NAVAL OPERATIONS, CHIEF OF

NAVAL OPERATIONS, CHIEF OF. The post of chief of naval operations (CNO) was established on 3 February 1915 to give the navy a military chief "charged with the operations of the Fleet and with the preparations of plans for use in war." Legally, the CNO was only an adviser to the secretary of the navy, but the structure was adequate during WORLD WAR I. The CINCUS (an unhappy acronym for commander in chief, changed after Pearl Harbor to COMINCH) was, in practice, the commander of the Atlantic, the Pacific, or the Asiatic Fleet. In March 1942 the titles of CNO and COMINCH merged in the person of Ernest J. King. His administration resulted in a general order abolishing COMINCH to vest CNO with clear supremacy.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Hone, Thomas. Power and Change: The Administrative History of the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations, 1946–1986. Washington, D.C.: Naval Historical Center, 1989.

R. W. Daly

D. W. Knox/A. E.

See also Navy, Department of the; Navy, United States; World War II.