{"id":35056,"date":"2020-04-07T08:30:15","date_gmt":"2020-04-07T16:30:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/?p=35056"},"modified":"2020-04-07T08:30:15","modified_gmt":"2020-04-07T16:30:15","slug":"after-crozier-comments-navy-secretary-modly-must-resign","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2020\/04\/07\/after-crozier-comments-navy-secretary-modly-must-resign\/","title":{"rendered":"After Crozier Comments, Navy Secretary Modly Must Resign"},"content":{"rendered":"

Originally appeared at The American Conservative<\/a>.<\/i><\/p>\n

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Acting Secretary of the Navy Thomas Modly just made things much worse for himself and the Navy by delivering an attack on Capt. Crozier in a speech to the crew of the USS Theodore Roosevelt. It will come as no surprise that the contents of the speech have become public<\/a>:<\/p>\n

“It was a betrayal. And I can tell you one other thing: because he did that he put it in the public’s forum and it is now a big controversy in Washington, DC,” Modly said, according to a transcript of remarks Modly made to the crew, copies of which have been provided to CNN by multiple Navy officials.<\/em><\/p>\n

There is a rough transcript of the speech here<\/a>, and both Task & Purpose<\/a> and The San Francisco Chronicle<\/em> obtained an audio recording<\/a> of the speech.<\/p>\n

Modly’s speech was an attempt to justify his unpopular and outrageous decision to remove Crozier from command, and by giving such an inflammatory speech so soon after that decision he showed remarkably poor judgment. The “big controversy” that he complains about just became even bigger. Lecturing the crew about Crozier’s supposed “betrayal” is not going to persuade anyone, and it is bound to stir up even more discontent than there was before. It is deeply insulting to Crozier and his crew to cast the captain’s actions in such derogatory terms. Even if Modly genuinely believes Crozier to have been in the wrong, it is destructive and demoralizing to attack a well-respected officer this way. He was lashing out at the crew as much as Crozier because the crew gave the captain such a rousing sendoff. That’s unacceptable, and it proves that there needs to be someone else in charge of the Department of the Navy.<\/p>\n

Modly’s original decision to relieve Crozier of command was a serious mistake, and this tone-deaf exercise in self-justification compounds the first error. Incredibly, Modly criticized Crozier for being either “too naive” or “stupid” for circulating his letter to maybe 20 people, and then he delivers a speech to a crew of thousands and somehow doesn’t think it was going to leak the minute after he finished. Whatever he hoped to achieve by berating the crew for their devotion to their captain, he has pretty much destroyed whatever credibility he might have still had with them.<\/p>\n

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The calls for Modly’s resignation began as soon as the speech became available:<\/p>\n

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Acting Navy secretary blasts ousted aircraft carrier captain as ‘stupid’ in address to ship’s crew – CNNPolitics. (ACTING SEC NAVY MUST RESIGN. This is the worst judgment by a defense official possible. Terrible signal to sailors.) https:\/\/t.co\/2hrEtcZxAW<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Barry R McCaffrey (@mccaffreyr3) April 6, 2020<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n