What happened
The U.S. Navy removed the commanding officer of the Ohio-class ballistic missile submarine USS Wyoming Blue crew this week, citing a loss of confidence in his ability to command. Rear Adm. Bob Wirth, who leads Submarine Group 10 out of Kings Bay, made the call to relieve Cmdr. Robert Moreno on Wednesday, October 8, 2025, according to reporting from USNI News. The Navy did not detail the incident or behavior that triggered the decision, which is standard when the service uses the loss of confidence formulation.
Moreno took the Blue crew’s helm on May 31, 2024, during a change of command ceremony at Naval Submarine Base Kings Bay, Georgia. That handover from Cmdr. Steven Dykstra was documented by the Navy’s public affairs imagery and release.
Rear Adm. Wirth assumed command of Submarine Group 10 in May 2025, the headquarters that oversees King’s Bay based SSBNs. His staff owns the responsibility to swap out a skipper when confidence is gone.
Why he was fired
The Navy’s statement gives the same blunt instrument it uses in most reliefs: loss of confidence. That phrase covers a spectrum from poor command climate to operational judgment lapses to personal conduct problems. The Navy rarely releases the underlying details while any inquiry is ongoing. USNI News reports that no additional circumstances were provided in this case.
This is part of a pattern. In recent years, the service has relieved a steady drumbeat of commanding officers across ship types for the same reason. In 2023 alone, the Navy removed 16 commanding officers, the majority for loss of confidence. The service argues the standard protects the fleet by acting fast when trust in a skipper’s judgment breaks down. Think of it like ejecting from a jet when warning lights stack up. You can debate the cause later. First, you save the airframe and crew.
The Blue/Gold crew model
The Wyoming is an Ohio-class SSBN, a nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarine tasked with strategic deterrence patrols. These boats operate with a dual crew model, Blue and Gold, to keep patrol tempo high while giving crews time to train and reset between deployments. That system is the Navy’s built-in shock absorber when a skipper is removed. Another qualified officer can be assigned to stand in, and the Gold crew remains a separate, fully trained team if schedules need to flex. The design is boring by intent. Strategic deterrence is supposed to be steady as a metronome and about as engaging.
In practice, a relief like this is more like swapping a quarterback mid-drive than calling off the game. The crew keeps drilling. Patrol schedules may shift at the margins if certifications need to be revalidated, but Submarine Group 10 and Submarine Squadron 20 exist to maintain crews at patrol-ready status and to plug leadership gaps fast. The organization at Kings Bay is built for continuity so the strategic triad does not miss a beat.
As for the Gold crew, Commander Jeremy D. Garcia remains firmly in command as of this writing.
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Cmdr. Robert Moreno was fired due to a loss of confidence in his ability to command, the Navy announced. https://t.co/97g93BqeBH
— Navy Times (@NavyTimes) October 9, 2025
The broader signal to the fleet
Relieving a ballistic missile submarine commanding officer is not routine. SSBN skippers carry custody of the most destructive weapons in the U.S. inventory. When a CO is fired from that community, the message to other commands is clear: when confidence fails, relief follows. The Navy’s critics argue the phrase loss of confidence hides too much. Retired leaders counter that it is accountability in action while protecting due process and classified or personnel sensitive details. Both can be true. The fleet’s job is to keep patrols going safely while the investigators do theirs.
Bottom line
Cmdr. Robert Moreno is out as CO of the USS Wyoming Blue crew after Rear Adm. Bob Wirth lost confidence in his ability to command. The Navy has not publicly shared the underlying cause.
Thanks to the SSBN dual-crew model and the depth at Submarine Group 10, the deterrent mission should hold course, even if there is short-term administrative turbulence as a new skipper takes the chair.
The triad is designed to ride through squalls such as this.
