Sunday, September 18, 2011

Navy Challenges in the OSD/OJCS Capabilities Based Planning Process

Navy briefers described their organizations’ attempts to cover all the bases in Capabilities Based Planning meetings called by OSD and OJCS personnel, but indicated that their organizations had insufficient resources to participate fully and effectively. Some lack of coordination and of internal Navy scheduling control was also evident. 

This may be due in part to the lack of clarity in OPNAV lines of responsibility for CBP activities; that lack sometimes results in a duplication of effort. In addition, other information provided to the committee indicates that the Navy is not always well represented in the DOD joint CBP processes.

Several non-Navy briefers noted that Navy representatives on the various boards and committees are often unfamiliar with the issues, not empowered to speak on behalf of the Navy, or absent. Regardless of whether these difficulties result from insufficient staff resources or other problems, they preclude justice being done regarding naval issues in the larger DOD environment and undercut Navy interests in competition for both influence and funding.

The full report is available for download HERE.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

This assessment is from 2005.

CBP isn't easy and Navy had only been at it a few years at that time. Would be interesting to know what has or hasn't been done in the past six years considering the amount of money that goes into CBP.

Steve said...

//Author's note: The following personal observations are from a single venue in a huge inter-Service organization. They are more than 25 years old and are from the start of Goldwater-Nichols, when the mandatory "Joint" game was new law and Service guidance. I confess to small exaggerations, but Reality might be very close.//

When I was on the Joint Staff, Air Force, by far and away, led in CBP representation and process management. Army, grim and looking like it had finished another 23-hour day (not counting PT w/field gear) was next. As Service 'cousins' to AF, Army was on the same page as AF but not nearly as classy; and then the Navy, whose representation was that of good listeners and information gatherers.
USAF sent expert level briefers with polished presentations. Army sometimes briefed from an easel and butcher block charts, and Navy distributed hand outs and then talked through the brief.
As "Navy observing Navy,"" it was very clear my dark-blue comrades from OPNAV didn't want to be there; for that matter, they did not want to be in the five-sided bldg, on the Navy Staff, rather doing Haze Gray things (me, too!).
But the Joint Process played in with funding forn major Service programs and the best arguments often won the day and dollar.

"Vis pacem - para bellum."

...and when at peace, the next best battle is a programmatic skirmish....

BTW: Is the Purple Water Fountain still down in AF territory?

Steve Myers (J33, 1985-87)

Anonymous said...

Don't know about the purple scuttlebutt in AF country. Believe, though, the Services' involvement hasn't changed much since Steve's day.

Urban Legend continues that officers receive multiple, consecutive assignments to the Air Staff, making them experienced and articulate during the program wars.

Naval officers do the best they can during their two-to-three year tours, waiting for the day when they see the Pentagon in their rear view mirrors for the last time.

Steve said...

...IRT Anon, the AF takes programmatics so seriously that they have an AFSC (read: Designator) for financial management. I recall that "RQ" is the department code for base and staff financial planning and comptrollers answer bells to it. Then, they hit the local golf course for UNCLAS matters. Golf is rumored to be a required AF officer skill area.

UNRELATED but also of urban legend-worth: do NOT mess with AF detailers! It is said that one homesteading O-6 wanted to work in a third (fourth??) Air Staff tour for (whatever) reasons. Might have concerning impending retirement. The colonels' assignments desk offered him command of the Joint EW Center in TX. "No thanks," he responded. "I'll take a new P-gon tour. Some weeks later, Assignments offered our hero another plum assignment: Director of the NATO EW Component in Italy. "I'll pass," he is said to have answered, "I'd like another P-gon tour."
The next day, he received message orders to unaccompanied command at a munitions destruction site in the Pacific, 700 miles from Hawaii - and no golf course. McMurdo Sound would have been better.
Heh, heh....

Steve

Anonymous said...

Having spent service time in the Navy only, the members that I am or have been aware of that were AF can be summed up by this one retired AF Colonel’s discussion with me. He said he had served 1 hitch as a Navy Dental Technician and after that hitch he joined the AF – one of his reasons, the enlisted men could go to the same head as the Officers.

Navyman834

Anonymous said...

Navy just doesn't play 'joint' very well. Never have; never will.