The nominee to be the next Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) said Thursday that whenever a blanket hold on high level military promotions is lifted it will ultimately take years for the promotion delays to fully recover.
Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R- Ala.) has instituted a blanket hold on upward of 300 military promotions over his objection to a Defense Department policy that reimburses service members that leave the state they are stationed in to receive reproductive healthcare services.
During a Sept. 14 Senate Armed Services Committee confirmation hearing for Vice Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Lisa Franchetti to become the full Chief of Naval Operations, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D- Mass.) argued these holds also impact everyone one to two levels down who cannot move on to spots being vacated as officials are set to be promoted upward.
Warren said the military services told her it can take months or years for the overall promotion system to recover and asked Franchetti how long it will take the Navy’s system to recover from the holds.
“I think just at the three-star level, it would take about three to four months to move all of the people around, but it will take years to recover, if confirmed, for the promotion delays that we would see forward.”
Last week, Secretary of the Navy Carlos Del Toro said on CNN that Tuberville is “playing Russian roulette with the very lives of our service members by denying them the opportunity to have the most experienced combat leaders in those positions to lead them in times of peace and in times of combat.”
Franchetti echoed the overall concerns of not having the right people in the right positions.
“As we look right now as our Navy is facing challenges all around the globe, threats from our adversaries, we want to have the right people with the right level of experience in those positions. And as we continue to not have the confirmed people that we’ve nominated with that experience, we’re going to continue to see an erosion of readiness,” she said.
Warren also asked Franchetti about how the holds are affecting military families.
“I think our Navy families are dealing with a lot of uncertainty. We ask a lot of our families to move, uproot, find new schools, find new jobs for spouses. And I have heard a lot of concerns from our families that they are having difficulty navigating that space right now.”
During a Department of Defense press briefing later in the day, deputy DoD press secretary Sabrina Singh said “her comments are absolutely right.”
“As these promotions continue to get delayed, that pushes back other promotions which is going to cause, you know, others of our senior level officers to consider whether they should retire. And you’re going to really see, potentially, a hollowing out of our military. So this absolutely has hugely consequential impacts for years to come,” she continued.
Singh also confirmed Franchetti was speaking on behalf of the Navy, but the Defense Department “completely agree[s] with that across all the military services.”
President Biden nominated Franchetti to succeed former CNO Adm. Michael Gilday in July (Defense Daily, July 21).
She took over for Gilday in an acting position when he retired last month (Defense Daily, Aug. 14).