Can the next SECNAV please just get the names right?

The Department of Defense is honored by the Navy’s naming of two future Gerald R. Ford-class aircraft carriers as the future USS William J. Clinton (CVN 82) and the future USS George W. Bush (CVN 83), as announced today by President Biden.

If a carrier has to be named for a person, why is there no USS Richard Halsey Best, whose dive bomber squadron sank two Japanese flattops on the same day during Midway? Best had to be medically retired that same year due to damage to his lungs caused by breathing bad O2 during the battle. His lungs never recovered entirely from that day. The smack talk and moto speeches of crewmembers of the USS Best writes itself. 

 

Or how about a flattop named for the Cajun “Lucky Pierre” Bordelon, the only U.S. Navy ace in the Korean War– who accomplished this feat in a piston-engine Corsair! He is also the only Navy “night ace,” earning all of his victories in darkness. A career Naval Aviator with 15,000 hours on his books and a former Eagle Scout with two Silver Stars and a Navy Cross to his credit, he is an all-American hero who has been forgotten by the Navy. 

 

The only U.S. Navy Korean fighter ace, Lt. Guy Bordelon, smiles at the nameplate on “Annie-Mo”, his Vought F4U-5N Corsair fighter in which he shot down five enemy aircraft during the Korean War. Bordelon was assigned to composite squadron VC-3 Blue Nemesis, which was deployed to Korea on the aircraft carrier USS Princeton (CVA-37) from 24 January to 21 September to Korea as part of Carrier Air Group 15 (CVG-15). 80-G-653594

Let’s drag out the Navy Naming Convention Soapbox

Current Secretary of the Navy Carlos Del Toro is on his way out with the change in administrations in Washington and, with all due respect to the office, it can’t come soon enough when it comes to naming conventions.

He has been grossly off-key from the typical conventions over the past four years.

Del Toro made the distinction that the upcoming first Columbia-class ballistic missile submarine, USS Columbia (SSBN 826), will not honor the previous 10 Columbias in current and past naval service but will specifically the first-named “District of Columbia,” which some have pointed out that is as another step in the plan to turn DC into the 51st state, but, hey…

In other submarine missteps– departing from 77th SECNAV Kenneth J. Braithwaite returned to traditional “fish” names for fleet submarines (or hunter killers in modern parlance), something the Navy did from 1931 through 1973. Hence, we will soon have USS Barb (SSN 804), Tang (SSN 805), Wahoo (SSN 806), and Silversides (SSN 807), all after the numerous esteemed fleet boats that previously carried those marine creatures’ names, and the country’s next frigate will take the name of one of the country’s original six frigates, USS Constellation— Del Toro named the future Virginia-class nuclear-powered attack submarine SSN-808 USS John H. Dalton, after Clinton’s hatchetman SECNAV. You know, the guy who snuffed out the Sprucans decades before their time, slaughtered the Navy’s cruiser and frigate force, and canceled the scheduled Service Life Extension Program on USS America (CV-66), forcing the mighty carrier to be decommissioned in 1996 and ultimately scuttled at sea rather than keeping her in the line through 2010 as previously planned.

Another Clinton SECNAV hatchet man will see his name on USS Richard J. Danzig (DDG-143), courtesy of Del Toro. Danzig’s only tie to the Navy was as its politically-appointed boss, and he was not a good one at that.

Dalton and Danzig, who were SECNAVs from July 22, 1993, to January 20, 2001, oversaw the destruction of the “600 Ship Navy” (which peaked at 594 warships in September 1987) managing the force’s constriction to just 316 vessels by the end of the Clinton era, a blow that the USN has been struggling to bounce back from for the past quarter century. There is zero reason for a new submarine and destroyer, built through billions of dollars in public treasure with the purpose of speeding into harm’s way, to be named for these guys.

Del Toro also ordered the Soviet-style, almost Orwellian memory holing, of the cruiser USS Chancellorsville— in the last few months of the ship’s life– to USS Robert Smalls (CG 62), which doesn’t do the latter naval hero any favors. In my opinion, as the Ticos are all named after battles, the cruiser should have gotten a more politically acceptable Virginia battle name such as USS The Wilderness or USS Fort Henry, and Smalls should have gotten a new destroyer to keep his name on the Navy List for more than just the self-serving span of Del Toro’s tour.

This month, in an effort to clear his desk while packing up the office, Del Toro has had a few hits and misses:

The future Bethesda-class expeditionary medical ship USNS Portsmouth (EMS 3) was announced during a ship naming ceremony at Naval Medical Center Portsmouth on Jan. 8. (Win)

The newest Arleigh Burke-class destroyer, the future USS Robert Kerrey (DDG 146), was named after the MoH recipient– the first Navy SEAL to be so honored– former Senator and former Nebraska governor. (Win)

The first two T-AGOS ocean surveillance ships of the Explorer class, the future USNS Don Walsh (T-AGOS 25) and the future USNS Victor Vescovo (T-AGOS 26), were named after esteemed Challenger Deep mariners. (Win)

Curiously, Del Toro also named the future San Antonio-class amphibious transport dock (LPD 33) USS Travis Manion after a Marine 1stLT who earned the Silver Star, posthumously, in Iraq. He announced this at an event with the Travis Manion Foundation. Yes, of course, Manion was a hero, but destroyers are and always have been named after heroes. LPDs, meanwhile, are all over the place with most named after cities while two– USS Richard M. McCool Jr. (LPD-29) and USS John P. Murtha (LPD-26), were named after heroes by Obama’s SECNAV, Ray Mabus.

In another break from the logic of a naming convention, Del Toro ordered that the future Constellation class frigate FFG-69 be named for Joy Bright Hancock, a director of WAVES. Yes, Hancock should have a ship named after her. Perhaps a destroyer in the same class as WWII nursing hero Lenah Sutcliffe Higbee (DDG 123) and computer pioneer RADM Grace Hopper (DDG 70). Especially when you consider all of the other Constellations are named for Revolutionary War heroes and vessels (Constellation, Congress, Chesapeake, Lafayette, Hamilton, and Galvez).

Further flipping the convention, Del Toro recently named the future DDG-145 as the fifth USS Intrepid! Surely the name would be better suited to a future LHD or carrier as the most famous “Big I” was the Essex class warrior flattop that served in WWII and Vietnam as well as provided service during the Space Race and has been a massive recruiting tool for the Navy in New York harbor for the past 50 years.

And I’m not getting into the rampant progressive politics of the John Lewis–class replenishment oilers, whose namesakes in almost all cases never served in the military and would probably be better remembered on postal stamps and the names of federal buildings. Oilers should be named for rivers, as they were for generations. These ships will be manned by overworked and underappreciated civilian mariners (CIVMARs) of which the MSC is in short supply, not budding law clerks and doe-eyed social activists. Heck, John Lewis got out of the peacetime (1961) draft claiming conscientious objector status!

And, hopefully, that’s the last time I will have to drag out this soapbox.