U.S. Navy in Review
By Robert Holzer and Dmitry Filipoff
March 2024 Proceedings Vol. 150/3/1,453
As the U.S. Navy confronts a more belligerent People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) operating across the Pacific, it made good progress in 2023 on instilling a new sense of urgency in operations, acquisition, force development, and organizational transformation. While much more needs to be accomplished to get the service on a real war footing, the Navy’s recent achievements should not be dismissed.
At the top, senior Navy civilian and military leaders stepped up their warnings on both the threats posed by the PLAN’s growth trajectory and China’s increasingly reckless operations at sea that challenge long-established norms of Navy leaders speaking clearly and repeatedly about PLAN actions and capabilities. This was long overdue.
“The Navy recognizes that this is a decisive decade—a decade during which command of the seas will determine the balance of power for the rest of this century,” former Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) Admiral Michael Gilday said at his retirement in August. “We are undergoing revolutionary changes in our plans, in our platforms, in capabilities, how we lead and support the men and women of Team Navy.”1
https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/2024/march/us-navy-review
