Wow, good to see a no holds barred, regardless of rank accountability, we could do with some of that in the U.K.
On the face of it, perhaps, but only if you want to follow the Blame Society route. What is the incentive now for anyone to tell the truth to an investigation? The cause of the fire was allegedly arson, and this investigation reeks of hindsight bias. Finding fault with people all the way up the chain whose actions would have been acceptable but for a deliberately started catastrophic fire seems unusually 'holier than thou'. There may well have been shortcomings in individual responses, but the inevitable consequence of this attitude to responsibility will be the absence of any form of delegation and the need for people at all levels to become inextricably entwined in detail.
I am reminded of a Bulldog accident some years ago when the aircraft hit a wall during a forced landing after the engine stopped. The cause of the engine failure was loss of oil pressure, and that was because all the oil had departed via a sump plug that had been poorly secured during maintenance; the Board found the cause to be Aircrew Error (remember those days?) because the QFI screwed up the forced landing! Nonsense, I think we might agree. And without wishing to reopen the Mull debate, regardless of failings at senior levels (Chug's beloved VSOs) there were plenty of people in the Mull chain who did their jobs to the best of their ability but would probably have been found culpable by the sort of investigation conducted by the USN here. Echoes too of the RAF's 1970s policy whereby station commanders were fired for an accident on their unit even when it was plainly for circumstances beyond their control (technical failure, birdstrike etc.).
There is a USN institutional/organisational issue here, but this investigation seems to have been determined to find someone to punish rather than ensure the lessons are learned by the whole fleet. It will be very interesting to see exactly what lessons are learned, and by whom. All I can say is that I am glad the investigation system in the UK (AAIB and MAIB) does not work this way.