Capt. John Randazzo, the new commanding officer of U.S. Naval Support Activity Naples in Italy, speaks at a change of command ceremony July 7, 2023. He replaced Capt. James Stewart at the ceremony. (Haydn Smith/U.S. Navy)
NAPLES, Italy — The opportunity of a lifetime almost didn’t happen for Capt. John Randazzo.
A few years ago, the decorated Navy helicopter pilot and squadron leader, whose 24-year career spans deployments to the Middle East and service at the Pentagon, was pondering retirement.
Leading a helicopter squadron through the first half of the pandemic and later fulfilling an important but less dynamic role in Washington had left him exhausted and uncertain.
But a conversation with his wife, Laura, brought clarity and Randazzo realized he wasn’t quite ready to leave the Navy. A new job on the chief of naval operations’ staff as executive assistant to the director of naval air warfare revitalized him.
“I felt that fire again, like I can make a difference,” Randazzo said during an interview last week.
On Friday, Randazzo relieved Capt. James Stewart to become the 36th commander of Naval Support Activity Naples, the service’s largest installation in Italy. The hourlong ceremony was overseen by Rear Adm. Brad Collins, commander of Navy Region Europe, Africa, Central.
“This is going to be my most challenging tour, for sure, and the place I can make the biggest impact,” said Randazzo, who joined the service in 1995 at 17 and spent a year at the U.S. Naval Academy Preparatory School before advancing to the academy.
Taking the job wasn’t a hard decision.
The mission was ideal, he thought, allowing him to apply the management skills he had refined in supporting service members and their families, among many responsibilities.
Naples also was the unanimous choice of his wife and two teenage children, who are experiencing their first overseas tour.
He is eager to try his hand at Italian cooking and woodworking, and visit the Sicilian town that shares his surname.
Capt. John Randazzo relieved Capt. James Stewart of command of Naval Support Activity Naples in a ceremony July 7, 2023, at the installation in Italy. (Facebook/NSA Naples)
Capt. James Stewart, former commander of U.S. Naval Support Activity Naples, receives the flag at his retirement and change of command ceremony July 7, 2023. (Haydn Smith/U.S. Navy)
Capt. John Randazzo became the 36th commanding officer of Naval Support Activity Naples in Italy on Friday, July 7, 2023. The transfer of command to Randazzo capped the 26-year career of his predecessor in the post, Capt. James Stewart. (Alison Bath/Stars and Stripes)
“This tour is a good match point for all of that,” said Randazzo, whose grandfather served as an enlisted sailor in Naples in 1946.
It’s a big assignment, he acknowledged. The base includes Capodichino, an administrative site near Naples International Airport, as well as family housing, schools and other services at Support Site, about 15 miles away.
A recreation area in nearby Pozzuoli, a port facility in Gaeta and responsibilities at Allied Joint Force Command Naples also are part of his new role. NSA Naples is home to U.S. 6th Fleet, among 55 commands.
Randazzo said he’ll spend his first months on the job building relationships with sailors, staff and others, a process that will help build the trust needed to fulfill the base’s mission. The effort incudes empowering people to ask challenging questions, he said.
Friday’s ceremony also capped a 26-year Navy career for Stewart, who had commanded the base since June 2020. Stewart steered the base and its more than 10,000 American and Italian personnel through the COVID-19 pandemic and the U.S. response in Italy to more than 4,300 Afghan refugees, among other accomplishments.
“For any other commander this might have seemed an overwhelming task but (Stewart is) one of the Navy’s best,” Collins said.
