Update: One of the best videos.
By now you know that either Acting Navy Secretary Thomas Modly and/or the Secretary of Defense Mark Esper or even the President fired the captain of the aircraft carrier of the USN Theodore Roosevelt for going public with the Covid-19 outbreak on his ship.
We don’t know whether this was Modly’s decision alone, whether it came from Esper, from someone higher up in the White House or from Trump himself.
To summarize:
Videos of his sendoff have been posted on Twitter and shown on TV (at least on MSNBC).
Be sure to turn up the sound here:
Here’s how the story was covered on Stars and Stripes (with videos):
Trump was asked about this in yesterday’s briefing and from his response it appears to me that he is weighing the political consequences of various courses of action.
It would seem that Acting Navy Secretary Thomas Modly is doing what he fired Capt. Crozier for, ie., making a major decision without going up his chain of command but we don’t even know how true this is. Perhaps he is protecting his boss, Mark Esper who made the decision.
Who the hell knows if someone made this decision at the lower level or whether it began with Trump and worked its way down the food chain?
This is from NBC News:
Speaking at a news conference Thursday evening, Acting Navy Secretary Thomas Modly said Crozier was removed from his post because he sent the letter over "non-secure unclassified email" to a "broad array of people" rather than up the chain of command.
"I have no doubt in my mind that Captain Crozier did what he thought was in the best interest of the safety and well-being of his crew," Modly said. "Unfortunately, it did the opposite. It unnecessarily raised the alarm of the families of our sailors and Marines with no plans to address those concerns."
They range through doing nothing (unlike given the publicity) through reinstating Capt. Crozier to this plus firing Mark Esper. From NBC News
Here’s just one typical tweet about the firing:
According to the Washington Post
Modly said the decision to remove Crozier was his, and that he received no pressure from the White House on the issue. He said that he notified Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper of his plan on Wednesday afternoon and that Esper indicated he would support him.
The Navy’s top officer, Adm. Michael Gilday, stood alongside the acting secretary as he made the announcement. Gilday said he has called for an investigation across all naval forces in the Pacific to examine the issue.
This is from the website Defense One:
John Kirby, a retired rear admiral who served as the State Department’s head spokesman from 2015 to 2017, tweeted, ”I understand the ‘trust & confidence’ argument. It’s sacrosanct in the Navy. But based on justification put forth by acting SECNAVfor why he lost trust & confidence in the TR CO, hard to see it as anything other than an over-reaction & unwarranted at a vital time for the ship.”
Said Lapan,* “There are so many flaws in how the Navy is explaining this that it’s causing people to question what the real reasons are.”
Of Modly’s suggestion that Crozier should have contacted him directly, Lapan said it directly contradicts the secretary’s reasoning for the firing.
“You’re the acting secretary of the navy. You’re going to suggest an O-6 ship captain coming directly to you is not going outside the chain of command? Everyone above that O-6 would have been furious,” said Lapan.
*David Lapan is a retired Marine Corps colonel who served as the top spokesman for the Pentagon, Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Marine Corps.
There are so many aspects to consider when speculating on who actually made the decision to do this, whether Trump knew in advance, what the end result of this will be, etc. I could only put one on the poll. Add your own in the comments.