Throw to the Cutoff Man

July 6th, 2025

Throw to the cutoff man. That is the first thing I remember the coach saying, the first time I played organized baseball (at age 10). Last week I saw a player on the Baltimore Orioles get that wrong and it cost them 2 runs. On the scoreboard there was no error. But the wrong choice cost two runs. 

A number of years ago, my first duty station, my first month at my duty station, perhaps the second time I stood duty, Leadfoot (senior duty officer - wrote the watch schedule) reminded me to “check the barracks.” I asked for clarification: “Huh?” And he told me to go over the barracks, check with Petty Officer John Doe and just walk through and make sure everything was okay. If not, tell them to fix it, and then log it all. So, I do that. Over the course of three years I have no idea how many times I stood duty or how many times I walked through the barracks, but I do recall going over there once and fining it a mess, and some pipe was leaking, etc., and I called some office on base, told  them of the problem, they came over and fixed it. I logged it, and the next guy on watch checked to make sure it was, in fact, fixed.

Problem solved. Handled by ensigns, chiefs, and first class petty officers. I didn’t come up with the right SOP, I just followed fundamentals, just as Leadfoot told me…

Fundamentals: Throw to the Cutoff Man… So?

Several weeks ago SecNav Phelan got a look inside some barracks in Guam: they were a mess. He’s new on the job, and new to the Navy as a whole, so he didn’t know how this is supposed to work. Here’s a reminder to those around him, who should have told him (but clearly did not): review the paragraphs above.

The Sailors and Marines were in a Baracks in Guam. Now, someone is going to say: well, these Baracks are managed by… Stop. All of that is, in the most fundamental sense, wrong. Go back to the simple, fundamental guidance Leadfoot gave to me, the SDO, 45 years ago. Guidance, by the way, that every other SDO on base (there would have been more than 20) was following. Just an Ensign or LTJG or LT wandering through the barracks, just to make sure they aren’t a mess. And if they are? Talk to the chief, and you enter it in the log. And then you or the next duty officer would talk to the chief the next day and ask him what’s what. Problem’s got fixed.

And if you had a deployment somewhere, to some Air Force base, perhaps, you did the same thing. And the commander of the squadron didn’t care if the Pope himself owned that barracks, that wasn’t his concern or yours. I can see my first CO pointing his long Texan finger at me: “You, Señor, need to go check.” 

If things weren't fixed, it rattled up the chain of command…And it could move very fast.

Now, apparently, that whole idea of looking after your people - or your barracks, or your ships or airplane - seems to have all gone by the boards. 

That is a leadership problem.

Thing is, every problem in the US Navy - EVERY Problem in the Navy - and every problem in the USAF and USMC and US Army and the US Space Force can be traced to this one thing: a leadership failure.

Some will object that it’s a funding issue or a technology issue or whatever and my answer is: those problems arise because of bad leadership. Great leaders can move the “vision” forward (whatever it is), convince the investors (Congress and the American people in this case) to spend more money, find the right people for day-to-day management to keep things on track, and understand that better is the enemy of good enough and keep all and sundry from gold-plating every project. It seems very little of that has taken place in the Navy (or anywhere else in DOD) for the last 35 years.

Here is the great secret - the real leadership in the services takes place among the Chiefs and master sergeants, among the majors and lt. commanders, lt. colonels and commanders, colonels and captains; not among the admirals and generals.

Good leadership, whether you are Alexander or Belisarius or Genghis Khan or Napoleon, good leadership distills down to just a few things: vision - a clear idea of the great goal, intellect - the ability to figure out a way to get there, communication - the ability to convince others to make your goal their goal, decision-making - the ability to translate experience and current data into the right choice, courage of your convictions - just that - sticking with your choices, and charisma - the ability to communicate your passion.

Few leaders have all these traits in abundance, most leaders have several, but they can get by because someone else has already created pieces of the puzzle: In a great nation like the US, the general is given orders - which contain the vision, he has a staff that provides the plan, he has a few key subordinates who may, in fact provide the communication skills, etc.

But caring for your troops is a gimme of good leadership, all the fundamentals are already worked out, there is no need for creativity. Yet they failed in those barracks.

The latest problem with USS Ford is a pretty good example of leadership that simply failed. Ford was built with, in essence, two kitchens - one operates all the time, one only operates when the airwing is on board. The result is fewer but larger pieces of gear. There are, for example only 8 large ovens. In an act of “genius,” the ovens were purchased under a contract that did not allow the Navy to repair them, they were to be serviced by contractors. This, of course makes perfect sense because the carrier is always going to be someplace where the contractor can easily reach the ship… Huh?

How could anyone who had spent more than a day at sea on a carrier ever have signed off on that contract? Yet they did. The contractors are not to blame, guys wearing gold braid are to blame. That is just another small example. But they are legion: the LCS, the Constellation class frigate (now the size of a World War II light cruiser), the nearly worthless Zumwalt class destroyer - at a combined $22 billion for 3 White Elephants.

Yet, here we sit, on top of decades of cost overruns, of late programs, of rusting ships and lousy aircraft readiness across DOD, of not enough live-fire training, moldy barracks, of ship schedules that don't hold up and yard periods missed… For years and years and years. And not one CNO has stood up, dug in his heals and said "This is wrong and we need to fix it and if you don't want to listen to me, I quit." Not one CNO, not one 4 star, not a single 3 star.

This is what is wrong. And SecNav Phelan and SecDef Hegseth are far too kind. I suspect that believe that having fired a few, the others will get the message. But, is that enough? Do we need leadership that can’t see what is wrong with a contract protecting “the intellectual property rights” for a stove? Really? On a nuclear powered aircraft carrier - that will spend nearly 30% of the next 50 years at sea? Really?

Now, the problem with the stoves is being addressed. But how did that happen? What other truly foolish decisions were made that have not yet come to light? And how do barracks end up with mold on the walls? 

SecDef and SecNav (and I am sure SecAf and SecArmy) need to clear out the lousy leadership.

Now, some will object that there are some things we get very right - and the strike on Iran demonstrates it. But, if anyone wants to know why that worked so well, there is one simple answer: training. 

Whenever anything like this takes place there is always some commentator who latches on to specific pilots or a specific sub element of some team, squadron, wing, etc. They are almost universally wrong. The 7 x B-2 aircrew - 14 pilots - didn’t succeed because they are the 14 best pilots in the 8th Air Force, though they are very good; they succeeded because over the years some folks sacrificed their careers defending training money. I tip my hat to the aircrews and ground crews who executed that mission, and the folks on the subs, and the various other aircrew and Patriot crews involved in that entire episode. Give them all medals and ribbons. But I would be willing to bet that every single B-2 aircrew could have executed that mission - because they all train hard and they don’t cut corners on training.

The process for prepping for a mission like this, and the routine training that aircrew in all the B-2, B-1, B-52, F-15, F-16, F-18, F-22, F-35, E-2D, E-3, KC-135, etc - the training is long and sometimes painful and sometimes boring and frustrating and irritating and… and… and… and it makes all the difference in the world. And that is all types of training. Not just more simulator time, real training, taking the ship out, taking the boat (sub) out, flying the airplane, burning jet fuel… going over the basics again and again and again and again and again. And critiquing every flight, pulling apart every bombing run, critically debriefing every hop. 

That’s why those folks did a good job: because by the time it came to execute the actual mission, it felt easy compared to what they had already done… And who overseas the real training? Majors and lieutenant colonels, lieutenant commanders and commanders, and a few colonels and captains. And who does all the real, detailed planning? The same officers; they deserve all the medals.

And the admirals and generals? They need to fix the mold.