Adm. Samuel Paparo is the right choice for chief of naval operations
Tom Rogan
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The current head of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, Adm. Samuel Paparo, should become the next chief of naval operations (the uniformed head of the Navy).
In a fortunate development, as reported by NBC News, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin has recommended to President Joe Biden that he nominate Paparo to lead the Navy. If Biden takes Austin’s advice, it will be at the expense of the presumed front-runner for that role, Vice Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Lisa Franchetti. Biden is yet to make his mind up. NBC hints at why, noting that “the decision to pass over Franchetti the same week that the U.S. military celebrates the 75th anniversary of women joining the armed forces may not sit well with some inside the Pentagon who were advocating for the Joint Chiefs to finally have a female officer.”
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As with the other service branches, the Navy and the nation benefit when the best female personnel can rise up the ranks on merit. Franchetti emphasizes as much. Judged against the nation’s needs, however, it should be a no-brainer that Paparo take over from Adm. Mike Gilday.
It’s China, stupid.
More specifically, it’s the fact that Paparo is an expert on the Navy’s posture, planning, and operations in relation to China. In contrast, Franchetti’s naval experience focuses more on NATO operations.
China must be the ever-increasing priority for the Navy. It is only the People’s Liberation Army, after all, that is churning out highly capable warships in preparation for a war with the United States near Taiwan and the South China Sea. It is only China that has the military scale and political ambition to displace the U.S. from the Pacific and recenter international order in its own solitary favor. It is only China that has spent decades investing in the specific capabilities and strategies needed to defeat the U.S. Navy in war.
Paparo gets this. Widely respected in the Pentagon and by China hands across the Defense Department and the Intelligence Community, Paparo is seen as a smart and effective leader. Viewed as less reflexively aggressive than the current commander of Indo-Pacific Command, Adm. John Aquilino, Paparo might make dialogue with the PLA easier even as he boosts the Navy’s readiness. A naval aviator and graduate of the Navy’s Top Gun school, Paparo knows more than most how difficult a war with China would be.
The next chief of naval operations must figure out how best to answer some very difficult questions.
Questions like how to use a smaller fleet to defeat an enemy that will be fighting, rearming, and repairing on its own doorstep. Questions like how to persuade Congress, including the most China-hawkish members such as Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-WI), to let the Navy have the ships it needs rather than the ships that political donors would prefer it have. Questions like how to employ naval strike aviation even while aircraft carriers face swarms of Dongfeng class anti-ship ballistic missiles operated by redundant satellite systems. Questions like how to maximize long-range missile stocks even as the Biden administration continues to pretend that the U.S. military can be stretched to the breaking point around the world. Questions like how to get Taiwan to wake up from its absurd China-threat slumber.
Yes, the chief of naval operations gets to reside at the palatial Tingey House in Washington’s Navy Yard. Yes, the chief is staffed by a 24/7 team of aides, cooks, and other luxuries. These are luxuries that the top admirals of most Western navies can only dream of. However, this is not an easy time to be the head of the Navy. War is likely coming, and the nation needs leaders who know it and are determined to prepare to win it.
Paparo offers the nation its best bet.