Posted on 01/28/2012 3:49:44 PM PST by blam
This New Commando 'Mothership' Is Being Rushed To The Middle East
Robert Johnson
January 28, 2012
The Pentagon is wasting no time in modifying its forces to meet the needs of a more specialized and commando-based military.
The Washington Post reports the Pentagon is fast-tracking the conversion of the 1960s warship USS Ponce to use as a "commando mothership" base for special forces teams in the Middle East.
The re-christened Ponce will hold small Combat Rubber Raiding Craft (Zodiac style boats), and helicopters routinely employed by the SEAL teams that are now becoming famous for their successful clandestine operations.
The news broke through Pentagon procurement documents, and though the Navy has refused to announce where the Ponce will be stationed, military paperwork suggest it will sail the Persian Gulf.
The fact that further documentation says the ship will "support mine countermeasure missions" fuels speculation that the Ponce will be used in the Strait of Hormuz should Iran follow through on its threats to try and shutter the waterway.
The commissioning of this new Afloat Forward Staging Base (AFSB) could signal a return for the SEALs to maritime-focused missions after spending the last decade immersing themselves in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Ponce will serve along with another AFSB previously stationed in the Gulf, the USS Cleveland.
While the Pentagon is wasting no time in getting the SEALs, and the Ponce, to wherever they're going, Pentagon spokesman Captain John Kirby told FOX News that he denied the Post's claim that they were "moving with unusual haste" in refitting the Ponce.
"While this work is being done in an expeditious fashion," Kirby said, it is not accurate to surmise that this signals a rush to meet some urgent combat requirement."
The Navy SEALs were used this week to recover two
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(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...
I never went out on one of the flat bottoms. Lucky enough that I could do my job well and always rode on a LKA. Big round bottom piece of crap, but it could ride out a typhoon better. I remember looking over at a LST in a typhoon and thinking thank god I am not on that. You could see about 75% of the bottom when it crested a wave. The splash was incredible. I could only see the antenna tops and about the last 10 feet. The Marines I talked to that where on that ship said they were strapped to their racks for 3 days. Flat bottoms stink.
Trudat....LHA-3 USS BELLEAU WOOD 1981...we were in a bad one off the west coast of Australia, the Marines were laying on the main deck, rolling in their puke, no chow was served for 2 days, PB&J for all....what a nightmare.
Shoot, I rode with UDT, SEALs and Marines aboard plenty of LSTs, LPDs, LSDs, LPHs etc. This is about as “new” as corn flakes or sliced bread.
BUMP for later read
Funny name.
The sanctions have put our foot on the crazy mullah’s economic lifeline. Our military is about one inch from their beards. Ought to expect some shooting soon. Just hope that China has not armed them with some new missile systems that would put our sailors at real risk.
That’s a fact. I rode upon the Fort Snelling, Pensacola, Guam, Iwo Jima, and too many other gator freightors to recall offhand. The old LSDs made 12 knots with a tail wind and current.
I had not taken sea sickness medicine for the first 3 days of the typhoon and finally went to the battalion aid station for some. They asked me if I had run out early, they were shocked when I told them I had not gotten any yet. Then they told me they had run out already. That is why I was on the deck looking at the LST. Supposedly it helps with sea sickness. All it did for me was make me glad I was on a LKA.
It was the USS Durham.
You can say that again. The little "Counties" were posted on the flanks of our ARGs, and in rough weather, it was amazing to watch them, as they tried to keep up.
Ironically, those little County-class LSTs were diesels, and they had super "long legs" ie fuel range. As a result, and due to their empty vehicle holds when not carrying the Marines, they were used for long-endurance intel missions. They could spend months at sea in places like the Bering Sea in winter, loaded with commo and intell containers and spooks. Imagine what a ride that must have been....for months.
You know you are old when you can remember when ships were brand new and just fresh in commission, and then you read they have been decommed, sink-exed or sold.
That would stink because with the intel gear you would be limited as to where you could go while on ship.
For whatever reason, I did not get sick...I am prone to but not that ship. I got sick as a dog on the USS BELKNAP CG-26 in the MED. Short choppy seas with a top heavy mast that had been added on for C6F antennas and offices.
Those were no liberty port cruises, from what I gleaned. They were full of spooks in intel collection mode, very hush-hush. The crew would not discuss their other missions, not to us frogmen or other embarked troops. My understanding is they would typically spend on the order of 3 months driving “gator squares” in the same patch of ocean, fair or stormy, summer or winter. They were an optimum “modular platform” to pull the duty, as long as you totally disregarded the human factor in terms of sea-keeping and a horrible motion.
If you read deeper in the article you would have read that there is not "wheel" but a 24 year old kid in Norfolk Virginia that drives it with his IPad.
“the human factor in terms of sea-keeping and a horrible motion.”
and don’t forget the wonderful chow...
I just asked my dad what was the first name of the admiral named 'Kauffman' he worked for. Draper L. Kauffman
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