During a Senate Armed Services Hearing on Thursday, Sen. Angus King (I-ME) asked President Trump's nominee to be Naval Operations Chief, Admiral Daryl Caudle about giving advice to the President.
00:00Further, Senator King, you are now recognized.
00:03Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
00:06Admiral, congratulations and thanks to you and your family for your commitment to this country
00:12and for your willingness to step into this very important role.
00:16First, I want to convey some congratulations through you to your mates in the Navy
00:21for the incredible performance of the Navy in the Red Sea.
00:25I have to mention at least one of those vessels was a bath-billed destroyer.
00:30But the performance, I've had multiple briefings, was really extraordinary
00:35and reacted to a difficult situation extremely well.
00:40So if you would please convey the congratulations and thanks of this committee and the Congress
00:45for that bit of bravery, courage, and military technology and manpower.
00:54It was a great effort. Thank you.
00:56Senator, I will pass that.
01:01I also, on a parenthetical, want to thank you and thank the Navy for sending ships to Maine.
01:07And I want to emphasize why that's important.
01:11We were talking about recruiting.
01:13One of the problems in our country today is that we've closed so many bases
01:17that young people don't see people in uniform anymore.
01:20So having a ship at the Rockland Lobster Festival or the Eastport Fourth of July Parade
01:26or I'm sure other parts, other coastal communities in this country
01:30makes a difference in showing the flag, if you will.
01:34And I hope you will continue that practice because, again, I think it fits into the recruiting effort,
01:40but it also just notifies our citizens of the importance of the Navy and what you're able to project.
01:48Well, thank you, Senator.
01:49I completely agree with that.
01:51Thank you for the time we got to spend together.
01:53Thank you for what Maine gives the Navy, from the top at Cutler
01:56and our fixed submarine broadcast site all the way down to the bottom
02:00to the disputed location of Ports of Naval Shipyard.
02:03Aren't you a diplomat?
02:05But thank you, sir.
02:06Senator Shaheen isn't here.
02:08You can say it's in Maine.
02:11Well, I really appreciate that.
02:12Now, one of your important roles as CNO is as a military advisor to the president.
02:19And it's critically important throughout history and at this time as any other time in history
02:25that you be willing to give your best military advice, regardless of the preferences of the president.
02:32This is a famously strong-willed president.
02:35Are you willing to give the president advice he may not want to hear based upon your best military analysis?
02:43Senator, I am absolutely ready to do that.
02:45I think it's an obligation.
02:46I've swore a note to do that.
02:48And if confirmed, I will do that with my utmost ability.
02:51I appreciate that.
02:53You may be tested on that, but that's exactly the attitude.
02:58Otherwise, we're not serving the president well or the country well.
03:02We talked about industrial base.
03:05It was touched upon.
03:06One of the things that's missing and has been missing, and this isn't on your watch, is the 30-year shipbuilding plan.
03:13We always talk about the industrial base.
03:15One of the things the industrial base needs is a consistent demand signal.
03:19Part of that is a 30-year shipbuilding plan that says to the private sector, here are the ships we're planning to build.
03:25Here's the schedule.
03:27Here's what we're looking for in terms of the modern Navy.
03:30I hope that that can be one of the things you attend to on your watch, is producing that overdue 30-year shipbuilding plan.
03:38Well, Senator, I often joke in my office a bit that you can't change a 30-year shipbuilding plan every year.
03:45That's called a one-year shipbuilding plan.
03:46And that's what we've had.
03:47Yes, sir, and so changing year 31 is okay, but not year one.
03:52But, sir, you have my complete commitment on that.
03:55I'm a big fan of multi-year procurement, incremental funding, multi-ship buy, anything that can stabilize our precious private and public shipyard workforce with clear planning demand signal I'm an advocate for.
04:09Well, that's absolutely a very important observation.
04:13And it's, as you say, the consistent demand signal, it allows the shipbuilding community to hire and maintain their workforce.
04:23We can't have troughs in terms of the demand.
04:27You and I talked in my office about the issue of availability.
04:32And my observation has been if Carnival Cruise Line had the same availability level as the U.S. Navy, they'd be out of business.
04:41Now, I know there's a lot more complicated ships, but we can do better than 50% or 60% availability.
04:48I hope you agree.
04:49Sir, I agree.
04:50When I was at Miami Fleet Week, I had the opportunity, when I was there, to meet with the Norwegian Cruise Line executives.
04:56I know we're also working with Carnival.
04:58We need a better approach to how we're doing maintenance.
05:02And learning from the best in the world certainly should be on the table.
05:05So I'm committed to learning from them.
05:07The ship classes are different, of course, but the practices of how they prepare for their availabilities, I think, is right for us to learn from.
05:15Final question, and I'm out of time, but I hope you will pay attention to the subject of directed energy, which I think is a very important capability.
05:24A directed energy shot is a lot cheaper than a $4 million missile.
05:28So the budget, the prior administration, grossly underfunded directed energy.
05:34I hope that's something you will look at carefully and support, because I think that's the future of naval warfare.
05:43Senator, my master's degree from the Naval Postgraduate School back in 1990 through 92 was in directed energy.
05:49My thesis is on high-powered lasers.
05:51I've not seen the Navy do an adequate amount of effort translating the research and development into shipboard use.
05:58We have the one instantiation on Preble.
06:00It's not enough, and I can agree with you that if confirmed, I will make that a priority,
06:05because it is the infinite magazine, if you will, especially against certain targets.
