There is no shortage of reasons to point to the many faults of the program, CONOPS, and execution of LCS – it long ago stopped being sporting. In 2017, LCS is something we really should have right, as we simply have to make it work until some time next decade when we can get a replacement ship displacing water. Changes have been made on the margins, but like trying to make a soup with bad stock, at the end of the day you only hope to make it palatable.
Time and time again, the Old School LCS critics have seen the issues they raised in the middle of the last decade come to fruition, as we knew they would once the ships started to displace water and deploy. The engineering and weaponeering problems were the hardest to hide and the first to come to the front. The manning issues have always been in the background and are harder from a distance to point to, as Sailors will mask manning problems as they always have; work harder to make it happen.
As reported last week by David Larter at MilitaryTimes, the manning concept has once again shown it’s PPT fragility. It is also showing a rigid system that, even in a benign peace, will put the Sailor and their families last.
We all know being Navy means months away from home. In moments of war and conflict, that can stretch to years. We know that comes with the job. In this case, I think we are abusing the trust between Sailor and Service;
The embarked crew of the littoral combat ship Coronado, forward deployed to Singapore, was supposed to be home for Thanksgiving after a four- or five-month tour. But now the crew has been on board and overseas for eight months and there is no end in sight.
About 70 sailors compose Crew 204, which deployed in June for the Rim of the Pacific exercise and to replace the LCS Fort Worth at Changi Naval Base. But once the Coronado and her crew arrived in Singapore, the Navy’s top Surface Warfare Officer announced a sweeping overhaul to the LCS program’s training standards that was spurred by a string of accidents, some of which were caused by crew errors.
Note here they have done nothing wrong. They just happened to be caught in a seam when the truth changed when reality demanded it.
They are paying the price for other people’s arrogance.
The shakeup has delayed getting the Coronado’s replacement crew qualified and could extend the ship’s deployment length to as long as a year, … The fact that nobody knows exactly when it will end has eroded crew morale and put an enormous strain on families.
…
“The Navy recognizes the hardship put on families when their sailors are deployed, especially for unscheduled or extended amount of times. … The work being done by this group of deployed sailors is to be commended and is imperative to long-term improvement and stability for the program and the sailors serving aboard the LCS. We are reviewing all courses of action to ensure we facilitate the earliest possible reunion with their families.”
…
A main factor driving Crew 204’s open-ended deployment is the delay in getting a new crew qualified to replace them after a change in training standards. Qualifying under the new training standards requires some underway time. And to get underway, the crew, which will be Crew 203, needs a ship and for now all the trimaran LCS-2 variant ships are either in overhaul or undergoing repairs.Officials told Navy Times that the replacement crew should be training on the LCS Independence, but that ship is in need of engine repairs and is not immediately available.
All this is being done to save face and to stick to a crew swap concept that is being redone on the fly.
It is well past the point to bring Crew 204 home. We are not at war. That single LCS is not a critical asset at this point in time. If the next crew cannot be ready in the time it takes to get that ship back across the Pacific – bring 204 home.
We should do the right thing.
