SIU Vice President Bryan Powell and SIU Political Director Brian Schoeneman recently took part in a high-level conference at the Center for Naval Analyses (CNA) aimed at implementing a national maritime strategy.
The gathering, co-sponsored by the Secretary of the Navy and the Maritime Administration (MARAD), took place May 15-17 in Arlington, Virginia, just outside the nation’s capital. Participants included key maritime stakeholders from labor, government and industry. They teamed up to enhance a collective understanding of what the host organizations described as “complex maritime domain issues,” with a goal of ultimately “offering recommendations on how to employ tools of maritime statecraft in a prioritized fashion to create a more favorable domestic and international maritime environment for advancing America’s maritime power.” (story continues after photo)
At various times during the conference, participants heard from guest speakers; worked together in breakout groups; and participated in open-session discussions.
MARAD last September announced its selection of the CNA “to conduct a study for the purpose of informing a new national maritime strategy. CNA is an independent, nonprofit Federally Funded Research and Development Center (FFRDC) sponsored by the Department of the Navy with expertise in researching sealift needs for national security. This new national maritime strategy will be designed to position the U.S. maritime industry as a global leader for decades to come. Over the next year, CNA will engage with numerous public and private stakeholders in the maritime community to complete the study.”
The agency further noted, “The National Defense Authorization Act of 2023 required MARAD to select an FFRDC to identify the key elements and objectives it needs to develop a U.S. maritime strategy that will revitalize the U.S. merchant marine and our maritime industrial base to meet our Nation’s economic and national security needs. The study is not a strategy, but rather a tool that can be used to provide a comprehensive approach to identifying and prioritizing the elements for a strategy.”
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