WEBB: This is late '95. A point paper sent to the admirals in the Navy, talking about post-command commanders. These are people who already had a command in naval aviation. These are the cream. It takes you 15 years to get selected for a command, and these are the people who make your admirals. Projected shortages of post-command commanders has been documented. It's my estimate that the number of available post-command commanders will be insufficient to fill valid sea duty billets in second quarter fiscal '96. We've made band-aid fixes to the problem, but the train wreck is now unavoidable. We can no longer fill our sea requirements. If every post-command commanders just completing his command tour went to a sea duty billet, we still would not have enough. The number of resignations from CO's in command is on the rise. It is rare that a special mission command CO accepts orders following his command tour. Fleet CO resignations are on the rise also. Requests for retirement should be forward to us 6-9 months prior to the requested date, but most are received inside of 6 months. The above numbers will change for the worse as PR ... get closer. And there are lists of some pretty serious numbers.

That's one of two documents which I received on that point. So the Navy-- I don't want to get in an argument with respect to numbers on this. When you're talking statistics, numbers can be variable, depending on how you want to use them. But this came from two different sources.

Q: And if these people are leaving the Navy, how do we know it's this and not downsizing, this and not corollary effects of a volunteer service?

WEBB: I would say that if I were Secretary of the Navy and we were losing people who had been selected for command who were the cream, then I would be concerned. And I would imagine that they are concerned. And I would hope that they've already taken actions which would attempt to turn that around. But the biggest thing that they have to do is to articulate from the top of the leadership what it means to be a Naval officer, and where the jurisdiction of the civilian process, particularly the Congress, should cease.

Q: I wonder if you don't ever sometimes feel like the original messenger? Like Cassandra, that your message is heard over and over and over, but not heeded.

WEBB: I have no desire to spend my life speaking about problems that can't be resolved. I have an obligation to at certain times, articulate what I see as areas in the United States military that need to be addressed or fixed or defended. So it's not up to me. I haven't been in the Pentagon five times since I left as Secretary of the Navy. This isn't where I really spend most of my time right now. But the most important thing that needs to happen, that hasn't happened for two decades, is that the uniformed leaders of the military have to articulate these issues themselves, or it doesn't do the kind of good that it needs to do.

And I think it's very important to say that this is not simply a Navy problem. The Navy's issues became magnified because of all of the mis-steps after Tailhook. All of the services, to some degree or another, struggle with these cultural issues. The Navy is the most visible because of the after-effects of Tailhook and the failure of the Navy leadership to deal with, particularly the Senate.

Q: But do you agree that the Navy seems less apt as accommodating itself to that?

WEBB: My personal view is that the Navy's public affairs apparatus and certain of the people at the very top have exacerbated a lot of situations that would have been much more easily dealt with if they had taken a different approach. But again, what has to happen now is, the uniformed leadership of the Navy has to defend its own culture.