We are very grateful we have a mother here with us today. We send to you our give his sympathies and profound sorr for your loss and appreciation for your sons service to our nation. I want welcome our members to todays hearing. I want tespecially recognize that we have with us the committee chairman, donald mac thornberry. He has been the leader of our ongoing effortto mitigate our military Readiness Challenges and i want to thank him for his leadership and for being here today to heaabout the challenges in limited by the tragic collisions in the pacific. I also want to send a warm welcome to congresswoman Elizabeth Este from connecticut and congressman rodney davis from illinois. I ask unanimous consent th a member not a member of the committee be a lot to participate in todays hearing after all subCommittee Members and then full Committee Members have had an opportunity ask questions. Is there an objection . Without objection, such members will be recognized the appropriate time for five minutes. As a begin today on the view readiness, underling problems associated with the ships, i have no doubt our navy remains the strongest in the world. But these tragic events reinforce our concern out the depth the Readiness Challenges the na faces. Iconcerned about the shortfalls in e pore structure and whether the sustaid operional tempo of reduced to 77 ship navy mahave contributed to these events. I also believe the first responsibly of the government is to provide for the National Security for ouritizens, to do for us will we candoor ourselves. That is especially true for our sailors, soldiers, air force, and marines. Therefore as members of this mmittee, to better understand the Readiness Commission and the underlying problems of the navy and to chart a course that best assistance the navy in rrting deficiencies and shortfalls. We now ask theenior leaders of the u. S. Navy and Government Accountability office here with us today to be candid in your best judgment and advise us on the underlng problems associatedith the uss fitzgerald and the ussohn mccain and how to recover from the tragic events. This afternoon we are honored to have with us, admiral moran, naval operations, rear admiral boxall, and mr. John pendleton, the director of the structural ises on the u. S. Account ability office. I would like to know turn to Ranking Member, congresswoman met them but ill of lo for any remarks we may have. Thank you for agring to convene this timely hearing. Particularly with regards to the seventh Fleet Operations ithe indo Asian Pacific region. Chairman whitman and i recently returned from japan, where we visited and met wi vice admiral sawyer and saw the damage to the uss fitzgerald firsthand. Thank you to our witnesses for joining us today. Admiral moran and boxall, i appreciated our meeting and look forward to the discussion. Your work is critical to aiding our Oversight Mission on this committee. The rent mishaps of the uss fitzgerald and the uss john mccain resultenot on in significant damage to the vesss, but also the tragic, tragic loss of life of 17 american sailo. Earlier in the year, we saw two additional mishaps, avoidable as i understand it, also involvg surface ships assigned to th seventh fleet. While investigations into the specific mishaps are still ongoing and the navy is in the midst of conducting two separate copperheads of reviews of surface Fleet Operations, i am interested tlearn of the initial findings and the foundational challenges that need to be addressed to reverse the concerning trend that we are seeing with the readiness of our Forward DeployedNaval Services. Specifically, im interested to see what steps might be taken to ensure appropriate times are allocated for ship maintenance in the Forward Deployed naval forces model. And how e chain of command will be held accountable to ensure Navy Standards are being met. In addition to the training and the maintenance time, i will be intested to hear how the navy is investing in developing and utilizing nextgeneration Training Systems to maximize the efficiency and the effectiveness of this time. This committee and the Navy Military answer civilian leadership of two our sailors to take appropriate actions to ensure the conceing factors are properly addressed. Poin have been raised out how the deployed forces model in the pacific a lark as both stressed existing resources and highlited gaps and efficiency in the manning of our vessels. The training of our sailors, and the maintenance of the fleet. Understanding a balance needs to be struck and a review of auster in the region is undery. Let me note that i believe maintaing a forwd resins in the in asia pacific is critical to our security in the region. Whether it be for powe projection, humanitarian assistance, bilateral and multilateral exercis, or other critical missions, t navy is able to rapidly react to contingencies only with Forward Deployed forces. However, these missions and our credibility are undermined if we are not able to effectively manage and operate the fleet. The navys deployment of significant capabilities ovseas did not occur overnight and the pacific did not become a heavy traffic thear overnight. So im concerned the threat the request for resources and strategic prioritization of where to spend these resources has not properly reflected the operations, the maintenance, and the Training Needs of the fleet. Finally, i will nclude by stating that todays hearing and the navys ongoing investigations and reviews should be viewed as just a starting point. I hope we will he a continuous alogue doing this committee and the navy on the issues. The lessons leard and specific actions that need to be taken to ensure the readiness of the surface fleet. I want to thank you, the witnesses, and i look forward the discussion and mr. Chairman, i yield back. Thank you, Ranking Member. The member of virginia, rob wittman for any remarkhe may have. I want to welcome admiral moran and admiral boxall and i want to thank you for attending our hearing. I want to thank chairman wilson, to hold this joint subcommittee hearing today. It is of essence we get to the bottom of this. O may arrive at conclusions that require jnt efforts from bo our subcommittees and look forward to working with the derailment from South Carolina to resolve these potentially egregious underlying issues to our service navy forces. Before i proce any further, i also want to rognize our special guest the audiee today, miss rachel eccle her son lost his life onoard the uss mccain a few weeks ago. Thank you for being here with us today and for the enormo sacrifice that you and your family have made for this couny. We are here today to ensure [applause] yeah. [applause] we are here today to ensure that the navy and congress learns from these tragedies andakes the necessary changes. What you to be assured that your sons life, given on behalf of this nation, was not given in vain. Naval warfare is inherently dangerous. As we coinue to review the collisions of the uss fitzgerald and uss john mccain, it is Important Note that even in a benign government, we send our sailors into precarious and oftentimes, deadly sittions. Our nation asks much of our servicememrs and they never fail to deliver. I hope that todays hearing provides positive steps forward to ensure our sailorare provided the best training and the best ships to sustain their daily lives in a time of war prevail over our enemy. We can allgree our nation failed these 17 sailors and their families with thestragic collisions. Last wee i let a barsan additional delegation to visit the seventh eet commander, vice admiral sawyer, and the sailors ported in japan. I was encouraged at their zeal and tenacity of the fleet even in the face of these difficult events. Nevertheless, i look forward to turning our attention to assess whether there are ocedural issues that may have contributed to training readiness of our forces in e seveh fleet as e committee reviews, two things are painfully obvious. The material condition and operational readiness of the ships are significantly degraded d not acceptable. Of our Largest Service combatants, thmajority of deployed ships are not properly ready to perform their primary warfare areas. The negative trend lines asciated with operational readiness of our deployed ships are deeply troubling. These negative Trading Trends interbedded to the lack of seamanship evident on the was as and the uss figerald. As for the ships themselves, they suffered as ny hybrizes operational deoyments over maintenance and modernization. This maintenance and trading model places sailors at risk and most likely contributed in part to the incidence we ve witnessed with the seventh fleet. It is equally problematic th the navy intends to increase the number of four deployed ships over the nexfew years with no increase to the maintenance capacity in you could discuss in japan, thereby reducing the risk for our sailors. This decreasing liance is a model that is not sustainable and needs to be significantly modified. We have also learned that many of our destroys based out of japan are only to be deployed for no me than 710 years. However, we ow the uss john mccain has been deployed to japan for over 20 years. Further, the uss fitzgerald and uss Curtis Wilbur and uss have each been deployed for over years. The navy cannot manage the requements of a flt of just 277 ships. E ships have been outside the United States for too long and their material condition is in unacceptable state. I remain convinced that one of the large longterm fixes is to incree the structure and build the navy that r nation needs. A larger fleet would allow the navy to place last strain on each available ship, which reduces the chance any sailor is placed in a hazardous environment. I support the need to equate funded training and providthe fleet the time it eds to complete required maintenance and training. I think there are a number of each country factors tt should be explored, including navy trning models, impacts associated with the caof ship parts, funding requirements for ship maintenance, incredibly high operational tempo endur the fleet specifically in the seventh fleet areaf response ability, and also the operatnal failures that ve occurred with the surface fleet. Each area deserv additional assessme. The navy model is rife wh risk and this risk will increase in the future. The navy needs to offer an alternative model that meets them nations need for redud risk to our saors. I think aian wilson to work with the subcommittee on thi important issue and i yield back the balance of my time. Thank you chairman rob wittman. The settlement from conneccut, congressman joe courtney, r his remarks. They can, mr. Chairman and thank you to the admirals for their testimony today and i would like to recognize miss eccles for putting a human subject on the topic we are discussingoday. Thank you. The circumstances that bring us to todays hearing part table and tragic. As our lead witness pointed out in his order, in the spaof 65 days, 17 sailors were lost in ship collisions and accidentn naval vessels. These were not limited occurrens but part of a disturbing trend of mishaps in the asiapacic region at since january has involved uss anetam, uss lake champlain, uss fitzgerald, and the mcin. To put that in perspective, these heartbreaking casualties are more than rvicemembers that we have lost in the afghanisn war zone in 2017. Two of those sailors are from my state of connecticut. The Compass Minerals estes thomas and estes is here today. Congressman estes is here today. Their famili in the entire state of connecticut are mourning the loss of these two patriots and are watching the response of the navy and congress to x this trend. Several reviews by the navy and secretary of the navy are underway to dig deep into this disturbing trend. I appld those efforts and i speak for my colleues that we pect the navy to be fully transparent with our panels as these efforts move forward and at we will convene again as many times as needed to provide support to fix this problem. Indeed, article one, section eight, clause 13f the constitutions ear. It is congress is duty to ovide and intain a navy, which certainly needs a navy will a clipped adequately manned. What doesnt seem to clear at this early stage that these incidents are a glaring manifestation of t increased demand being deployed on t navy vessels, particularly in the iapacific region. We ask these Forward Deployed shifts ships to do hard work. The uss mccain conducted f operation in the southhina sea. The fitzgerald was a pivotal pler in providing needed presence in response to kim jonguns threatofissile test. These are not the kinds of ships and crews we can afford to lose to preventable mishaps. As my colleague, mr. Whitman, pointed out, when obvious response is to grow our flight and shorten the backlog of repairing maintenance for the existing fleet to take the pressure off the fleet from heel to toe opetions of o operations like japan and spain. These two committees he pushed more aggressively on a birtisanasis to add funding to Ship Construction and readiness than a oer entity in congress. They hold these accounts up the white house budget and pass for a bipartisan vote the biggest since 2008. We have work to do to complete the process and this hearing will increase e members determination to get the best ink highest outcome possible. Today is also about whether systemand polici need to be reliant to improve readiness. Concerns about systems and policies are not new. The gao has reported, and as our wiess will discuss, a growing number of our deployed vessels are operating without certifications. This trend h worsened since the last report in 2015 and this needs to be corrected. Similarly in 2010, the navy conducted a review by vice admiral philip which outlined shortfalls about surface readiness that are strictly relevant today and looking at these indents in the larger state of navy fleet readiness. One of his priority recommendations includes clarifying who in e chain of command specifically has the ultimate s in whethea ship is manned, trained, d equipped to the level needed to safely do their job before being sent out on deployment. To put it another way, the certification process, which covers key competencies need to be reviewed and approved by an accountable decision maker. Thistunately, recommendation raised by the vice admiral has not been addressed since the report cannot. We expect a lot from the navy and for good reason. Our sailors are the best in the world and the sight of a navy vessel in a foreign rt sends a powerful message of protection for a rulesbased order in the maritime domain. Those sailordo what they need to do to keep the peace in the sea lanes of the worlds oceans free and open. In return our sailors and family should expect their leaders that send them to sea have done all they can to provide the resources they need to conduct their work safely and return safely. I hope the hearing will focus on the steps the navy will take to fulfill that expectation and what it needs from us here in the congress to get it done. I yield back my time. Thank you, Ranking Member. Thank you, mr. Chaman. I will be shor i want to be very clear that no the circumstances or housetrained our force might be, we should not and cannot have collisions at sea. Fundamenta professional seamship is the foundation for say operations. And all of the marvelous technology, the magnificent hardware that we put together on these ships, and the power of our Weapons Systems are meaningless without worl trained, skilled, patriotic and experienced sailors who are well led. You have my promise that we will get to the bottom of these mishaps. We will leave no stone unturned. Will be accountable to you, to our sailors, and the american public. Like you, our navy stands with miss Rachel Echols and all of our Navy Families with our hear bken, but determined to investigate thoroughly a of the facts, to address contributing factors, and to learn so tt we will become a better navy at the end of this. We have an absolute responsibility to keep sailors safe from harm in peacetime, even as they prepare for war. Chairman, although we are 20 feet apa, there is for what we need to do from here on out. I look forward to your questions. Thank you, very mh. Now turn to the gentleman from the government of Accountability Office for your opening comments. Thank you. Thank you very much for having meere today to summarize. Unrtunately, grim circumstances bring us together. Mrchairman, i do not know what specifically caused the accidents, but i do know the navy is caughtetween unrelenting operational demand and limited supply ships. The navy has been warning for some time that they have been keeping a pace that is unsustainable. Our workas confirmed the difficulties. However, our body of work has also spotlighting risk sociated the way the navy is managing the risk. So of these risks present significant challenges in the Building Blocks of readiness. Trainingnd manning and maintenae. Just over two years ago, we published a report about the danger of overseas ships. In that report, we found that ships based in japan d not have dedicated training periods like u. S. Based ships. Their agessive deployment schedule ge the navy more presence, it is true, but it came at a cost, including detrimental effects on ship readiness. In fact, we were tolthe overseas base ships were so busy that they had to train on the margin. A term i had not heard before. It was explained to me that they had to squeeze training in when they could. Given the concerns we recommended to the ny, carefully analyzed the risks that were mo