Open trackbacks…free for the linking!

But, “sea stories,” too!

So, there I was, a not necessarily fresh caught Ensign, but not an old hand yet. I had been aboard USS MILWAUKEE (AOR-2) for a few months when we sailed, in company with some other ships, but the only one I recall was the USS FRANCIS MARION (LPA-249) from Norfolk, VA to be part of the Naval force to honor Queen Elizabeth II on the occasion of her 25th Anniversary as Queen of England, her “Silver Jubilee.”

It was my first cruise overseas, while a commissioned officer, and was only about 6 weeks long, but it has some special memories. Not only was I exposed to my first taste of fleet steaming, it was the second part of the “Join the Navy…”

We head towards the English Channel, and, unlike the rest of the units in company, who headed into Portsmouth for the Naval Parade festivities, we, the “fat ship” got sent east, then north, arriving to anchor in the Firth of Forth, off the Royal Navy Dockyard at Rosyth, Scotland, just north of Edinborough.

I decided, when not on duty, to get ashore and do some exploring. I did and got some great sightseeing in. Oh, did I mention that enroute Scotland, some of the radio equipment I was responsible for maintaining had suffered casualties and I had sent out casualty reports (CASREPs) on them? Oh, sorry…small details make for good stories some times. I did have outstanding equipment issues, which were in need of updated status reports (SITREPs). I figured, being the wise young officer at that point, that when we got underway, there would be plenty of time to get the updates out. However, I seemed to not yet have grasped the understanding that SITREP dates required sitreps, or casualty correction (CASCORs) sent along to keep the larger logistics system up to speed.

Thankfully, LCDR Frank Mueller did have a grasp on not one, but two things: The operational necessity to keep “the system” informed of such important matters, and also that some junior officer don’t get it yet.

The day we sailed from the Firth of Forth, after sea and anchor detail had been secured, Frank asked if I had updated my casualties. I said, “no, sir, but I will get it done today.” His response was something like: “This is how it works: CASREP SITREPS are due out the day status changes, or when the previously indicated SITREP date is reached, which ever comes first, then you get to go on liberty (I later learned he should have said “Shore Leave,” but I understood than and now).” His voice was calm and got it….

While in transit to Europe, we had a problem with the Raytheon LN-66 Pathfinder RADAR. I had to submit a CASREP because we didn’t carry the zener diode required to make the repairs. We anchored at Wilhelmshaven, Germany for three days. I wanted to go ashore, but I had my assigned duties, trying to track down the elusive zener diode, so my electronic techs could make the repairs. We finally did get one via the local husbanding agent and the ETs went to work.

I was able to “hit the beach” for a few hours, so LTJG George Parish, the Navigator, and I went to find gifts for the wives. I Had converted $60 to Marks for my ration of gift money. We wandered into a porcelain shop and I was in awe of the several painted and unpainted dolphin figurines by Kaiser Porcelain. They were exceptionally lifelike and the painted ones didn’t have that hard looking edge that hand painting normally has, with these figures looking just like the ones I had seen at sea. All I could afford was the $58 dollars for an unpainted pair of dolphins jumping over a wave. I don’t know art, but not only was the wife pleased when I got home, a few weeks later, as we wandered through Military Circle Mall, there, in the window of a jewelery store, sat the exact same dolphins, but with a price tag of $120. I never made a buy like that again (from the profit standpoint), but I will say the two dolphins are still with the Ex, and she won’t hand them over. I suspect they are worth a little more than $120 by now….

Subtitle: The Dove becomes the Hawk, when the opportunity to make brownie points exists…

Presidential candidate, Barak Obama (D), has a plan. BZ for coming forward with something instead of criticisms, butjfk nailed it: I’m too stoopid to understand such well educated people such as Barak:

Obama might send troops into Pakistan

By NEDRA PICKLER, Associated Press Writer 2 hours, 1 minute ago

WASHINGTON – Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama said Wednesday that he would possibly send troops into Pakistan to hunt down terrorists, an attempt to show strength when his chief rival has described his foreign policy skills as naive.

The Illinois senator warned Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf that he must do more to shut down terrorist operations in his country and evict foreign fighters under an Obama presidency, or Pakistan will risk a U.S. troop invasion and losing hundreds of millions of dollars in U.S. military aid.

“Let me make this clear,” Obama said in a speech prepared for delivery at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. “There are terrorists holed up in those mountains who murdered 3,000 Americans. They are plotting to strike again. It was a terrible mistake to fail to act when we had a chance to take out an al-Qaida leadership meeting in 2005. If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President Musharraf won’t act, we will.”
[…]

Let me get this straight: He was courageous enough to vote against going to Iraq, and he will sit down with dictators and thugs who oppose us, but threatens invasion of a country, which, has it’s internal struggles, but is generally an ally in the larger endeavor.

Am I missing something? Send the military to get the internal policy of a nation who is helping us, yet, crawl to the feet of those who specifically state they are trying to kill as many of us as they can….

This certainly would set a new low water mark for American foreign diplomacy. I can see it now: We pull out and let the manics run wild and murder, yet we punish those trying to help us for not helping in the way we think they should be.

Boy, you think they hate Bush? Wait until we and they both are on the receiving end of this immature, blustering, plainly idiotic effort. We won’t have a single ally left on the face of the planet…but maybe that’s what “they” are angling for.

I guess it’s his plan to say he’s gonna get OBL, because GWB couldn’t manage to do it (but, then again, WJC had sniper scopes on OBL and couldn’t be bothered to issue the orders and save the pain caused in the subsequent years). I would say BO has an exceptionally limited understanding of the very conflict we are engaged in. Getting OBL isn’t going to stop the many deadly incidents of the of the distributed network of sudden and not so sudden jihadis. Picking off OBL and parading the pictures of his cold dead body, at this point, is likely to cause a major flare up of the problems we’re having now. Keeping him in hole in the side of a wind and snow swept mountain has effectively decapitated his leadership role, significantly reducing the scope and deadliness of future attacks around the world, let alone here at home.

So, here we go: In order to skunk his only significant political rival, Hillary, he will speak as though he is the President and telegraph a message I’m sure all the rest of the world, who is at least marginally of wholly on our side, to cringe, while the enemy, far in the mountains, smiles upon their good fortune that the Republicans abrogated their responsibility to really lead this country….

But, hey, I’m unedumacted, what do I know? I bet Obama doesn’t realize a lot of foreign money isn’t coming his way, at least via normal channels. Now it will have to come by caravan in small unmarked bills from SW Asia. It will take a lot longer to get here.

H/T: Andi posting on Milblogs