While the Chinese military is preparing for war, the United States is becoming more woke.
As a result, if hostilities were to break out between the two countries, the U.S. military could find itself outnumbered, outgunned, and unprepared to meet its Chinese counterpart. This is particularly true of the U.S. Navy’s surface fleet.
Those were the findings in a report jointly commissioned by four Republican lawmakers: Sen. Tom Cotton representing Arkansas, and Reps. Dan Crenshaw of Texas, Mike Gallagher of Wisconsin, and Jim Banks of Indiana.
Several collisions at sea involving U.S. Navy warships in the Pacific prompted the report, as well as other recent Naval disasters, including the burning of the USS Bonhomme Richard in San Diego.
The blockbuster report, prepared by Marine Lt. Gen. Robert Schmidle and Navy Rear Adm. Mark Montgomery, both retired, indicated that “finding and sinking enemy fleets should be the principal purpose of a Navy.”
But instead, “many sailors found their leadership distracted, captive to bureaucratic excess, and rewarded for the successful execution of administrative functions rather than their skills as a warfighter.”
Meanwhile, Chinese President Xi Jinping announced Friday that China should begin preparing for military conflict, stating, “We must persist in strengthening the overall planning of war and make preparations for military struggle.”
Xi suggested earlier that China’s enemies will “have their heads cracked and bleeding.”
U.S. Navy Intelligence officer (ret.) J.E. Dyer reviewed the report and told Newsmax that not all of the issues they referenced are new.
“While some of the concerns in the Schmidle-Montgomery report have been perennial issues for the Navy, others stand out as critical at a time when China has enlarged and modernized its fleet significantly and Russia is putting emphasis on unprecedented maritime training profiles and high-capacity weapons,” said Dyer, who has written extensively on issues of national security and military preparedness.
The report’s findings were based on “long-form” interviews of 77 active-duty and retired sailors throughout the ranks, including 10 females.
One interviewee, an active-duty black female lieutenant, said she was troubled over the military’s new emphasis on diversity training.
“Sometimes I think we care more about whether we have enough diversity officers than if we’ll survive a fight with the Chinese navy,” the unnamed officer said. “It’s criminal. They think my only value is as a black woman. But you cut our ship open with a missile and we’ll all bleed the same color.”
The military’s new emphasis on “wokeness” comes from the very highest levels and is invading all service branches.
When Army Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, appeared before the House Armed Services Committee on June 23, he defended military training in the controversial critical race theory.
“I want to understand white rage and I’m white,” he told the committee members. He then tied “white rage” to the January 6 Capitol riot, which he described as “thousands of people [who] assault[ed] this building and [tried] to overturn the Constitution of the United States of America.”
Retired two-star Marine Corps Gen. Arnold Punaro argued that China’s growing military and America’s lack of readiness places the U.S. at a disadvantage.
“We need to wake up and start moving,” he said Thursday. “China is on the march and our military needs to basically rebuild.”
Despite remarks like that and the report’s conclusions, Dyer was optimistic, because it provided a roadmap to reverse this trend.
“All of the report’s recommendations are excellent,” said Dyer, whose analyses have appeared in Commentary’s Contentions, Patheos, The Daily Caller, The Jewish Press, and The Weekly Standard.
“I would emphasize Number 4 here, developing a warfighting course with ‘a combat focus on the integration of surface naval capabilities to achieve strategic end states,’ because that’s where unity of purpose as a Navy begins. It’s what the Navy exists for: fighting for, on, and from the sea.”
But it’s not just training that the Navy is lagging in — it’s also the fleet itself.
The Navy Times reported recently that the Chinese People’s Liberation Navy fleet as of the close of 2020, consisted of 360 battle force ships, according to Naval Intelligence estimates. The U.S. Naval fleet was just 82% of that number — 297.
In summing up the report, Dyer offered this advice:
“Give the fleet a reason to reprioritize. Develop that warfighting focus, make it tangible and executable, and that will go a long way to resetting priorities for the fleet’s always-overburdened time,” Dyer said.
Government’s most basic function is to protect its citizens. Stressing racial quotas over readiness and qualifications won’t do it. Neither will emphasizing critical race theory over military theory.
And President Biden’s reputation for being soft on China doesn’t help either.
If we’re going to make America safe again and strong again, we need to wake up and make America less woke again.
Michael Dorstewitz is a retired lawyer and has been a frequent contributor to BizPac Review and Liberty Unyielding. He is also a former U.S. Merchant Marine officer and an enthusiastic Second Amendment supporter, who can often be found honing his skills at the range. Read Dorstewitz's Reports — More Here