In the effort to discover what steps our Navy is taking to address the concerns brought up following the incidents in WESTPAC in 2017, as always – follow the money.
In the scheme of things in a $700+ billion defense bill, $64 million may not seem like a bunch, but it is not nothing.
Via our friend Sam LaGrone, let’s see what short-term Surface Warfare reforms we’re going to spend some coin on in the Pentagon Reprogramming Request:
$16.2 million for additional enlisted pay and benefits to help improve afloat unit manning and training.
$1.3 million for Naval Surface Forces Atlantic to update Automatic Identification System laptops.
$1.8 million for a Naval Sea Systems Command ship control system design review.
$2.3 million to reestablish U.S. 2nd Fleet.
$4 million for improvements in budget and accounting process.
$22.6 million to establish the Mariner Skills Training Program (MSTP) at Newport, RI, Norfolk. Va. and San Diego, Calif.
$0.3 million to expand the use of U.S. Naval Academy Yard Patrol (YP) craft for NRTOC midshipmen in FY 2018.
$7.18 million for consultant services to “execute a forward-looking learning culture” in the service and a modernizes the Navy’s Manpower Requirement System.
$8.5 million to accelerate fielding of the Next Generation Surface Search Radar.
So, roughly $6.3 million (~10%) is for setting up staffs and learning to count money better, and even more $7.18 million goes in to the defense consulting feedtrough. I guess you have to feed Vaal a little bit … but I’ll take the rest.
More to follow, but this will work for now. As the problems are people, training, mindset and culture, this looks productive.
A shame it took a year of tragic events to make it happen, but it did.
