The former Captain in charge of the Theodore Roosevelt who was relieved has become something of a folk hero on social media:
A cheering and applauding crowd of sailors aboard the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt wished farewell to their captain, whom the Navy relieved of command after he raised concerns about the spreading coronavirus on his ship in a letter that was leaked to the media.
Hundreds were pictured in the gathering in the ship’s hangar deck and many chanted Capt. Brett Crozier’s name in multiple videos posted to social media.
A video posted Friday to the Facebook page of Michael Washington included the hashtags #MYCO and #WEARETRSTRONG.
“That’s how you send out one of the greatest captains you ever had,” someone says in the video, then using an acronym for greatest of all time, adds: “The GOAT, the man for the people.”
Crozier was dismissed Thursday due to a loss of confidence in his ability to command and for not using his chain of command to make service leaders aware of his concerns about the virus outbreak that had infected more than 100 sailors on the ship, acting Navy Secretary Thomas Modly said at the Pentagon.
Stars & Stripes
When I first heard about this story I thought initially he got screwed, but unlike social media I actually will go and read more source documents about what happened.
The memo that was leaked is posted on the San Francisco Chronicle website and the first thing I thought while reading the letter is why wasn’t this sent over a SIPR computer which classified information should be sent? The letter was filled with information about the operational readiness of the ship. Sending the message over a classified network would have avoided this whole mess.
Secondly, here is the part of the San Francisco Chronicle article that was buried that no one is talking about; why was the crew allowed to go on shore leave in Vietnam?:
Gilday told reporters last week it was unclear if sailors became infected following the ship’s previous port of call in early March to Da Nang, Vietnam. Gilday said they debated whether to go on with the Vietnam visit, but at the time there were only 16 coronavirus cases in northern Vietnam and the port was in the central part of the country.
Sailors were screened prior to returning on board. The first three sailors tested positive 15 days after leaving Vietnam, officials said.
San Francisco Chronicle
I read that 16 infected number and instantly did not believe it because it is coming from a regime, just like the Chinese, that can easily suppress information. Vietnam likely has a far larger coronavirus problem that they don’t want the outside world to know about. It seems to me this was a very bad decision to have a port call in a country right next door to the coronavirus epicenter.
Lastly for people that have been to Naval Base Guam, this is not a huge base with a lot of open accommodations for 5,000 people on an aircraft carrier that just showed up. The only place to house that many people in rooms that can be quarantined would be in resort hotels in Tumon. Think of Tumon as the mini-Waikiki of Guam, outside of the military Tumon is the economic engine of Guam with its tourist industry.
How many resort hotels you think were eager to fill their business with sailors possibly infected with coronavirus? Plus how many residents of Guam wanted these sailors in the community when they see photos like this of sailors congregating on the beach in defiance of orders put out by the local government to practice social distancing:
Getting this many sailors into resort hotels was going to take Navy leaders time to make happen with the local government and hotel owners:
Moving sailors out of Naval Base Guam into hotels was criticized by Sen. Sabina Perez and community groups.
Eight community groups said in a statement: “The decision to house them in the middle of our community is playing a game of chance with the health of our people.”
Pacific Daily News
This was not going to be something easily done especially when you take in consideration the sensitivities the people of Guam have of past colonization. The Navy was going to have to work carefully with Guam’s political leadership to make this happen and all indications are they did:
When the vessel docked, there were no beds and now, a week later, there are almost 3,000 beds for the crew, Modly told reporters at a press briefing. Creating available space for the sailors happened in a week, he said.
“That’s not because of this letter,” Modly said, referring to Crozier’s letter. “That’s because of stuff going on well before the letter was sent.”
Modly added the letter was sent via email and copied to 20 or 30 other people. The letter created the perception the Navy wasn’t on the job and created a degree of panic, he said.
It seems like people on social media are looking for a COVID-19 hero of some kind, but Captain Crozier in my opinion is not it. If people want some COVID-19 heroes here are the people that get my vote.
