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A Lesson in Corruption the US Navy Doesn’t Want You to Know About
Why did the surface warfare officer (SWO) navy allow submarine officers authority to grant and receive surface warfare qualifications on surface ships? This practice was common during the 1970/80s. Under current navy instructions, submarine officers (1120 designator) are not eligible. Submarine officers knew seamanship, but that didn’t mean they understood or had any experience in shiphandling. Submarines do not steam in formation with each other, and do not perform tactical maneuvering operations with each other. They do not perform underway refueling, or aircraft operations on their deck. These submarine officers spent their careers on diesel boats that the navy was phasing out in favor of nuclear-powered submarines. They had nowhere else to go for command at sea assignments. What training and experience did these submarine officers receive before being assigned to command navy surface ships? I have an FOIA request pending to find out.
These submarine officers commanded non-combatant surface ships, such as tenders and other vessels (like the USS Point Loma AGDS-2). The idea of granting a surface warfare qualification to anyone on a non-combatant ship made no sense. But don’t ask too many questions. Some of these submarine officers granted surface warfare qualifications to women who were willing to have sexual affairs with them, and some women complied. The fact that they granted qualifications to those women made it easy for the senior submarine officers to avoid sexual harassment/ discrimination charges from other women who refused to engage in sexual affairs. “See, we granted qualifications! We awarded them Navy Commendation Medals! What’s the problem?” The problem on the USS Point Loma was that the submarine chain of command was afraid of scandal, and chose to ignore disciplining sexual misconduct, treating it like it didn’t happen. They were totally afraid of bad publicity, and the consequences of what that meant for the leadership’s reputation. The problem wasn’t just the sexual misconduct. It was tied to the integrity of the warfare qualifications that were issued from this ship. Qualification became more about politics than merit.
The submarine officer corruption was not limited to awarding qualifications to their sexual amours: they awarded SWO qualifications to each other, without testing knowledge. One submarine officer, who was chief of staff to the Commodore, was awarded SWO qualification even though he never served on a surface ship. This same officer told me to my face, “Women are not expected to qualify SWO. It’s just a decoration.” He kept his pin inside his desk, refusing to wear it on his uniform. Same man who evaluated my future in the Navy.
These submarine officers also had the authority to evaluate junior officers assigned to a surface ship for the first time. The USS McKee (AS-41) awarded Officer of the Deck (OOD) and SWO qualification to a woman lieutenant who was legally blind, meaning that she wore thick glasses that could not correct her vision to 20/20. Navy instructions on SWO eligibility state that 20/20 correctible vision is required without exception. This officer admitted that she was allowed to enter the navy with a waiver for her vision. But that waiver was intended for her to serve as a general unrestricted line officer ashore. Later, she volunteered for sea duty when it became available for women. So why did the navy ignore the waiver and assign her to a surface ship as a line officer?
On the USS Point Loma, a recently qualified woman lieutenant was assigned to be senior watch officer, a collateral duty. This woman stated openly that she saw other women SWO candidates as competition and a threat to her advancement in the surface ship community. Evaluating her peers gave her an unfair advantage, and it was a conflict of interest. All of which the Commanding Officer (CO) ignored because he accepted personal (although nonsexual) favors from her. She delayed and denied qualifications with her slander. Neither the CO or XO attended any boards, so they had no firsthand knowledge of how these oral boards were conducted. This lieutenant bitterly resigned from active duty as a lieutenant commander.
This is what I’ve been up against. The navy’s institutional reputation is more important than anyone’s individual career. Anyone who noticed and pointed out what was wrong became the problem, like me; a threat that must be discredited and eliminated. I wasn’t interested in accepting a fake qualification in exchange for moving on to some mediocre career that would end mid-grade, but that is what happened to all the others.
No one in the SWO navy monitored the integrity of THEIR qualification program. One has to wonder why?
THE USS POINT LOMA AND FAKE WARFARE QUALIFICATIONS
This ship was a poor platform for surface warfare officer (SWO) and Enlisted Surface Warfare (ESW) candidates for the following reasons:
- It was a non-combatant ship, meaning it had no weapons systems installed.
- It did not steam in formation with other vessels.
- It had no underway refueling ability.
- It had no flight deck for air operations, while most naval vessels have at least a helicopter pad.
- It never performed tactical maneuvering operations with other surface vessels.
- Its underway schedule was relatively sparse due to the ship’s limited 1980s mission as a support vessel for the submarine force Trident missile testing program. Equipment for this purpose was owned and operated by private contractors. At other times, its mission was to haul deep submergence vehicles where needed.
- There was no organized training for bridge watch standers, who were left on their own to question “qualified” individuals whose own knowledge was hampered by the ship’s limited mission and their own inexperience.
- Standards of knowledge for qualification were never identified. The whole process for evaluating SWO candidates was completely arbitrary and intended to meet political goals.
- Rampant, unaccountable sexual misconduct between senior and junior officers and with crewmembers influenced some of these awards.
- Submarine officers with no previous experience on a surface ship were assigned to command this ship, and to act as Executive Officers. The Navy allowed them to receive SWO qualifications automatically, and to grant qualifications to each other in addition to subordinates. Knowledge of surface warfare was not tested for these submarine officers prior to award.
- No one in the chain of command monitored the integrity of the SWO qualification program, despite Navy instructions requiring it. Case in point: the ship’s commanding officer, CAPT D.J. O’Shea, never attended anyone’s oral boards, and neither did the Executive Officer. Their decisions relied on the opinions of newly qualified, inexperienced junior officers with personal agendas to destroy their competition.
- Any junior line officer with a “qualification” from the USS Point Loma would have been at a disadvantage if assigned to other navy vessels which possessed any of the above capabilities.
NOBODY CARED, BUT WHY NOT?
What is most surprising is that no one in the SWO community cared about the integrity of their own qualification program. They simply allowed the submarine force to corrupt it with not a care in the world. They cannot say they weren’t aware, because my complaints made them aware. It is not a stretch to say that submarine officers, including CAPT O’Shea, did not care either. All the way up the chain, nobody cared. Why? I say no one respected SWO qualifications and SWO officers. Try doing this in the aviation world, or the SEALS, or in Navy Diving, or even the submarine force itself. There is far more scrutiny for their qualifications. It’s interesting that under current navy regulations on SWO qualifications, submarine officers are not eligible for this award. There’s a switch of policy no one has explained.
One explanation for the indifference can be found in the history of the SWO program itself and how it began. Prior to the 1960s, there was no such thing as a SWO qualification. All those great surface warriors like Admirals King, Nimitz, Halsey, didn’t have one. These are the leaders that helped us win WWII. The aviators had their “wings of gold”, and the submariners had their “dolphins”, the SEALS had their “tridents”. But the surface force had nothing but ribbons to pin on their chest. It wasn’t enough. Call it Pin Envy. So, some genius came up with a half-baked qualification program that made it easy to get rid of officers the leadership either didn’t like or didn’t want by making the qualification mandatory for all junior line officers assigned to their first ship. Even after completing SWO school, after the junior line officer is assigned to a ship, he/she must obtain signatures for a laundry list of line-item topics supposedly testing their knowledge along the way to being eligible for an oral board. The signatures are not binding, so they’re useless. The process of getting all those signatures is political, based on whether the candidate is liked or favored by the qualified officer. Even if the junior officer gets all the signatures to be eligible for an oral board, he/she must face several “qualified” officers from the same ship with mixed levels of experience, who may or may not like a candidate for any number of reasons having nothing to do with performance or competence. By this point, I hope you understand that this qualification is not based on merit. However, some officers manage to get SWO qualified on merit despite the setup. I say those are the exceptions.
In recent years, the Navy was forced to change this experience to standardize the qualification program for all line officers serving on all ships. This happened after highly publicized collisions in 2017 that resulted in several fatalities at sea. A combination of inexperience, lack of training, and exhaustion contributed to those catastrophes. It’s a step in the right direction but unclear of its effectiveness at the moment.
Another more obvious explanation is that neither the submarine or the SWO community wants to admit their negligence/dereliction of duty in failing to monitor the integrity of the program on the USS Point Loma. Why is that? I’m glad you asked.
I wasn’t just trying to earn a warfare pin or move up the ranks. I was fighting for a Navy that lived up to its own standards, a Navy where merit mattered, where women could serve without being harassed (sexually or otherwise), and where leadership was held accountable. When people report harassment, discrimination, retaliation, they expect accountability. Powerful institutions will never admit wrongdoing. They fear lawsuits, bad press, financial consequences. So they create another narrative, where the “whistleblower” is the problem, and where the abuse is individual, not systemic. Of course, they do it to protect the institution from any liability. This should be a powerful reminder of why whistleblowers matter – and why they need real protection.
