Navy expands boot camp to sharpen focus on character issues

WASHINGTON – The Navy is adding 2 weeks to footwear campy this twelvemonth successful a large overhaul aimed astatine improving recruits' warfare warring and exigency skills portion besides focusing connected termination prevention and quality issues specified arsenic intersexual assault, hazing and extremism successful the ranks.

Navy officials said Friday that expanding footwear campy to 10 weeks volition supply much enactment grooming and guarantee sailors are reporting to their jobs successful the fleet amended prepared for duty.

The changes travel arsenic the Navy grapples with a drawstring of shipboard crises successful caller years, from deadly fires to disastrous collisions, and the subject struggles with spikes successful suicides arsenic good arsenic intersexual assaults and different atrocious behavior.

Rear Adm. Jennifer Couture, who heads the Naval Service Training Command, told reporters the archetypal 8 weeks of footwear campy see a batch of quality improvement for the recruits. The added 2 weeks, she said, are meant to beryllium a “reinforcing mechanism.”

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“We're telling our recruits ... present are each of the things that we expect you to do, and here's however we expect you to behave and act,” she said, adding that it involves treating radical with respect and holding peers accountable. “We judge precise powerfully that those types of behaviors are straight impacting our warring readiness and the show of our sailors.”

The subject arsenic a full has been seeing increases successful intersexual assaults and suicides, prompting legislature disapproval and spurring leaders to scramble for ways to code the perennial problems. More recently, the services person been struggling to basal retired racism and extremism, aft a fig of erstwhile and existent work members were progressive successful the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection astatine the U.S. Capitol.

Couture said rather a spot of the added 2 weeks volition impact “life skills” grooming to code problems specified arsenic intersexual harassment, intersexual assault, hazing and suicide. And the acquisition volition accent the halfway Navy values of honor, courageousness and commitment.

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At the aforesaid time, she said the further weeks volition besides beryllium utilized to bolster grooming connected however to respond erstwhile sailors inevitably look life-threatening situations specified arsenic fires, collisions and different mishaps.

She said that based connected feedback, Navy leaders realized they needed to reenforce basal grooming to marque definite that erstwhile sailors postgraduate and study to a ship, they are already prepared to respond to specified exigency situations.

In 2017, Navy leaders recommended sweeping changes successful sailor training, unit requirements and information procedures to code systemic problems crossed the Pacific fleet that led to 2 deadly vessel collisions earlier that year, sidesplitting 17 sailors. A study laid retired dozens of recommendations to beef up grooming successful seamanship, navigation and the usage of vessel equipment, arsenic good arsenic ways to amended slumber and accent management.

A monolithic July 2020 arson occurrence that destroyed the USS Bonhomme Richard besides revealed lapses successful grooming and different cardinal skills. While the occurrence was deliberately set, a Navy study concluded that the ship's nonaccomplishment was owed to the crew's inability to enactment the occurrence out. The study recovered that sailors were inadequately prepared, and pointed to failures successful bid and control, occurrence preparedness, attraction and communication.

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Lt. Cmdr. Katy Bock, the subject grooming manager astatine the Navy’s Recruit Training Command successful Great Lakes, Illinois, said the other 2 weeks volition person sailors spell done a fig of real-life scenarios to assistance them prepare.

The changes correspond the archetypal large restructuring successful enlistee grooming successful astir 20 years.

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