NORFOLK - As the new commander of Naval Air Force Atlantic, Rear Adm. Richard J. O'Hanlon intends to make sure aircraft carriers continue their high-profile global presence.

O'Hanlon assumed command Tuesday at Norfolk Naval Air Station. He most recently served as director of readiness and training at U.S. Fleet Forces Command.

His predecessor, Rear Adm. John W. Goodwin, goes on to head the Navy's Next Generation Enterprise Network, which will replace the Navy Marine Corps Intranet.

In his new role, O'Hanlon will oversee all East Coast carriers and their aircraft. One of his many priorities will be the U.S. military's renewed focus on Afghanistan.

Naval aviators are flying more than half the current sorties over the country. Given Afghanistan's landlocked status and the difficulty of placing land-based U.S. aircraft in neighboring countries, that's likely to continue.

O'Hanlon said that demonstrates the built-in flexibility of naval aviation, where carriers can park themselves off any coast in international waters and conduct their operations.

O'Hanlon knows this mission well. A former pilot, he was commanding officer of the carrier Theodore Roosevelt on Sept. 11, 2001.

Within 30 days of the attack, the ship had left Norfolk to join the carriers Enterprise and Carl Vinson in the Arabian Sea off the coast of Pakistan. Within hours of arriving, the Roosevelt was launching sorties as part of the initial invasion of Afghanistan.

O'Hanlon also is looking at what carriers can bring to operations other than battle, such as humanitarian missions, anti-piracy efforts and partnership-building exercises with other navies.

O'Hanlon said his first order of business will be talking to the wing commanders, ships' commanding officers and enlisted leaders about issues including aircraft, weapons, ship conditions, fuel and training.

"What hurts their head?" he said. "What are the things they're dealing with?"

A native of New York City, O'Hanlon is a 1976 graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy.

Rear Admiral Richard J. O'Hanlon
Deputy Chief of Staff
Operational Readiness and Training
U.S. Fleet Forces Command

Next Defense Team To Weigh Carrier’s Florida Move

(NORFOLK VIRGINIAN-PILOT 16 JAN 09) ... Dale Eisman

WASHINGTON - Top members of the Obama administration's new team for the Pentagon promised Thursday to take a fresh look at Navy plans to relocate an aircraft carrier from Norfolk to Mayport Naval Station in Florida.

William J. Lynn III, the president-elect's nominee to be deputy secretary of defense, and Michelle Flournoy, undersecretary-designate for policy, told U.S. Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va., that the administration will look carefully at all the military service budgets as part of a quadrennial review that begins every presidency.

"This is a major budget item, and we'll commit to you that we will review it," Lynn said of the Mayport plan. "We will consult with you and Congress about where we think we need to go on this program."

Lynn and Flournoy made their comments during a confirmation hearing conducted by the Senate Armed Services Committee. Both are expected to win approval from the committee and the full Senate.

The Navy formally announced Wednesday that it wants to invest more than $600 million to upgrade facilities at Mayport to accommodate a nuclear-powered carrier.

Putting a nuclear carrier in Mayport would reduce the number of flattops based at the Norfolk Naval Base to four, draining an estimated 11,000 jobs and $600 million per year from the Hampton Roads economy.

Webb has urged the committee's chairman, U.S. Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., to demand that the Navy provide a full explanation of the plan and the thinking behind it. Webb and other members of the Virginia congressional delegation are expected to try to block the Navy from spending any money to implement the decision.

Stennis Departs on Deployment
Story Number: NNS090114-14
1/14/2009

By Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class (SW) Elliott J. Fabrizio, USS John C. Stennis Public Affairs

Smaller Crews, Higher Standards

Outgoing SECNAV Also Makes Case For 11 Carriers In Wide-Ranging Interview

(MILITARY TIMES 17 JAN 09) ... Philip Ewing

The Navy's long-term ability to take on its worldwide missions depends on maintaining a force of 11 carriers, according to the service's top civilian.

The force can make do with fewer flattops for a while, Navy Secretary Donald Winter added, but in the long run, the Navy may not be able to fulfill its commitments if the permanent number drops to 10.

"We have a series of commitments that we've made. Those have been worked out with the combat-ant commanders. On average, we believe that we can meet all of those commitments with 11 carriers," Winter said.

Winter reaffirmed his support for the Navy's current carrier force in a Jan. 12 interview with Navy Times reporters and editors, less than a month before the Navy is expected to request a short-term exemption from its legal requirement to maintain 11 carriers.

The Navy is seeking an official sanction for the 33-month gap between the scheduled decommissioning of the Enterprise in 2012 and the commissioning of the Gerald Ford in 2015. It will be the second year the Navy has made that request, after Congress turned down the first one, and it will be a time in which fiscal hardship and a strengthened Democratic Congress appear likely to generate discussion of fewer carriers.

The Navy can drop to 10, Winter said, for "a short period of time." "It's a matter of managing how many carriers are in various availabilities at any given period of time," Winter said. "But that doesn't mean that we're prepared to reduce the number of carriers from a long-term perspective."

Winter, during the interview, announced that has agreed to stay on as Navy secretary for two more months at the most to keep continuity in the Pentagon early in President Barack Obama's term. Winter said he has committed to stay until March 13 unless a re-placement is nominated and con-firmed before then.

Reflecting on his time in office, Winter said he had "no regrets whatsoever" and called it "an absolutely incredible experience." He said he was "incredibly impressed" by the sailors and Marines he has met throughout the fleet and on his trips to the war zones in the U.S. Central Command area of operations.

Shipbuilding, Crew Size

Winter's tenure included cost overruns and delays for the amphibious transport docks San Antonio and New Orleans; the littoral combat ships Freedom and Independence; and the amphibious assault ship Makin Island, although the design and planning for each preceded his time as secretary.

Still, Winter battled the ship-builders, even sending a public letter in 2007 to the head of Northrop Grumman complaining about the Navy's problems with the San Antonio. As Winter looked back on his term in his interview with Navy Times, he said he was trying to steer the service away from unnecessarily complex programs and incorporate better quality into Navy ships from the outset.

"One of the things I want to emphasize is that when I talk about quality, I'm not just talking about the normal [quality assurance]-type deviation assessment and inspection. We need to design end-quality. And we've lost a lot of that over the last several years," Winter said. Instead of building in margin for changes, the Navy and its contractors have focused on a single selling point a ship's speed, or the resolution of an unmanned plane's sensors. "A rebalancing is needed here," he said.

He reiterated his support for crew reductions, saying it was important to take advantage of technological advances without sacrificing safety.

He cited the Freedom's ability to operate with fewer personnel on the bridge and in engineering be-cause of automation. When asked how older, legacy ships which weren't designed with today's crew numbers in mind can be expected to steam with fewer sailors, Winter said the solution lies in modernizations.

"There are very few ships that have stayed the way they were originally designed, and we continue to modernize those ships as we bring in new capabilities. We're doing that with the cruisers right now. We do that with the carriers every time they come in through a refueling complex overhaul]. We do it with the submarines.

"And when we do that, we need to reflect those changes in modernization in the crew structure."

Skipper Firings

Winter also oversaw a series of high-profile punishments of senior leaders, in what is easily the strictest environment compared with the other armed services. But he defended the Navy's methods for selecting commanding officers, despite a relatively steady line of firings across the service  from admirals to surface ship captains to squadron commanders to sub skippers. In 2008, the Navy fired a range of officers, including a three-star admiral; the heads of recruiting districts; the skipper and executive officer of the carrier George Washington after a shipboard fire; the one-star program executive officer for ships; and the skipper of a ballistic-missile submarine.

"We've had a long-standing history and tradition of maintaining high standards, and holding people accountable," Winter said. "That said, you can't always get it right and mistakes happen, or sometimes it's just not a mistake of promoting or positioning the right individual. Sometimes situations change, and when it proves not to work, I think it is incumbent upon the service to take the corrective action"

He contrasted the Navy with the Marine Corps and the Army  which have had fewer reliefs  by saying that land forces have "a different structure, if you will, where you have multiple individuals engaged in command."

The Navy demands more of its commanding officers, Winter said, because "when a ship goes over the horizon, that ship and its crew [are] totally and completely dependent on the captain of the ship, and you damn well better have the utmost confidence in that individual."

He said he examines each relief for "root causes," but declined to ac-knowledge any patterns.

A good top-level look at budget issues – all communities included to provide perspective – Dutch 

Affordability The Buzz At SNA Symposium

(NAVY TIMES 17 JAN 09) ... Phillip Ewing and Antonie Boessenkool

Affordability was at the forefront of the minds of many attendees at the Surface Navy Association's annual symposium in Crystal City, Va., Jan. 13-15. Cost-control and extending the life of today's warships will be key to realizing plans for a 313-ship U.S. Navy, and officials, surface warriors and contractors were talking about it.

"Tough choices and appetite suppression" are two keys to achieving the 313-ship fleet, Adm. Gary Roughead, chief of naval operations, said Jan. 14, because the service needs to keep its existing fleet as long as possible while controlling costs for the new ships it wants.

"We cannot afford any gold plating," Roughead said, and reiterated the need to manage ships' life-cycle costs, "maintain restraint when designing manning models," and field the most efficient fleet possible to get ahead of another potential spike in fuel costs.

Roughead told a packed auditorium that he has been studying the operating costs of the Navy's latest ships, and the prospect of high fuel and operating costs decades from now "scares the heck out of me."

The world is running out of oil, he said. "If we don't get serious about energy, we're delivering a terrible future to our children."

To stave that off, the Navy needs to put its maximum effort toward making its ships as efficient as possible, Roughead said. "It's not just going to be trailing another shaft or turning off lights in more spaces."

Another problem is the financial crisis, which threatens to impose drastic funding cuts. Roughead said the full effects of the downturn "are still to be felt" over the next few years. He ticked off a few dynamics he's been watching:

            The service's fuel costs have gone down as oil has retreated from its record peaks last summer.

            Roughead said he is "very interested" in what the national economic situation does to U.S. shipbuilders, many of whom depend on Navy contracts for survival.

            The Navy is watching the effects of the economic downturn on individual sailors for example, the leaner times could change many of the arrangements for a sailor when moving from Naval Station San Diego to Naval Station Norfolk, Va., he said.

            Navy budgets must account for increased retention as more sailors stay in the service for the job security and benefits, he said.

Destroyers, LSDs To Get Inspections

The head of the U.S. Navy's surface forces has ordered technical inspections of dozens of warships to see "exactly what their lifespan is" through assessments of their material readiness. First up are Harper's Ferry and Whidbey Island-class dock landing ships, then Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, Vice Adm. D.C. Curtis said.

The Navy's steam-powered gators are getting old, Curtis said. "We may think a ship is 14 years old," he said, but with a high operational tempo, "is it really 17 years old?"

Under the Naval Surface Force pilot pro-gram, inspectors from Naval Sea Systems Command and the Board of Inspection and Survey will assess the warships' readiness and expected lifespan. The Navy's goal of reaching a minimum 313-ship fleet means every ship has to serve as long as possible, Curtis said, and to plan accordingly, he wants the best information he can get about the condition of the force.

On Jan. 13, he spoke at the Surface Navy Association's national symposium outside Washington, emphasize the importance of material readiness. He plans to create a "surface ship life-cycle maintenance activity" to look at readiness across the fleet.

Curtis has spent the last year working to get SurFor "back to basics," after a series of embarrassments in early 2008 that included failed inspections for two Aegis warships and a disappointing visit by Curtis to the San Diego waterfront. Since then he has increased the amount of live-fire training for surface sailors; reinstituted waterfront instruction for freshly minted surface warfare officers; and called for computer instruction to give way to more hands-on training.

Mccullough: Fleet Not Able To Go Everywhere

Today's Navy is entering its most fiscally and operationally challenging era in decades, the service's top requirements officer said Jan. 14, as consistently high demand from combatant commanders means the service doesn't have enough ships to go all the places it wants.

There's a "presence deficit" for U.S. naval forces across the globe, said Vice Adm. Barry McCullough, deputy chief of naval operations for integration of capabilities and resources.

Even more uncertainty comes from anticipating the priorities of the incoming Obama administration and fluctuating fuel costs, McCullough said.

"Last July, I crawled under my desk when I looked at the cost of a ... barrel of oil," he said. Yesterday the price was about $41 a barrel, "so now I'm dancing on my desk. But I have no idea what it's going to be next week"

McCullough said the Navy should continue to maintain what he called its "high-end" ships and capabilities, even as a new generation of "low-end" ships arrive, including the Littoral Combat Ship and the Joint High Speed Vessel.

"You've got to be able to maintain the high-end capability because if you lose it, the cost to recoup it is incredible, not only in dollars, but in other things. So you have to be able to maintain the industrial base, and a capability at the high end, if you choose to be a high-end Navy."

Navy To Base Carrier At Mayport

The Navy has decided to make Naval Station Mayport, Fla, the homeport for a nuclear-powered carrier, Florida Sen. Mel Martinez announced Jan. 14, only hours after praising the idea in a speech at the SNA symposium.

"Strategic dispersal is in the best interest of national security," said Martinez, a Republican. A Mayport carrier would ensure all the ships weren't together in the event of a Pearl Harbor-style attack, he said, and would relieve what he called the burden carried by Naval Station Norfolk, Va., as the only East Coast port equipped to maintain nuclear-powered carriers. All five East Coast carriers were in port together in the Hampton Roads area for 35 days last year, Martinez said, and two were there together for about 81 percent of the time. Keeping the ships together makes them vulnerable, he said.

Martinez's remarks were the latest shot fired in an ongoing skirmish between Mayport boosters and Virginia's governor and congressional delegation, who want all five of the Navy's East Coast carriers to remain at Norfolk. Virginia Sen. Jim Webb, a Democrat, last week issued a report that detailed what he viewed were the problems with Martinez's "strategic dispersal," including the steep costs to dredge the channel at Mayport and upgrade equipment at the base so that it could maintain and repair nuclear warships.

Rep. Randy Forbes, R-Va., blasted the Navy's decision as a waste of money.

"I look forward to asking Navy officials in depth, as they present their budget, what other priorities were sacrificed for this unnecessary and costly decision," Forbes said in a statement. "With the cost of the move estimated to be anywhere from $600 million to $1 billion not including personnel relocation costs  the Navy has chosen to forgo significant impacts on critical unfinished priorities, including building one or possibly two LCS, funding over half of the cost of a destroyer, restoring aging infrastructure in our shipyards, or investing in over a dozen F/A-18s."

Lockheed: JTRS Effort On Schedule

Lockheed representatives discussed progress on a Joint Tactical Radio System (JTRS) contract it won last year. The company won an initial $766 million contract to develop the system for the airborne, maritime and fixed stations components of the JTRS program.

BAE Systems, General Dynamics, Northrop Grumman and Raytheon are all part of the Lockheed team for the contract.

"We are on schedule," for the JTRS program, said Tony Gehr, Lockheed's technical director for maritime and fixed systems. "Where today we have legacy radios with kilobits of capability, but limited ability to easily move net-work application data, JTRS is going to bring IP [internet protocol] enablement to those tactical platforms."

The critical design review for Lockheed's system is set to take place in May. Demonstrations of the small airborne portion and the maritime/fixed station portion of the program are scheduled for March 2010 and September 2010, respectively, Gehr said.

Lockheed expects a Milestone C production decision and the start of low-rate initial production in November 2011, and the development, test and evaluation phase will be complete in November 2012 with the close of the contract.

Lockheed's JTRS will provide communications for more than 160 different platforms, according to the company. But it's possible that not all existing radios will be upgraded, said Capt. Ed Hasell, the Navy's director for maritime and fixed systems. There may be some radios that DoD officials deem too outmoded to integrate with JTRS.

Ship Control

David Shikada of Lockheed's simulation, training and support division spoke about progress on Lockheed's program to modernize machinery control systems on DDG 51 Arleigh Burke-class destroyers. The systems manage propulsion, electrical systems and damage control equipment, and the upgrades would automate more functions and con-dense four control station consoles into one. One crew member could operate the modernized system during normal, peacetime operations, rather than the four required under the current system.

Earlier this month, the company announced a contract that could total $51.5 million for the hardware for the modernized control systems on the destroyers. That contract followed three others in 2007 and 2008 to modernize computer programs, provide engineering services and support the integration of hull, mechanical and electrical systems aboard existing Arleigh Burke-class ships.

"What we're evolving to under the modernization program is an initiative to make human workload less," Shikada said. "The cost of the sailor and the crew is the largest element of whole life support costs for ships." Cutting the required crew for the control system to one person could mean "pretty significant savings for the Navy."

This year is critical for the effort, Shikada said. "We'll be focused on completing development and design of that system this year" to meet a March 2010 deadline for the system on DDG 51.

Shipyard Gets $373M To Plan Carrier CVN-79

Keel-Laying For The Ship That Will Follow The Gerald R. Ford Is Scheduled For 2013.

(NEWPORT NEWS DAILY PRESS 16 JAN 09) ... Peter Frost

ARLINGTON - — Just four months after receiving a $5.1 billion contract to built the lead ship of the Navy's next generation of aircraft carrier, Northrop Grumman Shipbuilding received on Thursday another lump of money to begin planning the ship following it.

The Navy awarded the company a $373.5 million contract for design, advanced planning and procurement of certain parts for the yet-to-be-named carrier, known as CVN-79.

The 21-month contract provides for research and development efforts with suppliers, and it allows for the purchase of materials that take years to produce, like machinery for the carrier's nuclear propulsion plant.

By the end of the year, about 300 Northrop employees will be assigned to the carrier, which will be built in Newport News.

The timing of the contract is "beneficial to both the Navy and our shipbuilders," said Mike Shawcross, Northrop's vice president of the Ford-class building program.

The company's Newport News shipyard, the only one in the country to make nuclear-powered aircraft carriers for the Navy, is scheduled to lay the keel of the CVN-79 in 2013.

The Navy plans to commission the carrier in 2019, four years after the service is scheduled to enter the first ship of the class, the Gerald R. Ford, into the fleet.

Thursday's contract sends a clear signal that the Navy is committed to continuing to build carriers for the future fleet, but it provides money only for advanced planning on the ship.

A full construction contract probably won't follow until at least 2012.

If, the Navy and Congress opt to continue with the ship, its construction would add stability to Newport News' manufacturing base.

At its peak in 2012-13, Northrop will have about 4,500 workers employed on the Ford.

And as production would wind down on that ship, work on the CVN-79 would build, allowing Northrop to retain its experienced shipbuilders.

Including advanced design work and initial acquisition costs, the Navy projects the price tag for the Ford to come in about $13.9 billion.

Recurring costs for future Ford-class ships, including the CVN-79, will be about $8 billion.

That $8 billion includes all government-furnished equipment, such as combat systems, radar and communications, and other new equipment.

The Navy plans to build 11 Ford-class aircraft carriers, and construction is projected to continue through 2058.

The Ford class will include many of the design features of the Nimitz class, but Northrop and the Navy have added several new technologies to the ships, including a new flight deck with an improved weapons handling system, advanced arresting gear to catch landing aircraft, a re-engineered launch system and a new nuclear propulsion plant design.

The redesign will allow the Navy to increase the daily number of flights on and off the ship from 120 to about 160.

‘Significant Cost Growth’

Marine Corps H-1 Upgrade Effort Breaches Nunn-McCurdy Thresholds

(INSIDE THE NAVY 19 JAN 09) ... Jason Sherman

The Marine Corps’ $8.7 billion program to upgrade its fleet of Vietnam-era helicopters continues to be plagued by cost growth despite a recent decision to slash the total number of aircraft to be procured, forcing the Pentagon to flag the program for breaching Nunn-McCurdy statutory thresholds.

Navy Secretary Donald Winter, in a previously unreported development, advised lawmakers in a Dec. 18 letter that the average procurement unit cost for the H-1 Upgrades Program, managed by Bell-Textron Helicopter, now exceeds the baseline estimate by “at least 15 percent” compared to the unit cost report baseline estimate of July 2007. The letter, obtained by InsideDefense.com, does not provide an explanation for the cost growth.

On Nov. 7, H-1 Program Manager Col. Keith Birkholz “provided reasonable cause documentation to the service acquisition executive that the program would breach the significant cost growth threshold which is defined as 15 percent above the current baseline estimate or 30 percent above the original baseline estimate,” Winter wrote.

On Oct. 15, Birkholz told Inside the Navy the Marine Corps was cutting in half the number of AH-1Z attack helicopters it planned to build from scratch in order to avoid a “significant” breach of Nunn-McCurdy thresholds, which would require the defense secretary to certify to Congress that the program is essential to national security, triggering remedial action; or terminate the program.

The service had hoped to refurbish as many of its venerable AH-1W helicopters into a modernized AH-1Z variant, but determined that more than half of the 226 airframes that were to be refurbished are degraded beyond repair -- forcing the program to consider manufacturing 105 new aircraft, Inside the Navy reported in May.

Building 105 brand new AH-1Zs airframes would have driven the unit cost over the “critical” Nunn-McCurdy threshold, prompting the program to pare back buys of new airframes to 58, Birkholz told Inside the Navy.

The U-1 Upgrade Program replaces the two-bladed UH-1N and AH-1W with a four-bladed system coupled with enhanced aircraft electronics and a new cockpit, as well as an overhauled airframe. The aircraft also are designed to have a high degree of commonality.

‘Presence Deficit’

McCullough: Navy Cannot Meet Combatant Commanders’ Requests

(INSIDE THE NAVY 19 JAN 09) ... Zachary M. Peterson

The Navy cannot meet the growing demand for naval forces around the globe from U.S. military combatant commanders, the Navy’s top programmer said last week.

“To say that we are globally persistent is a misnomer,” Vice Adm. Barry McCullough, deputy chief of naval operations for integration of resources and capabilities, said Jan. 14 at the Surface Navy Association’s annual national symposium in Arlington, VA.

“There’s a presence deficit for naval forces globally and how do we explain that and how do we move ahead to get the force structure to support it,” he asked. “The demand for naval forces globally keeps going up.”

Navy Secretary Donald Winter said last week that the growing number of requests for naval forces by combatant commanders is being looked at in Navy’s portion of the ongoing Quadrennial Defense Review slated for release next year.

The Navy must determine what missions it must conduct and what capacity it has to do these missions, Winter told reporters at a Jan. 16 group interview at the Pentagon.

As the Navy downsizes to 330,000 sailors and officers in fiscal year 2009, it will be more difficult for the service to afford to perform myriad missions around the globe.

Sailors who fill billets for soldiers and Marines around the globe -- what the Navy labels individual augmentees -- present a funding challenge for the service, McCullough said last week.

“We cannot afford to take [individual augmentees] out of hide anymore,” he said.

In November, Inside the Navy reported individual augmentees were hampering readiness afloat and ashore.

“There is no excess manning at sea, therefore even a few thousand sailors contributing to IA [what the service calls ‘individual augmentee’ billets] has an effect on afloat and ashore readiness,” service spokesman Lt. Cmdr. John Daniels told ITN Nov. 21.

McCullough argued the Navy needs to figure out what missions must be funded in the baseline budget and find supplemental funds for temporary missions.

A product of... Navy Office of Information www.navy.mil January 26, 2009

 “We are presented with a once-in-a-generation opportunity to shape and stabilize a high quality force to meet the demands of the Maritime Strategy and the joint warfighter. Our goal is to come out of this period a more flexible and agile Navy and to have policies in place that create stability and predictability in Fleet manpower.”

– Vice Adm. Mark Ferguson, Chief of Naval Personnel

Navy aspires to be a “Top 50” organization. Today, the Navy offers a superb compensation and benefits package, outstanding health care, significant opportunities for education and advancement, an exceptional retirement benefit nd the ability to serve alongside the finest Sailors in the world in service to our nation.

Shaping and Stabilizing the Force

• A central component of future success is instituting programs and initiatives that create opportunities for life- work integration and flexibility in career paths. The virtual command pilot, 4-day work week and the new paternity leave policy are just a few of the innovative solutions available to commands. Senior leadership is also dedicated to making strategic investments in education and training. The post-9/11 GI Bill and Navy’s Safe Harbor program are recent examples of the nation’s commitment to Sailors and their families.

• All of the initiatives and programs combined are driving Sailors to “Stay Navy” in increasing numbers. Since 2003, Navy end strength has been reduced by approximately 8,000 to 10,000 personnel annually. The Navy is transitioning to a period of shaping and stabilizing the force and putting into place the necessary tools to ensure the long term health of the force.

Guiding decisions on personnel programs and initiatives

• The Navy’s force stabilization initiatives provide an opportunity to build upon the finest Navy in the world and create a Navy that is better, stronger, and more capable of meeting the demands of the Maritime Strategy and the joint warfighter.

• Actions are tied to the following principles:

o Retain the best Sailors with the right skills

o Target incentives to retain critical skill ratings

o Keep a balanced force based on seniority, experience and skills matched to projected requirements

o Focus on performance and safeguard the careers of top performers to improve the quality of the force

o Attract and recruit our nation’s best and brightest

o Provide the Fleet stable and predictable manning to meet mission requirements

• Navy has initiated several personnel actions including performance boards for probationary officers; restrictions on short term extensions; early transition in overmanned ratings up to one year prior to End of Active Obligated Service; reenlistment for Selective Reenlistment Bonus limited to 90 days before the end of obligated service; expansion of Perform to Serve to Zone B and eventually to Zone C; and a performance-based continuation board for Chief Petty Officers with greater than 20 years of service.  

                               Key Messages      Facts & Figures  

• Dedication to Sailors and world-class benefits, policies and programs make the Navy a “Top 50” employer.

• The Navy is focused on improving advancement opportunity for all top performers.

• Personnel policies are designed to give the Navy stability into the future.            

• Our goal is to stabilize the force at approximately 329,000 Sailors by the end of FY09 from our current level of 332,000.

• This equates to approximately 3,000 Sailors or less than 1% of the force.

Remarks by Chief of Naval Operations

Admiral Gary Roughead

Secretary of the Navy Donald Winter

Farewell Ceremony

January 23, 2009 

We are to honor today Secretary Winter. Farewells as you know are never easy and even though we serve in a profession where farewells are part of our life, they seem to get harder and harder as the years go on and the responsibilities increase. I think it’s because as that time progresses we realize the privilege that we’ve had, the experiences that we’ve had and the great journey that we are a part of. So it is bittersweet that we say farewell to the Winters but in a way it’s not that bittersweet because they’re really not leaving by the way, and this is a good thing. 

It has also been a true privilege over the last couple of years to have been able to serve under your leadership. We began, our first meeting in the Pacific in Hawaii at Pearl Harbor, and I owe my position today to the Secretary and as I said I have great respect for him. But we were living this blissful existence in Hawaii and the Secretary had rewarded me with a position in Washington DC that I love and relish. 

It really has been a fast couple of years and it has accelerated since Ellen and I arrived in Washington and most importantly it has been a truly privilege and honor for me to serve as the Chief of Naval Operations under a great Secretary of the Navy. A man who I’ve come to know as a gentleman of the greatest intellect, the highest sense of honor and an absolute, total commitment to the men and women who wear not only this uniform but the uniform of every service in our Armed Forces. His compassion for our Sailors is evident in everything that he does. The shortest meeting, the smallest issue, always distills down to ‘what does it mean for the men and women who serve in our great Navy?’  

He has brought in my opinion the same passion and zeal and enthusiasm to the position of Secretary of the Navy as one of the greatest – Teddy Roosevelt, who made his mark and put the Navy of the United States on the world stage with the sailing of the Great White Fleet. And Secretary Winter realized the importance of that event and saw that as a re-statement of our global interests and our global responsibilities. He has been the one who has led us in this milestone year of the sailing of the Great White Fleet.  

He has also led the Navy at a time when we have used the Navy, when the Nation has used the Navy, in a way that it has never done before. As we sit here today, there are 14,000 Sailors, men and women who serve in our Navy, who are in the mountains of Afghanistan, the deserts of Iraq and the Horn of Africa, serving alongside the Army and the Air Force, the Marine Corps and the Coast Guard, but serving ashore -- and that’s in addition to our normal global responsibilities. He has spearheaded the programs, the processes that have allowed us to transform ourselves to support that Navy in this new way of operating.  

He has also been spearheading significant and needed changes in how we do and buy things in the Navy. We and the world’s navies buy expensive things. That’s just the way it is. He also has been the leader in addressing that which we can do to bring those costs down, but again I come back to the fact that he is always about delivering the capability to the Sailor on the deckplate or in the squadron that is deployed somewhere in the world. He is exacting in his standards. The term I have used in my staff, Mr. Secretary, is if they go on to brief you, you better be ready to do a lot of push ups because that’s exactly what you’re going to be doing. You’re going to be put through your paces, you’re going to be pressed on the details, you’re going to be asked what the value is of what we are about. That is what a Secretary of the Navy must do and because of his background, he has been a mentor, he has been a teacher and he has been an inspiration to those of us who have been involved in that very, very important business. 

And for that Mr. Secretary, on a professional and personal level, I thank you for everything that you have done and what you have allowed me to do, what you have shown me to do, so that I can serve the Navy better. 

Now the real power behind the office of the Secretary of the Navy is not on the stage today. It is Linda Winter: a woman of, I’m going to really step out on this one, of greater intellect than the Secretary of the Navy. A woman of intense interest in what our young men and women do, how they live, what’s important to them, and what they need for themselves and their families. She has taken the time to dig in and explore the issues. She has also benefitted the uniformed spouses by being there at our conferences, by being the key participant in discussions, in the same way that Secretary Winter does, asking the questions that often times don’t came to harbor but that are so very important. And because of that, because of her involvement, we have become a better Navy and our families and our servicemen and women are much better today than they would have been a couple of years ago. I thank you for that. And on Ellen’s behalf I would also like to thank you for your friendship to her. She often comes back and tells me great stories to include lying on your stomachs and petting dolphins, and again in Hawaii I might add. But those are the types of times and the types of things that you did to find out more about who we are, what we do and what is important to us. 

So it really has been a true pleasure and an honor to serve with you, to serve for you, as a partner in leading this great Navy. And on behalf of all who wear this uniform, we wish you both fair winds and following seas in all that is ahead. But we also recognize that you will always be part of us and we will always benefit from your leadership and your integrity and your total commitment to the men and women who serve. Thank you very much. 

Helo Careers Spin Up

Navy Adds Squadrons, Sees Much Wider Usefor Rotary Wings

(NAVY TIMES 02 FEB 09) ... Andrew Tilghman

The Navy is expanding and streamlining the helicopter fleet, offering young rotary-wing aviators more career flexibility in the coming years.

The Navy has added three rotary-wing squadrons during the past several years, and plans to stand up seven more by 2019, Navy officials said.

Today's fleet of 7,700 enlisted sailors will grow to about 9,100 in the next 10 years, and the number of officers is slated to rise to 1,775, up from today's level of about 1,400, Navy officials said.

"There will be a lot more command opportunities for people to get promoted. And that will follow on the enlisted side — the opportunity to make chief will in-crease," said Cmdr. Michael Stoll, the helicopter readiness officer for Naval Air Forces.

At the same time, the Navy is scaling back the number of helicopter types in the fleet, dropping from seven models to just two: the MH-60R and the MH-60S.

Those two aircraft will be taking on more missions than before, including anti-submarine war-fare, anti-surface warfare and mine sweeping.

For helicopter pilots, the new configuration will allow more variety because fewer platforms will be doing more missions.

"The junior pilots will get to fly more in different environments," said Cmdr. Michael Nortier, commanding officer of Helicopter Maritime Strike Squadron 71. "Now you'll have an opportunity to move back and forth between

expeditionary and air wing squadrons."

More squadrons — especially concentrated in the areas of San Diego; Norfolk, Va.; and Jacksonville, Fla. — will also mean more options for enlisted sailors to settle down, buy a house and keep their kids in the same schools.

"It's going to allow folks to stay in one place as they do their sea-shore rotation," said Cmdr. Michael Ruth, commanding officer of Helicopter Sea Combat Squadron 8.

EIS Notice Released Jan. 15

Navy Proposes Basing 12 Stovl JSF Squadrons On West Coast

(INSIDE THE NAVY 26 JAN 09) ... Dan Taylor

The Navy will hold two public scoping meetings early next month as it mulls basing 12 squadrons of the shorttake-off, vertical-landing (STOVL) variants of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter at Marine Corps bases in San Diego, CA, and Yuma, AZ, according to a Jan. 15 notice in the Federal Register.

The notice of intent to prepare an environment impact statement (EIS) states that the proposal to base the squadrons at Marine Corps Air Station Miramar in San Diego and Air Station Yuma would take about 12 years to implement and would begin in 2012, when the STOVL is scheduled to meet its initial operational capability.

The squadrons would be comprised of about 182 aircraft, and the new arrivals would require the construction of facilities and modifications prior to and after 2012.

The service has identified five alternatives, which range from basing an equal number of squadrons at each air station or having one air station host as many as 10 squadrons with the other air station having only one active and one operational test and evaluation squadron, the notice states.

Top Admiral Ready For Fight Over Carrier Site

(NORFOLK VIRGINIAN-PILOT 31 JAN 09) ... Dale Eisman

WASHINGTON--The Navy's top admiral signaled Friday that he's prepared for a fight over plans to relocate a Norfolk-based aircraft carrier to Florida and insisted that the shift is "in the best interest of the nation."

Adm. Gary Roughead, the chief of naval operations, said that while the Navy and other military branches face increasingly tight budgets, "making sure that the fleet is best postured, positioned and prepared to respond has to be a priority."

"That is what I get paid to do and that was the basis for my recommendation" to assign a carrier to Mayport Naval Station, he said.

Norfolk is the Navy's only East Coast base equipped to maintain a nuclear-powered carrier. Roughead and outgoing Navy Secretary Donald Winter have proposed spending about $600 million to build and upgrade facilities at Mayport to provide a home for one of the five flattops assigned to the Atlantic Fleet.

The planned move is predicated on concerns that the fleet is vulnerable to a terrorist attack or natural disaster if all the Atlantic carriers are housed in one port. The Navy has three nuclear-capable carrier ports in the Pacific, Roughead noted.

The transfer would shift about 3,000 sailors from Norfolk to the Jacksonville area and siphon hundreds of millions of dollars annually from the Hampton Roads economy.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates promised this week to review the plan, which state and local officials argue is unnecessary.

U.S. Sen. Jim Webb, a former Navy secretary himself, is pressing Gates to demand that the Navy provide a more detailed assessment of the risk involved in maintaining just one nuclear-capable carrier port on the East Coast.

Webb argues that the current alignment of nuclear ships was in place throughout the Cold War, when the Soviet Union's navy posed a far greater threat than any nation or terrorist poses today.

A conventionally powered carrier, the John F. Kennedy, was in service and based in Mayport through most of that period, however. The Kennedy was retired in 2007.