Let's put the Program Office's reply through a cynical filter that would parse away all that "battlespace" ****. More cynically, let's call it my "Mike Sparks" mode despite the sometimes less than brilliant reputation of that man:
Paragraph 1: The intro
Paragraph 2: Everything has changed! We've got bigger, cooler computers now! You are obsolete!
Paragraph 3: We'd increase automation so the noise in the control room is minimized, reversing our 30-year old anti-automation position!
Paragraph 4: We got new cool computer screens all over the place. You are behind the times, old man. Now the OOD can glimpse at waterfall displays that he has only a basic understanding and experience of (compared to the dedicated sonar staff), second guess the sonarmen and constantly disrupt the sonar supervisor's attention! I don't want to explain how wanting to talk to the sonar supe directly means putting the rest of the sonar crew into the control room which would never be as quiet or undisturbed as their comfortable little alcove no matter what we do. Trust us, we really thought this over...
Paragraph 5: Instead of using basic, effective, reliable noiseproofing measures, I create a problem by sticking the sonarmen somewhere noisy and use a fancy, expensive electronic gadget to solve the problem I created myself. I also ignore all the other distractions in the control room other than acoustic - if nothing else, the psychological pressure of a senior watch officer/captain directly watching all the time can hardly be good for long-term concentration.
Paragraph 6: We really did our homework on this.
Paragraph 7: The cool new computer displays really help!
Paragraph 8: Thanks for your time, but we aren't making any changes.
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