Report of Bomb On Norfolk Naval Airstation Bus

which is why I have never turned my nose up at the Democrats

:)

I to served on both, 3 Deterrent Patrols aboard the venerable James K Polk SSBN 645.

Which is why I know of what I speak. If I had it to do over again I would not have wasted 19 months of my Navy career on a 'Boomer".

I learned absolutely nothing from that experience, other than it was a blight on an otherwise wonderful 20 years.

Nothing is more demoralising, to a thinking person, then spending 2 1/2 months, at a time, boring holes in the ocean and then coming home to pretend you accomplished something.

:)

I brought the James Madison, SSBN 627 out of the yards and made 7 patrols. After that, I spent a year and a half on the Narwhal, SSN 671. Made electricity and answered bells on both, and got paid the same.

Can't think of a thing I would have changed about my Navy career, including the decision to end it before I had to add to the aforementioned list.

"I learned absolutely nothing from that experience, other than it was a blight on an otherwise wonderful 20 years."

Well, I was one of those fast attack bubbleheads (insert snotty primadonna comment knocking boomers here), and as far as I'm concerned, boomer patrols are some of the most important work a sailor can do.

We can only take strategic nuclear deterrence for granted because we already have it. If we didn't, the world would be a very different place indeed, comrade.

So for what it's worth, thanks for doing what you had to do.

The truth is that duty on a fast attack boat is pretty damn boring, too. For the guys who work in the back, it's all basically a matter of depth, speed and plant parameters. Watching steam demand. Oooh, pinch my arm. Doesn't really matter what you're pushing or where, the view in the back is always the same.

Now if you're a coner on the otherhand, then maybe it's more fun and yeah boomer patrols would suck by comparison. At least the ops guys get to plot courses and fiddle around with the periscopes and masts. For the guys in the back, on the other hand, it's "Oh hey, rig for ventilation. Whoop de freakin' do."

Sorry your tour sucked, mine basically did, too. But that's life aboard submarines for you, in all its unglamorous splendor. If it was really all that much fun, a lot more people would be doing it. 8^)

I would never knock the mission of the FBM fleet, nuclear deterence helped win the cold war days....so far. Though I think Putin would like to bring them back, unless the Chineese beat him to it.

My complaint (lame as it may be) is that it was extremely boring and many FBM sailors acted as if they were god's gift to the navy. (In truth it was mostly the zeroes that acted that way).

I actually had the best of both worlds, coner and engineering, being one of the lowly A gang types. AS COW and Dive I got in on all the fun Spec Ops with fast boats, even played with Seal teams as the boats Dive Master during Lock in / Lock out Ops.

As AMR1 and Aux of the Watch (the early years) I got to clean Engine Room bilges, shaft alley, suffer through ORSE drills and even participate as part of the Rad Decon team (what fun!/sarcasm off) with my Nuc trained buddies.

But all in all with the ops fast boats did and the ports we went to it was far better than my boomer experience.

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