WASHINGTON — The deputy chief of naval operations for information warfare recently warned sailors and other military officials they are marks for hacking attempts, especially at a time of international hostilities.
“Cyberattacks against businesses and U.S. infrastructure are increasing in frequency and complexity,” Navy Vice Adm. Jeffrey Trussler said in an unclassified memo, dated February. “DoD and federal law enforcement report adversary interest in our remote work infrastructure. This means that you are a target — for your access and your information.”
Hackers have exploited mistakes on Navy and private, at-home networks by stealing or guessing weak passwords and other credentials, furtively installing malware, and posing as service members or veterans to pry information out of people, according to the message.
“With heightened tensions throughout the world, ensure your team understands how the actions of a single user can impact our global force,” said Trussler.
The memo arrived amid an avalanche of cyberattacks in Ukraine and as Russia again pressed its western neighbor. Distributed denial of service attacks, which rely on overwhelming traffic to render something useless, paralyzed Ukrainian websites throughout January and February.
The White House National Security Council has blamed some of the attacks on the GRU, a Russian intelligence agency. Moscow has denied responsibility; the Russian Embassy in the U.S. on Feb. 18 said Russia “has never conducted and does not conduct any ‘malicious’ operations in cyberspace.”
While Ukraine was not specifically mentioned in the February memo, a long-term strategy for competition with Russia and China was.
Trussler has stated the Navy is investing in cyber, and last year said “cyber protection and operations” must be “culturally embedded in everything we do, and that will take a bit of education.”
“I think we have to get better at partnerships and putting creative teams together to test systems in order to tell you what’s safe and what’s vulnerable, using people who are capable of thinking like the adversary,” he said at the Sea-Air-Space 2021 conference, according to a Navy narrative.
Colin Demarest is a reporter at C4ISRNET, where he covers networks and IT. Colin previously covered the Department of Energy and its National Nuclear Security Administration — namely nuclear weapons development and Cold War cleanup — for a daily newspaper in South Carolina.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit ruled in favor of service members objecting to the Navy’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate due to their religious beliefs.
On Monday, a three-judge panel denied the Navy’s request to require about three dozen personnel to get vaccinated despite their objections on religious grounds. The SEALs, represented by First Liberty Institute, filed a lawsuit against the Navy since they were at risk of being fired for not complying with the mandate.
“The Navy has not accommodated any religious request to abstain from any vaccination in seven years, and to date, it has denied all religiously based claims for exemption from COVID-19 vaccination,” the judges wrote, according to The Washington Examiner.
“But evidence, recited previously and not meaningfully challenged here, suggests that the Navy has effectively stacked the deck against even those exemptions supported by Plaintiffs’ immediate commanding officers and military chaplains.”
In January, a federal judge also sided with the SEALs holding religious objections to the vaccines. First Liberty Institute, a conservative legal nonprofit specializing in religious liberty cases, filed a motion in late January claimingthat the Navy retaliated against the plaintiffs and called on the judge to hold the military branch in contempt.
“Events around the world remind us daily that there are those who seek to harm America. Our military should be welcoming service members, not forcing them out because of their religious beliefs,” Director of Military Affairs for First Liberty Institute Mike Berry said in a statement.
“The purge of religious service members is not just devastating to morale, but it harms America’s national security,” he continued. “It’s time for our military to honor its constitutional obligations and grant religious accommodations for service members with sincere religious objections to the vaccine. We’re grateful the Fifth Circuit denied the Navy’s motion.”
In addition to opposing the mandate, the SEALs argued that the Department of Defense did not legally consider their requests for religious exemptions. Out of roughly 16,000 requests, the service only granted 20 of them.
The servicemembers, who are all Catholic, Eastern Orthodox or Protestant, “do not object to safety measures that reduce the transmission of COVID-19 in the workplace,” but rather, they oppose the vaccine’s ingredients.
The SEALs object to the use of “fetal cell lines in [the] development of the vaccine” since they opposed abortion. According to the lawsuit, the SEALs believe “that modifying one’s body is an affront to the Creator,” and therefore, they have received “direct, divine instruction not to receive the vaccine.”
As of last week, just over 1,100 service members were discharged from the Air Force, Marines and Navy for not complying with the vaccine mandate. On Monday, the Army announced that it would start discharging servicemembers who refused to get vaccinated.
Related:
40 U.S. Navy Seals Threaten Lawsuit over Vaccine Mandate
Federal Judge Halts COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate for Navy SEALs with Religious Objections
OSHA Withdraws COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate for Businesses with over 100 Employees
Milton Quintanilla is a freelance writer. He is also the co-hosts of the For Your Soul podcast, which seeks to equip the church with biblical truth and sound doctrine. Visit his blog Blessed Are The Forgiven.
A federal appeals court delivered a blow to Pentagon’s vaccine mandate and denied the Biden Administration’s attempt to reinstate the U.S. Navy’s COVID-19 vaccine requirement.
On Monday the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denied the Navy’s request to reinstate the U.S. Navy’s COVID-19 vaccine requirement a month after a federal judge in Fort Worth halted the mandate.
‘[Evidence] suggests that the Navy has effectively stacked the deck against even those exemptions supported by Plaintiffs’ immediate commanding officers and military chaplains,’ the three-judge panel said.
While the percentage of vaccinated active duty personnel in each service is at 95 percent or higher, the number of unvaccinated personnel is close to 30,000
More than 1.62 million US military service members are vaccinated, according to the DoD
In November, dozens of U.S. Navy SEALs claimed they were wrongfully denied COVID vaccination exemptions on religious grounds, and that the Defense Department’s mandate violates their First Amendment rights.
The troops sued the Department of Defense – along with President Joe Biden and top military officials.
The suit, which lists 35 unnamed service members, argues that the Pentagon is overstepping its bounds as a federal body and is infringing upon their constitutional rights, with the Navy requiring them to be fully vaccinated by November 28 – after they have been denied a religious exemption.
In some cases, the lawsuit argues, SEALs are reportedly being threatened and, in a few instances, harassed into complying with the demand – and have also been flat-out denied a religious exemption.
According to the filing, the SEALs behind the suit are all Christian and are pushing back against the mandate because it contradicts ‘their sincerely held religious beliefs.’
The plaintiffs include members of the Navy SEALs and the Navy Special Warfare Combatant Craft Crewmen, a US Navy Explosive Ordnance Disposal Technician and US Navy Divers, according to court documents.
They filed their lawsuit with the help of the First Liberty Institute, a Texas-based Christian legal group that regularly takes on religious liberty cases.
The Navy itself has previously said that it has not granted an exemption to any vaccine in the past seven years
The Army, the US military’s largest service with 478,000 active duty soldiers, reported the lowest number of service members seeking a religious exemption – just over 1,700 soldiers – compared with the other three smaller services
‘Events around the world remind us daily that there are those who seek to harm America. Our military should be welcoming service members, not forcing them out because of their religious beliefs,’ Mike Berry, director of military affairs for First Liberty Institute, said in a statement following Monday’s ruling.
‘The purge of religious servicemembers is not just devastating to morale, but it harms America’s national security,’ Berry added. ‘It’s time for our military to honor its constitutional obligations and grant religious accommodations for service members with sincere religious objections to the vaccine. We’re grateful the Fifth Circuit denied the Navy’s motion.’
Military branches and the COVID-19 vaccine mandate
US Army
Deadline: Dec. 15
Percent vaccinated: 97%
Members dismissed: 3,300 at risk of being fired
US Navy
Deadline: Nov. 28
Percent vaccinated: 97%
Members dismissed: 45 as of last week
US Air Force
Deadline: Nov. 2
Percent vaccinated: 97.5%
Members dismissed: 64, including members in basic training
US Coast Guard
Deadline: Nov. 22
Percent vaccinated: 95.3%, including partially vaccinated
Members dismissed: Unknown
Marine Corps
Deadline: Nov. 28
Percent vaccinated: 96%, including partially vaccinated
Members dismissed: 334
Sources: Individual branches, Washington Post, US Naval Institute
Each military branch set its own deadline after Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin issued a memo in August requiring all service members to be vaccinated.
While the percentage of vaccinated active duty personnel in each service is at 95 percent or higher, the number of unvaccinated personnel is close to 30,000.
The Army, the US military’s largest service with 478,000 active duty soldiers, reported the lowest number of service members seeking a religious exemption – just over 1,700 soldiers – compared with the other three smaller services.
In comparison, there are more than 4,700 in the Air Force, 3,000 in the Marine Corps and 2,700 in the Navy who are requesting the rarely given religious exemptions, according to data released by the branches in the past week.
None of the requests have yet to be approved.
On December 16, the Marines announced they had fired 103 service members for not getting vaccinated. The Army said it fired six people, including two commanding officers.
In January, US District Judge Reed O’Connor of the Northern District of Texas issued a preliminary injunction in the suit saying there is ‘no COVID-19 exception to the First Amendment’ and that the pandemic doesn’t give the government the license to ‘abrogate those freedoms.’
O’Connor sided with the troops, pointing out that 29 of the 35 service members had their requests for religious exemptions denied, calling the process of obtaining one ‘theater.’
The Navy itself has previously said that it has not granted an exemption to any vaccine in the past seven years.
‘Religious exemptions to the vaccine requirement are virtually non-existent. In the past seven years, the Navy has not granted a religious exemption to any vaccine requirement,’ O’Connor wrote.
The first firings from the military’s COVID-19 mandate began in December.
The Marines fired 103 members and the Army fired six, including two commanding officers.
The two Army officers commanded active-duty battalions.
Navy Cmdr. Lucian Kins, the executive officer of the destroyer USS Winston S. Churchill, became the first naval officer to be fired over vaccine refusal in December.
He reportedly requested a religious exemption to the military’s vaccine requirement, but was denied and appealed the decision.
Navy spokesman Lt. Cmdr. Jason Fischer declined to give the precise reason why Kins was relieved of command, citing privacy concerns.
He did, however, state the reason for the firing was that Anderson lost confidence in Kins’ ability to perform his duties after he failed to obey a lawful order.
As the long conflicts of World War II at last came to an end in 1945, Fleet Admiral Chester Nimitz—one of the greatest naval strategists this nation has ever known—commanded the largest naval armada the world had ever seen. With the United States now the unquestioned leader of the free world (actually coming out of the war with far greater strength than going in), it would have been reasonable for Nimitz, and the rest of the world, to believe the U.S. was holding all the right cards to ensure continued dominance.
Yet Admiral Nimitz knew resting on laurels would not win tomorrow’s battles. The United States had seen dark days during the war—times when the enemy’s technological capabilities had surprised the Allies and led to significant losses in battle. Those surprises started with the attack on Pearl Harbor, when not only the attack itself was a surprise, but the accuracy and power of Japanese torpedoes caught the U.S. Navy off guard. (It would take us a year to catch up on that front alone, an amount of time we will likely never have again in modern conflict.)
Tech surprise came into play also in the Atlantic, where early on German U-boats operated with near impunity until allied anti-submarine capabilities came of age. Even toward the end of the war, the adversary in Europe was working furiously to develop new capabilities for revolutionary V-2 rockets—the world’s first long-range, guided ballistic missiles.
Thankfully, the U.S. had made dramatic technology advances through new partnerships with industry, academia, and allies which proved crucial to victory. Radar played a critical role in success in the battle for the Atlantic and beyond. The Manhattan Project assembled some of the world’s greatest minds and developed the atomic bomb. U.S. industry and government paired up as never before to create multiple new platforms to dominate land, air, and sea, and manufactured them at a scale never seen before. Crucial new materials, such as synthetic rubber, while lacking the star-power of new carriers or bombers, nonetheless played key roles—as did new medical technologies, advances in computers, and even duct tape.
Admiral Nimitz and other key leaders knew that the recent past underscored the importance of imagining the future. And that would extend to the Navy itself. “There will always be a Navy,” he said, “Not necessarily a Navy of battleships, or submarines, or carriers, but a Navy in the sense of what the word Navy truly means…what the future Navy will be like, we cannot say as yet.”
Against this backdrop, in 1946, Congress created the Office of Naval Research (ONR). President Harry Truman signed the bill into law in August 1946—a little over 75 years ago. The bill’s instruction for the new organization: “to plan, foster and encourage scientific research in recognition of its paramount importance as related to the maintenance of future naval power, and the preservation of national security.”
Since its founding, ONR has produced incredible results. ONR sponsored-research has played a key role in the development of GPS, radar, computers, new uses for gallium nitride, new autonomous surface, sub-surface, and airborne platforms, virtual training, tropical cyclone prediction, directed-energy weapons, stealth capabilities, and so much more. The raw knowledge coming out of ONR over the years has been astounding: More than 70 Nobel Prize winners have been sponsored by ONR; in many cases, they have thanked ONR directly for pivotal guidance and partnership.
From advanced computing to precision navigation and timing to materials science, the Office of Naval Research has supported the efforts of dozens of Nobel laureates through the past eight decades. (ONR)
Impressive as its history is, and as exciting as today’s technologies are, the people of ONR cannot be satisfied with what we have already accomplished. We must continue to forge ahead with an ongoing call to intellectual arms. Today, the Department of the Navy and the nation require us to reimagine naval power, and recognize that, across the Navy and Marine Corps, we must change to maintain naval dominance. Monumental efforts are needed, in the spirit of people like Admiral Hyman Rickover, whose singular focus brought about the nuclear-powered Navy, despite entrenched bureaucracy seemingly designed to slow down dramatic change. I recently introduced the concept of a new “hedge strategy” for the Navy, where newly developed, autonomous platforms and sensors on thousands of unmanned vehicles—the small, the agile, and the many—will complement the Navy’s powerful carriers, aircraft, and submarines. Noted entrepreneur Steve Blank wrote about this strategy in Proceedings earlier this year.
Our nation and the Navy are the better for ONR’s first 75 years of research and development. We must act just as boldly today because what happens in the next 10 years in science and technology may well determine the next 100 years of history. We are at a pivotal moment—and technologies being developed now are going to be akin to James Watt’s steam engine and the subsequent Industrial Revolution that changed the world. Artificial intelligence; autonomous and unmanned capabilities; quantum computing; directed energy; materials science; and biotechnology are today’s equivalents. And, too often-overlooked, the workforce development and STEM educational efforts that drive those advances are what will ensure the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps maintain their edge and ensure a safe and secure nation and global commons.
1946-2021
Eight months before Winston Churchill declared at Westminster College in Missouri that an “iron curtain has descended across” Europe, U.S. naval officers ensured that the postwar Navy would have the services of the first military organization dedicated to advancing civilian science and technology for future readiness. Originally founded on a temporary basis in July 1945 as the Office of Research and Invention on the authority of the Secretary of the Navy and the War Powers Act, the new organization was the product of what had been learned from the national mobilization of science for the war.
Soon renamed the Office of Naval Research, the command had a revolutionary mission: to support science in the interest of national security, in peacetime as well as wartime. As had Nimitz, Vice Admiral Harold Bowen, the first Chief of Naval Research, championed the argument that readiness was no longer something that could happen after a conflict had begun. Enduring technological advantage was a national security imperative.
As the Naval STEM Executive, I believe that maxim has never been truer. To maintain that technical advantage, we need to view our naval STEM workforce as a matter of national security. Our edge will continue to come from great ideas; the great ideas will come from a unique, diverse workforce; but that STEM-inspired workforce will not just magically appear—it must be supported and nurtured. Holistically, if we are to succeed in a rapidly-changing technological landscape, our brightest young minds in general—and formal educational organizations, including university STEM programs and historically black colleges and universities and minority-serving institutions in particular—must be viewed as national assets. Within the Naval Research Enterprise—which includes ONR, ONR Global, the Naval Research Laboratory and PMR-51—we are prioritizing support to these programs as foundations of the future.
Across the globe, determined adversaries are rapidly developing advanced weapon systems, shrinking (or in some cases overcoming) the capability advantage U.S. forces have long enjoyed. To maintain or regain our edge, ONR is engaged in scientific and engineering efforts from the ocean floor to space.
Let’s start with the oceans. It is here that ONR made some of its most well-known impacts. Indeed, the field of oceanography itself likely would not exist as it does today without ONR’s early and persistent investments after World War II. Early efforts in wave prediction and acoustics, many headed by the late “Einstein of the Sea,” Walter Munk, contributed to our understanding of the oceans and expertise in undersea warfare. Marie Tharp and Bruce Heezen developed the first comprehensive three-dimensional map of the seafloor, which was essential to the later formulation of the theory of plate tectonics. Sponsored research in deep-submergence technology resulted in the record-breaking dive to the bottom of the world’s ocean in 1960, when Navy Lieutenant Don Walsh and explorer Jacques Piccard went to the bottom of Challenger Deep in the Mariana’s Trench on board the bathyscaphe Trieste.
ONR funded the deep ocean research accomplished with the bathyscaphe Trieste in the 1950s and 1960s. Here Don Walsh speaks at the 60th anniversary of the Challenger Deep dive in January 2020. (ONR)
It didn’t stop there. ONR’s support for basic research in the 1970s resulted in the discovery of undersea hydrothermal vents, and an entirely new form of life sustained by chemosynthesis—work led by Robert Ballard. And the latest generation of networked sensor platforms, such as floats, gliders, and remote vehicles, originally developed with ONR support to study ocean dynamics and climate change, provides the means for real-time maritime domain awareness today.
In addition to discoveries in the oceans, ONR continues to lead in developing the vehicles, sensors, platforms, and ships that make all these discoveries possible. These efforts include everything from building submersibles such as Alvin, launched in 1964, and unique vessels such as the Floating Instrument Platform (FLIP), to providing many of the nation’s largest ocean-going research ships such as the venerable R/V Melville (AGOR-14) and R/V Knorr (AGOR-15), each of which provided more than 40 years of service, and the current R/V Sally Ride (AGOR-28) and R/V Neil Armstrong (AGOR-27).
ONR’s impact goes beyond marine sciences. One of its earliest projects in the 1940s, Project Whirlwind, resulted in the first digital computer capable of real-time computing. Originally intended to control a next-generation flight simulator, Whirlwind would eventually be incorporated as the heart of the first strategic air defense early-warning system. Today, nearly every device that contains a real-time computing device—from the computer in your car to the servers that monitor daily shipping traffic—owes something to ONR’s early work in digital computing.
One of the early advanced computing efforts supported by ONR was Project Whirlwind. (ONR)
ONR-sponsored research aided in the development and enhancement of the atomic clock, an essential and necessary component to the satellite navigation systems upon which so much of modern life depends. Early investments in directed energy supported the research of Charles Townes, who invented the microwave amplification by simulated emission of radiation (maser) in the 1950s and contributed to later development of the light amplification by simulated emission of radiation (laser). Those investments came full circle in 2014, as ONR deployed the first laser weapon system on a warship, the USS Ponce (AFSB(I)-15)—and today has put a far more powerful laser aboard USS Portland (LPD 27). ONR-sponsored research in railguns over the past decade resulted in a series of record-breaking kinetic milestones with this next-generation technology. And, ONR has long been at the forefront of new materials for nearly every environment, from explosive-resistant coatings for vehicles and ships, to highly conductive materials such as gallium nitride—found in nearly anything with full-color LED lighting and, more significantly, in high-power radars and electronics.
Warfighter protection efforts have been front and center as well, with significant military and societal significance. Medical research sponsored by ONR has included everything from the SeaLab underwater habitats that helped us understand human interactions underwater, to more recent automated trauma monitoring systems, virtual reality PTSD treatments, and QuikClot, a wound dressing that accelerates blood clotting. Indeed over the years, ONR has supported an array of technologies that have directly benefited Marines, from wearable tactical energy systems, mobile power and logistics systems, to next-generation tactical ground vehicles.
Our work in unmanned systems has led to enormous success and even greater promise ahead—but it is worth noting it took decades to get to the point of such groundbreaking autonomy exercises as the Integrated Battle Problem 21 (IBP21), where over 30 autonomous platforms were successfully tested in blue water operations. Beginning with some of the earliest investments in artificial intelligence that resulted in the first autonomous robot, Shakey, at Stanford University in the 1960s, ONR has been a leader in building and improving autonomous vehicles, automated decision-making, and human-robotic teaming and interactions. This year, our new SCOUT initiative—a novel partnership with the Joint Interagency Task Force-South—will provide impressive new autonomous capabilities to support narcotics interdiction efforts.
ONR’s importance to American science and technology extends beyond research and new capabilities—indeed, the organizational infrastructure that ONR uses to support research and innovation has been replicated across the Department of Defense and beyond. The first deputy chief of ONR, Alan T. Waterman, had served as the director of field operations for the Office of Scientific Research and Development during World War II, and would become the first director of the National Science Foundation when it was founded in 1950. Our peer organizations—the Army Research Office, the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency—were founded during the Cold War using the same S&T management principles pioneered by ONR.
Over the decades, a wide range of warfare centers, laboratories, and university-affiliated research centers, have been established and grown into a diverse S&T network, dedicated to advancing innovation. Of all ONR’s many legacies, collaboration between institutions and organizations—military, industrial, and academic—is perhaps the most profound and longest-lasting. Fostering an environment of partnership, from the Naval Research Laboratory and ONR Global, to our sister organizations throughout DoD and beyond, has proven time and again to be essential to advancing modern science and technology.
Moving Forward
As impressive as the organization’s history is, we will not rest on our laurels. The challenges facing our Nation today are grave. To ensure continued deterrent-level dominance over increasingly sophisticated state and non-state actors, we must in this decade overcome our own well-intentioned bureaucratic hurdles, which may have once been useful but are no longer. As happens periodically, there come tipping points where what has worked well in the past—how we operate both internally as well as externally with our partners—is no longer effective.
In that spirit, ONR has expanded its paradigms and vision. In the early decades, ONR was optimized as a basic research organization focused on discovery in universities and basic research institutions. In the 1980s and early 1990s, though, as the Cold War was ending, ONR took on more applied research and advanced technology development. In the past 30 years, we have added new ways to approach innovation. Examples include: TechSolutions, which takes ideas from Sailors and Marines to swiftly produce working prototypes; Future Naval Capabilities, which accelerate cutting-edge technologies into the fleet and force; and Innovative Naval Prototypes, which take seemingly “over the top” ideas, technologically, and explores finding the next game-changing capability.
The Floating Instrumentation Platform (FLIP) is owned by ONR and operated by the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. (U.S. Navy photo by John F. Williams)
Innovation is not only about platforms or technologies. We must also rethink how we do business. For some programs, it will take decades to “get there.” But for others, our research is so close to maturity that we simply cannot accept slow contracting processes, constrained funding lines, and inability to get on ship modernization schedules. Our sailors and Marines need capabilities now. We can better utilize tools that already exist to get things done—including newer forms of funding, such as Partnership Intermediary Agreements (PIAs), Other Transactional Authorities (OTAs), hackathons and prize challenges, new internships, and creative academic programs such as multidisciplinary university research initiatives (MURIs), and more, all of which can accelerate innovation deliveries.
One of the key ways we’re doing this is through our Naval X program, with its associated Tech Bridges. At its essence, Naval X is a new way of inspiring collaboration and fostering new paths for new ideas. The Tech Bridges, envisioned as a new kind of collaborative workspace and uninhibited idea factory, have taken off around the country and now, around the world, with new ones in London, U.K., and Yokosuka, Japan.
Too often, projects fail to move from advanced technology development to component development and prototyping. Bureaucracy and complacency are powerful and omnipresent, poised to grab onto promising projects and stymy them. We must overcome these obstacles—go around them, over them, and do whatever it takes to defeat them. I do not have all the answers on how to do that, but we are making progress and eagerly looking to new ways of doing business. If you have a great idea, the Naval Research Enterprise wants to talk with you.
As I meet with thought leaders around the country, including author and entrepreneur Safi Bachall, MIT lecturer and author Steven Spear, process guru Steve Blank at Stanford, and other brilliant folks from government, industry and academia, I am hearing excitement about what ONR is trying to do and agreement that the time to act is now.
As it has for 75 years, ONR is pursuing the future with a sense of determination, and optimism. Yes, our adversaries are moving quickly, fielding new technologies and weapons faster than they have ever been. But ONR is answering the challenge with a sense of optimism. Working with civilian universities, industry large and small, other government labs, and our allies, we will continue to provide the technological edge that allows the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps to adapt, survive, and win.
Master-at-Arms Seaman Robert Rowe, from Lansing, Kansas, assigned to USS Gerald R. Ford’s (CVN-78) security department, stands transit watch during a sea and anchor evolution on the flight deck on Feb. 25, 2022. US Navy Photo
The lead ship in the Navy’s new class of aircraft carriers wrapped up a key maintenance availability and will soon start work-ups ahead of its first deployment.
USS Gerald R. Ford’s (CVN-78) six-month Planned Incremental Availability (PIA) at Huntington Ingalls Industries Newport News Shipbuilding ended with sea trials, the Navy said in a Tuesday news release.
The carrier’s crew will now head into a training phase before deploying later this year for an abbreviated first patrol, Navy officials have told USNI News.
“The PIA involved six months of modernization and maintenance work to ensure Gerald R. Ford has the most current upgrades prior to the carrier’s maiden deployment,” HII said in a news release. “The ship entered the PIA in September 2021 after completing full ship shock trials and a successful post-delivery test and trials period.”
Ford‘s full-ship shock trials – when the Navy detonates 40,000 pounds of ordnance in the water near the hull to test the ship and its systems – finished without any major flooding, fires or injuries, Navy officials said at the time. It was the first shock trial event for the Navy since 1987 when it tested the Nimitz-class USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN-71).
“Ford required only 20 percent of the repair work we saw with TR,” Rear Adm. James Downey, the program executive officer for carriers, said in the Navy news release.
The carrier’s crew, not the shipyard’s team, performed approximately 85 percent of the work needed following shock trials, Downey noted in the release.
Quartermaster Seaman Alysia Noyes, left, from Chandler, Arizona, and Quartermaster 2nd Class Landon Sherrill, from Crossville, Tennessee, both assigned to USS Gerald R. Ford’s (CVN-78) navigation department, prepare to hoist a broom to signify a ‘clean sweep’ of post Planned Incremental Availability (PIA) Sea Trials, on Feb. 28, 2022. US Navy Photo
“At the start of CVN 78’s PIA, teams conducted detailed inspections, assessing potential damage sustained during FSST. The Navy had conducted shock trials on the Nimitz-class carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN 71) in 1987, and used those results plus other modeling and simulation to estimate the potential impact from the explosive events on the overall PIA workload. FSST-related repairs during Gerald R. Ford’s PIA proved fewer than anticipated,” the Navy said in the release.
After a series of delays and troubles with new technologies aboard the carrier, Ford‘s deployment slated for later this year comes four years after the original maiden deployment date of 2018.
Downey told reporters in January that Ford would deploy by the fall.
“Very end of the summer. If we look at dates out there – what are typical, actual dates for the beginning of the fall – she’s right around there to a bit to the left of it,” he said at the time.
NORFOLK, Va. — The U.S. Navy’s cruiser modernization program has been disorganized in its planning and troubled in its execution, service leaders have told Defense News. But it’s a sliver lining for those working on destroyers, as they’re able to learn from mistakes in the cruiser effort and avoid repeating them.
The Navy’s massive upgrade project involved cruisers receiving improved combat systems, sensors and computers, as well as fixes to their aging hulls and mechanical and electrical systems. Now, as the service launches a destroyer modernization plan — much smaller in scope, but susceptible to similar challenges — those in the cruiser community are looking to help.
Seven cruisers were put into a particular variation of the modernization program as part of plans to extend the life of the Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruisers: They’d undergo an initial maintenance availability to modernize areas like the galley; go into a reduced operating status with a skeleton crew of about 35 sailors watching over the ship pierside for several years; go into a one-year availability to prepare for dry docking; and then conduct an “extended dry-docking selected restricted availability” where the bulk of the work would be done.
The first cruiser, Gettysburg, is nearing the end of that process and will go to sea this year, after its 2014 entrance into the service life-extension effort.
At the same time, the destroyer Pinckney is at the General Dynamics NASSCO shipyard in San Diego, California, for the “crawl phase” of the DDG Mod 2.0 program. While there, the ship will receive the Surface Electronic Warfare Improvement Program (SEWIP) Block 3, go on deployment, and then return to receive the SPY-6(V)4 air and missile defense radar.
The DDG Mod 2.0 program will eventually conduct the SEWIP and SPY-6 upgrades at the same time in a longer availability. For now, Pinckney and a few other vessels will undergo this “smart start” process so the Navy can begin learning lessons on SEWIP installation, even as SPY-6 lessons are learned separately though integration work at land-based engineering sites and aboard the first Flight III destroyers being built with a variant of the SPY-6, Capt. Matthew Tardy, the surface ship modernization program manager at Naval Sea Systems Command, said in January at the Surface Navy Association conference.
The guided-missile cruiser Gettysburg transits the Gulf of Oman with the Harry S. Truman Carrier Strike Group in November 2013. (MC2 Lyle Wilkie III/U.S. Navy)
Though the two modernization efforts differ in scope and duration, Commander of Naval Surface Forces Vice Adm. Roy Kitchener, told reporters in January that the Navy must ensure proper planning and oversight to avoid the delays that plagued the cruiser program.
“That’s a very complex availability, a lot of work when you’re taking SPY-6 and then integrating it with SEWIP and integrating it with another combat system. There’s a lot of work there, and I think we need to make sure we have that right, we have the proper oversight,” he said. “They’re lengthy, they’re challenging. We need to make sure that we get them done quickly and efficiently because it’s a great capability that we need to get out … to the force.”
The problem with cruiser modernizations
Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Michael Gilday recently visited the cruiser Gettysburg — the first cruiser that will come out of this program, and a ship where he served as executive officer earlier in his career. Defense News joined the CNO during the Feb. 4 tour.
“We’re in year three of a one-year avail[ability]. We were expecting to be complete almost two years ago,” Gettysburg’s commanding officer, Capt. Megan Thomas, told Gilday during the visit.
The cruiser receiving significant updates to its combat and computer systems, including upgrading to the Baseline 9 version of the Aegis Combat System, receiving the Consolidated Afloat Networks and Enterprise Services system, modernizing to the newest configurations of the AN/SLQ-32C(V)6 and the AN/SQQ-89(V)15, undergoing Cooperative Engagement Capability upgrades, and more. These processes, however, involve a lot of challenging cable work.
On the hull, mechanical and electrical — or HM&E — side of things, the 30-year-old cruiser received upgrades throughout the nearly eight-year modernization program. Some systems were fixed early on but sat unused while the ship was in reduced operating status for years, so getting them up and running is proving a challenge, Thomas said.
“Ventilation is probably our most troubled system right now,” she noted.
Few other ships in the fleet use the same outdated ventilation system, she explained, so the maintenance team had to fix components, such as motors, that might otherwise have been replaced if spare parts were available.
“A lot of the electrical connections associated with the motor controllers have degraded over time. And of course we had a large amount of contractors on and off this ship that are doing a lot of other cabling work,” which has caused damage to some of the ventilation system, she told Gilday.
The guided-missile cruiser Gettysburg undergoes its lengthy modernization effort and service-life extension at the pier at Naval Station Norfolk, Va., on Feb. 4, 2022. (Megan Eckstein/Staff)
She noted that Gettysburg hasn’t experience tank issues, but its fuel tanks haven’t been refueled yet. Tanks have been an ongoing headache for the cruiser fleet; Vella Gulf was sidelined as it tried to deploy in March 2021 because of fuel tank cracks, and Lake Champlain required repeated maintenance during its deployment to the Indo-Pacific region in 2017.
Thomas said Gettysburg will fuel up to about 60% to ensure no cracks in the fuel tank emerge; then 80% for additional leakage testing; and then fully refuel at sea while still testing for cracks and corrosion along the way.
The ship is to go to sea for HM&E trials in June, and it will soon kick off a lengthy 30-week process of combat system testing.
“We’ve been really trying to just claw our way back to get to milestones and really build some momentum,” Thomas told Gilday, noting that delays have harmed crew morale.
Gilday said Gettysburg’s experience confirmed what he was previously told about the cruiser program’s troubled life-extension efforts.
“We’re trying to drive down maintenance delay days,” Gilday said during the meeting. “In 2019, we had about 7,700, and right now for ‘22 we’re looking at about 2,200. Of those 2,200, 1,200 belong to four cruisers and an [amphibious dock landing ship].
Gilday also cited the significant cost of keeping old cruisers ready for missions: more than $80 million in unplanned maintenance costs in FY22 as well as a strain on the limited ship repair workforce. For those reasons, he reaffirmed his desire to retire some of the cruisers earlier than planned — “not Gettysburg, but other hulls,” he told Thomas — despite congressional opposition throughout the last decade.
Sliver lining
Though there’s little for the Gettysburg crew to do now other than try to stay on schedule, Thomas has identified lessons learned that can be applied to other cruiser and destroyer modernization programs.
A key issue for Gettysburg was planning. Thomas said the original work plan called for concurrent activity by BAE Systems and multiple subcontractors in various spaces on the ship, but that work was poorly deconflicted.
“There needs to be a lot more planning in advance of the execution of an avail[ability] that’s going to be of this size, because as the contractors, subcontractors and [alteration installation teams] are all clamoring to get into the same space, we have definitely learned some lessons about sequencing of work,” she told Gilday.
Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Mike Gilday and Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy Russell Smith visit the cruiser Gettysburg and its leadership on Feb. 4, 2022. (Megan Eckstein/Staff)
Thomas told Defense News in an interview aboard the ship that miles of new cables were installed, but some of it got pulled loose as other work took place after installation.
“In one of our spaces, computer central, the ordering, the sequence of the work that I referenced, was problematic in that they put in the new cabinets and then they came in and did all the cabling, which runs in the false deck underneath it,” she said. “Sitting in the seats that we are now, it’s kind of like: How did we not see that? But it’s different companies doing these items, and so it really takes a full collaborative effort to make sure that those communications — whether it’s restoration meetings, or it’s daily production meetings — that everybody is sharing the information that they need to hear so that we’re not having to duplicate effort.”
Her crew also learned lessons about proper crewing during a major maintenance availability. Because the cruiser modernization program lasts so long, none of the sailors assigned to the ship before going into the Service Life Extension Program, or SLEP, are still around during the critical dry docking period and the effort to bring the ship back to life. This can be challenging, Thomas said, and she encouraged other cruiser captains to bring in expertise or send sailors to gain expertise on other ships to ultimately help with the most critical and complex parts of the SLEP.
“I have one sailor who was assigned to USS Gettysburg before it went into SLEP, and now he came back as a first class [petty officer] and now he’s a chief — so great to kind of have that continuity, but 1 out of 338 does not a crew make,” she explained.
Thomas has also developed a color-coded watch bill that identifies which crew members are qualified for which watch stations as well as who has previous cruiser experience. This helped her perform targeted cross-decking with other East Coast cruisers to get her watch team at-sea experience in addition to their classroom and pierside training.
Thomas praised Naval Sea Systems Command for providing technical expertise, and she recommended other ship captains coming out of lengthy modernization periods lean on the organization’s resources for help — especially because so few sailors, relatively speaking, have experience on cruisers.
“NAVSEA has worked to give us a number of people, senior enlisted folks, to be able to help understand, troubleshoot and correct material issues. That’s great for us — especially our apprentice-level and even some of our journeymen-level individuals who don’t know necessarily what right looks like. So they need that senior leadership walking alongside them to help them understand that condition,” she said.
Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Mike Gilday speaks with sailors aboard the guided-missile cruiser Gettysburg on Feb. 4, 2022. (MC3 Jeremy Boan/U.S. Navy)
She also recommended cruiser captains pay close attention to crew morale while contractors work on their ships. “Sailors join the Navy to get underway and see the world. And as we have gone through this availability, the number of times the goal posts have shifted has been very frustrating for them. So that’s why we have kind of worked in closer-in goals, so that they’re more achievable goals.”
Thomas and the crew have tried to celebrate each point of progress this year. Upon their arrival in Naval Station Norfolk from the BAE Systems shipyard, the NAVSEA fleet integration team welcomed the ship on the pier with “Welcome Back, Gettysburg” signs, she said, and “they stopped wearing hard hats for the first time.”
“So that was one of the first questions I was asked is: ‘Captain, do we need to wear hard hats when we go to Naval Station Norfolk?’ So I mean, that was a huge morale booster,” she added. “There’s an end in sight.”
Doing it different for destroyers
Looking to the destroyer modernization program, Thomas said the Navy is avoiding the biggest mistake: putting HM&E systems down for so long and then trying to restart them again.
She also hopes the DDG effort will focus on sequencing of the work, especially with the longer availabilities involving the SPY-6 and SEWIP installations on top of HM&E work; and she hopes technical experts will be kept on site as crews become familiar with their new gear and begin taking ownership of it.
Tardy — the surface ship modernization program manager at NAVSEA — said he doesn’t want to draw too close a comparison between the cruiser modernization effort and the upcoming DDG Mod 2.0 program. Many of the cruiser challenges stem from the ship’s long-term reduced operating status, which isn’t part of the plan for destroyers.
But Tardy did say the Navy learned much about getting systems up and running after a long maintenance period. The crawl-walk-run approach to DDG Mod 2.0 lowers the risk.
“We’re very conscious of making sure that those availabilities are executed and done correctly,” he said, with everything being done with an eye toward buying down integration risk early in the process.
Pinckney and a couple other destroyers will get the SEWIP installation only in their first availability, allowing shipyards like NASSCO to learn best practices for installation and integration.
The guided-missile destroyer Pinckney transits the South China Sea on July 22, 2021. (MC2 Jeffery Southerland/U.S. Navy)
Simultaneously, crews elsewhere are learning about SPY-6 installation and integration. The first radar has been installed on the Jack Lucas, the first Flight III destroyer being built at Ingalls Shipbuilding in Mississippi.
Between lessons being learned at Ingalls and fellow destroyer-builder Bath Iron Works in Maine, and at land-based test sites such as Lockheed Martin’s Moorestown, New Jersey-based Aegis Combat System test site, the Navy will have a good sense of how best to integrate the radar onto the destroyers.
“The real key, I think, is to make sure we involve all our stakeholders — so industry partners, our new construction counterparts, [Naval Sea Systems Command] and the [program executive offices] — so that we take the lessons that we’re learning on the SPY-6 that’s being installed there so we can apply over to the in-service side when we backfit,” Tardy said.
Dave Baker, NASSCO’s vice president for repair, told Defense News in a Feb. 15 visit to the San Diego yard that Pinckney’s availability — which includes the normal scope of a dry docking availability, plus the SEWIP installation — allows the company to focus on significant structural work associated with SEWIP installation without worrying about the SPY-6 radar just yet.
Older versions of the AN/SLQ-32 electronic warfare system were affixed to the destroyer below the bridge wing, above a platform for sailors to access and maintain the system. That entire area will now be enclosed in what Baker called “bug eyes” on either side of the ship. Those steel structures are complex and have to maintain just the right angles and flat surfaces for the system’s arrays.
Baker said NASSCO spent a lot of time understanding how to build, lift and install the steel pieces and then integrate the SEWIP system, but he acknowledged lessons learned would have to be captured and rolled into clean-sheet designs to inform future SEWIP installations as part of DDG Mod 2.0.
Pinckney’s availability began in October and is on track to end a few months early, around May 2023, at which point the Navy can combine lessons learned on SEWIP installation from NASSCO with those for SPY-6 installation in order to craft a plan for the longer modernization periods.
Megan Eckstein is the naval warfare reporter at Defense News. She has covered military news since 2009, with a focus on U.S. Navy and Marine Corps operations, acquisition programs, and budgets. She has reported from four geographic fleets and is happiest when she’s filing stories from a ship. Megan is a University of Maryland alumna.
The importance and use of forward naval presence have been roundly debated for months. That debate ended on Feb. 24, when Russia invaded Ukraine from land, sea, and air.
Wars have a way of providing clarity on issues too easily obscured by peacetime priorities. Today, it is clear the U.S. must act to ensure this conflict does not expand, and the Navy has a key role to play.
Clearly, the U.S. must bolster NATO militarily. And when it comes to deterring further escalation or expansion of this conflict – say into the Baltics – the mobile and sustained forward striking power of the Navy is irreplaceable.
Last December, the Harry S. Truman carrier strike group was redirected from the Persian Gulf to the Eastern Mediterranean for this very reason. While sailing from there into the Black Sea may seem like an obvious next step, it is neither strategically nor operationally necessary to sail into that violent furball. Best to keep this group in the Eastern Mediterranean where it can hold Russia’s Syrian, Libyan and Black Sea interests at risk.
The top priority now must be to prevent the war from widening, by deterring Putin from moving against the Baltic states or non-NATO Finland. Doing this quickly – within days – requires positioning mobile and very lethal naval forces at two strategic pressure points: the Baltic Sea and the Barents Sea. Russia has weakened its naval presence in both seas, sending its purpose-built “carrier-killer” Slava-class cruisers with their long-range Sandbox (SS-N-12) anti-ship cruise missiles to the Black Sea and Eastern Mediterranean.
Sending a carrier strike group to the Barents or the North Sea would be operationally significant. But sending a group to the Baltic would have a greater strategic impact, as it would be smack dab in the midst of nations long coveted and antagonized by Putin’s Russia.
Surging large groups of naval vessels in the midst of war could potentially escalate the crisis. But in this case, it is what is needed to achieve the opposite effect. Today, clarity of intent is paramount, and positioning of military forces is the plainest of diplomatic language. Surging naval forces now would signal unmistakably—and far more strongly than words or sanctions—that the U.S. is committed to stopping the violence from spreading.
On the other side of the world, crises are almost seasonal, and the time is fast approaching for a new round of crises in the East and South China Seas. On the heels of Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, Chinese warplanes sortied nearby Taiwan, forcing it to scramble jet fighters in response.
China must not be led to believe it has a free hand to move against that land of nearly 24 million people. It is critical that U.S. naval forces remain proximate to Asian flashpoints to complicate the planning challenge for Beijing, ensure deepest operational intelligence insights, and bolster regional resistance to Chinese coercion.
Thankfully, there are carrier strike groups present in both the Western Pacific and in Eastern Mediterranean—a significant statement of U.S. naval power. But this will not be enough given Putin’s full invasion of Ukraine and months of China’s increasingly aggressive military posturing around Taiwan.
China is definitely eyeing how the U.S. responds to Putin and entering those observations into its calculations for its own next steps. Two things will likely weigh heavily on Beijing’s mind: How well U.S. trained and equipped Ukrainian forces fare against the Russians, and how effectively the U.S. is able to rally the world to isolate Russia economically and diplomatically. These are key considerations in determining China’s decision on whether to attack Taiwan or not.
Since the 2018 National Defense Strategy, much has been said of the value of a naval “surge force.” Now is the time to prove its value and availability by surging a strike group from the U.S. to the Baltic Sea. Timeliness is important. And the audience comprises more than just Moscow or the capitals of NATO. Beijing is a crucial observer as well.
Not acting will beget, in short order, a wider conflict in Europe, a fresh conflict in Asia, or both.
Brent D. Sadler is the senior fellow for naval warfare and advanced technology at The Heritage Foundation’s Center for National Defense.
Railguns are out. The US Navy has big plans for lasers and hypersonic missiles –Fifteen years and $500 million later, the U.S. Navy has put the kibosh on an important railgun program.
The railgun was meant to change naval combat. It was developed to shoot projectiles at remarkable speeds to eliminate enemy shipping in a re-imagined manner. This summer, the Navy removed all funding for the railgun from its latest budget proposal and indefinitely paused the program. The idea is to focus more on producing lasers and hypersonic weapons.
What is a Railgun?
The U.S. Navy was looking for alternative styles of weapons, one of which was the use of electromagnetic railguns. Functioning as a large electrical circuit without gun powder, they send a kinetic energy warhead 5,000 miles per hour or MACH 7.5 at 20 to 32 megajoules with a range of 110 miles. At these speeds, railguns could have defended against cruise missiles and ballistic missiles. These are valuable capabilities in the South and East China Sea since the Chinese have an enormous amount of shore-based cruise and ballistic missiles that are aimed at U.S. naval warships near the coast of China.
The weapon produces 1,200 volts in ten milliseconds which makes a pulse-forming network. This results in a network of capacitors that will release the energy to propel the projectile. The projectile weighs 45 pounds and accelerates to 5,000 miles per hour in an astonishing one one-hundredth of a second. This is three times the speed of conventional weapons. Since the warhead is made up of kinetic energy, it does not use explosives. The ultra-high-speed enables the warhead to knock out cruise missiles and ballistic missiles with kinetic energy. The railgun can fire at a rate of 10-rounds per minute at a cost of $25,000 per round.
Maybe the Railgun Could Evolve?
Another development for the Navy is that the guided projectiles used in railguns could also be fired from a conventional powder gun. This program is called “gun-launched guided projectile.” These projectiles do not fly as fast as the rounds fired out of the railgun, but they would take advantage of existing military weapons. In other words, the guided projectile could be fired from already existing conventional land-based howitzers and shipborne powder guns.
The Case to Keep the Railgun
The railgun would have taken at least five more years to develop, and the research and development required were always subject to navy priorities and the ebb and flow of Congressional funding. The railgun wasn’t yet ready to be deployed on U.S. Naval ships and it only received $9.5 million of funding for the fiscal year 2021. But the navy originally saw its value, especially in air defense, to defend its shipping in dangerous potential conflict zones in the Middle East and East Asia.
I don’t agree with the Navy pausing this program. The Navy put too much time and money on it to say goodbye. The railgun is a great idea in concept and could have been a difference-maker in a potential naval battle against the Chinese or Russians. The railgun fits in nicely with the stealthy Zumwalt-class destroyer, lasers, and hypersonic weapons. It is a stand-off weapon – a form of warfare that is coming more in vogue. The railgun could also defend against incoming missiles.
Maybe it’s not dead yet. It could come back under a different administration, a new Chief of Naval Operations, or if Congress flips over to the Republicans after the 2022 midterm elections.
1945’s new Defense and National Security Editor, Brent M. Eastwood, PhD, is the author of Humans, Machines, and Data: Future Trends in Warfare. He is an Emerging Threats expert and former U.S. Army Infantry officer.
In 1922, US Navy collier USS Jupiter was converted into the aircraft carrier USS Langley
Langley was the US Navy’s first aircraft carrier, but it only spent 15 years in service in that role.
USS Langley’s historic service life came to an end in February 1942, when it was sunk in a Japanese attack.
On the morning of February 27, 1942, US Navy seaplane tender USS Langley and two destroyers broke off from a large Allied supply convoy and headed for the island of Java.
The Japanese were well into their invasion of the Dutch East Indies and were poised to attack Java. Langley was carrying cargo that was badly needed to defend the island: 32 Curtiss P-40 Warhawk fighters of the 13th Pursuit Squadron.
Just before noon, however, Japanese aircraft pounced on Langley. The onslaught sunk what was, for a few years at least, the US Navy’s first aircraft carrier.
The first carrier
US Navy collier USS Jupiter at Mare Island, California, December 18, 1913.
US Navy
USS Langley began life not as a seaplane tender or an aircraft carrier but as the Proteus-class collier USS Jupiter.
Jupiter was laid down in 1911, launched in 1912, and commissioned into service in 1913. It was the Navy’s first turbo-electric-powered ship, making it high-tech for a vessel that was not meant for combat.
The ship was used exclusively to transport personnel and supplies, particularly coal. It conducted the first ever west-to-east Panama Canal transit in 1914, dutifully carried out supply missions along the US’s East and West coasts, and even conducted two coaling operations in France during World War I.
After Jupiter brought troops back to the US from Europe in 1919, it was decided to convert it into an aircraft carrier. Britain’s HMS Argus had shown the value of such a vessel, and with HMS Hermes under construction, the US did not want to fall behind.
The conversion process began in 1920 and finished in 1922. In March of that year, the ship was recommissioned as USS Langley and designated CV-1, the US Navy’s first carrier designation.
A US Navy Aeromarine 39B airplane approaches USS Langley during landing practice in October 1922.
US Navy
The upper sections of its seven coal cranes were removed and their bases were used to support the new flight deck. Langley could carry 36 biplanes in a hanger below the flight deck, which was mostly open-air.
Its original complement of four 4-inch guns was replaced by four 5-inch guns, and a catapult was installed.
The carrier was nicknamed “Covered Wagon” by its crew because it resembled a pioneer wagon when viewed from below the flight deck.
Seven months after its recommissioning, Lt. Virgil C. Griffin flew the first plane — a Vought VE-7 — off its deck. Nine days later, Lt. Cmdr. G. DeC. Chevalier made the first landing on the carrier.
The following month, the ship’s captain, Cmdr. Kenneth Whiting, became the first aviator to be catapulted from Langley’s deck.
Another change and wartime service
A Douglas DT-2 torpedo bomber takes off of USS Langley during a test at Naval Air Station North Island in California, April 2, 1925.
US Navy
Langley spent 12 years with the Navy’s Pacific Fleet. It operated mostly in the waters off Hawaii and California as a training and testing platform for sailors and pilots to inform future carrier operations.
By 1936, the US Navy had commissioned larger, purpose-built carriers, and Langley’s deck and hangars were too small for modern carrier planes. The ship was decommissioned yet again in order to undergo another conversion.
In 1937, Langley was recommissioned as a seaplane tender and given the designation AV-3. With the removal of the forward 40% of its flight deck, the ship’s bridge was visible again.
It was assigned once more to the Pacific Fleet, serving mostly in a scouting and support role. It was sent to Manila in 1939 and was anchored nearby when the US’s war with Japan began on December 7, 1941.
A starboard bow view of USS Langley, October 27, 1937.
US Navy
Unable to offer much resistance on its own, Langley withdrew to the Dutch East Indies and then arrived in Darwin, Australia, on January 1, 1942.
Now part of the hastily assembled American-British-Dutch-Australian Command, Langley operated out of Darwin and supported anti-submarine patrols until January 11, when it was tasked with transportation duties to support the defense of the Dutch East Indies.
Langley, with its cargo of P-40s, departed Freemantle, Australia, on February 22 as part of a larger convoy before meeting its escorts, USS Whipple and USS Edsall, on the morning of February 27. The three ships then headed for the port city of Tjilatjap in Java.
Unknown to Langley and its escorts, they had been spotted by a Japanese reconnaissance plane. Around 11:40 a.m., Japanese Mitsubishi G4M “Betty” bombers arrived from Bali and attacked.
US Navy seaplane tender USS Langley is torpedoed by USS Whipple after being abandoned south of Java, February 27, 1942.
US Navy
Langley took five hits, which destroyed many of the planes it carried, impaired its steering, and caused a 10-degree list to port. With water flooding the engines, the ship soon went dead in the water. The order to abandon ship was given at 1:32 p.m.
All but 16 of the crew managed to evacuate to Whipple and Edsall. The escorts then fired nine 4-inch shells and two torpedoes into Langley to ensure it wouldn’t fall into Japanese hands. Langley’s survivors were then transferred to the nearby oiler USS Pecos.
Two days after Langley was lost, Pecos was sunk by aircraft from the Japanese carrier Sōryū. Whipple managed to recover 232 survivors, but the destroyer left behind more than 400 other members of Langley’s and Pecos’ crews because it feared attacks by Japanese submarines.
JOINT BASE PEARL HARBOR-HICKAM, Hawaii – Secretary of the Navy Carlos Del Toro visited Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard and Intermediate Maintenance Facility (PHNSY & IMF) February 27 to discuss the Shipyard Infrastructure Optimization Program (SIOP) with shipyard and Naval Facilities Engineering Systems Command (NAVFAC), Pacific leadership.
SIOP will improve needed efficiencies across the U.S. Navy’s four public shipyards to ensure the fleet is prepared to support the nation’s national security mission by synchronizing with current efforts to improve the productivity of the workforce, processes and procedures. By modernizing the infrastructure and industrial plants to deliver availabilities needed in strategic competition, the shipyards will be able to support surge capacity necessary for operational and global events.
“SIOP at our naval shipyards is a top priority for my office,” said Del Toro. “PHNSY & IMF is the second naval shipyard I have visited since my confirmation and seeing first-hand the need for infrastructure improvements further cements my commitment to the SIOP initiative. The level of maintenance work done here every day is often challenged by aging facilities and equipment. Each shipyard worker recognizes that every ship and submarine undergoing maintenance and necessary modernization must be returned to the fleet on time, every time to keep our adversaries in check. In order to achieve this, we must provide our shipyard workforces with necessary upgraded facilities, tools and equipment.”
The Navy’s four public shipyards are the backbone of our nuclear-powered fleet, and essential elements of our national defense strategy. Though still encumbered by a non-stop schedule of maintenance availabilities on our fleet of ships and submarines, their performance has been plagued by aging conditions, configurations and locations of supporting facilities, dry docks and equipment.
Originally designed and built in the 19th and 20th centuries to support wind- and steam-powered vessels, the Navy’s public shipyards are currently not efficiently configured to maintain and modernize a nuclear-powered fleet. These inefficiencies along with obsolete facilities result in higher maintenance costs and delayed schedules. SIOP will refurbish and reconfigure the public shipyards with the 21st century industrial technology our workforce requires through integrated infrastructure investment.
While SIOP is a high priority for the Navy, members of Congress have also lent their support for this key initiative that will further strengthen the Navy’s ability to respond to world events at a moment’s notice. Over the past few months, PHNSY & IMF has hosted numerous congressional and staff delegations to highlight the important work of the Navy’s maintenance community and showcase the need firsthand for upgraded infrastructure and facilities at the century-old shipyard.
“Since the inception of the shipyard in 1908, there have only been two periods of modernization- to support operations during World War II and again post-Korean War to support the launch of our nation’s nuclear-powered Navy,” said Captain Richard Jones, Shipyard Commander. “SIOP will give us the opportunity to continue supporting our mission in keeping the U.S. Pacific Fleet fit to fight by providing our workforce with new and upgraded facilities to support the next generation of Virginia-class submarines.”
Dry dock re-capitalizations must be completed to provide needed capacity for current and future platforms – accommodating the future configurations of Virginia-class submarines at PHNSY & IMF and Portsmouth Naval Shipyard and the Ford-class aircraft carriers at Norfolk Naval Shipyard and Puget Sound Naval Shipyard and Intermediate Maintenance Facility.
For PHNSY & IMF, the need for a new dry dock is critically important as Dry Dock 3 will become obsolete at the end of 2023. With a projected need date of 2028, Dry Dock 5, as it may be called, is working toward completion of its Environmental Impact Statement (EIS).The EIS is the culmination of more than three years of research, planning and coordination by the U.S. Navy and our local, state and federal partners to propose the best design alternatives for a new dry dock with the least amount of environmental impact.
“As PHNSY & IMF is the largest industrial employer in Hawaii, we also have strong historical and cultural ties to the community, “said Jones. “By working closely with our local partners, we will continue to honor the important legacy of Pearl Harbor.”
The Navy recently held a virtual public meeting on February 24 to receive feedback from the local community on how the proposed project alternatives may impact the local environment. The public is invited to comment on the draft EIS until March 21. To learn more about the project and to make an official comment, visit the project website at www.pearlharbordrydockeis.org.
PHNSY & IMF is a field activity of Naval Sea Systems Command and a one-stop regional maintenance center for the Navy’s surface ships and submarines. It is the largest industrial employer in the state of Hawaii. It is the most comprehensive fleet repair and maintenance facility between the U.S. West Coast and the Far East, strategically located in the heart of the Pacific, being about a week’s steaming time closer to potential regional contingencies in the Indo-Pacific.
For more news from Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard & IMF, visit navsea.navy.mil/Home/Shipyards/PHNS-IMF or facebook.com/PearlHarborNavalShipyard.
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