Good evening, everyone.

Lou, thank you for that kind introduction.

Congresswoman Kiggans and Congressman Scott – thank you for joining us tonight. Your presence and support are invaluable to our Navy, our Sailors, and the families who call this region home.

To the local government leadership in attendance – thank you for your partnership and for everything you do to support our Sailors, their families, and the installations that are such an important part of this community. The Navy simply could not do what we do without strong communities behind us.

And to the Navy League of Hampton Roads, our industry partners, veterans, community leaders, and friends of our Navy – thank you for having me tonight.

There may be no better place in America to talk about the state of our Navy than Hampton Roads. Because this community doesn't simply support the Navy.

In many ways, Hampton Roads is the Navy.

Our ships are built, maintained, repaired, and deployed from here.

Tens of thousands of Sailors and Navy families call this community home.

And generations of Americans have sailed from these waters to defend our Nation.

So, before I say anything about where our Navy is headed, let me simply say thank you for what this community does every day for our Sailors, their families, and our mission.

A year ago, I had the extraordinary privilege of becoming the 34th Chief of Naval Operations.

When you take this job, people immediately want to know your priorities.

What are you going to change? What programs are you going to start? What will define your tenure?

Those are fair questions.

But I started with a different one: What do I need to learn?

Before I asked the Fleet to change…Before I issued our Fighting Instructions…Before I made decisions affecting hundreds of thousands of Sailors and their families…I needed to listen.

I've served in this Navy for more than four decades. I've commanded at sea. I've led Sailors during peace, crisis, and conflict.

But the view from the CNO's office is different.

You have to see the entire Navy as one warfighting system - from the schoolhouse to the shipyard, to the waterfront, to the Fleet commander - and understand how every decision ultimately affects the Sailor standing the watch.

And you cannot understand that from the Pentagon. So, I got out into the Fleet.

Over the past year, I’ve visited more than 100 commands, traveled more than 70,000 miles, visited ten countries, and held 24 All Hands Calls with thousands of Sailors around the world.

Those weren't inspection trips. And they certainly weren't photo opportunities.

They were “listening sessions.”

Some happened on the bridge of a destroyer. Some happened in cockpits, shipyards, barracks, maintenance spaces, and on mess decks. Some were simply conversations walking down a pier.

And those Sailors taught me more about the state of our Navy than any briefing ever could. They confirmed something I have believed my entire career: Our Sailors are extraordinary.

They are talented, innovative, resilient, and carry an enormous operational load. But they were also candid.

They showed me where bureaucracy was stealing time from leadership.

Where processes had become more important than outcomes. Where maintenance delays were eroding readiness.

And where our own systems were making it harder - not easier - for Sailors to accomplish the mission.

And here's what struck me:

They weren't asking for an easier Navy. They were asking for a better Navy.

A Navy that gets obstacles out of their way and lets them focus on what we actually need them to do: Become the best warfighters in the world.

That's why Sailors First became my number one priority. And I want to be very clear about what that means.

Sailors First is not about making the Navy softer.

Sailors First is about making the Navy more lethal.

Because people generate combat power. Not paperwork. Not bureaucracy. Not organizational charts.

People.

Every submarine on patrol. Every aircraft launched from a carrier. Every destroyer defending the force. Every cyber operation. Every missile fired in combat.

Every successful mission begins with a Sailor who is trained, equipped, ready, and trusted to do the job.

So, we started attacking the friction Sailors identified. More than 6,000 Sailors have moved off ships and into barracks.

We are investing $375 million across 95 housing, barracks, galley, and fitness projects.

We're experimenting with better ways to feed our Sailors – from a completely different galley experience in Gulfport to giving Sailors at Bangor greater flexibility in how they use their meal entitlements.

Some people might hear that and say, “CNO, those don't sound like strategic issues.”

Spend twelve hours standing watch, maintaining a ship, turning aircraft, or operating a nuclear power plant and then tell me that sleep, food, housing, and fitness aren't strategic.

Readiness begins with the Sailor.

But Sailors First goes well beyond quality of life.

It means giving Sailors back their most precious resource: Time.

Every unnecessary form. Every redundant inspection. Every approval that adds no value.

Every hour spent satisfying bureaucracy instead of training, maintaining equipment, developing our people, or preparing to fight – That’s combat power we voluntarily surrendered.

And the same is true of maintenance. Hampton Roads understands that better than almost anywhere.

When maintenance slips, everything slips. Training slips. Deployments slip. Operational availability slips. Families pay the price. And ultimately, combat readiness suffers.

That's why I have spent time in our public and private shipyards – not only here at home, but along the Gulf Coast and overseas in Japan and South Korea.

Not because everyone else has all the answers. But because good ideas don't carry passports.

If someone has figured out a better way to build a ship, repair a ship, manufacture a part, train a Sailor, or move work faster, I want to understand it.

Because our adversaries are doing exactly the same thing. Continuous improvement isn't corporate jargon.

For the United States Navy, continuous improvement is a warfighting imperative.

Remove friction and we create capacity. Create capacity and we generate readiness. Generate readiness and we strengthen deterrence.

And if deterrence fails, readiness gives our Sailors what they need to fight and win.

That last point matters because this has not been a theoretical year for your Navy.

While we have been changing the institution, American Sailors have been operating – and fighting  – around the world.

We supported Operation SOUTHERN SPEAR closer to home.

And during Operation EPIC FURY, our Navy conducted sustained, record-breaking, combat operations in the Middle East.

Think about the scale of what your Sailors accomplished. We brought together naval forces from waterfronts on both coasts.

More than two dozen ships. More than 27,000 Sailors supporting the fight. Carrier strike groups.

Destroyers. Amphibious forces. Submarines.

Logistics ships. Mine warfare forces.

Crewed and uncrewed systems operating together. Different communities. Different homeports. Different platforms.

One Fleet. One Fight.

And when the Nation called – our Sailors delivered.

That experience reinforced something fundamental for me. The Navy cannot wait for war to figure out how it intends to fight. Our Sailors deserve clarity before the shooting starts.

They need to understand our purpose, how we generate combat power, how we command when communications are degraded, how we make decisions at speed, and what I expect when higher headquarters cannot provide immediate direction.

That is why we issued the United States Navy Fighting Instructions and developed the Navy Warfighting Concept.

Together, they answer some very basic questions: Why does America need a Navy?

What do we provide the Nation and Joint Force that nobody else can provide? How do we build combat power? How do we generate it? And most importantly - How do we fight and win?

I describe that system as the Foundry, the Fleet, and the Fight.

The Foundry builds combat power. The Fleet generates combat power. And the Fight employs combat power. They aren't separate initiatives.

They are one integrated warfighting system designed to deliver the United States Navy's differentiated value to the Nation:

Sovereign, persistent, decisive combat power from the sea - anywhere in the world.

But strategy that never reaches a Sailor isn't strategy. It's a PowerPoint presentation. So, we are moving capability into the Fleet. And we are moving it faster.

We are taking unmanned systems out of perpetual experimentation and putting them alongside operational forces.

The Theodore Roosevelt Carrier Strike Group is integrating a medium unmanned surface vessel into strike-group operations.

In the Middle East, unmanned vessels have already operated alongside our forces in a real-world operational environment. That's the standard.

I don't need another unmanned system that looks impressive during a demonstration.

I need systems that deploy. Systems that sustain. Systems that integrate. Systems that fight.

We're increasing the striking power of the undersea force.

Virginia-class submarines equipped with the Virginia Payload Module provide significantly greater payload capacity and help preserve the guided-missile submarine capability historically provided by our Ohio-class SSGNS.

We're fielding Flight III destroyers with SPY-6 and the latest Aegis capabilities.

And we're putting advanced manufacturing directly into operational units.

Theodore Roosevelt recently operated with a containerized hybrid-metal manufacturing system capable of producing and repairing critical components at sea.

Consider what that means operationally. A component fails thousands of miles from home.

Yesterday, the Fleet waited for the supply chain to deliver the part.

Tomorrow – the Fleet prints the part.

That's not science fiction. We're doing it now.

And we're changing the way all new technology enters the Fleet through our Fleet Introduction Operating System – or what we call “FIOS.”

The idea behind FIOS is simple: The Fleet is not our integration laboratory.

When a new capability arrives on the waterfront, its training, logistics, maintenance, software, doctrine, and support must arrive with it. Not six months later. Not after the first deployment.

Day one. Ready to fight.

All of this points toward the larger question: What Navy will America need in 2030? 2040? 2045?

Nobody in this room can predict the character of future war perfectly. So, our answer cannot be to design a Fleet optimized around one prediction.

We need a Navy that can adapt faster than the threat. That is the logic behind our Future Force Design or what I’m calling the Adaptive Fleet.

A Fleet that does not require every platform to do everything.

A Fleet that combines carriers, submarines, destroyers, frigates, amphibious ships, logistics forces, autonomous systems, distributed sensors, and new payloads into force packages tailored to the problem a commander must solve.

Sometimes we will need exquisite capability. Sometimes we will need affordable, attritable mass.

Most of the time, we will need both.

That is also why I'm pushing hard on containerized capability.

For most of naval history, we have tightly coupled the payload to the platform.

But if we can increasingly separate the two, we can change what a ship brings to the fight without waiting twenty years to design another ship.

Sensors. Electronic warfare. Autonomous systems.

Manufacturing. Weapons. Payloads over platforms.

More combinations for our commanders. More uncertainty for an adversary. More dilemmas at a speed the enemy cannot comfortably solve.

And while the Navy Warfighting Concept describes how we intend to fight, we're also developing our Navy Deterrence Concept.

Because the objective isn't to fight every war we prepare for. The objective is to make our adversaries decide that starting one is a terrible idea.

That requires more than simply possessing capability. We have to understand whom we're deterring.

What they value. What they fear losing. What actions influence their decisions. And whether the forces we're presenting are actually changing their calculus.

That is where your Navy is headed: A more adaptive Fleet. A Fleet combining crewed and uncrewed systems. A Fleet capable of rapidly changing its payloads and force packages.

A Fleet sustained by a Foundry that can build, repair, supply, and regenerate combat power at the speed war demands.

And most importantly – A Fleet of Sailors with the training, authority, technology, and confidence to act at speed when the Nation needs them most.

None of that happens without the people in this room.

For more than a century, the Navy League has connected America's Navy with the American people.

You advocate for our Sailors. You support our families.

You educate our communities.

You remind Americans why sea power matters.

Our industry partners build and sustain the ships, aircraft, weapons, networks, and technologies our Sailors take into harm's way.

And here in Hampton Roads, all those pieces come together every single day.

People sometimes ask whether, after a year as CNO, am I optimistic about the future of our Navy – Absolutely!

Not because our challenges have gotten smaller. They haven't. Not because the world has gotten safer. It hasn't.

I'm optimistic because I don't see a future to fear. I see a future to build.

And over the last year, I’ve met the Sailors who are going to build it. I've watched Sailors solve problems no headquarters could have anticipated.

I've watched Chiefs and junior officers exercise extraordinary leadership. I've watched young enlisted Sailors develop solutions that changed the way entire commands operate.

I've watched crews overcome maintenance challenges, extended deployments, combat operations, and long periods away from their families – and continue to answer the Nation's call.

Every visit to the Fleet leaves me more confident than the last.

Because America's greatest maritime advantage has never simply been the amount of steel we put in the water. And it has never been technology alone.

Our greatest advantage is the character, competence, initiative, and fighting spirit of the American Sailor.

That is why Sailors First will continue to guide how I lead our Navy.

We take care of our Sailors so they can fight. We train them so they can win. We trust them so they can act when the plan inevitably meets the enemy. We give them a battle-ready Fleet.

And we build the Fleet of tomorrow so the United States continues to possess something no adversary can afford to ignore: A Navy that can arrive without asking permission.

A Navy that can remain as long as necessary.

A Navy that can fight from the seabed to space.

And a Navy that can deliver decisive combat power from the sea – anywhere in the world.

That is our differentiated value. That is how we deter. And when necessary, that is how we fight and win.

But above all - that is how America's Navy helps preserve the peace.

Thank you for what you do for our Navy, our Sailors, and their families.

May God bless each of you. May God bless our Navy families. And may God continue to watch over the men and women of the United States Navy standing the watch around the world tonight.

Thank you.