Adm. Lisa Franchetti, the Navyās No. 2 officer, has been leading the service on an acting basis because of the impasse.
President Joe Bidenās nominee to be the Navyās top officer, Adm. Lisa Franchetti, said it could take the service years to recover from the impacts of Sen. Tommy Tubervilleās blockade of hundreds of senior military promotions.
Franchetti told the Senate Armed Services Committee during her confirmation hearing Thursday that the impasse has created āa lot of uncertaintyā for Navy families.
āJust at the three-star level, it would take about three to four months just to move all the people around,ā Franchetti said. āBut it will take years to recover ā¦ from the promotion delays that we would see.ā
More than 300 general and flag officer nominees have no clear path to confirmation over Tubervilleās objections, which he put in place over his opposition to the Pentagonās policy that reimburses troops who need to travel to seek abortions and other reproductive care. The Pentagon is standing by the policy and Tuberville has vowed to continue his procedural hold, so thereās no end in sight to the standoff.
As the Navyās current No. 2, Franchetti has been doing the top job on a temporary basis since Adm. Mike Gilday retired in August. The Army and Marine Corps are also being led by interim chiefs who are waiting to be confirmed.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), who quizzed Franchetti about the impact of the blockade, said the long-lasting effects create a āpropaganda win for our enemies.ā
āOur military experts project China wants to be able to take Taiwan by 2027, and weāll still be trying to repair the damage inflicted by these holds,ā Warren said.
āThe Republicansā failure to end this blockade makes it clear: they donāt care about our leaders,ā she added. āThey donāt care about the families who have served their country honorably for decades.ā
Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) shot back at Warrenās comments, noting that the blockade would end if Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin simply repealed the abortion travel policy.
āOne person. Secretary Austin, come on, do the right thing,ā Cramer said.
Democrats, whoāve urged GOP leaders to talk Tuberville down from his tactics, estimate that nearly 90 percent of general and flag officers will be impacted by the hold between the over 600 officers requiring confirmation this year and other officers who will have to temporarily cover vacant jobs.
Confirming all the delayed promotions individually isnāt practical and would take hundreds of hours. But Republicans contend Majority Leader Chuck Schumer should at least hold one-off votes on members of the Joint Chiefs. The problem worsens at the beginning of next month, when Joint Chiefs Chair Gen. Mark Milley retires with no Senate-confirmed officer to take his place.
Franchetti also underscored the āuncertaintyā the blockade had created for Navy families, who face delayed moves, issues with school enrollments and other problems.
āOur Navy families are dealing with a lot of uncertainty,ā she said. āI have heard a lot of concerns from our families that they are having difficulty navigating that space right now.ā
I enlisted in 1998 while things were quiet. Clinton got us a nice raise back then. Then 9/11 happened and the military was inundated with right wing āpatriotsā reacting to events and looking to kill uppity brown people. I saw the quality of recruits diminish as the military lowered standards to surge troop strengths to engage in an illegal war. I recently met someone who was in my old unit only a few years ago and I didnāt recognize the Marine Corps he described.
Personally, being ordered to partake in an illegal war in Iraq after having just left Afghanistan in an unresolved state only strengthened my liberal beliefs. Going to other parts of the world and seeing what politicians and superpower governments do to people, and the amount unnecessary pain and suffering that takes place at the hands of ideologues and dogma, should radicalize anybody against fascists and right wing ideology. People who see and experience all that and return even more hateful and bigoted are psychopaths.
I am proud of my service and my conduct in it, even if I donāt agree with the missions I was on. I would do it all again. I loved being a Marine. The only people youāll find me hating are fascists and religious radicals. THATāS who I learned to hate in the military because that is where most human suffering came from.
It surprises some people that Iām a liberal veteran. I tell them that you canāt go through that and see all that and not be a liberal, not if you have a heart and brain.
And to anyone I piss off with this opinion: Youāre just telling on yourself.
I signed up for the US Air Force literally a month before 9/11 happened, and I had to seriously reconsider what I was getting myself into when the Twin Towers fell. What was supposed to be a chill peacetime enlistment ended up being a potential start to WWIII (at least, thatās what we thought when it happened).
I still went through with my enlistment, but I remember going to the MEPS that December and having one guy in my processing group who was joining the US Army. All he would talk about was how he couldnāt wait to be issued his weapon and how many ātowelheadsā he was going to take down. He kept harassing the Marine in charge of our group, asking questions like how soon heād get his weapon (before weāre sent to Basic Training?) and how they tracked confirmed kills (has anyone gotten one before they finished Basic? Do we get to shoot terrorists as part of our training?)
No idea what happened to that dude, but Iām hoping he didnāt make it far in his career.
I donāt know about Army because Iāve always hated how shitty soldiers tended to be. Mouthing off to Sargents and being generally undisciplined pigs. Couldnāt even follow a joint battle plan for a joint patrol and nearly got my convoy wasted by friendly fire. But PRIOR to 9/11 people like you describe wouldnāt have made it through Marine boot camp if they didnāt stop acting like that. I doubt they would have made it through USAF or USN basic/boot either. But armyā¦ yeah, probably went in and got his ass shot off.