The Navy says the civilians sitting at two of the three control stations aboard the USS Greeneville were not a factor in its collision with a Japanese vessel during an emergency surfacing routine. It's not a red herring, but it's not really significant either. It simply looks really bad. The civilians may have been sitting at the controls during the emergency blow, but they were not controlling the vessel.
Nobody controls a submarine's course during such an exercise.
The issue is who gave the order to begin the surfacing procedure, on the basis that there was no danger on the surface. That was the ship's command, not the civilians. So at least from what we know right now, it's correct to say that the civilians had no hand in the accident. But of course it looks terrible for the Navy that there were civilians sitting at the controls during an accident that killed nine people. Particularly for the Japanese government, who are outraged that they had to hear this in media reports, rather than from Washington.