WHAT YOU ALWAYS WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT NAVAL TRADITION (BUT WERE AFRAID TO ASK) TABLE OF CONTENTS FOREWORD 5 ABOUT THE AUTHOR 6 CHAPTER 1 - INTRODUCTION 7 General Why Should I Bother Reading This? CHAPTER 2 - NAVAL HISTORY, TRADITIONS AND CEREMONIES 11 General Battle of the Atlantic Sunday Toasts of the Day The Loyal (or Royal) Toast Clinking Glasses Passing the Port Funerals/Burials Military Funerals Hand Saluting Saluting Other Ships Gun Salutes Manning and Cheering Ship The Wearing of Caps Half Masting Launching and Naming Ships Warship Names The Prefix “Her Majesty’s Canadian Ship” The Officer’s Commission Paying Off Pennant Grog and Splice the Mainbrace Crossing the Line The Ship’s Bell The Ship’s Badge, Colours and Motto Battle Honours Individual Medals and Awards Weddings Whistling in Ships Piping Naval Punishments Christmas Dinner On Board Ship Miscellaneous 1/125 CHAPTER 3 – OPERATIONAL ISSUES AND DEPLOYMENTS 33 Pilots (The Maritime Kind) Tugs Fog Boats Cars Replenishment at Sea Stupid Time Foreign Affairs Other Government Departments CHAPTER 4 – NAVAL TERMINOLOGY 42 Introduction Some Maritime Expressions CHAPTER 5 – WHAT IT MEANS TO BE AN OFFICER 52 Introduction Loyalty Courage Integrity Responsibility Perspective Innovation and Imagination Inspiration and Motivation Polish Instinct A Final Thought CHAPTER 6 – SOCIAL AND WARDROOM LIFE 63 Wardroom Life Dress Behavior in Other Messes Chiefs’ and Petty Officers’ Messes The Junior Rates’ Mess Cocktail Parties and Receptions Mess Bills The Mess Dinner CHAPTER 7 – PERSONNEL ISSUES 69 Performance Assessment Calls Canadian Diplomatic Representatives Staff Jobs The Care and Feeding of Task Group Staffs The Divisional System Senior Officers Junior Officers Senior Non-Commissioned Members 2/125 Junior Non-Commissioned Members Breaking Bad News Deployment Preparations Mixed Gender Issues Making That Difficult Decision Honest Mistakes CHAPTER 8 – ADMINISTRATION 85 A Necessary Evil E-Mail More on E-Mail Public Affairs Dealing With the Public The Joining Letter Boards of Enquiry and Summary Investigations Ship’s Tours CHAPTER 9 – AIDES DE CAMP AND FLAG LIEUTENANTS 92 Introduction Standing Out Work Schedule Use of Rank and Position Travel Away and Visits In Personal Duties Relationship with the Staff Equipment Personal Relationship A Final Thought CHAPTER 10 – THE NAVAL MESS DINNER 100 Introducing a Speaker Thanking a Speaker Preparing for a Mess Dinner Conducting a Mess Dinner A Final Thought CHAPTER 11 – ON ASPIRING TO COMMAND 109 The Commanding Officer The Others More on Risk Management Strategic Thinking Loyalty Motivation Voices in the Night A Sobering Story CHAPTER 12 – CONCLUSION 117 A Voice from the Past 3/125 A Final Thought CHAPTER 13 – REFERENCE MATERIAL 119 “Heart of Oak” The Naval Hymn The Naval Prayer The Blessing of the Ship/Ship’s Company Prayer for the Fleet “The Laws of the Navy” 4/125 FOREWORD This project enjoys my full and enthusiastic support. Like many Canadian naval professionals, I have seen, and lamented, the gradual erosion of some of our more traditional practices as we have in recent years narrowed our focus more to the demands of operations. Certainly, except for wartime, these demands are more immediate and more crucial today than at virtually any point in the almost one hundred-year history of our Navy. But the two areas – operations and tradition - are not incompatible or mutually exclusive. Indeed, tradition underpins and reinforces operations in meaningful and necessary ways, at the same time that operational requirements draw inspiration and purpose from historical events. As the author of the following document, retired Captain (N) R.G. Allen, states, it helps us to know who we are and where we come from. This must be understood in order to know better where we are going, and how we wish to get there. This link with the past builds pride, strengthens morale and hones professionalism. While training courses give us the warfare skills we need, an informal document like this can help connect us to our history, and aid us in achieving a fundamental understanding of our profession. It can help explain what it means to be a mariner and a sailor. I am indebted to Captain (N) (Ret’d) Allen for his effort in producing such an excellent and readable explanation of some of our traditions and naval ethos. As the centennial of the Canadian Navy looms on the horizon, I encourage you all to read this publication closely. It paints a picture of the origins of our service and examines some of its subsequent history. But woven among the definitions, explanations and anecdotes are some valuable lessons for today – lessons that we must learn and remember in order to preserve the essence of what it is to be a navy – our Canadian Navy as a critical element of our professional and capable Canadian Forces. No initial effort in such a broad and important area could ever be complete; I encourage suggestions for additions and improvements to this document. A.B. Donaldson Commander Commodore 5/125 ABOUT THE AUTHOR Captain (Navy) Robert (Bob) Allen, a prairie boy from Saskatchewan, joined the Royal Canadian Navy in 1967. He retired to Victoria, British Columbia, thirty-six years later. In between, he divided his career equally between the West Coast, the East Coast and Ottawa. In Esquimalt, he held appointments as Executive Officer of GATINEAU and as the last Commander of Maritime Operations Group Two. In Halifax, he was honoured to serve as Commanding Officer of GATINEAU for one and a half years. This was clearly the highlight of his career. With the Canadian Patrol Frigates not yet operational, a few “steamers” carried the full load of taskings. These included establishing United Nations-mandated sanctions in the Adriatic off the former Yugoslavia, and off Haiti. At NDHQ, he occupied several policy positions. While usually dealing with Asia Pacific issues, he was also intimately involved with the policy aspects of the First Gulf War. His last five years of service were in the United States. He spent three years as the Deputy Chief of Staff to the Commander Striking Fleet Atlantic, and two years in the Headquarters of the Supreme Allied Commander Atlantic. 6/125 CHAPTER 1 - INTRODUCTION GENERAL There are three things - and only three - that are inevitable in this world. There is death, there is tax, and there is the fact that from time to time, senior naval officers and Chief Petty Officers will lament the erosion of naval ethos among more junior officers and NCMs. This has, without doubt, been going on ever since the second (and hence junior) man pushed off into a lake astride a log. That this phenomenon recurs at regular intervals is no reason to dismiss it, for those who are concerned about this decline are serious, and sincerely want to impart the importance of understanding who we in the Navy are, and how we got here. The world changes constantly and we should and must change with it. That does not mean that we need to abandon that anchor, that connection, to our past that makes us, those who go down to the sea in ships, unique. This volume is intended to address some of the areas that are thought to need attention. Some will seem fairly trivial, while others are of much more import. This effort cannot, clearly, be comprehensive, and it does not purport to be. It can only scratch the surface by selecting targets that are either close to the heart of the author, or topical because of some recent headline or scandal, or perennially on the list because constant reinforcement is necessary to ensure understanding. A glance at the table of contents will confirm the random nature of this examination. Many important topics are covered well elsewhere, so this present effort will not attempt to collate or regurgitate them. Instead, this document should be seen simply as helpful hints from those who have gone before. This pamphlet is aimed particularly at he (and now, she) who in a few years will become an Executive Officer of a frigate or MCDV (Maritime Coastal Defence Vessel). That is, the targeted audience will primarily be senior Lieutenants and junior Lieutenant- Commanders in Department Head positions. Put another way, these lessons are intended for that group of officers (and indeed NCMs) that is transitioning from a situation where they manage and administer, to one where they will supervise and direct. They are at that point of their careers where a wider view is necessary, where the interests of the whole ship, and not just one’s own department, have to be considered. They are approaching that point where they will be judged not by what they do, but by what they inspire others to do. Obviously, given the primary target audience defined above, the subjects covered here will be of interest to a much wider group. Those more junior people aspiring to these responsible jobs will also want to heed these lessons for the purposes of education and preparation. It should also be clearly understood that the observations contained here are not applicable only to officers, because we today serve in a navy where, thankfully and inevitably, both senior and more junior NCMs are being asked (and expected) to do much more than ever before. Some hints are directed specifically at one rank group or the other, but many are of very general interest. 7/125 If you are potentially in line to be entrusted with an appointment as XO, you have to prepare yourself, both so you can do the job well, and more immediately, so you can convince somebody “up there” that you should be selected for it. There was a time, not that long ago, when the Canadian Navy seemed to steam around our coasts in largely obsolescent vessels doing training and little else. That training was fairly sound given the severe limitations of the equipment. We could do man overboard drills more quickly and effectively than anyone. Everyone tried hard, and meant well, but there was always that suspicion that we were somehow the second team. There existed the view that we were somehow deficient where warfare issues were concerned. That is no longer true. Today, our ships are modern and capable, and our sailors among the best trained in the world. We participate in important, international operations – individually on occasion, but usually as part of a larger coalition – and we hold our own. Indeed, we shine. We have expertise, widely recognized, in warfare areas that we only dreamed about before about 1990. Events around the time of the First Gulf War impacted our navy significantly, and the curves of our operational commitments and naval skills have been upward ever since. This strong operational focus is a good thing in every sense. It builds pride, and purpose, and professional capability. But, it is not the whole story. It is possible to focus too narrowly on the demands of the warfare disciplines to the exclusion of those basics that hold the navy together, and make us, collectively, “different”. And let there be no mistake, “different” is what we are, and must be. Naval service is a calling like no other, and the navy is a unique mistress. To truly be a part of this, to be a player rather than a passenger, it is not enough to “attend” from 0800 until 1600. In some ways like marriage, the commitment must be absolute if the task is to be properly accomplished. Part of that commitment is understanding, and being true to, the essence of the service. That means having respect for the age-old traditions, but it also means learning from the past and adapting its lessons to the challenges of today’s world. It does not mean a slavish following of outmoded customs, but it does involve a recognition of, and respect for, those fundamental underpinnings of our craft that make naval service so different, and so rewarding. Hence the motivation for the production of this collection of thoughts. WHY SHOULD I BOTHER READING THIS? There are four main reasons why the target audience, loosely identified above, should read the following pages. First, our mothers were usually right! They used to tell us that fruits and vegetables were good for us. Science has now reduced every food to its constituent molecules, and examined the benefit (or otherwise) of each in exhaustive detail. Diets catering to every nuance of the spectrum have come and gone. Foods that were declared essential a few short years ago, have now been found to be carcinogens, while past dangers have latterly yielded un-imagined dietary benefit. All that coffee just might be good for us. At the end of the day, despite all the transient health trends and the intense endeavours of 8/125 nutritional science, it seems clear that our mothers were right all the time. Eat your veggies! Second, a wise man once observed that if common sense were so common, everyone would have some. The implication was clearly that many of us seem not to have received our fair share. Third, some people insist on seeing the glass as half-full; some, half-empty. Meanwhile, the average engineer is of the view that the glass was built twice as big as it had to be. Fourth, re-inventing the wheel is time-consuming, wasteful, and very likely to arrive at the same conclusion in the end. To make every error yourself, sometimes more than once, but learn nothing in the process, is criminal. To make most errors, but only once, and profit from the experience, is laudable, but painful. By far the easiest way to achieve true wisdom is to let the guy in front of you in the line make the mistake, then profit from his misfortune. So, to summarize these four reasons in more understandable terms: a. those with gray hair (or no hair) often know what they are talking about; b. it is incredibly easy to read something and say, “I knew that”. Demonstrating knowledge up front, without the benefit of hind-sight, is more revealing; c. what seems obvious to one person might well be counter-intuitive to his best mate. Perspectives differ, and you can learn much from understanding the other guy’s or gal’s point of view even if you don’t agree with it; and d. the lessons recorded here were often learned the hard way. These are often the most valuable lessons. Remembering the target audience, the following chapters will try to provide some advice on the care and feeding of three groups: Commanding Officers, Junior Officers, and ship’s companies. As has been stated, this volume cannot be comprehensive. Still, the randomness and selectivity of the chosen topics might lead to head scratching. There will be items of import that have been missed altogether, and these should be flagged for future attention. Similarly, some obscure topics will seemingly be examined ad nauseum because of the author’s predilections. This effort should very much be seen as an adjunct to, and not a substitution for, other publications - both official and un-official. It is what it is. The text is sprinkled with short stories and pithy observations in italics. While the connection to the surrounding paragraphs might sometimes be obscure and difficult to fathom, the intent is only to illustrate or reinforce. 9/125 The author accepts full responsibility for any lies told, lines stolen or reputations defamed. No apology is made for the quality (or otherwise) of my memory. Robert G. Allen Captain (N) (Retired) 10/125