If seamanship is that bad in the 7th Fleet, how bad is it in the other fleets?
Heads need to roll from the top down.
For years the Navy has been spending a lot of money and frittering it away on removing urinals so transsexuals will not be forced to choose to stand up or sit down.
Check out the Alnic MC tracking-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vlrA36GzHNs
As I understand it, the purple stripe separating the inbound/outbound traffic at Singapore is about a couple hundred yards wide.
The Alnic MC was traveling 9.2 knots per hour and was about a 100 yards or so starboard the purple stripe (denoting the traffic separation zone).
The USS McCain was destined for Singapore. Somehow the USS McCain gets in front of the Alnic MC and gets hit. Why was the USS McCain heading across the Traffic Separation Zone when its destination was Singapore?
A certification to be war ready? Wouldn’t a destroyer be war ready by design?
Were these ships at war?
I get the lack of training, that is a leadership failure.
Who does this certification? Sounds like fake news, I sure as heck hope it is anyway. That’s insane. In the middle of Pearl Harbor.. sorry mr prez, the ships aren’t certified. I will fill out this paperwork while thousands die.
I have to say, I am deeply concerned about our entire defense structure.
And yet, there they were, performing "basic operations at sea." So I guess that certification is meaningless if you can deploy and operate without it.
Sure, individual personnel on board ship failed at their basic duties - probably for a combination of reasons. But there has also been a massive failure in command/leadership. If you say "these are the basic qualifications a ship and it's personnel must demonstrate..." and then you let units deploy that do not meet those criteria... That's a leadership failure too.
In my best Sam Kennison voice.....
“Say it! Say it! Say it!”
The Clintons gutted the Navy!
8 of 11? They are getting stuff confused. There are probably 11 cruisers and somehow 8 not ready is probably the number of all ships not ready in the entire PacFleet or 8 hips out of 200, so this is a non-story but really an indictment of the press who thinks there are only 11 cruisers and destroyers in the entire Pacific Fleet!
8 not ready is no big deal since they are probably in refresher training and just out of overhaul. It is a non-story.
Train like you fight. Fight like you train.
Our Navy is in trouble.
Gay Ray did his job well.
The same thing happened in the AF nuclear force. After the fighter jocks succeeded in eliminating SAC, the nuke guys sucked hind teat for a couple decades. Result?
- Accidentally flying nukes to Barksdale, which were left unguarded until a munitions crew caught the blunder.
- ICBM crews were caught cheating on certification tests.
The bottom line is fighter jocks never had any business in charge of the nuclear enterprise. Nukes require steady folks in charge that follow checklists, not seat-of-the-pants folks.
Anyway, the AF finally put the nukes back under a 4 star and they appear to be fixing their problems.
I think the surface Navy probably sucks hind teat behind the SEALS, boomers, attack subs and carriers, but that’s just a guess.
It depends on politics and how harsh the fighting is.
If we’re getting creamed, then it’s,
“Grab a gun. The enemy is over there!”
If the military has time to play politics, they will play politics.
Pathetic affirmative action hires. Can’t even pass basic seamanship.
Paperwork
Helicopter pilot: I have the target locked on, permission to fire, sir.
Negative!, Your paperwork is incomplete.
Everyone was drilled, engineering, supply, air, deck, coms, etc. Although I don't know what drills in particular Navigation and Operations went through, I am sure they were tested too. Every year similar ships, (say aircraft carriers ), would compete and Airlant would announce the results for the Battle "E" (E = Efficiancy), for the overall winner. Departments could still win fleet wide recognition, say for Engineering , Air, or Supply for example. Ships would have these "awards" painted on the island structure.
As the old saw- you can[t fight the war with the army you want; you fight the war with the army you have. The Navy and all the military have suffered from two 8 year periods of purge and active reduction in the last 24 years. It cannot be refurbished in a short time. In the meantime we have to go with what we have left and make it suffice.
Here is a link to the GAO report—
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3988084-Pendleton-GAO-Statement-Sept-7-2017.html#document/p2
My God, our once elite military is second rate. What a shame.