And he worries the brass are breaking the law to put him behind bars while the real culprit who spoofed a SEAL goes free.

An explosives expert lauded for taking out terrorist supply routes and safe houses in internal SEAL records provided to Navy Times, Special Warfare Operator 1st Class Aaron Howard faces a court-martial trial for allegedly posing as a pair of people who wooed three women through text messages into sending racy images of themselves in 2017.

The victims are an aircrew survival equipmentman second class and two civilians, military prosecutors say.

All the charges fall under Article 134 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, which prohibits actions that can ruin good order and discipline in a unit or those that bring discredit upon the armed forces.

A member of Virginia-based SEAL Team 6 since 2014 and its Sailor of the Year two years later, the highly-decorated Howard’s medals include a Bronze Star with a Valor device denoting battlefield heroism inside an undisclosed nation, according to records provided to Navy Times.

During one of dozens of targeted raids deep behind enemy lines to snatch guerrilla leaders, on Sept. 29, 2016 he selflessly exposed himself to withering small arms fire so that his team could remove “two critically wounded surrogate force teammates,” according to the medal’s citation.

But now he risks brig time, demotion and an unwanted exit from the military.

Navy Region Mid-Atlantic spokesman Jeff Hood said SO1 Howard waived his Article 32 hearing and has been arraigned but has yet to enter a plea and no date for his court-martial trial at Naval Base Norfolk has been set.

The sexy snapshot scandal is the latest imbroglio to embarrass the SEALs, the elite special operators once lauded as “silent professionals” who eschewed the sort of shenanigans that snagged headlines.

But on Wednesday, Special Operations Command announced military leaders had booted from Iraq a Coronado, California-based SEAL Team 7 platoon following allegations they were tied to a booze-fueled July 4th party.

During the probe into the illegal celebration, Air Force authorities also began a separate inquiry into sexual assault allegations involving a SEAL leader there and a female service member, but officials insist it was the drinking that triggered their return to Coronado.

Although he was exonerated of all war crimes charges by a panel of his peers, the recent court-martial trial of Special Warfare Operator Chief Edward “Eddie” Gallagher in San Diego included witnesses testifying about a similar cowboy culture inside another SEAL Team 7 platoon, with their 2017 deployment to Iraq punctuated by heavy drinking on the battlefield and unlawful photos of service members mugging with dead bodies.

But the Gallagher trial and the ongoing prosecutor of his platoon’s commanding officer, Navy Lt. Jacob X. “Jake” Portier, also revealed allegations of heavy-handed SEAL leaders who engaged in unlawful command influence to scuttle the SEALs’ chances of getting a fair trial.

The military judge hearing the case ended up sanctioning Navy prosecutors for a warrantless spying operation run by counterintelligence agents at Naval Criminal Investigative Service that targeted defense attorneys and the editor of Navy Times.

Currently languishing in legal limbo at Naval Special Warfare Development Group, Howard now spends his days performing menial chores such as painting buildings instead of hunting terrorists.

He and his attorney— Michael Waddington — say they have no idea how DEVGRU leaders came to suspect him as the catfisher.

According to legal filings in the case, the Navy began probing the spoofing and sexting allegations in late 2017 but Howard quickly took and passed a pair of polygraph tests, something Gallagher did, too.

Also like Gallagher, Howard insists that he’s innocent. And in a series of legal filings his attorney Waddington accuses SEAL commanders of wielding unlawful command influence to overcome a shoddy investigation.

Called the “mortal enemy of military justice,” unlawful command influence, or UCI, occurs when superiors utter words or take actions that wrongfully influence the outcome of court-martial cases, jeopardize the appellate process or undermine the public’s confidence in the armed forces by appearing to tip the scales of justice.

And to Waddington, SEAL Team 6′s UCI problems began shortly after Howard hired him.

In a July 25 motion he filed with the military court here, Waddington wrote that in early 2018 Command Master Chief Eric Adamski and Master Chief Special Warfare Operator Scotty Walker convened a meeting with Howard to tell him that he was “guilty for getting a lawyer” and was an “(expletive) idiot” who “cannot be trusted” and “(expletived) himself because he sought legal counsel.”

When Howard tried to find witnesses who would back him up or swear to his good character, DEVGRU leaders verbally, through electronic communications and on the command’s work portal page warned them away from him, Waddington wrote.

In April of 2018, enlisted leaders held an all hands meeting with Blue Squadron SEALs to dish on Howard’s investigation, telling them that he “was guilty and SEALs should not help with his case,” according to the motion.

DEVGRU’s command then held another briefing detailing what they say were their initial investigative findings and gave a PowerPoint presentation that implied Howard “was guilty of various offenses,” Waddington wrote.

They then emailed the presentation to Howard’s fellow SEALs, his superiors and “potential fact and sentencing witnesses,” which is why they’ve “shunned him and refused to participate in his case, in any manner,” including assisting the defense team in their investigation, Waddington continued.

Nine days ago, Waddington filed another motion to compel SEAL Team 6 leaders to fork over the PowerPoint slides, emails and other records, but the Navy has yet to provide them.

So Howard’s defense team is left only with the command’s investigation.

In the legal filings uncovered by Navy Times, it’s unclear if NCIS or any other law enforcement agency participated in the SEAL Team 6 probe.

“NCIS declined to take the lead in this investigation,” Waddington said. “That pretty much left it up to the command.”

Saying all the evidence against Howard is “circumstantial,” the attorney told Navy Times that the command seemed to suspect Howard because some of the texts to the women mentioned being stationed once in San Diego, but “that could be 50 percent of all SEALs.”

There’s also a comment alluding to working out with kettle bells, but that’s not unique to any SEAL, Waddington added.

“In one text, the spoofer made comments about liking baseball,” Waddington said. “And they assumed because my client was a high school athlete that he played baseball. He didn’t. He played football.”

Howard offered his phone for forensic investigators to comb over, but Waddington said the command declined.

Reached in Coronado, Naval Special Warfare spokeswoman Cmdr. Tamara Lawrence said it would be inappropriate to comment about an ongoing court-martial case but leaders expect all sailors “to uphold the highest ethical and professional standards.”

And all misconduct allegations “will be investigated by the appropriate authorities,” she added.

A U.S. Navy EP-3 Aries II reconnaissance aircraft, was approached in an “unprofessional manner” by a Venezuelan SU-30 Flanker-C fighter aircraft in “approved international airspace” on Friday according to a U.S. Southern Command statement released Sunday.

“After reviewing video documentation, we have determined the Russian-made fighter aggressively shadowed the EP-3 at an unsafe distance in international airspace for a prolonged period of time, endangering the safety of the crew and jeopardizing the EP-3 mission,” the release said.

The U.S. aircraft “was performing a multi-nationally recognized & approved mission in international airspace over #CaribbeanSea,” Southern Command tweeted earlier today.

The Venezuelan fighter “took off from an airfield 200 miles east of Caracas,” but the release didn’t specify how long the intercept lasted.

The United States, allies and regional partners routinely patrol the Caribbean Sea with ships and aircraft on counter-drug missions. Intercepts of U.S. aircraft have happened more frequently overseas near Russia and China, and are relatively uncommon so close to the U.S. homeland.

Southern Command did not detail if this EP-3 Aries was looking for drug smugglers or if its purpose was to monitor Venezuela while tensions with the regime of embattled President Nicolás Maduro continue to simmer.

The Maduro “regime continues to undermine internationally recognized laws and demonstrate its contempt for international agreements” and its “unprovoked and unjustified acts” are undermining the ability of “the U.S. and other nations to safely conduct flights in international airspace,” Southern Command stated.

Southern Command’s release also took a swipe at Russia, which has continued supporting Maduro despite National Assembly President Juan Guaidó declaration in January that he’s the South American country’s legitimate leader.

In the past months, most governments in the Western Hemisphere, including the United States, have recognized Guaidó’s rule.

Maduro continues to draw support from nations such as Cuba, China and Russia.

As recently as last month, Russia buzzed a U.S. P-8A Poseidon over the Mediterranean in a similar incident.

“This latest action also demonstrates Russia’s irresponsible military support to the illegitimate Maduro regime and adds to Maduro’s growing legacy of reckless and negligent behavior, which undermines international rule of law and efforts to counter illicit trafficking.” Southern Command’s release said.

Led by the amphibious assault ship Kearsarge, the ARG included the landing platform dock Arlington and the dock landing ship Fort McHenry and carried more than 4,500 sailors and Marines.

They left Norfolk on Dec. 17 but their deployment really became three separate cruises. The trio of warships often operated alone, thousands of miles away from each other, overseen by different combatant commanders.

They combined to run eight exercises and at least three named operations while also making port visits in 13 different countries across Europe and the Middle East, according to a Wednesday press release by the ARG heralding their arrival.

“This ARG’s ability to disaggregate forces and operate efficiently and effectively across multiple areas of responsibility during this deployment enabled us to simultaneously fulfill the security requirements of three combatant commanders and that’s no easy task,” said Capt. Joseph O’Brien in the press release.

O’Brien assumed command of the Kearsarge ARG on April 12 during the flagship’s port visit to Bahrain.

“It took a lot of coordination, training, and expertise from the deckplates up the chain of command and I couldn’t be prouder of this team,” he added.

Kearsarge spent most of its time in the U.S. 5th Fleet’s area of operations, sailing more than 37,600 miles on its deployment and launching 1,775 sorties split between the Marine air combat element and the Chargers of the Navy’s Sea Combat Squadron 26.

The missions included flights into Afghanistan from the North Arabian Sea, according to Chief Mass Communications Specialist Peter Lawlor, Kearsarge’s spokesman.

The Arlington concentrated on the Mediterranean Sea, except for a brief June excursion through the Suez Canal to operate in the Gulf of Aden under 5th Fleet’s control during heightened tensions with Iran.

The ship also weathered the loss of one of their own, when Lt. Kaylie Ludwig was found unresponsive and pronounced dead on May 21 during a port visit to Naval Station Rota in Spain.

But Fort McHenry can claim the most unusual cruise.

It was the first American warship to enter the Black Sea since the Russian seizure on Nov. 25 of three Ukranian gunboats in the Kerch Strait.

After sending a message to Moscow, it departed Constanta, Romania, in early January and began to confront a very different problem.

Sailors and Marines on board Fort McHenry began showing symptoms of viral parotitis, an infection similar to the mumps that’s marked by fever, dehydration and chills.

The outbreak nixed port calls for about 110 days, although the crew eventually took liberty in Jebel Ali in the United Arab Emirates, leaving on May 13.

The last six weeks of Fort McHenry’s cruise included visits to the German port of Kiel and Riga, the capital of Latvia, for the U.S. 2nd Fleet’s Baltic Operations exercise.

Most of the Marines went home first.

The ARG arrived off North Carolina’s Camp Lejeune on July 15 to disembark the bulk of 22nd MEU and their gear.

Kearsarge and Arlington then sailed north to Norfolk Naval Station while Fort McHenry returned to Florida’s Naval Station Mayport.

Picked by President Donald J. Trump and confirmed without a whiff of scandal by the Senate, his elevation to CNO was derailed by an ongoing Pentagon probe into emails he allegedly exchanged with his former spokesman, Chris Servello.

Although he was never charged with a crime and has long professed his innocence, Servello’s own career foundered in late 2016 after he was accused of sexually-tinged shenanigans while dressed as Santa Claus at a boozy Pentagon holiday party.

With CNO Adm. John M. Richardson poised to retire this summer, Secretary of the Navy Richard Spencer must find a replacement that will win over Acting Secretary of Defense Mark T. Esper, then the White House and finally lawmakers.

“[Secretary]Spencer is committed to quickly recommending a new CNO for nomination, and he will move to that decision urgently but deliberately,” Cmdr. Sarah Higgins, his spokeswoman, told Navy Times on Monday.

Although he has other options, secretaries traditionally have fished for CNOs from the smallest pool of commissioned officers, four-star admirals.

By law, the service is allowed only six full admirals on active duty at a time. Currently, there are eight but that’s because two lead joint commands and they don’t count against the statutory limit.

But Spencer also could dive deeper, selecting a vice admiral if he believes that officer is the best person to run the Navy. There are 41 three-stars on the Navy’s rolls.

“All three and four-star admirals are eligible to be recommended for service as the CNO,” Higgins said. “The Secretary of the Navy will make his recommendation based on who is the best and most fully qualified officer for the position.”

Adm. Christopher Grady — the top officer at Fleet Forces Command in Norfolk — and current Pacific Fleet Commander Adm. John C. “Lung” Aquilino in Hawaii likely are two of the front-runners, according to retired Navy Capt. Jerry Hendrix, a Defense Strategy and Force Structure Analyst at the Telmus Group.

“Grady and Aquilino are are really the most likely candidates at this point, but are by no means the only options,” Hendrix said.

“Grady’s experience, as of late, has been in Europe and the Middle East, where Adm. Aquilino has been out in the Pacific. And given the focus on that region these days, that could be a consideration in favor of Aquilino.”

Aquilino is a career aviator, Grady a surface warfare officer. In the wake of twin warship collisions in the Western Pacific two years ago that killed 17 sailors, “there might be an argument to be made that having a SWO in the job would be a good decision,” Hendrix said.

As for seniority, it’s a wash. Both have occupied their current posts since May of 2018.

But also in the mix is the highly respected Adm. James G. Foggo III, the commander of Allied Joint Forces Command Naples, Naval Forces Europe and Naval Forces Africa since late 2017.

To Hendrix, Foggo is “very intelligent” and has the potential to be an excellent CNO, but his nomination would raise eyebrows because he’s a career submariner.

“If you went with Foggo, you would have had three submarine officers in a row as CNO,” Hendrix said. “We’ve done that before, with Admirals [James] Watkins, [Carlisle] Trost and [Frank] Kelso in the 1980′s, but it’s not something that’s really wise, to have one community to hold the chief of naval operations office for such a long time.”

Not to mention that newly-promoted Vice Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Bob Burke also is a submariner. He became VCNO on June 10.

“Robert Burke is a submarine officer and was viewed as a complement to Moran,” Hendrix said. “That’s why it would be unlikely to see Adm. Foggo, who is also a submariner, come into the job as CNO if the plan was to still have Burke as the vice chief.”

That also could remove Adm. James F Caldwell Jr. from consideration. The director of the Naval Nuclear Propulsion Program, he’s also a career submariner.

Stacking the deck with submariners might irk the other line officer communities, Hendrix said.

So if Foggo or Caldwell became CNO, Burke might be shifted to a four-star command elsewhere while the sea service began the search for a new VCNO.

Hendrix said the odds might be long for Adm. Phil Davidson at U.S. Pacific Command and Adm. Craig Faller at U.S. Southern command, assuming that as combatant commanders they would want the job.

Hendrix pointed to Davidson’s tense February testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee where he bristled at questions concerning readiness levels in the fleet.

Although he was confirmed last year by the Senate for the Southern Command post, Faller is weighed down by an Inspector General report.

Investigators revealed that while commanding the Stennis Carrier Strike Group in 2011, Faller accepted from an unnamed “prohibited source” a free room upgrade for a two-night stay in a Kuala Lumpur luxury hotel, a gift valued between $2,000 and $10,000.

Although the Navy concluded the perk ran afoul of ethics rules, officials ruled that Faller’s actions were mitigated because he accepted the suite on behalf of his shipmates, not himself, and his staff judge advocate general appeared to bless the upgrade.

If Spencer and Trump really want to shake up the Navy bureaucracy, there are two other options Hendrix believes they could consider.

“In 2003, President George W. Bush recalled Gen. Peter Schoomaker to be the Army’s chief of staff, three years after he retired,” Hendrix said.

Hendrix didn’t name any candidates from the retired rolls, but indicated their main problem is age. The statutory retirement age for officers is 62, although a special act of Congress could grant a waiver.

And then there’s the threat of a deep selection.

“Arleigh Burke was a two-star admiral in 1955, when he was picked over 52 more senior three- and four-stars to be CNO,” Hendrix said.

Current rules limit the bench to three- and four-star admirals today, but it’s possible the perfect person for the job isn’t a full admiral — even if Hendrix concedes “it is unlikely they would do that.”

As for keeping Adm. Richardson at the helm, that’s tricky, too.

“I would say is the idea of just extending John Richardson in the job is not an automatic,” said Hendrix. “Richardson has a term of office. That term expires and so in order for him to continue, there’s going to have to be Congressional action taken.

“If that action doesn’t get taken because of the summer holidays or some other reason, then Burke, as the Vice Chief could become the acting CNO. It’s one thing to say that Adm. John Richardson will just stay on as CNO until a successor is identified, it’s not an automatic thing.”

The change of office ceremony took place just moments after the 31st chief of naval operations, Adm. John Richardson, pinned a fourth star on Burke.

Richardson is slated to retire on Aug. 1 and will be replaced by Moran, who was confirmed by the Senate at the next CNO.

“It is an honor and a privilege for me to assume this responsibility,” Burke said in a prepared statement released by the Navy. “I look forward to continuing to serve our sailors as the vice chief of naval operations.”

On May 24, Burke turned over his duties as the 58th chief of naval personnel to a key deputy, Rear Adm. John B. Nowell Jr.

Like Richardson a career submariner, Burke commanded the Norfolk-based attack submarine Hampton and later became commodore of Submarine Development Squadron 12 in Groton, Connecticut.

The United States Submarine League bestowed upon Burke the Rear Admiral Jack M. Darby Award for Inspirational Leadership and Excellence of Command in 2004.

“Adm. Bob Burke brings a tremendous wealth of operational and personnel expertise to the job as the next Vice Chief of Naval Operations,” Richardson said in the Navy release.

“His work in 6th Fleet helped prepare our Navy for a resurgent Russia. Most recently, as Chief of Naval Personnel, Bob’s been a strong champion for our sailors — opening up new opportunities and putting more and more power in the hands of our sailors. I look forward to serving with him at this new and important level.”

“At roughly 11:45 local time, the guided-missile cruiser Chancellorsville and the Russian anti-submarine destroyer Admiral Vinogradov crossed paths in the Philippine Sea,” Cmdr. Clay Doss, spokesman for the U.S. 7th Fleet in Japan, told Navy Times by phone.

Doss said the American warship was recovering its helicopter and maintaining “a steady course and speed” when the Udaloy-class destroyer Admiral Vinogradov moved from “behind and to the right” of the U.S. vessel and “accelerated and closed to an unsafe distance of 50 to 100 feet.”

Doss said the Russian maneuver forced the Chancellorsville to “execute all engines back full and to maneuver to avoid collision.”

“We consider Russia’s actions during this interaction as unsafe and unprofessional, certainly not in accordance with the International Regulations for Preventing Collisions at Sea,” he said.

That’s not the way Moscow portrayed the incident, which Russian officials said occurred in the East China Sea.

Quoting the Russian Pacific Fleet’s news service, Tass alleged that the near-collision happened when a U.S. carrier strike group and a Russian “task force” were “heading in parallel directions.

Moscow’s account claims the “Chancellorsville suddenly changed its course and crossed the Admiral Vinogradov destroyer’s course some 50 meters away from the ship,” which was “forced to conduct an emergency maneuver.”

The Russian Pacific Fleet had “voiced a protest to the US vessel’s command, stressing that such steps are unacceptable,” according to Tass.

Doss would only say that the Russian account was “not true” and that the U.S. crew was “safe and operating in accordance with the rules of the road and it was their maneuvers that forced us to take action to avoid collision.”

Doss said the U.S. presence in the area came as part of “routine operations” and the Chancellorsville’s interaction with the Russian vessel was “strictly a ship to ship” encounter.

While Doss agreed it was “fair to say” the cruiser was operating as part of the Ronald Reagan Carrier Strike Group, there was no indication that either warship was close to other vessels at the time of the incident.

It’s the second reportedly unsafe incident involving Russian and American forces in the past week.

On Tuesday, 6th Fleet officials accused a Russian fighter jet of dangerously buzzing a U.S. Navy patrol plane while both flew in international airspace above the Mediterranean Sea.

The incident occurred in international airspace over the Mediterranean Sea, with the Russian Sukhoi SU-35 fighter making three passes at a P-8A Poseidon patrol plane, according to a Navy statement issued Tuesday.

While 6th Fleet officials deemed two of the three passes safe under international rules for aerial intercepts, the second pass by the Russian “Flanker-E” jet veered directly in front of the American aircraft, creating “wake turbulence” that unlawfully endangered the aircrew.

Lasting 175 minutes, Tuesday’s encounter became the latest in a series of incidents involving Russian forces over the past several years, highlighting growing tensions between the rival powers.

“This interaction was irresponsible,” the 6th Fleet statement said.

“We expect them to behave within international standards set to ensure safety and to prevent incidents” because “unsafe actions‎ increase the risk of miscalculation and potential for midair collisions,” it added.

The 6th Fleet statement indicated that the patrol aircraft was operating in accordance with the 1972 Agreement for the Prevention of Incidents On and Over the High Seas and the U.S. crew never tried to provoke the Russian jet.

Navy Times questions about where in the Mediterranean Sea the incident occurred and which squadron was involved have not been answered.

During a 25-minute encounter on Nov. 5, a Sukhoi Su-27 “Flanker” fighter buzzed a Navy EP-3E Aeries II reconnaissance aircraft flying in international airspace over the Black Sea.

That Russian jet also made “a high speed pass directly in front“ of the Aeries “putting at risk the pilots and crew,” a Pentagon spokesman told Navy Times at the time.

Similar incidents involving Russian fighters and U.S. patrol planes occurred in early 2018 and late 2017.

Russian aggression in the air follows Moscow’s 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula, a move that soured relations with both the United States and NATO allies.

It was a moment of profound symbolism, pointing both to the Navy’s heroic past and a potentially violent future.

Tuesday marked the 77th anniversary of the Battle of Midway, a key strategic victory for the United States against Imperial Japan during World War II — and it was the Union Jack that fluttered in ports during the island hopping campaign.

But its rebirth on warships also has much to do with a call by Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John Richardson to focus on combat at sea against peer and near-peer competitors after nearly two decades of waging war against insurgencies and terrorist networks in the Middle East, Africa and Asia.

All that was announced on Feb. 21 by a fleet-wide message ordering the Union Jack to replace the First Navy Jack on shipboard jackstaffs.

Famous for its “Don’t Tread on Me” rattlesnake slithering across 13 red and white stripes, the First Navy Jack had fluttered on all Navy ships since Sept. 11, 2002, the first anniversary of the terror attacks in the United States by al-Qaida.

Then-Secretary of the Navy Gordon England assumed it would continue to fly until the so-called Global War on Terrorism ended, but in his message to the fleet CNO Richardson argued that the Union Jack better reflected the cumulative strength of the nation and its Navy “where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.”

The “rattlesnake jack” isn’t going away, however. It will be proudly flown on the Japan-based 7th Fleet flagship Blue Ridge, marking it as the oldest commissioned vessel in the active fleet.

It also survives as a shoulder patch worn on the Type III Navy Working Uniform.

The newest arrival to Naval Station Norfolk, the aircraft carrier John C. Stennis, put Richardson’s words into action on Tuesday.

“Today we raised the Union Jack on our ship,” said Lt. Nick Elliott, the flattop’s assistant navigator, after watching two of the warship’s quartermaster’s execute colors at Norfolk’s Pier 14.

“This small flag’s 50 stars represent the unity of the United States and that’s especially significant, today, on the anniversary of the critically important victory at Midway — a battle we won because of not only our initiative, but our unity and single focus of purpose, traits that are just as important today as we refocus on a more global scale.”

Flanked by fellow Texan Quartermaster 3rd Class Danaril Mojet on board Stennis, Quartermaster 2nd Class Matthew Lewis told Navy Times that both petty officers felt honored to raise the Union Jack on Tuesday.

“We wanted to get this right, so we took our time and and stayed focused on what we needed to do and did it right,” said Lewis, a Dallas native.

“So then let me ask you a question — catapult — right, the catapult system. Do you like electric or steam?” Trump said while calling for an audience voice vote during his roughly 20-minute address in Yokosuka, Japan.

The president treated his appearance on board the Wasp as a Memorial Day event because it still was Monday in the United States, but Trump’s address conveyed the same pro-steam theme he’s sounded since early 2017, when he entered the White House.

In May and September of 2017, Trump blasted EMALS while encouraging the Navy to return to using “goddamned steam,” a bugaboo he repeated during a 2018 Thanksgiving call with the troops.

His speech is the latest sign that Trump continues to want the Navy to abandon the revolutionary Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System, or EMALS, on Gerald R. Ford-class carriers and replace it with steam catapults used by previous flattops.

“I really need this information, because, you know, we’re building carriers. We’re building one using an electric catapult and an electric elevator,” Trump told hundreds of personnel assigned to the Japan-based 7th Fleet.

Trump’s Tuesday speech questioned whether the “electric” system would work in battle, grousing that it “must be very delicate” compared to the steam catapults on carriers such as Nimitz, which was commissioned in 1975.

He also bemoaned the original decision to go with EMALS over steam as “before my time a little bit” and grumbled that “this crazy electric catapult” was “$900 million” over budget.

Trump didn’t detail where he got those figures, but a 2017 report from the Pentagon’s Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation office estimated that the price tag for Ford’s EMALS would rise to $958.9 million, about $814 million more than analysts thought it would cost in 2004 when the contract began.

And that’s still a moving target because more funds were needed to patch software glitches in EMALS before combat-loaded jets can be launched.

Those fixes are expected to be finished when Ford leaves Huntington Ingalls Newport News Shipyard in October.

Congress has appropriated funding for EMALS to be installed on the future Ford-class flattops John F. Kennedy and Enterprise, too.

Bloomberg analyst Rob Levinson told Defense News that Trump could order the Navy to scrap EMALS in the future CVN-81, which hasn’t been named, but that would be difficult to do for Kennedy and Enterprise.

The partially-built Kennedy probably would need to be “torn apart,” he warned, “and a lot of penalties would have to be paid to contractors.”

Going back to steam also would likely receive a chilly response on Capitol Hill, not to mention at San Diego-based contractor General Atomics, the manufacturer of EMALS.

The problem is that Ford-class carriers have been designed from the power plant up for EMALS.

To return to the system used by Nimitz would mean carving out space for both generating steam and piping it to the catapults, displacing other systems built into the warships.

That’s why in 2009 the Navy estimated that replacing EMALS with steam catapults could delay construction of a Ford-class carrier for up to 18 months.

As for the warship Wasp, it doesn’t even use catapults to launch its helicopters, MV-22 Osprey tiltrotor aircraft, AV-88 Harrier II jump jets or F-35B Lightning II Joint Strike Fighters.

But that didn’t stop Trump from calling for a voice vote from “all of the folks that know exactly what I’m talking about — the catapult system.”

His push for steam drew enthusiastic cheers but when he mentioned “electric” only a smattering of applause could be heard, followed by laughter from the rest of the audience.

Singling out one pro-EMALS voice, Trump joked that he “works with the enemy” before saying the sailor was “all right,” although perhaps “in danger.”

Trump said that he’s talked with members of Ford’s crew and they also complained about the “electric catapult” and preferred steam.

“So I think I’m going to put an order when we build a new aircraft carrier carrier, we’re going to use steam,” Trump said.

Called the “standardized prisoner uniform,” those awaiting trial will wear a “chocolate brown” version. Those already convicted and serving their sentences will be issued what the Navy is calling a “tan” variation.

Although officially designated a different color and design, at first glance the tan outfit resembled the current Navy khaki service uniform for those in pay grades E-7 and above.

Old soldiers also might notice a certain similarity with the khaki cotton uniform that was discontinued in 1985.

But a closer look shows these prisoners will wear no rank, ribbons or insignia, only a white name tape on the right side of the chest and a single, open pocket over the left. And there’s no equivalent to the darker brown uniforms in the modern military.

The new duds are designed to enhance security and cut costs, according to an April 24 press release from Navy Personnel Command, which oversees detention facilities worldwide.

The uniform change will affect immediately the 357 military prisoners currently confined and those who join them behind bars.

Because of this “non-pay” status that most prisoners are in, the cost of their clothing comes out of the Navy’s pockets.

“Prison populations are largely comprised of prisoners incarcerated for crimes against people, which is reflected in courts-martial judgments with longer sentences and more less-than-honorable discharges from service,” said Jonathan Godwin, the senior corrections program specialist with the Corrections and Programs Office at Navy Personnel Command, in the statement.

“Punishments consist of total forfeiture of all pay and allowance, and it is rare for a prisoner to return to active duty.”

Until now, confined military members wore their working uniforms, which today often are an assortment of different styles and camouflage patterns chosen by the services they joined.

But that often makes it difficult to distinguish between prisoners and guards.

And then there’s the cost. The typical service-specific military utility uniform — a blouse and a pair of trousers — runs $95. Add in a fleece jacket and the price tag jumps another $45.

The new unisex prisoner uniform — shirt, pants, web belt with open-faced buckle, jacket and cap ― likely will cost “about $45,” officials say.

That doesn’t include service-issued undergarments, socks and boots, which most prisoners will continue to wear.

The outfit shift eliminates the mandate for commands to ensure those being confined show up at the brig with four sets of utility uniforms, plus related accessories and garments.

Instead, the new prisoner uniform will be issued to service members when they check in at any of the confinement facilities.

And while behind bars, “they will be held responsible for care and maintenance” of the uniforms and will turn them in when they leave, according to the release.