Minutes. Well, good morning. This Committee Meets this morning to receive testimony on recent u. S. Navy collisions at sea, including u. S. S. Lake sham plain, uss fitzgerald, and uss john s. Mccain as well as the grounding of uss an teet tomb. We welcome or witness, the on able Richard Spencer secretary of the navy, admiral john richardson, chief of naval operations, and mr. John pendleton, director of defense for structure and readiness issues at the Government Accountability office. Id like to take a moment to recognize family members who lost loved ones in the fitzgerald and mccain collisions who are here with us today as our honored guests. From the fitzgerald, eric rooem, the wife of chief petty officer gary reem. Steven ritzco and show know douglas parents and brother of petty officer third class shingo douglas. Senior chief petty officer victor and carmen shah boy yn sa buyian, and theyre son luke. Parents and growth of petty officer first class carlosvictor sa buy on. Wayne and nikki rigsby, father and stepmother of seaman dakota rigsby. Darryl martin, chief father of petty officer first class xavier martin. And from the mccain, jennifer simon, wife of petty officer first class kevin bushel, and his mother karen bushel, along with her wife anne shane. Rachel economiels, mother of metty officer secretary class timothy ekels, teresa and austin palmer, mother and brother of petty office every second class logan palmer. Let me express my deepest condolences to you all on behalf of this committee, the u. S. Senate, and the american people. Your presence here today reminds us of our sacred obligation to look after the young people who volunteer to serve in the military. With those individuals who i just named stand so that we can recognize their presence here. Thank you and god bless. Uss john s. Mccain was named after my father and grandfather, i remember the ship launching ceremony nearly 25 years ago. And my wife cindy continues to serve as the ships sponsor. So believe me, these tragedies are personal for me and my family as well and we share in your sorrow. My commitment to all of you, is that we will get to the bottom of these incidents. Its simply unacceptable for u. S. Navy ships to run aground or collide with other ships and to have four such incidents in the span of seven months is truly alarming. This Committee Takes seriously its oversight role. We will identify shortcomings, fix them, and hold people accountable. We will learn lessons from these vent tragedies to make the navy better and all who serve in it safer. I know our navy leaders share these goals and will Work Together with us to achieve them. To that end, i hope our witnesses will help the committee better understand what happened with regard to these incidents. Were interested in the status of investigations, common factors or trends identified, root causes, corrective actions, and accountability measures. Wed also like to know the extent and cost of damage to the ships and operational impacts of unanticipated repairs. Finally, we ask you to highlight areas in which we in congress can stos help ensure the safety and proficiency of our sailors, including changes to current law. Im deeply concerned by mr. Pendletons written testimony which indicates 37 , thats over onethird of the training certifications for u. S. Navy cruisers and destroyers based in japan were expired as of june. Hes notes, this represents more than a fivefold increase in the expired warfare certifications for these ships in the last two years. I would point out warfare certifications are a ships ability to fully be prepared to engage in combat. Press reporting paints an even blee bleaker picture. The mccain had experienced expired certification in six of the ten key Warfare Mission areas. The fitzgerald had expired certification in all ten mission areas. Secretary spencer and admiral richardson, i dont need to tell you that this is troubling and it is unacceptable. And we acknowledge and appreciate the accountability acts the navy has taken to date. The navy has relieved two Commanding Officers, a commander and a captain, it has issued reprimands, 20 reprimands to other officers an enlisted sailors. Since august 23rd this squadron two star strike group and three star commander will all have been relieved for cause. I assure you this committee will go everything we can to support the Navy Leadership actions to course correct, but we must also call to you task and demand answers as leaders of our navy, you must do better. Particularly id like to know why the recommendations to the gao and other relevant reviews such as 2010 Fleet Review Panel were not effectively implemented and maintained. The lives of the 17 sailors lost in the fitzgerald and mccain collisions were priceless and i mourn their loss. These preventible incidents also come with a very real price tag in terms of the cost of these to taxpayers. I understand the current estimate for repairs is approximately 600 million. But the cost will also be felt in unexpected deployments for other ships to meet operational requirements. Im also concerned by the apparent difficulty of navigating safely in the western pacific. With three of these ships now nondeploibl for months or years due to damage repairs theres serious questions about our Maritime Readiness to be fight in response to north korean, chinese and russian aggression. The ongoing reviews directed by secretary spencer and admirable richardson must quickly get to the bottom of this and identify root causes, corrective actions and further accountability actions. Time is of the essence. I hope these reviews fully examine how discrete changes over the years have compounded resulted in prioritizing the need to do more with less. And that has come at the expense of operational effectiveness. These changes include longer deployments, socalled optimal manning of ships, less handson and initial training, less time for maintenance, less time to train, and an officer personnel system governed bylaws like the defense officer Personnel Management act and the goldwater nickels act which were put in place more than three decades ago and may have created a breadth of experience over depth of technical experience. We need to look seriously and rigorously at all of these types of systemic cribbing factors and i would like your assurance, secretary spencer, that you will do so and that is you consider additional accountability actions. You will look at all levels of command as appropriate. While we are focused on instruments at sea today, this committee recognizes that the current readiness crisis affects all of our military services. Its part of a larger deeper trend forcing military units at the tactical level to try to do too much with too little. And in the last three years, fatal training accidents have taken the lives of four times more Service Members than our enemies have in combat. This cannot continue. Unfortunately, this is an issue of command. Theres plenty of blame to goi round for the deteriorated state of our military and we cannot ignore congresss responsibility. Years of budget cuts, continuing resolutions, and sequestration have forced our military to maintain a highoperational tempo with limited resources. We know that has come at the cost of training, maintenance, readiness, effectiveness, and the lives of too many brave, young americans. Our service chiefs, including the chief of naval operations, have testified repeatedly that the budget control act and sequestration are endanger the lives of our men and women in uniform. My dear friends, we were warned. To fix this problem were we must all do better. Military leaders must make honest assessments of their requirements and request the full extent of what they need in the in turn, we in Congress Must provide these resource theres a timely and predictable way. That is the only way to truly restore the readiness of our force. Its the only solution to ensuring that accidents like this do not happen again. And it is the bare minimum we owe to the brave men and women who risk our lives to defend our nation. Senator reed. Thank you, mr. Chairman. I want to join senator mccain in welcoming you folks to the committee this morning to testify on the issues su surrounding the recent accidents and the departments plans for demming what went wrong and what steps need to be taken to ensure such accidents should not occur in the future. Service in the Nations Armed forces can be very dangerous. The country is saddened whenever we lose one of americas sons or daughters. But it is particularly disturbing when young people are casualties in the course of conducting normal peace time operations. I want to extend my condolences and i know i share with senator mccain for your loss. We should not prejudge the outcome of the internal navy reviews and the circumstances surrounding these accidents. However, we do know that the department of navy has been facing serious readiness problems and kauns willing training and deployments. In addition, the navy like other service, has also been operating in very high tempo for a long period. These conditions have been aggravated by many years of Budget Constraints and uncertainty which have forced leaders into making difficult decisions. All these factors have taken a toll on Navy Commanders and navy operations. Secretary spencer and admiral richardson, i ask your commitment that youre giving this situation your full attention, that you will follow these investigations wherever they lead, and that you will share all findings with congress. We must do all that is necessary to provide and sustain our navy and all our armed fortces. Again thank you to the witnesses and i look forward to the testimony. Secretary spencer. Chairman mccain, Ranking Member reed, distinguishes members of this committee, i want ton thank you for the opportunity to appear before you and talk about the state of our navy. Before we move forward, though, i want to express our deepest condolences to the families and loved ones ant crew whos have lost one of their own in the last few months. Having looked into the eyes of many of these families and shared time with them, knowing that their return ones return home in a flagdraped casket i know my words are completely insufficient. To the families prens present, please know that poly and i have you in our thoughts and prayers. The 17 sailors from the uss fitzgerald and uss john s. Mccain were sons, brothers, husbands, fiancees, uncles and friends. They were patriots and they will not be forgotten. We pledge our full support to their families and crews. Were going to back our words with actions. We have a problem in the navy. And were going to fix it. In addition to the investigations already initiated, we are conducting two thorough reviews. The cnos comprehensive review will look at the tactical and operational situation at hand. My strategic readiness review will an independent team comprised of military and Industry Experts that will look and examine a root causes, accountability, longterm systemic issues and then provide remedial insight. These reviews will compliment and enhance each other providing the deputyth and criticalallity that the situation demands. I will act to the limits of my authority to change processes and acquire any needed capabilities in order to protect our people. Im here today to impress our sense of you are dwenssy and to be highlight a way forward to renew a culture of safety and training across the fleet. We will take Lessons Learned from the recent tragic events and come out the other side a stronger more capable Navy Marine Corps team. Make no mistake we are not waiting 60 days or 90 days to make adjustments. The c ceo made a list of actions that we are taking meetly ranging from ship to ship Material Inspection totz activation of ais radar identifications while were trafficking specific areas. We are not lying idle and i can tell you, ladies and gentlemen, we are committed. I appreciate the opportunity to work with you on the Remedial Solutions and to find our way forward. Thank you and i look forward to your questions. Admiral richardson. General mccain, Ranking Member reed and distinguished members of the committee, i also want to thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today to discuss the recent u. S. Navy incidents at sea. To begin with, i also want to express my deep condolences to the families of the 17 sale letters wers who served their country with distinction. In both of these tragic incidents, our sailors acted heroically to say their ships has they combated flooding and the loss of critical systems. Care and support to these families, the familiar lives our sailors is our top priority. Ive committed to them that that we will learn everything we can from these tragic events to prevent another accident. As you pointed out, sir, many of the family members are here today and we will always stand with you. What we do is inherently dangerous. But it is leadership responsibility to ensure we provide the right training and oversight to keep our team safe and effective. We are taking immediate corrective actions to ensure we meet the training and material readiness standard to prevent another mishap. We are not it stopping with immediate actions. In addition to the investigations into the specific incidents on fitzgerald and mccain, were conducting as a secretary pointed out, a comprehensive review which will turn over ever stone to examine for more systemic problems. This review will compliment the secretarys strategic review. Ive testified several times about the triple whammy, the corrosive confluence of high operational tempo, inadequate budgets and budget uncertainty. The funding approved in fiscal year 17 is being used to plug our most urgent readiness holes in the fleet and our 18 requests sustains that progress. While we have prioritized maintenance and readiness dollars, full recovery will not happen overnight. It will take years with stable and adequate resources. But make no mistake, sir, while these factors do exert a negative force on the challenges we face, at the core this is about leadership, especially command. Our first, that or our first mol kufl effort, our first team must good to safety, safety is first. And no matter what the situation, those charged with command but achieve and maintain a standard that ensures their teams are trained and ready to safely and effectively conduct assigned operations. We must remain vigilant to meeting this standard, fighting against every pressure to erode it. Our commanders must meet the absolute standard to develop safe and effective teams. If we cannot meet the standard, we do not deploy until we do. And we must established a command climate that supports honest reporting. Senator, these incidents demand our full attention. We must provide our sailors the necessary resources and training to execute their assigned missions. I am accountable for the safe and effective operations of our navy and we will fix this. I own this problem. Im confident that our navy will identify the root causes and correct them and it will be better in the end. Again, thank you for the opportunity to be here and i look forward to your questions. Mr. Pendleton. Chairman mccain, Ranking Member reed and members of the committee, thank you for having here here to summarize jos work on navy readiness. Mr. Chairman, i dont know what kazed the tragic recent accidents, but i do know from my work that the navys caught between an unrelenting Operational Command and limited supply ships. At this point im skeptical that the navy will be able to make readiness gains unless demands on them are increased. Even with increased funding going forward, my assessment agrees with the navy that will take several years to rebuild training, manning, and maintenance. Foundations of readiness that have become shaky over time. Our work is also revealed Significant Management issues that the navy must confront. In a 2015 report we found that the ships based in japan had such aggressive deployment schedules that they did not have dedicated training periods like ships in the United States did. In fact, we were told that the overseas ships overseas base ships were so busy that they had to train on the margins. When i asked ma what that meant it was explained to me that they had to squeeze in training when they could. The assumption i think was that the seventh fleet, because it was perpetually in motion, it was ready. I think the navy has now realized that this will conventional wisdom was, in fact, likely faulty. We recommended a time back in 20 2015 that they revise dedicated training time and also more broadly assess the risk associated with increased reliance on overseas basing of ships. Dod and the navy agreed with us, at least on paper, but theyve taken little action since to implement our recommendations. The navy has other even more broad management challenge that it must address like shipmaning. A navy internal study found that salers were working over a hundred hours a week back in 2014 and it concluded this was unsustainable and potentially contributing to a poor safety culture. We recommended, in breach brief, that the navy assess how much work it takes to run a ship and use that to size the crew. Maintenance is also taking longer and costing more. Ship deployments have often been extended. This causes ships to have more problems when theyre brought in for maintenance. Shipyards have struggled to keep pace for a number of reasons. Over the past few years, the lost operational days that has been created by the maintenance overruns have cost the navy the equivalent of the presence of almost three surface ships per year. That, in turn, strains the remaining fleet and its an unsustainable vicious cycle. As you know, the navys not alone in its Readiness Challenges thats nigh why jao and this committee supported the need for a Department WideReadiness Program that explicitly balances resources with demand and is transparent about how long it will take to rebuild readiness and what it will cost. I sugges