiral Roughead’s decision to abandon the DD–1000 and go back to building 51s. I continue with that 

decision today. I am also an early supporter of his decision to put 

our Nation’s missile defense on our Aegis destroyers, which makes 

this particular report all the more damning, since that is now the 

mainstay of our fleet. 

If the radar of the mainstay of our fleet are not working because 

of lack of spare parts, because people aren’t trained, because it has 

now become accepted for them not to work, four questions: Who is 

responsible? Who is going to fix it? And when does it get fixed? 

Admiral HARVEY. Sir, the answer to that one is pretty easy. I am 

responsible. It is my job to ensure the readiness of the surface fleet. 

If I can’t do it, I get moved out and they bring in somebody who 

can. I consider that my responsibility in terms of the training, in 

terms of providing the maintenance funding so that we buy the 

parts we need to do the fixes we need to sustain the Aegis system 

and all its supporting subsystems fit to fight. That is my responsibility. 

In terms of the overall picture of the fleet, I believe I am on track 

to reverse these trends in the next 2 years if we stay on track with 

the investments we know we need to make in terms of our training, in terms of sustaining our maintenance availabilities, in terms 

of making sure our repair parts lockers are filled up appropriately. 

And we will drive to that via the BMD [Ballistic Missile Defense] 

mission that we have been given. That is a big driving factor for 

us, again, for which I am responsible for the readiness of the Navy 

to execute that mission. 

So that is what I consider the answer to be, sir. 

Mr. TAYLOR. So your timeline is 2 years? 

Admiral HARVEY. My timeline is to turn the trends in 2 years. 

I testified that we had negative trends. I believe that if we sustain 

the funding in 2010, if we get funding we need in 2011, and we re-
15 

distribute our manpower as I have recommended, if we can do 

these things, we can turn those trends around in that amount of 

time, sir. 

Mr. TAYLOR. Admiral, one of the observations from a retired officer whose opinion I respect is that in the effort to rush sailors to 

the fleet, that the training times have been reduced substantially, 

not only for the enlisted people but for the officers, and that too 

much emphasis has been put on training through computer modeling; too little emphasis has been put on actually having the sailor 

tear a compressor apart, tear an engine apart, rebuild a panel on 

an electrical system. 

I agree with that observation. I am curious what, if anything, is 

being done to turn that around. 

Admiral HARVEY. Well, I agree with that observation, too. So I 

am glad you respect that retired officer’s opinion, because I think 

he got it right. 

Let me give you two examples of what we are doing right now, 

sir: 

Number one is in junior officer training. A few years ago, we took 

a look at the training that was being provided at the Surface Warfare Officer School for the basic course in Newport, Rhode Island. 

It was a 6-month course. There was a widespread opinion that that 

was a course in which we crammed 6 weeks of work into 6 months. 

We didn’t like the course. We didn’t like the output of the course. 

It was inefficient. And we felt also that the ensigns and JGs [junior 

grade officers] attending that course didn’t think much of it either. 

So we were pretty fired up about computer-based training. And 

there was an idea that, hey, maybe we can save money. Take that 

course, digitize it, give it to the officers to do on their own, and be 

guided in that by their commanding officers. That experiment was 

a flat-out failure. Admiral Curtis recognized that early on in his 

tour, and we have brought back the Surface Warfare Officer introduction course in San Diego, Mayport, and Norfolk. 

So we have got back to getting these junior officers some incredibly important training before they get to the ship, so they are not 

lost and confused and swimming in a big ocean by themselves 

when they get there, and not throw the entire burden on a CO 

[commanding officer] who has already got a few other things to 

worry about. So that is being done right now, sir, and I suspect we 

will expand that course over time to do right by our junior officers 

and get them off to a strong first start. 

The second piece, incredibly important, fire controlman training. 

Again, we saw in what was called the ‘‘revolution in training’’ the 

benefits that could accrue to us in terms of how we transmit this 

knowledge and how it is retained through the most modern computer-based training available. We found also that we met a standard, but that standard of training was too low. So lots was blamed 

on computer-based training when in fact there are indeed great advantages to it. 

But you have got to set the standard right and you have got to 

augment it, you have got to balance it with a version of on-the-job 

training, which you probably grew up with in the Navy for the last 

235 years. And so we have done that. 
16 

I was just in Dahlgren last week looking at the changes we have 

made at our A school and our C school curriculums, the fundamental package by which we send a trained fire controlman to the 

fleet. We have made changes so that in our C school it is much 

more of an instructor-led environment. The classes I observed were 

one instructor, three students, who were through the basic course 

and now getting that intense training in big maintenance—the big 

maintenance issues. Not the easy stuff. The hard stuff. And so they 

get ready to get to their ship and be an impact player on arrival. 

So we are making those changes, sir, in real time. We have got 

more to do, particularly in the enginemen rate, again, for these 

ships that have these complex diesel main propulsion engines. We 

are working on that at the engineman A and the follow-on schools. 

So I think we are going down the right track now. And I continue 

to push very, very hard to keep going down that track, sir. 

Mr. TAYLOR. Admiral, lastly, I would think Mr. Bartlett and I 

would have a slightly different view of the LCS program than the 

rosy one you gave the subcommittee. I hope it is getting turned 

around. I hope that they will come in at a decent price. But thus 

far it is late, it is costly, and it is subject to protest, as opposed to 

Littoral Combat Ship. About the only other thing that could go 

wrong is if it didn’t stay in the fleet as long as it should have. 

What is the projected life of those vessels, and whose job is it to 

see to it that we get those years out of those ships? 

Admiral HARVEY. I think the view I presented, I would not characterize it as a rosy one, sir. I thought it was a realistic one from 

a fleet-user perspective. You were referring, I think maybe, to some 

issues on the acquisition side of the house. I was referring to what 

we are doing right now with the ships we have got that are out 

there sailing with the fleet as I speak. 

I believe the service life for going forward for those ships is 25 

years. Again, it is on me to ensure that, working with Admiral 

McCoy and his organizations, that we have a realistic maintenance 

plan in effect that we actually execute, that will do that maintenance, the deep maintenance over the long haul that will get those 

ships to their service life. 

So I think it is up to me and Admiral McCoy to get that piece 

of it right, sir, and to get them to that service life. 

Mr. TAYLOR. Admiral, let me commend you for your willingness 

to step forward and say, ‘‘That’s my job.’’ That I like to hear. I hope 

you will instill it in the junior officers below you so that 5, 10, 15 

years from now that now-lieutenant who is going to be a commander or captain is taking the same ownership responsibility for 

those vessels. 

Admiral MCCOY. Mr. Chairman, can I comment on part of your 

question and augment Admiral Harvey’s statement? 

I will tell you that I am responsible for the engineering and 

maintenance piece of our ships, both on the BMD side, which you 

talked about, as well as the LCS. And I will tell you that over the 

last 2 years, if you looked at NAVSEA, the area that we have refocused the most is on this piece—surface maintenance and getting 

it right; getting the fundamental engineering right; the 

underpinnings, the technical rigor behind the maintenance plans. 

In fact, every 60 days I meet with Admiral Harvey on the plan 
17 

ahead and what we are doing to arrest the issues that we are talking about here. And I just spent an hour with the CNO [Chief of 

Naval Operations]. 

This year, we decommissioned USS Philadelphia and USS Los 

Angeles at 33 years, their designed ship life. We never doubted that 

we would get those ships to that point. In fact, those crews will tell 

you those ships went out more capable than the day they entered 

the Navy. And that is because we have an established process that 

gets to the technical rigor—when you do tanks, when you do 

pumps, when you do valves, when you do deep maintenance—and 

we don’t depart from that. And we have the maintenance infrastructure both at the major shipyards as well as the intermediate 

level to in fact do that maintenance. And for the past 2 years we 

have been working on just that, and putting that in place for the 

surface wars. Because budgets are no good and budget problems 

tend to impact those who have the least data the most. 

And so, in fact, because we have not had the technical underpinning of what should be a selected restricted availability on a DDG– 

51, what work should be done to get the ship to its full design life? 

When budget times got hard, because we didn’t have the underpinning, we cut it. And there was no impact to that because we didn’t 

have the fidelity. We are putting that in place. 

We stood up the SSLCMA, the Surface Ship Life Cycle Management Activity, in 2009, to do exactly what the submarine force and 

the carrier community do. We have those plans. In fact, we increased surface maintenance $150 million this year because of the 

quick-look efforts that we did a year ago for the DDG–51 class that 

said we were way off the mark on the surface maintenance that we 

need. 

In addition, we are working right now, and expect next year to 

get for the first time, program-related engineering and logistics 

budget line to the tune of about $47 million to do the ISEA [InService Engineering Agent] support, to do the things that you are 

talking about. So why didn’t the ISEAs provide more support for 

the Aegis BMD, more training on the deck plate for our sailors? We 

will now be able to do that. In fact, I am working with a three-star 

panel that includes both fleet deputy commanders and director of 

the Navy staff to get the maintenance and sustainment and assessment piece right well into the future. 

And so that is where we are headed. We are not reinventing anything. We are doing exactly what we have done on our submarine 

force and aircraft carriers that has proven successful. 

Thank you, sir. 

Mr. ORTIZ. The chair recognizes Mr. Wittman. 

Mr. WITTMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Admiral Harvey, I want to go back, and I appreciate your comments about Ao and operational availability. I think that increased 

operational availability is critical. It still seems like to me, though, 

there are situations where demand still exceeds availability. 

Let me point to a comment by Ranking Member Akin, where he 

had said that the deployment of the 13th MEU [Marine Expeditionary Unit] may be delayed due to the material readiness condition of the USS Green Bay LPD–20. I just want to get you to confirm whether that is or is not the case. 
18 

Second, within that context, have other deployments of surface 

combatants or amphib vessels been delayed over the past 6 to 12 

months due to the readiness of the fleet? And are you planning for 

more delayed deployments next year, based on operational availability? And what are the operational and personal impacts of 

those delays, if any? 

I realize operational tempos have a lot to do with that too, and 

demand, but I want to get your perspective on that, and where we 

are, and that is a real-world situation that appears to be developing. I just want to get your comments on that. 

Admiral HARVEY. No, sir. Admiral McCoy will talk to the Green 

Bay specifically because he has the best knowledge on that. But in 

terms of making the deployment schedule for the MEUs, we are 

going to make the deployment schedule we have to make for our 

Marine Expeditionary Units and our Amphibious Ready Groups 

[ARG], and we will do what it takes to get there. Those are critically important in every theater, as we saw when we started the 

Haiti operation. And we diverted the Nassau ARG with the embark 

MEU down south to see if we were going to need them for the assistance; pushed them on into CENTCOM [United States Central 

Command]. 

But we certainly have had issues as we saw with the LPDs. I 

was very concerned whether we would deliver the LPDs on time 

and fix the ones that we have to get fixed. I am very confident now 

that we are going to be able to make all the deployments I see in 

the near future, on the right schedule for our ARG/MEUs, and 

make them with the full ARG set of ships. So I don’t see future 

delays. 

Now, certainly to be complete, we have reracked within those 

ARG/MEUs some of the ships that went. The Ponce is going over. 

We pulled her out for one more deployment because of the problems with San Antonio. But we made the deployment, we made the 

requirement, and we will continue to do that. Pretty much whatever it takes. 

Now, does that have an impact on sailors if you move them from 

one schedule to the next? Absolutely. Today in Norfolk, the USS 

Dwight D. Eisenhower is arriving after a 7-month deployment. She 

had a 6-month break from her last one, okay? That is a huge impact on those sailors and their families, to the point of your question. We recognize that. But we also recognize the demands of the 

war we are in and we have to meet those demands. Our sailors recognize that and they are staying with us. So we are okay in terms 

of meeting our deployment schedules. 

We are okay in terms of now I think we have got to understand 

what is going on with San Antonio. We will have that ship when 

I need it, and the rest of her class when we need them. 

And I will get Admiral McCoy on the Green Bay in particular, 

sir. 

Admiral MCCOY. Yes, sir. 

Congressman, earlier this spring, Green Bay entered a postshakedown availability following new construction trials. During 

that time frame, we elected to install system modifications that we 

determined coming out of the San Antonio investigation, and other 

issues with main propulsion diesel engines on LPD–17 class. We 
19 

changed the filtering systems. We also did some piping changes between the final strainer and the engine to eliminate socket welds 

and install butt welds so that we didn’t have, possibly, contaminants and hideout places for contaminants in the system. We also 

did a number of piping inspections and piping repairs due to inadequate fillet welds during the new construction process. Towards 

the end of that PSA, post-shakedown availability, we determined 

significant foreign material in the steering system that had fouled 

the rams and caused galling of the steering ram. And we had to 

go cut the deck and replace the ram, which made that PSA go long, 

which pushed the downstream schedule. 

That has been repaired. The ship has been back out and completed final contract trials last week. And we expect the ship to 

take its place in the regular fleet rotation from thereon, sir. 

Mr. WITTMAN. Very good. Thank you, Admiral McCoy. 

Admiral Harvey, I want to go back to a more general scope question and ask you what measures are you putting in place to ensure 

that the Navy is going to stay committed to improving the readiness of the surface force over the long haul? 

As you know, the Navy has already been directed to find $28.3 

billion in efficiencies over the next 5 years. And that I think creates some significant challenges. We have seen too many examples, 

unfortunately, within those cost-cutting realms trying to front-load 

those savings but then being concerned about what are the longterm implications of that. And as Ranking Member Forbes had 

pointed out, if you look at the 30-year shipbuilding plan, there are 

some concerns about how the loading of the cost structure is there 

with the construction of ships and those costs. 

Let me ask this. Under those challenges, how can you assure this 

committee that the Navy is truly committed to making the investments that it needs into the future within context of all those cost 

requirements and training, manning, maintenance, testing and 

quality assurance, to ensure that we are able to sustain operations? 

And I think that is the key, not knowing quite what the challenge 

is going to be in the future. The concern is, How are we going to 

balance all of those things in the face of those requirements to 

save, but also in the face of what we all know, too, are many, many 

needs and demands going forward. 

Admiral HARVEY. It is a two-part question, sir. I will take one 

at a time. 

The first part. We have to simply make the commitment to treat 

our surface ships in their training phases, in their maintenance 

phases, and in their deployment phases like we treat our submarines and like we treat our aircraft carriers. We have a firm 

maintenance plan for aircraft carriers and submarines that we do 

not deviate from. We simply won’t. And until we have that attitude 

thoroughly inculcated in the fleet, in the force, in the maintenance 

activities, and in the budget tiers, we will have problems in the 

surface fleet. 

We have to treat those ships right for the long haul. That means 

during that reset phase, when we commit to training, we have got 

to do the training. When we commit to a captain that he has got 

a 20-week maintenance period, then by God we give him a 20-week 

maintenance period that is well thought-out and well-configured 
20 

and paid for, and delivers real maintenance that keeps that ship 

going not just for the next deployment but for the deployments to 

come. 

So it is a level of commitment across the organization that we 

will go back and treat these ships right for the long haul, just like 

we do the rest of the fleet. That is number one. 

Number two, sir, you keyed on it in your opening statement and 

you have come back to it here. There is an unconstrained demand 

on the part of every combatant commander for what these ships 

bring. I understand that. I know what these ships and their crews 

bring. It is incredibly valuable not just to the wars going on now, 

but to all of our strategic engagements around the globe. 

Look what is happening up there off Korea right now, today. Incredibly important deployment of our fleet and sustaining that deployment over the long haul. But we are going to have to meter 

that demand, just like we meter it today for our nuclear attack 

submarines, just like we meter it today for our aircraft carriers, 

just like we meter it today for amphibious ships. 

Through the global force management process that is run by 

Joint Forces Command in conjunction with the Joint Staff, we receive all of the demands and we come back and say, here is what 

we can meet while we sustain this fleet for the long haul. 

So it is an idea that you not only meet the critical needs today, 

but you do it in a way that sustains yourself over the long haul. 

So I have got to work that. We are working that hard in the Navy. 

I need to work that with the Joint Force who uses the incredible 

capabilities we bring. That is the answer, sir. We have to get there. 

Mr. WITTMAN. Thank you. I appreciate your candor there. 

I want to extend a little bit further, too, on the ability to sustain 

in the long haul. Obviously we have capital needs, but also on the 

operational side we have those human needs. And one of the concerns there is making sure that you can meet all of those demands 

in a pretty challenging environment. 

One of the aspects of that obviously is training. And you spoke 

a little bit to that; about how we make sure that we get timely 

training that assures that people at every level have the skills and 

capabilities that they need. And I wanted to ask how you are integrating the innovative use of technology, like serious gaming, into 

the training regime to try to make sure we are getting the most 

out of the time that our men and women in the Navy have to obtain that training. And just like you said, we want to make sure 

that things are effective the deployment side increases, as you 

know, return time and making sure they have training becomes 

even more important. 

So I just want to get your thoughts about how you are using 

those innovative technologies in meeting those training needs into 

the future. 

Admiral HARVEY. Well, I will tell you one—I have been in command for almost exactly a year and it has been a real learning 

process for me in so many different areas. And you keyed on one 

of them. I came in and found a significant investment that was 

planned, an increase and significant use of what we call ‘‘fleet synthetic training,’’ is how you train a strike group commander to be 

ready to go to the Arabian Gulf and deal with whatever they may 
21 

find over there, but without having to get the entire strike group 

underway, spend all the money on fuel, take them out of home, fly 

the air wing, fly those hours off those aircraft just to train the staff 

of the striking commander. 

I was a skeptic. I was old school. I said, ‘‘by God, you get underway, that is where you learn, that is how you learn.’’ Okay? That 

is why we did it for the last 30-some years. But I have really become a believer in the fleet synthetic training and what I have seen 

develop over the last 5 years. It is very sophisticated, it is very 

complete, and it really puts the onus on the people, the targeted 

audiences, for the training at the staff level, at the fleet commander level. I think we really put them through a wringer with 

that and we get a very good result for it. 

I think that is what you are talking about, sir. And I see that 

as something I am going to continue to push very hard on because 

you get a really big bang for not so many bucks. 

Mr. WITTMAN. Thank you, Admiral. Thank you, members of the 

panel. We really appreciate your time today. 

And, Mr. Chairman, with that I yield back. 

Mr. ORTIZ. The chair recognizes Mr. Courtney. 

Mr. COURTNEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thank you to the 

panel. This has been a terrific hearing. And thank you for your 

great work. 

I have worked with Admiral McCoy over the last year or so on 

a couple of issues, and I am just so impressed with the quality and 

seriousness which you brought to your job. 

Admiral Harvey, you have been pressed a few times today about 

whether or not there is really a light at the end of the tunnel in 

terms of the challenges the Navy faces in terms of the 30-year plan 

and the need to find efficiencies. I just wanted to at least support 

your positive outlook. 

This Saturday, we are commissioning the Missouri, which was 

built in 65 months. The first submarine in its class took 87 months 

to build. The next block, again partly because of Admiral McCoy’s 

great team, is going to be probably 55 months in the making. So 

the fact is there are ways to find efficiencies, to find savings, without sacrificing capability. Those newer boats are going to be, in 

fact, more capable than the first ones that came through the system. 

So I share your belief that when you set targets and you really 

hold people’s feet to the fire, that you actually can see real results. 

And obviously you mentioned the submarine fleet a couple of 

times in terms of it being an example for the surface fleet. 

I guess the one question I wanted to ask today is you mentioned, 

Admiral, the exercises going on in Korea right now. It all is happening because of a surface ship that was sunk. Obviously, it was 

a South Korean vessel, but there clearly was a pretty scary shortcoming that that ship had, which is that it couldn’t detect through 

its sonar technology the minisub that basically, in my opinion, committed homicide in that incident. 

Obviously, you are dealing with maintenance issues and keeping 

ships sort of maintained. But, obviously, there are challenges out 

there that you also have to kind of respond to or see out there. 
22 

And, obviously, this minisub threat, and particularly in shallow 

settings, creates a real challenge in terms of sonar. 

Again, we talked about radar issues which has been analyzed. 

But where are we in terms of the surface ships’ capability—our 

surface ships’ capability in terms of being able to deal with a threat 

like that? 

Admiral HARVEY. Sir, I think of no warfare area that presents 

our Navy a greater challenge than anti-submarine warfare [ASW]. 

I mean, the physics are against us. And as long as you can build 

a diesel electric submarine, they are going to be in certain environments, in certain bodies of water and under certain conditions, they 

are going to be very, very tough to detect on the best of days. But 

the good news is we have got the best equipment in the world, our 

sonar seats, our Navy towed array system, and the sailors that we 

have to put that all together and work that piece real hard, bringing the PA [patrol aircraft] Poseidon into the fight now, as we are, 

as a replacement for the P–3. 

One of the reasons Chairman Taylor mentioned about the truncation of the DDG–1000 was to keep the focus and the great capabilities that our DDG–51 class Flight II and hopefully the Flight 

III have in the blue water, the deep ASW fight. Tremendous challenge. 

But we have the best equipment in the world. We have to make 

sure that our training matches the capabilities of the equipment. 

And I think if there is any area where I have seen the deficiencies, 

it has been in our focused training on ASW. I think our helicopter 

squadrons have been solid over the years. Our P–3 deployments 

were entirely focused for the last 8 years on supporting the fight 

on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan with some of their unique 

surveillance systems they had. 

We brought them back to blue water. We are focusing and we 

have set the standard: You are the ASW platform, and ASW is a 

mission that only, only the United States Navy does in our Joint 

Force. 

So the key, sir, to getting at this very tough challenge is the 

training of our sailors across the board—aviation, submarine, and 

in the surface fleet—that makes our equipment truly capable of 

what we know it is capable of. It is that package you have to bring 

together and then work it together with the helicopter, with the 

towed array, with the submarine, working it all together in real 

time. 

So it is individual training, it is collective training, and it is staying on that equipment and keeping it up to design specs. If we do 

all that, we will be good to go in either the Western Pacific, in the 

Persian Gulf, or anywhere else we may have to operate and sustain 

ourselves for an extended period of time. 

Mr. COURTNEY. There has been, obviously, a lot of back and forth 

today about the training challenges that are out there and whether 

or not the computer-based training really is adequate. 

Again, is the sonar area one of these places that you are focused 

as far as upgrading? 

Admiral HARVEY. Absolutely sir. It is a critical warfare area—a 

warfare area of growth that we really have to get after, ASW and 

ballistic missile defense. In both those areas, the training that is 
23 

going to be required from an individual basis, from a team basis, 

that you would see in the CICU [rugged chassis] of a destroyer or 

on a theater basis, because these are big-picture issues. So it is a 

theater issue as well. 

All of that is a blended solution of training. You can’t get it all 

from a CD. You can’t just do it all passed down from the older 

petty officers to the younger petty officers. You have to stay up. So 

it is a blended solution that matches the capabilities of the sailors 

we are trying to train. 

So that is what we have to stay after, in a ruthlessly disciplined 

process to get at, in order to be equal to the challenges we are 

going to face. 

Mr. ORTIZ. The chair recognizes Mr. Coffman. 

Mr. COFFMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And Admiral Harvey, Burke, and McCoy, thank you so much for 

your service to this country. All three of you have had distinguished careers. 

Let me just say that, Admiral Harvey, you have mentioned a couple of things. Number one, I think your commitment to, or the 

Navy’s commitment to expeditionary forces and the commitment to 

extending the fleet through its service life. 

First of all, to the expeditionary forces. I think the United States 

Marine Corps has a requirement to deploy two Marine expeditionary brigades at any one period of time. That is 17 ships per 

Marine expeditionary brigade. So that is 34 ships in total. And 

then you probably need an additional four for maintenance purposes in terms of rotation. 

Right now the United States Navy is down to 31 amphibs and 

now the United States Navy would like to retire 2 prior to their 

service life. I believe the USS Peleliu and the USS Saipan. And 

that raises a concern to me that not only does the United States 

Marine Corps not have the requisite number of ships to fulfill its 

mission, but that the United States Navy would like to save operating dollars in cutting back two ships prior to the end of their 

service life. 

You mentioned the USS San Antonio and the maintenance problems there. But you did not mention in your presentation those two 

ships which the Navy wants to retire prematurely. I wonder if you 

can address those issues. 

Admiral HARVEY. Absolutely. I was just recommending to the 

Chief of Naval Operations yesterday that, based on all that I have 

learned in the last year, and particularly in the last 4 months, and 

what I believe will be the way ahead for our LPD–17 class, that 

I am a strong supporter of going ahead and decommissioning in fiscal year 2013 Peleliu and Denver, and still being able to meet the 

deployment requirements for the ARG/MEUs that we just talked 

about in a recent discussion. 

So I do support decommissioning those ships. Tough call. Clearly, 

a very tough call. But if we don’t, and if you look at the maintenance costs of those ships, they are not steady each year. As you 

approach the age of those ships, those maintenance costs, just to 

keep them going from day to day, are on a geometric road, not an 

arithmetic road. So it is taking more and more of a finite budget 
24 

to keep fewer ships going. And that is a very difficult choice to 

make. 

I talked a lot earlier today about the redistribution of those 

324,000 sailors. We have urgent needs in our Special Operations 

Forces, what we have learned in the last 10 years about the needs 

for that incredibly skilled and incredibly important force. Our cyber 

forces, we are in the news every day about more and more cyber 

threats to this country and to the Armed Forces. So we are counting on redistributing those sailors off those ships into these very 

vital warfare areas. 

So in terms of using the sailors best for the long haul, making 

sure I get the most out of the maintenance dollars, while still meeting the essential combatant command requirements, I made the 

recommendation to CNO to move forward with those early decoms 

[decomissionings]. I support it. And I believe I can look General 

Rich Natonski and Denny Hejlik in the eye down there in Norfolk 

where the rubber meets the road and say, I am going to get the 

Marines where they need to go, when they need to get there, and 

still decommission those ships. 

Mr. COFFMAN. Admiral, when is the service life of the Denver 

and the Peleliu, when do they come to the end? What is the schedule for those? I believe it is a 40-year life. 

Admiral MCCOY. Congressman, they are both around 35 years. 

They are both within about a 5-year window of their service life. 

Mr. COFFMAN. Let me just say this; that I think that sometimes 

organizations over time forget their core mission. And the core mission of the United States Navy is projecting seapower. That is the 

core mission. 

And if it is a matter of saving operating dollars, let me just remind you that, in my view, that the United States Navy is topheavy and could use some reform in terms of reducing its bureaucracy at the top. 

But let me leave you with another issue, and that is something 

to look at. I would commend to you that you certainly have talked 

about doing all you can to extend the service life of these ships to 

at least realize their usefulness until they are scheduled to be decommissioned by virtue of their service life; that you adhere to 

those schedules and that you find the savings in looking at the topheavy nature of the United States Navy’s bureaucracy at the top. 

Also, on a separate note, to look at—I believe that all of the services are based on an archaic model of a 20-year career path and 

the promotion schedules reflect that. And I think that those promotion schedules are too fast and I don’t think that sailors, as well 

as members of other services, gain the kind of technical proficiency 

they ought to gain with that kind of career path that I think is too 

expedited. 

If you would like to respond to any of the issues that I have 

raised, please do so in my remaining time. I believe my time has 

expired, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. ORTIZ. You can go ahead and respond to his questions. 

Admiral HARVEY. Yes, sir. You covered a lot of territory, but I 

want to go back to you on one point that I think is just incredibly 

important, and that is kind of what our focus is here and my responsibilities. 
25 

I am sitting here staring at a quote from the U.S. Constitution, 

Article 1, Section 8, which is a very visible reminder of the Congress’ responsibility for the provision and maintenance of the Navy. 

And I am very, very aware of that. 

I am equally aware of the law, its requirements of the Navy. It 

is Title 10, Section 5062. ‘‘The Navy shall be organized, trained and 

equipped primarily for prompt and sustained combat incident to 

operations at sea.’’ 

Sir, I have never forgotten that. That is the law that drives every 

action at Fleet Forces Command. We have to make tough choices, 

as do you. And you make them every day and we make them, too. 

But I am never—I just want to assure you, I understand what the 

law demands of the United States Navy. I understand deeply the 

mission of the Navy and the Navy-Marine Corps team, and what 

we do for the Nation that no other Armed Forces on this planet can 

do. And I am deeply committed to sustaining that capability 

through whatever lays ahead: good times, hard times, whatever. 

That has never, never gone from my mind and governs every action 

I take every day at Fleet Forces. 

Admiral MCCOY. Congressman, could I come back on the design 

life? Peleliu, when the ship was designed, was a 20-year ship. So 

she is already at the 35-year point. And we expect Denver to be at 

44 years, based on a 40-year life, when she goes out. 

Mr. COFFMAN. Mr. Chairman, may I ask one question about the 

USS Saipan that was not addressed? 

Mr. ORTIZ. Sure. 

Mr. COFFMAN. You all did mention the USS Saipan, and I understand that that was a part of the proposal to prematurely retire the 

Peleliu and the Saipan. I don’t think that that was mentioned to 

this committee. And the Denver, quite frankly, was not mentioned. 

The USS Denver was not mentioned to this committee in prior 

hearings. 

Admiral MCCOY. Sir, you may be thinking about the Nassau, which is LHA–4, and the Peleliu, which is LHA–5. 

Mr. COFFMAN. I stand corrected. The USS Nassau. What is the 

status of the USS Nassau, then? 

Admiral MCCOY. We expect her to go out next year, sir, in fiscal 

year 2011. 

Mr. COFFMAN. That is before its scheduled service life? 

Admiral MCCOY. No, sir. It was designed for 20 years when it 

was built. Just like Peleliu. 

Admiral HARVEY. It is way in excess of its service life, sir. 

Mr. COFFMAN. Mr. Chairman, I think if we could get—I would 

like a report back on that, because I think we have differences in 

what the scheduled service life is. And I would be stunned that 

these—I am rather surprised that these ships are only 20 years. 

Admiral HARVEY. Yes, sir. We will certainly get that to you. 

[The information referred to can be found in the Appendix on 

page 53.] 

Mr. ORTIZ. Thank you so much. The chair recognizes Mr. Kissell. 

Mr. KISSELL. I want to thank the panelists for being here today, 

but I also want to thank the chairman for having this joint hearing. I am on the Readiness committee, but my other subcommittee 

is Air and Land. So to get this insight to the issues of the Navy 
26 

is very interesting to me, and I don’t have the intimate knowledge 

that I would like to have there. So my questions might be more of 

a general nature and actually reflecting maybe some concerns that 

have already been expressed. 

Admiral Harvey, you talked about trying to reverse downward 

trends in terms of training and command structure and things 

along this line. And that obviously would be an issue across any 

of our branches of service if we had downward trends. 

I think one of the keys there—and this was mentioned by my colleague, Mr. Wittman—is not only what are we doing about that, 

but at some point in time that downward trend started. How confident can you be in telling us that we are willing and have systems in place that maybe perhaps could spot other downward 

trends before they reach the point that evidently this one has, to 

cause so much concern? 

Admiral HARVEY. Yes, sir. I think in one of my earlier responses 

I talked about the institutional rigor with which our aviation and 

submarine communities view every aspect of their operations, and 

that my assessment was that similar type of institutional rigor has 

not been present in how we monitor the health of the surface fleet. 

My answer is we have got to ensure we take that rigorous type of 

approach in the surface fleet in every aspect of this: training, maintenance, operations, and repair parts. Until we do, we won’t turn 

those trends around. 

That is why my focus has been on working with the admirals to 

my right and to my left on getting that type of rigor into how we 

view our business with the surface fleet; making sure it is not just 

a passing fad from day to day, but that it becomes deeply entrenched in how we do business from day to day. I think that is 

the key. If we don’t get there, we won’t reverse those trends. 

But I think we have got the focus, we have got the energy, I have 

got the resources, and we certainly have the intent to get that kind 

of rigor in how we do business with our surface fleet and sustain 

it into the future. 

Mr. KISSELL. As Mr. Taylor said, we appreciate so much you 

being willing to take on that responsibility because that is—as Mr. 

Forbes said, we have a relationship, but that is also what we are 

dependent upon from you and we appreciate that. 

And once again, kind of going into what Mr. Courtney talked 

about, the mini-submarine. We have talked about in some hearings 

I have been in before about we know what IEDs [Improvised Explosive Devices] have done in Iraq and Afghanistan and how they take 

the multibillion dollars that we have available and high-tech gear 

and they bring it down to a common danger that is very cheap. 

The threats that are presented to our Navy along this line where 

we have the highest technology on our ships, how are we anticipating the equivalent of IEDs being a challenge to our Navy in future years so that we can prepare defenses from that, short of actual experience? 

Admiral HARVEY. Well, I think what you are talking about there, 

sir, is, (a)—and General Mattis alluded to it in his confirmation 

hearing yesterday in front of the Senate Armed Services Committee—our ability to adapt. 
27 

These events move at a speed during wartime which is far in advance of what you experience in a normal peacetime environment. 

And organizations are developed and structured generally during 

peacetime. What we have to do is ensure that our ability to adapt 

in this large bureaucratic structure, that we know and love as the 

United States Navy, we have to ensure that we have that ability 

to adapt as fast as whatever the enemy throws at us, wherever 

that enemy may be, conventional, nonconventional, asymmetric 

threats—which is kind of what you are alluding to here—and how 

rapidly we do that. And you do that because you have got the best 

people on the planet wearing the uniform and working on that 

piece every day. 

So it starts with our people. If we bring in the right people, if 

we maintain them in our service, if we train them correctly and 

treat them correctly, they have the imagination, they have the capability, they are absolutely brilliant on the basics, and they will 

bring us through those kind of threats that you talk about. Because 

those are failures of imagination, those are failures of adaptation. 

And I think we are particularly strong if we keep the people where 

we need them. We will stay current with the threats. We will not 

lose in the battle of the future. We will be the preeminent naval 

force on the sea because of the people we have working for us 

today. That is the key to this whole thing. 

Mr. KISSELL. And I would even suggest—and I think this is obvious—that the word—and ‘‘adapt’’ is a great word—but ‘‘anticipate’’ 

to what could be brought our way so that we don’t have to learn 

from experience, so to speak; that we can anticipate and through 

that anticipation avert a bad situation. 

But I appreciate once again your all’s service, and these are important conversations. Once again, Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the 

opportunity to learn more about seapower. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Thank you so much. Mr. Critz. 

Mr. CRITZ. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and to Chairman Ortiz 

and my chairman, Chairman Taylor, and to you gentlemen for appearing here today. 

My question goes to the LCS manning. I understand that the 

LCS is designed to carry a 78-person crew. And one of the things 

that is worrisome is that the GAO [Government Accountability Office] report says the Navy faces risks in its ability to identify and 

assign personnel given the time needed to achieve the extensive 

training required—484 days. 

I am curious if the LCS and really all new ships will require our 

crew members to do more or our ships to do more with less people. 

And I would like to hear the details on how you plan to maintain 

this healthy circle of readiness. 

And why I refer to this is that in one of our questions, or some 

of the information we were given, it was our understanding that 

ships now have to be augmented with personnel to help them pass 

INSURV, which raises questions about ship self-sufficiency. So we 

have a decline in the number of personnel and we are getting information that ships are having to be augmented with personnel to 

meet this INSURV. I would be curious to hear your answer. 

Admiral HARVEY. Yes, sir. I think there is a little bit in your 

questions for all of us here, and I will take a first shot at a couple 
28 

of things. My first INSURV inspection was when I was Lieutenant 

Junior Grade Harvey back in 1977 under—Admiral Buckley was 

the lead inspector on the USS Bainbridge. It was pretty rigorous 

back then, too. And it took all we had to go through an INSURV, 

which is operating every piece of equipment on board that ship, in 

port and underway, in a very short period of time, to its design 

specifications. 

Now, in normal ship operations, even under the most strenuous 

conditions you can imagine underway, you are never operating 

every piece of equipment to that level of degree in a very, very 

short period of time. So the INSURV inspection is a very intense, 

focused look at an entire ship, stem to stern, every piece of it, in 

a very finite amount of time. 

But the effort it has taken us in the last 3 years to prepare a 

ship for INSURV, as you alluded to, was precisely one of those incredibly important indicators that showed me we had our trends in 

the wrong direction. So it wasn’t just the INSURV results, what it 

took to get those ships that passed to the passing level. The intense 

maintenance we had to do and the workup to those ships, the extra 

training we had to do, that was the issue. Not so much we had just 

a failure rate, but it took a lot more effort to get them ready to go. 

So that was part of the thing that we have learned from and it 

is clearly one of the things we have to correct. And you correct that 

through the steady application of resources and training throughout the cycle of the ship; not just in 2 weeks before the great exam 

comes, and you try and do an all-nighter essentially, and cram it 

up, and then get through it. That is entirely wrong. 

And the approach we are taking is that steady strain of increased effort, treating these ships as they need to be treated. So 

that is the very important thing I think we have learned from the 

INSURV piece. 

To LCS, I think the issue before us, as always on these complex 

issues, is very simple. We have to have the courage, the institutional courage, to face the facts that we draw from her recent deployment. And we have to put them down. And we say, This is 

what we designed this ship to do. These are the CONOPS [Concept 

of Operations] that we put out there for this ship to execute— 

which they executed, by the way, very successfully in the Caribbean in the anti-narcotics missions. Some real successes down 

there that were very, very important for us. 

But then we have to look at the totality of them. Could they 

maintain the ship the way we need to maintain that ship? Could 

they operate that ship to the degree we needed to operate that ship 

and get those answers in black and white and then deal with the 

facts as we find them? We may have to make adjustments in manning. We may have to make adjustments in maintenance schedules. We may have to make adjustments in terms of how we prepare those crews to get to that ship and be ready to execute because it is unique in the Navy in terms of what we expect those 

sailors to do. 

I think we just simply have to be sure that we are getting the 

facts, that we have the courage to face those facts and follow them 

where they lead us. Because if we do that, we will deliver on this 

Navy a great ship. 
29 

One last story, sir. I alluded to earlier that I was in the commission crew of the FFG–8. That class of ship—and I think Chairman 

Taylor may remember—was much maligned in its early days of operation. It was designed to do long-range ASW patrols in the North 

Atlantic. That is why that ship was built. None of those ships have 

ever executed a long-range ASW patrol in the North Atlantic in the 

course of their lifetime. But they have gone on to do incredibly valuable things over many years of good service. 

I think we are going to see that similar type of growth in LCS. 

And that is not just happy talk. I don’t do happy talk here. I don’t 

do it with sailors. I believe to the marrow of my bones that we are 

going to be very glad we brought LCS into the fleet. And I think 

we are going to have the courage to follow those facts and make 

sure we develop that ship and see what it is capable of and bring 

that to the fleet, those capabilities that we really need. 

In terms of some specifics on the training for the LCS, sir, I 

think Admiral Burke can give us a couple on that, sir, with your 

permission. 

Admiral BURKE. Yes, sir. A couple of things about LCS manning. 

First of all, we are putting a lot of effort into getting the right people to the ship. So we are taking good quality sailors and putting 

them on that ship with a significant amount of training. 

The other thing that we are doing that is quite different from 

what we have done with other ships is we have what we call a 3– 

2–1 concept for the majority of the LCS fleet. And that is three 

crews for two ships, one of which is away all the time. So what that 

does for us is provides greater Ao, to Mr. Wittman’s point; but it 

also gives us ready replacements that we need to keep that ship 

operating because the training of these sailors is at such a high 

level and they are so critical to the team because there are so few 

of them. So each individual person is more valuable than he would 

be on a 300-person ship, for instance. So that 3–2–1 concept allows 

that rapid replacement to happen should we have a crew member 

get sick or hurt, or whatever the case might be. 

And then the other thing that we are doing is we have taken a 

bunch of the logistics functions off the ship. We have done some of 

this in some of the other classes, but not to the level of LCS. So 

we have taken off many of the supply functions, many of the ordering parts, people functions, taking care of the crew. So we have this 

logistics support group that tracks the ship, is ahead of them for 

husbanding needs, for repair parts, getting the parts there, getting 

the contract crews there to clean and maintain the ship to keep it 

at the right level. 

So those are a couple of things that we are doing in the LCS. 

And that is what Admiral Harvey alludes to. We are treating this 

ship differently, and we have to treat it differently. We have to 

adapt to the ship, as opposed to have the ship adapt to what we 

have done. 

Additionally, I think Admiral McCoy probably wants to talk 

about some of the things we have done in the maintenance area on 

this ship. 

Admiral MCCOY. Congressman, along those lines of the Navy 

adapting to LCS or LCS adapting to the embedded Navy structure, 

there are a number of things we have had to do. For example, we 
30 

have had to augment the crew with contractor support to do fundamental preventive maintenance, where we have not done that before on previous ships. But when you are down to a 40-person crew, 

we need to do that. During maintenance availabilities, we augment 

the crew with contractors to do things like tag-outs, to set system 

isolation to support the maintenance. 

In port we provide contractor support for deep cleaning and 

painting and corrosion prevention, which we do not do for our other 

ships, all examples of how we have to adapt to fit the LCS model. 

Additionally, the whole mission module concept is a great burden 

reliever for the crew because the fundamental warfighting package 

is maintained off the ship and can be, in a turnaround, essentially 

a fresh one on the shelf provided to the ship. 

We send the key data on the propulsion plant and the main auxiliary systems off board every day electronically to ISEA engineers, 

in-service engineering agents to look at the health and the monitoring of the systems. Additionally, we have these ships in the 

American Bureau of Shipping inspection cycle to make sure that 

we are looking at all areas of the ship on an about 8- to 10-year 

cycle, similar to what we are standing up for the rest of our surface 

Navy. 

Right now as Admiral Harvey talked about, we are looking at 

what are the early returns, what have we learned from both ships? 

And two things we have learned. Even though we have done one 

pass on preventive maintenance, it is still too much. But we need 

to go back and do another pass, and in fact take some more preventive maintenance off the crew’s burdens to either shore support 

and, in fact, infuse some technology. 

So, for example, we are working on laser technology for doing 

lube oil and fuel oil samples to take some of that burden off of the 

crew, other examples of how we are trying to adapt. 

The other one is corrosion. We need better choices during the 

shipbuilding process—of materials—better paints and things like 

that. We are seeing already corrosion on both ships. So we are factoring that back into the production line, as well as into the maintenance plan. 

Mr. CRITZ. Thank you very much. I have no further questions. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Thank you so much. 

I just have one last question, unless some of the other members 

and the rankings and Chairman Taylor have a closing statement. 

But I know that you all are very responsible, and this morning 

you have done a great job. But my question is: What plans and 

metrics has the Navy developed to track and measure progress of 

the corrective actions that are being implemented? And how would 

the Navy assure that this does not end up in the same place we 

did, again, in another 5 to 10 years? 

Admiral HARVEY. Yes, sir. The direction I have given to my subordinate commanders, both the fleet commander, the second fleet 

commander and for the type commanders in surface, air and submarine, we gather in a room every 2 weeks and we put the fleet 

up on the board and we talk about what has to happen to deliver 

the forces ready for tasking that we have committed to delivery. 

We look at every aspect of their maintenance, their training, their 

manning, every piece of what it takes to deliver a ship, a squadron, 
31 

a submarine, to a combatant commander, ready to operate to the 

limit of its combat systems capabilities. 

We now take a hard, hard look at that. And I ask some pretty 

tough questions. You can ask tough questions, Mr. Chairman, and 

so can I. And I like to get the same kind of answers out of my people that you want out of me. 

It is the same process. We look at the assumptions that are so 

important. You heard Admiral McCoy talk about the assumptions 

that we made for the LCS to operate properly with the manning 

we have given her. And if you don’t bring those assumptions home, 

this whole thing collapses like a house of cards. 

So we focus on what we owe those ships and squadrons and submarines to deliver and what we owe those sailors. And we drill 

down hard on that. And we are just going to keep at it. 

And then I owe the CNO a picture of the fleet. And this is where 

I come to him and say, ‘‘This is what I have got. This is what we 

are able to do. This is what I need to sustain ourselves into the future.’’ And I have to be honest and forthright in doing that. And 

I think I will be. That is his expectation of me, and I certainly intend to deliver on it. 

But that is the kind of thing, sir—there is no magic formula for 

this. This is hard work every day, chasing the facts, understanding 

the facts, and acting on the facts. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Chairman Taylor, do you have any statement that 

you would like to make? 

Mr. TAYLOR. No. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Mr. Forbes. Mr. Wittman. 

There is no question that you gentlemen are very, very well informed, very knowledgeable, and you have answered some tough 

questions this morning. And we just want to assure you that we 

want to work with you. And anything that happens along the way, 

let us know, because we would like to help you. 

But I think that this hearing this morning has been very, very 

informative to us and members of the subcommittee. And we just 

want to say thank you so much for what you do, for your service, 

and the family support that you get from your family. 

Chairman Taylor. 

Mr. TAYLOR. Thank you, Chairman. And again, I don’t want to 

delay this any longer. 

Admiral Harvey, for about 4 years running, both then-Chairman 

Bartlett and I had people come to our office and tell us the LCS 

program was on line and everything is going fine; and then somewhere around November of 2006, we get a call that this thing has 

just gone to hell in a hand basket. At no time do I ever remember 

anyone stepping forward and saying, ‘‘That was my job and I didn’t 

do it right.’’ So I do want to commend you for stepping forward 

today and saying that it is your job, that you are going to get it 

done. In this town, we don’t hear that often enough. 

So I want to commend you for what you said. I look forward to 

working with you on this. And you tell us what you need from us, 

because it is our job to provide the funds that you need to do yours. 

Again, I want to thank all of you for being with us today. And 

I particularly appreciate what you had to say today. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 
32 

Mr. ORTIZ. Thank you so much. And there being no further questions, this hearing stands adjourned. Thank you. 

[Whereupon, at 11:42 a.m., the subcommittees were adjourned.] 
A P P E N D I X 

JULY 28, 2010 

PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD 

JULY 28, 2010 

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WITNESS RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS ASKED DURING 

THE HEARING 

JULY 28, 2010 

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RESPONSE TO QUESTION SUBMITTED BY MR. COFFMAN 

Admiral HARVEY. The Landing Helicopter Assault (LHA 1) Class Amphibious Assault Ship had a designed service life of 20 years as defined in the Performance 

Specifications for LHA 1 Class of March 1969. Today, USS NASSAU (LHA 4) is 31 

years old. 

U.S. Navy uses the Expected Service Life (ESL) of ships for long-range ship planning, budget development, and force structure recapitalization planning. ESL is 

typically longer than the designed service life objective and is achieved through a 

technical assessment of the ship’s material condition coupled with any necessary 

modernization. The ESL of the LHA 1 Class was established at 35 years per a 1986 

Chief of Naval Operations memorandum and was supported by implementation of 

the LHA Mid-Life Upgrade Program. The LHA 1 Class technical assessment, conducted by operational and technical personnel (SEA 05, PMS 470 Program Office) 

as a result of an August 1997 INSURV report on USS NASSAU (LHA 4), validated 

the ship’s degraded status. This one-time technical assessment was conducted across 

all ships of the class and resulted in development of the mid-life package to address 

known deficiencies. [See page 25.] 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING 

JULY 28, 2010 

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QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. ORTIZ 

Mr. ORTIZ. Over the past several years, the Navy has concurrently taken several 

actions that have affected ship crews, including implementing reductions in manning on certain ship types, shifting to more computer-based training, and increasing 

mission requirements aboard ships. While the Navy’s intention was to save costs 

and improve efficiencies, it appears that collectively these actions have affected ship 

readiness. However, based on GAO’s analysis, the Balisle report, and other studies, 

it appears the Navy took these actions on a case-by-case basis without sufficient 

analysis of the potential collective effect. 

As the Navy looks to the future, what steps will it take to ensure it considers the 

holistic effect of making changes to manning, training, and mission requirements on 

ship crews before implementing any adjustments? 

To what degree are the issues raised in the Balisle report being used as ‘‘lessons 

learned’’ as the Navy struggles to manage the strike fighter shortfall? How can we 

be assured that we will not see such an erosion of readiness in aviation as the Navy 

works to minimize the resources required to support legacy aircraft squadrons? 

Admiral HARVEY. Our surface force is ready today. Operation UNIFIED RESPONSE (OUR), the Haitian earthquake relief effort, highlighted the readiness of 

the Fleet to respond to a significant, no-notice tasking. While OUR was not combat 

operations, the Fleet’s response was also not the hallmark of an unready force. It 

is our overall readiness trends that are of concern. These trends (Board of Inspection and Survey trends, Casualty Report trends, ship’s force maintenance backlogs, 

etc.) are the result of the cumulative impact of individual decisions made over the 

last two decades. The decisions made over the last two decades were based on detailed analysis under a specific set of assumptions about a future we can never predict with 100% accuracy. Feedback loops (readiness trends) are critically important 

to the Navy because they allow us to adjust the course of the Navy program based 

on reality (versus assumptions) in execution. We are doing this today with the surface force to prevent an unready force in the future, and have the same formal processes in place for our air and submarine communities. 

The feedback mechanisms in place for our aviation community are much more robust than in the surface community, which is why operational and material health 

trends have not degraded as significantly despite community challenges (e.g., strike 

fighter shortfalls, aging force). To prevent erosion of readiness that could result in 

an unready force in the future, Navy commits forces at a sustainable rate in the 

Global Force Management process; enforces established man, train, equip, and 

maintain standards; and monitors feedback loops, adjusting course in execution as 

required should resourcing/program decisions create negative readiness trends. 

Mr. ORTIZ. For those ships with ballistic missile defense responsibilities, has the 

Navy included manpower requirements for this mission in its ship manning documents? 

Admiral HARVEY. For FY10, Fleet accelerated PR–11 funding for 30 Fire 

Controlmen (FCs) in support of Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD). Fleet also requested an additional 30 billets for ships that will possess a BMD capability in future years. These increases in BMD requirements will ensure the Navy can effectively accomplish the BMD mission aboard designated ships. 

Additional training requirements will also be necessary to support this increase 

in BMD manpower aboard BMD ships. Fleet has requested 54 training instructors 

for Center for Surface Combat Systems (CSCS) Advanced Warfare Trainer (AWT), 

Afloat Training Group (ATG), and Tactical Training Group (TACTRAGRU). This 

BMD manpower addition provides the necessary capacity to execute advanced and 

integrated training in line with growth in BMD capabilities. 

Mr. ORTIZ. In a recent report, GAO noted that in-port workloads have been increasing for Navy cruisers and destroyers, but based on a longstanding assumption, 

the Navy does not measure or evaluate in-port workload when determining the required crew sizes of its ships. 

What plans, if any, does the Navy have to adjust its methodology for determining 

the crewing requirements for it ships, or for verifying its assumptions concerning 

in-port workloads? 
58 

Admiral HARVEY. Navy determines shipboard manpower requirements utilizing 

at-sea wartime scenarios derived from each platform’s Required Operational Capabilities/Projected Operating Environments (ROC/POE). In assessing workload as 

part of the optimal manning initiative, Navy used a long-held assumption that atsea workload exceeds in-port workload requirements. 

In-port workload requirements are not guided by Condition I watchstanding (i.e., 

Battle Stations), but are impacted by additional requirements when in port, such 

as training, maintenance, supporting local security requirements and leave of absence. The Navy is reviewing military personnel manning assumptions and recognizes 

that the reduced crew size also impacted crew workload capacity both in-port and 

underway. At the same time the optimal manning initiative was reducing crew size 

and crew workload capacity, the organic intermediate maintenance support available from the Regional Maintenance Centers was also decreasing due to military billet reductions which shifted workload to the private sector. Consequently, Navy is 

looking closely at increasing manning levels both shipboard and at the regional 

maintenance centers to alleviate the maintenance burden when ships are in port. 

Mr. ORTIZ. How did the consolidation of the ship intermediate maintenance activities into regional maintenance centers affect 1) the material assistance and support 

available to surface ships, and 2) the professional development opportunities available to shipboard personnel who are on shore duty between tours at sea? 

Admiral HARVEY. Consolidation of maintenance activities (Intermediate and 

Depot) within geographic regions was a Navy decision made to gain efficiencies and 

reduce overhead. The consolidation in Norfolk specifically, diluted focus of the maintenance activity and resulted in a loss of focus on surface ship intermediate maintenance. Separately, but concurrently, all intermediate maintenance activities were subjected to manning reductions that eliminated shore Sailor billets as these requirements could be performed by DOD civilians or contractors, which resulted in a significant reduction of journeyman training opportunities for Sailors rotating ashore. 

Command, U.S. Fleet Forces Command, Commander, Pacific Fleet, and Naval Sea 

Systems Command implemented initiatives to restore shore billets at the Norfolk 

Ship Support Activity, South East Regional Maintenance Center, South West Regional Maintenance Center North West Regional Maintenance Center and Hawaii 

Regional Maintenance Center effective in FY2011. These additional billets will 

renew our commitment to a training continuum for Sailors to hone their craftsman 

skills while improving surface ship maintenance responsiveness and effectiveness 

such that the Fleet produces ships ready for tasking. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Does the Navy plan to address the loss of both training opportunities 

and assistance and support available to ships caused by the consolidation of the ship 

intermediate maintenance activities into regional maintenance centers in 2004? 

Admiral HARVEY. Yes. Consolidation of the ship intermediate maintenance activities into regional maintenance centers in 2004 was designed to combine three activities with waterfront support missions, Shore Intermediate Maintenance Activities, 

Fleet Technical Support Centers, and Repair Supervisors of Shipbuilding, into a single regional command that increased administrative efficiency by reducing duplicate 

overhead functions and provided a single point of contact for ship repair support. 

The consolidation did not impact waterfront military repair billets, however in 2006 

a separate initiative substituted civilian personnel and contractors for 2,214 military 

billets (2,148 active duty and 66 reserve full time support). At the time, it was 

thought that use of more capable depot level personnel would increase the overall 

efficiency of maintenance execution. In 2007, 126 of these military billets were 

bought back, resulting in an overall net of 2,088 military billets reduced from this 

initiative. 

The Navy is in the process of reassessing those decisions and is developing a plan 

designed to optimize the responsiveness of waterfront shops and military personnel 

training opportunities while continuing to utilize the expertise of more capable, but 

remote depot shops. This review is expected to result in an increase in waterfront 

military repair billets. A separate initiative is working to revitalize the Navy Afloat 

Maintenance Training Strategy which is designed to ensure that personnel assigned 

to shore maintenance activities receive formalized training designed to lead to journeyman certification. 

Mr. ORTIZ. In a recent report, the GAO recommended that the Navy address its 

lack of outcome-based performance measures for off-ship training programs by developing metrics to measure the impact of training on job performance, knowledge, 

skills, and abilities as they relate to occupational and watchstanding proficiency. 

What actions, if any, does the Navy plan to take to address this recommendation 

and develop the types of metrics outlined in the GAO report? 
59 

Admiral HARVEY. The Department of the Navy increased efforts to measure the 

impact of off-ship training on individual job performance, knowledge, skills, and 

abilities as they relate to occupational and watchstanding proficiency across the 

Surface Force by introducing a Surface Warfare Officer (SWO) qualification Log 

Book program, increasing the frequency of Level of Knowledge (LOK) exams, and 

re-emphasizing the necessity to update the Training and Operational Readiness Information Services (TORIS) and the Navy Training Management and Planning System (NTMPS) data bases. 

The Surface Navy instituted a SWO Log Book pilot program, modeled after the 

Aviation Log Book program, to record all professional development evolutions for 

every officer which can then be used to help evaluate training impact to job performance, skills and abilities. The expectation is to refine and expand the program to 

include enlisted Sailors, providing data that can be used to measure factors affecting 

job performance. Additionally, every Sailor is required to take a LOK exam within 

the first three months of reporting on board and then again every quarter for the 

duration of their tour. All scores are maintained in the TORIS database which provides an output-based metric that training commands and the Chain of Command 

can use to help determine how off-ship and on-ship training affect the knowledge 

base of Sailors. 

Access to every Sailor’s goals and progress of Personal Qualification Standards 

(PQS), warfare qualifications, watchstander qualifications, and off-ship and on-ship 

education is tracked and reported in NTMPS. In May 2010, Commanders, Naval 

Surface Force Pacific and Atlantic sent a joint message to the Surface Fleet outlining best practices for training and readiness. The message reinforced the necessity to properly document, in both TORIS and NTMPS, all training conducted because this documentation is necessary to understand how well training is conducted 

and what adjustments are needed to improve training in the future. 

Mr. ORTIZ. GAO reported that the Navy instituted a number of changes but didn’t 

have an evaluation strategy with metrics in place to inform itself of whether it was 

achieving desired results or to elicit info that might enable it to detect any unintended consequences. 

How does the Navy intend to evaluate the impact of any planned corrective actions? 

Admiral HARVEY. Commander, U.S. Fleet Forces Command and Commander, U.S. 

Pacific Fleet measure and assess Fleet Readiness monthly and provide that assessment to CNO. Further, Navy Fleet Readiness is reflected in the Joint Forces Readiness Review which serves to inform the Department’s Quarterly Readiness Report 

to Congress. 

Mr. ORTIZ. Based on the findings of the Balisle report, the Navy plans to take 

a number of actions in many interrelated areas, such as training, maintenance, command and control, manning, etc. What’s not clear, however, is who will be responsible for making sure the actions are coordinated and implemented. To avoid the 

problems of the past where the Navy wasn’t looking at things holistically to see 

whether the changes it was making were compatible and did not have unintended 

consequences, the Navy will need to make accountability clear and have some kind 

of integration mechanism across the areas, whether it be one senior-level official 

who is the focal point supported by an interdisciplinary group or another approach. 

How does the Navy intend to proceed from here in taking corrective actions, including establishing leadership and organizational accountability? 

Admiral HARVEY. To reaffirm my 28 July testimony, I am responsible and accountable for Fleet readiness. It is my responsibility to man ships with sufficient 

numbers of trained Sailors who are afforded adequate and recurring Fleet training 

to maintain their war fighting skills and to provide sufficient maintenance such that 

our ships and systems are fit to fight. 

I meet regularly with Commander, Pacific Fleet and our subordinate commanders 

to review and assess Fleet readiness to ensure Navy can deliver the forces ready 

for tasking that we have committed to delivering. 

With regards to the Fleet Readiness Panel for Surface Force Readiness specific 

recommendations, I have begun executing a plan of corrective actions to improve 

Surface Force Readiness. Both Surface Force Type Commanders are responsible and 

accountable to me for delivering the improvements in readiness that I and the panel 

identified. 

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