NAVY LEAGUE NEWS
Sea Services Panel
“What does your Coast Guard do for America? Why is
the next nickel you spend in the Department of
Homeland Security [DHS] or across the broader spectrum
of agencies, why is that nickel well spent with the United
States Coast Guard. We think we’ve got a good story.”
The service is managing to balance recapitalization
and mission demands, Schultz said.
“We’re pretty proud of our overhauling of our acqui-
sitions program,” he said. “We brought a lot of new tal-
ent in, brought intellectual capital in terms of ship-
building expertise and managing those big complex
contracts. The real driver there is stable funding.”
Tokarski noted the connection between the pan-
elists’ respective services, their “fundamental concept
about water … highlighting how domestic waterways,
even from the interior of the country, connect all the
way to Afghanistan, a land-locked country.
“That happens because a maritime nation is able to
project power unlike any other nation in the world. We
do that to support our forces,” he said, noting that 95 percent of the supplies needed by U.S. forces in theater is carried on commercial U.S.-flag ships and then transported
through the Northern Distribution Network, which was
established entirely by commercial industry “using how
DAN REYNOLDS
From the left, Sea Services Panel moderator Robert Sutton; Hanifen; Rear Adm. Thomas H. Copeman III, Navy chief
of Legislative Affairs; Kevin M. Tokarski, the Maritime Administration’s associate administrator for National Security; and
Rear Adm. Karl L. Schultz, Coast Guard director of Government and Public Affairs, discuss the possible implications of
the debt-reduction debate on the sea services Oct. 28.
