U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Devon Dow

A scandal is claiming the careers of some of

the brightest officers in the Navy.

The story centers on alleged bribes to Navy officers by a civilian contractor, Glenn Defense Marine Asia Ltd. (GDMA). In one instance, U.S. Navy Cmdr. Michael Vannak Khem Misiewicz is accused of giving classified information about a ship's movements to the company and even redirecting vessels to ports that benefited the company and its CEO, Leonard Glenn Francis. "In return, Francis provided Misiewicz with paid travel, luxury hotel stays, and prostitution services," the U.S. Justice Department says. The bribes reportedly included Lady Gaga tickets, a detail that has drawn even more attention to the case. The pair have been arrested and face a pretrial hearing by the week's end.

The scandal serves as a reminder of the deep reach that civilian contractors have into military logistics. The U.S. military has always gone to war with civilian contractors in tow. During the American Revolution, the ratio hovered at one contractor per six soldiers, while the numbers in Iraq were closer to one contractor for every person in uniform, according to the Congressional Budget Office. Relying on contractors saves the Pentagon money, allowing the military to get some jobs done without the commitment of recruiting, training, and caring for troops. Plus, contractors can be hired and fired as needed. But the system also opens the door to bribery and graft.

The Navy is particularly beholden to contractors. The Army needs a surge of cooks, servers, vehicles, and basic supplies when it deploys, but can cut them off when a deployment ends. The Navy is always on the move. That means it is constantly wheeling and dealing access to foreign ports for resupply and replenishing.

The Navy hires people to represent its interests in ports. These positions are known in the maritime world as husbands, and that's where Leonard Glenn Francis stepped in. His firm would arrange everything Navy ships in the Pacific Rim needed, from the tugboats used to dock to people who could empty the bilges. At the end of the stay in port, the husbanding agent presents the ship with a bill for the various subcontractor services. However, the system is not particularly well run, as it is hard for any ship captain to keep abreast of changing costs, fees, and tariffs. "The Navy's ability to track and analyze port-visit cost changes remains rudimentary," says one Navy 2009 Postgraduate School paper.

In an attempt to control costs, the Navy has been trying to consolidate individual ports into regional contracts. That meant fewer, but bigger, contracts in the big-money industry. In this case, the Navy has cancelled nine contracts with the GDMA worth a total of $205 billion, and Francis is being accused of bribing Navy officials to steer work his way by redirecting ships to ports where he held the biggest sway. The Naval Criminal Investigative Service started probing GDMA's relationships with ships' captains. Misiewicz was arrested in September. Capt. Daniel Dusek, commanding officer of the forward-deployed amphibious assault ship USS Bonhomme Richard, was relieved of command in October.

In addition to the changing nature of husbanding contracts, Francis may have been feeling the pinch on his empire after his company's reputation became tarnished by bad performance. In 2011, his firm lost a bid for a U.S. Navy contract and disputed the outcome in court. It came to light that GDMA has received a "less than satisfactory past performance rating"—it seems that subcontractors had not been paid and the company was not responsive to Navy ships' needs. The bills were higher than expected, and sometimes dubious, so the Navy decided it wasn't worth it to sign that contract with GDMA.

At the time, the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) was already probing the company's dealings and its habit of handing in inflated costs. And Francis knew this: The Justice Department's GDMA case also alleges that the CEO put an NCIS investigator on the payroll. In exchange for lavish trips and hookers, Supervisory Special Agent John Bertrand Beliveau II ostensibly provided Francis with confidential information about the NCIS criminal fraud investigation. The Navy alleges that he secretly downloaded reports from the NCIS database and conveyed the information to Francis.

Corruption can spread through an organization. To have such senior-level officers implicated in bribery is a large blow to the Navy, while exposing those assigned to investigate them as tainted is even worse. Senior Navy officials have told reporters that other high-ranking Navy officials may be implicated—this scandal is bound to get worse before it gets better.

This content is created and maintained by a third party, and imported onto this page to help users provide their email addresses. You may be able to find more information about this and similar content at piano.io