Nominating a New Proceedings Editor

If you read this blog and are not a member of the United States Naval Institute, you should be. Don't want to subscribe to Proceedings? Why not? I assure you, right now the answer to that question is important and the Board would like to know, at least I hope they would.

I am a member, not lifetime, but will be for my entire life. I'm still in my current 3 year plan, but my wife knows there are two magazines I will always be a subscriber to, Naval History and Proceedings. Both are important, Naval History is nothing short of fantastic, and we definitely live in a time where the need for Proceedings is evident. This news has generated a lot of email.

The U.S. Naval Institute, the publisher of Proceedings magazine, has fired its well-known editor, author Robert Timberg.

Timberg, a former reporter, spent three years at the helm of Proceedings, a forum for military thinkers for more than a century. He is the author of several books about naval history, including “The Nightingale’s Song” and a biography of Sen. John McCain.

Bob is also a Pulitzer Prize winner, a former Marine whose service cannot be casually dismissed. I'm torn on this issue, and it is frustrating that as a member I end up learning about this from Navy Times rather than from the USNI, as a member an email with an explanation would have been appropriate. Here are some of my thoughts.

Let no one say there hasn't been progress over the last few years, but whether Bob was responsible is unclear. Proceedings is now available in online format, which is important and necessary. This was a clear step forward.

However, the content quality has been mixed, 2007 marked a very low year for the publication, the content was mostly boring and did not reflect the urgency of a nation at war. 2008 was better, but there are some omissions and actions that definitely deserve criticism.

For example, the shoot down of US 193 did not get enough attention. When a warship shoots down a satellite for the first time in history one would think this deserves major discussion in the nations oldest, most prestigious strategic national defense forum. I'm also very unhappy with the quality of fact checking taking place in articles, there is absolutely no excuse whatsoever for so many articles to get the facts wrong in Proceedings. On that point Bob deserves criticism, he contended the inaccuracy of facts would spawn debate. Sorry Bob, members don't want to debate facts, they want to debate ideas that are well grounded using consistent details.

There are two questions in my mind. First, is Proceedings still an independent forum? It is a serious question, it seems we see a lot of emphasis on ideas coming from existing Navy leadership and perhaps not enough emphasis on ideas counter to those of leadership. It is hard to be independent when you are pushing the policy of the status quo.

Second, where is Proceedings going? In the information age, Proceedings is not performing well in its role as the forum for radicals who are pushing the debate of ideas. Hell, I'm not even sure they are even part of the conversation anymore. Consider for a moment who is doing this, blogs maybe, the Small Wars Journal for sure. In fact, if I was on the Board of Directors the very first name I would float as the new editor is Dave Dilegge. He may not want it, but if Proceedings intends to get back to being the place where the folks carry torches and pitchforks for national security issues, someone like Dave is exactly who Proceedings needs right now.

That is about as far as I'm going to carry this conversation, I know many want to express frustration one way or the other, so in the spirit of a Navy culture who cares about these things feel free to leave your rant in the comments. Several USNI Board of Directors are regular readers, they might be interested in what you say.