An interesting item in the NOC
May 27th, 2010 | leadership ordnance Shore duty Uniforms | Posted by Phil Ewing
It's important to keep a sharp lookout at all times for things others may not have noticed. // MC3 Walter Wayman / Navy
This is a delicate item: An Amphibian Associate of ours and his eagle-eyed readers have spotted something hilarious in the new Naval Operations Concept, but it’s borderline scatological. It involves the glossy pictures that take up much of the document and the salty language common among average sailors out in the fleet. That’s probably all that’s safe to say here on the family-friendly Deck. If you’re easily offended, please do not click.
If you’re interested, first, check out page 23 in the NOC (31 in your PDF reader). Then go here. Then, for a clearer picture and a little background, go here.
Then ask yourself: How many admirals probably signed off on this report? Did none of them see this, or did they all just agree it was funny?
Now, Navy PAOs can take their game to the next level
May 26th, 2010 | Officers | Posted by Phil Ewing
Outstanding Navy public affairs officers such as Lt. Lara Bollinger -- seen here teaching photojournalism principles to students in the Philippines in 2009 -- now can get a new professional credential. // Lt j.g. Theresa Donnelly / Navy
These poor public affairs officers. Reporters are always calling them up on the phone and being all, like, “hey, answer my questions and deal with my crabby attitude, and be quick about it!” Their bosses are always all, “hey, don’t let those scum-suckers in the press write anything bad about me or the admiral!” It’s a job with its share of challenges.
Here’s something that might make it easier — a new credential for PAOs across the force that “will help these communicators further their professional development, while demonstrating their mastery of public relations knowledge, skills and abilities,” according to this announcement. PAOs must submit a “portfolio” and take some computer-based training — just like A School! — among other steps to get the new high-level accreditation.
Take it from us hacks: Improving the fleet’s human PAOs is highly preferable to the alternative:
Sportsmen at sea
May 26th, 2010 | Carriers Photos Sports | Posted by Phil Ewing
MCSN Jacob Galito / Navy
The carrier Enterprise may be the oldest ship in the fleet, but that doesn’t mean its crew has to sacrifice every creature comfort — on Monday, AS1 Steven White, left, and AS3 Marlon Goodchild unwound by enjoying the sport of kings in the hangar bay. The nice thing for these guys is that this space is probably still more comfortable than the basements where ping-pong tables are typically set up.
The PT is virtual, but the sweat is real
May 26th, 2010 | Recruiting Science and technology The deckplates | Posted by Phil Ewing
HM1 Guy Duke helped ET3 Joshua Benedict attempt the tree position -- or vrksasana, to purists -- in Wii Fit yoga. The Navy may consider adding Wii Fit, or video games like it, for boot camp classes. // MM3 Juan Pinalez / Navy
The Navy’s top medial officer, Vice Adm. Adam Robinson, isn’t personally acquainted with the video games these kids play today — your crazy golfing games, or your yoga things they have now, and such — but he said last week he could see the Navy using them to help new recruits get into shape.
Robinson was good enough to spend some time here at the Center of Excellence for a meeting with Military Times reporters and editors to talk about a wide range of health-in-the-force issues, and you can get the full accounting, including stories and an extended transcript, in the print edition of Navy Times now on newsstands. But in a special blog sneak preview, you can check out his video game ideas right now.
One thing we wondered about is whether the Navy would use existing software and hardware, or develop its own custom equipment to train recruits. For example, the Navy could design a game using the “Dance Dance Revolution” gamepad in which you accidentally found yourself in blue-tile country, and you had to run away as an angry officer chased you back to your berthing spaces. Or you could use a Wii remote to check tank levels in the machinery spaces — the old fashioned way.
How would you use video games to help Navy newcomers get into shape?
Can the Navy do small-sub, shallow-water ASW?
May 26th, 2010 | Foreign navies Submarines | Posted by Phil Ewing
An MH-60R of HSM 71, the "Raptors," listened with its dipping sonar in the Pacific. But are old-style ASW techniques effective against small, near-shore, shallow-water subs? // MC3 Walter Wayman / Navy
Near-shore anti-submarine warfare is, amazingly, what’s hot online today: The New York Times is linking to a Popular Mechanics story warning that the navies of the world — including the U.S. Navy — need to brush up on their sub-hunting skills in the wake of the infamous Cheonan attack. In particular, writes Joe Pappalardo, today’s navies need to learn how to fight small midget subs like the one that South Korean officials think torpedoed their patrol ship. Galrahn agrees and makes some excellent points.
It’s a tough challenge any way you slice it: You’re talking about a 130-ton, four-person vessel with two torpedo tubes that can operate from a merchant mother ship, according to Jane’s Fighting Ships. A sub like this might not work in the open ocean taking out convoys, but as a relatively close-range, shallow-water derringer, it’s effective and lethal.
How do you fight it? A surface ship pinging away with its active set probably has a good chance of catching one of these things, but you’d have to know to ping, and keep pinging. A few unmanned surface vehicles, like the one planned to sail aboard littoral combat ships, also could ping in concert trying to find the mini-sub, with the added advantage of being able to stand safely away from the LCS as they hunt. That’s if the Navy ever actually fields LCS and its ASW kit.
The Navy already acknowledges it’s knuckling down on finding and fighting quiet, diesel-electric attack subs; it will add towed-array sonars to its new batch of Arleigh Burke-class destroyers starting with DDG 113. But is there anything you can do to stop a five-person mini-sub — except stay away?
The leatherneck league
May 25th, 2010 | Photos The greenside | Posted by Phil Ewing
MC2 Ace Rheaume caught this commonplace, yet utterly surreal scene in Camp Leatherneck, Afghanistan, where Seabees and Marines played a game of pick-up softball on Saturday. These figures frozen against the dimensionless, dusty background, complete with that construction equipment on the horizon, all combine to make this image like something an early Renaissance artist would paint if he were commissioned to show what softball looks like in hell.
Navy, Scoop Deck release operations concepts
May 25th, 2010 | leadership Washington | Posted by Phil Ewing
Aircraft carriers -- one of which, the George Washington, is depicted in this photograph -- are large, seagoing vessels that can launch and recover aircraft. The United States uses them to project influence abroad. // MC2 Charles Oki / Navy
Scoop Deck on Tuesday released its 2010 Blog Operations Concept, which seeks to operationalize the notational conceptual framework that underpins key Web 2.0 content-delivery matrices through the use of italics, Emphatic Capitalization and Terms Made Into Arbitrary Acronyms (TMIAA).
Blog Operations Concept
You are reading words on a site on a computer network, known as the “Internet,” called a blog. It contains words, links to other sites, photos and Other Multimedia Products (OMPs) such as video. Authors periodically update it with new content. You, using an Electronic Content Reception Device, such as a Desktop Computer or mobile Device, absorb its content by looking at it with your eyes. You are encouraged to respond to the content displayed on the blog by posting Comments. If you have any Tips or see Content Elsewhere You Believe Should Be Featured In A Post (CEYBSBFIAP) you are encouraged to compose an electronic mail Message and send it to the Address produced by the clicking of this link with your Mouse or other Pointing Device (PD).
Naval Operations Concept
In other Operations Concept News, the Navy late Monday released its 2010 Naval Operations Concept, which details how the Navy and the other Maritime Services operate in the maritime domain, among other critical fundamentals.
Tensions build, rumors fly
May 25th, 2010 | Maritime operations North Korea The Pacific | Posted by Phil Ewing
Did the cruiser Shiloh -- which was exercising with South Korean forces around the same time the Cheonan was sunk -- have anything to do with it? Almost certainly not. But that doesn't stop the speculation. // MC3 Taurean Alexander / Navy
Internet rule number one: In the absence of accurate information, make stuff up. This dictum, which applies in any situation, is in full effect for the showdown on the Korean Peninsula over the sinking by the North of the South’s patrol ship Cheonan.
South Korean investigators say they found traces of explosives, parts of a propeller and other evidence that proves Cheonan was torpedoed by the North. That’s all we know for sure. Why would the North do it? Was it an official order or did a local commander go rogue? What does the North want out of all this — if it’s even thinking that far ahead? These are the questions to which there are no real answers yet.
Oh, but there are theories: One is that it was a friendly fire attack by the South’s own navy or, even the U.S. Navy. You’ve got to check out this column in the Asia Times which all but blames 7th Fleet for the sinking of the Cheonan, and then, once you have, please post a comment explaining it to the rest of us so we can try to understand it. Here’s just one gem:
A South Korean sister paper of the Washington Times, Segye Ilbo, on March 29 quoted a military source as saying: “The radar of the CIC on the corvette Cheonan is capable of easily detecting any torpedo within any radius of 20-30 kilometers but on that fateful day it detected no sign of a torpedo attack or naval firing by North Korea.
Yes, you read that right — this “military source” says the ship’s “radar” should’ve “easily” detected the torpedo.
Others: South Korea was “warned” about a submarine “suicide attack” and North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Il’s son personally ordered the attack. Here’s something that is very real, though — commanders have sortied American warships in Japan to take a cruise up North Korea way.
See for yourself: Mids scale a (dry) Herndon
May 24th, 2010 | Naval Academy Photos | Posted by Phil Ewing
Well, it would appear that when a 21-foot granite monument isn’t smeared with lard, it’s a lot easier to scale. Naval Academy Superintendent Vice Adm. Jeffrey Fowler ordered a dry climb for this year’s class of plebes out of concern over the safety of the ritual. It’s also an unsubtle message that Fowler, despite the short time he has left in Annapolis, wants to communicate that he thinks the Naval Academy has outgrown the Herndon climb, and that the energy of the brigade is better spent elsewhere.
What do you think? Is Herndon a tradition the Naval Academy must keep? Or is Fowler right — should the Naval Academy eliminate a tradition that he says is at worst dangerous and at best, easily mocked?
The old ship-renaming trick
May 24th, 2010 | Pirates | Posted by Phil Ewing
The crew of the destroyer McFaul wasn't fooled when pirates tried to change the name of the ship they'd hijacked. // MC2 Jason Zalasky / Navy
There’s a scene in 2005′s underrated Nicholas Cage vehicle “Lord of War” in which Cage’s bad-guy arms dealer trips up the federal agents on his trail by repainting the name of the ship he’s using for his latest smuggling scheme. When the feds spot Cage’s vessel they don’t find the one they’re looking for — they think — so they can’t bring the hammer down.
Although that movie sank like a stone when it came out, at least one DVD made it to a pirate den in Somalia, because a team of hijackers used that exact trick on a cargo ship last week. When the destroyer McFaul spotted the ship, which is really named the Iceberg I, its crew saw its pirate captors had rechristened it “Sea Express,” according to this story.
The only difference is, the crew of the McFaul wasn’t fooled — the destroyer shadowed the hijacked vessel on the open sea until it turned back to the Somali coast.