You & WWII: Bonejarring 'Wake of the Wahoo'

Review by Bill Doughty

Ever wonder what it would be like to step into the shoes of a World War II veteran back in the 1940s? 

Former Navy Yeoman Forest J. Sterling helps us smell the diesel, feel the pressure changes and taste the salty air when his submarine surfaces after a tense, bonejarring attack. "Wake of the Wahoo" takes the reader across the breadth of the Pacific for "The Heroic Story of America's Most Daring WWII Submarine, USS Wahoo" and shows the spirit of shipmates at war.

With a foreword by retired Vice Adm. Charles A. Lockwood, the people are real, the action is intense, and the life on the boat and on liberty rings true, whether the crew is playing cards, eating sardine sandwiches, dealing with bum torpedoes or dodging Layson Albatross ("Gooney") birds on Midway in between missions.

Captain Dudley "Mush" Morton is shown to be an innovative and tough but caring leader who placed the welfare of his crew above his own. Lt. Cmdr. Dick O'Kane, who would one day be awarded the Medal of Honor and go on to become a rear admiral, is depicted as an intense and dedicated warfighter.

Sailors experience the extreme and the mundane.

Sterling writes about heading out for deployment from Wahoo's homeport in Hawaii:

"Wahoo backed clear of the pier and turned. She shook as the screws reversed, stopped and then headed proudly out of Pearl Harbor Channel. On the pier, the spectators were straggling off to their routine jobs, and on the Wahoo, I stood watching with my stomach churning in excitement. There was a sudden silence about the ship, and I noticed everyone who was topside had done likewise. Krause was two-blocking the Colors, after having dipped the flag in a Wahoo salute. I found myself wishing that on this patrol Wahoo would in some small way help to atone for the sacrifice made by the men still entombed aboard the Arizona."

He describes fear and determination during a depth charge attack from above:

"Wahoo was searching frantically for the bottom, piling tons and tons of protective water over her back. 'Rig for depth charge, rig for depth charge.' I felt Wahoo's decks level off and at that instant Pandora's box opened and all hell broke loose. Three depth charges went off in succession, seemingly right on deck over the crew's messroom. We were plunged into complete darkness, and a loose piece of metal shooting through the void struck my left ear, causing it to sting sharply. Dishes stacked on the tables were lifted and thrown about. Loose knives and forks flew about at random, their screaming lost in the blasts of the depth charges. Patches of cork showered down, followed by a ventilationless room full of smoking dust."

More action topside as the deck gun and twenty millimeters fired on an armed enemy motor launch, with Sterling standing watch and observing:

"Whenever the deck gun went off, I flinched from the shock wave that followed. There would be a blinding flash of yellow, which I saw from the corners of my eyes against the binoculars, the shock jarring my whole body, followed by a cloud of acrid white with brownish tints and pale blue colors drifting into view on the starboard side of the ship. A sharp explosion of a shell going off near the twenty millimeters caused me to jump. I looked down and saw the barrel pointing in the air and Gerlacher staggering dazedly away from the gun. Glinski was sitting on deck and looked stupidly at his right foot. The shoe leather was brutally torn and I could see blood spurting from a wound onto the deck. I resolutely returned to scanning the ocean."

This is a personal account of submariners who, according to Fleet Adm. Chester Nimitz, played a critical role in achieving victory in the war. Nimitz, himself, stepped aboard Wahoo to present the crew with the Presidential Unit Citation signed by Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox after the sub's third war patrol.

Wahoo took on Japanese freighters, destroyers, troop transports, and other submarines, sinking 21 ships of 62,963 tonnage.

Sterling is a good writer because he was a good reader, describing how he and his shipmates would read magazines like Look, Reader's Digest and periodicals about the American West. They read newspapers and studied atlases when they weren't playing pinochle or eating, another favorite pastime. On the menu aboard the submarine: mincemeat pie, chili con carne, "Dagwood sandwiches," corned beef and cabbage, fried chicken and apple pie with a slice of cheese.

In the book's preface, Sterling says the story and life aboard the ship "can only be told by someone who was there." Just prior to the Wahoo's last fateful mission, Sterling was suddenly transferred to a school to help him become a better yeoman and make Chief. (He would rejoin the Pacific War and participate in landings at Saipan, Tinian, Guam and Leyte before rejoining the Silent Service.)

Wahoo ship's bell recovered and on display.

Sterling shares poignant memories of seeing Wahoo sail from Pearl Harbor one last time. He closes the book with a recommendation about O'Kane's book "Wahoo" and ends with this message to shipmates:

"Sorry, fellows. I should have been with you. I can never understand why Captain Morton changed his mind and transferred me at the last moment. My spirit has been with you all these years." Sterling died in 2002 and is interred at Biloxi National Cemetery.

Adm. Jonathan Greenert congratulates new CNO Adm. John Richardson Sept. 18, 2015. (USNI)

This book was a personal recommendation from Adm. Jon Greenert, who served from Sept. 2011 to Sept. 2015 as Chief of Naval Operations. Greenert, like current CNO Adm. John Richardson, is a submariner. While Greenert commanded the U.S. Seventh Fleet out of Japan, an international team discovered the remains of USS Wahoo in 2005 in the Soya Strait.

At different times Greenert and Richardson commanded USS Honolulu (SSN 718) in Pearl Harbor earlier in their careers – in the wake of the Wahoo.

March Madness: Coach K's Philosophy & Found Haiku

Review by Bill Doughty

One foundation for Duke University men's basketball head coach Mike Krzyzewski  (along with his family) is his education at West Point U.S. Military Academy, where he learned three disciplines: "respect for authority, personal responsibility and the discipline to be honest."

"Imagine if every person had such a great foundation and then the passion and heart to love what they do. They'd always love their lives," he writes in "Leading with the Heart," written in 2000 and published by Warner Books. "That's what I'd call success."

Fundamental qualities for success in leadership and performance include communication, trust, collective responsibilities, caring and pride, according to Coach K. "In leadership there are no words more important than trust. In any organization trust must be developed among every member of the team if success is going to be achieved."

Pride comes from ownership of the mission; understanding of the mission comes from communication, caring and demonstrating collective responsibility as a team.

Coach K writes about being overly rigid in his early days as a coach, but he learned how to keep his core principles while being flexible, adaptable and innovative, depending on the personalities and situations he faced as his teams evolved. Now, "I want no artificial walls erected that might limit potential, stifle creativity or shackle innovation." Good leaders must be able to think on their feet and react immediately when necessary. And good leaders give their teams freedom to excel.

"At Duke, nobody is a number. Rather, we try to plant seeds that help people grow. We try to give every individual the freedom to develop their full capabilities.

"If you put a plant in a jar, it will take the shape of the jar. but if you allow the plant to grow freely, twenty jars might not be able to hold it. The freedom to grow personally, the freedom to make mistakes and learn from them, the freedom to work hard, and the freedom to be yourself – these four freedoms should be guaranteed by every leader in every organization."

Touring the Pentagon after the 1992 season.

A pivotal moment in the book is his retelling of one of the most memorable plays in college sports history, the East Regional championship game against the University of Kentucky in March 1992. The Duke Blue Devils were down 103 to 102 with 2.1 seconds left in the game. Coach K called up a play for Grant Hill to pass the ball 75 feet down the length of the court to Christian Laettner at the top of the key on the other end.

It's what happened immediately before the play was called and immediately after it was executed that sets Coach Krzyzewski apart as a great coach, leader and human being. It must be read in its entirety to be fully appreciated, and it's too long to excerpt here.

Speaking with Soldiers at Fort Bragg.

In "Leading with the Heart," Krzyzewski offers practical advice for leading teams with exuberance and excitement, always living with integrity, demonstrating confidence, using plural pronouns such as "we" and "our" instead of "me" and "my," and building pride, unity and motivation through traditions. 

Returning several times to examples from his experience at West Point, Coach K writes:

"I find that people, generally, want to be on a team. They want to be part of something bigger than themselves. They want to be in a situation where they feel that they are doing something for the greater good."

Found Haiku in Coach K's Philosophy

This book is filled with Sun Tzu or Confucius-like sayings like, "Never let a person's weakness get in the way of his strength," "Sometimes a loss can be a win," and "The only way you lose is if you don't try your best."

Within some of his words of wisdom are "found haiku," poems or verses generally fitting the rule of three lines of 5-7-5 syllables.

Here are some found haiku in "Leading with Heart":

The deal is [in] the

handshake; the deal is that there

won't be any deals

You hear, you forget;

You see, you remember; You

do, you understand

Confidence can be

an extremely effective

weapon against fear

Confidence shared

is better than confidence

only in yourself

A key principle:

don't worry about losing;

think about winning

People have to be

given the freedom to show

the heart they possess

And at the heart of

character is honesty

and integrity

Help me do my best,

help me be myself, and help

me lead with my heart

"Leading with the Heart: Coach K's Successful Strategies for Basketball, Business and Life" by Mike Krzyzewski with Donald T. Phillips was written 15 years ago, so references to Duke basketball players and others are somewhat dated (no mention of Jahlil Okafor, for example, who was only four years old at the time), but references harken back to some great memories of NCAA seasons and games. Among the names Coach K recounts in hardwood stories: Bobby Hurley, Grant Hill, Danny Ferry, Chris Collins, Trajan Langdan, Steve "Wojo" Wojciechowski, Shane Battier, Christian Laettner, Tommy Amaker and Johnny Dawkins.


Coach K's book is on CNO Adm. Greenert's professional reading list. 

Duke Blue Devils (28-3) are ranked 3 by the AP as of March 8. Coach K's team was victorious yesterday over the University of North Carolina at Dean E. Smith Center, Chapel Hill, North Carolina. Down by two points at the half, they ended with a win at 84-77. They are expected to be a number-one seed in the upcoming NCAA tournament bracket.

Climate Change as Serial Killer

by Bill Doughty

Climate change has been a killer for millennia, according to Eugene Linden, author of "The Winds of Change" (Simon & Shuster, 2006).

"Earthrise" in 1968. Photo courtesy of NASA.

His examination of the history of climate-as-assassin – and key questions in the debate – shows what may be in store with a warming earth, melting ice and the effect on in the invisible "ocean conveyor" on what Bill McKibben described in "Eaarth": "a blue-and-white marble floating."

Seen clearly from space for the first time in the early days of space exploration, earth is revealed as an ecosystem of sea, land and sky – "vast ocean, air currents and weather systems" – a home world alone in the vastness of space. Balanced. Interconnected.

Over time earth has experienced the extremes of heat, cold, floods and droughts. But thanks to a rare synergy of offsets – the position of large land masses, contours of the ocean floor, the reflective power of ice and snow, and tilting of earth's spin axis, among others – the period over the past 10,000 years has been relatively calm for our planet.

In other words, "This is about as good as it gets," according to Linden.

But the serial killer waits to strike again. Climate change has killed entire species, disrupted humanity and changed cultures.

Akkadian victory stele of Ram-Sin

"It's not climate, but climate change that throws civilizations into a tailspin," Linden writes.

Africa and Mesoamerica experienced drought that collapsed cultures including the Mayans. Ancient civilizations thought they had displeased the gods. The Anasazi disappeared. The Akkadian civilization disintegrated as warming climate dried the lands and hot winds blew away topsoil.

Linden cites the works of Barbara Tuchman ("A Distant Mirror"), Jared Diamond ("Guns, Germs and Steel") and, interestingly, Adam Smith ("The Wealth of Nations") as well as David Keys, author of "Catastrophe: An Investigation Into the Origins of the Modern World."

"Keys does not shy away from big ideas. In 'Catastrophe' he argues that by unleashing the plague from the south and causing barbarians to move westward from Asia, the climate upheavals of 536 played a key role in the end of the Roman Empire, the rise of Islam, and other events that marked the end of ancient times and set the stage for the emergence of the modern world. It's a sweeping claim, so bold that it almost begs contradiction, even from those willing to posit the consequential role of climate in human affairs. When a civilization is in decline, after all, the agent of its end might be entirely different from the cause of its decline. When pneumonia kills an aged patient in failing health, is pneumonia the killer, or merely the final nudge? As Keys exhaustively documents, by the sixth century, the Roman Empire was senescent, with little sense of purpose, kept together principally by the fear of the gathering barbarians at the gates who were constantly probing for opportunities and signs of weakness."

Bruegel's Triumph of Death

Climate warming unleashes invasive species and diseases – bark beetles, rats, hantavirus, mosquitoes, fleas and ticks. The result is millions of deaths, including from plagues. The Black Death started in China, came down the Silk Road to Crimea, and then in 1346 moved westward to Europe.

Climate change may be a killer, but it also opens the way for ecological opportunity. Just as Kaplan does in "Monsoon," Linden sees synergy in climate, weather and geography: "Climate does not control geography, of course, but climate can override the advantage that geography might otherwise confer."

Preparing a gravity core for deployment.
(Photo by Mary Carman, Woods Hole)

Researchers, including Navy veteran Lloyd Keigwin of Woods Hole's McLean Laboratory, are studying the effects of and on the ocean as a result of abrupt climate change. Are oceans stable? How will currents and civilization change in a warmer climate? What can we learn by studying paleoclimate in the Holocene, including the "Little Ice Age"?

Ice, caves, lake sediment, tree rings and dirt blown over ice are witnesses to the serial killing, the silent witnesses or proxies that help scientists examine the past.

A clear and present danger comes periodically in the form of El Niño, "the killer next door."

"In the rogue's gallery of climate killers, El Niño may be a mere foot soldier, but because we are repeatedly reminded of its depredations, it looms large in the minds of those who study the impact of climate on history," Linden writes.


El Niños in India and China over the past century and a half killed substantially more than the 60 million people who perished during World War II, according to Linden and his source, Cesar Caviedes ("El Niño in History: Storming Through the Ages"). Is it possible that a warmer world will invite more severe storms?

Earth's system for achieving balance on the blue-and-white marble (with an El Niño pictured in red) is interconnected and not completely understood, but Linden shows in research, timeline and graphs how science is searching for answers to questions in his final chapter, "Going Forward":

"Where are we headed? Is climate changing? If so, are we causing these changes? What changes lie in the future? Are we better prepared to deal with climate change? Can we do anything to halt climate change or ameliorate its effects?"

Navy leaders recognize that climate change can accelerate instability and conflict, degrade the environment and cause food and water scarcity, disruption and migration – requiring significant humanitarian assistance.

In 2009 the Secretary of the Navy outlined goals for reducing use of fossil fuels and embracing new sustainable, renewable and nonpolluting forms of energy. Also in 2009 the Chief of Naval Operations created Task Force Climate Change (TFCC) to address the naval implications of a changing Arctic and global environment. 

The Navy participates with the U.S. Coast Guard and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in the National Ice Center, whose mission is to "provide the highest quality, timely, accurate, and relevant snow and ice products and services to meet the strategic, operations, and tactical requirements of the United States interests across the global area of responsibility."

Last month the U.S. and China, the world's biggest polluters, signed a climate agreement to significantly reduce emissions over the next decade and beyond. A United Nations climate summit in Lima, Peru shows hope for the world in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and making significant progress in next December's global climate treaty meeting in Paris, France. 

Is cooperation in fighting a serial killer among the New Year's resolutions through 2015 and 2016?

140318-N-RB579-607 ICE CAMP NAUTILUS (March 18, 2014) Chief Machinist's Mate (Nuclear) Aaron Cook braves the cold while supervising a work party at Ice Camp Nautilus, located on a sheet of ice adrift on the Arctic Ocean, during Ice Exercise (ICEX) 2014. ICEX 2014 is a U.S. Navy exercise highlighting submarine capabilities in an arctic environment. (U.S. Navy photo courtesy of Lockheed Martin by Dr. Amy Sun/Released)

'Turn the Ship Around!' Emancipation Leadership

Review by Bill Doughty

Here's a paradox:

More leadership creates more unthinking followership; less top-down leadership creates more engaged leadership – at every level of an organization.

How can a Navy leader build trust, ownership, competency and passion in their workforce?  "Tap into the existing energy of the command, discover the strengths, and remove barriers to further progress." That's the advice of L. David Marquet, Captain, U.S. Navy (retired), author of "Turn the Ship Around: A true story of Turning Followers into Leaders," published in 2012 and added this year to the CNO's Professional Reading Program as an essential Navy read under "Be Ready."

Marquet takes us aboard the nuclear-powered attack submarine USS Santa Fe (SSN 763) and shows us how his leader-leader philosophy succeeded over a traditional top-down, do-as-I-say focus on procedures rather than objectives and goals.

Among his revelations, in no particular order:

• Learning is better than training.
• "Control without competence is chaos."
• To change the organization, "change the genetic code."
• Celebrate the workforce's or individual's success immediately.
• Communicate goals and intents all the time at every level.
• Find the courage to change and tolerate (and learn from) failure.
• "Encourage dissent and a questioning attitude over blind obedience."
• "Take deliberate action" – no autopilot nonthinking.
• Celebrate the organization's legacy and traditions.
• Eliminate top-down monitoring systems and administrative disincentives.
• Don't brief; instead, certify.
• "Giving control is a deliberate act of courage."

From http://davidmarquet.com 

As Captain of Santa Fe, Marquet discovered that the old top-down leader-follower model was a disincentive to ownership and eroded the authority of the chief petty officers, who are generally recognized as the backbone of the Navy's chain of command, especially at the deckplates.

With less authority and responsibility, chiefs lost "eyeball accountability." But, with Marquet, "Being the chief would no longer mean a position of privilege but a position of accountability, responsibility and work." His pillars are control (give control), competence, clarity and courage.

Under the new paradigm, leaders at all levels moved from a focus of avoiding errors to achieving goals and objectives in order to become "truly exceptional."

In 2000, Stephen Covey rode USS Santa Fe (SSN 763) with then CDR Marquet.

Marquet was inspired by Stephen R. Covey ("7 Habits for Highly Effective People"), who stressed, "begin with the end in mind." Covey writes in the introduction: "My definition of leadership is this: Leadership is communicating to people their worth and potential so clearly that they are inspired to see it in themselves. I don't know of a finer model of this kind of empowering leadership than Captain Marquet's."

In fact, Marquet moves beyond empowerment, preferring the term "emancipation," allowing the natural tendency of the individual to have freedom and control over their destiny and to be part of the greater whole.

Another author who influenced his thinking is G. Edwards Deming ("Out of Crisis"), father of Total Quality Management and Total Quality Leadership. Deming believed that people have an inherent desire to do a good job, but processes often get in their way. To improve performance, improve the processes. Marquet writes:

"This had a big effect on me. It showed me how efforts to improve the process made the organization more efficient, while efforts to monitor the process made the organization less efficient. What I hadn't understood was the pernicious effect that 'we are checking up on you' has on initiative, vitality and passion until I saw it on Santa Fe."

Marquet asks, "How many top-down management systems are in play within your organization. How can you eliminate them?"

Santa Fe's creed, included in this book, is a work of art. The ship's guiding principles under Marquet are clear and concise. This leadership bible includes lists of before and after – reenlistments, retention, advancement, qualifications and certifications – that demonstrate the success of the leader-leader philosophy. His "don't do this, do this" list is a great snapshot reminder that I intend to keep at my desk.

"Turn the Ship Around!" begins, "Our greatest struggle is within ourselves. Whatever sense we have of thinking we know something is a barrier to continued learning."

Reading, thinking, learning and listening can help us achieve what Marquet discovered: "A truly better way for humans to interact."

Tom Clancy Gone?

by Bill Doughty

More than 20 years ago Martin Greenberg edited “The Tom Clancy Companion."   Like many Americans I thought about the iconic Clancy this week after his obituaries were published: Tom Clancy, author of “The Hunt for Red October,” “Red Storm Rising,” “Patriot Games,” “Clear and Present Danger” and other now-classic techno-thrillers, dead at 66.

Tom Clancy loved the Navy, and the feeling was mutual.

With an introduction by his writing partner and family friend Larry Bond, this easy read is presented in four parts: an essay by Marc A. Cerasini on “The Birth of the Techno-Thriller,” an interview with the author by Greenberg, a series of essays by Clancy, and “A Tom Clancy Concordance,” an encyclopedic compilation by Roland J. Green.  The concordance includes an entry for USS Reuben James (DDG-57), central to “Red Storm Rising.”

The interview with Clancy shows the author’s strong feeling on the mission, capabilities and power of the Navy as well as the long-lasting international impact of democracy and freedom.

 “What will happen, what must happen, very simply is that democracy is going to spread itself across the world.  And the reason democracy is going to spread itself across the world is that it works.  Over the past 200 years, representative democracy and the free-enterprise system have proven to be extraordinarily effective at giving people the things they want -- justice and prosperity.”

Read Clancy’s interview and essays and learn, among other things, his views on Reagan, Ricin, Napoleon, Apple computers, stealth technology, Bush Sr., Iran and Iraq, science and technology, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Baltimore, God and science fiction writers, including Joe Haldeman, Edgar Allen Poe and Jules Verne.

Essays

“Dinosaurs” discusses the outdated, outmoded weapons systems from previous wars and calls for extending former President Reagan’s “Zero Option” for theater nuclear forces and “an international agreement to bring intercontinental-ballistic weapons down to as close to zero as we can,” in Clancy’s words.

Clancy's essay “Before Anyone Gets Carried Away” eviscerates Oliver Stone’s movie about JFK and gives a logical and forceful view about Kennedy assassination conspiracy theories.  “But I Like to Shoot” gives the author’s views on responsible gun ownership and gun control, while “Funeral” celebrates the death of communism.  Revised in 2005, "Companion" expanded the concordance and retained the original essays.

“Getting Our Money’s Worth” showcases the British Royal Navy and prevention of war through strength, commitment and expertise.  It seems to presage CNO Adm. Greenert’s “Warfighting First” tenet:

“The military needs to restore the warrior ethic.  A warrior is someone who kills his fellow man for a living, and wants to be good at it.  Not all officers are or can be warriors, but only those who are deserve to command at any level.  The military must change its programs to identify them, to nurture them, to select only the best from their ranks, and then to give them the support and experience they need to fulfill their wartime missions at every level of command responsibility.  That will give us the force which will win in war; and recognition of it will go far toward preventing one.”

Several essays get to the heart of Clancy’s personal philosophy.  In “Investia-3. Principles,” he writes that, “A healthy society allows citizens of different beliefs to speak their mind.  In words that resonate today:

“As citizens of a free society you have a civic duty both to tolerate people whose beliefs are different from your own, and a moral duty to listen to them from time to time, because even a fool has something intelligent to say once in a while.”

“Back to the Frontier” calls for support to the nation’s space program, recalling Neil Armstrong’s and Buzz Aldrin’s walk on the moon in 1969.

Harrison, Baldwin and Affleck as Jack Ryan.

“Who can forget that night?  Who can forget the pride of nationhood?  Who can forget the excitement and the wonder? ... Exploration is part and parcel of American history ... The Space Program is the future.  It really is that simple.”

There are hundreds of other works by and especially about Tom Clancy.  Legions of critics have weighed in on the prolific writer, but he is much more complicated than his novels or protagonist Jack Ryan.  Clancy said he wrote “The Hunt for Red October” to achieve a lifelong dream to be a novelist and to achieve immortality.  

Tom Clancy, R.I.P. 

‘Web-feet’ of Lincoln and His Admirals

by Bill Doughty

Esteemed Lincoln historian (and Navy Reads contributor) Eric Foner said this about Craig L. Symonds’s “Lincoln and His Admirals”:  “Despite the numerous volumes on Lincoln and the land Civil War, this is the first full study of Lincoln's relationship to the war at sea, and it reveals him mastering the nuances of naval warfare.”

The War of 1812 has been called the second Revolutionary War and the real birth of the United States Navy; the Civil War was an internal revolutionary rebellion over slavery, in which the Union fought for a “new birth of freedom” for all. It was also a watershed event for the Navy.  By the end of the Civil War, the Navy proved its worth as a littoral and open-ocean force with global implications.

Symonds’s brilliant “Lincoln and his Admirals” shows strengths and weaknesses of military and political leaders, the Army-Navy relationship, and the president’s intense interest in the strategy and management of the Navy, through Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles.

Symonds explores the relationship of Admirals Farragut, Porter, DuPont, Dahlgren and Wilkes, not only with Welles and Lincoln but also with Generals Grant, McLernand and Halleck, among others.

Ego, politics and power are revealed behind the curtain of history.  Symonds shows how Lincoln sought to understand before being understood, as “a neutrally patient navigator.” “Lincoln remained a reluctant commander in chief, and once he had a command team in place that he trusted, he backed away,” Symonds writes.

Du Pont

“Lincoln and his Admirals” is a great read, showing the personalities of the leaders and containing fascinating side notes that go further behind the curtain.  These are just a few examples:  The interesting case of Cmdr. George Preble, grandson of Edward Preble, hero of the Barbary Wars; the vanity, weakness and overreaction of Rear Adm. Samuel Francis Du Pont (to a newspaper story written April 15, 1863); and the sweet-and-sour opposites of Lincoln, the forgiving, and Welles, the vengeful.

“Welles’s tendency to chastise, however, was as instructive as Lincoln’s to soothe,” Symonds writes.  Lincoln’s natural empathy and political skill helped him deal with a fiery cabinet and strong-willed military leaders.

Sometimes flawless, occasionally dysfunctional, the joint efforts of the Union Army and Navy were an important reason the North prevailed.  Lincoln could see the effectiveness of combined operations when there was a willingness to operate outside of narrow and arbitrary lines of authority.  He valued collaboration and cooperation, he encouraged innovation and new technology, and he rewarded aggressive, decisive action in battle.

Read “Lincoln and his Admirals” to understand not only the Navy’s achievements in saving the Union but also the strategies and tactics of good leaders who see bigger themes.

According to Symonds, Lincoln showed “determination to put the good of the country ahead of personal ambition.  He expected his admirals -- and his generals -- to tolerate inconvenience and disappointment for the good of the cause.  The broader goals of Union and victory were more important than anyone’s personal trials, including his own.”  Through it all he continued to support modernization of the Navy.

The Navy had 588 warships by the end of 1863, according to Symonds, with 75 of the ships armored and with more and bigger ironclads coming.  Some of the ironclads featured 11-inch and 15-inch guns.

Anticipating the arguments of Alfred Thayer Mahan a generation later, Lincoln wrote, “Our country has advantages superior to any other nation in our resources of iron and timber, with inexhaustible quantities of fuel in the immediate vicinity of both, and all available and in close proximity to navigable waters.”  Although “other governments have been making large expenditures ... with a view to attain naval supremacy,” it seemed likely to him that “this government is destined to occupy a leading position among maritime powers.  After he wrote this passage, however, he (or perhaps [Secretary of State] Seward) decided that the British might construe it as too direct a challenge to their maritime supremacy, and he deleted it, replacing it with a slightly less confrontational sentence: “The events of war give an increased interest and importance to the navy which will probably extend beyond the war itself.”

In the summer of 1863 Lincoln wrote this in a public letter to James C. Conkling, showing his appreciation for the Navy team: “Nor must Uncle Sam’s Web-feet be forgotten.  At all the watery margins they have been present.  Not only in the deep sea, the broad bay, and the rapid river, but also up the narrow bayou, and wherever the ground was a little damp, they have been, and made their tracks.”

(CNO Adm. Greenert unveiled the latest iteration of the Navy’s Professional Reading Program at the Ford Center for Education and Leadership in front of a sculpture of 6,000 books about President Lincoln.  His program and list of books are focused on history, tradition, and leadership/management, tailored around his three tenets (warfighting first, operate forward, be ready)   We’ll continue to showcase the influence of Lincoln this year, along with books from and related to the CNO’s reading list.  In the previous blog post, Symonds shared a list of top five books with Navy Reads.)

China and 'Best Case, Nuanced Scenario'

Review by Bill Doughty

“Monsoon” by Robert D. Kaplan provides a panoramic sweep of the Indian Ocean and its relevance to world commerce, with a special discussion of China, the United States Navy, and energy.

“Forty percent of seaborne crude oil passes through the Strait of Hormuz at one end of the ocean,” he writes, “and 50 percent of the world’s merchant fleet capacity is hosted at the Strait of Malacca, at the other end, making the Indian Ocean the globe’s busiest and most important interstate.”

Citing the International Energy Agency’s “World Energy Outlook 2007,” presented in Paris, Kaplan writes, “The world’s energy needs will rise by 50 percent by 2030, and almost half of the consumption will come from India and China.”  What are the political realities of growing economic stakes, finite energy resources and heightened nationalism in the face of globalization?

Kaplan’s observations conclude in a pivotal chapter, “China’s Two-Ocean Strategy?”

“[As] China rises economically and politically, taking advantage, in effect, of America’s military quagmire in Iraq and Afghanistan, a new and more complex order is gradually emerging in the maritime rimland of Eurasia, which includes not only the Indian Ocean but [also] the western Pacific.  What follows is an analysis of a U.S. Navy that has already reached the zenith of its dominance, faced with a rising Chinese maritime presence that, along with the rise of India, could over time herald the end of Western control over these waters.”

Kaplan evaluates the shrinking U.S. Navy -- from 6,700 ships at the end of World War II, 600 ships during the Cold War, to fewer than 280 ships today.

At the same time, “China yearns for an authentic blue water, or oceanic, navy...” in both the Indian and Pacific Oceans, Kaplan posits.  Add Japan, India and other Pacific nations to the mix and this will lead, he concludes, to an increasingly complex global power arrangement, one that is not bipolar or suicidal.  In fact, China already cooperates with other nations, including the United States in combatting a mutual enemy -- piracy.

Ship's Serviceman Seaman Qing Su, right, from New York, translates for a U.S-China combined visit, board, search and seizure (VBSS) team comprised of Sailors from the guided-missile destroyer USS Winston S. Churchill (DDG 81) and the Chinese People's Liberation Army (Navy) frigate Yi Yang (FF 548) during a bilateral counterpiracy exercise in the Gulf of Aden, Sept. 17, 2012. The focus of the exercise was American and Chinese naval cooperation in detecting, boarding, and searching suspected pirated vessels. (Photo by MC2 Aaron Chase)

Kaplan cites the cooperative strategies espoused by (now retired) Adm. Michael Mullen, former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and former Chief of Naval Operations who, in 2007, said, “the economic tide of all nations rises not when the seas are controlled by one [nation] but rather when they are made safe and free for all.”

“Monsoon” is a key read on current CNO Adm. Jonathan Greenert’s Professional Reading Program list in the “Operate Forward” category.  

These past two blogposts only begin to scratch the surface of this great book.  “Monsoon” demanded two posts to showcase both its science and art.  This book is essential to understanding the sweeping history, present reality and potential future of the region.

As for the future, Kaplan writes, “Strong American-Chinese bilateral relations going forward is not only plausible, but might be the best-case scenario for the global system in the twenty-first century...”

“Therefore, the most likely scenario in my mind for relations with China is something quite nuanced: the United States will both compete and cooperate with China.  The American-Chinese rivalry of the future could give new meaning tot he word ‘subtlety,’ especially in its economic and diplomatic arrangements.  Yet, if this relationship has its hard edges, I expect one of those will be where the two countries’ navies interact: in the Greater Indian Ocean and western Pacific.”

Mutually Assured Destruction, with it’s apt acronym, created an uneasy and dangerous peace during the Cold War.  Today, the intertwined economic and energy dependency of the largest economies of the East and West may achieve a mutually assured peace.  Kaplan shows that readers and leaders on all sides need to understand how the winds are blowing across the Indian Ocean in order to fully see the big picture.

Chinese sailors render honors to Secretary of the Navy the Honorable Ray Mabus during a visit to the People's Liberation Army (Navy) hospital ship Peace Ark (866) Nov. 29, 2012. Mabus visited Ningbo, China to discuss the United States' new defense strategy, deepening military-to-military engagements, rebalancing toward the Pacific and fostering a positive, cooperative and comprehensive relationship with China. (U.S. Navy photo by MCC Sam Shavers)

A Long Arc Toward Justice

by Bill Doughty

Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles was one of the first people to learn about President Lincoln's commitment to free enslaved human beings in the South.  Lincoln confided in Welles and Secretary of State William Seward on July 13, 1862, according to Seward’s diary, that emancipation was part of a military strategy.

Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles, center, at Lincoln's right hand.

Was Lincoln motivated by morality or practicality -- or both?

A new book by John Burt, “Lincoln’s Tragic Pragmatism,” joins over 16,000 titles published to date about the 16th president and explores the question. 

Regarding Lincoln's practical motivation, Burt writes:

“He explained to Welles that emancipation ‘was a military necessity absolutely essential to the salvation of the Union, that we must free the slaves or be ourselves subdued.’ Such an act would, at the least, weaken the power of the Confederacy, since it used its slaves to do such things as dig intrenchments or move supplies, jobs which otherwise would have to be performed by white soldiers. He further noted that the border states would do nothing, left to themselves, and could only be persuaded to free their slaves if the slaves were freed in the Confederacy first.”

Burt’s book was showcased this week on one of America’s best radio shows,  Tom Ashbrook’s On Point, and is available as a podcast. The acclaimed new book examines Lincoln’s philosophy and approach to democracy.  Listen to the discussion here.

Ashbrook opens his podcast with a quote from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.: “The arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice.”

He quotes a passage from Burt:

“Lincoln provides a model for moral agency in a complex world in which one must make one’s way among various half-understood alternatives, none of which leaves ones hands clean.”

Burt discusses conflicting beliefs and values, the tension between democracy and morality, and the fundamental principles of persuasion.

He tells Ashbrook, “My conscience commands me, but it has to persuade you.  And, indeed, if I don’t persuade you and compel you, then I’m not behaving in a democratic way either.  It may be a high-minded tyranny, but it’s still a tyranny.  I have an obligation to get you to accept defeat on things that matter to you highly.”

The On Point conversation brings out contemporary parallels -- from Martin Luther King’s strategy in the 1960s to current challenges of the ongoing Continuing Resolution and impending Sequestration in 2013.  In considering Lincoln, the lessons in leadership, compromise and warfare -- concessions without “fatal sacrifices” -- are striking.

Another one of the 16,000+ Lincoln titles (used as a backdrop by CNO Adm. Greenert to announce his revamped Professional Reading Program) is Ronald C. White, Jr.’s “The Eloquent President.”  White examines some of the president’s greatest speeches, addresses and public letters between 1861 and 1865, pulling them apart and looking at the poetry, cadences and conviction inside.

Like Burt, White also describes the role of Welles and Seward as Lincoln’s close confidants on the issue of emancipation.

Welles wrote detailed entries in his diary and recounted Lincoln’s growing belief in “Divine Will.” According to Welles, Lincoln saw victory in the Battle of Antietam as an indication that “God had decided this question in favor of the slaves.”

In "The Eloquent President," White writes:

“What was most remarkable, in an atmosphere charged with religious fervor and hyperpatriotism, was Lincoln’s new belief that God’s purposes may not be able to be identified by either side.  What sets him apart, in this musing, from his contemporaries in both North and South was his absence of pretension.”

White puts Lincoln’s passionate and compelling speeches under a magnifying glass, peeling off words and phrases and examining the inspiration, techniques and underlying morality of the president’s rhetoric.

He considers the Annual Message to Congress, delivered Dec. 1, 1862, as  “Lincoln’s finest message to Congress.” In that address, Lincoln calls for a “plain, peaceful, generous, just” way to save the Union.

Lincoln’s conclusion includes the phrase “fiery trial”:

“Fellow-citizens, we can not escape history. We of this Congress and this Administration will be remembered in spite of ourselves. No personal significance or insignificance can spare one or another of us. The fiery trial through which we pass will light us down in honor or dishonor to the latest generation. We say we are for the Union. The world will not forget that we say this. We know how to save the Union. The world knows we do know how to save it. We, even we here, hold the power and bear the responsibility. In giving freedom to the slave we assure freedom to the free--honorable alike in what we give and what we preserve. We shall nobly save or meanly lose the last best hope of earth. Other means may succeed; this could not fail. The way is plain, peaceful, generous, just -- a way which if followed the world will forever applaud and God must forever bless.”

White concludes, “His words transcended the limitations of the event.  He used this occasion not simply to report to Congress but to mobilize public opinion. He offered a powerful appeal to history but also invited Americans to think in the future tense.  Lincoln’s message represented a breadth of conception and height of imagination in his expanding rhetorical arsenal.”

Lincoln balanced the highest ideals of morality with a tough, clear-eyed practical approach to achieve compromise and cooperation.  Using the art of the long view, he kept his commitment to the arc of the moral universe that would lead to justice for future generations.