Though it sounds like something from an old pirate movie, the antique penalty is not only still on the Navy’s books, it is still actually imposed, despite a century of abolition efforts.
On New Year’s Day, it will finally go by the boards.
A sweeping update of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, passed by Congress in 2016, will take effect Jan. 1, bringing dozens of changes that are intended to make the system fairer and more efficient. Most are the kind of procedural tweaks that concern lawyers, not sailors. But the bread-and-water part will be felt on all decks.
Commanders throughout the armed services will still have the authority to punish minor misconduct in various ways without a trial. But the new law deletes the regulation that authorized ship commanders to confine low-ranking sailors on “diminished rations” — bread and water — for up to three days at a time.
That regulation is no mere neglected relic from a bygone era. As recently as 2017, a destroyer in the Pacific was known as the USS Bread and Water because of the skipper’s liberal use of the penalty to punish missteps like missing a curfew or drinking under the legal age.
Many in the Navy will be happy to see it go. But some mourn what they see as an expedient and effective tradition of the seas.
“It sounds medieval, and that is sort of the point,” said Capt. Kevin Eyer, who regularly sentenced sailors to bread and water for minor misconduct before he retired in 2009. “Sometimes you just need to scare a kid. We want them to succeed, but you need to give them a kick in the pants.”
But just as attitudes about spanking children have shifted, the culture in the Navy has drifted away from corporal penalties like bread and water, and officers increasingly view them as counterproductive.
“It just seems anachronistic and stupid,” said Capt. Scott Tait, who joined the Navy in 1992 and has commanded two destroyers.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.