When Congress established that position, it was clearly understood that the Chief of Naval Operations – the Navy’s highest-ranking military officer – was subordinate to the Secretary of the Navy, and that his job was to prepare the Fleet and keep it ready for war. He could give recommendations on the shipbuilding program, but not make the decisions. He did not control the technical bureaus which were concerned with ship design and construction; the chiefs of these bureaus reported directly to the Secretary.
The Navy was divided into what was called a bilinear organization. One line of authority and responsibility, that for operational matters, extended from the Secretary to the Chief of Naval Operations. The other line extended from the Secretary to the chiefs of the bureaus. Ship design and construction were handled by the Chief of the Bureau of Ships who reported directly to the Secretary. Occasionally a Chief of Naval Operations attempted to expand his power over the bureaus. Admiral King tried to do so during World War II. President Franklin D. Roosevelt at once saw the issue. Roosevelt was no novice in naval affairs. He had been Assistant Secretary of the Navy from 1913 to 1920 – not only a long period of time, but also during the years of World War I. The President gave as his reason for opposing King that:
“We ought not to have all the administrative problems of personnel and material, shore establishments, production, etc., go up through the Chief of Naval Operations. When you come down to it, the real function of the Chief of Naval Operations is primarily naval operations — no human being can take on all the responsibilities of getting the Navy ready to fight. He should know all about the state of that readiness, and direct the efforts of it… If they are not ready to fight, or are slow in getting ready, it is his function to raise hell about it. Details of getting ready to fight ought not to bother him.”
And, mind you, this was said when the Navy had not yet reached a fraction of the technical complexity it has today. Roosevelt clearly understood the distinction between the role of the line officer and that of the technical officer. Unfortunately, some of the policy makers who came later did not.
That was a 1974 speech from Admiral Rickover, “The role of engineering in the Navy.” HT: Rob.
The Navy is better than the other services in this respect as they have Engineering Duty Officers running their shipbuilding programs. But I think one of the interesting points here is Roosevelt’s comment that no one person can be responsible for getting the fleet ready to fight — R&D, shipbuilding, acquisition, sustainment, etc. It’s simply too big and complex of a job.
Asking the CNO to take responsibility for all of the technical bureaus is like asking an NFL coach to run the end-to-end operations of managing the stadium, ticket sales, videography and content delivery, procurement of equipment, food services, etc. And this problem is compounded because even more than in the 1970s, the services are technology driven organizations, creating an informational problem.
The CNO used to be one player in a multi-organizational system that decided on weapon systems. The General Board of the Navy coordinated activities with input from the CNO, the bureaus, the chief of naval intelligence, and the navy war college. There was probably some wisdom to having separate lines of authority in line and technical officers with processes for mutual coordination. The CNO’s staff has grown as it has taken on new functions, particularly after McNamara, as Rickover reported:
The staff of the Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) has grown in recent years, until it now includes 65 admirals. This is about twice as many as were assigned to Fleet Admiral King’s staff at the height of World War II. In addition, the CNO staff has more than 300 captains in comparison to only 187 billets for captains to command all ships and squadrons at sea. There are also over 320 commanders on the CNO staff, as well as many senior civilians and lower-ranking officers. These staff officers get involved in technical matters for which they have no qualifications.
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