Chaotic Synaptic Activity

Valour-IT Fundraiser

2009-10-23T10:04:00.001-04:00

Psst! Go "Over There!"

2006-05-17T01:49:00.000-04:00

In case you missed it, this is now the archives or the "junior blog." The postings have moved

OVER THERE!

Time to Move....

2006-05-10T21:15:00.000-04:00

I've been exploring the wonders of Wordpress and my own domain. I've begun the blog over there, but find it easy to just do the simple thing here on blogger.

So, I'll be moving the bulk of my work over the www.chaoticsynapticactivity.com. I tried importing everything, but somehow a small bit of postings (like all of 2005) didn't move over. I have been hanging back, and not pounding on it lately to figure it out, but I'd just have to go back and edit a lot of links anyhow....

I haven't completely gotten up to speed on getting the right files pointing at the other right files, and I'll be fiddling with the layout for at least the next few days, so if if you're not getting there, don't give up, just try later.

I'll leave this up as the archives, and have a link at the top of the blogroll section on the new site right now. My blogroll is presently quite limited, because I just have to type them all back in (if any one has a better way to shove them into MySql, please clue me in!).

I'm looking forward to improved capabilites, such as categorizing posts, to make it easier to dig around by subject.

If you have me blogrolled, please take a few moments and update your blog templates, or what ever format you have them in.

See you on the "other side!"

I Think This Would Qualify as an "F" Ticket Ride

2006-05-09T23:22:00.000-04:00

People with imaginations...and a copy of PhotoShop are to thank for this creation...

I'm sure Lex would agree this would break the "letter barrier" and we could refer to experiences such as this as "F ticket rides."

42 Years (and two days) Ago in a Country Far Away

2006-05-09T07:09:00.000-04:00

Note: I did this a few days ago, but lost the post, so it's late for the anniversary, but still worth taking a moment to consider this bit of history.

It was on this day, May 7th in 1954 that the French forces in Vietnam surrendered to General Giap, culminating the "57 Days of Hell," at a place now burned into the collective military knowledge, as a seminal battle, Dien Bien Phu.

The official website for the battle is here.

There is much to study and much to learn from this battle. Some might argue that we (the US) should have been supportive the man we call Ho Chi Minh in the aftermath of WWII and the subsequent strife in the region could have been avoided. Certainly, William Lederer, a retired Navy Captian with significant experience in SE Asia, tells an interesting story in "Our Own Worst Enemy". I first found this book while at the Naval War College in 87-88 and I have recently purchased a used copy and begun re-reading it. The book was published in 1968, and he prophetically listed a number of major factors that were not going well for us. The most striking, in my reading, was our lack of our understanding of the culture and history of the Vietnamese, and the great regional history, added to the exceptionally limited number of Americans who were literate in Vietnamese. Bill Lederer, on page 54 of his book describes a chance meeting in a bomb shelter in China, while waiting out a Japanese bombing raid, with a Jesuit priest and his assistant , Mr. Nguyen. After the raid, they went to the river gun boat and provided a copy of the US declaration of Independence to this oriental gentleman, at the request of the priest. The story seems to hold together well, when you read this document from Sept 2, 1945 (less than a month after VJ Day).

It begins thusly:

All men are created equal; they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable Rights; among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.

This immortal statement was made in the Declaration of Independence of the United States of America in 1776. In a broader sense, this means: All the peoples on the earth are equal from birth, all the peoples have a right to live, to be happy and free.

The Declaration of the French Revolution made in 1791 on the Rights of Man and the Citizen also states: "All men are born free and with equal rights, and must always remain free and have equal rights."

Those are undeniable truths.

Other reading tells us Ho Chi Minh actively supported the OSS in conducting guerilla warfare against the Japanese forces in the French Indochina region.

The net result, at the end of the war, is we didn't support freedom for all, but President Truman responded to the request of the French to allow them to return to their SE Asian colonies. The Japanese prisoners were armed and put to work ferreting out the Vietnamese nationalists, and assisting the French in re-establishing control.

Back to William Lederer. His book describes a people who once fought 1000 (yes, ONE THOUSAND) years agains the Chinese conquerors. I'd say that shows a cultural mentality of long term thought. By the way, the Vietnamese fought until they prevailed. That's a lesson in "stick to it-ness" if I ever read one.

Along the way to our effective withdrawal from the region in 1972, the French felt the fury of a people determined to be their own controlling authority. The French were overcome in a valley base of Dien Bein Phu. Bernard Fall wrote the early story of the battle, "Hell in a Very Small Place: The Seige of Dien Bien Phu". Obviously, because of the significance of a battle, where a large industrial nation's defeat by peasant farmers occured in the post WWII period, many other documents and studies have been conducted.

Miscalcualtion? Entangling alliances? Over confidence? Arrogance? Greed? It happened, its still a story in heroism and strong wills in battle.

"Proud" releases on DVD Today

2006-05-09T06:39:00.000-04:00

Today is the day when you will be able to purchase a story of WWII, of heroism and also of the racial integration of the US Armed Forces.

Produced by Ally Hilfiger, it's a story worth studying. The movie was also shown during the Tribeca Film Festival.

The reporting this bit of history about the crew of the USS MASON (DE-529) is available today on DVD.

Here is the Amazon.Com link to order it.

I've previously blogged a little about the story in a post here.

Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the trackback.

Thanks to OTB for the Traffic Jam!

Butchers Who Want You to Back Off and Go Home

2006-05-07T14:53:00.000-04:00

Disgusting and that's not strong enough a word for this blatant effort by the Islamic terrorists to make even more people cringe and turn against the war in Iraq. In fact, they want you to step back from the entire GWoT. The only problem is as you step back, they step forward.

I have regularly asked (in a virtual rhetorical format via this blog) just where are all the NOW women, and I now call to the male "feminists" as well. What's your response to the throat slitting of Atwar Buhjat?

At some point, you whiny liberal, "peace loving" people, I have bad news for you:

If you persist in your efforts to derail the free world from taking this group of criminals and sadists down, who have not perverted their religion, they are just strict adherents of the teaching of Mohammed, one day your back will be against the wall and your throat will be next.

How ironic, you call for peace, it is peace through weakness. These people were breed in a part of the world where to show a lack of strength is not only losing face, but also designates you as a target for attack. You have to study the cultural issues before you pontificate from your safe place, having grown up in a society that is full of compassion for those around them and that doesn't resort to killing anyone who sends a signal that they are a threat to the current person in power.

Most unfortunately, you cannot stop improperly used strength by having none of your own. It's a nice thought that one day we could, but while the president of Iran threatens to build nuclear weapons, and use them for no other reason then to destroy a culture he has been raised to blame for his own countries ills (sound familiar? Yep, same argument Mr. Hitler used to get into power in Germany in the 1930s....study it...it is happening again), I'd think you'd be buying plane tickets to go to hold up your daiseys in Teheran and also Sadr City, but there haven't been any news reports of a mass migration of "peace loving people" in the news. What's wrong? Afraid you'll be carted off to prison and your lawyer friends won't be able to get you out on bail before you are tortured (maybe with an electric drill) before you are summarily beheaded or shot in cold blood?

Go ahead...keep it up, they'll be sure to thank you by shaking your hands for your efforts to defeat George Bush, and any other president who will do the hard and right thing to protect us, before they place a hand around you, in order to keep you still while they take their 8" blade to your jugular arteries.

Now, a solution, for I hate "idea men" who can only complain, but not give you a way to fix it:

Your only hope, in the long run, is to not only support the troops, but to support the war. Thank the young men and women who daily sit 6000 miles from their family just for you. They may not know you, but they know you love freedom as they do, and they have the courage to raise their right hand and make the commitment for all of us.

In the short term, get your letter writing campaign to the terrorist leaders and the president of Iran. Tell them to stop, and boycott their products and services (oops! Pardon me, but just what is it they produce other than death, slavery and mahem?). How about booking your plane tickets to Israel, where you can be human shields to prevent another major event of genocide.

As for the women of the world, and Alan Alda, time to (SU)³!

Little Green Footballs reports the same story, but the comments on posts there are always good reading.

UPDATE 05/08/2006: It seems the video is not of Atwar Buhjat, who is reported to be alive and well, but the victim is a Nepalese truck driver. In some small way, that takes away from my rant above, but I still see it as a symptom of a gruop who has but one end in mind: Victory, and a will that is strong to pursue that.

H/T: Mudville Gazette.

42 Years Ago in a Country Far Away

2006-05-07T14:02:00.000-04:00

Welcome LGF readers. Thanks for stopping by.

Now, to the featured event:

The official website for the battle is here.

It begins thusly:

All men are created equal; they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable Rights; among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.

This immortal statement was made in the Declaration of Independence of the United States of America in 1776. In a broader sense, this means: All the peoples on the earth are equal from birth, all the peoples have a right to live, to be happy and free.

The Declaration of the French Revolution made in 1791 on the Rights of Man and the Citizen also states: "All men are born free and with equal rights, and must always remain free and have equal rights."

Those are undeniable truths.

Other reading tells us Ho Chi Minh actively supported the OSS in conducting guerilla warfare against the Japanese forces in the French Indochina region.

Miscalcualtion? Entangling alliances? Over confidence? Arrogance? Greed? It happened, its still a story in heroism and strong wills in battle.

Thanks to Little Green Footballs for the open post.

More Humorous Signage

2006-05-07T14:00:00.000-04:00

T-Shirt sighting: "Scars are tattos with better stories" I like it....

Even if it Tastes Like Chicken...

2006-05-04T16:27:00.000-04:00

I don't think it would go well trying to slice this banana onto your Cherrios... Located on Worth 1000.

Operation "Forward Pass" - For Graduation Time

2006-05-03T16:35:00.000-04:00

This post has been in the mental crock pot for a few days now. While checking my sitemeter log, I saw a hit from Instapinch, a blog of a former Naval Aviator, so I chased it. His post on graduation from college and heading to the cradle of Naval Aviation for AOCS has motivated me to finish it and ask the rest of you to tossing your stuff into the pool of knowledge for the soon to be graduates in our country.

UPDATE 5/12/2006: A little more on the New & Improved blog...Yes, I'm calling for papers for this project!

In the weapons world, with one weapon system in particular I worked with, the future plan was to have the ability to fire the weapon from sea, and a forward observer, usually in an aircraft, could take control and "tweak" the flight path. The capability would be called "forward pass." I see this concept outlined below as a similar capability. Stick with me and read the post.

In my MilBlogging Conference AAR - Part II, I spent a few minutes drafting the types of military bloggers that are developing. In the case of the active duty and veteran MilBlogs, I see an opportunity I'd like you (in those two categories) to consider as we are coming up to graduation for not only high school, but also the service academies and the many colleges and universities that have ROTC departments.

And I can hear it now: "And your point is?"

Do you have any good advice for the soon to be military members, both enlisted and officer? Was there a particular "mentor" you had that gave you the best piece of advice you ever heard to help you transition into the military and you found out, by the test of time, that it was wisdom suitable for mention to those who will don the uniform behind us? Do you have antecdotes, "sea stories" or the like, that will provide some valuable insight? Your stories, posted for the next genration of warriors, is hereby dubbed "Operation Forward Pass."

Have you already taken the time to provide same to some family friend, young workmate, or relative, that you could share with the blogsphere?

If you have a well read blog, yet have no stories to pass on, but have a target audience of those who are coming up on joining, you could link to the posts that come up on other blogs? I think this would be a great topic area for blogs written by family members of current military personnel, for they most likely are already attracting a readership of parents and spouses of soon to be military members. The extention of the stories through these blogs would greatly expand the "max effective range" of such knowledge.

In the couple of years I've been reading blogs, there have been several powerfully written posts such as this, sometimes taken from email, or letters of others kind enough to send them to a blogger. There may be enough wisdom already written to quickly do a summary post of a blogs posts, linking to the good stuff used already.

There have been a few DEPers out there blogging, and they have gotten some great inputs from others. I recall last year, a USMA Cadet had a blog up, and there was lots of good stuff sent his way.

If you're a DEPer, or ROTC/Academy type and blogging, you could certainly share the advice you're received as you approach the day you will raise your right hand and swear to defend The Constitution.

Take a minute, consider the wisdom you have gained with regard to your entry into the profession of arms, and see if it's fit to recycle for the next generation. Who knows what the max effective range of your blog is...it just might turn out to be several generations...

So, what do you think? Should we begin "OFP" now? Do we need a sidebar graphic for those particpating by posting their own stories, and those who will "autocat" them? There has got to be tomes of valuable insight awaiting those who need it, in specific and generic terms.

Not only will the information alone be useful, but it will give you a chance to honor the person who took the time to help you "assimilate." To provide proper attibution will give you a public forum to thank them and to let them know, or those who google them up, that they had an impact in someone's life.

I ask you to step up and share the pieces of discrete knowledge you have.

Maybe It's Time for This: Online Integrity

2006-05-02T13:59:00.000-04:00

A short, but common sense list of princples has been posted at Online Integrity:

# Private persons are entitled to respect for their privacy regardless of their activities online. This includes respect for the non-public nature of their personal contact information, the inviolability of their homes, and the safety of their families. No information which might lead others to invade these spaces should be posted. The separateness of private persons’ professional lives should also be respected as much as is reasonable. # Public figures are entitled to respect for the non-public nature of their personal, non-professional contact information, and their privacy with regard to their homes and families. No information which might lead others to invade these spaces should be posted. # Persons seeking anonymity or pseudonymity online should have their wishes in this regard respected as much as is reasonable. Exceptions include cases of criminal, misleading, or intentionally disruptive behavior. # Violations of these principles should be met with a lack of positive publicity and traffic.

Sound reasonable? Doing it already? Sign up...

Wow! Look at Us Bloggers Go!

2006-05-02T11:41:00.000-04:00

Interesting analysis on "The State of the Blogosphere" using Technorati data @ Sifry Alerts Blog:
Part I and Part II.
Excerpts to tease you into reading the posts:

New blog creation continues to grow. Technorati currently tracks over 75,000 new weblogs created every day, which means that on average, a new weblog is created every second of every day - and 19.4 million bloggers (55%) are still posting 3 months after their blogs are created.

Late last month, I gave a high-level overview of the growth of the blogosphere, covering the overall size of the data sets that Technorati tracks, the number of new blogs created each day, the number of posts per day, and the issue of splogs or spam blogs. To recap, here's the highlights of Part 1: * Technorati now tracks over 35.3 37.3 Million blogs * The blogosphere is doubling in size every 6 months * It is now over 60 times bigger than it was 3 years ago * On average, a new weblog is created every second of every day * 19.4 million bloggers (55%) are still posting 3 months after their blogs are created * Technorati tracks about 1.2 Million new blog posts each day, about 50,000 per hour

H/T: Black Five.

101st Fighting Keyboardist Division...

2006-05-01T16:45:00.000-04:00

The new logo off to the left is for those who desire to jump in an defend the defenders, using their keyboards as the weapon of choice...More at The Captain's Quarter's!

A Powerful Movie - "The War Tapes"

2006-05-01T16:17:00.000-04:00

While attending the meeting at Fran O'Brian's and the MilBlogging Conference, I had the opportunity to meet Deborah Scranton and SPC Mike Moriaty. What's significant about that? Deborah, when offered the opportunity to go to Iraq as an embed, countered with "can you have the troops film their year and I'll make it a movie?" They told her, as long as she provided the cameras and got the soldiers to volunteer to help her.
The result is "The War Tapes.". This past weekend, the film was shown at the Tribeca Film Festival in NYC.
The reviews seem to indicate the movie tells a powerful story, to a sold out crowd. as it was throught the eyes of three men who chose to take the cameras provided. Andi of Andi's World has her review. Note: Andi was the one who not only suggested, but made the MilBlogging Conference happen. Matt of Black Five also has a review of his sneak preview.
The movie will be making its way to theaters around the country starting in June. Get to the website and sign up in the community, so you'll get announcements on the schedule...

And Now for Some Light Humor...

2006-05-01T16:15:00.000-04:00

Signage, in the form of bumper stickers and, in this case, a message done with white liquid shoe polish on a car's back window last Friday on the way home gave me a smile, and I'm sure the writer made one point, yet missed another: "Honk if your illiterate" heh... Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

NY Times and Unfettered Lies - "The War Tapes"

2006-05-01T08:22:00.000-04:00

Short intro: "The War Tapes" is the chonicling of a year in Iraq by members of the Vermont National Guard. Several soldiers did the filming, with the cameras being provided for them by the film's producer, Deborah Scranton. Well, once more, the MSM/HBM, in the form of the New York Times has the gall to just make a statement that is absolutely wrong. Read the review of "The War Tapes" movie at the Tribeca Film Festival here. It's part way down in the NY Times article, between other movie reviews from the festival, but here is the false statement from the NY Times reporter:

It is fascinating to observe how a prevailing cynicism about the war doesn't undercut the deeply felt patriotism of men who assume that its goal is not the establishment of democracy in the Middle East, but the acquisition of oil and money.

Taking a look at the website for the movie, here are comments from Mike, one of the soldiers who did the filming, and one other who were there for the year deployment:

Oil and money? Actually I never said it was for oil and money. I support the mission in Iraq and its intentions. I feel the US Military is doing a terrific job in many many areas. I do think we are moving too slowly and too delicately. Too busy being nice and treading lightly. Its a war. I had an elderly Iraqi gentlemen tell me this weekend at the conference our problem is that we lost our "angry face". He went on to educate me how the enemy insurgents in the Middle East always have and always will respond to one thing and one thing only. Brutal opponents. Hell,maybe we should take some oil while we are there. We deserve it. Posted by: Mike M. | April 25, 2006 08:32 PM Funny. I don't remember anything about oil while I was there? Do you, Mike? We never escorted oil out of the country. In fact, the only Fuel I saw was being IMPORTED from the outside. Posted by: Kinsella | April 26, 2006 10:52 AM If the war is for oil then why are gas prices so high? As far as the war supposedly being for money,thats funny. Money for who? All I saw was money being spent. I just dont see the profit here. Profit for Halliburton maybe,but someone please tell me what other company is big enough and prepared enough to replace them. Dont get me wrong KBR needs some major belt tightening as far as I'm concerned but lets get off the Cheney/Halliburton thing. Its only for the sake of trashing the administration.Dick Cheney isnt in Iraq telling KBR to fix my air conditioner 7 times in 6 days and to charge the tax payer for every visit. The problem isnt them being there,its that noone can really watch the numbers and question them. NON PRODUCTIVE folks. That kind of whining doesnt help prevent another guy from getting blasted at 50 Alpha. Posted by: Mike M. | April 26, 2006 11:58 AM

The sad part is those comments will most likely never make it to the NY Times pages as a correction to a film critic turned master strategist by watching a few films. On the bright side, I suspect people who have believed this falsehood on the war for oil will now, based on the review, go to see it in order to gather "evidence" to support their beliefs. Once they have seen it, I suspect they will have found out Mr. Holden tricked them into seeing the war in a different light than they had hoped to, spoiling their agruments from now on. I will say, if this in Mr. Holden's intention, to cause them to enter the "kill zone" and to ambush that lie, he does the world a great service by making the film more widely viewed and understood. Side note: The NY Times film critic, Stephen Holden, seems to fancy himself as an accomplished psychologist, too:

When they return in triumph, two are suffering from signs of post-traumatic stress they are reluctant to address.

I think Mr. Holden should keep his day job and get a grip on reality. Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the trackback....

"Another American Century or Another American Civil War?"

2006-04-28T14:12:00.000-04:00

From the great poster and former blogger, Fjordman, a regular commenter on Litte Green Footballs in the comments for this article "Muslim Groups will march with Illegals":

I am always working on several posts at the same time, now including one called "Another American Century or Another American Civil War?" You Americans need to understand just how much is at stake here. We are in the early stages of a world war with Islam, Muslims are working to get nuclear weapons and are openly calling for the physical destruction of the West. Your enemies are watching the way you are handling the illegal situation, and they are not impressed. Do you think the North Koreans or the Iranians are scared of a country that allows itself to be intimidated and held hostage by a bunch of Mexicans who shouldn't even be in the country in the first place? When you're a supwerpower, the line of separation between domestic and foreign policy hardly exists. During the Cold War, the Soviet Union was impressed by the way Ronald Reagan handled the blackmail by the air trafic controllers. He simply fired them. This signalled to your enemies abroad that you were not going to give into black mail anywhere.
What is at stake here is your credibility as a superpower. In the longer run, it could be your physical security from nuclear attacks, perhaps even your very survival as a coherent nation state.
DO NOT give in to Mexican intimidation. Build the fence, and deport the illegals. Yes, ALL of them. No amnesty.
We are facing decades of what could potentially become the deadliest war in human history, where the very survival of Western civilization and perhaps human civilization in general hangs in the balance. We cannot win this without you. You are the indispensible nation, and if you break down, the rest of the planet is basically screwed.

Fjordman also has some thought provoking info at the Gates of Vienna blog. He has been reporting on the spreading problems Eurabia is seeing from the massive immigration without assimilation. Here is one of his recent posts: "New Oslo Peace Process".
He may be our Paul Revere for this time in history. Are we willing to consider his analysis?
Update 4/29/2006: Daily there is more international news, not reported by the MSM with any detail, on what lies ahead. I submit our "tolerance" of the "religion of peace" is doing nothing more than bringing on a world conflict, which, but all written history, begun as the followers of Mohammed spread their religion/politics across the middle east, into the Indian subcontinent, and then to Europe within about the time frame of one century. The fighting that has taken the lines of battle back and forth since then is what we are still engaged in. With the addition of nuclear weaponry, modern telecommunications and international travel by air, the battle lines are no longer measurabel on a map. Fjordman has it half right in his coming article, but I am rapidly coming to tne belief that the coming American Civil War (stay tuned for the Battle of the Illegal Immigrants on May 1, 2006) is merely a cover stroy for the coming global war on all things not Islamic. See this story on "Judgement Day", not brought to you by President Bush and his cabal of right wing Biblical friends, but another president that is quickly having his name become a household word...it's not going to be pretty and the size of our amred forces will not be large enough to take it on as we are now. The draft will be for more than just the sons of Republicans, but for all those who do not desire to live in slavery to the thoughts of a 7th century epileptic.
Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post and Outside the Beltway for the OTB Caption Jam.

MilBlogging Conference AAR - Part II

2006-04-27T23:23:00.000-04:00

Part I
Editorial note: I thought I was in it Saturday during the conference, but I found it Monday driving home....
The comments from the conference are mulitplying (go figure!) and posted at Andi's World. Great reads all, but the best one is this one from Steve Schippert from Threats Watch just goes to show you how a simple effort can help someone else.
I added Black Five's discussion at the top of the entries, for I think it's worth keeping in our thoughts as we blog: What is the "max range" of your blog?
I've had a little time to think over the MilBlogging Conference adventure. Here is some detail to go with a "take away" point:
From Part I:

Top levels “take away” points:
1) “Stay in your lane” is good guidance. Blog on what you know. With a rule like that, you should be bulletproof if a question is posed about how factual your commentary is.

In regards to that direction, have you noticed how hard it is to tell the person who just told you their story that they are wrong? If they told you another person's story, it can be picked apart. When it's yours to tell, just what will they say? Nada...or they'll just whip out the ad hominum stuff and tell you how stupid you are. So...stick with what you know for sure.
The focus of 2/3rds of the Conference day was essentially discussions centered on blogging issues dealing with current world ops in the GWoT. Certainly, that provides an essential foundation for future MilBlogging, for the comments on "think carefully about who is reading this blog" is a fitting framework for all other blogging for the community (not a bad idea for everyone else, too...what if kids on MySpace posted based on what their parent's reaction would be...but I digress).
I see several subdivisions of MilBlogs and by wrtiing this, I think it will help frame what people are doing, as well as maybe someone reading this will realize they may have a part to play as well.
1) MilBlogs that are fundimentally daily diaries. Smash and CJ got their starts there, and so much of the active duty blogs today are in this "model." At the conference, CJ admitted this was his venting method during his time in theater, and Smash initially did it to get the word back home to his family (he has since matured, or "evolved" to being our BlogDaddy, so I'm looking for a present at Christmas this year). Begun as coping mechanisms, they are, in fact, history being recorded from a first person's view, with out the Monday Morning Quarterbacking. One other blog like this of note is no longer active, the 365 and a Wakeup blog of Capt Danjel Bout, CA National Guard, but is one of the finest pieces of writing I have found.
2) MilBlogs that are designed as support networks, out in the open bulletin boards. The panel discussion on this topic was amazing. The power of the Internet, combined with some family members wanting information, turned these early seekers into mentors for spouses and parents all over the country. Carla, of Some Soldier's Mom and Deb of Marine Corps Moms are two like this. Included in this area would be blogs such as Soldier's Angels.
3) MilBlogs written by non-active duty people with significant "discrete knowledge" and usually are analysis/commentary on geo-political/military matters. Not constrained by DoD rules, and also "out of the loop" of current tactical/startegic info, these blogs stand to be a powerful part of the "Army of Davids" that Col Austin Bay referenced several times during his conference remarks. The insight provided by these blogs can help either the MSM or just plain old citizens understand the issues in military operations more consisely. Threats Watch is one of these, and the work of Bill Roggio at The Fourth Rail is another of note. I would also put Eagle Speak here, for he runs a great blog on stuff that tends to the leagl side of maritime affairs, with piracy being a major topic these days.
4) Personal historical MilBlogs. Cheaper and easier than publishing a book, and you don't need an editor to tell you to do parts over...lots of veterans fit here, such as much of my current work. I have also found it quite rewarding to document storeis of many of the older vets I find.
5) Organizational blogs designed particularly to support the troops. There are many, but at the moment I'm thinking it's pretty late and I can continue this discussion later.
As far as the blogs mentioned above, I linked them for some quick examples, but I know there are many more that fall into the same groupings. My blogroll has plenty of them to pick from.
That's about enough for the moment. Again, as I got taught: to tell them what you're going to tell them, tell them, then tell them what you told them. Here's the wrap up: By categorizing the main discussions of MilBlogs, I think it will help each blogger frame where "their lane" may be, and therefore keep the work applicable and effective in the greater discussions of our society. I also think the rest of the world will better know where to go to read, and some of them will realize they are an intergral part of the MilBlog community, they just haven't taken the time to get going yet. Later, it will help subdivide our networking for any efforts we undertake.
Comments welcome.
Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

I FOUND IT!

2006-04-26T08:38:00.000-04:00

During the return home from the MilBlogging Conference, I found that mythical place that so many other have..... So, one more mystery of life solved: Hog Heaven is a place witth an address... MilBlogging post-conference work delayed to watcht the Lightening play hockey the way it was meant to be: Full contact, helmets, gloves, sticks, punches all flying.... PS: If you want the full address, leave me comments.

MilBlogging Conference AAR - Part I

2006-04-23T16:45:00.000-04:00

Part II
I can’t help but feel something pretty powerful happened yesterday, and, with luck, years from now, about 150 of us can say “back at the first conference, we wore jeans and T-Shirts…none of this fancy black tie stuff was allowed!”
While the air of informality reigned, it was the meeting and greeting and putting faces to text, followed by exciting conversation and thought provoking panel discussions.
Top levels “take away” points:
1) “Stay in your lane” is good guidance. Blog on what you know. With a rule like that, you should be bulletproof if a question is posed about how factual your commentary is.
2) Don’t underestimate the “max effective range” of your comments. The well placed furor over Fran’s Steakhouse lease began when FbL’s not very big readership blog made those fateful remarks, that, within days, became national level news in the MSM! Other stories were told that indicated similar results, in the most unexpected manner.
3) Your stories relating to military life and issues can be a powerful factor in closing the gap between the military/ex-military and the non-serving public. Share them wisely.
4) A lady who does marketing for a living indicated the rise of the blogosphere pretty much coincides with the declining readership of the dead tree media. One more powerful point: They don’t augment their understanding of events with blogs, they turn to the blogs for info. Take a moment to soak that one in.
5) She also said psychology studies show when a message of fear is delivered via TV, the viewer connects “better” with the message, which also makes the viewer more attentive to the commercials. That means the fear produces better results for the advertisers, which means the show/network can make more dollars this way. It pays to make us fearful….
6) Chuck Z says he’s upset that the MSM doesn’t tell the bad. Interesting point that makes you go “HUH?” until you hear the rest. He told of an insurgent who gunned down his own nephew so he could get a shot at two of Chuck’s sergeants. That was never in the news. Other examples followed that one.
7) Also from Chuck Z, he says it’s a great feeling to walk into a wounded service person’s room and bring them a laptop that makes a significant change in their life. Valour-IT – it’s making a difference in a big way.
8) Given the changing sources of sought out information coming from blogs, we bloggers have become “accidental journalists.” I’d say not only is that interesting, it also should give us some reason to not repeat those mistakes we complain about the MSM making, lest we fall victim to them ourselves as time passes and this form of info sharing becomes part of the MSM of the future.
9) Our efforts provide “individuals with discrete knowledge.” Back to take away lesson 1: Use it wisely, particularly by staying in your area of expertise. Resist the urge to pretend you know more than you do.
More to come. I'm still enroute home and visiting.
Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the trackback!
Thanks to ARGGHHH! for the tracback!

DC MilBlogging Conference

2006-04-22T11:26:00.000-04:00

Some earlier info... The first session is over and the discussion was centered on the purpose and (implied) the responsibility of MilBloggers. I'm sure the main site is going to cover this well. The side discussions have been interesting. After thinking Neptunus Lex was this completely amazing writer of the "Rythyms" blogvel, I now know he has had assistance from a ghost....well, it's still good anyhow, and I understand how the ghost writing made the detail of another area fit the overall "look and feel" of reality the Lex so masterfully weaves into the online story. More later, but this is "from my perspective," something that was highlighted as to what we can do best in the MilBlogging universe. Thank you to Mudville Gazette for the trackback....

Semi-Live Blogging from DC MilBlogging Conference - Part II

2006-04-22T00:43:00.000-04:00

Part I Lesson learned: When you are having the first conference and the population is largely those who don't post their pictures, tell everyone to bring one of those spring steel crickets, like they used with the airborne troops on D-Day. Got there at 8PM, the bar was packed and no one was discernably standing at the entrance, with a box of "Hello, My Name Is" stickers. I got a drink and stood back doing the visual sweep. I did notice a couple in one of the side halls, the women looking ever so slightly familiar. Another guy wandered in and leaned against the door frame, looking around. I told him he'd have to push up to the bar to get help. He said "I'm supposed to be meeting a group of people here at 8:30, but we don't know what each other look like." DING, DING, DING! It was DadManly. Hand shake, a chuckle, and then I approached the couple. It was Smash and spouse. Buzz Patterson zipped thru, and then we began to form up quickly. Andi had a stack of blank white name tags and the obligatory fat black pen, and those of us who had filled one table made ours. I then slef-appointed and figured the best way to meet everyone was to be the name tag person. Lots and lots of people showed up. Lots of good conversations, and nice to put faces and real names to the reading.... The discussions were from ackward, like "ummm...I haven't read your blog..." to discussions on the status of books, self funded trips to the 'Stan, and "I'm glad to see you here." It's late. Chap: Too bad you're on TAD, because there are a few people here you'd really enjoy. More later (no promise as to when)! Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

Semi-Live Blogging from DC MilBlogging Conference - Part I

2006-04-21T18:49:00.000-04:00

I'm checked in after a long drive and three family visits enroute, and will be heading to Fran's Restaurant tonight for the pre-MilBlogging Conference join up, but more importantly, to shake a few hands and say a few words of thanks to our service personnel, while trying not to interupt their free steak dinner. LCDR and Mrs Smash will be here, and I think one other tagged with being a navy type in the list of attendees. I'm looking forward to getting to know some of the people I have read much of over the last two years. I was hoping Capt Lex would make an excuse to make a cross country, but....he's busy, I guess, becoming an systems engineer.... If you're not already briefed in on the furor over Fran's lease not being renewed, go here, read and chase the links. Hilton boned this one up (even the MSM is writing negative things!). Fran is also looking to set up a fund to keep the dinners for the wounded personnel from Walter Reed going. If you have a few spare $$$, that may be a good place to drop them. More later!

Note to the Complaining Generals

2006-04-19T22:44:00.000-04:00

Dear sirs: A caller to a radio talk show today reminded me of a man from history that should be your role model. The problem is, you all have now gotten out, and can't pull this off. Sucks to miss the opportunity to rush through a salinet and tear up the rear of the enemy, does it? Sorry, I digress, so to my point, three words: GENERAL Billy Mitchell.

Operation Praying Mantis - 18 Years Ago

2006-04-18T13:16:00.000-04:00

I received a comment on my A Journey into History - Part IX that discussed my participation in Operation El Dorado Canyon 20 years ago.
The author of an upcoming book about the mining of the USS SAMUEL B ROBERTS (FFG-58), Bradley Peniston, left me a note indicating that 18 years ago today, the retaliation for the attack on the ROBERTS was conducted. That was Operation Praying Mantis.
Brad's book, No Higher Honor, tells the story of the crew of the ROBERTS, led by the Captain, CDR Paul X. Rinn, in their efforts that saved the ship from sinking, despite having a broken keel. The book is due out in June of this year.
Excerpt:

At twenty-five knots, the sea came on quickly. Its surface, wrinkled and opaque, rushed toward the warship, split against the steel prow, and became a fleeting trail of foam pointing back toward Kuwait.
Four decks above the waterline, Seaman Bobby F. Gibson leaned over the forecastle rail and twisted the focus knob on his binoculars. His metal chair, bolted to the main deck just behind the bow, afforded a panoramic view of the central Persian Gulf. The 19-year-old from Walkertown, N.C., took in the scene one small circle at a time.

Looks like a pretty well written beginning...
Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

I Had a Choice, Too

2006-04-17T19:39:00.000-04:00

It's getting downright depressing when your "leadership" bails, then puts on suits and ties and whines like spamked little boys. On the other hand, it puts a smile on my face to see the all of a sudden (left wing) supporters (who used to think anyone in the military couldn't get a job in "real life") somehow believe the complaints of 6 former generals will cause the President to move aside the SecDef. That's hilarious.
I can't say every day in my 20 years was the way I would have done it. On top of that, I thank God it wasn't sometimes. I worked for some excellent officers who had plenty of practical experience at the profession to help guide me along. I enjoyed my time, overall, but a few days I'd like not to remember.
My first real choice came in 1980. I was coming to the end of my obligated time based on the acceptance of an ROTC scholarship. By then, I had served aboard two ships and had made one forward deployment and what seemed like on, due to the time spent out of homeport on a newly commissioned vessel (and most of it wasn't in some exotic overseas ports, but in beautiful Pascagoula, MS, in the shipyard). I thought several things could be done better and I made a choice. I could get out and complain, and have no real power to effect change, or I could stay in and work towards what was better than the existing conditions. I stayed.
I was sent ashore to a training command, where I had the chance to improve on the training I had received, for the new crews coming through my office. With the tutoring of many fine men in my shop, we, together, produced some outstanding results, which were widely complimented and recognized to the top levels of a major training facility.
I spent a tour as a Department Head. I had great role models from when I had been a Division Officer, but there was room to improve. Once more, with a fine crew supporting me, and two great captains, we did some spectacular things.
On a sea going staff, with a commodore who never saw a tasking, for us or anyone else, he wasn't willing to say to "my staff can do that!" I'll say this: The positive part was we got our fingers into all sorts of exciting things. The negative part was there wasn't many minutes (I chose that word carefully) left in the days to sleep. The personal management at this period of my career left somethings to be desired, but we all lived, even if the wives had separate plans to reduce our workload. I see a microcosm of the desrciptions of Secretary Rumsfield being a hard man to work with in that time of my life, under one commodore. We had to have done our homework and you better be on top of what was going on, or we got asked where we got our SWO pins from (you guessed it, the answer was provided many times: A cracker Jack box). Was it pleasant? Nope. Did it make a point? When it was over, was it recognized as a "teaching method" that worked? Yep. Would I use it? Nope (well, one time in a particular situation I did). I blended the message with other teaching/mentoring styles I had been taught, and I think I was effective.
As I worked my way up the "increasing responsibility" ladder, I had several occassions to either complain, or work to fix "it." In 1988, I did just that, and ended up actively working a side project for 5 years. Along the way, I had the opportunity to look some of my seniors in the eye and tell them they were making it essentially impossible on the fleet sailors and officer to comply, while I had to fail ships at inspections. My option was to roll up my sleeves and do something, while telling the big boss' staff to extricate body parts and rewrite directives. One four striper in particular, didn't like what I was trying to say at all. One weekend, I spent about 20 hours making an Excel sheet to graphically depict what I had been talking about. When he looked at that, he agreed and became the biggest proponent in getting it all changed. I didn't care he was presenting it to the Admiral as his plan, the fact of the matter was he understood and then was able to fix things. There are days I realize it sure didn't help me make the last few career steps, but in the end, the fleet did get relief and sensibilty applied.
There were times in the downsizing of the shore based training and inspection teams I was tasked to plan how to do it. I had plans submitted that were "modified" to the point of not being effective, but I said my peace, then saluted and gave a cherry "aye, aye!" and made it happen with what I had left.
I never made flag, but all I can say to the generals is I'm pretty disgusted and I expect more. Thankfully, no one I worked for has ever shown such bad manners. Sirs, if you didn't like what was happening, I say it was your duty to stay in and constructively argue your point, but to know when it was acceptable to try someone else's way to get it done. If it ever got so bad as to be intolerable, then it was your duty to submit your resignation, citing the issues clearly, but not to keep your mouth's shut until you can cut a book deal.

A Journey into History - Part IX

2006-04-15T02:00:00.000-04:00

Part I, Part II, Part III,Part IV, Part V, Part VI, Part VII, Part VIII

As you might imagine from the previous posts, we were busy. For this set of ops, each CVBG would handle one target each, so deconfliction would be pretty easy. Having been in the Med since January and assigned to chase a subsurface threat that never materialized, this time the ASW Commander's Intentions message speculated there would be no opposition in that area. Not only did the Libyan's show little interest in coming out to sea to try to get a torpedo off at us, the Soviet subs had largely been replaced with surface ships over the last month, which we assumed was a strategic move to limit the possibility of one of their subs being engaged. Not only did the SOVREMNNEY DDG and KARA CG become our "tattletales," they had made it a point to stay on the north side of the formations, but always within visual range of the carrier.

Our CVBG had been in the western Med, at port visits. We had gotten underway and directed to steam to the north of Sicily. We "parked" up there, and then in the late day of the 13th, we were ordered to plan for a modified EMCON "A" transit of the Strait of Messina, that narrow passge between the boot of Italy and the island of Sicily. we would have to proceed single file, and with all our military radios and radars off. We would keep our navigational lights on.

THe Strait of Messina is a challenge, even in the daylight, because there is a ferry to the island and the captains decided they have the right of way over all others. There is plenty of other traffic, such as vessels coming from Naples and heading south and east, and then throw in the fishermen. Now, envision this all happening on a dark night, with a low, solid overcast, so any moonlight is eliminated as an aid to the lookouts and bridge watch teams.

In amongst all this planning, we heard the USAF was going to participate. The air wing weaponeers then had to shift their work to set up a two carrier strike on Benghazi, while the Air Force would take out the targets in Tripoli. Side note: The Libyans have renamed their city to Tarabulus from Tripoli. Thankfully, my staff didn't need to be flexible over this issue, so we settled in to set up planning the screening ship stations for the transit.

I don't recall what time we departed our staion north of Sicily, but it was well into the night. We took off at high speed fro the Strait of Maessina, and I was thankful that I would be able to sit back and watch my SWO counterparts in the BIDDLE's ship's company sweat out this exciting transit of the Strait. To the east, the glow of Mt Vesuvius could be seen in the night sky. The surface traffic of many types of commerical and private vessels in the vicinity was quite dense and I'm sure the conversations between the bridges, lookouts and CICs were all too busy that night.

Successfully transiting the Strait, our battle group reformed on itself and headed into the Ionian Sea (central Med). I swear it almost was like a cartoon, as we rushed at top speed down there, then put on the brakes hard, as the strike package began the launch. The operations were going as planned, at least from where I was able to listen, and now it was time to settle back and let the aviators do what they had been trained to do best.

Different from the previous operations in this series of showing the flag to Col Khadaffi, we had believed there would be subsurface activity. When we pronounced that, based on intelligence estimates, there were plenty of reported "goblins." The confidence in these contacts was usually the lowest confidence, but we still needed track them. We used DRT tracing paper over the charts of the Med, in addition to recording position reports in JOTS, and we constantly analyzed "time, speed and distance," to check and see if the postion was a new contact, or continuation of a prior ASW prosecution. This time, no one reported any subsurface contacts at all.

I made this observation about this night: Everything anyone did, who I had contact with, whether it be the radio communications or face to face discussions, was absolutley professional. Proper radio-telephone (R/T) and internal communications were crisp, and properly formatted. Call signs and codewords were used exclusively. Conversations were not any longer than necessary. We had the strike frequency put up in our CIC Flag module, so we could hear what was going on miles to our south. The data links were running exactly as they taught you in the school house and team training. Somehow the focus on conducting real world ops against a real enemy really focused the entire battle force.

Since I don't directly recall, I'll rely on the Operation El Dorado Canyon entry at Wikipedia, which says the strike happened at 2AM local time. I recall the "feet dry" call from the Navy Strike leader, and then it was dead silent a few minutes later as the planes cleared the beach and headed back to us, taking their nose count as soon as they called "feet wet." We heard each plane answer up. We then listened to the Air Force go feet wet and check for all planes. The count went well for a while, then when one number was called, there was no response. They called the pilot several times, then announced one plane was not with them. It was a sinking feeling.

Anyhow, the deed was done, 20 years ago tonite. I was there. It is my only claim to combat operations, and I had a seat near the head tables for all of it. One day I'll wrap this all up with some of the tactical things I observed/learned. I guess the most interesting thing for me in having participated was when I later went to the Naval War College Command and Staff course in Newport, RI, was how the Maritime Ops trimester focused almost exclusively on this operation. There was an EA-6B backseater named Ed in the same class with me, and we were the only two who had bragging rights about being in there. Many times, the class would get asked a question about operations and they alluded to situations/conditions/ops that were highlighted by the Gulf of Sidra ops, and we felt like kids who had been given answers to the test at the beginning of the school year. On the other hand, we'd answer questions with real world solutions we had seen, and we would be told "that's not doctrine!"

One day, I was asked to model the operational chain of command for a three CVBG, with a USAF component. I went to the chalkboard and commenced to begin drawing the "who would work for who diagram. Our moderator keot commenting from the back of the room, where he had gone as I went forward, "that's not in accrodance with DOCTRINE!" I finally looked at the Navy Capt and said "Well, sir, it worked fine for Adm Jerimiah!" then I turned around and went back to drawing.

Anyhow, suffice it to say, it was an experience!

Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

Sun 'n Fun 2006 Heritage Flight

2006-04-14T08:21:00.000-04:00

My video was no where near this good, but here's one to follow up on my earlier post... Bonus video of an F-117 flying by..

Sun 'n Fun 2006 - After Action Report

2006-04-10T16:22:00.000-04:00

Well, it's over today. Yep, the 2006 Sun n' Fun Fly In is seeing the last people leave today.

Here's a quick outbrief, but not with pictures of the actual event...those come tonight.

On Thursday evening, I drove Jim, Sr. (Valiant Glider Pilot of who flew under the Eiffel Tower fame) (the link is to part 1 of three...links to all parts of the antics of Jim and his glider buddies contained therein), to have dinner with those of the Stinson aircraft type (for he flew a Stinson L-5 under the tower).

They were not only gracious, and, having established earlier contact, had name tags for the two of us, and then proceeded to eat BBQ, and listen to Jim's tales of days gone by with great interest.

Due to other scheduling issues, we didn't get back to the Fly In until Sunday afternoon. We wandered about, found an SNV aircraft, which Jim referred to as the Vultee "Vibrator." They went from 120 HP Stearman trainers, to the 450HP Vultees.

I went off to see the F-22 Raptors and Jim got talking to another gentleman, who turns out, flew from the same field as Jim, only a year apart. They did a little reminiscing.

I got my 6 o'clock shot (yep, static, but I can't afford the gas bill to chase one) of the F-22, as a follow on to this post over at Neptunus Lex.

We wandered among the many palnes of various ages, me finding a Twin Beech, with a passenger door, which conjured up memories of jumping at Covington, LA in 1980 from said equipped aircraft. It's amazing how 10 people could actually build formations from those without being spread across two counties on exit. I got my SCR, with the jumpers there building an "8 Way" around me. Saw a C-47 (jumped one of those at Perris Valley), and then a few T-34Bs.

The "Legacy Fly By" was to be a TF-51, and F-15, and the F-22. I got a good spot by the fence and waited for the take off. Due to low clouds, they could only hot dog so much, but the F-22 didn't use a lot of runway. Next the F-15 made a bunch of passes, having to go to burner a lot, but a great low altitude presentation. To the south, the F-22 played about, just under the clouds about 2000', doing Cobra manevuers, until the TF-51 joined with him. Then the fun began.

The two aircraft commenced to do a little "DACT" (dis-similar air combat training). The F-51 turned some tight circles, with the F-22 matching him in speed and turn diameter. Impressive for a large jet to do that. The, the LtCol must have gotten bored, for on about the 10th circle, he vetored thrust and functionally cut across the circle on a spoke thru the middle and quickly joined on the wing of the TF-51, while the prop plane was still in the same turn. That's impressive to watch!

The F-15 finished it's passes and then joined the two other aircraft to make a three ship formation. From there, they conducted two "Heritage" passes, the TF-51 in the lead, the Eagle to port and Raptor to starboard. I did get a vido of the first fly by, without framing my subjects well....gotta love new equipment.

Next the Raptor pilot did his passes, most of the time without his afterburners on, and was just as impressive as the Eagle. Then he came in low and vectored the thrust to begin a vertical climb. It looked like someone grabbed the nose and shoved the tail underneath to get vertical. I'd not like to be on the business end of that maneuver.

Ok, I'll try to get the pictures up tonight. Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

I'm Not Sure How to Title This

2006-04-07T21:53:00.000-04:00

Chap has encapsulated, in his thoughts on career "circumstances" of his own, a lot of insight for the rest of us. Well, let me clarify: He seems to have said what many of us have felt. See the comments for thorough understanding of this. We all entered knowing the struture we work within is a pyramid. We, at the subconscious level, know only one person is at the top at a time. Some of us don't make it there (what a blinding flash of the obvious!). He discusses that type of issue, with far more clarity than I. Read his post and be rewarded with a very honest monologue about military life.

Why UXO Makes Bad Paperweights

2006-04-07T07:28:00.000-04:00

Even if it looks really cool and has the possibility of being a great babe magnet, even before this incident, I have always declined to have percussion fired ordnance as paperweights on any of my desks...stick with electically primed is my advice. A 5"54 cal round will do nicely and can also be used as an anchor if you live in New Orleans and the hurricanes come.

The explosion also destroyed a computer keyboard, scattering some of the keys around Colla's desk.

So even if his fingers come out of this OK, he'll be having a hard time typing whole words from now on, too...

The Day has Arrived - April 4th, 2006

2006-04-06T14:45:00.000-04:00

Every since the introduction of Mac OS 10, I predicted the day would come when the morning headline, above the fold, in large print, would read:

"MAC RUNS EVERYTHING"

The day was 4/4/2006, and it's been a long time coming. The OS 10 operating system, being built on a UNIX base, runs UNIX programs. It (obviously) runs Mac programs, (which is an interesting story about backwards compatability the Apple always supported - but that's another post). Now, with the Intel based Mac computers, Boot Camp (oh, btw, a free beta!)..."we" have arrived.

A pox on the houses of all of you die hard, brainwashed PC-ites, who, having never laid a hand on the mouse of a Mac, could, with a straight face, tell me "Macs are no good!"

The same to you who proclaimed "We have 25,000 programs, you only have 2,500!" Now we own all of yours and all of ours....

One comment (as Chapomatic likes to say): Heh!

Yep, I have a PC now, but you'll have to wait until Oct this year before I lay out my hobby equipment "ownership" post.

And if you think it's no big news, check Apple's stock. As of a few mintues ago, it had gone from $60 (yesterday) to $71 today. The Dow is presently "taking a dump" my investor friend tells me....hmmmmmmm..... Update: 4/7/2006: The 2 Steves Who Changed the World from CNN. How true...

A Journey into History - Part VIII

2006-04-06T14:09:00.000-04:00

Part I, Part II, Part III,Part IV, Part V, Part VI, Part VII, Part IX

So life, the evening of March 24th and wee hours of the 25th were exciting. Quite honestly, it was also the closest I personally ever came to combat during my career, and then it turned out to not even be that at all. In this case, it was the closest I ever came to being connected (directly) to a major international incident.

As the sun rose later on the 25th, at least two of Khadaffi’s Navy ships were transmogrified into mobile targets for the battle force’s SUCAP. Later in the day, I recall a ship’s company sailor poking his head into our watch station area, proudly holding a black and white 8x10 picture of a smoldering NANUCHKA gunboat. He asked if we wanted a copy. I would have loved one, but then I thought back to a story one of my CO’s had told me of a story about pictures.

Gary Voorheis had been at a Wardroom party many years before, at the house of one of the ship’s officers. He told us of being ushered upstairs, where upon he and a few other officers were shown pictures of the USS BELKNAP (CG-26) just after she had collided with the USS KENNEDY (CV-67) in 1975. These were photos taken by the officer, with his own camera, and he had held onto him for several years. Back in “the OLD Navy,” the Navy’s policy was every, yes, you read that right, every picture taken aboard a vessel was Navy property. The common convention was, short of some major situation, no captain bothered to have all photos developed and examined for possible useful content, however, the regulation was in place. In this case, these picture of the post-collision damage fell under this regulation. To shorten the story, shortly after the party, I believe the Naval Investigative Service paid the officer a visit and confiscated the photos, and I recall significant (read career ending) repercussions followed for withholding evidence from the collision investigation board.

In light of that story, and not being certain of the possible classification that may be assigned to the photo of the unlucky gunboat, I declined. About two weeks later, when the stateside mail caught up with us, there were copies of US News and World Report, with the very picture of the flaming evidence on the front cover.

We gave Khadaffi's boys a big black eye, taking out a couple of SAM radars and at least two gunboats. My understanding is a thrid Nanuchka, with a little brighter skipper, was zig zagging between the ROCKEYEs lofted at him, and while he made it to port, the shrapnel left enough damage behind for the ship to sink pierside from progressive flooding.

The SARATOGA CVBG, taking ADM Jerimiah and the CRUDESGRU EIGHT staff back to the US. Just the CORAL SEA and AMERICA CVBGs remained. My staff transferred from the SARA back to USS BIDDLE (CG-34), and resumed our watches in the staff area in the Combat Information Center. The CORAL SEA CVBG began preps to turn over and OUTCHOP, too. Our last scheduled port visit was Benidorm, Spain (for the USS BIDDLE). On the last day of the port visit, we were informed we had been extended in the Med. That was quite a shock, but, orders are orders.

Side note: While we were involved in this series of operations off Libya, we began to receive mountains of mail from the States, courtesy of Operation Dear Abby. The history of that operation, which continues today, began with a letter from a BIDDLE sialor, even before we had left for e cruise. Early in my blogging days, I discussed the special support we received thru this project.

I also recall one day on watch when ADM Jerimiah was out on the Flag Bridge of SARATOGA, he beagn laughing and called us to come out and "see this." We pulled the curtain back to see a small commercial jet, which had been chartered by a news crew flying over the CVBG, and an gaggle of different Naval aircraft were all tucking in beside an behind it, trying to get on camera. I suspect that was the time the famous picture, of a crew member of an EA-6B Prowler was holding up the sign "SEND COOKIES" for the camera, that was widely published.

As we headed back to sea, and the planning began to rapidly develop for a Navy strike on Tripoli and Benghazi, one night, the USAF sent a "natiional asset" our way to recon the target areas. The SR-71 flight I blogged about last year, was what I saw, and my post discussed how I found out who the pilot was, LtCol Brian Shul, quite by accident.

Due to time constraints, I’ll edit this post later (most likely tomorrow), to record my view of the events 20 years ago today. Those events were the bombings of Tripoli (actually named Tarabulus by the Libyans) with USAF FB-111s and Benghazi with Navy A-6s. The event was named Operation El Dorado Canyon.

The blogger known as the Southern Air Pirate, now on active duty and part of the GWoT, realizes his father was in the same fight, but, there where I was 20 years ago today....and his dad went "feet dry" with VA-85.

Stay tuned for the details from my view!

Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

Got the "Need for Speed"™ on the Surface?

2006-04-04T15:18:00.000-04:00

Do we call it the "Flyak" or "Foil Kayak?" In any case, who thought "up on the foils" was reserved for powered vessels? Maybe I can find one of these to crash, too!

The Army Armor Ban and Standards

2006-03-31T22:41:00.000-05:00

One of Matt's guest bloggers, Laughing Wolf, has a post about the Army banning the use of personally purchased body armor. Admittedly, this has to have been a tough call for the chain of command and I'm sure there will be some backlash from parents, spouses and the media, claiming the Army really wants the tropps to die. Not true at all, but it's a hard thing to comprehend. An example I ran across back in the late 80s had to do with blankets (like the kind you use on your bed blankets). I was XO on a ship and had to put the word that all personal blankets were to be removed from the ship and henceforth only the Navy issue wool blankets were authorized. As cold hearted as that sounds, it was actually a way to preserve the lives of the sailors aboard the ships. Here's why: Essentially all blankets you can buy at the store on the beach, short of ones of natural fibers, use some sort of synthetic material for the fabric. This is fine in the house, but not on a ship because, when the "civilian" blanket burns, it produces toxic fumes. So, you retort: "Yeah? SO?, here are fires in houses, too!" Yes, there are. I reply: "And when your house is burning down, you run outside and get away, which puts you in an area of lots and lots of fresh air, which would dilute the toxic fumes. When your ship is burning, you have to attack the fire (enter the berthing space) and therefore go into an enclosed space, where the heated fumes boil down from the overhead, along with the smoke." By getting the blankets off the ship, we decreased the risk of serious lung injury to our men. That's all about protecting the crew from harm. Add to that discussion of blankets to the situation where a sailor dies in a shipboard fire, but from burns, but suffocation, and the autopsy showed the death was due to toxic fumes in the atmosphere? When that happens, the law suits will make the $400 hammers and toilets seats of days gone by like an a walk in the park. The public would be outraged, and I would submit, rightfully so, for the chain of command didn't make sure the sailors were safe. All manner of things are tested extensively, before being allowed for use in the Fleet or field, such as such simple things as ear plugs. Stuff bought off the shelf may or may not help keep your hearing intact, and it would be nice to know. The testing required by the Armed Forces is to make sure we are getting our money's worth, and the new item is capable of doing the job we asked it to. But, even more important than the research to make sure the product work, is the sacred trust the service members have in their Government to take care of them. One only has to look at the fallout of such issues as the use of Agent Orange without proper precautions to realize how vital this ban is, until the civilian companies equipment is proven to be effective. It may even come to pass that the civilian items of a particular manufacturer are better than the stock items, which will then get that manufacturer on the list to buy from at the Federal Government level. Back in the late 80s, my Commodore went from his staff job to being the assistant to N6 (the office in charge of all the Navy's computers. Wes Jordan was instumental in running tests that showed that the extra cost of verifying Commercial Off The Shelf (COTS) computers was a waste of the taxpayers money. I saw a video tape that was done where they put an HP-9020 computer and monitor in a 19" rackmount and proceeded to run the Grade A shock test (considered a replication of the force of a nuclear blast), with a modification. They raised the hammer to it's maximum height, not just (I think) 8 feet high. On the 20th drop of the hammer, the monitor flicked off and the equipment, which had already exceeded qualification for Grade A worthiness (I think it was three drops to qualify - and from 8 feet, not higher), appeared to have been bested. Upon examination, the power switch for the monitor had been damaged, and upon replacement, the unit came up and the computer display was still there. THE HP-9020 itself took the licking and kept on ticking. The analysis was that even commerical clients were demanding computers and peripherials to be built to survive some rough handling, and HP, for one, was putting a product off the end of the assembly line that met MILSPEC standards, without each unit having to receive extra testing. Net result: We (the Fleet) got good COTS stuff for use in all sorts of tactical applications and the taxpayers reaped the benefits in big dollar numbers. The boost in our ability to detect and identify hostile targets, and then engage them with confidence in our targeting, was dematically changed, as our detect to engage times went from hours to minutes in one particular system I directly worked with. With luck, our groud troops will be benefactors of such an investigation, and we, as taxpayers will also see savings.

YO! Can I Have the Ferrari This Weekend?

2006-03-30T18:19:00.000-05:00

It seems there are people are doing the same thing with really cool (read: EXPENSIVE!) cars like general aviation plane owners have been doing for years....time sharing!

Anyone interested in a MilBloggers shared car? :)

Oh, and there is Ferrari wallpaper at this website...

Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

A Journey into History - Part VII

2006-03-30T00:25:00.000-05:00

Part I, Part II, Part III,Part IV, Part V, Part VI, Part VIII, Part IX

It was the early morning hours of March 25th at this point (around 0200) and there we were, the entire staff and almost all the augmentees, standing there in our watchstation on the Flag Bridge. I believe it was the 07 Level on the carrier’s island. All around us were the nominal things used to stand the watch: Notebooks, pens, pencils, dividers, parallel dividers, magic markers, tactical publications, message boards, and, don’t forget the coffee cups and Coke cans. These things, as some of you readers know, have another, more generic name: Missile Hazards. More on that in a moment.

In theory, the pair of Soviet built OSA missile patrol boats headed towards us "AT HIGH SPEED!" were each loaded with 4 SSN-2 STYX cruise missiles. In new math, that means 8 near supersonic, with a flight profile low to the water, weapons may be announced with the proword "VAMPIRES" any moment. Back to the missile hazards. Steve Nerheim was at one side of the chart table, and I was at the other. I recall I looked at Steve, and he had a wild-eyed look in his eyes, just before (and simultaneously with me) his hand grabbed for the latch on the top drawer of the chart table and proceeded (aided by my hand at the other hand on the other latch) to slam the drawer wide open, whereupon we both yelled "MISSILE HAZARDS!" and began sweeping every loose thing from the chart table top into the drawer. After that we grabbed and stuffed every thing in sight into that drawer, and then got to getting ourselves into battle dress.

The concepts of missile hazards and battle dress are generally introduced to most naval personnel during the endless days of "REFTRA" (refresher training), which used to be held at Naval Station, Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, a place more often (and oh, so lovingly) just called "GTMO" (pronounced "git-mo"). The many and varied stories (of the same incidences in some cases) would fill screen after screen after screen on blogs by the hundreds, but almost all of them would mention something about missile hazards or battle dress. Missile hazards, as deemed by common sense, once you get by the fact the GTMO Fleet Training Group (FTG) sailors were "making you do it," is anything that the force of a close by explosion may be able to impart enough energy into it so as to damage the human contents of the surrounding vicinity of said missile hazard. You come to hate the thought of dealing with the lost point for things like the "left behind" paper clip the FTG guy is holding in your face just before the ship is cleared for getting underway for the day’s training, with that "I just nailed you for one more point off your exercise score, buddy!" look on his face, but after a few weeks, you begin to unconsciously scan your vicinity constantly for loose items. It’s bad enough to get nailed at the beginning of the day, but more irritating when you use some object, such as the dividers to measure something on a chart, and then carelessly put them down on the chart, and, as luck normally has it, right under the nose of the exercise observer, who, once more, smiles and lifts his clip board to make a note about another point off.

That being said, when real, high speed ordnance may be in your future "real soon now," you immediately recall the laws of physics, and some rudimentary biology that says that coffee cup over there is gonna leave a mark if I leave it sitting on the frame stringer just behind the chart table. It’s sort of like Steve and I, having served in different commands to get where we were, "got religion" on the topic when this scenario presented itself.

Battle dress is the other thing sailors love to hate and do just about anything to justify not reconfiguring their clothing in order to satisfy the little tyrants the FTG guys seem to be. Battle dress amounts to a real fashion statement. Consider the well dressed (for work) sailor, chief or officer (not in the new BDU knock off stuff) with the bottom of the bell bottom or khaki trousers stuffed into their black socks above their shoes, the normally open shirt collar buttoned all the way to the top, and the long sleeves rolled down and the cuffs buttoned. It does look very strange, and, once again, when you consider the purpose, it is something meant to keep the exposed skin to the absolute minimum. In the in most every training scenario, the outfitting also meant scrambling for the locker in the space that held the gas mask bags, each one normally labeled for the crew member it was issued to/fitted for. Picture strange shaped olive green or medium grey footballs with waist straps flying across the space as someone answers up to the name just read off the stenciling. In the late 80’s, we adopted the crew wide issuing of anti-flash gear, which included opera length gloves and a pull over hood, with the open hole for your eyes and nose to be exposed though.

I’ll admit, I missed out completely on the opportunity that most every other service member experiences: The tear gas chamber. I was in GTMO for refresher training in early 1985, while assigned to USS CONOLLY (DD-979). We were going to be import for the weekend, but the Saturday morning schedule had most of the crew set to attend this wonderful opportunity to appreciate the wonders of low level chemical warfare. On Friday evening, they sent us a schedule change that sent us to the base school auditorium instead. Our training involved listening to a Royal Navy LT, who was currently assigned on an exchange tour with Fleet Combat Training Center, Atlantic as a Tactical Action Officer (TAO) course instructor. That assignment was not the basis of his talk that day. He spent several hours talking about his experiences in the Falklands War. He had been the Weapons Officer on one of the destroyers that was hit with and sunk by an Exocet cruise missile. He had been rescued and then was aboard the frigate that had had an Argentinean dumb bomb, unexploded, lodged in the engine room that exploded when the EOD technicians were attempting to safe it. That ship sunk also. As you might imagine, despite the significant exhaustion that GTMO instills, no one was sleeping in the gym that day.

He talked about the effectiveness of anti-flash gear in various parts of the presentation. He said you could tell those who did not like to wear it and had pulled the lower part of the flash hood hole down under their chins. He said when the fireball caused by the unused fuel of the cruise missile ignited and swept through a space, those with exposed skin bore the damage, from surrogate sun burns to significant burns all over their face. He also discussed another physics topic, which was about the property of colors to transmit heat. One ship’s commanding officer had labeled his flash hood with "CO" on black magic marker on the forehead area of the hood. Despite wearing the hood properly, that captain will forever go through life with “CO” burned into his skin, in the same manner that the colored patterns of the kimonos the Japanese women were wearing during the atomic bombs dropped caused their skin to be marked where the darker colors in the fabric patterns was. That part of his story stayed with me to the end of may sea time.

While the brief moments of time were passing in that watch station, with everyone kicking into GTMO muscle memory mode, the SARATOGA Surface module crew ordered the airborne SUCAP (Surface Combat Action Patrol) to intercept the OSA boats. We had the ASUW circuit up in one of our many speakers and I remember the section A-6 lead calling asking if the ship was sure there were OSA boats out there, for the area where he was sent did have a ship, but he said it "had a lot of lights on it." That reminded me that before the cruise, I remember there had been a push to make sure the Air Wing A-6 assets where equipped with TRAM pods. These "pods" were multi-function sensors mounted beneath the radome of the aircraft, and they were articulated to allow the aircrew to steer the cameras and laser designators around. Included in the sensors was low light level television. The section leader of the SUCAP, despite the urging of the ASUW talker to engage the targets with Harpoon, spent a few extra moments using the available tools to ensure he was doing the right thing. What he reported back was he was breaking off the attack because it wasn’t OSA boats, but a cruise liner, with all sorts of deck lights on, and it was doing 16 knots, not 42. Moral of the story: Make sure everyone has their heads in the game, and you’ll not make stupid mistakes that cause nations to have to apologize to most of the citizens of the world for engaging a "white" (neutral) target in the fog of war.

And this ends my recollection of the events of March 24th and 25th in 1986, in the central Ionian Sea, aboard the flagship for Battle Force ZULU. It is not, however, the end of the tale of the beginning of the offensive phase of the GWoT.

Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

A Journey into History - Part VI

2006-03-25T23:53:00.000-05:00

Part I, Part II, Part III,Part IV, Part V, Part IX

The operations had been intense. Standing Port and Starboard watches in pairs, it was usually LCDR Al McCollum and I. Al was a P-3C ATACCO guy, and I had spent my earlier years "driving" ships. For two decision makers running 9 ships, all the ASW related air assets from three carriers and all the helo equipped "small boys," and then all the shore based airplanes out of Rota and Sigonella kept us pretty busy.

We had a lot of work up time, and at our prior sea tours, a pretty good bit of ASW work. This was different. For the first thing, there was no way to beg, borrow, steal, or sneak a peek at a schedule of events (SOE) for the "bad guys." Now the "bad guys" were not some our our guys, or allied guys. They were the real deal with a twist on top of it. Twist: The Soviets had subs in the Med, and the Libyans had subs in the Med. Why was that sigificant you ask? Well, the Libyans had purchased Foxtrot class diesel subs from the Soviet Union.

Guess what the Soviets had deployed to the Med during this episode? You got it, Foxtrots....So, since there is potentiall now "daytime" when you are doing ASW, meaning you can't hang back until the sun rises to get a visual to confirm your other sensor information, if a subsurface contact, that had the acoustic and other characteristics was dtected in a threatening posture, would an order to engage bring on WWIII with the Soviets, or would we be the heros? Thankfully, we never got to find out.

It had been a long day, Mar 24th, 1986, punctuated by some fun in the late afternoon. Khadiffi had two SA-5 missiles at our Combat Air Patrol (CAP) F-14s flying over the Gulf of Sidra. This fell under that magical definition of "hostile act" in the Roles of Engagement that every warrior longs for, as the response that follows is solidly supported. Shooting back on "hostile intent" is a lot stickier. So, the "SAM! SAM! Vicinity SURT!" calls fill the net. The strange thing is the SA-5, being a semi-active guided missile, needs a separate tracking radar to be diriecting energy at the target, thet the missile receivers pick up and fly to. The "illuminator" radar signal wasn't detected, indicating the missiles had been fired in a purely ballistic mode, and therefore had a snowballs chance of hitting a target, unless the pilot was dumb enough to fly into the missile's path. Our were not. They banked clear of the area, and moments later, as I recall, AGM-88 HARM Missiles were fired from the rails of the waiting A-7 Corsair IIs, that had been trolling along below the search radar horizon of the SAM sites. Oh, yes, the HARMs did their job quite nicely, taking out the search radars.

So Khadaffi now had his "money shot" for his Arab brothers, showing how he took on the great Satan, with out the risk of actually taking out any US military assets, which had the demonstrated potential of leaving us in a quandry over how to respond. I recall debating with CDR SMith, the CCDG-8 Intel Officer and ROE Officer, if that firing truly constituted a hostile act, since the missiles technically couldn't have hit anything. He assured me it was a hostile act.

From WDBASE:

On March 24, six SA-5s were launched from the new missile base at Surt against American aircraft. None was hit, however, because the SA-5, with a range of 240 kilometers, could threaten high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft over the Gulf of Sidra but was relatively ineffective against high-performance jet fighters. Subsequently, the missile site was put out of action by carrier-based A-6 Intruders firing High-Speed Anti-Radiation Missiles (HARMs), that homed in on the Libyans' radar guidance signals. A second strike followed the next day to knock out a replacement radar unit. Although Soviet technicians were believed to be present to oversee the installation and operation of the SA-5 batteries, none was reported injured in the exchanges. At the same time, a French-built Combattante-class missile attack craft was destroyed when it approached United States Navy ships protecting the aircraft carriers. The Libyan vessel was hit by two Harpoon missiles launched from an A-7 Corsair aircraft

I disagree. The SAMs didn't hit our planes because they didn't have radar signals to guide on. Also, about 2000 (8 PM) that evening, one of the A-6 Intruders found a Libyan La Combatante class patrol gunboat sailing north of Tripoli (not an A-7, the call sign of the spotting aircraft was in the 600 series (602 I think), which would have been one of the A-6 squadrons). We had the Surface Combat Air Patrol (SUCAP) radio circuit patch up to our watch station and heard the report. The PG was steaming along like it didn't have a care in the world, and I suspect they were not alerted to the fact that US forces had been engaged that afternoon. Anyhow, the ASUW radio talker asked what load 602 had aboard, and the response was "ROCKEYE." ^02 was ordered to "Take the La Combattante." and acknowledged the order. We waited several minutes, the net was silent, when finally the ASUWC takler asked for a "BDA" (battle damage assessment). 602 came back and said "we got them with Harpoon!" The next comment was "But you had ROCKEYE" "6XX had Harpoon, so we had them do it." we figured 602 was a nugget crew and were afraid of a close in pass against a gunboat with a surface to air capabillity, so they got on Sqaudron Common and asked if anyone up had Harpoons loaded. Next over the net was direction to use ROCKEYE, and then look for survivors. The two attack sank the La Combattane. This was the first combat use of Harpoon.

About an hour later, we heard that the F-14 in CAP Station 5 was yelling about taking "Triple A" fire (anti-aircraft artillery). The USS YORKTOWN (CG-48) hustled off to the west to fix the problem, and reported a very high speed target inbound. They also fired Harpoons at the target, but there were no indications of any targets being hit. Post combat analysis showed the fog of war may have settled in and the AN/SPY-1 system may have had a spurious signal display, as the "target" was showing altitude and much faster speed than the La Combattante could acheive. For the next few days, O mulled over the sequence of events and went up and pulled out our plots from that evening. I back plotted CAP Station 5 from the operational tasking of that night and the area where the A-6s had attacked the La Combattante several hours earlier and CAP Station 5 we very close together. I suspect the aircrew saw the aftermath of the sinking (maybe not fully sunk by that time) ship and thought the fires and secondary explosions were AAA.

My watch was to end at midnight, but as was the custom of the Commodore, things got crazy, and the relief by LCDR Steve Neheim didn't happen until almost 0200. Just as I was preparing to leave the watchstation and get some sleep. The USS SARATOGA's CDC reported "two high speed contact, suspected OSA IIs, approaching at high speed from the north west!"

That report, when asked to be confirmed and was reported as "two OSA boats, inbound at 42 kts NW!" will make the hair on the back of your neck stand up and the muscle memory of many trips to GTMO for refresher training comes back in a flash...More to follow...it's late and I'm already a day late getting this out. Stay tuned! Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

A Journey into History – Part V

2006-03-24T20:39:00.000-05:00

Part I, Part II, Part III,Part IV, Part VI, Part VII, Part VII, Part IX

And then there were three CVBGs in the Mediterranean. Gathered for the purpose to "show the flag," we would specifically challenge Qhadaffi’s claim to sovereignty over the waters and air space in the Gulf of Sidra. Freedom of Navigation ("FON") operations at their finest.

To bring in a few important background details, we had conducted FON Ops in late January, twice in February (a third one was aborted and we stayed moored/anchored in Italian ports), and then again in March, we went to sea in force a few times. I figured we’d send some surface ships (that, for the uninitiated, comprises all ships except aircraft carriers (which belong to AIRLANT/PAC) and submarine tenders (those belong to the submarine community) smartly into the Gulf, have them press south at best speed, and make a show of force. I was wrong. We actually tip-toed down there on a very nasty, cloud covered, windy, clod day, complete with sea so high, the Libyan Navy would have barely been able to make headway to meet and greet us. I know the USS YORKTOWN (CG-48) was one of the vessels tasked to go, and I recall the USS CARON (DD-970) might have been the other. As I sat listening to the situation/position reports coming back on the radio, it was obvious we could have made our show of force and been completely unopposed, yet it was equally clear the two powerful warships were not to cross the "Line of Death" without specific direction from "Zulu Alpha" (the call sign for the battle force commander.

In the operations building up to the shoot ‘em up, I subconsciously was schooled in the major factor that wins conflicts, a lesson I would learn later consciously at Naval War College: It’s all about logistics, logistics, and yep, you guessed it….more logistics. At the time, the force structure planned for a single CVBG in the Med, one in the Indian Ocean, and I’m not sure how many the Pacific Fleet kept roving the seas on deployment. In any case, the shore support in the Med was designed and stocked for one CVBG, and here we were with three within a few weeks, arriving in theater. The names of the many ships escape me, but here are the ones I can recall:

USS CORAL SEA (CV-43), USS AMERICA (CV-), USS SARATOGA (CV-60), USS YORKTOWN (CG-48), USS BIDDLE (CG-34), USS WAINWRIGHT (CG-28), USS CARON (DD-970)*, USS SCOTT (DDG-995), USS JACK WILLIAMS (FFG-24), USS DEWERT (FFG-45), USS AINSWORTH (FF-10), USS JESSE L BROWN (FF-10), USS CAPADANNO (FF-10), USS GARCIA (FF-1040), USS MONOGHELA (AO-178), and USS IWO JIMA (LPH-7)*. (* indicates that these may not have been there, as this is being done from raw recollection on my part).

I do know that my staff, as "ZULU XRAY" (ASW Commander), had nine ships primarily under our command, which included all the FF units at least. We also had all ASW related resources for the entire theater under our control, which included the shore based VP squadrons with P-3C Orion Maritime Patrol Aircraft (MPA). Those assets flew from NAS Rota, Spain and NAS Sigonella, Italy.

Anyhow, back at the ranch, the supply system was now having to provide beans, bullets, black oil and spare parts to three times the assets, which also were sailing/flying a very aggressive schedule. The warehouse ashore in the Med were emptying out quickly. The fuel stockpiles were taking a hit as well. Each day, in the early evening, each ship submitted a daily SITREP message to the chain of command. One of the paragraphs in the format listed the present percentage of fuel aboard. At our level, we had a standard figure of how many barrels (42 gallons) per day each type of ship would burn. This set of stats was further subdivided into a burn rate based on the type of ops the ship was engaged in. One rate for at sea steaming, another for import steaming (running the boilers to operate the electrical power generation and auxiliaries) and a third burn rate for “Cold Iron” or with the main propulsion plant shut down. We totaled up the data and forwarded it to the battle force staff. Decisions on when and who would sail were based on the fuel calculations.

In between our jaunts to sea to demonstrate our resolve, we had to anchor/berth somewhere. Due to Qhadffi’s threats to the European countries, only Italy would allow us to enter their waters. They were a solid ally, even when SCUD missiles were lobbed at a small Italian island south west of Sicily, in retribution for their cooperation with us. I got to see a lot more of Naples than I wanted in those days.

ASW operations for the force were a stretching experience. As a TACDESRON staff, we had the Commodore, the Chief Staff Officer, four watch officers (we stood the watch in pairs), then a radioman (RM) and operations specialist (OS) senior chiefs rounded out our normal compliment of tactical watchstanders. We had “borrowed” a few OS1s and 2s from the BROWN and CAPODANNO for the cruise, and they helped keep up with the radio comms and plotting. We stood watches in “Port and Starboard” (2 shifts), in six hour watch cycles.

Two HP-9020 JOTS computers, fed by Link-14 teletype from the SARATOGA’s comm. Center allowed us to track our assigned unit’s locations in near real time (a few minute time lag, when things worked, and the ships had their Link 14 systems properly patched). More often than not, things were not running as planned, due to the multitude of switches and components involved, so were tended to have the junior OSs on the radio circuits, calling for updated positions, so we had an accurate picture of force location.

In addition to the JOTS computers, we tracked the units on a piece of tracing paper, laid over a chart of the central Med. Due to the force dispersion from close to the entrance to the Suez Canal to west of Sicily at some times, it was the only way to be able to have a “big picture” to scan and make decisions upon. It took constant attention, mostly from OSCS(SW) Jim Koch and RMCS(SW) Rumbaugh, to keep the Link 14 feed patched to us.

Stay tuned for more "sea stories"….

Cpl Desmond T. Doss, CMOH Winner, Passes Away

2006-03-24T15:03:00.000-05:00

Black Five has the news of the passing of Desmond Doss. Update 03/25/2006: Services for Desomnd Doss are in this newspaper article. He will be buried in Chattanoga, TN, on April 3rd. I previously had written of the heroism of this man who lived for God on the 60th anniversary of Desmond Doss' valour on Okinawa May 5th, 1945. The movie of not only his selfless actions as an Army Medic, but of the life of a man who completely understood what it meant to have convictions and the stick by them, titled "The Conscientious Objector," is here. I highly recommend you order your DVD copy and plan on hearing a story of someone incredible. As a 3rd grader, I went on a walk with my dad and sisters in the sugar cane fields near MCAS Futema on Okinawa, where I was told the story of a man who would not carry a weapon, but saved almost every man in his company. That was striking enoough, but to hear man years later the path that man walked to do that is even more incredible. I now regret not heading to his Church to shake his hand and let him know the inspiration he was across a career, and later in my personal life. Thanks to Adam's Blog for the Open Trackback. Thanks to Point Five for the Weekend Open Trackback.

"The Heart of Steel" - A Story of Volunteers

2006-03-23T08:28:00.000-05:00

Just found as a new post on YouTube, a trailer for the film "The Heart of Steel," the story of volunteers at Ground Zero. This is a brief scene from "The Heart of Steel, a documentary about "The Renegade Volunteers", an amazing group of ordinary citizens who boldly changed the relief effort in the aftermath of the September 11th Tragedy. I shot this on a digital hi-8 camcorder entirely on donations. Check it out and visit www.theheartofsteel.com for more info. "The Heart of Steel" will screen at the upcoming 2006 Tribeca Film Festival in the NY Specials section. For more information, please visit www.tribecafilmfestival.org. Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post! Thanks to The Real Ugly American for the Weekend Open Trackback.

When Capt Lex Retires, This May Be His Best Option for Fun

2006-03-21T10:43:00.000-05:00

YouTube has some great stuff.... Since I know the retired paycheck of a Navy Capt is not good enough to allow Neptunus Lex to have an F/A-18 in his garage for weekend jaunts, maybe he'd be satisfied with doing what the guy in this video did.... And, oh, yeah...he already understands the management of powered flight systems, so he'll pick it up in no time and can be down at Skydive San Diego real soon now... Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open POst!

Air Force "PJs" In Action

2006-03-21T02:16:00.000-05:00

Jumping, rappeling, hoisting...it all looks fun! Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

An Inflatable Raft, a Skyvan and a Camera Dude...

2006-03-21T00:29:00.000-05:00

Mix with 10 jumpers and Voila! Try it if you ever get bored with life...

A Journey into History - Part IV

2006-03-16T19:59:00.000-05:00

Part I, Part II, Part III, Part V, Part VI, Part VII, Part VII, Part IX

Please pardon the skipped month, but if you have read the other three parts, I'm now going to just shift to the events of 20 years ago. I'll work on "Life Between the Catapults, or What I Did on My Indian Ocean Cruise" will come later.

When you last read about the SARATOGA/CCDG-8 Battle Group, we had received orders to head for the Suez Canal. That we did. It was still Janaury, and we made our way into the Red Sea and to Port Suez in full EMCOM at top speed that conditions allowed.

We made the 24 hour long northern transit and headed for the Ionian Sea (the central part of the Mediterranean Ocean, to join with the CORAL SEA/CCG-2 Battle Group. With the join up, Admiral David Jerimiah (COMCRUDESGRU 8) was named Commander, Battle Force Zulu. With this entery into the Med, the meetings aboard SARATOGA (CV-60) between Adm Jerimiah and Admiral Frank Kelso, COMSIXTHFLT, began as well.

Muammar Khadaffi had once more proclaimed his claim to the Gulf of Sidra as Libyan territorial waters (first made in 1973), and told the world he would defend his territory. Thus began what we called "OVL" (pronounced "oval") for "Operations in the Vicinity of Libya."

I can't recall all the dates associated with the Ops in late January, but off we went, two CVBGs worth of assets, to challenge the claims of Khadaffi to the rights to navigate in international waters. It was more than just to drive about in the water, waving the flag, but also to carry the message that President Reagan was ready to muster significant military capability to counter state supported terrorism. In December, 1985, Libyan supported terrorists had bombed discos in Germany, killing several people, to include US service personnel.

This series of operations gave me the opportunity to see the effects of moving large forces around, and the intricacies involved. I was afforded a special seat to this "play," with my squadron, DESRON 32, being assigned as the Battle Force ASW Commander. When we moved aboard the SARATOGA per CINCPACFLT doctrine (The ASW Commander for the battle group will be embarked on the CV) the previous December, we were berthed with Adm Jerimiah's staff (I roomed with the Intelligence Officer) and we ate in the Admiral's Mess. The good side of this was we generally knew most of what was going on from these close arrangements, but the bad side was the CCDG-8 Ops Boss tended to look at us as augmetees to his staff. There were a few discussions over who could task who, but things worked out for the best.

My assignment was the Combat Systems Material Officer, so I had to keep the handle on logistics for the ASW ships, and I regularly interacted with the CCDG-8 logistics guys, so I got a glimpse into the "big picture" regulalry.

On top of all these things, the USS AMERICA Battle Group was also dispatched from stateside to make the Battle Force Zulu a three CV formation. That hadn't happened since the Vietnam Conflict....

Things got raelly busy, and for the first time for me and many others, the "bad guys" were not the "orange" forces, and there were no umpires, nor back door copies of the enemy's schedule of events....More on that in the coming posts on this topic.

Side note: The most favored movie for the Admiral (and therefore his staff as well) was "Zulu", starring Michael Caine. Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

Need 2M Internet in the Middle of Nowhere?

2006-03-09T14:28:00.000-05:00

Just a thought...if you have about $80-100K in spare change, and a need, then this just might do the trick. The best part (besides service in a serene place, far from the maddening crowds, is it's "parachutable."

Are Things as They Seem? - Check out Ferris Hasan

2006-03-08T22:07:00.000-05:00

Remember the young man of 16 who disappeared from Florida in Dec, 2005, to head for Iraq in search of a story for his journalism class? It looks like his parents did know... And there isn't such a jounalism class... And his father has been arrested for forging US Passports and Military IDs before... And they live in a $4M dollar house... So what's the real story? Read an expose here. Update 03/14/2006: From a cheesel (a commenter on the LGF thread):

#27 cheesel 3/14/2006 09:29AM PST #5, Curt... New Muslim flick--Boy tries to join Hezbollah to fight the infidels: "Ferris Hassan's Day Off".

Thank you, Cinnamon Stillwell and Tom Blumer for doing some real reporting! Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

"Proud: The Men of the USS MASON" in NYC!

2006-03-07T14:57:00.000-05:00

Ben Garrison, one of the crew members of the USS MASON (DE-529) told me the movie "Proud" would be showing in NYC @ the Magic Johnson Theater beginning on the 10th of this month. Quick background: The USS MASON was the only large ship in WWII manned by an African American crew. The story is quite amazing. Ben also mentioned the movie would be being released on DVD soon. Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

Why You Should Eat Your Carrots....or Not...

2006-03-06T15:26:00.000-05:00

Ah, the wonderful world of OPDEC....

I spent an afternoon with the widow of a B-29 pilot, who flew with the 20th Air Force in the Pacific Theater. Walter was the Co-Pilot of the "Ancient Mariner" ("Z Square 53").

She let me sort through many of her husband's books and then she told me an interesting story.

It turns out the whole deal about eating your carrots to improve your eyesight was actually operational deception to cover for the fact that the Norden bomb sight had been placed in service. So long as the enemy believed our aircrews just had eagle eyes from eating many carrots, then they'd not realize there was a piece of equipment they needed to place on their capture and exploit plans. Just think, it was such a good plan that it has hung on all these years in the common knowledge data base of parents and those trying to get that little advantage hunting or flying.

Moral of the story: You can tell your mom you won't see any better if you eat your carrots....nor any worse if you don't.

Update on Vegtable Mythology - 3/7/2006: I had breakfast with my friend, Jim, Sr and told him this story. He said they were sort of force fed carrots as pilots, and also said he didn't have much need for a Norden Bomb Sight, so he was never in on the plan to confuse the enemies of Democracy.

Someone is Trying to Solve the Problem

2006-03-04T10:49:00.000-05:00

Prototype 19D anti-terror device. Go and read the technical data! HT: Mudville Gazette's Open Post.

Last Trap of the Tomcat - Part II

2006-03-03T13:58:00.000-05:00

From Part I, the "Bottom Line": The F-14 Tomcat was a superior piece of technology that would counter the threat posed by the Soviet Union and her client states. All things have their purpose.

In this part, I will present some things from my life that I saw of the influence of the F-14. Way back in 1971, I went to take a physical and when asked to "read line 6 on the chart on the back of the door.," I squinted and said little for about 10 seconds> Next I heard: "Do you wear glasses?" Next I thought: "I CAN"T FLY!"

Yep, it was true. No 20/20 for me. In retrospect, I then also realized why it was sometimes a challenge to read things the teachers wrote on the chalkboard, but I had never connected it with bad eye sight, just to liking to sit in the back of the classroom. I also should have known that if both parents wear glasses, it most likely the offspring will also be so afflicted. Anyhow, as you might have grasped, I had planned on being a go fast kind of guy for many years before that fateful day in 11th grade.

Fast forward to fall of 1975. It was the early part of Senior year and time to tell the people in the NROTC office which career path I wanted to go for. I still wanted to fly, but knew the only opportunity was to be a Naval Flight Officer (NFO) (also referred to as the "Guy in Back" (GIB)). I sat down with the officer teaching us and asked his opinion of that choice. His advice was to look for something else I would enjoy, for, at that time, he said, you could be the best GIB in the world, and even a great leader, but.....it was rare to make it past Lt Commander. It seems the pilots had a lock on the upper level ranks, and also things like command of anything avaition. It certainly didn't sound like a career path for the option of longevity. Message to midshipman closing in on commissioning date was: You better love being the guy in the shadows due to your bad choices in genetic stock.

Ok, other options: Explosives Ordnance Disposal (EOD)? Wow! Get paid to play with things that go "BOOM!" and skydive/parachute and SCUBA dive all day (when not doing PT)? Sign me UP! Not so fast, due to the rule change that very year which required you to serve a tour in "Unrestricted Line" prior to applying to be accepted in the EOD. Ted Strong, discussed here had told me how much fun it was few months earlier when we met at the NAS Cubi Point O Club. So, scratch option #2. So, I told them I wanted to dress like this:

to go to work in the Navy. That one worked. I would become a Salvor! Well, to make a long story shorter, a discovered when a whole bunch of diving school instructors were all over you at the bottom of the pool, I was getting a little too stressed, so I chose to take a different path, hence my adventures for the next 19 years in Surface Warfare. I did learn you can swim, tap dance on the slit at the bottom of the Ancostia River, and do so much more while wearing 198 lbs of "stuff," and that "Shorty," an Army Sgt assigned to the school had little short, stubby legs, and he could beat us in any calestenics, but we'd just leave him behind on the morning 4 mile run.

The F-14 is now reaching significant number in the Fleet at the time. The special thing is the NFO, specifically called a "Radar Intercept Officer" (RIO) in the back seat became a significant player in the full use of the F-14 system. As a matter of fact, the pilots became relegated to being bus drivers, so the GIB could get to wear he could open up a 55 gal drum of brush on whoop ass for any Soviet bombers coming inbound to the CVBG. The old "lineage" of pilots being supreme beings, in the footsteps of Eddie Rickenbacker, Richard Bong, Manfred von Richtofen and Werner Voss were fading. The crack in the armor began to split. The pilots still got a workout in the Naval Fighter Weapons School (TOPGUN), in case they had to cozy up to the bad guys, yet they had no capability to target and launch the AIM-54 Phoenix missile. The RIO did the job.

That is the crucial way that the F-14 Tomcat community, from my outside view. By the middle of my career(mid 80s), some NFOs began to be selected for squardon commands. As time went on, that "ticket punch" than opened doors for the NFOs to command wings and eventually aircraft carriers.

Another phenomena of the times was the economics of the late 70s - early 80s made it better for pilots, particulalry multi-engine rated, to get out after their obligated service was copleted. The airlines were recruiting heavily, and many pilots went. I remember the day I saw the ALNAV message that announced that NFOs could apply for pilot training, if they had served two years in their community. If selected, you would move forward (sideways) in the same airframe only, so P-3 ATACCOs could become P-3 pilots, and F-14 RIOs would go to the front part of the Tomcat cockpit. The vision requirments for the move were 20/200 (correctable). At the time, I was 20/50.

Had I been able to know this in 1975, I'd have gutted out two years in the backseat, knowing I could fly, and eventually have a fair shot at command. Water under the bridge, and I still did exciting things as a "shoe."

As a note on the diving career that never happened, they made a Special Operations designator (not to be confused with Special Warfare (the SEALS)), which was comprised of Salvage Divers, EOD and Ordnance Management experts. Had I been a diver, I could have entered that program. I didn't and what happened was there were only 6 CAPT (O-6) billets in the entire community, and the 4 stripers wouldn't retire, so some great guys never made it very far in rank, only because of personnal issues, and nothing to do with their performance. Most likely, I'd have made LCDR and been "continued" until 20 years, then told to retire. One classmate from the Naval War College, Ed Kittel, happened to have this happen to him. He didn't get to the NWC because he was just someone filling a billet, he was there because he was very good at what he did. Ed Kittel became a special agent in the FAA, and worked on many crash cases after his retirement in 1992.

The "Bottom Line" here: The Tomcat manning conditions helped elevate the NFO to a greater professional plateau in the eyes of the "system." Not only did it affect the RIOs in the F-14s, but it helped all the NFOs in all airframes become more of value to the Navy.

Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

Thanks to Cao's Blog for the OTB!

The Reason Women Choose Islam from Seed Magazine

2006-03-03T12:54:00.000-05:00

Idle reading night a few days ago brought this to me. I was reading Seed, a new periodical I just noticed, for the article "The Harsh Light of Science." The premise is the ansgt of both the scientists and the religious leaders having a serious scientific study of religion, but I digress. This quote on page 54 (Feb/Mar 2006 issue) jumped right out at me"

"For instance, eating disorders, such as anorexia nervosa and bulemia are much less common among women from Muslim countries in which the physical attrativeness of women plays a muted role, relative to that in Westernized countries."

There you have it. It's the evil western world destroying women again. Thanks to Little Green Footballs for the Open Thread!

Last Trap for the Tomcat - Part I

2006-03-02T01:16:00.000-05:00

Last Trap of the Tomcat - Part II

I began this post on 2/22/2006. I filed it as a draft. Today, whislt driving about for work, I began to ponder the effect of the F-14 Tomcat on my "generation." Part I will cover some history, and in that, a discussion of how/why the Military gets such toys, and also why it quits using them, too.

Military.com reports the last F-14 combat mission ever has occured.

The "Anytime, Baby!" guys got their airframe about the time I was commissioned. A few years later, as counter-battery in the recruiting wars, the Navy gleefully helped Hollywood make "Top Gun."

I stopped there, but had captured the article. Here we go....

The Tomcat went into service the same year I did, 1972. It, as with all other equipment the US Military buys, was bought with a purpose in mind, with the operational requirements laid out by a bunch of people trying to project into the future, many years before then. Being a major procurement program to replace the McDonald F-4 Phantom II, the entire process received an equivalent amount of scrutiny by all levels of government.

The story within this story is instructive for those who often wonder "What were they thinking?" when they see some piece of expensive military equipment being a perceived "misfit" in it’s role of the moment. The beginning of a development is a "threat assessment." What does the bad guy have now (since you just got surprised) or what do you think he is building, based on available intelligence? The answer to the threat assessment then makes the "OR" (operational requirement) pretty clear. You have to be able to counter the threat. The ORs come from the "Fleet" (in the case of the Navy), making sure the people currently assigned to the duties of war fighting make the major input to the capabilities the new system will have to meet. Shore duty "pukes" and contractors have to sit on the side lines and bite their tongues, or lobby at the bar after the big meeting, hoping to get their 2 cents into the equation. The purpose is keep the people who are not going to have their body parts on the line from "gold plating" projects, at the expense of the tax payers’ good graces. For all the grumbling about these decisions, know it’s a pretty good system to keep costs down, but, yes, sometimes a really expensive hammer does show up in a project plan.

Along the way in all of this, the ORs become reality when the actual contractor is chosen to build the item. In most all cases, this comes many years later, and the warfighters who suffered through the many hours of meetings, at the expense of their professional development, have moved on the retirement or shore duty, and now the people behind them have to keep the flame burning and answering questions of the contractors, the Pentagon at large, and taxpayers. This can be a daunting task, for even if the note taking in the early days was exceptionally well done, there never seems to be the time, nor were many of the side conversations that supported some of the decisions captured to aid in the present discussions. In this, the oversight of the Operational Test Force comes into play, and the project officers "ride herd" on the Fleet guys and the contractors to make sure the equipment does what was laid out in the system requirements, which came from the ORs.

That’s the short way into the F-14 story. In the 60s, the Soviet Union was building up its fleet for defense of the Motherland. While the oceans provided a great buffer, our ability to conduct long range air strikes with several varieties of conventional and nuclear capable platforms, such as the A-3D Sky Warrior, the A-4 Skyhawk, and the A-6 Intruder, the Soviets wanted to take out our carriers before they could get within launch range of the homeland. The counter force to ours was not Soviet aircraft carriers, but massive amounts of SNAF (Soviet Naval Air Force) bombers, equipped with supersonic cruise missiles. Additionally, they put guided missile submarines (SSG/SSGN) to sea, and also put the missile capability aboard surface ships, mostly of the cruiser size, when it was a missile designed to sink air craft carriers quickly.

Soviet TU-16 "Badgers," TU-95 "Bears," and later TU-22 "Blinders" and TU-160 "Backfires" would come in massive formations, guided towards CVBGs (Carrier Battle Groups) by forward observer platforms, usually of the TU-95 "Bear D" variant, using it’s underslung "Big Bulge" search radar and video data link to pass the information of the location to the armed aircraft, submarines and surface ships, waiting over our long range radar horizons. The bombers would be armed with cruise missiles that were essentially the size of a small fighter aircraft, packed with explosives. The AS-2 "Kipper," AS-4 "Kitchen," -5 "Kelt," and -6s "Kingfish" were all in this category, capable of being launched from 100 to 200 miles from the carriers. The AS-4 and -6 were particularly nasty, as the climbed high, then approached at several times the speed of sound, and then pitched over towards the target at a very steep angle, making it exceptionally difficult for our gun systems to track and engage the missile in its terminal phase (think ORs for those gun systems that did not envision that threat capability when they were developed, rather than people consciously building a "bad" system).

Welcome to the party the Grumman F-14 Tomcat. Admiral "Hammerin' Hank" Mustin, while the Second Fleet Commander, often stated his doctrine of "shoot the archer, not the arrow" to say the easier shot is the one at the sub, or not too supersonic, large profile bomber, than to deal with multiple, small, high speed inbound cruise missile, and the F-14 did this in spades. Capt Lex may yuck it up that the F-14 is gone, but even he knows it was the right platform for its time. In a match up between the two aircraft for some DACT (dissimilar aircraft training), and "BVR" (beyound visual range) weaponry being used as it was intended, the "Anytime, Baby!" aviators would be the first ones back with notches in the belts, drinking a few at the O Club and saying things like "Yeah, we had them on radar in plenty of time to smoke them like cheap cigars at about 100NM. You should have heard them whining all the way to impact about how it was so unfair for us to have Phoenix onboard!" >/p>

The AIM-54 Phoenix missile, targeted by the AN/AWG-9 radar was more than a match for the Soviet bombers. Being able to be punched off the deck with 6 AIM-54s, it could "buster" (in afterburners) out to Combat Air Patrol (CAP) station on a threat vector quickly (combat radius of 500 miles +), being capable of doing more than twice the speed of sound (think 1500+ mph as a round figure, and BTW, that's Mach 2+!). The AWG-9 radar could scan a sector, and simultaneously track a target for each missile. The AIM-54 range was demonstrated to be in excess of 100 NM. Add a CAP station about 200 miles down the threat axis and a few sections of F-14s, and the bad guys were going to have tough sledding to reach their launch points. More than likely, they would be swimming with the fish before they could get their cruise missiles off their rails, which, from my perspective, was a very, very good thing. Oh, I forgot to mention, not only could these cruise missiles of the Soviets go really fast, and carry a lot of explosives (enough to do serious damage to an armored aircraft carrier), they could carry nuclear warheads, as well, which meant those of us in the "screen" in small boys, or aboard the supporting oilers and ammunition ships in the vicinity would be in serious danger as well. I really liked the idea of the F-14 being the main fighter in service.

Compare and contrast this with the oh, so sexy "lawn dart" known as the F/A-18 Hornet. Is this an aircraft the pilots dearly love? Does it have a really cool radar that does serious magic, can be used in air-to-air or air-to-ground modes? Yes, it does. Can it be equally at home yanking and banking in ACM (air combat maneuvers), as well as "mud moving?" Yep, that too. Can the Hornet dogfight successfully without having the jettison stores meant for a ground target? Check. Does the Hornet have the "legs" to get way out on station and still put a major hurting on a bomber with a 200 NM reach? Not so sure (with out lots of tankers, which then decrements the number of fighters being fighters)? Nope. Interestingly enough, the initial OR for the F/A-18 had a combat radius that wasn’t attainable during operational testing. It seems the then SECNAV, John Lehman directed the combat radius for the F/A-18 in the test documents be lessened, so that we could get the production rolling, hence the knick name of "lawn darts" being applied. Toss them up, and they come back down. The F/A-18E/F "Super Hornets" that came along later provided more fuel tank space in the wings, addressing this issue.

Enough for now....if ou've hung on this long, stay tuned for Part II, where I will discuss how the Tomcat was a revolutionary aircraft in the annals of the Navy from a personnel perspective...

Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

Thanks to Little Green Footballs for the Open Thread!

And Now For a Little Levity....

2006-02-28T18:25:00.000-05:00

From a comment on a post over at Little Green Footballs:

#257 Blue Chip 2/28/2006 01:35PM PST
Ok, time for a little levity.
I’m working on a parody of the Oscars (apologies to all the parody masters out there-I’m a novice-It's a work in progress).
Any feedback - much appreciated.
* Backstage at the Oscars Rehearsal *
Producer: “Five minutes everybody! Places please! This is a live rehearsal! Camera one – zoom in on Jon!”
Jon Stewart: “Dick? I’m gonna open with the Bush/Cheney ‘Brokeback Mountain’ joke. Maybe use the “Capote & Cheney Hunting” stuff later? You know, after we have the “Jumpin’ Jihad” musical number. What do you think?”
Producer: “Yeah, that works. Don’t forget Rosie O’Donnell and Nathan Lane are doing the “Gay Love Stories at the Movies” montage right after you. Keep it tight on the monologue. We don’t have a lot of time before the commercial break…”
Jon Stewart: “Right. Alex Baldwin and Marty Sheen are still doing the “Support the Troops – Vote Democrat” mock PSA? That’ll kill! Funny stuff!”
Producer: “Of course. Camera Two? Make sure you get a good shot of Cindy Sheehan sitting next to Michael Moore during Jon’s monologue! Third joke in, wait for the line “Bush loves cartoons at the movies….”
Jon Stewart: “Cindy promised to wear her tee shirt if we showed it. That still a go?”
Producer: “Hell yeah! This isn’t the ‘State of the Union’ speech, you know. We still have free speech in Hollywood! By the way, make sure you pull all the “Mohammad - The Musical” jokes”
Jon Stewart: “I pulled all the Mohammad jokes. No sense offending a respected religion for no reason. We don’t need any grief over being ‘insensitive’ to cultural differences.
Producer: “Absolutely. That’s the same reason we dropped Theo Van Gogh from the “In Memoriam” montage. I mean, the guy basically made a hate film. We can’t celebrate that.
Jon Stewart: “Not enough fire insurance in the world to mention that guy! Can you imagine?!? They’d burn the theater down!
Producer: “Hell! They’d burn half of Hollywood down!”
Jon Stewart: “Is Redgrave going to hand out the award to “Paradise Now” when Palestine wins for best foreign film?”
Producer: “Who else? She’s always supported them. We thought it was a good fit. Should be an interesting acceptance speech, too.”
Jon Stewart “Did the President tape a message for opening credits? Like Clinton did?”
Producer: “The President….? Of the Academy….?”
Jon Stewart: “No - the President of the United States. You know, Bush?”
Producer: “Hell no! Will Farrell is doing a really funny impersonation of him we filmed last week. It has ‘Bush’ trying to figure out what the films are about based on just their titles! It’s a scream! He thinks ‘Crash’ is about NASCAR! Our audience will love it”

Valour-IT Donations - Not Just For Memorial And Veteran's Day Anymore...

2006-02-24T13:09:00.000-05:00

FbL has an update on the progress of one wounded serviceman, a recipient of a laptop and voice activated software several months back. Note this:

The laptop was the first step to the road to recovery. It proved that he was going to be able to do all the things that he did before.

For more info, and to see what a bunch of committed, Type A competitors can do when a need arises, check out this link to my post on the Veteran's Day 2005 fund raising drive... Valour-IT is an ongoing project. Please consider supporting it as you can. Thanks to Little Green Footballs for the Open Thread!

Nigerian Archbisop Denounces Jihad

2006-02-23T12:09:00.000-05:00

From the Calgary Sun: As the contiuning travelling road show of violence makes its way around the world, the Nigerian Archbishop denounces jihad (bolding in the letter below by editor of this blog):

Having watched with sadness and dismay the recent development in some States in the Northern part of this Country where many Christian Churches and other property have been wantonly destroyed by some Islamic fundamentalists, the Christian Association of Nigeria is compelled to issue the following statements: From all indications, it is very clear now that the sacrifices of the Christians in this country for peaceful co-existence with people of other faiths has been sadly misunderstood to be weakness. We have for a long time now watched helplessly the killing, maiming and destruction of Christians and their property by Muslim fanatics and fundamentalists at the slightest or no provocation at all. We are not unaware of the fact that these religious extremists have the full backup and support of some influential Muslims who are yet to appreciate the value of peaceful co-existence. That an incident in far away Denmark which does not claim to be representing Christianity could elicit such an unfortunate reaction here in Nigeria, leading to the destruction of Christian Churches, is not only embarrassing, but also disturbing and unfortunate. It is no longer a hidden fact that a long standing agenda to make this Nigeria an Islamic nation is being surreptitiously pursued. The willingness of Muslim Youth to descend with violence on the innocent Christians from time to time is from all intents and purposes a design to actualize their dream. It is sad to note that all acts of hostility meted against Christians by Muslims in the past have remained unaddressed with nobody paying compensations or the culprits brought to justice. We do appreciate the fact that at this stage of our national development, peace is absolutely necessary for realizing our dreams and aspirations. It is in view of this that Christians in Nigeria agreed to participate in the forthcoming National Census as sacrifice for the peace and progress of this nation, in spite of our protest over the non-inclusion of Religion and Ethnicity as necessary demographic data. May we at this stage remind our Muslim brothers that they do not have the monopoly of violence in this nation. Nigeria belongs to all of us – Christians, Muslims and members of other faiths. No amount of intimidation can change this time-honoured arrangement in this nation. C.A.N. may no longer be able to contain our restive youths should this ugly trend continue. We now demand that further destruction of Christian Churches and property in this nation be permanently put to an end. All levels of Government in this country should take adequate steps to protect the lives and property of Christians everywhere in this land as no further destructions will be tolerated or ignored. The Federal Government and those States where Christian Churches have been destroyed are hereby urged to take urgent steps at rebuilding those structures and paying adequate compensation while assuring Christians of adequate protection in this country. These governments should now show in practical terms that Nigeria belongs to all of us by going beyond mere promises of rebuilding destroyed Churches and property as in the past to actual reconstruction, which will help the victims to quickly put this unfortunate incident behind them. A stitch in time saves nine. Signed Most Revd. Peter J. Akinola (CON, DD.) President, Christian Association of Nigeria

"Toonophobia"

2006-02-22T13:22:00.000-05:00

From Cox & Forkum This is a nice lead in to my post on the GWoC. H/T: Little Green Footballs.

New, Cool Tech Toys....The Eyebud...

2006-02-21T12:56:00.000-05:00

Thanks to CPU Magazine, I once more see something so cool I have to take a few minutes and look at the account balances... Presenting (drum roll, please!): The "Eyebud" Like a 105" screen @ 12 ft, but needs no wall anchors. 'Nuff said...Oh, the entire press release here! Side note (bonus info): Gizmodo looks like a worthwide place to dream and waste some surfing time... More bonus notes! Foam from the rocket industry to be used to make surfboards! Whoda thunk that one up during the Cold War? Thanks to LIttle Green Footballs for the Open Thread...

"Space Marines"

2006-02-20T14:19:00.000-05:00

And you thought they were kidding when they wrote Quake.... Here's a Marine Corps project

New Term: Great War on Cartoons (GWoC)

2006-02-18T18:10:00.000-05:00

While reading this latest on the news of the riots over some 6 month old cartoons of Mohammed, I think it would be appropriate for the MSM to begin tracking up the "body count" for the Muslims indiscriminate killing of themselves and anyone nearby, as some form of twisted revenge for drawings published in newspapers. Let's refer to it as the "Great War on Cartoons," for that is what it is. It is a world war, from New Mexico to Italy, to Africa, and across the Middle East. Read the link to the story in Nigeria above (Africa) and tell me this isn't a religious war. It is, and it has been and will be. Pretend all you want, stick your fingers in your ears, scream "LALALALALALALA!" all you like, squinch your eyes closed and hope it was all a bad dream. Wishing isn't going to make it go away, it will be the youth of America and some staunch allies, who do the dirty work in stopping this. As I consider the straegy that is unfolding, it's a masterful one. Just as the North Vietnamese did, use mass media to "get the word out" that they are too terrible to resist, and then, when the lie becomes accepted fact, then it will be easy to roll votes through Congress to pull funding for any overseas troops. They put their "boots" on the ground retreated from. From a partcial tactical standpoint, I recall the teachings of Wesley E. Jordan, Jr.: "Time, Speed and Distance!" If this truly was a real issue with the masses of Islam, then the riots would have simultaneous broken out last summer, when the cartoons forst appeared. They didn't. There may be some good news in that circumstance. Here's my guess why. It is taking a travelling band of agitators to first get "buy in" for the idea of the riots, and then have to hoof it to each site to hopefully find an ember to fan and hope a flame will appear. If this is the case, then it's a small band of terrorist propagandists, and many tools of the trade have been taken from them. Years ago, their satellite phones went down, after the disclosure that we were listening to them. Notice how things calmed down quite a bit. With all the internationally exchanged watch lists of terrorists, travelling on any public means must have become difficult, which would explain the delays between subsequent violence in different places. Add to this that the NYT leaked we were monitoring their phone calls (cells and landlines) and it has been acknowldged that the "chatter" has decreased. These few guys (not being sexist, just recognizing that muslims don't let women do much of anything) are left with drafting letters and having a courier hand deliver them, or making them memorize an order, that they have to deliver without error. Talk about sucking in command and control issues, let alone having a chance of getting inside your enemy's OODA Loop... The good news may be we are effectively throttling their tactical comms, allowing a mere trickle of information to flow. The bad news is they have developed strategic communications tools by co-opting the traditional press, where "the world's opinion" happens. If you didn't read the link to the 20 Year Plan of Islam above....here it is. Get there and absorb it. Update 2/19/2006: Uncle Jimbo has some thoughts over at Black Five on things that don't exist.... Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post Update: 02/21/2006: The Nigerians say the MSM silence is killing them. From the History News Network:

This REFUSAL of the press to mount a HUGE OUTCRY is GETTING US KILLED. . . . If they'd all come out in unison and HOWLED THEIR DISGUST, it might have quelled the riots and shamed the Muslims into ceasing this obscene behaviour. As it is, Muslims see nothing is going to happen to them for howling and they are going to up the ante. The REAL STORY IS THE PRESS REFUSAL TO COVER THIS. WHY?

That fact is truth, even if it hurts the liberals feelings...enough already! Update: 2/23/2006: It seems the violence is begetting violence. Nigeria Christians are retaliating by killing Muslims and then burning their corpses in the streets. See this article from the Herald Sun. Sadly, add at least another 85 dead by 'toons to the list. Also, in news 2/23/2006: Nigerian Archbishop denounces Jihad.... Thanks to Sobering Thoughts blog for the link!

"Because Great Minds Do Not Think Alike..."

2006-02-18T15:27:00.000-05:00

There has been a struggle lately at the University Of Washington over honoring LtCol Gregory Boyinton, USMC and of the American Volunteer Group Flying Tigers. An ace, POW and Medal of Honor winner in WWII, he was a U of W grad ('34). The Student Senate recently voted agasint honoring Pappy, because of his chosen profession. Here's the background on this issue. This is the fallout of what the ROTC community at U of W had to say. The content is remarkably well stated and is one of those documents that communicates to me that there is plenty of hope for the future, if the men and women who put this together will be the ones defending us.

An Open Letter to the University of Washington Student Senate From The UW Military Community. Student Senate, Of the many student organizations on campus, the military community often holds a negative image. The various Reserve Officer Training Corp programs are frequently criticized by some as producing trained killers. Yet these programs are designed with considerable effort to produce leaders of integrity, courage and dedication. The individuals thats come out of ROTC are some of the brightest leaders our nation is capable of producing. They are exactly the sort of people the UW should strive to produce. The military community does not desire parades, monuments or banners. We do our jobs not for thanks nor praise. We do our duty because we believe we serve a purpose greater than ourselves. However, we resent the fact that some members of the student government would liken us to criminals or murderers. It is true that the profession of arms is a violent one. But as a professional military, our services put an unbelievable amount of effort to accomplish the mission with as little damage and loss of life as possible. The world is still a violent place and the only thing that keeps violence off of our doorstep, is that other men and women stand ready to absorb that violence. Soldiers are not responsible for making policy. We are assigned missions by the duly appointed civilian leadership, one not unlike the concept of the student senate. Like the American public we each have our own political opinions and beliefs. The ideas and politics of each person in uniform is as diverse as can be found anywhere on campus. Yet we all share one commonly parroted ideal; that freedom of thought and liberty are divine rights to be enjoyed by all humankind. To this day there are millions of people who live under the weight of oppression. Few people around the world enjoy the same security, luxury and freedoms that are so openly taken for granted in our nation. Gregory Boyington and men like him literally bled to protect liberty from a growing oppressive empire. Many before him, many of his peers, and many future graduates from his Alma Mater have, and will continue to pay the price of liberty with their own blood. So easy is it to condemn and criticize others. And so easy is it to give way to ignorance and preconceived notions. We are all guilty of it, all of us. While it is not uncommon, it is also not fair that some confuse the necessity of violence with murder or fascism. No American warrior fights for his appointed Commander in Chief. No American warrior fights for oil. Americans take up arms not to force their choices on others, but to give and protect the liberty of choice. Despite all the criticism and the apparent negative feelings of all involved parties, we are PROUD to be members of the University community. The UW may not always support the military community, but we strongly support the University of Washington. The UW is and will continue to be a main center of academic achievement, as well as a diverse community of politics and ideas. We firmly support the University of Washington because great minds do not think alike. Great minds think for themselves. With Genuine Respect, The Military Community of the University of Washington

A scholarship fund in LtCol Boyington's name has been set up here to support Marine Corps vets, or their children. H/T: Black Five Thanks to Little Green Footballs for the Open Thread!

Administration Split on Decision to Invade Europe

2006-02-18T12:24:00.000-05:00

It seems this was written in 2002, as a satirical note on current events (2002 and now), but it's well done. From Rand Simberg at Transterrestial Musings:

April 3, 1944 WASHINGTON DC (Routers) Fissures are starting to appear in the formerly united front within the Roosevelt administration on the upcoming decision of whether, where and how to invade Europe. Some influential voices within both the Democrat and Republican parties are starting to question the wisdom of toppling Adolf Hitler's regime, and potentially destabilizing much of the region. "It's one thing to liberate France and northwestern Europe, and teach the Germans a lesson, but invading a sovereign country and overthrowing its democratically-elected ruler would require a great deal more justification," said one well-connected former State Department official. "The President just hasn't made the case to the American people."

Read it all... Add to it this other "bit:"

Congress Concerned About Diversion From War On Japan December 12, 1941 WASHINGTON DC (Routers) Despite yesterday's declaration of war against the US by the German government, some in Congress are concerned about becoming embroiled in a war in Europe, when we are apparently so ill prepared to defeat the duplicitous Japanese, who only five days ago attacked and decimated our Pacific fleet in Hawaii without warning. Many fear that the US, still mired in the deep economic depression of the past decade, lacks the resources to take on separate foes on three separate continents and two oceans, particularly when it seems so unnecessary, and a diversion from our true enemy.

The rest is here..

"HTHL" Concept for Space Launches

2006-02-18T12:03:00.000-05:00

Ahhh..Saturday morning link chasing while updating computers nearby.. Horizontal Takeoff, Horizontal Landing (HTHL) for the "1st Stage" of the launch process from Andrews Space. I found this at the bottom of an article discussing the FAA's Environmental Impact Report for a spaceport in Oklahoma...(which is interesting in itself to read). Andrews Space has developed a hybrid jet/rocket powered aircraft, the Gryphon, that collects oxygen for the rocket fuel while on it's way to launch altitude using the Andrews Alchemist™ ACES propulsion system. Certainly this has a wide range of low cost options..... Here's a link to a video of the concept: Quicktime Windows Media H/T to Transterrestrial Musings.

"Isn't It Ironic?"

2006-02-17T17:37:00.000-05:00

Sorry, Alanis, I couldn't resist... On the way back to the office today, the 4:30 PM news said the FBI estimated a serious possibility of a terrorist attack at the Oscars.... Consider the irony of it all, but let's pray it doesn't happen. The Hollywood crowd has done their utmost to undermine the entire GWoT effort. If George Clooney, Tim Robbins, Sean Penn, Johnny Depp, Michael Moore, etc, etc, etc were attending, the enemy (that those people think don't exist) would be targeting the very ones who can help their cause win through mass media influence. AS a strategy, I see it as pretty counter productive, but tactically, I could see them going for a splashy, last gasp sort of thing to scare us into submission, beofre they become irrelevant in the world picture. I tried googling the story, but no results. I geuss it's late breaking news for this afternoon.

Open Note to the "Media"

2006-02-15T13:14:00.000-05:00

For those in the "Main Stream Media," I would like to address a few issues: Can we please get to something of substance? We have a country hurtling towards development of atomic/nuclear weapons. The President of that country also declared Israel (a soverign nation) should be wiped off the map. Maybe I'm way off base here, but I estimate this to be more important than a hunting accident. I don't mean to take anything away from the man suffering, but the sheer amount of time devoted by "you" implies this is an issue of great importance. The good news is the man is in excellent care, in a country with excellent doctors and sanitary hospitals. While his wounds may cause him problems, the bottom line, is it's under control of skilled medical personnel. On the other hand, the few trickles of reporting on the Iranin President discussing the coming of the 12th Imam and how Israel needs to disappear, and then says the holocaust never happened poses a significant danger to just about all the rest of the world. Just yesterday, an Australian newpaper released more photos and video of the Abu Gharib prison abuse, which, quite predictably, has already brought on protests (read riots that kill people) in some muslim countries. Somehow, the cartoon "scandal," the flushed Koran (that never happened) and many other proven after the fact completely false allegations regarding how American troops act keep surfacing, and causing more riots. These riots kill those who particpate, for the most part, which means these people could really care less about human life, let alone a cartoon, it's you whipping up a frenzy just to sell more papers or advertizing time. Nice...great plan. I have a question: Are you really on the Carl Rove super dupper triple secret payroll and being used to help eliminate more Islamic minded people at a lower cost and where we can't land our military to do the job? Back to comments: If you can't bring yourselves to sum up the human cost of the use of nuclear weaponry (I suggest reading about Hiroshima and Nagasaki for details), then go for the environmental angle. The radiation will rise to the area of the upper atmosphere and then move "downwind" (read: back toward Iran - how stupid are they really?) and cause long term helath consequences, unlike and power plant has ever done. But, then again, the Islamic radicals don't mind collateral damage, like you, unless it's the US Military that accidentally kills a civilian, which cause you all to foam at the mouth once more, demanding blood. Is it so hard to see the thin facade of rightousness you drape yourselves in? A slight breeze of truth will carry that away, and then you stand, exposed in your rampant hate and hipocracy. How about telling us about the $250K Al Gore received for trashing our sitting president while speaking in Saudi Arabia? The man needs a job in Hollywood, not Tenessee, because he can memorize a script for any audience willing to pay? Some would read the definiton of "treason" and label it as such, but....you can't seem to find the time to get to the heart of this story. President Jimmy Carter at least got some coverage, while standing on the body of a dead woman. Nice touch, for all of you, and him, for being so disrespctful of Mrs. King. Paul Harvey, who seems to be drifting left, commented today about more and more land and businesses being ripped out of the hands of the people as a result of the Kelo decision of the Supreme Court, and lamented that President Bush and our Justice Dept can't seem to find any help for the citizens. Well, a quick review of the "decision" is the "liberal" justices voted to steal the land for private development and the "conservative" ones objected. Toss in how you all have convinced the public (and the NEA has made sure the general populace knows nothing better) that any decision of the Supreme Court is absolutely above all other branches of the Government. This being the case, it makes no sense for Paul harvey to complain, for if the Justice Dept did go after the issue, then you all would pillory them for thinking they were better than our hallowed, non-elected judges. Consider that you also braodcast load and clear the issues Justice Roberts supported, in opposition to the Supreme Court decisions when he was a member of the Solicitor General's Staff. You don't want it any other way, unless it's not the way you want it. There are bigger issues to provide the world with, besides some birdshot (not buckshot, like you all like to say) that injured a man. How about get a grip and make a living the decent way, starting with telling the truth and demonstrating some sense of proportionality, and also considering the positions you support? Comments?

Calling to the Bellevue, WA Reader....

2006-02-14T18:27:00.000-05:00

I see someone in the logs about daily coming to the blog from Bellevue. If you'd be so kind as to drop me an email, I'd love to ask some question about the area I grew up in. Last time I passed through was in 1980, so I assume (without much risk), things have been changed just a little. Thank you in advance....(use the "email me" link on the sidebar, please) P.S. Thanks for your daily trips to see if I've produced anything worth reading...

Need a Chuckle? See New TV Series Ideas...

2006-02-14T18:18:00.000-05:00

Over at Fark.com there's a little bit of PhotoShopping going on... Check it out...this is one of oh, so many...

It May Not Be Accurate, But I Like How It Sounds....

2006-02-14T18:07:00.000-05:00

Blood Type Predicts Personality?, which I found chasing those little links from the Netscape Home Page (Who wants to wait for tabbed browsing in Explorer anyhow? I've been using it for a few years in Netscape...but I digress).

Type-O people are warriors. They are outgoing, expressive, and passionate. They are highly motivated and natural leaders. Blessed with a strong physical presence, they aren't afraid to gamble because they are so convinced they will win. They are natural athletes. They tend to be obsessive in their quest for success, and this can make them boring to others.

Sure sounds like Neptunus Lex to me (from afar). What about the rest of you?

I'm Thinking Even the Most Reluctant Parent Would Cave

2006-02-14T12:22:00.000-05:00

Dr. Spock taught my parents generation is was a bad thing to spank children. I don't advocate it, but I had my share when I "left the farm" so to speak.... If a child today was acting like large numbers of Muslims today, I think even the pacifist parents amoung us would consider an extended, meaningful "laying on of hands." It's getting pretty disgusting, and the press seems to be egging them on by continually highlighting the bad behavior, which, in a World Court would be considered acts of war (buring embassy type properties is considered an attack on the soil of the nation who is placing diplomats there. That's a loooooonnnnggggg standing agreement, but then again, it was when we were having wars amongst countries with borders, not with ideologies, where the combatants do not wear a recognizable uniform, nor to they report to any chain of command. It's a war alright, and we need to stop looking at this like lawyers watching civil disobedience. We need to see it as a people group desiring to push their moral code on everyone they can. That's what happens in wars. The side note is how "we" get all upset when a Christian happens along in the work place, or at the mall and asks you about your believe structure. More often than not, the press tells us people are "forcing" their religion upon others and then "we" go so far as to have the Ten Commandments taken down, so as not to offend society at large. Where is the equivalent outrage when the Islamic proponents demand we not publish certain cartoons? Don't you see? Next time, will it be pictures of un-Burkaed women they brun towns down over? Or...could they decide no Jewish people should be employed? Don't call me an alarmist, just open up your paper, or turn on c-BS/ABC/NBC/CNN...they are at it now, and they will keep it up. Rueters Photo Hungry for a Big Mac? Get one now before they riot in the street against that... (H/T: Michelle Malkin!)

New Stuff...Random Magazine Browsing Report

2006-02-13T21:31:00.000-05:00

I had'nt heard of this car before...750HP...and sexy, too. How about a personal gyrocopter? From CPU Magazine, this update on holgraphic stroage progress:

Holographic Storage Coming Soon Maxell and InPhase Technologies say that holographic data techniques would store 150 million pages, or 63 times the capacity of a DVD, on a single 5.25-inch disc. Lasers and 3D holographic images would store and retrieve data at ultra-high densities and could ultimately put 1.6TB of data on a single disc with transfer speeds of up to 120Mbps. “Unlike other technologies that record one data bit at a time, holography allows a million bits of data to be written and read in parallel with a single flash of light,” says Liz Murphy, VP of marketing at InPhase Technologies. Expect an early 300GB, 20Mbps model later this year.

I recall seeing a documentary about 10 years ago about NASA working on a project to put data on a 1"x1"x1" plastic cube, that would be accessed using two lasers to look into the matrix for a dark or clear spot. They said you could use many discrete frequencies of laser light and begin the storage capacity all over, so many "layers" of data could be stored simultaneously. I think they said there was about 900 frequencies, so therefore, a single 1" cube would hold all of the Library of Congress and have room to spare. Maybe they are getting close...I'm sure the RIAA will not like this development.

Just When You Thought You Didn't Need Black Shoes....

2006-02-09T18:12:00.000-05:00

AP reports on the use of the Navy to blockade the coast of Yemen, to prevent the escape of the al-Qaeda guys who got out of prison the other day. I know the TR is there, but you can bet the DDs and FFGs are running up and down the coast.

Speaking of Records....

2006-02-09T12:21:00.000-05:00

The "World Team" successfully completed a 400 person formation in skydiving in Thailand! Oh, yeah, just in case it has always been a burning question for you, here's the answer: THIS IS WHY YOU JUMP OUT OF PERFECTLY GOOD AIRPLANES! To be certified as a record, the formation has to be held intact for at least 3 seconds, and every jumper must be in the "slot" where they were planned to be, it's not just grab on someone as you get there. They use CAD/CAM programs and good old common sense as to figure out what the formation will look like and who belongs where (combination of experience and also body size). Flying about the sky, after exting from aircraft in close formation, with 32 ft/sec/sec taking effect, and the brain having to take a some time to register, it gets exciting. They plan and practice the routes from the planes to the entry into the formation. The break off plan is staged and executed at various departure and opening altitudes. People in the practice jumps that aren't paying attention to their surrounding (and therefore become a danger to the other jumpers) are "cut" from the load and the people "on the bench" are called in and briefed about the position they are filling. As the formation builds, the aerodynamics begin to slow it down, so those who have joined the formation need to keep their collective fall rate up, as once it gets too slow, single jumpers will end up falling faster and then not make it in while they "go low." Once you're in, you have to watch the subtle signals of the movement of the mass, for ripples can flow thru it like a wave if people don't keep there individual fall rates matching the rest of them. If they take a second or two to react, rather than anticipating, the waves can remind you of a "crack the whip" game, only at about 120MPH. The formation can break apart as a result. It's an activity that takes intense mental preparation and focus, all the way to a safe landing. Consider 400 jumpers and 8-10 camera guys all looking for the coolest place to land and swoop the crowd on the ground...it sucks to ruin a prefectly good record attempt with a collision before getting down to celebrate. Additional technical note: The jumpers not "attached" happen to be camera flyers, most likely doing stills and digital video. There's a little of the background on what happens...here's my "resume" to discuss such things, in case you need to check me out. It's exciting times in the skies! Check this post out about the 85 way canopy formation over Lake Wales, FL in December...the record for that part of the sport. Update 2/10/2006: Read a first person account of the jumps here from Luke Oliver. He mentions his mentor in "Big Ways" was Sandy Wambach. She organized both record attempts I was on. For a women barely standing 5' and maybe 98 lbs soaking wet, not only did she dream big, but she did it big... Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post! Thank you, also, to Blue Star Chronicles, Bloggin' Out Loud, Adam's Blog, The Real Ugly American, Black Five,Argghhh! The Home of Tow Jonah's Military Guys, Little Green Footballs and Jo's Cafe for the Trackback!

Some Days You Just Want to Give Up....

2006-02-09T10:46:00.000-05:00

So...al-Rueters tells us GTMO "detainees" on hunger strikes were tube fed....in the process, people with a mind to kill us in our sleep (and our children, too) would rather starve to death, so it took some restraining to assist them in keeping alive. I'm sure "please, would you eat now?" wasn't working at all. Just for fun: What if we just stood outside their cells and said "Oh, well, I guess they want to die" and provided them blankets and a comfortable cot. How would that news headline read? Something like: "US STARVES GTMO DETAINEES TO DEATH!" As far as the media dn the left are concerned, is there any course of action that could have been taken in the face of fanatical opposition? Better yet, if George Felos knows whats good for him (meaning how he can once again regain the international spot light an lots of blood money), he'll make sure he gets his bar certification to practice in Federal Courts, particularly in the SCOTUS. Just think, I'm sure he can come up with an argument for the judges that makes perfect sense that we should just let these detainees out of this for, because their living conditions are just soooooo horrible and we're torturing them keeping them alive...

Electronic "Paper" Not Far Away!

2006-02-08T16:36:00.000-05:00

Check this out! Thin, flexible LCD displays. Just think of the potential applications!

The Intelligence Summit 2006

2006-02-08T10:08:00.000-05:00

I caught an interview with John Loftus on the Schnitt Show yesterday afternoon. They were discussing the upcoming intelligence symposium in DC (17-22 Feb) and a series of statements by Saddam Hussein will be played during the conference. It seems the modern day Saladin liked to baost about what he got over on Hans Blix, the UN and the rest of the world, and there are recorded statements regarding where the WMDs went, who helped move them just days before the invasion in 2003, and that he had things not listed on the UN reports from GWI. This could become the story of the year.... Apparently the voice has been verified to be that of Saddam and not some actor and should provide the opportunity for a lot of people to consider crow as the other meat they will need to make a staple diet out of after this set of disclosures. He said a lot of old time spooks, DoD people and press attend. Info on the symposium is here. Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

Thomas Paine Said...

2006-02-08T00:35:00.000-05:00

Chasing vistors links usually brings something interesting. From a speech at a change of command on the USS BULKELEY, a quote from Thomas Paine:

"Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly; … it is dearness only that gives everything its value."

Fine words, for yesterday, today and the future...

An Anniversary....

2006-02-07T15:20:00.000-05:00

I'm not in the same time zone, and since the actual event happened on the other side of the International Dateline, I'm a day late...but my calendar in 1971 said "February 7th." NAS Agana, Guam. Cessna 172 Skyhawk. Larry the Lawyer (and willing Instructor/Jumpmaster). Dad and two of his friends. Me. Leon Steppe. Blue skies. Light Winds. Orange flight suits. Surplus military C-9 28' "rounds." 24' cotton twill "belly wart" reserves. White motorcycle helmets. Combat boots. Big smiles. Picture for the album. "Do you want to go first?" Leon asked me. He was a co-worker of my father's, but closer to my age tahn to my Dad. I said what ever he wanted was fine, then he volunteered that he'd rather go first, so he could get it done with. I don't really recall the ride up, or Leon jumping, other than he went before I did. I can still picture looking in at Larry (as I was perched, holding the right strut with both hands, feet planted on the step on the main mount strut. He yelled "GO!" above the about 70-80 kts of wind. I next recall the opening shock and it wasn't bad. On the other hand, I had no body fat and was a tall, skinny teenager, at the ripe old age of 16 1/2. I generically checked out the ground below, while many new sensations tried to get my attention. I next clearly remember the dialogue with myself: "It's less than 100 ft!" "NO!" "Yes it IS!" "NO, IT's NOT!" then.... (sound of 1st, immediately followed by 4th point of contact contacting Mother Earth) (sound of strong language appropriate to the situation) My first PLF really sucked. If I'd had a Black Hat around, I'm sure it would have been worth a lot of push ups. I just had Dad and his friends come bolting across the field in the car (not sure who let that happen), to congratulate me. Debrief: Good exit, good arch, didn't count (Deer in headlights mode). To this day, my first 3 seconds of freefall, before the static line took over, are not recallable. I landed in a clear area. Leon had almost kissed the side of one of the hangers. I found out years later the reason my burise on the right cheek occured: You leave a 3D view, go up and then the ground pretty much goes to 2D, then you come back into it and until you get some experience, that transition back to 3D is a tough one. In the meantime, it's not uncommon to see the legs of the student move from feet and knees together, slightly flexed to feet and knees together, but legs more like you are sitting in a chair, as you unconsciously raise them. Being hidden (in those days) below your "belly wart," you don't realize you're doing it, so come time to become a "leg" again, you skip contact points 2 and 3...(see your local Airborne qualified neighbor to get the details). Between weather, aircraft availibility, Jumpmaster access, I did not make another jump on the island of Guam, but the second one was about 6 months later, at Monck's Corner, SC, under the tutlage of Allan Gardner, a former Golden Knight. He and Johnny Throbridge (not real sure of the spelling of his last name) both had gold wings (1000 freefalls) and were two of a very few who had attained that distinction in those days. Anyhow, I've jumped from Guam to Maine, and a few places in between. Put my younger sister out on her first several jumps, was "knob" training upperclassmen at night to skydive, and put a lot of them out the doors of C-182s and C-206s. Looked on in wonder as Johnny brought his new "StratoCloud" to the DZ, complete with labels on each front riser: "200 Jumps Minimum." ParaCommanders were the hot canopy, and then the French made Papillon made some inroads to the maket. My first rig was a C-9, formerly white and dyed burgandy, in a 4 pin container. I did 6 static lines to get to freefall, and will say the two most anxious moments I have ever had in the air were my second jump, and my first 10 second delay. I survived. I have lept from 17,000 ft, with 90 some others in the air, made three night jumps, a water jump, my 1000th jump was with Jerry Bird, the man credited widely for making "relative work" a major part of the sport. My 1000th freefall was a night jump over Eloy, AZ. Been on two tandems to help play a really bad passenger for my buddies who were getting their tandem master ratings. The biggest jump was the VA State record in 97. 87. We held it for 13 seconds on the first jump of the second day of the attempt that October weekend,and it was solid as a rock. No waves or tension...just 87 people collectively working gravity and the air in perfect synchonization. I was in the trailing King Air of the four plane formation, and only had two people following me out. I entered about 5 people from the completion on the other edge and have the video to prove it...watching it with someone who wasn't in it is kinda like the "Where's the Skydiving Waldo" thing. I have met incredible people, gotten to know a man who owns more planes than most air forces of the world (Paul Fayard), suffered one sprained ankle, one sprained wrist, two sprained fingers and 5 malfunctions in 1274 jumps. I don't know how many students, static line and accelerated freefall, that I have shown the sky to, but it's a lot, and only one said "no" when the door opened. Amazingly enough, the other one that almost didn't go was a big, strapping Marine (sorry, dude, but it's the truth!). I've talked to some of the best skydivers and videographers in the world, jumped with the Russian national team, had discussions with a German International Relations Masters student from Georgetown U one one side of me and a Croatian Army officer on the other side of me, while we packed our chutes for another time up. I've done demos at the parade ground at Ft Devons on Armed Forces Day, watched a guy in Tuskeegee, AL, get out at 1000 ft, because the DZ owner told him for a buck (all the guy had left) he could ride up to 1000 (so he did...). I've known BASE jumpers, but never done it. Took road trips through the SE of the country in the summer of 73, looking for a military base that had gas and flight hours allocated on 1 July (the new fiscal year then), and found Benning didn't but Rucker did. Made the news (well, it was sort of filler) when I was allowed to help fill the last three seats on the CH-54, when the SEALS in the area where trying to make a record of a 21 way formation. The local news crew was there and gave me all of about 3 seconds time before the next story after the SEALS story played....I found out, while I sat in a meeting of NAVMASSO people, that I had made the cover of Soundings (the Naval Base Norfolk paper), posing for the camera while hanging by my hands only off the strut of a Cessna 182 about 3500 ft over the Great Dismal Swamp. They put it on the overhead to open the meeting. Been out of a balloon, UH-1D/Hs, CH-46s at Quantico, a CH-54 over Fentress NALF, Cessnas of many flavors, to include a Caravan, Queen and King Air Beechcraft planes, Skyvans, Casas, and a few other flying things. Done a full backwards layout off the tail ramp of a Casa, after letting the rest of the jumpers go, then running from up by the pilots as fast as I could. I've been able to ride up to see the sun, while the ground was in the shadows of the end of the day and make some jumps that could technically have been called night jumps when it was all said and done. I hold no records for quantity, but my personal "best" is 24 jumps in 2 days. All of those were at least from 13000 ft, so I racked up over 30 minutes of freefall. While the sun was up, you pack, jump and maybe take a leak. You can eat before the sun comes up and after it goes down. I can "guess" the inside of a could looks like you're in an amost tranlucent bright white sphere, but then again, it's against FAA rules and the BSRs (Basic Safety Regulations) to jump into/through a cloud, so I might be wrong about that. I was sitting in the lobby of the O Club at Cubi Point when a LTJG walked up to me, and said "Don't you go to the Citadel and jump out of airplanes?" "Yes." I replied, still not knowing who he was. Then he told me he met me the year before at Quantico. Ted was his name and I had showed up and made a few jumps there during summer break. He then told me I should try and get into EOD, because all they did was dive and jump and workout and get paid for it. Ted Strong was his name and last I heard, he was making the big time in investments in Boston. He was a character.... I've left the ground when it was freezing and headed to 12,500 to 13,000 ft in the winter. Without wind chill, you count on losing 3.5 deg per 1000 ft of altitude. You better be dressed for the occassion. Rain hurts, because you are hitting the pointy ends on the way down, and if it's a lot, roll over and go back to Earth until it's time to set up for opening. Of all the rigs I've packed for students (a whole lot of that work), not one has had a malfunction. It's not a death wish thing, for, as the guy in the interview with a psychologist in Parachutist back in '71 said: "If I don't pull, I won't be able to jump again." I second the motion! It's more than likely an MAO-D thing, so you might not understand.... Sound like a great thing to try? USPA's website is here. There is plenty of information there and how to find a local drop zone. My advice...skip the tandem, and go for AFF....Instructors and Jumpmasters need to eat, too... P.S. If you got this far, pop over to Far East Cynic and congratulate him on his one year Blogversary.... Thanks to Skydance.at for the link as skydiving news!

Super Bowl is Over, But GoDaddy Went For It!

2006-02-07T10:40:00.000-05:00

Here is a set of links and the timeline to the effort for GoDaddy went thru to get their commercial for the Super Bowl approved....

I'm Terrifying a Former Army Officer

2006-02-04T15:12:00.000-05:00

But many things seem to terrify him, if you scan his blog, so I'm in good company. Here are the opening "shots" across my bow:

It is pretty scary when people (Retired Navy no less) cannot distinguish between listening in on the Enemy's military communication and listening in on random phone calls into the US with regular US citizens on the other end. This is the beginning of the end for all personal liberties. I wonder who really has won? It appears we are moving far closer to what the USSR was then not.

Well, I'm impressed. I thought I was just a small voice in the blogsphere, yet I have found out from Kevin that I have the ability to cause the downfall of society by my very (in his opinion) bad analytical abilities regarding a analogy of history..... I would submit his mindset has limited him to refusing to accept progress. What a sad state of life that must be. Yes, at the time of the Battle of Midway, there were no cellphones to be tapped by FDR. Kevin's world view would then suggest we cannot use the methods of finding out what the enemy's intentions are via SIGINT must be limited to just those we used in WWII (I'm taking his statement of me not being able to understand the difference between "enemies" and American citizens as acceptance of the "rightness" of "wiretapping" the Japanese Naval communications in WWII as a good and proper thing to do...). So, now that the world does have cellphone and commincations technology as the Internet, that those methods of communication between those who would harm us are off limits to those in elected and paid employ of the US Government because they are not of the earlier era. The element missing in his analysis of my analysis is a simle concept: R.E.A.L.I.T.Y. Kevin, if you're reading this, I urge you to embrace reality® and join the rest of us. Imagine this: In WWII, the Germans (I mention them, so you will understand my concept of enemy, even if I'm not referring to the Japanese) routinely landed their agents along the eastern seaboard of the US. I am not specifically aware of the Japanese doing the same thing, but I suspect that it occured, or they infiltrated the US by other routes, but the concept (hang with me, Kevin!) is enemy "spies" (what we used to call them, regardless of what their born or naturalized status is/was) were within our borders, specifically to gather intelligence to support the execution of war against us (tough concept, but a recognized one in all of recorded history). Today, we know from the 9/11 Commission report, and other research of the events leading up to the attacks on 9/11/2001, that the men who carried out those attacks were all within our national boundries for some time before conducting their attacks. Interestingly enough, when that came out, to include the traffic stops of some of them just days before 9/11 and the FBI office in the midwest that wanted to pick up one of them (but were told they could not, for fear of violating civil rights of the suspect), the papers were full of calls to punish all of our law enforcement people for not "connecting the dots." It certainly is all so clear after the attacks that "SOMEONE SHOULD HAVE KNOWN!!!" Yeah, like all the people hollering actually preform at an exceptional level of psychic ability every day and just those in the government are stupid beyond belief... As I have thought about this post for a few days, it scares me that a man who served in the Army doesn't have enough discernment to figure that not all phone calls answered or made from within the US borders are made by US citizens. Kevin would have no calls monitored, to make sure that not a single US citizen is impacted, while a foreign national easily conspires against us at will, knowing he will not be found out in that method of communications. Additionally, some US citizens actually are invested in making us fail. John Walker comes to mind in this case. Would Kevin think it was acceptable to actually hold those people accontable for their sedition, or, are they shielded as perfect because they are US citizens? If that was the case, then we'd need not statues regarding treason. Once more, back into the reality breech: Those people exist, and to ignore that fact is at our peril. Add to it that spies within an enemy's borders, with the ability to pass intelligence back to the homeland, have been around since Thucydides chronicles the Pelloponnisian War between Athens and Sparta. Is it reasonable to allow those in authority to find and arrest those who are involved in this sort of effort to destroy a country? I submit the answer is yes. The next discussion would be what would that look like, and this is the discussion worth having over this entire issue. In WWII, FDR wholesale dispensed with worrying about chasing phone calls, and had the Japanese ancestry put behind barbed wire, for ease of monitoring. The travesty in the long run is the most decorated regiment in the history of the US Army (the record stands to this day) was the single Nesei unit, the 442nd Regimental Combat Team. Over the years, there have been efforts to recognize the egregious violation of the Japanese-American's rights, where the internment also meant the loss of their personal and business properties (an early version of the SCOTUS Kelo decisions, with out using the Supreme Court) Toss this detail in: I'd think any person in the profession of arms would have a concept of the OODA loop and understand that if we have to battle to beat the MSM to the airwaves during a war, we darn sure have to speed up our intelligence gathering loops. Side note: Col John Boyd, the recognized leader in the formualtion of the stratgies of the current US Air Force, is the man who came up with the OODA Loop. Col Boyd served with Congressman Sam Johnson, too. Back to the story: If the enemy can get inside your decision making or action taking loop on a time line, you're, how shall I say this delicately? "YOU'RE SCREWED!" and you lose....With nearly indistingiushable from the speed of light communications capabilities today, it makes sense to figure out how to integrate the intelligence gathering domestically into our laws, rather than act like we're all safe and the greatest danger is a call to a married person's extramarital playmate, that goes no further, is the downfall of all of our civil rights, as Kevin strongly implies. We face a similar, but far less deadly (unless you're from the music, TV or movie industry) in the world of copyrights. With the near the speed of light capability to "rip off" the artists, the ability to make the single, legally authorized archivial backup is being taken away from us. In contrast to the issue of terrorists, where we fall all over ourselves to make sure even foreigners get every advantage granted under US law, in the copyright discussion, the RIAA and others of that type have convinced judges at many levels that the only reason anyone would use a recording device (starting with the introduction of the VCR) is to steal. That is in complete juxtaposition to the case at hand. I doubt there is any serious rebellion by those who see us as being painted as a society as thiefs with a broad brush, screaming it it's beginning of the end of our civil rights.... Quite honestly, I'm baffled that Kevin (pardon the 3rd person reference, Kevin, if you are reading this) has a limited grasp of the procedures in the Soviet Union, being as how he stood nose to nose with them as an Armor Officer in Germany, while he was in. Here's a comment I will conduct my flawed analysis on:

All these crazy "security" reasons are the reasons given in the USSR why people were controlled by the Government.

This sort of helps put Kevin's frame of mind out there for analysis: The 50s through the 90s were the times of the Cold War. We (those of us in the service) regularly took the time (or were required to attend lectures) on how the Soviets operated. Within these training sessions or manuals were descriptions of the society, so you cold frame their actions accrodingly. Domestic spying, in a very organized manner occured in every venue of life, for military and civilians. The military units each had their own Communsit Party member, the "Commisar," who had authority over even the commanding officers, to make sure everything was done in accrodance with the party line, specifically, in a centralized command structure (and in all of society at large, as well), you sure didn't question orders, or step outside of the box, or you got a train ticket (all expenses paid) to the Gulag...That constitutes 'crazy "security" reasons' Kevin discusses, not what has happened here in the US.

I now start all my conversations on the phone with random words.. Al Queda, Bomb, Down with US etc... just trying to drive the NSA crazy!

Advice to Kevin: Sounds like fun, but are you hoping they will come with a SWAT Team so you can have an audience with them and then spout off how George Bush is Satan's brother? I don't think you'll get the coverage, as you are a white guy. Sorry, me, too, but it seems only a few white guys get any press these days, when they think they have a message to convey. Reality: I doubt even your effort will get you noticed, but have fun playing with President Bush's mind. You know, I bet he hasn't heard a single tapped conversation, but we do know LBJ used to listen to tapes of Martin Luther King, Jr. "having his way" with women in hotel rooms. In fact, LBJ played them for others to listen to, while enjoying alcoholic beverages. In this case, I submit 1) LBJ was far scarier than President Bush in his wiretapping and 2) MLK, Jr. was an American citizen, ergo, you need to be more afraid of Democratic presidents invading our rights this way than Republicans.... On top of it all, it's sad to think that someone can live under a self imposed shadow of doubt and fear (read Kevin's blog). I can't imagine thinking only a few people in this country can make it into what he is so afraid of. I have faith that there are many thinking people, most everyone of them, concerned deeply about doing the right thing. In a nation of almost 300 millions people, even if 1% were those trying to take away our civil rights, the newspapers and TV would have 3 million to comment on. Given a number that large, it would be easy to sink into depression and figure it is the beginning of the end, unless you realize the rest of the population is standing to prevent it. The bottom line: As new threats appear, it's time to figure out how to handle it, within our body of law, not how to obfuscate the process. Update 2/24/2006: Welcome to readers from Command T.O.C. Feel free to post comments, as this has always been an option....(note: "no comments" just menas no one has yet posted any on the topic, not that you cannot voice your opinion).

A Flying Car?

2006-02-01T17:05:00.000-05:00

Sometimes it's fun chasing the links that brings people here...particularly the ones coming from search pages...:)

Not Looking So Good

2006-02-01T08:41:00.000-05:00

The morning's news. Oh, joy.....I'm sure the blogsphere and the HBM will be trumpteing this story and I'm just in the mood to put in my two cents (you know, just about no one bends over to pick up pennies in the parking lot any more...for what that's worth). I wasn't around in the 1930's, but I'm amazed that the world marches towards intentional conflict, so many voices are raised to not stand up as a world community and tell the Iraninas this is unacceptable behavior, while we have in our figurative grasp something to make them understand that decisions have consequences. The decision to "play nice" consequence is that the rest of us will play nice. The consequence of creating nuclear weapons with the stated intent of using them in an offensive manner against others, with a heavy emphasis on genocide, will not be tolerated. Further, proportional force is acceptable and proper under the circumstances. This force may be that the world, as a whole, unified voice, isolates the Iranian nation completely and lets them stew in their own (excess oil production) juices, until they see the cause and effect, and decide nice is better. The hard part is hearing the crying babies and the pleas for not letting the babies starve. Yep, tough to handle, but it's up to the leadership to change their mind so as to protect their citizens, and not harm them (the nature of government in civilization). Will a lot of the people who think the way to solve probelms with letting the addict/rageaholic/terrorist have everything they ask for, having already demonstrated their thought processes are not normal, will have to be held in their seats and told by the leadership of the rest of the world to just be patient and see how the pain of the isolation will bring about a better, long term solution than giving in, once more, like a battered spouse who returns to the agressor and then apoligizes for leaving....a much more intelligent man than I made a speech in 1979 that addresses how we might approach this situation. As far as those who disgree with this conceptual plan: How about trying to come up with a solution and not just say "THAT'S NOT THE ANSWER!" Frankly, the "War is not the answer" signs and bumper stickers offer little to the need for peace, it's just a slogan that indicates a lazy mindset. I challenge to you is to engage your brain and see if you do have a plan and not a gripe.Like I said, my two cents. With prices what they are, possibly not worth much.

The Taliban "Grows Some" - NOT!

2006-01-27T13:41:00.000-05:00

Breaking News! Taliban militants besides lauching attacks against Afghan and foreign troops, intensifying the attacks to destroy the female schools. Go figure. With NATO, US, Afghan Army and Pakistani troops to pick on, they do what they do best: Go for the "soft" target. Translation: They can't handle a fight, but they can be the armed with AK-47 and RPG equivalent of the school yard bully. I guess they are felling pretty emasculated because women now get to learn something. You have to be really insecure to try to kill them, just so they don't learn....or you are ashamed they will find out they have been getting the short end of the stick (or the longer end quite literally) since the days when Mohammed decided he had had enough of Christianity making everyone equal, and turned back the clock to recapture the worst of the male dominated Jewish culture. Yep, it's a great "religion" alright.

Lest We Forget: Wiretapping in Another Era

2006-01-27T11:55:00.000-05:00

In reference to the current debate over the NSA "wiretapping" issue, we have been here before. The situation is in many ways similar, but, it was a different time. It was a time when an attack on American soil awakened a sleeping giant, that then, with a crippled, and barely adequate military, travelled across two large oceans and set their youth into harm's way, with the will of the people firmly behind them. The first engagement in the Pacific was Pearl Harbor. The enemy took the initiative and caught us unprepared for the challenge, despite General Billy Mitchell having shown us we were not able to protect our national security in the late 30's. The next engagement in that theater was the Battle of the Coral Sea, where a non aviation admiral, Admiral Raymond Spruance, took a new type of battle force against a powerful enemy and he held the line of the Japanese advance into the southern Pacific. As a side note, much has been written critisizing Adm Spruance for his perceived lack of agressiveness with his fleet, but the bottom line is we had suffered major blows and his conservative approach acheived a turning point, where they progressed no more. Next came a tiff in the vicinity of a very small island, big enough for little more than an airstrip and populated by gooney birds named Midway. It was an incredible naval victory for the US, where we caught the Japanese carriers by surprise. Heroism was a common virture in that battle, with famous names of ships such as USS THATCH and USS McCLUSKEY being named after valiant aviators who carried the day in that moment. What allowed us to sink four Japanese carriers to the loss of our one (YORKTOWN)? It began with what we might call "wiretapping" today: Interception and reading of the Japanese Naval Code. The story is incredible, how a group of Navy code breakers struggled to break the code, then had a dummy "in the clear" message sent from Midway, saying the island was running out of fresh water. In subsequent intercepts, the Japanese coded messages reported this "condition," and therefore our experts were then confident they had the right methods to ensure other coded messages "breaks" could be given the highest degree of confidence. Read this excerpt from a site discussing the history of the Midway Atoll:

During World War II, the U.S. utilized a great military intelligence advantage over the Japanese, in both their radar capabilities and code breaking. The radar on Midway gave position, bearing, and altitude. Intelligence experts discovered that the Japanese planned to attack an unknown site referred to as "AF." To test the theory that Midway was the target, a disinformation message regarding Midway's freshwater supply was sent out over open communication channels. The Japanese intercepted the message and redistributed it in their JN 25 code, saying that "AF" needed freshwater. This strengthened intelligence allowed Admiral Nimitz to reinforce Midway's defenses and station additional bombers, fighters, and torpedo aircraft on Eastern Island in preparation for the suspected attack.

Clearly, our govenrment officials, with the sanction of the President, had listened in on the tactical and strategic messages of the enemy, who intended to harm us, in this case, once more, as a follow up to the attack on Pearl Harbor. Across time, this method has been hailed as the runing point of the War in the Pacific, and how in less than a year, a underdeveloped Navy had come back from a major blow, devised entirely new strategies, and had taken the fight to the enemy. Pretty impressive. Should we now impunge the character of President Roosevelt (who had the Bill of Rights as a restriction on his actions) and demand a reversal? No, that would be ludicrous. Look at the common threads: 1) Japan wanted resources. We blocked them with embargos. They decided to destroy us in order to be able to go to the areas of the world where oil, metal and rubber resources were, and take them via a military presense. We reacted with economic sanctions on them, thus causing shortages of the strategic materials of the day. 2) Japan, acting as the agressor, attacked our soverign territory. 3) Japan planned another attack on our territiory. 4) Government officials, acting on official orders, listened in on the conversations of the enemy (Japan) in order to find out how to defend our nation. 5) Japan lost the war, yet is now a major democratic and economic powerhouse, and is not occupied by the United States, in fact, they are one of our closest allies. See the connection? The difference is the modern day agressors in this story do not have the covering of a soverign nation status, and defined borders, but otherwise, they still desire to attack and destroy us, for we interfere with their expansionist plans, and desire for major power status on the world's stage. The Islamic terrorists do not want the strategic materials, they just want sharia law spread worldwide and have proven they will kill those who are 1) weak and 2) those who resist. Polish mathematicians broken the German Enigma Codes, and turned that information over to the British, who exploited it throughouot the way, and shared the intelligence with us to re-route naval convoys of troops and material around U-Boats in the Atlantic. We also were reading the Berlin-Tokyo diplomatic message, as a result of breaking that Japanese set of codes. In each of these three cases, this effort produced free people and not more oppression. Why can't anyone see that in the current situation? Thanks to Little Green Footballs for the Open Thread! Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

"i am a marine"

2006-01-26T13:59:00.000-05:00

Via Mudville Gazette Dawn Patrol this morning, I followed a link to One Marine's View titled "This Young Marine Breaks the Code." I was not disappointed.

"When I joined the Marine Corps in February of 2002, I was really looking for a way to pay for college. The college I attended for just one semester went bankrupt, causing me to lose my full scholarship. I signed the enlistment papers never thinking about going to war, even though the United States was attacked by terrorists just a few months earlier."

Scrolling thru the comments on Capt B's blog, which quoted this Marine Sargent, I found the Sargent himself had left a comment, thanking the Captain for posting his letter, and a link to a new blog, Myskatterbrain. The first post is the letter by the one who wrote it in the first place. He decided to juimp into the blogsphere, and I might add, with an incredible start. I've marvelled for many years at the comraderie the Corps builds. Once in a while, I even think back to the day at the end of my college sophomore year, standing in front of a towering Marine major, the AOIC of the NROTC Unit, and telling him I had decided to go into the Navy, for there seemed to be little use for marine biologists in the USMC. He thought a moment and agreed. I bretahed a sigh of relief. I enjoyed my career driving ships, but there are days I see I might had had something more special... Please read the first person report on the transformation of a man in his thinking. You won't be disappointed, and you will know many others have travelled the same path. Thanks to Little Green Footballs for the Open Thread!

A Sense of Proportionality

2006-01-26T08:25:00.000-05:00

I use Netscape as my browser. I started with it in the way back days of the web and have kept it. The Netscape homepage hilights the news with a main article, then three that rotate in a window just underneath that. Top story: "7 Children Die in Hiway Crash; 15 Year Old Driving" - Yes, a bad thing... Rotating stories: 1: "Breakfast Battles: Watch Out McD's" - It seems the Egg McMuffin is loosing ground in the fast food, spike your sugar and cholesteral in the morning market. HORRORS! 2: "Militant Group Wins Palestinian Election; PM Resigns" - mmmm...Sorta important, but no words really grab you much. 3: "A Happy Hot Rod Homecoming" - Cool! The dude gets his Vette that was stolen 37 years ago.... Wow...news of violent, islamic terrorists winning a majority of the seats in the election os a soverign nation is (pardon the pun) "sandwiched" between news of a major fast food chain losing market share at the drive thru window and some guy getting his car back. I'd say "they" sort of missed out on the understanding of the importance of each of the news stories, but then again, we can't say "they" never report "good" news.... The media said they don't censor the news, but there is so much to choose from and so little time to report it, they have to select carefully. I submit their selections, particulalry today, as the democratic mechanism of voting has brought a procalimed terrorist organization into the access to nation status. But, then again, Iran did the same thing, and speaking of that, the media sure isn't very concerned about that either....

Commonality: P-3C/Update II and Gay Marriage

2006-01-25T15:41:00.000-05:00

Isn't it interesting how this analogy can help understand a complex issue. Let me begin with the story of the P-3C Orion Update II version. I think it was while I was on the Destroyer Squadron staff when I recall seeing a message declaring how the newest version of the P-3C Orion would not be called the P-3D, but rather the P-3C/Update II. Having built a lot of plane models growing up, and spenind a lot of thime studying the military aircraft of the WWII era, I had come to understand that when a major modification of an aircraft was made, they changed the letter at the end of the designation. The B-17F became the B-17G when they hung a remotely controlled set of .50 cal guns in a chin turret. The P-47, when it got a bubble canopy, vs the old framed one, became the P-47D. The P-38 had lots of variants, some as fighters, some as light bombers, some as photo recon, others as Pathfinders. Each carried a different letter behind the "38." Fast forward to the mid-80s. The P-3 airframe, a military adaptation (quite succesful one at that, for it still patrols the oceans) of the Lockheed Electra passenger plane was getting a major internal makeover. All sorts of more automated gadgets were being stuffed in and now the decision had to be made as to how to dsesigate it. Between the lettering scehme noted in the previous paragragh, and what I learned, there is significant reason to point this out, for the people having to call on the aircraft will know what's up there supporting them, or, during mission planning, may have to be specific requests to make sure the operational function comes off as planned. Why didn't the "P-3D" come into the nomenclature? Simple...it's all about money. I learned long ago, the best way to figure out complex issues is to take a look at the money trail, and you may glean some interesting information. In this case, it wasn't the money for the airframe, or the ground support, but it was the issue of the printing and distrobution costs for the change pages for the plethora of publications in existance that referenced the "P-3C." You know, Admin Warfare, the undiscussed mission area, is important! The message that told us to use P-3C/Update II indicated it was cost prohibative to change all the TACMEMOs, NWPs, NTPs, etc, etc, etc, so henceforth and foreevermore, all we would be able to say if we had a "P-3C." Make sense? By now, I hope you didn't get lost in the story and are anxiously awaiting the connection to Gay Marriage. Here it is: It's about the money. Money, you ask? Yes. Here's the deal. Civil unions won't suffice. Like the many forests of printed pubs with "P-3C" that the Navy wasn't about to change, the veritable mountain of legal and regulatory documents out there in the world that say "marriage" in the context of legal rights on allowance of benefits are too many to consider trying to get to change them, one by one, in order to them to say "marriage and/or civil union" would cost lots. On top of that, unlike the control over this decison to change or not being in the hands of the Navy alone (or, in a worst case, the Department of Defense), these documents are under the purview of all sorts of private companies as well. You can't change them just by having the federal government deeming it so. Not only that, it would mean each occurance of resistance to granting rights similar to those granted to straight married people would have to be the approached legally by the person encoutering it, meaning more money out of the pockets of the gay person seeking compensation. The documents will range from applications for insurance, health care plans, employee handbooks and claims forms for all types of insurance. While someone may annonce an equivalency between "marriage" and "civil unions," there will be plenty of businesses that would drag their feet, or flat out say "it says 'marriage' here. sorry!" Therefore, the most effective path to gain access to the many things we grant two people who have promised each other, under a legal contract, to take care of the other, only a nationwide decree of the legality of marriage will suffice. That means, no matter how hard the uphill battle for the activists for this course of action seems, the bottom line is it will then instantly take down all barriers in every other place they may come in contact with resistance, for they hold up a piece of paper saying "Marriage License." The other beauty of this approach is that not every document would have to be known at the time. The acceptance of a "civil union" might make things better for many, but the lingering cases would continue to pop up for years to come, with the associated legal bills and time spent waiting for a clogged court system to hear the case. All this discussion is to help understand why the issue of gay marriage is being pushed so hard right now, and will continue to be. It's the path of least resistance. Thanks to Little Green Footballs for the Open Thread!

Not Your Dad's M-60....

2006-01-25T15:08:00.000-05:00

From Military.com, an M-60 A4 firing 850 rounds "at one sitting." It seems the old standby crew served weapon has been given improved qualities...They said it goes 15K rounds before a barrel change. See it here. Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

Dear Liberals: Try Reading the Directions

2006-01-25T13:18:00.000-05:00

I won't bore you with lots of links, but between the Judge Alito pontifications, the Abrahamoff, the Tom Delay fake consiracy charges...It seems when "it" is brought up by the libs, they soon find out it's people in their own party doing the same kind of things, be it falisifying travel claims, moving PAC money around, taking PAC money, or wiretapping.... The items come and go so fast, you almost can't read them. Here's my counsel for the liberals/Democrats: I know, I know....you would never really handle any type of weapon, but consider this in a parable style of instruction, the way Jesus teaches...it's in the analogy, not the specific words (or images, in this case) 'nuff said (for now) If this information has helped you in anyway, please pop over to Project Valour-IT and ,ake a donation to the program to get laptop computers for our wonded service members as compensation for my counselling. Thanks to Little Green Footballs for the Open Thread!

A Journey into History - Part III

2006-01-24T15:38:00.000-05:00

Part I, Part II, Part IV, Part V, Part VI, Part VII, Part VII, Part IX I recall the weather was exceptional. Clear skies and gentle low swells, as we forged our way north, communicating "the old fashioned way," semaphore, flashing light (Morse Code) and flag hoists. The stuff a WWII movie is made of. When tactical manuvering is done this way, and the crews do that well, it's pretty impressive to see many thousands of tons of steel dance across the waves in unison, or planned staging of their movements in an aquatic ripple effect. Traffic was light and we came across one ship of significance, a Soviet merchant ship. "Back in the day," every Soviet vessel that sailed was a mobile intelligence gathering platform. This encouter became a point of focus for our boring, but important transit. The BIDDLE was dispatched out ahead to keep tabs on her, and the SARATOGA and thge other ships were maneuvered to stay a good distance away, but if you can see a ship, then it can see you. That's a good rule to aply in such situations, especially bright sunny days with no clouds at all. Back to the background: The BIDDLE fell behind out Battle Group, much to the chargrin of our CSO, CDR Nurthen. The rest of us had kept small bags with a few days worth of clothes and our toothbrushes... To close this line of the story, we all entered the Med, the BIDDLE late, and a few days later, my staff moved to our flagship, the BIDDLE. The CO of the BIDDLE was under the operational command of the Commodore, even though he had a higher "lineal number." Friction became a part of life, as each man tried to fence off their territory. Upon our embarkation on the cruiser, which was tasked as the anti-air warfare commander (AAWC) for the Battle Group, we found ourselves, as the ASWC, routinelt in EMCON "A," as the cruiser would be dispatched down a threat axis in radar and radio silence to ambush the incoming enemy aircraft. We had normally ridden aboard destroyers before, and this didn't impact us much, except to lose a SONAR from the inner ASW screen. As a side note, one of the normal duties of the ASWC was to also be assigned to be the Screen Commander (SC), responsible for planning and executing the screen of these big deck ships with the destroyers and frigates assigned. Now the problem is we are our on station, only able to listen to the radio circuits, but could not respond. Needless to say, it really put a crimp in our style. It didn't help any that the BG Watch Officers would try to get ahold of us, and get angry when we didn't answer there calls. The "INCHOP" reports were filed, briefings from the 6th Fleet and supporting staffs were made. We then joined up with the SARATOGA BG and "swapped" escorts. It was an odd cruise, for the CORAL SEA would remain in the Med and show off the new thingy I understood to be (possibly) affectionately termed "The Lawn Dart." It was the first operational deployment of the F/A-18, and therefore a good time to parade the new birds around the shores of our allies, more than likely to let them know we were going to use it, so they should get on board and buy some, too. I found out later, foreign navies (and I'm sure other services) don't take it too well when you try to sell them something you aren't planning on using yourself. The F-20 Tigershark aricraft comes to mind in this example. Anyhow, we "worked up" with one carrier, then swapped out on deployment. We didn't move the escorts exactly between battle groups, and some discussion followed, ending with a decision to leave BIDDLE with the CORAL SEA in the Med, and the SCOTT (DDG-995) coming with us to the North Arabian Sea (NAS)/Indian Ocean. It sort of balanced the firepower overall. That decision was crucial at another level. Here were two crews, with gear packed for deployment. Once for a winter Med cruise, the other for the Indian Ocean climes. It wasn't just a bite for the operational issues, but also for the "civies" loaded by the crews for liberty, as well. And back at the 20 years ago corral: The Soviet ship didn't seem to take any interest in us, as they should have. It steamed on it's way, with out deviating from it's course. Not unusual for a regular merchant vessel, but definitely strange for a Soviet flagged ship of any category. A few days after we sailed from DGAR, towards a point in the ocaen south of the Arabian Penninsula, were were given orders to head to the Red Sea and prepare for a northern transit of the Suez Canal....

This Just In New Reading for Little Liberals...

2006-01-19T12:53:00.000-05:00

Coming to a cute new bookstore near you: Brainwashing of the young and the helpless: Why Mommy is a Democrat from the Little Democrats website. How wonderful! Having spent a lot of years being directly of indirectly invloved in training, in and out of the Navy, I know that many groups try to get in the loop early in life, for it is the time when we are extremely effective sponges. All education at that level is worthy of being carefully chosen, for it is the foundation building time. There are some interesting reactions already blogged about, such as this one: Sean Gleeson's Blog and at Peer Review. Enjoy! HT to a young consevative looking forward to entering the Marines! Thanks to Little Green Footballs for the Open Thread!

Glow in the Dark Pigs? Yep, It's True!

2006-01-19T12:24:00.000-05:00

They have finally done it in Taiwan using genetic engineering to "install" jellyfish bioluminescense genes in pigs. This could spawn a whole series of applications. Kids could have a GITD pig as a pet, so when parents venture in the tried and true admonistion of "this place looks like a pigsty!" would be far more applicatble. IN the menatime, the GITD pig would provide a night light function for the child. Sailors of all types might enjoy a GITD pig, so as to remind them (in the case of Capt Lex) the glow in the carrier's wake as they make night traps, or (in the case of Chapomatic) the glow of the boiluming plankton in the periscope while underwater, or (in the case of CDR Salamander) the green shine of the UNREP ship's bow wave following the outline of the ship as you get gas and ammo at night.... And, there are many other applications. Maybe GITD hampsters would be a better idea if you are trying to get into the novelty market... HT to Little Green Footballs.

Convergence - A Method to Gather Public Opinion for the GWoT

2006-01-18T17:20:00.000-05:00

From www.dictionary.com con·ver·gence (kn-vûrjns) n. 1. The process of coming together or the state of having come together toward a common point. That one definition is what I think I need for the following discussion. The support for the Global War on Terror is slumping. I have an idea on how to get support form a broad cross section of the country, if not maybe the world. It is a summation of the current issues we are facing and comes from the headlines. All that is needed now is to figure out how to pull it together. My first point of reference is the recent issues brought on by the New York Times disclosure of the NSA conducting electronic monitoring. The general impression is President Bush has ordered the surveilance of regular American citizens. This, in fact, if it were the case, would most certainly not be Constitutional, and everyone would agree. That's not the real case, but in order to find out what the al-Qaida operatives are up to, the monitoring has involved American citizens, who are at the other end of the phone call. Now, the mood of some people, mostly on the left side of the political spectrum, seems to be that protection from this monitoring should be afforded to the terrorists. This would now confer the same rights we have as Americans upon foriegn nationals, making the application of the Constitutional right of the 4th Amendment universal. As of yesterday, certainly CAIR and the ACLU are making their acceptance of this view an issue by filing a suit to prevent the President form directing this surveillance be conducted. Step 1: Leverage off this view of the left that terrorists are defacto American citizens. Place this note on the large easel in the front of the conference room. Next stop: Megan's Law. This is the Federal law that requires sex offenders to register with local law ebnforcement and provide their address. Put that on the lagre sheet in the front of the room. Why is this a point to consider? For several years, and most recently, there is an almost psychotic reaction in the form of hatred to the presense of sex offenders. If we can harness this emotion, and focus it towards the terrorists, then we will have some real "will of the people" to go after the perpetrators, regardless of the expense. Soccer moms, and just about every body else really hates these people and therefore, they are a unifying force in the community. The most recent case in the news to illustrate this point is the sentencing of Mark Hulett by Judge Cashman in Vermont. The reaction in the media and on the radio and TV shows will let you know an overwhelming majority of people are truly upset. Get yourself a copy of Loretta Napoleoni's Insurgent Iraq. This book is centered on discussing al Zarqawi, currently thought to be the leading al Queda commander in Iraq. Lots of interesting stuff in there, most of it in the first few chapters of the book tend to keep repeating that the Jews displaced the Palestinians, and those who came into Jordan then made it hard for the Jordanians, and that's why al Zarquawi became a terrorist., but I digress.... In the paperback edition from Seven Stories Press, on page 31, there is an interesint tidbit of useful information: al Zarquawi was in prison for drug possession and sexual assault. There you have it: the head AQ guy is a sexual offender. Before you say so what?, go back to my first point: The ACLU would have us treat non-US citizens as our own, remember? Toss in the fact that the US Supreme Court has become accustomed to looking to foreign courts and laws to make decisions for US cases. Here's the strategy: based on those two points raised above, and that al Zarqawi, under US law, would be designated a sexual offender, leverage off the push to treat all persons of the world as if they had rights under the Constitution. It should not be selective, just when it's convinient for the foriegner's to claim protection, but it should be universal. In this instance, then the criminal acts committed should also be on the table. After all, isn't that what the ACLU has been tryiing to get for the detainees at Guantanamo Bay for the last several years, access to our court system? There you have it. Current events and what the desires of the liberals are asking for can be used to now shine a light on who one of the main terrorist is, and therefore bring the rage against him, which will help end the fight in Iraq. Just some idle thinking. Update 1/19/2006: Consider the information in this article about the marked increase in "honor killings" among the Palestinians:

Palestinian feminist Abu Dayyeh Shamas claims that: "Men feel they have lost their dignity and that they can somehow restore it by upholding the family's honour. We've noticed recent cases are much more violent in nature; attempts to kill, rape, incest. There is an incredible amount of incest." One women’s group reported over 400 cases of incest in the West Bank alone in 2002.

Rape and incest, both crimes make a sex offender of the prepetrator, and the volience in Israel attests to the Palestinians propensity towards terrorism, and the opening paragraph of the article links the terrorism with the sexual crimes:

When Israel began erecting a separation barrier in late 2003 to protect its citizens from the seemingly endless procession of suicide bombers, Palestinian society responded by redirecting its destructive urges inward. All revolutions are said ultimately to turn upon themselves and devour their own children. And, when suicide bombing became an increasingly difficult means of enhancing family prestige, Palestinians shifted the focus onto their female offspring to restore the balance.

A sad statment on the human condition. Side note: I have called things like this to the attention to NOW in posts gone by, but, somehow, there is no ruffled feathers in their camp. I would have thought their feelings for the oppressed women would certainly draw their outrage for all women, not just the culturally elite ones. NOW drops the ball again (and again, and again...) Thanks to Little Green Footballs for the Open Thread!

A Journey into History - Part II

2006-01-18T16:15:00.000-05:00

Part I, Part III, Part IV, Part V, Part VI, Part VII, Part VIII, Part IX Needless to say, I was rather disappointed. I mean, get all the way to about 13 degress south of the equator in the Indian Ocean, and you can't even get a chance to have a beer, and see if the Exchange has any T Shirts to prove you were there. Back the stateroom, back into khakis, and head aft about a 1/3rd the length of the ship, then up 7 decks via "ladders." In the Navy, ladders are mostly very steep stairs, not vertical ladders like you might think, but some actually are, usually in the out of the way places, not were there is normal people traffic. (returning to the build up to the main story line - here's more back ground) So, we hauled our stuff to the MONOGAHELA (AO-178) and let that ship's company decide where to put us. The staterooms are huge on those ships, as they have so much space above the area they needed for tanks for fuel. Most officers on the ship already had two man rooms by themselves, so we fit in well, for last minute visitors. Steve was left to getting our gear hauled to Combat Information Center (CIC), and OSCS Koch went to work getting our Joint Operational Tactical Systems (JOTS) HP-9020 computers set up and patched into the radio circuits for LINK 14 data. Controlled chaos was the mood, but, the hosts took care of us. We sailed on time, and settled in for a long planned 6 month, but actual 7 month deployment, not expecting a lot besides boring holes in the waters of the North Arabian Sea, letting Iran know we were there.... The MONOGAHELA did not man the CIC full time. They really didn't need to. With no weapons, and being counted on to just deliver fuel and some cargo, the bridge watch could generally handle the radio traffic and radar watches along with their tasks. They did man up for us, and several Boatswain's Mates (BMs) were provided, along with the Operations Specialists (OSs) to support us. We found out they had cross trained their senior BMs to be CIC supervisors and they were very proficient at their duties. We steamed east, and rendezvoused with the USS CAPODANNO out of Newport, RI, the JESSE L BROWN out of Charleston, SC and USS JACK WILLIAMS from Mayport, FL. A few days later, we received a message fro BIDDLE that repairs were completed and she was getting underway, with "excess SOA" authorized. For transits out of local op areas, we had a top speed limit (on over all average speed) for the ship's movement, which helped plan logistics for fuel delivery, at sea and to forward shore stations. SOA means "speed of advance." 16 kts was the normal limit. BIDDLE would be steaming about 2/3rds of the way to the Straits of Gibralter at close to her top speed. About a day out of our arrival at the entrance to the Mediterranean, the BIDDLE caught up to use late in the day. We packed up our gear, short essentials, and palletized it for highline transfer. BIDDLE came alongside MONOGAHELA just before sunset to commence alongside replenishment at sea (RAS), and our pallets were sent over. The master plan was for us to be heloed over in the morning, to embark on the planned flagship for our staff. Fast forward: It's about 5 AM local time, and I'm one watch. BIDDLE calls us frantically on one of the circuits, reporting white smoke in one of her shaft alleys. Shaft Ally is the last space in the ship where the shafting from the ships turbines then penetrates the hull, heading out to the struts and the propeller. White smoke in there is a bad thing. The response is for the Engineering Officer of the Watch (EOOW) to direct the shaft be stopped ASAP, and then to lock the shaft in place. The net reslut of this action is like dropping a large sea anchor, for the blades of the affected prop are being pulled almost sideways thru the water and not turning. BIDDLE's max speed in this condition was several knots slower than we had to go to arrive in the Med on time to reported to COMSIXTHFLT. I notified the Commodore and the Ops Boss. Planning went into affect for what to do until BIDDLE caught up, since our records and publications were over there. The affect on the Staff was not too bad professionally, as the MONOGAHELA's library would have publications we could use, but the biggest impact was the Chief Staff Officer, Bill Nurthen, has also send his clothes over, except for a single change of them. Well, you can imagine his angst, but also how were were able to play on this to get under his skin for the rest of the cruise.... Later that morning, the OPREP (operational report) from the BIDDLE made it's way to use, and listed the cause of the loss of all oil in the main shaft bearing as sabotage. Someone had uncapped the drain line, and big machinery, which in many cases actually relies on the oil as a medium to carry heat off the movig parts as much as it being a lubricant, does stuff like get hot and the glows red, and then breaks or catches on fire. Shortly after this message came out, the Battle Group Staff lawyer sent one back, letting the BIDDLE know the reported was to read, or any subsequent reports to list sabotage as "malicious destruction." That's the term used when it's one of your own people who causes the damage. (back to the story) So was sailed by late afternoon, the SARATOGA, SCOTT, JACK WILLIAMs, BROWN, CAPODANNO and MONOGAHELA all in formation. We left in strict EMCOM "A." That means no, I mean no, radio communications and all radars were turned off. Once clear of the harbor, our orders were to proceed NNE at top speed in EMCOM. We didn't even know were we were going, except a point south of the Arabian peninsula. More to come...

"AIED?" - Aerial IEDs?

2006-01-18T15:40:00.000-05:00

Scary story, but gives new meaning to the old axiom of never take the same path twice. It seems the bad guys have come up with a creative solution to get at our helo assets, to include special attention being paid to MedEvac helos. From the Telegraph, here's an article on Aerial IEDs.

The new home-made weapons, known to the Americans as "aerial improvised explosive devices" have been used on numerous occasions. "The enemy is adaptive. They makes changes in the way they fight, they respond to new flying tactics," Brig Edward Sinclair, a US army aviation commander, told Defense News, which first revealed the new threat.

HT to Van Impe in a Open Thread comment over on Little Green Footballs. Thanks to The Military Outpost for the link! Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

"Proud: The Men of the USS MASON"

2006-01-18T09:50:00.000-05:00

Ally Hilger has produced a movie, which has finally begun to make it's way into the movie theaters. The movie, "Proud," is the story of the USS MASON (DE-529) is now out and playing in small engagements around the country. It's now playing in Atlanta, GA. A link to the schdeule page is here... My interest in this story began with my friendship with Ben Garrison, who was a Radioman on the MASON during the war. As a result of this aquaintance, I have come to know of the the 761st Tank Battalion and the "Triple Nickel" 555th Parachute Regiment, in addition to the well known story of the Tuskegee Airman of the 99th Fighter Squadron. I did some blogging on it last spring, encapsulating some of the history of the beginnings of desegregation in the US Military. We have come a long way... Thanks to Little Green Footballs for the Open Thread! Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

In Case You Keep Track of These Things...

2006-01-16T11:34:00.000-05:00

The new record is 85, set 12/05/2005 at Lake Wales, FL. An you thought Naval Aviators® were the pre-eminent formation flyers... Notes from the website on what was hanging there in the sky:

The 85 way was completed in 9 minutes and 46 seconds from the time Chris left the plane until the last legal grip was taken on Annie. We held it for 17 seconds. Taking the height measurements from the canopies down the center line and heights of those individuals the formation was about 276' tall give or take a foot or two. The formation was 175' wide since there was about a foot between each person's canopy. According to the Sunday/Monday weigh ins (and Chris wearing 90 pounds) the people on the 85 way made it weigh 17,552 pounds

Get more info on this World Record here... Here's the preceeding work for an 81-way diamond:

What's the Difference?

2006-01-16T08:54:00.000-05:00

I as sat watching the first two hours of Season 5 of the Fox series "24," I thought there is one difference between that and reading the blogvel "Rythyms" by Capt Lex: At least you know for sure when the next episode of 24 is coming on... One doesn't come with exceptionally loud (and appropriate) sound effects... Other than that, both are action packed and worth every minute. BTW, Rythyms XLII is posted! Update: Thanks to an astute commenter at Little Green Footballs, there is a list of rules when operating in or near former Special Agent Jack Bauer... Over at Plain as the Nose on Your Face, we have these truthful Bauerisms:

We feel it is high time that everyone learned a bit more about the man entrusted to safeguard our national security: * When in Jack Bauer's presence, Chuck Norris urinates sitting down. * Jack Bauer can squeeze through spaces that would make a spider claustrophobic. * Tired of the incessant whining and complaining, Jack Bauer found the dogs and let them right back in. * Jack Bauer's saliva is bullet-proof. * After receiving repeated roundhouse kicks to the head from Chuck Norris, Jack Bauer was heard to ask,"Can you go a bit lower? I was crammed in an air conditioning duct between 7:00 a.m. and 8:00 a.m. and my back is killing me." * Jack Bauer can eat five times his body weight in terrorists. * Concerned that his dog would break under interrogation, Jack Bauer snapped his neck and turned him into the bag which he still carries to this day. * Jack Bauer has the ability to smell sounds. * Ancient peoples sacrificed virgins to Jack Bauer in anticipation of his birth. * The only thing elephants used to fear was mice. Until they hurt one of Jack Bauer's friends.

And...thanks once more to Little Green Footballs for the Open Threads, that are the cause of so much fun and information from all over the world!

A Little Blogging Humor....

2006-01-16T08:36:00.000-05:00

This was published in the local paper on New Year's Day, but not listed in the Pearls Before Swine cartoon archives. Maybe it's an analogy of what happens out here in the blogosphere sometimes... Thanks to Little Green Footballs for the Open Thread! Thanks to Mudville Gazette for the Open Post!

Michael Yon Needs Help

2006-01-13T09:51:00.000-05:00

Michael Yon, a former SF Operator turned freelance reporter, is in the States and has made an intersting observation, and is calling for help from retired military people:

The difference a year can make is staggering. One year ago, the gap between the ground reports from Iraq from military friends prompted my travel to Iraq to see for myself just what was happening. The dispatches posted to these pages over the ensuing months were an attempt to bridge that gap. Now that I’m back in the United States for a time, trying wring every bit of information of the war out of the news, only to come up dry most days, it’s become clear that in just under a year, the media gap has morphed into a chasm. Before this thing becomes a black hole, it’s time for a few good men and women to put their military experience and expertise to use in an operation that can create an alternative channel that will allow frontline information to break through and be heard.

Here's the post with his plea for those with connections to the real men and women on the front lines to step up to the plate and become the conduits for the news to flow from our service members. Think of it as a call to arms, to quit grumbling about those PAO types who were good for nothing, and become one. Who can sniff out a (let's be polite) "fake" story better than those who have been there, and also, who can know it's a good story for the same reasons? Most likely you also have connections to friends and family who are in some far flung corner of the world on a deployment, doing the hard work, and not having it reported, at all, let alone the way it is. Here's the unabridged direction from Michael:

Call for Volunteers: Any retired military personnel interested in the Frontline Forum, please email to michaelyonmagazine@hotmail.com, and put “Volunteer” in the subject heading. Please describe briefly your military experience and an estimate to the number of hours per week you can spend reading stories from troops. If you have skills that are in some way related to this project, please include a description of those skills in your email. Let us know what you can do and how much of it you are willing and able to do. Someone will get back to you soon. While the Volunteers organize, we’ll build the forum, network with others who are in touch with our troops, and when all is ready, we can turn on the faucets and open the flow of frontline news.

On the Rush Limbaugh show a few days ago a caller made a great point: Many years from now, the people researching what this time was all about will pull up articles from the NYT and Washington Post. He was a little discouraged, saying "they have alredy beat us, because they have written it the way they want and now it's history." Michael's call for volunteers may well be a way to counter the press bias for those of two and more generations down the road, who will no longer have the view of those who were there. So...time to quit grumbling about the Has Been Media and get out to poke a stick in thier eye, with that valuable tool called "truth." Thanks to Little Green Footballs for the Open Thread! Can you help?