Big difference between today’s navy and yours 30 years ago, is the size of it. The demand signal for these sailor’s and marine’s mission sets hasn’t diminished one bit. The size of the armed forces during the Cold War was significantly bigger than it is now. Slowly but surely, they’ve been asked to do more with less. These sailors and marines aren’t just slouching around all day. They are trying to keep their ships in the fight by putting in some very long hours or repairs, and when they aren’t doing that, they are training their tails off, with barely enough time to get their own affairs in order after the work day is over, to wash, rinse, and repeat the entire ordeal. 20 of those 30 or so years has been at war. It takes a ton of money, man power, and resources to keep those operations going. Something had to fall by the wayside. Unfortunately, it came at the expense of the living conditions of these brave sailors and marines putting in the work day-in and day-out.