Innocent Bystander

It's what we do.

Best laugh in a month. Thanks. Now I have 5 minutes to become somber for a 1300 video-conference on impact of CV-19 on our business. Laughing hysterically is not a good option for that call.

Place across town from us has a reputation for never ending soup. Supposedly gets put away at night, topped off and back out the next morning. Don’t rinse, but repeat. 30 years ago, we had an all you can eat seafood place a few miles from where we lived. Great prices and decent tasting food, got shut down when a disgruntled employee reported them for recycling leftovers from customers’ plates. Haven’t been to an all you can eat place since.......

Of course, that was filmed and initially published about a year ago. Happened in Chicago.

Before you guys go all OPSEC crazy, there are public reports that the USS Ronald Reagan has active CV-19 cases onboard. Reagan is the Forward Deployed Carrier homeported in Japan. In normal times, it takes 3 Carriers to keep one deployed at all times. The deployed asset. The Post deployment maintenance and refit ship and the ship/air wing/battle group preparing to deploy. In addition, you have 1 carrier in long term overhaul/refueling. Basically, 10 carriers keep 3 fully deployed carriers and surge up to around 6. Current status can be derived from this info. https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/ops/where.htm

Haven’t read the book but he and I were at the boat school together. He earned his 4 stars and is one of the most thoughtful and intelligent people I have met.

Positions are not random. Marc has it. Safety checkers on either side of the aircraft. Despite the obvious fun to break up a 14 hour day on the flight deck. Each person near the cat has a specific purpose and position depending on the type of aircraft. Notice at about 1 minute when the Hummer (E-2) gets launched. Because those big turbo props have a large mass of relatively slow air and a lot of buffet, the safety checkers drop slightly behind the jet blast deflector. For the hornets, with near center-line engines, there isn't much blast if you are not directly behind the exhausts. Also notice that when you take away the dancing, the shooter gives a "take tension" signal and the nose of the aircraft squats just a bit as the cat moves the shuttle into the firing position. Simultaneously, teh shooter gives a run up signal by circling his forward hand with 2 fingers in the air. That tells the pilot to release brakes and go to full power. The pilot advances the throttles, does a full control wipe out, takes the position and salutes the shooter, signaling the aircraft is ready. The shooter then points at the safety observers and the catapult operators (green shirts in the "battle hatch") and requires an affirmative thumbs up that the aircraft and catapult are ready. Then he touches the deck and the operator fires the cat. By the way, Hornets launch with the pilot's hand off the stick to allow the fly-by-wire settings to control the aircraft at the end of the stroke. .

Really trying to stay away from the shitfight but those who take a harder view than I do are expressing their opinions and they are not totally wrong. As I pointed out, Chopper very likely knew his letter was effectively his resignation. I remain convinced that he worked it through his immediate COC and got a lot of push back. He didn't just pull into Guam on a whim. That was a scheduled stop and it was openly known that TR has CV-19 aboard and was in trouble. His dissent was how wise it was or wasn't to get back underway without a quarantine and cleaning to stop the virus at that point. Some have pointed out the gap in preparedness that his decision has created. The Pacific is a challenge. China has serious designs on their 9 Dash Line Strategy and believes they will bring the insurgents in Taiwan back under mainland control. You can determine for yourself if this is a time when they might strike. Do you take a 2-3 week pause to "clean" the ship or do you spend that 3 weeks getting sicker and be unable to fight if the ball goes up? Again, hard choices. I'm personally a big advocate of what former CNO Vern Clark called "covenant leadership". When you take command of young men and women that have signed up to give their lives if necessary, that's a very significant responsibility and should never be taken lightly. Additionally, as you get more senior, the decisions get harder. Well trained subordinates make the easy decisions and you really don't want a young LT thinking a lot when carrying out orders. Officers in major deployed commands have to employ strategic leadership. At times, that can mean making hard decisions about life and death. Capt Crozier, responsible for the health, welfare, readiness and lives of 1.5% of the Navy's personnel came to one of those decisions and made his moral decision fully understanding the consequences. I respect him for that. I'd ask that former military who espouse a hard opinion one way or the other state their experience. I'm a VN era enlisted man who kept getting offered "good deals". I attended the Naval Academy, flew fighters ff carriers, held CDR Command at sea and Major Command as a Captain ashore. I attended Senior Service College (ICAF) and have studied ethical decision making, strategic leadership and the elements of National Power. In staff positions, I served as aviation readiness director on a fleet staff and as the Executive Assistant to a 3 star major claimant. I attended far too many funerals and memorial services. My moral touchstones are places such as Gettysburg, Normandy, Pearl Harbor and The Vietnam Memorial. As my Army counterparts would say, I've walked the ground alone and listened to the ghosts. If you are going to ask people to die, you need to respect those who did and try to understand the leaders who commanded them. Enough. I'm just an old retired Captain with opinions.

Another benefit to being one of those rural hicks who chose to leave the inside the beltway rat race. A sweet well and a functioning septic system with family trained on flushing only processed food and TP pays off again.

Nice save Snags

Men and women. They work very long and hard days in an environment where a moment’s inattention gets you dead. They are the kids we look at as teenagers and lament their lack of dedication and direction. In a very short time, they are responsible for the lives of their shipmates. Lead them well and they will follow you to hell and back. Maybe they will gather and cheer you when your boss fires you.

Everybody loves the airplane they flew. My fleet airplane was the original Tomcat. Analog flight controls and a beast with great aerodynamic performance held back by not so great engines and a bit ungainly behind the boat (nicknamed the “turkey” behind the ship). Instructed in the A-4 and it was simple and fun. Quickly became second nature to fly it but it has a couple of nasty habits that could bite and was pretty underpowered in its trainer version. Once you flew 10 hours in it felt like home. Only flew the Hornet a couple of times. Felt natural on the first flight. Great engines. Wonderful performance. Makes a hack look good and good pilots great. A clear generation “better” than the Tomcat and earns the love of those flying it today. Like a good boat, a good airplane just feels “right”. A lot of that is technology and progress. In the analog days, an airplane got designed and built and then test pilots mapped out the flight envelope. Poor qualities were discovered, flight control gains were refined and mods were done to minimize them or flight envelopes were restricted to avoid the nasty bits. In a fly by wire airplane, we pretty much know how it’s going to fly before it is built. Tactical airplanes are designed to be minimally stable but the control computers re.ay pilot inputs into control deflections to control the flight path of the aircraft. Very few objectionable flight characteristics exist on day one and are pretty much cleaned up in test. “Nasty habits” just don’t make it out of test and to the fleet any more. Mission requirements have exploded and pilot workload gets very high. The concept of “sensor fusion” came in in the 80’s and we stopped looking at presenting radar, infrared, ew and other sensor data directly to the pilot and started combining sensor inputs into target tracks and actionable info. Basically combined lots of data into information displayed to provide intelligence. For example. Radar provides great range but not the best azimuth. Infrared provides great azimuth but no direct range info. Shared data (data link) can combine both own aircraft and off board info to resolve multiple sources into a precise target, target track, etc. Pilot takes that actionable info. The Strike Eagle F-15 really missionized the second cockpit and we stole and improved that approach for the FA-18F. By the way, the F-35 takes this sensor fusion to a new level...... Each generation of tactical airplanes brings better handling qualities and sensor capabilities to the point that it comes down to picking a performance and sensor capability as a starting point for a new airplane that will then be developed over the life of that aircraft it moves so fast these days that there is a danger of always wanting the latest toy before the aircraft itself is fully in service I believe the F-35 fell into that trap a bit. As things got delayed, better “stuff” became available that got pulled into the baseline that raised cost and delayed “maturity.” Run through that cycle a few times and costs start to get ugly and “maturity” seems to never arrive. Never ask a fighter pilot about his airplanes. We pour a scotch, put our feet up and relive our youth. By my god it was a pretty good youth. Kinda like those who actually grew up with fondness for IOR boats. They were the best we had back then.

If you think that letter was his first step, you would be completely incorrect. He worked through the chain of command for several days. It was common knowledge in and out of the Navy that TR had diverted to Guam with more than 100 positive COVID cases aboard. As the CO stated in the letter, if there was a wartime requirement, he would have sucked it up and "fought sick." If Acting Secretary Modly was just finding about it, it may be because he was out of touch and thinking about the new "War on Drugs" he elped teh President roll out Wed evening. A tough situation and he knew he was offering up his career when he sent the letter. Commanding Officers have to make hard decisions. Chopper faced a momentous challenge and chose the health and lives of the crew over his career. Wives, husbands, kids and mothers and fathers will see their loved ones again due to his decision. He did the right thing for the troops and SECNAV was simply wrong. A "relief for cause"or firing is generally referred to as a "Change of Command without the Band." Even with a band, turning over command of the crew that you have trained, supported and poured your heart and soul into is poignant. If you want any affirmation that he did the right thing, watch the crew send him ashore after he was relieved. No shame here and the crew sends a very powerful message to the political appointee who fired him. https://www.newsweek.com/coronavirus-captain-crozier-navy-ship-1495974

That you invite me back says volumes about what is “normal.”

Don't get carried away