Apropos of assigning responsibility.

I have no idea.  Reading the info at the link above, and reading Dunnigan's piece (provided in it's entirety below) and the added caveat of I am *not* a submariner - it strikes me that if the San Francisco had the ability (and a reasonable expectation of the need to use it) to prevent the strike, then the fact that the Captain and members of appropriate staff divisions took a professional hit is entirely justified, death of a sailor or no.

There is a chain of failures (as is usually the case in events like this, regardless of service), a whole lot of little things that added up and ended in the death of a sailor, and injuries to others, and extensive damage to an expensive national asset.  Many of the other other failures in the chain were insignificant of themselves, it's only when you add them together that it manifests itself. 

And the hammer always falls hardest at the point where people could have done that last, reasonably expected thing, to prevent the accident.

Something similar can be argued to have happened regarding Abu Ghraib, where the odd links here and there of the causal chain starts up pretty high, and trickles to a torrent down to where the crimes occurred, and the farther down the chain that happens, the less the damage that attaches to the top.

LTG Sanchez  will go to his grave believing that Abu Ghraib cost him the fourth star that was his for the taking.  I think it did, too.  And I think it should have.  Which is probably, based on having read his book, where our opinions on that matter diverge. 

We don't know, based on the info available to me, what *else* may have happened to people at higher levels in the chain that lead to the grounding of the San Francisco and the death of Machinist Mate Second Class John Allen Ashley.  The lapses may not have risen to a level sufficient to support criminal sanctions - but who knows what words went into efficiency reports.  That can only be inferred from subsequent career changes, and even then, if you don't know the people and the community well, you're only guessing.

I don't know if Dunnigan is correct in his assessment of the NJP actions.  Back in the day when young Donovan commanded, you didn't offer article 15's under those circumstances unless you were willing to take it to that level - simply because if your bluff is called, you can lose a lot of credibility if you won't take it to the next step.  In my experience, at least, Article 15's are offered when you are dealing with an offense which, for whatever the reasons, you feel that a courts-martial, while supported by the evidence, would be overkill for the context of the offense, especially in matters of good order and discipline, or professional conduct that wouldn't be criminal in a civilian context.  That may well have been the case here - the impact of the lapses up the chain, the overall context of the offenses, may have found the convening authority with the sense that a courts-martial would be overkill when considered in the overall situation.  But MM2C Ashely died in a preventable accident, someone was responsible, and the Captain paid (appropriately I'm thinking) the heaviest price among the survivors

Privilege of command. 

Mebbe some of the sailors will weigh in.
 

90 Percent Of The Crew Was Injured
by James Dunnigan
September 28, 2008

Discussion Board on this DLS topic Three and a half years after the American submarine USS San Francisco hit the top of an underwater mountain, the medical report has been released. The collision, of a sub moving at over 50 kilometers an hour, smashed the sonar equipment that fills the bow (front) of the sub, as the boat careened off to one side. The sub's sudden change of speed and direction was unexpected by the crew. Thus 90 percent of the 138 man crew were injured. One sailor later died. Most of the injuries were minor, but a third of the crew had serious problems (nine had broken bones, two had dislocated shoulders, nine had concussions and 23 had cuts). Fortunately, the two sailors with medical training were not injured, and were able to prevent all but one of the injuries (a bad concussion) from getting worse. The navy is used its study of the San Francisco medical situation to make changes in how subs are equipped, and sailors trained, to deal with large scale injuries. The navy also noted that 15 percent of the crew still had psychological problems months after the accident. This is not unusual for sailors involved in a large scale accident. But there were other reasons for poor morale among the San Francisco sailors. The sea mount the sub hit had been spotted by survey satellites in 1999 and 2004, but the intelligence agency responsible, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, said it didn't have the money to update naval charts. Neither did the navy, or anyone else. Thus American submarines were allowed to continue moving around amidst all manner of uncharted hazards. Instead, the sailors on duty when the San Francisco hit the sea mount were punished for not having taken more frequent depth soundings (which would have indicated they might be approaching an obstacle), or consulting another map (than the one originally used) that showed a possible sea mount five kilometers from where they actually collided with one. The navy held the crew responsible for the collision. Six members of the crew were given non-judicial (no court martial) punishment for their actions, or inaction, that caused the accident. At the time (January, 2005), the sub was traveling at high speed and at 500 feet depth. The six sailors punished included officers, senior NCOs and lower ranking sailors. Punishment ranged from letters of reprimand to reduction in rank. The charges were hazarding a vessel and dereliction of duty. The investigators concluded that these six crewmen could have detected the approaching sea mount and taken evasive action if they had followed proper procedures. The captain of the sub was earlier relieved of command. At the same time, the navy also gave awards, for helping save the submarine after the collision, to eighteen NCOs and two officers. These included two Meritorious Service Medals, nine Commendation Medals, four Achievement Medals and five Letters Of Commendation. The lack of courts martial indicates that the navy didn't feel it had strong enough evidence for that approach, which is more like a jury trial, and demands more compelling evidence. The non-judicial punishment hurts, but does not destroy, the career of a submariner. This is because the navy has a hard time recruiting qualified people for this kind of work. The navy could have held one or more courts martial, but apparently were convinced that just using the non-judicial punishment would get the matter behind them with a minimum of fuss and penalty. The charges in the non-judicial hearings were of the you should have seen this coming and been more cautious variety. Anyone who knows anything about nuclear submarines, and their crews, knows that these are the most cautious and deliberate sailors in the fleet. Eventually, more details of these proceedings, and the collision itself, will come out.