Despite efforts to increase the number of potential sailors, the Navy is expecting to go into Fiscal Year 2025 with a smaller force.
The Navy is preparing to fund an active-duty end strength of 332,300 sailors, according to the Presidential Budget released Monday. It’s a decrease of 14,700 compared to the ask in the Fiscal Year 2023 budget.
The Marine Corps, which falls under the Department of the Navy, does not see a change in end strength between FY 2024 and FY 2025. The service is expected to stay at 172,300 for its active-duty end strength.
In FY 2024, which is still not funded as it is tied up in continuing resolutions, the Navy’s goals of recruiting 40,600 enlisted sailors and 2,807 active-duty officers reflected the FY 2024 budget request of an end strength of 347,000.
The FY 2023 budget set the end strength at 346,300, but the Navy finished the fiscal year with 332,431 sailors, about 93.9 percent, Capt. Jodie Cornell, spokesman for the chief of naval personnel, said in an email.
“We will need to expand efforts to further retain the right Sailors in the required skillsets and recruit the right number of accessions to meet Fleet manning requirements in the future,” she said in the email.
FY 2024 continues to see a shortfall in active-duty sailors. The Navy ended January 2024 with 324,599 active-duty sailors — 269,628 enlisted and 54,971 officers — Cornell said. The sea service expects that the end of FY 2024 will see higher numbers because of a summer surge in recruiting.
“This reflects a shortage of 7,316 enlisted Sailors and 1,535 Officers due to recruiting challenges and routine seasonal dips in personnel numbers,” Cornell said in a statement to USNI News.
